The Logical Atheist

"You can't tell the players without a scorecard." That's what vendors used to shout at major league baseball games to sell programs. The same could be said about the broad atheist community. The terms have multiplied, so you need a guide to keep them straight.  On side side we have what have been variously called negative atheists, soft atheists, and weak atheists. These are atheists who do not believe in God or gods, mostly because they have yet to see convincing evidence. (When I write God  I'm including any sort of supernatural thing.) But they won't say they believe no God exists. Some on this side call themselves skeptical atheists. I would call them evidentialist atheists. On the other side we have, correspondingly, positive atheists, hard atheists, or strong atheists. They not only do not believe in God, they believe no such thing exists. They go beyond a-theism, mere nonbelief. (See Wikipedia's  scorecard .) Things get a little confusing because on...

"We cannot think [therefore, or say] anything unlogical...." --Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus Prolific atheist celebrity Matt Dillahunty -- who has done many videos on logic, reason, and certainty -- thinks the problem with the laws of logic is that it they not axiomatic -- self-evidently true -- and cannot be validated because you have to use them in the very attempt to refute them. I guess he thinks that involves circular reasoning or question-begging. Most generally, he thinks logic (along with reason) is no demonstrable. Here's how he puts it in a YouTube video : There are people who believe that reason is in fact absolute. I used to be one of them. Even as an atheist I would argue that the only absolutes are identity, non-contradiction, and excluded middle. And now I recognize that while this is a reasonable position to hold, that all of the evidence shows that these things are inviolate and absolute, we have no way of demonstrating that be...

Contrary to what many people think, the intellectuals known as the New Atheists pull their punches in their case against theism. Indeed, because they promote a philosophically watered-down version of atheism, they are way too easy on religious believers. While engaged in a worthwhile cause, they go about it in a weak and self-subverting way. How so? By giving undeserved credit to their religious opponents. They could pull the rug right out from under them, but they don’t do it. Too bad. Here’s a typical example: in an interview with the Freedom from Religion Foundation, Ron Reagan said this about his lack of belief in God: “You show me evidence, I’ll reconsider, but in the absence of evidence I do not believe.” You can find similar statements from the late Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins , Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris, Matt Dillahunty,* Aron Ra,** and many others, all of whom I respect. Dawkins, a biologist, for example, writes, in The God Delusion , “The existence of God is a sc...