The Atheist dilemma

I was prompted to write this after observing my atheist friends call anyone who disagreed with them idiots.

An atheist is one who knows for sure that God doesn’t exist and thus there are no “absolutes.” In their world view, everything is relative. (I want to clarify something here – most of my atheist friends live very peaceful lives, they are kind, and they are faithful in their marriages. I am not saying that these atheists are immoral people.)

Let us consider a scenario:

Jack is an atheist and Andrew is a theist. Jack believes in a set of ideas, which we will call Idea Set A (ISA). Andrew believes in another set of ideas, which we will call Idea Set B (ISB).

Jack calls Andrew an idiot because ISB (Andrew’s set of ideas) is different from ISA (Jack’s set of ideas). Jack knows for sure that ISA is BETTER than ISB, which is why he calls Andrew an idiot.

So now, let us analyze the situation:

If I say that my idea is objectively better than yours, what does that mean? It means that there is an absolute standard on this matter and that my ideas are closer to (or the same as) the absolute standard than yours. That’s the reason why I think my ideas are better than yours, and thus I call you an idiot.

Let me explain what I mean by the word “objective.” There is a huge difference between “objective” and “subjective.” For example, if Jack says, “Vanilla ice cream is the best ice cream in the world,” he is obviously speaking subjectively. In other words, he is not speaking this as an objective truth, true for everyone in the world; rather, he is speaking of something that he believes is true for himself. He believes that vanilla ice cream is the best ice cream in the world, but other people can believe that other flavors are the best. They are all correct to themselves; however, since their opinions are subjective, they are not implying that their opinions are true for the entire world. There are no “absolutes” implied here. Vanilla is the best for Jack, chocolate is the best for Andrew, peanut butter is the best for Bob, etc., but no one flavor is the best for the entire world. Do you think Jack will ever call Andrew an idiot in this scenario? I don’t think he will.

Let us consider another illustration on this same topic. Bobby tells me that he thinks there are about 8 million people living in New York City. Mike tells me that there are only 1 million people living in NYC. It’s very easy for me to arrive at the conclusion that Bobby’s idea is closer to the “absolute” than Mike’s because we have a real city called NYC that I can examine and compare their claims to. Now let’s say that NYC is not a real place, but is rather an imaginary place. What would that mean? Does it matter what Bobby says or what Mike says about NYC’s population? Can I ever make the conclusion that one person’s idea is better than the other’s? It’s impossible, because there is no real NYC to compare their claims to in order to see who is closer to the absolute. The rule of thumb is that when we make an objective claim, we imply the existence of absolutes.

So when we call others idiots because we think our ideas are better than theirs, we are assuming that an absolute standard exists and that our ideas are closer to this absolute than theirs. But here is where an atheist’s dilemma begins: he doesn’t believe in the existence of absolutes (because to him, everything is relative), yet he is quick to affirm that his ideas are better than those of others. He’s holding a double standard: he believes there are no absolutes, but at the same time he believes his ideas are absolutely correct. How can this be?

Let us come back to our friends Jack and Andrew. Do you think Jack is using a double standard here? With his atheistic worldview Jack affirms that there are no absolutes but at the same time he considers (objectively) that ISA is better than ISB. Do you see the fallacy?

If you are an atheist who happens to read this, please provide an explanation, if you have one.