NOTE: The Moderate Voice runs Guest Voice posts from time to time by readers who don’t have their own websites, or people who have websites but would like to post something for TMV’s diverse and thoughtful readership. Guest Voice posts do not necessarily reflect the opinions of The Moderate Voice or its writers. This is another post by Matt Pearl and is cross posted from his own blog.
Why I’m An Atheist And What That Means
by Matt Pearl
If there is something that the people who know me know, I am a real stickler for logic and reasoning. That is, I will generally not believe something unless there is necessary and sufficient evidence for that belief. For example, I am not going to believe in Russell’s Teapot because there is no evidence for its existence.
Then we have the question of God…
In our culture, when someone has a belief, it is generally up to that person to justify that belief. If you believe that I murdered someone, then you damn well better have evidence. If I believe that gnomes sneak in to my room and steal my underpants at night, then you would think that I was crazy unless you saw the little bastards for yourself.
However, there is generally one set of beliefs that not only go unquestioned, they are untouchable by criticism. Those are mainstream beliefs about God and mainstream religious beliefs.
Why is that? Because there is no evidence, despite theists’ claims, that either necessarily or sufficiently proves the existence of God. To try to hide this fact, theists put the burden of the proof on atheists; atheists have to prove that something does not exist, which is impossible.
In science and statistics, a hypothesis is said to be accepted if you can say that you can reject the null hypothesis. You don’t prove the null hypothesis, because you can’t prove nothingness.
I am an atheist because I have not seen any evidence that either necessarily or sufficiently shows that there is any sort of supernatural being. I cannot reject the null hypothesis that there is no God, so I don’t. Now, if some such evidence were to come about, I would be open to it… I’m not closed minded.
Does this make me any less of a moral person? Nope… I have a clean criminal record, I don’t lie, and I don’t steal. I don’t visit unnecessary harm onto people or animals, and I believe that every person should have the right to their own autonomy.
For some reason, atheism is the one greatest obstacle to a candidate seeking political office. A black, Muslim lesbian probably has more of a chance of being elected, merely because there is a segment of the US population that thinks that atheists are fundamentally evil (even looking at spell check, it won’t accept non-capitalized “muslim” or “christian” but it will recognize “atheist”).
The long and short of it is that I don’t want to have to disprove your beliefs because I can’t. If you say that something is, you should have to give evidence for your claim, period.
I can’t prove the null hypothesis, so don’t ask me to.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.