Today’s topic is the atheistic worldview– is
it really rational? Well, let me tell you a story… Years ago, I was speaking at an event in
British Columbia, and when I stepped off the platform, I saw a fellow approaching and thought,
this is probably not going to be an overly pleasant conversation. He announced himself as
an atheist and the Professor of Philosophy at the local university, and began aggressively informing
me how ludicrous he thought my presentation on God’s existence and the Bible being real history
was. And as often happens in these ‘informal debate’ settings, a crowd began to gather around.
So, after firing off a bunch of scientific ‘proofs’ supporting the story of evolution, he
paused, to see my reaction. And, because he had a PhD in Philosophy, I took a different tack than I
usually would and the conversation went something like this: “So, you’re a professor of philosophy
here, Sir? And philosophy includes the study of epistemology, of how you can know things,
isn’t that correct?” And he confirmed both. “Then can you tell me one thing you know
for certain and how you came to know it?” He kind of looked at me, annoyed, and asked what
I meant. So, I asked him again to tell me one fact or bit of knowledge that he knew for certain
and how he came to know it. He said, “Well, I know I’m standing here!” so I asked him, “Well,
how do you know that?” So, he put his finger on my chest and said, “Because I can see you, and touch
you, and I can feel the floor!” and he tapped the ground a couple of times with his foot. So, I
said, “So what you’re telling me is that your five senses are informing you that you are here,
correct?” to which he said, “Well of course!”. “But how do you know that your senses are actually
working?” I asked. “How do you know they’re working correctly? How do you know you aren’t just
some brain in a jar somewhere being fed impulses that make you think you’re really here? How do you
know you aren’t in the Matrix and this is all just an illusion? You can’t just tell me that your
senses are confirming your senses because that would be a circular argument, right?” So,
he caught on to what I was saying and said, “Well yes, actually, I can’t know anything for
certain, but neither can you!” So, I said OK, just to confirm here, what you are saying is that
in your worldview as an atheist, you have no way, or mechanism of being able to know anything for
certain?” He said, “Well, no ultimately”, but then again added, “But neither can you!” So, I said
“Wait a minute. I’m a Christian and believe in the God of the Bible who is all seeing, all knowing,
omnipotent, exists outside of time and so on… Now if the God of the Bible exists, could He give His
creatures faculties and reveal information to them [revelation] so that they could know things for
certain?” “Well I don’t believe in God…” he said, kind of waving his hand, trying to dismiss my
argument. So, I said “I know that’s what you’re professing but that’s not what I’m asking. I’m
asking, if the God of the Bible exists, could He do that? Could He give His creatures abilities
so that they could know things for certain?” “Well of course he could because He’s God!”. So I said,
“OK so let’s get this straight. What you’re saying is that in your atheistic worldview, if it’s
true, you can’t know anything for certain. But if my worldview is true as a Christian, I can know
things for certain?” “Well, absolutely,” he said, “but I don’t believe in your God”. I looked at
him and said, “ ‘Absolutely'? You ‘know’ that absolutely? I thought you just told me that
if your worldview was true that you couldn’t know anything for sure, so how do you ‘know’ that
with certainty?” And that was basically where the conversation ended as he muttered and walked
away. You see logically, simply to be able to have an argument or discussion concerning the
truth of any topic, you must assume we exist; logic is real, and that knowledge is attainable.
But as the atheist professor confirmed, if someone doesn’t start with the idea of God’s
existence, nothing can be assumed with certainty, which means knowledge is actually not possible
– you can’t ‘know’ anything for certain! So, is atheism rational? No! Far from what many people
might think, atheism is by far the weakest of worldviews, which is likely why God’s word says;
‘The fool says in his heart “There is no God”.’
