Barns - The Dawkins proof for the existence of God

Copyright Richard Barns 2009

Published 2009

Second Edition 2010

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or otherwise, without written permission from the copyright owner. However, short extracts may be used for review purposes.

I found out about the problems of atheism by taking atheism seriously. I tried to be a consistent atheist and I believed the conclusions that atheism led to. But I found that what consistent atheism led to was something utterly unworkable. It was, paradoxically, my desire to be a thorough atheist that drove me towards God.

This book is a result of that experience. It is a response to Richard Dawkins book The God Delusion but it is not simply a reply to Dawkins arguments against God. I will also be looking at evidence for the existence of God that is provided by Dawkins himself. My argument is not only that Dawkins cannot refute theism, it is that he is unable to be consistent to his atheism. Gods existence is so inescapably part of human life that even Richard Dawkins lives as if God exists.

I would like to thank all those who have helped in the making of this book, in reading and correcting manuscripts and in bringing useful references to my attention. I have made much use of Internet-based resources and my thanks go to the individuals and organisations that have made them freely available. The sources are all acknowledged in the endnotes. The endnotes are primarily page references and web site addresses but some do add extra details or background information such notes have their index numbers enclosed in brackets.

Finally, I should say a brief word about language. In this book I have used the word man to refer to humanity as a type, and I have used he as a neuter pronoun. I have used these words for want of better alternatives and they are not intended to be gender specific.

How can you believe in the existence of something that you cannot see indeed that you cannot detect by any means? I hope that by the end of this brief chapter I will at least have sketched an outline response to this question that lies at the heart of atheisms challenge to belief in God.

I will take my definition of atheism from Richard Dawkins. In the first chapter of The God Delusion he describes an atheist as:

There is nothing beyond the natural, physical world. Nothing exists but material objects interacting with each other. Material objects are composed of atoms, and atoms are made up of protons, neutrons and electrons. Actually things are rather more complicated than this. Protons and neutrons are themselves made up of lesser components and there are a variety of other, more esoteric, particles.

Thus the fundamental particles interacting via the fundamental forces explain the behaviour of every material object and as Dawkins says there is nothing beyond the natural, physical world. If this is true it means that everything can be explained in terms of these particles and their interactions. All that exists is the void of space in which there are vast quantities of incomprehensibly minute fundamental particles. These particles interact with each other via the fundamental forces and that is the cause of everything that happens. What is love? It is the production of certain chemicals in the cells of the brain and the endocrine system. These cells and these chemicals are ultimately composed of fundamental particles interacting with each other, and thats it. Every thought, every emotion, every ideal reduces to material particles interacting in space.

In the remainder of this section we will look at some of the outworkings of this belief.

Firstly, if only matter exists then there is nothing special about human life.

There is nothing special about the chemical elements in the human body. The oxygen, carbon, hydrogen etc in the human body are just the same as the oxygen, carbon and hydrogen found anywhere else in the sea, soil or stones. The elements in the body may be arranged in a more complicated structure and may take part in more complicated interactions than they generally do elsewhere, but that doesnt give life any value, it just means that it involves complex chemical reactions. The body is composed of the same fundamental particles interacting via the same fundamental forces as are found everywhere else. A human being thus has no more value than any other material object. Indeed the idea of value has no meaning other than as an entirely arbitrary personal or social assertion. This is not saying that human life is no more important than animal life, or even plant life, but that human life (or any life) is no more important than gravel. There is nothing special about it. There is nothing special about anything because there are no standards of specialness. There are no standards of anything. There are just material particles reacting with each other. Nothing but matter in motion.

Secondly, there can be no concept of ought.

What about human actions? They are of no more value or significance than the actions of any other material thing. Consider rocks rolling down a hill and coming to rest at the bottom. We dont say that some particular arrangement of the rocks is right and another is wrong. Rocks dont have a duty to roll in a particular way and land in a particular place. Their movement is just the product of the laws of physics. We dont say that rocks ought to land in a certain pattern and that if they dont then something needs to be done about it. We dont strive for a better arrangement or motion of the rocks. In just the same way, there is no standard by which human actions can be judged. We are just another form of matter in motion, like the rocks rolling down the hill.

We tend to think that somewhere out there there are standards of behaviour that men ought to follow. But according to Dawkins there is only the natural, physical world. Nothing but particles and forces. These things cannot give rise to standards that men have a duty to follow. In fact they cannot even account for the concept of ought. There exist only particles of matter obeying the laws of physics. There is no sense in which anything ought to be like this or ought to be like that. There just is whatever there is, and there just happens whatever happens in accordance with the laws of physics.

Mens actions are therefore merely the result of the laws of physics that govern the behaviour of the particles that make up the chemicals in the cells and fluids of their bodies and thus control how they behave. It is meaningless to say that the result of those physical reactions ought to be this or ought to be that. It is whatever it is. It is meaningless to say that people ought to act in a certain way. It is meaningless to say (to take a contemporary example) that the United States and its allies ought not to have invaded Iraq. The decision to invade was just the outworking of the laws of physics in the bodies of the people who governed those nations. And there is no sense in which the results of that invasion can be judged as good or bad because there are no standards to judge anything by. There are only particles reacting together; no standards, no morals, nothing but matter in motion.