Are atheists less than honest?
“All scientists—including agnostics and atheists—believe in God. They have to in order to do their work.” The dependable regularities and constants we observe in nature are the basis for all scientific inquiry and progress. Whatever their philosophical theory of these regularities might be, all scientists in practice depend on these laws to be a reliable guide to the external world. These natural laws or regularities are simply the providential speech of God upholding the world.
Our beliefs about natural law are eerily similar to classical divine attributes. We assign to natural laws such properties as omnipresence (operating in all places), eternity (at all times), immutability (constant effects), immateriality (seen only in its effects), omnipotence (incapable of being broken), transcendence (applies generally), immanence (applies particularly), incomprehensibility (mystery as to why such laws work), goodness (natural laws are reliable), rectitude (consequences for breaking scientific laws are always the same), and beauty or simplicity.
In the face of these parallels, we can address two objections.
- First, materialists might agree will all of the above but insist such laws are mere impersonal forces and not the product of a personal God. We would counter by pointing out that understanding, articulating, and using natural laws presuppose rationality and meaningful language—a property only found in persons.
- Second, in response, it’s not the things of nature themselves that partake of divine attributes, but the laws that describe and regulate them. These laws, as the very speech of God, create a subtle and mysterious place for mediating the nature of God to the world; even as our own human words both do and do not convey ourselves to the world.
