Koan #26: The Argument from Atheist Converts

It is often said by the most fervent of Unbelievers that there exist no good arguments for why they should believe and follow the Faith, with all that the Faith entails and espouses. In the spirit of discourse and charity, it is, therefore, desirable to present such arguments, as has been done for millennia, to these most fervently unbelieving of Unbelievers in the hopes of achieving at least some reflection on both sides. And this is just such an attempt, although please note that it is an argument that is both audience specific and done with one’s tongue firmly in his cheek. Yet one must not digress. Thus, this particular argument for the Faith is known as the “Argument from Atheist Converts.” It carries forth as follows: 1. In recent years, and in western culture particularly, a rash of particularly vehement, ardent and evangelically vocal atheists have arisen. 2. These specific Unbelievers often claim that those that hold religious beliefs, and in particular Christianity, are the embodiment of a being that is irrational, emotive, unintelligent, non-“bright”, biased, unscientific, unreasonable, ridiculous, illogical and so forth (a further number of terms could be added, but the point is made). By contrast, the true Unbelievers of this age and culture are the embodiment of a being that is rational, un-emotive, intelligent, “bright”, objective, scientific, reasonable, serious, logical and so forth (again, a further number of terms could be added, but the point is made). 3. With this in mind, it follows that if anyone converts from unbelief to the Faith, then this conversion has great weight, value and assistive/authoritative proof for the strength, validity and worth of arguments made for the Faith, for how could an epitome of rationality, un-emotiveness, intelligence, “brightness”, objectivity, scientific literacy, reasonableness, seriousness and logicalness by converted by anything but the most powerful of arguments and evidence. By contrast, the conversion of a Believer to unbelief is nothing special, powerful or significant, for how could the conversion of an epitome of irrationality, emotiveness, unintelligence, non-“brightness”, bias, scientific illiteracy, unreasonableness, ridiculousness and illogicalness be significant or weight in favour of that particular view. It may, in fact, weaken it as it has been adopted by one with such weak mental facilities. 4. This means, therefore, that either the vehemently arrogant Unbeliever must concede the exponentially greater importance of the conversion of an Unbeliever to belief in contrast to the opposite, and thus the strength of the arguments, facts and evidence that converted such a Unbeliever, or the vehemently arrogant Unbeliever must concede that Unbelievers are not the hyper-rational, totally objective, extremely logical, etc. individuals that the latter so often claimed they are, but are rather subject to the same mental and psychological biases and issues that affect all persons. 5. This then naturally leads to the concession that the Unbelievers claimed objectivity and bias-free-truth-seeking focus in assessing the arguments for the Faith and its entailments are fallacious and unwarranted; they therefore hold no more weight than the Believer’s assessment of the same arguments. 6. Nor can this argument simply be dismissed by the Unbeliever through the claim that the converted Unbeliever simply became irrational and illogical instantly upon conversion, for how can one change so suddenly and momentarily from being the epitome of rationality and reason to its exact and extreme opposite. Such a claim is absurd and just demonstrates the emotional and mental protective barriers that such Unbelievers create for themselves to protect their psyches from the possibility that they are in error. Nor can the Unbeliever claim that the converting Unbeliever was never a “real” Unbeliever—entailing all the traits mentioned above—to begin with, for doing so commits the so-called “No True Scotsman” fallacy, a fallacy with Unbeliever so often use against those of the Faith. Let it therefore be realized, even though it must be granted that many already do, that the Unbeliever in no more rational or objective or logical than the Believer, nor do his assessments of the arguments for the Faith hold any more weight than the Believer’s.