5 Is believing in the existence or absence of a (personal) god legitimate?

I will talk about atheism at the bottom of this post. Let me start with theism.

For most people, belief in the “whatever” (see post number 2) comes natural, is effortless. They just recognize there is something, the “whatever”. They may not even consider it a belief. For many, the “whatever’s” existence is so obvious that they consider it a given, a fact, beyond question, beyond doubt.

Many people have no problem calling the “whatever” “god”. Other people, however, don’t like to call it “god”. For them, that’s too loaded a term. 

For some people, believing in a personal god is easy peasy. These include folks that have been brought up in this belief and did not loose their faith when growing up, when being told that it is unintelligent and unreasonable to hold such a belief. Or when finding out that the moral imperatives of their belief can be quite inconvenient. 😉

Very few people start believing in a personal god because they experience an epiphany (don’t we envy them?).

For all other people (those not brought up in this belief to begin with, those who got tricked out of their faith, or those without epiphany) it can be quite hard to begin (first time or anew) and continue believing in a personal god.

They may have to overcome the notion that it unreasonable or even unintelligent to believe in a personal god. They also have to find a type of personal god that is believable to them. This may mean avoiding a god that has been adorned with dogmata that, for them, are too “demanding”, too “unbelievable” or against their moral fabric.

Making the decision to (try to) believe (for the first time or again) in a personal god is perfectly legitimate and does not mean one is dimlit, unreasonable, unscientific. It may be the most reasonable thing to do for a rational person (later posts will explain why).

The same for decisions to not call the “whatever” “god”, to not believe in a personal god, and so on. These, too, may be legitimate positions that deserve our respect.

So, let’s not derogate each other. We may find another person’s beliefs personally unacceptable, even ridiculous, but this alone is no justification for attacking their intellectual or moral integrity. More about this in later posts.

However, all this does not mean that we have to stay quiet when a belief causes people to inflict unreasonable self-harm or to do things that we consider unethical – whatever that is. … Getting into very deep waters here. More about this, too, in later posts.

4 Against the misuse of Ockham’s razor

In the debate about evolution versus intelligent design we often hear that plain evolution (as its proponents imagine it to work) is perfectly sufficient to explain that life on earth has evolved as it has, and in the (very long) time available. We hear that we don’t have to assume any form of divine design or intervention to explain its variety and complexity and its underlying molecular mechanisms.

And then we are usually told that it would be plain unscientific to assume a divine influence.

Why would that be unscientific, you may ask. Because god is something
supernatural, and invoking god is, therefore, per se unscientific? No, that’s not the reason.

The reason is much simpler:

There is something like a rule of thumb used by scientists that says :
Of two alternative theoretical explanations for the same result, the simpler explanation should be preferred – because it is more likely correct.

And the proponents of evolution obviously consider evolution the simpler explanation.

The name of the rule is “Ockham’s razor”.  Sometimes spelled “Occam’s razor”. Weird name, I know. Google it.

You will find it expressed in several ways. But it all comes down to the principle, that we should keep our explanations and theories simple because the simple ones will more likely turn out to be correct. Scientists – often intuitively – follow this rule when designing experiments, trying to make sense of what they found etc. It helps them to keep unnecessary “ballast” out of their ideas. Ockham’s razor is indeed useful.

However, one problem with the rule is that its suitability depends on how much we we already know about the issue of interest. The less we know (or in other words: the more we will learn about a topic over the years to come) the less fit is the rule in predicting what will eventually show to be correct.

When I started my career, our knowledge of the workings of molecular biology was comparatively limited and many of our theories were too simple to serve as a basis for developing therapies. Now, we know so much more. Things turned out to be much, much less simple than we thought. And our better understanding of the intricacies of molecular biology (while not necessarily yet universally complete) eventually has allowed us to develop some amazingly successful therapies.

Another example: As far as I understand, our knowledge of the genetics and anatomy/physiology of some organisms has raised the question how their existence could be explained by the proposed mechanisms of evolution. Maybe this will lead to further refinement of our theory of evolution, eventually allowing us to explain the emergence of these organisms. Or we may have to conclude that there were other mechanisms at work. You may know that, as one of them, influx from other places of the universe is currently under discussion.

— Before I go on, let me say that I personally feel unable to take a position on the evolution versus intelligent-design debate. This is mainly because I have not taken the time to turn every stone myself and form a sufficiently stable opinion. For me personally, this debate is not important enough to invest a lot of time. So, I have not a good-enough idea of how exactly the proponents of evolution propose it to have worked to produce life as we see it, nor do I have more than a vague idea of what exactly the proponents of intelligent design are thinking. On the other hand, I see that there may be more than these two alternatives. While it appears to me safe to assume that evolution has played an enormous role, can we really conclude that it accounts for all and everything? Maybe, a combination of the two has done the trick, or something totally different has come in, such as the above-mentioned extraterrestrial influx of genes or organisms (though this moves the debate merely from an earthly to the galactic level). —

The purpose of this post is not to discuss the merits of one of these theories. I just want to talk about the observed misuse of the “keep-it-simple principle” principle (Ockham’s razor) as an argument in this debate.

Educated scientists are supposed to know that Ockham’s razor is nice for keeping our thinking and experimentation focused and economical, but that is unfit for predicting always, across the board which theories are correct, or more likely correct.
So, I find Ockham’s razor should not be used to smear the proponents of intelligent design as “unscientific”.



3 Limitations of our minds

When trying to understand the ‘whatever’ (see post number 2) and thinking about the potential existence or non-existence of a god, or a potential god’s potential characteristics, it is important to work from the assumption that our minds are extremely limited. Many things are simply not accessible to our minds, and where observations are possible (e.g., by use of scientific tools), we may not be able to interpret them correctly or make sense of them.

There are good books about this topic, and I do not want to go deeper here.

However, I would like to illustrate how massive our mind’s limitations might be.

Let me tell you about one of our late dogs. His name was Troy. He needed his daily allergy medication to prevent him from getting a severe oral mucosal inflammation – so severe that he would not be able to eat and could eventually die. I bet he did not know this was the reason we gave him every evening – wrapped in a slice of ham – his allergy medication. I am also sure he did not know that there exists a pharmaceutical industry that manufactured his medication, that we humans have gained an understanding of biology and pharmaceutical science that allowed us to develop such medications. Or how serious we took it to keep him well, always hoping that his allergy would not flare up again and spin out of control. Sure, he will have sensed our love for him (as we sensed his love for us) but probably not more.

It is conceivable that we humans might be as limited in knowing what’s really going on as Troy was. Or less limited. Or even more limited.

Let’s keep this in mind when deciding whether to accept or refute certain assumptions or when interpreting our observations. But let’s not have it derail or paralyze our thinking.

2 An oversimplified introduction to beliefs

The following is not to educate you about the spectrum of beliefs. I assume you are perfectly familiar with what’s out there. The following is to serve as reference point for some thoughts I will bring up in future blog posts.

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Most of us, if not all, have a sense that the universe(s) (which means all there is, from the very large to the very small) is a somewhat “orderly business”. Unfortunately, our minds (even when extended by scientific instruments  and methodology) are not capable of grasping the gestalt of this … well … whatever it is. We don’t even have a good, agreed-upon name for it – which is why I call it the ‘whatever’.

The agnostics among us leave it just there: They may acknowledge the existence of the ‘whatever’, but that’s it. Nothing more, no further playing with the idea, no speculation on the nature of the ‘whatever’ – either for lack of interest or, for example, for fear of making difficult-to-defend inferences.

Others, which we call theists, take it a step further. They interpret the ‘whatever’ in the context of other evidence for the existence of a supreme being – evidence from natural sciences (e.g., derived from the assumption of a ‘big bang’) or mathematics or philosophy, and conclude that the ‘whatever’ is a manifestation of a god. The name theists comes from the Greek word theos, which means god.

Given how little information we have about the ‘whatever’ and how unspecific other evidence for the existence of a supreme being is, it is not surprising that there are many different ways our theist friends imagine god to be. And almost all of them are conjecture – which does not mean that the theists’ beliefs are stupid. When applied properly, conjecture is totally fine. Much of this blog will be about when and how to use conjecture appropriately.

Many theists believe in the existence of a personal god. This means they believe that god is a person, not just something like an unrelatable force. And of these theists, many decided to believe that this personal god even cares about the world, us humans, and even specific people. Take Christians as an example.

Some of the theists who believe in a caring, personal god have pretty extreme expectations of being protected by their god. This makes them prone to becoming disappointed (e.g., when some sad event hits them or their loved ones).

Atheists are people who believe that there is positively nothing that should be called god (whatever that god would look like). Aided by the absence of conclusive evidence for the existence of a god, atheists conjecture that there is no god. As I said above: When used appropriately, conjecture is totally fine. And confessing to atheism is a perfectly acceptable choice – as long as one acknowledges that it is a belief.

1 What this blog is about

For most of my life, I was an agnostic. For periods of time, I even called myself an atheist.

Currently, I would call myself a theist of some sort.

By education, I am not a theologian or philosopher. I am a scientist working in the area of medical/clinical research, specialized in the evaluation of the practical consequences of research results. I make a living by helping and training fellow scientists in rational decision making in the presence of inconclusive data. Many of my positions are are influenced by my coming from this specific field of scientific reasoning.

A while ago, I stumbled about maddening debates between some Christians and activist atheists. The latter claimed to follow scientific thinking protocols, but what they claimed to be “scientific thinking” tended to give us scientists a bad name. On the other hand, also the Christians in the debate were less than convincing. They argued within their “box”, not reaching anyone on the outside. And certainly not me.

I started monitoring such debates. Did it for quite some time. Same picture again and again.

Applying the scientific thinking standards of my profession, I analyzed the arguments used and – on all sides – found flaws in reasoning that made the debate unnecessarily unproductive and prevented a relaxed, friendly dialogue.

I know atheists, agnostics, theists of various types, and Christians who are wonderful people, and across the spectrum I see them being passionate about ethical behavior, environment, peace, etc. Well yes, they have disagreements, but on so many aspects they are on the same wave length. We may never see broad agreement when it comes to certain fields of value judgment. But I see insurmountable disagreements on the very same topics among atheists, agnostics, and Christians themselves. So, let us not overrate differences in theistic (non)beliefs as source of disagreements in difficult ethical matters.

And never let us use theistic (non)beliefs as a reason to despise or slander each other as evil or dumb.

There will always be some, on each position of the spectrum, who want to fight, vilify, or sow hate. But I am convinced that the rest of us enjoys talking to each other, and can collaborate to make the world a better place.

I want to contribute to getting us there, from my specific professional vantage point.

In this blog, I will share – little bit for little bit – thoughts that might get us
– atheists, agnostics, theists and Christians – out of our boxes and help us make our debate a little more rational, relaxed and friendly. For most of you, these thoughts might not be new, but if they are for some it is worth it.