The COST of Theism and why you should second guess religion
Howdy. I’m Danni Gadfly, and I’m sure for at least some of you, when I say the word anti-theist, even though you likely have no experience with the word or have never even heard of it before a picture comes into your mind. You likely wonder where it differs from being an atheist. It’s not a rigorously defined term like atheism and doesn’t necessarily have its connotations. To be honest, the term “atheist” is somewhat nebulous. A lot of people don’t understand that atheism is an extremely loose term that says nothing of the person, their goals, or their tolerance to theism.
Plenty of atheists are happily married to theists, for example. And for those of you who subscribe to a religious doctrine, theism, in the way I’m using it, simply means someone who subscribes to a religious belief. It doesn’t have to mean Islam, Christianity, or the Greek pantheon. It means all of the above who believe in those metaphysical claims. I need to make clear it does not necessarily mean certain sects of Agnosticism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Deism, or other metaphysical positions like that, although it can certainly include them depending on how metaphysical certain sects of those beliefs want to get, and even then, they’re somewhat in a gray area. Allow me to take your attention to a hypothetical scenario for a moment. We’ll get back on track in a moment. Please just bear with me.
What a home invasion can teach us about Theism
Imagine for a moment that you’re minding your business in your home alone when, all of a sudden, you hear the glass break in your living room. You instantly know what this means. Someone’s breaking in. You live in an isolated area without any neighbors for miles. Without a moment to waste, you grab your firearm and head to confront the intruder. Just then, you make eye contact with them. They have stolen the firearm that you had lying around for some reason (you were probably too comfortable) in the living room. As you stare at each other in the eyes, pointing your weapons at each other, the criminal lists their demands.
They want control over your home and won’t hesitate to shoot you if you don’t cooperate, although they want you alive. You see, they believe they have a divine right to rule over your home. It really belongs to them, and it was foretold to them from a divine source that this is their home and that they may only stay in it if they submit to it. They use the fact that there was a weapon lying around for them to grab and use as further proof of their divine right to rule. You ask them why in the world they would come to the conclusion but they say it’s self-evident. It’s so “obvious.” Just look at the fact that there was a perfectly loaded gun for them to use right where they broke into their future home.
Now, at the worst possible time, you begin to realize that you don’t remember if you loaded your weapon. So, at best, you have a 50/50 chance of even having the ability to back up your threat, But a new development happens outside of your knowledge. The intruder comes to the same realization. They are also unsure if they are armed with a loaded weapon. At most, you believe you only loaded one gun but don’t know which. You only had enough ammo for one of the guns, and now that you think about it, realize that you may not have left either loaded. In this scenario, there are three possibilities.
Your firearm is loaded.
Their firearm is loaded.
You’re both rocking unloaded boomsticks.
Remember, you only had enough ammo for one weapon, and you don’t even know if you loaded one of them, much less which one it is. There’s no fourth option where they are both loaded.
So, to go back to the earlier discussion, what do I mean when I say anti-theist? To be clearer, I’m talking about a more political position, and I’ll expand on this more later. So you can, in a sense, have theistic opinions (like being Agnostic or Confucianist) and still be anti-theist. I’m talking about realizing that religions shouldn’t be placated with the privileges many governments give them and that they shouldn’t be allowed to take their children out of the school system to raise them to be soldiers in an imaginary war. I know not all religions or denominations of Christianity do that (although a literal reading of the bible explicitly preaches that message, which is a huge problem. This type of ideological reading of the text is encouraged by the text. People who use that text can never escape it, even if they don’t explicitly believe the radical metaphysical claims. It’s sort of like how when you let someone into your home, you’re inviting all of their bacteria as well.) and that’s why a large portion of this essay is targeted against Christianity in particular, but make no mistake, many of these arguments just as easily apply to any form of theistic belief. For example, while the COST argument is devastating alone to the Christian faith, many other religions also do not have a solid answer to that predicament despite claiming to. Christianity is just an example of the worst of what I’m talking about and what happens when you let something fester. And again, for those of you who think I’m generalizing Christianity or being unfair, I’m going to take words out of Jesus’ own mouth here. If you want to see the true worth of someone, don’t look at their words or what they say they want to do; look at what they produce. That is where the truth is. If I say to you I want to donate to charity and bring about a peaceful, loving world, but I bring chaos and drama wherever I go, you might want to inspect me a little closer. Same thing with this religion.
“[15] Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. [16] You will know them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorns or figs from thistles? [17] In the same way, every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit. [18] A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. [19] Every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire. [20] Thus you will know them by their fruits. ”
Above all, I am going to show you how unethical and rotten theistic belief is at its core. It’s a large claim to make, but with a little bit of logic, game theory, and some of your time, I’ll show you exactly why theism is not only dishonest but also incentivizes unethical behavior. It breeds ignorance, encourages tribalism, perpetuates unfounded primitive superstitions, and is the root and benefactor of many persisting fallacies that tether humanity back from its potential. I also want to make clear that theism itself is not pure evil; it is just that it is incentivized to be unethical, whereas skepticism is incentivized to be honest. This doesn’t mean skeptics are honest and theists are dishonest. Not by a long shot. But I can prove to you that when it all shakes out, one side specifically encourages a specific ethic no matter where you are personally on a moral scale.
So, let’s check back in on our standoff. Remember, there are only three options here. What would you, as the homeowner, do in this situation? Well, let’s say that in order to know whose gun is loaded for sure, you propose a test fire. You’re both to point your guns toward the ground of the broken window where nobody is and test a shot because you’re unsure that either weapon is loaded. Now, before we look at this situation to understand the strategies and why they matter, I should let you know that this metaphor is an allegory for debates between skeptics and people who make large (often metaphysical) claims. Here are the positions and terms laid out in more ordinary terms.
The skeptic/non-believer (or homeowner, in this case) is saying that we have enough evidence to say that specific grandiose claim x isn't true. In this case, your gun is loaded.
The believer or home invader is saying we have enough evidence to say specific grandiose claim x is true. In this case, their gun is loaded.
The third option is that both are wrong or neither gun is loaded. We essentially don't have enough evidence to say specific grandiose claim x is untrue, but there is also no conclusive evidence that specific grandiose claim x is true.
The third option, on the one hand, seems to allow the believer enough room to keep going. But on the other hand, not really. It undermines the claim that what they believe is obvious. It's still anyone's game at that point, and that still goes against what the believer claims. That what they believe is self-evident.
The best strategy for the skeptic: Test fire
This strategy is a simple test of proof. For you as the homeowner, this is the best option for a few reasons (and keep in mind that I’m now discussing the real-world aspect of this).
It’s straightforward. It immediately shows who’s telling the truth and who’s lying.
It puts pressure on the intruder or the person making massive metaphysical claims that they say are obvious.
It’s the most honest route. If someone has true proof of their beliefs, then showing them should be a cinch.
It’s more ethical and rational, as conducting a test fire shows that you are willing to know the truth and not drag out this situation.
It provides a closer step to the overall current truth of the situation.
From what you can see here, a test fire is the most honest thing to do in this situation. In a debate, a way to test the proof of the claim or use empirical evidence and logical argumentation would be beneficial. As we can see, honesty is incentivized by this approach. Knowing straight up who’s packing heat and who isn’t puts an end to the situation.
The best strategy for the believer: Bluffing and preventing a test-fire
In this strategy, I’ll list five reasons why deception is incentivized so you can get the picture of why a believer’s position naturally breeds and rewards deception.
By preventing a test fire, the believer maintains the uncertainty about the state of both firearms. This ambiguity can work in their favor, as it prevents the homeowner from gaining a clear understanding of the situation. The uncertainty can create fear and hesitation in the homeowner, making them less likely to act decisively.
Bluffing and presenting a confident front can intimidate the homeowner into compliance. If the homeowner believes the intruder’s firearm is loaded, they may be less likely to resist or challenge the intruder. By asserting control and making demands, the intruder can manipulate the homeowner’s actions and decisions.
Preventing a test fire hides the potential weakness of an unloaded firearm. If the intruder’s firearm is not loaded, a test fire would expose this, significantly weakening their position. By maintaining the bluff, the intruder preserves the appearance of power and threat, which is crucial for their demands.
By confidently bluffing, the intruder can shift the focus away from the need for empirical evidence and towards emotional and psychological manipulation. This redirection can distract the homeowner from insisting on a test fire.
Rhetorical strategies and fallacies can be used to persuade and influence the homeowner, making them less likely to demand proof and more likely to acquiesce to the intruder’s demands.
So, at this point, you’re probably thinking, “Okay? I can see why a test fire is advantageous to the person who is not making grandiose claims.” But it goes so much deeper than that. Have any of you ever heard of the Monty Hall problem? If not, I’ll do a quick description of it so I can show you how it factors into this situation.
The Monty Hall problem can indeed be counterintuitive at first, so let’s break down why switching doors increases your chances of winning the prize, even after one door is revealed.
Monty Hall Problem:
1. Initial Choice:
- You have three doors to choose from: Door 1, Door 2, and Door 3.
- One door hides a car (the prize), and the other two hide goats.
- You choose Door 1 (your initial choice).
2. Probabilities Before Any Doors Are Opened:
- The probability that the car is behind Door 1 (your choice) is 33% or 1/3 (one-third).
- The probability that the car is behind one of the other two doors (Door 2 or Door 3) is 66% or 2/3 (two-thirds).
3. Host Opens a Door:
- The host, who knows where the car is, opens one of the remaining two doors (say Door 3) and reveals a goat.
- This action provides additional information.
Why Switching Increases Your Chances:
1. If You Stick with Your Initial Choice (Door 1):
- The probability that the car is behind Door 1 remains 33%.
- This probability does not change because it was the initial choice, and no new information about Door 1 has been revealed.
2. If You Switch to the Other Door (Door 2):
- The probability that the car is behind one of the two doors you didn’t initially choose (Door 2 or Door 3) was 66% from the beginning.
- Since the host revealed a goat behind Door 3, 66% probability now rests entirely on Door 2.
Breaking It Down Step by Step
1. Initial Choice Probability:
- There’s a 33% chance that you initially picked the car.
- There’s a 66% chance that the car is behind one of the other two doors (Door 2 or Door 3).
2. Revised Probabilities After the Host’s Reveal:
- Sticking with Door 1: Probability remains 33%.
- Switching to Door 2: Probability is now 66% because the host’s action effectively removes one losing option from the other two doors.
Intuitive Explanation Using Scenarios
1. Scenario 1: Car Behind Door 1 (Your Initial Choice):
- You stick with Door 1: You win the car (probability 33%.
- You switch to Door 2: You lose (probability 66%.
2. Scenario 2: Car Behind Door 2 or Door 3:
- You stick with Door 1: You lose (probability 66%.
- You switch to Door 2: You win (probability 66%.
Conclusion
- Sticking with Initial Choice: Wins only if the initial choice was correct (33%).
- Switching: Wins if the initial choice was wrong, which has a higher probability (66%).
This is why switching is more likely to yield the true result. The key insight is that the host's action of revealing a goat gives you additional information, effectively redistributing the probabilities and making the remaining unchosen door more likely to contain the prize.
Now, let’s show how that factors into the home invasion metaphor. You should already see how.
Applying the Monty Hall Problem to the Test-Fire Scenario:
You (the homeowner) and the intruder both have firearms, but neither of you knows if your guns are loaded.
There are three possibilities:
Your firearm is loaded (Y).
The intruder’s firearm is loaded (B).
Both firearms are unloaded (¬Y∧¬B).
Initial Probabilities
Each Scenario Has an Equal Probability:
Your firearm is loaded: 1/3 chance.
The intruder’s firearm is loaded: 1/3 chance.
Both firearms are unloaded: 1/3 chance.
Testing Your Firearm (The Test Fire)
If You Test Your Firearm:
Firearm Loaded: If your firearm is loaded, you have the upper hand.
Firearm Unloaded: If your firearm is not loaded, this reveals important information.
Updated Probabilities After the Test-Fire
If Your Firearm is Unloaded, two scenarios remain:
The intruder’s firearm is loaded.
Both firearms are unloaded.
After testing your firearm
- When you test your firearm and find it is unloaded (¬Y), you eliminate the scenario where your firearm is loaded. Now, only two scenarios remain:
- The intruder’s firearm is loaded (B).
- Both firearms are unloaded (¬Y∧¬B).
Updated Probabilities
1. After Testing Your firearm is unloaded (¬Y):
- Since the scenario of your firearm being loaded is eliminated, the probabilities of the remaining scenarios must be recalculated.
- The total probability must now be distributed between the remaining two scenarios.
Correct Redistribution
The Monty Hall problem teaches us that once one option is eliminated, the remaining probability is distributed among the other scenarios:
- The remaining probability space of 66% must be divided between the two remaining scenarios.
So:
- Probability that the intruder’s firearm is loaded (B): 33%
- Probability that both firearms are unloaded (¬Y∧¬B): 66%
Implications
1. For the Intruder:
- Initially, the intruder might have believed there was a 33% chance their firearm was loaded.
- After your firearm is revealed to be unloaded, the likelihood that both firearms are unloaded (¬Y∧¬B) rises to 66%.
- The intruder's belief in their firearm being loaded now only holds a 33% probability.
Summary of the Intruder’s Perspective
After you test your firearm and find it unloaded:
- Probability that the intruder’s firearm is loaded: 33%
- Probability that both firearms are unloaded: 66%
Conclusion
Given this shift in probabilities:
- The intruder should realize that the chances of their firearm being loaded are only 33%, while the chances that both firearms are unloaded are 66%.
- This change in perspective significantly weakens the intruder’s position, as they now face a high probability (66%) that neither of you has a loaded firearm.
This application of the Monty Hall problem illustrates that in scenarios involving uncertainty and partial information, testing and revealing part of the information can drastically shift the probabilities and strategic considerations, especially weakening the intruder's confidence in their initial stance.
Monty Hall Problem Summary: Always switch your choice after the host reveals a goat because it increases your chances of winning from 1/3 to 2/3.
Test-Fire Scenario Application:
Conducting a test fire provides critical information, much like the host revealing a goat in the Monty Hall problem.
If your firearm is unloaded, the intruder’s best response is to assume their firearm is also unloaded, which leads to a strategic and probabilistic advantage for the non-believer (homeowner).
By understanding and applying the Monty Hall problem, we see that testing for the state of the firearms (test fire) is crucial for gaining the upper hand and making informed decisions based on updated probabilities.
There’s just one problem, though. The believer/intruder is ideologically committed to their dogma. Despite the chances of working from a more beneficial angle, instead, they have to pick the worst option every single time. Now I know there are likely to be some questions so I’d like to steelman opposing viewpoints with a Q&A.
Q: Can’t I just game the system as a believer by going in there believing my gun isn’t loaded?
A: That’s pretty strategic, but there are a few reasons why it can’t work. Keep in mind that this is a metaphor for belief in grandiose claims. If you were to go in there with the belief that your gun is unloaded, you wouldn’t be doing any of this in the first place. You’d surrender before a test fire even got suggested. Thus, you’d never have the chance to switch off. To put this in real-world terms, following a religion that you don’t even believe in would make absolutely no sense whatsoever if the strategy is to pull this switcheroo off in a debate. You’d either genuinely believe in your theistic claim in some way or not. It would be a black-and-white thing. Agnosticism is one of the only claims that this doesn’t apply to because it’s gray in nature. Whatever you pin on it, it can switch to the other side.
Q: What happens to the homeowner, given their belief is false?
A: Remember that the homeowner’s claim is that there’s definitive proof that you’re wrong. If that claim is wrong, it doesn’t necessarily make you right. The skeptic, being proven wrong, must switch their view. If they’re to take the believer’s perspective into account, it would be that both guns are unloaded, which still proves the believer wrong in a way since it disables your claim of self-evidence. This is why it is in the believer’s best interest never to let a genuine test fire happen and to use every fallacy and rhetorical trick in the book (including shifting the goalposts) never to let a test fire take place. The believer thrives off of uncertainty, which allows their deception to take route. We can see this in most theistic claims simply enough with their deception of what happens after death. So keep in mind this actually helps the skeptic regardless. It can never help the believer to be honest and straightforward.
Q: But aren’t you just using a contrived scenario to paint believers in a bad light?
A: No, this is genuinely what the situation shows. I used logic, not my own emotional reasoning, here to show what this situation reveals. A theistic claim (especially those of a grandiose nature) is incentivized to be dubious and thrive in confusion, fallacy, and bluffing. The conclusions lead necessarily from the premises. If a believer just said, "Honestly, I have no clue if I'm right, I'm more or less just pulling this straight out of my rectum because that's what I was conditioned to do as a child or that's what my culture has a bias towards and they converted me in a low place so now I'm loyal to it." We wouldn't have an issue. But that's just it. Saying that would require honesty, which is not incentivized by the theistic approach. Threats and bluffs are.
Q: Doesn’t this oversimplify the variables and beliefs?
A: Yes, and for good reason. I’m pointing out that the scenario is designed to make all choices equal, with a 33% chance for each possibility. This is a deliberate feature of the metaphor, intended to create a level playing field for evaluating the believer's and skeptic's positions. As long as you’re not allergic to fairness, you should be fine. But isn’t this odd? The only way a believer can have a decent chance isn’t by being fair. It’s by leveraging the scales in their favor from the outset typically through special pleading. By setting up the situation in this way, I’m controlling for potential confounding variables and isolating the key epistemological and ethical differences between the two stances.
Q: This is still so contrived. Aren’t there limits to this metaphor? While the home invasion scenario is a powerful analogy, it might not map perfectly onto all instances of belief and skepticism. There could be cases where the dynamics of the situation differ from those described in the metaphor, limiting its explanatory power.
A: Actually, the 33% probability advantages the believer when considering the multitude of real-world religions. In reality, the existence of numerous conflicting religious claims would make the probability of any one belief system being true significantly even lower. By granting the believer a 33% chance, my metaphor is actually being generous and strengthening the believer's position for the sake of argument. It even provides the ability to prove that they have the true path to divinity definitively. It’s not only the fairest but also the most charitable and idealistic.
Q: Doesn’t faith, by its very nature, not require empirical evidence in the same way that other claims do? The demand for proof is missing the point of religious belief, which often involves a leap of faith beyond what can be rationally demonstrated.
A: Wow, imagine telling someone in any other situation that proof shouldn’t be sought after. And that’s my point: a test fire (the most honest option) actually puts the believer in a bind, thus revealing the dishonesty at the core of the system. It’s one thing to take a leap of faith; it’s an entirely different thing to structure your entire life and raise your children, hoping they’ll do the same to their children in a system without even wondering or having the courage to see if it’s true or not.
Q: Even the skeptic's reliance on empirical evidence and testing could be challenged by the problem of induction - the philosophical question of how we can justify inferring general principles from specific instances. Can’t I argue that the skeptic's position, while appearing more rational, still rests on certain epistemological assumptions that can be questioned?
A: Belief often thrives in conditions that are biased toward it. If a belief system requires a departure from epistemic fairness and neutral inquiry to sustain itself, that is a strong indication of its fundamental weakness and lack of grounding in reality. This observation reinforces my central thesis about the dishonesty and fragility of the believer's position.
Q: Some might argue that religious belief, even if not empirically verifiable, can have pragmatic value in providing meaning, comfort, and moral guidance to individuals and communities. Isn’t the skeptic's insistence on evidence discounting these subjective benefits of faith?
A: Even considering the problem of induction, there is still a 33% chance of the skeptic's specific claims being right at the outset. This acknowledges the inherent fallibility of human reasoning while still maintaining that the skeptic's position is epistemically stronger than the believer's. The skeptic's willingness to subject their claims to scrutiny and revision in light of evidence is a virtue, not a weakness. I really hope you understand that if you were to buy a car from someone on Facebook Marketplace, the fair thing to do would be for them to allow you to see it and test it. It’s the same exact principle here. If they just said, “Trust me, I have a car, and if you don’t believe, you’ll burn in the lake of fire or not achieve enlightenment, etc.” That would be ridiculous under any other circumstance.
Q: Can’t I argue that human reason and empirical investigation are inherently limited tools for understanding the nature of reality, especially when it comes to questions of God and the transcendent? I see the skeptic's stance as a form of intellectual hubris that fails to acknowledge these limitations.
A: There’s so much wrong with this question. Firstly, it sets up a false dichotomy, which not even my home invasion scenario does. A leap of faith requires dishonesty to get off the ground. If the believer must resort to fallacious reasoning, emotional appeals, or suppression of critical inquiry to justify their leap, that suggests a lack of epistemic integrity. A truly justified and truth-conducive belief should be able to withstand rigorous examination and evidential testing.
Q: Can’t I argue that your analysis doesn't fully account for the complex historical and cultural factors that shape religious belief and practice? I see your approach as overly individualistic and ahistorical, neglecting the social and traditional dimensions of faith.
A: Again, this is dripping in fallacy. This is what I’m talking about with theism and defending it. Appeals to history, tradition, or cultural context do not, in themselves, prove the truth of a belief. While these factors can explain the origins and persistence of a belief system, they do not provide independent epistemic justification for its claims. Insisting on the validity of a belief simply because it has historical or cultural roots is a form of the genetic fallacy.
Q: You keep saying theistic claims are caked in fallacy. But you know what? You’re committing the fallacy fallacy by implying this. What do you have to say to that?
A: The fallacy fallacy occurs when someone suggests that because someone commits a fallacy, the thing being said must not be true. But in this case, that is simply untrue. Even given the home invasion scenario, the believer’s chance of being right is 33%. And even if they’re proven wrong, it’s not definitively so. It just means their claims aren’t self-evident like they say they are. Also, I’m not just saying that theism is wrong because of that. I’m saying it’s literally unethical. It can be right and unethical. But when you add up the fact that it’s likely to be wrong and is unethical because it requires lies and fallacies even to hold water you begin to see the issue.
Q: But this is basically saying all skeptics are good and all believers are bad. Isn’t that a huge leap?
A: That’s not what this reveals. What this actually reveals is that the approach of a skeptic is incentivized to be honest and is hindered by dishonesty and vice versa with the believers. There are some bad skeptics and some righteous believers, but their strategy actually goes against what their positions dictate for them. Even still, if a believer is righteous but doesn’t actually seek the truth and just assumes their beliefs are right off of fallacy, their righteousness can certainly be called into question.
Q: What about Pascal’s Wager?:
A: Everyone’s debunked that already, but here’s another one.
The insights from my analysis of the home invasion metaphor and the genuine belief strategy provide another refutation of Pascal's wager and expose its inherent dishonesty.
Pascal's wager, proposed by the 17th-century philosopher Blaise Pascal, argues that it is rational to believe in God because the potential benefits of belief (eternal happiness in heaven) outweigh the potential costs of disbelief (eternal damnation in hell), even if the probability of God's existence is low. In other words, Pascal argued that it is a better "bet" to believe in God than not to believe.
However, analysis reveals several critical flaws in this reasoning:
1. Dishonesty and insincerity: Pascal's wager encourages a form of dishonesty (go figure), where the believer adopts a belief not because they genuinely think it is true but because they see it as a strategically advantageous position. This is analogous to the believer in the home invasion scenario claiming their gun is loaded, not because they genuinely believe it, but because they think it will give them an advantage. The same obviously goes in an actual debate where a believer would be saying they’re right not because they believe it but just to “win.” As analysis shows, this kind of dishonesty is ethically problematic and epistemologically weak.
2. Undermining the believer's position: If the believer adopts their stance as a strategic ploy rather than a genuine conviction, it undermines the sincerity and credibility of their position. In the context of Pascal's wager, if someone believes in God simply because they see it as a good bet rather than because they are genuinely convinced of God's existence, it calls into question the authenticity and depth of their faith. And this is operating on faith, the playing field of the believer.
3. Ignoring the demand for evidence: Pascal's wager sidesteps the crucial question of whether there is any empirical evidence for God's existence. It encourages the believer to accept the proposition without subjecting it to rational scrutiny or evidentiary testing. This is analogous to the believer in the home invasion scenario wanting to avoid a test fire because it could reveal the emptiness of their claim.
4. False dichotomy: Pascal's wager presents a false dichotomy between believing in the Christian God and not believing at all. It ignores the multitude of other religious and non-religious worldviews that people can adopt. This is similar to how the home invasion metaphor simplifies the scenario to a binary choice when, in reality, there are many competing beliefs and stances. The difference is, though, that the home invasion metaphor actually increases the chance of a believer being right while giving every option in it a fair chance, whereas Pascal’s Wager creates a false dichotomy. Pointing out his oversimplification destroys his argument, but pointing it out on my own destroys your own argument. Remember, the chances given in my scenario are never exactly zero that your belief is empty. They never dip below 33% on your argument. What it shows is the behaviors that are incentivized. If the believer actually wanted to be honest and test their claims first, that would be great; however, it goes against their position. They thrive on fear alone that the gun is, in fact, loaded. If they’re wrong, that’s it. At best, they have to retreat to “Well, it’s not impossible just because there’s no definitive proof.”
5. Genuine belief and its implications: If someone genuinely believed in God and the promised rewards and punishments, they would have no need for Pascal's wager. The fact that the wager is put forward as an argument for belief suggests a lack of genuine conviction in the first place, just as the believer in the home invasion scenario wouldn't need to bluff if they genuinely believed their gun was loaded.
Analysis of the home invasion metaphor and the genuine belief strategy exposes the flaws and dishonesty inherent in Pascal's wager. It shows how the wager encourages a form of insincere, strategically motivated belief that undermines the credibility of the believer's position and sidesteps the critical questions of evidence and rational inquiry.
By applying the insights from my work to Pascal's wager, I aim to provide a powerful philosophical refutation of this famous argument and demonstrate the broader applicability and significance of my ideas that will be presented in this essay. This further strengthens the case for the skeptical, evidence-based approach to questions of belief and highlights the importance of honesty, sincerity, and rational inquiry in the pursuit of truth.
So, in short:
The believer is incentivized to use fallacies, rhetorical tricks, and other forms of deception to maintain their stance; this hypothetical scenario exposes a fundamental lack of epistemic integrity in the believer's approach. This is a damning indictment of the ethical and truth-seeking credentials of the believer's position.
The believer's stance thrives on mystery, ambiguity, and a lack of empirical testing. By avoiding or suppressing critical inquiry, the believer's position reveals its own fragility and lack of grounding in reality. This is a strong challenge to the epistemic warrant of religious belief.
"Self-evidence" is a loaded and contentious term that begets a deceitful nature that theistic, grandiose belief, in this case, incentivizes. In fact, it would be deceitful to say, given the impossible situation where both guns are unloaded, that this somehow proves the intruder correct. It undermines them quite a bit by suggesting that said claim is unobvious at best.
If the skeptic asks for a test fire, the best thing to do if the skeptic's firearm fails is for the believer to switch stances. But that would be antithetical to their belief, as it would be admitting something akin to agnosticism. They are literally not allowed to change their beliefs in most cases.
If the skeptic gun fails, the most rational thing to do would be to assume both guns are unloaded or, in this case, that the believer is wrong in their perception and that their beliefs can and should be called into question.
Theism often exploits people's vulnerabilities and desires. Theistic beliefs often gain traction by appealing to people's fears, hopes, and longing for meaning and purpose. This can lead to a kind of emotional manipulation that takes advantage of people's psychological needs and vulnerabilities. And again this makes sense when you understand trickery is incentivized under this system.
My history with Christianity
Up until a year ago, I was a Christian, although I never fully embraced the church's practices. My journey toward anti-theism began when I confronted a Christian about a contradiction in the Bible regarding Judas' death. Her response—that it was better to cover up such flaws to maintain the Bible’s authority—highlighted the dogmatic nature of religion. This encounter made me realize that the religion I followed was more about dogma than truth.
When I came to this Christian about this irreconcilable difference, she told me that even though this is indeed a flaw, it’s better to cover it up and not talk about it because the bible is the best chance people have at living a happy life. I had already begun my foray into logic by that time, and along with the logical fallacies that were beginning to mount up, her response told me all I needed to know. This was never about morality; it was never about truth. It’s about dogma.
“But Danni you’re overgeneralizing. Not all religious people are dogmatic about it.” You’re absolutely right but let me ask you something. Can those religious people say no? Can they simply tell God “No. I’m not going to be doing that. Or I will do this and not this.” You know as well as I do that for most denominations that’s grounds for hellfire then and there. Even many of the most inclusive and kind denominations ultimately have pieces of the bible that they must obey for fear of eternal punishment. In truth, there’s simply no way to be religious and not dogmatic. You’re either going to brandish the dogma as a weapon and use it to hurt other people or are going to inflict the pain on yourself. The oppression may be unmistakable like some Christians hatred of queer people or it may be internalized like a queer Christians’ hatred of themselves. The oppression has to go somewhere.
“But Danni no system is perfect. Plenty of other things like politics and workplaces do these things.” Yeah but you don’t see too many of these things claiming they represent ultimate truth either. The fact that religion hides it claims behind ultimate authority and yet ironically knows full well that it gives you a bad faith(Source: Rational Wiki) ultimatum is the problem I’m talking about.
“But Danni the link you made to bad faith says that religious arguments aren’t bad faith.” No what’s it saying is that the two terms are different not that they can’t and don’t often coincide. If it said what you think it said that would be special pleading which would be ironic given the website. The dishonesty of pretending like you will engage with an argument knowing full well you’re mind is already made up and nothing can be done to persuade you. That’s bad faith. And religion often demands this of it’s victims. That they ought to appear as having some semblance of rationality on the surface so as to not discourage outsiders from coming too close and being ensnared.
This is because, ironically enough, religion itself is a bad faith philosophy that encourages shifting the goalposts on every issue it differs with to maintain a semblance of congruence. To communicate honestly with the world, you’d also need to have the epistemic humility to know that your core, sacred beliefs are possibly wrong. If you engage with the world with the intent of having sheer confirmation bias(Source: Simply Psychology), that’s a fundamentally dishonest way to live your life. It was like a lightbulb moment when I finally escaped the religion. So many realizations had come flooding in.
People had always had me pegged as an atheist, even when I was Christian. And on some level, I can see why. There was always this dissonance(Source: Medical News Today) between my indoctrination and my understanding of the world. I’ll go into this in a later post; this post will already be long enough because, as the title says, I’m confident that by the end of this post, I can get you to second-guess Christianity. I’ll be going through roughly three large arguments against Christianity that I’ve formulated that Christians have never been able to answer (because nobody has asked these types of questions before, to my knowledge), and not only can they not answer them, but it actively damns the religion.
On Rationality
Throughout this read, I’d like to draw your attention to the ethical concept of fairness. It’s one of the most debated concepts in human history, and I notice that its meta-level implications are often overlooked in discussions on religious neutrality. I wonder if it’s due to religion's power to specially plead (Source: Logically Fallacious) any situation it finds itself in; nevertheless, I digress. Now, keep in mind that I’ve already shown you one of the many ways in which theism is unethical, which calls into question its ethical basis in the first place. So, before I say my next point, I want to frame it correctly.
It would by no means be a stretch to say that if you are disadvantaged by the pursuit of fairness, equality, and equity, your position would be unethical, perhaps even deeply so. After all, moving toward fairness in whatever form is necessary to move away from unfairness, at least in that specific area. There are certainly reasonable political arguments that can be made about how nothing can ever be truly fair because fairness is an intangible ideal that can never truly be expressed, let alone reached in a large system. There are many ways to go about this in a shrinking world with so many moving parts. However, I would like to propose that we can make a solid attempt.
Whatever we humans seek in this mostly intuitive notion of fairness almost with great certainty lies in a meta-level application of Empiricism and Rationalism (Source: Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy). What I mean by that is that those perspectives would be the very root, the beginning, of all inquiry into ethics, not the entirety, and certainly should never be left out.
I would like to give the briefest rundowns to explain what I mean here. Empiricism, as a philosophical approach, emphasizes the role of sensory experience and evidence gathered from the external world in the formation of knowledge. It often stands in contrast to Rationalism, which prioritizes reason and innate ideas. Empiricism's commitment to observation and experimentation aligns it with scientific methods, which seek to minimize bias and subjectivity.
Study after study shows that while our ancestors often used intuition as a survival tactic, it is woefully inept at guiding our decisions in the modern world. Rationalism, to some degree, places importance on intuition. However, when combined with an empiricist approach, we can begin to craft hypotheses that complement our lives instead of just lifting up our intuitions for the sake of our egocentric biases (Source: Effectivology).
One of the most impressive strengths of Empiricism is its focus on falsifiability. Falsifiability in no uncertain terms was the approach in the home invasion scenario where the homeowner proposed a test fire. Falsifiability allows that a statement or claim should have a way to be tested and actually observed which at worst may prove it to be totally false but at best just show how true said thing is. It’s the most valuable component of scientific inquiry and is perhaps singlehandedly responsible for the explosion of collective knowledge throughout the world. It allows us to disprove things. For those of you with dogmas, this must sound horrifying, but for those of you subjected to the whims of those who follow the dogmas, it has been a savior whether you realize it or not.
Empiricism also prioritizes claims and data that can be observed, measured, and replicated. This concept alone prevents people from making grandiose assertions that they insert into reality. It is, in many ways, an affront to those with that approach to life that you would dare have to prove something.
Rationalism, on the other hand, tends to emphasize reason and logic. This may sound like Empiricism, but the difference is that rationalism often uses logic to justify abstract ideas that come from the brain’s intuitions. This can leave it less grounded in observable reality. This may sound like ad hoc rationalization; however, a difference is that it provides ways to reason about concepts that I’m sure many of you care about. Love, gratitude, giving your life some purpose.
I ask you then, given what is described of empiricism and rationalism, are they the best attempt at fairness and neutrality?
I would say Empiricism helps mitigate our personal and cultural biases so they aren’t just being swung around blindly. By prioritizing observable and verifiable evidence. Rationalism, by applying logical analysis, further reduces biases by critically examining assumptions and arguments. Together, they can create a more objective and balanced framework for understanding. Empirical methods emphasize falsifiability and replication, which enable continuous testing and improvement of theories. Rationalism, with its emphasis on logical consistency, ensures that the conclusions drawn from empirical data are systematically sound. This dynamic interplay fosters a robust process of self-correction and refinement.
I propose this because people seem to have this ingrained egocentric bias that all of their ideas are valid and beyond scrutiny. We often identify ourselves with our thoughts and ideas. It’s why theists would be scathing if proof that harmed their beliefs came out but gloating if something gratifying was said. When individuals are unwilling to entertain ideas that contradict their own, intellectual growth and innovation can be stifled. This resistance can impede scientific progress, philosophical discourse, and societal development.
People seem to have an inherent bias to their own intuitions. Even people who lack self-confidence still have this bias towards their intuitions, as the feeling that one isn't worth being confident about is itself an intuition. We tend to start with a bias and build logic from there. This is referred to as post hoc rationalization, and it’s often observed in the psychology of shopping. You can come up with a really good reason why you should buy that object, but you’re only doing it as a way to rationalize buying that object.
Then comes cognitive dissonance. For example, many propose exposure to diverse viewpoints as a way to mitigate our harmful biases. There’s a problem with that, though. These viewpoints can become arbitrary quite quickly. If I was raised in the antebellum South a week before the Civil War, I'd be exposed to plenty of viewpoints. In fact, that was one of the main issues. Governments try their best not to be too diverse for a reason.
One can, in essence, be biased to diversity as well. There's a sort of appeal to diversity that can go on in which someone assumes that because something is diverse, it must be true and/or good. But this isn't the case. The Olympics is the most diverse sporting event on Earth, and it's not without its detractors. This is why the attempt at neutrality that empiricism and rationalism offer seems to be the best. Yes, one can argue that this approach is biased toward rationality (in the sense of wanting to make sense, not necessarily the philosophical position), but this also opens up the argument as to what irrationality exactly has to offer humanity. Blending Empiricism with Rationalism is key to the pursuit of rationality and fairness. Or what I call rational fairness.
This means not just saying, “Trying to help minimize crime is unfair to criminal empires.” Or, in this more important case, “Not giving privileges to theism and helping to minimize it passively is unfair to theists.” As if there aren’t significantly better ways for them to be helped. Do you want a purpose in life? Join a charity. Do you want clarity in your mind? Meditate. Do you want the ability to know what happens after life? Well, I hope you understand, at the very least, that going with what someone made up and making children and vulnerable people believe it for hundreds of years to bolster numbers to give yourself the existential satisfaction of it being “true” is unethical.
So, one's views must be tested logically, empirically, and philosophically. I can say I value what the founding fathers valued, but this isn't actually specifically defined or given rigor like a philosophical or logical claim should be. They even say in the document that their values are merely supposed to be "self-evident." Under scrutiny, what the founding fathers meant were those privileges and rights for a certain group of people.
You may argue that even these irrational elements that we allow to sit around and spread information can be gleaned from this. That they lead to some beautiful works of art, poetry, and media, beautiful cathedrals and monuments, and the bonding of communities that otherwise may not ever have come together.
Even with irrationality, though. Should it be examined irrationally? I think not. Examining irrationality rationally is more likely to yield positive results. This means (and again, I'm saying this because of people's cognitive dissonance) that if I believe that depression comes from demons and believe I have rituals to exorcise the demons, but they don't work yet, therapy and medication do, then if I'm to align myself with rational fairness and actually seeking the result I want (treating the depressed state) then I would align with what actually rationally works.
At the end of the day, the difference between rationality, as I've defined it via rational fairness, and irrationality is that irrationality doesn't believe in providing proof. It assumes itself via any fallacy it can sink its teeth into. It ultimately winds up with what I call "conjecture stacking" and fallacy. Even with what one could ostensibly describe as the benefits of irrationality, those can only be observed from a rational party. Irrationality assumes itself first and perhaps rationalizes itself if it needs to put up a defense against something. Rationality doubts itself until it tests itself and, even then, allows room for falsifiability. It is married to the concept. Once again, I want to make clear there’s a difference between Rationalism and rationality. Let’s not equivocate the terms.
And so, at the end of the day, a paradox occurs. Neutrality seems to be consistently realized under a rational/empirical system, as irrationality doesn't like neutrality. Now I ask, is it fair that I equate neutrality to fairness? In a diverse system, I'd argue that it's the only way to be fair. In the context of rationality and empiricism, neutrality involves the objective evaluation of ideas and evidence without bias. It means applying consistent standards and criteria to all claims, regardless of their origin. I argue that Rational fairness isn’t necessarily neutral but meta-neutral.
And what I mean by that is that it isn’t that it doesn’t get involved in the case of a party being harmed. But after looking at the situation from as much of an unbiased and fair perspective as possible, it is able to make a decision such that if it were the other party in that predicament, it would have done the same thing. It’s not to become emotionally unavailable but that it is not married to a particular party. Yet also has no problem getting rid of a party if need be. Fairness implies impartiality and justice in the treatment of all individuals and ideas. It means giving each perspective an equal opportunity to be heard and evaluated on its merits.
In order for true fairness to be achieved via this system, some things need to be scrapped. This is what happens in empiricism. Rational fairness is not in the business of protecting ideas or dogmas but people. If we understand that “casting demons out” of people only tangentially works because of the human mind's susceptibility to superstition and ritual but that actual kind therapy and ethical medication provide consistent results, why in the world would we need to keep shifting the goalposts even to allow this demonology to continue? That’s unethical and the exact kind of thing I’m talking about.
I think there's a belief people have that fairness simply means "I win." But in truth, you can lose in a fair system. It just means when you lose, it’s not because of a handicap that was placed against you due to no fault of your own. Fairness means that even if an individual loses or does not achieve their desired outcome, the process is just and unbiased. The loss occurred because the competing arguments, evidence, or performances were stronger, not because of unfair handicaps that were externally placed on the individual. But again, this is the core message of my point on rationality.
By this very logic, then, we should not allow theism to continue in the way that it does. What is it if not an unfair handicap placed on people by an external force? Yes, human minds may be prone to superstition and irrationality; however, we tend to also have a strong inclination toward logic as well. I love demonstrating this to people, and I’ll likely mention this again later in the essay, but if I were to say the sentence, “God literally just honestly told me that he doesn’t exist.” That very phrase just tends to kick into gear the rational mechanism of even some of the most irrational people out there. And for good reason. It obviously makes no sense and refutes itself. Therefore, nurturing and cradling irrationality due to the fact that we’re primed for it makes no sense. And I don’t want to hear that this is a disservice to theism as if I had never heard of Christianity, for example, I wouldn’t suddenly become one. I believe it’s one of the main reasons that Religious people are some of the least likely people to believe in aliens(Source: Pew Research Center). They intuitively know how small it makes their core claims.
A rational/empirical system sets clear, evidence-based criteria for evaluating claims and making decisions. This transparency ensures that everyone understands the rules and standards. Decisions are based on logical analysis and empirical evidence, minimizing the influence of subjective biases or arbitrary factors. A rationally fair system provides equal access to opportunities AND resources for presenting and defending ideas or actions. By focusing on the quality of evidence and the soundness of reasoning, a rational/empirical system ensures that the best ideas or performances prevail, regardless of the individual's background or status. It nurtures people so that we can continue to either hone or discover new and consistently valid ideas. And I’m not talking about a meritocracy here. I’m talking about rationally conceiving the worth of an idea, not a person.
The Deep Ugliness of Theism’s Ethics
Moral absolutism (Source: Utexas - Ethics Unwrapped) and moral relativism(Source: Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy). Those are two terms we’ll be getting acquainted with in this section. So, a decent way to see the validity of an idea is if it can be reversed, does the logic still hold? For example, a common thing I point to in discussions on free will and determinism is this. “If free will is real, then at what point does the choice to have it ever pop up?” Free will ironically can’t even pick itself, let alone explain determinism. However, this paradox doesn't appear in hard determinism. Determinism admits that at no point do you ever have a choice, so this paradox simply doesn’t occur when you reverse the assumption.
I bring this up to show that special pleading assumptions are a telltale way to know you’ve got a stinker of an ideological stance on your hands. So, what I'm talking about in this case is what I call the Miracle Dilemma in theology. If we're to grant that one religion has the capability to perform miracles, then we are to grant that all religions are to perform miracles. But doing this takes away the urgency that many religions operate on. This shows us something very interesting. Granting equal validity to all miracle claims diminishes the unique urgency and exclusivity that many religions rely on. This equal treatment highlights the special pleading inherent in such claims. Thus, when we put everyone on an equal playing field and call them valid, it shows that theological claims operate on irrationality at their core. Special pleading specifically. If fairness is a detriment to your beliefs, then that says quite a bit.
The necessity for special pleading and resistance to fairness indicates that certain belief systems are fundamentally biased and irrational. They rely on maintaining an unequal playing field to sustain their exclusivity and urgency. Empirical and logical examinations of these claims can further reveal their weaknesses. If a belief cannot withstand rational scrutiny and fairness, it suggests that the belief is not grounded in objective reality.
What we begin to see is that this also constitutes an ethical issue as well. If cheating is the only way you can get by, then that's a fundamentally deceptive case. Again, miracles are the only way to perform the special pleading test. In all, actually, if I can generalize what a specific religion is saying down to what any other religion is also saying, then it's specially plead. A Christian might say, "Yeah, but Buddhism doesn't provide an actual relationship to Jesus Christ as my faith does." However, the subtext of the claim is that it provides a relationship or truth value to truth and/or divinity. Which Buddhism absolutely can by that metric. It would just be nitpicking and special pleading to say otherwise.
Special pleading is not only an ethical issue but also an intellectual one. It involves deceptive practices that undermine fairness, honesty, and integrity. By applying rational and empirical evaluation consistently, we can expose and mitigate the effects of special pleading, promoting a more ethical and fair discourse. This approach ensures that all claims, whether religious or otherwise, are evaluated based on their merits, fostering a just and equitable intellectual environment. Recognizing and addressing the ethical implications of special pleading helps us uphold moral principles and encourages honest, transparent, and respectful dialogue across diverse perspectives. For those of you who’d like to dissect my concepts in more detail, I’ve provided a logical formula below to help you with that.
Key Concepts to Translate
Belief System (B)
Requires Special Pleading (SP)
Maintains Claims (MC)
Deceptive Practices (D)
Validity (V)
Ethical Principles (E)
Honesty and Transparency (H)
Fairness (F)
Treating All Claims Equally (T)
Consistent Standards (C)
Undue Favoritism (UF)
Valid Justification (J)
Statements
"If a belief system requires special pleading to maintain its claims, it relies on deceptive practices to appear valid. This deception undermines ethical principles of honesty and transparency."
If B requires SP to MC, then it relies on D to appear V.
D undermines E of H.
"Ethically, fairness requires treating all claims equally and evaluating them based on consistent standards. Special pleading violates this principle by granting undue favoritism to certain claims without valid justification."
F requires T and C.
SP violates F by granting UF without J.
Modal Logic Translation
Symbols
B: Belief system
SP: Requires special pleading
MC: Maintains claims
D: Deceptive practices
V: Valid
E: Ethical principles
H: Honesty and transparency
F: Fairness
T: Treating all claims equally
C: Consistent standards
UF: Undue favoritism
J: Valid justification
Formulae
Belief System and Special Pleading:
(B∧□(SP→MC))→□(D→◊V)
This means: If a belief system B requires special pleading SP to maintain its claims MC, then it necessarily □ relies on deceptive practices D to possibly ◊ appear valid V.
Deception Undermines Ethical Principles:
□(D→¬EH)
This means: Necessarily □, deceptive practices D undermine ethical principles E of honesty and transparency H.
Fairness and Consistent Standards:
□(F→(T∧C))
This means: Necessarily □, fairness F requires treating all claims equally T and consistent standards C.
Special Pleading Violates Fairness:
□(SP→(UF∧¬J→¬F))
This means: Necessarily □, special pleading SP grants undue favoritism UF without valid justification ¬J, which violates fairness ¬F.
Combined Formula
Putting it all together in a combined formula:
((B∧□(SP→MC))→□(D→◊V))∧□(D→¬EH)∧□(F→(T∧C))∧□(SP→(UF∧¬J→¬F))
If a belief system requires special pleading to maintain its claims, then it necessarily relies on deceptive practices to possibly appear valid. Necessarily, deceptive practices undermine ethical principles of honesty and transparency. Necessarily, fairness requires treating all claims equally and consistent standards. Necessarily, special pleading grants undue favoritism without valid justification, which violates fairness.
So here’s what we can derive from this section:
Theism often relies on dishonesty and deception at its core. As my home invasion metaphor illustrates, theistic belief often involves bluffing or misrepresentation, where believers make claims that are not supported by evidence and try to pass them off as true. This form of dishonesty violates basic ethical principles of truthfulness and sincerity.
It takes advantage of people's trust and credulity. When people listen to religious claims, they often do so with a certain openness and willingness to believe, trusting that they are being told the truth. Special pleading takes advantage of this trust by presenting claims in a misleading and deceptive way, exploiting people's willingness to believe.
It undermines the very concept of truth. By using inconsistent and biased standards of evidence, special pleading creates a situation where truth becomes relative and subjective. What counts as true is not determined by objective criteria but by the special exemptions and privileges granted to certain beliefs. This undermines the idea of truth as something objective and discoverable and replaces it with a kind of relativism where truth is whatever one wants it to be.
Theism encourages epistemic irresponsibility. By relying on faith and dogma instead of evidence and reason, theism promotes a way of forming beliefs that are disconnected from reality and unconstrained by facts. This is ethically problematic because it can lead people to hold and act on false and harmful beliefs.
Theism involves a failure of empathy and perspective-taking. As my special pleading test shows, theistic arguments often rely on self-centered reasoning that privileges one's own beliefs while dismissing or misrepresenting the beliefs of others. This lack of empathy and unwillingness to consider other perspectives is ethically troubling.
Theism can lead to moral absolutism and intolerance. By claiming a monopoly on moral truth and divine authority, theistic beliefs can foster a rigid and uncompromising moral stance that is insensitive to context and resistant to change. This can lead to intolerance, prejudice, and even violence against those who hold different beliefs.
Theism often exploits people's vulnerabilities and desires. Theistic beliefs often gain traction by appealing to people's fears, hopes, and longing for meaning and purpose. This can lead to emotional manipulation that takes advantage of people's psychological needs and vulnerabilities.
Now I wonder if you caught it there. The ugliness I’ve been describing. And you might be saying that for someone trying to make objective arguments here, I shouldn’t use such a subjective word as ugly. But I truly do mean it as objectively as I can. There seems to be one consistent trait that humans worldwide have had disgust for since inception. Every culture, every time period, and even most religions dislike this trait. Hypocrisy. Now, special pleading itself is already hypocritical. However, when allowed to fester, it begins to exponentially multiply into what I consider deeply ugly.
What I was referencing was the fact that theism is both morally relative and also morally absolute. It actually has the gall to assert moral absolutism within its moral relativism. It's utter nonsense and seems to violate the morality of any shade drastically. The combination of moral absolutism and moral relativism in theistic thought is not just contradictory; it's deeply problematic from an ethical perspective.
On one hand, many theistic beliefs often involve a kind of moral absolutism. Many theistic traditions claim to have access to absolute moral truth or knowledge, often in the form of divine commandments or sacred texts. They tend to present their moral principles as objective, universal, and unchanging, and they often condemn other moral perspectives as false or misguided. And I get it because if they were to change their religions openly and honestly, people would begin to wonder how it could be perfect truth.
But on the other hand, the very basis for this claimed moral absolutism is often a form of moral relativism. As the special pleading test reveals, theistic moral claims are often grounded not in objective reasons or evidence but in the special status and authority granted to one particular religious tradition. What counts as morally true is determined not by impartial criteria but by the dictates of a specific god, a pantheon, or religious doctrine.
This is a clear form of moral relativism because it makes moral truth relative to the beliefs and practices of a particular group. It suggests that there is no universal moral truth but only the moral truths of specific religions, which may differ and conflict with each other.
The problem is that theistic thought tries to have it both ways. It wants to claim the certainty and universality of moral absolutism while relying on the partiality and subjectivity of moral relativism. It wants its moral principles to be seen as objectively binding on everyone while acknowledging that they are derived from the specific beliefs of one religious tradition.
This is not just logically incoherent; it's also ethically dangerous. It creates a situation where moral principles can be asserted with absolute confidence and imposed on others without any real justification beyond the say-so of a particular religious authority. It allows people to claim moral infallibility and righteousness while actually basing their moral beliefs on subjective and arbitrary grounds.
This hypocrisy allows religion to take advantage of all shades of morality. Wanna say you’ve got the actual way to morality but wanna distance yourself from a scandal or view you don’t like? Bing, bang, boom, form a new sect or branch of the religion and claim YOU’RE the real one, and there you go. Moreover, this combination of absolutism and relativism makes theistic morality immune to critique and revision. If moral principles are seen as absolute and divinely ordained, then they cannot be questioned or improved based on new evidence or arguments. But if they are actually relative to the beliefs of a specific tradition, then there is no way to adjudicate between competing moral claims from different traditions.
Now, I love putting my arguments through a masochistic amount of rigor, so let’s set up a Q&A.
Q: The special pleading test doesn't fully account for the uniqueness and specificity of religious experiences. They might claim my particular religious tradition offers a qualitatively different kind of spiritual encounter or revelation that cannot be equated with the experiences of other faiths. I insist that the distinctiveness of my religion's practices, rituals, or doctrines creates a genuine difference that justifies special treatment. Aren’t you just blind to that fact?
A: This is literally arguing for special pleading. I’m not even sure why I should entertain this. If you’re so positive, though, feel free to message me or make a critique of what I’m saying. I’ll remain open to being disproven, so please try your hardest.
Q: The special pleading test assumes a kind of epistemic equality between different religious traditions that is not warranted. Human reason and evidence are inherently limited when it comes to understanding divine truths, and different religions may have access to different levels or kinds of spiritual knowledge. Is it special pleading to recognize these differences in spiritual insight or authority?
A: This doesn't hold water because the special pleading tests puts all religions on fair ground. Using this to argue for a specific religion doesn't work because it still runs into the downfall of special pleading via an appeal to mystery for a particular worldview.
Q: The special pleading test operates too much on the level of reason and evidence and doesn't give enough weight to the role of faith. Religious belief is not just a matter of empirical proof or logical argument but also of personal trust, commitment, and spiritual intuition. So isn’t it appropriate to have faith in one's own religious tradition, even if that faith goes beyond what can be rationally demonstrated?
A: Faith doesn't make something true. This is more special pleading. Belief, no matter how strong or sincere, is not a reliable guide to reality. Arguing that faith justifies special treatment for one's own religious claims is a clear case of special pleading and one that the test rightly rejects. Furthermore, faith is only validated by evidence. So it makes no sense even to say this. If I, as a Christian, have faith in the promises of the bible, I expect to see some results after death, whether or not I'm going to Heaven or Hell. This is the problem with theism. It creates the circularity of faith for the sake of faith. You people forgot what you’re even doing. You’re still being promised evidence.
Faith is just stubbornness with special pleading. The same words are used to describe both in the dictionary. Just because there's a connotation doesn't mean they're necessarily different. Faith is justified stubbornness, and if you think of a situation with someone being faithful and someone being stubborn outside of the connotations, the similarities are abundant. Take Hiroo Onada(Source: BBC), for example. I'd argue that he has more faith than most theists. Committed to his duty for nearly three decades long after the war was done. He wouldn't back down until his own commanding officer from decades past flew back to get him. He was that loyal and faithful. Even still, when he made it back to Japan, he was devastated by what his country had become. He refused to adapt to this new world. He was too faithful to the old one.
Was he faithful, or was he stubborn? Both obviously because they're the same thing. When you take away special pleading. Faith is necessarily an immovable belief without evidence. Having evidence for something takes away the need for faith. For example, I'm “stubborn” about the fact that gravity exists. If someone comes to me with a notion that it doesn't, I'm going to be stubborn about that because every second of my experience proves gravity does exist. I have evidence; I'm just being stubborn because the evidence warrants it. There's no need for faith there. There may be some distinction in that faith often seeks to deny evidence to the contrary, while secular stubbornness may merely lack it, but they are, at best, one degree removed from each other.
Even still, this is not really faith or stubbornness. It’s a trust that is actually built on evidence. That’s the difference that people often try to equivocate because some definitions of faith are synonymous with trust. Make no mistake, the religious definition is “belief despite evidence.”
The way many people go about faith, especially in organized religion, shows special pleading and mental gymnastics. If something were true, you wouldn't need to do that. If something were so apparent and demonstrably true, the lengths people would go to defend it just wouldn't make sense. In fact, they actually work as an implicit admission that it's not true in the slightest. If I had a feather and came up to you and said that it is an immovable object, you'd probably be confused about that, given it's a normal feather, from what you can see. So if I say I can prove it and put a fan next to it to turn it on, and it clearly blows away, why should I specially plead the definition of what it means to move? Having to bend over backward to redefine movement itself is an implicit admission that I'm lying. I am using those mental gymnastics to stall time until I can build a fortress for the feather so no wind can blow it and nobody can see if it moves within there.
If I go back to you looking to demonstrate that the feather can't move, these are two implicit admissions rolled into one. The fact that I built a fortress shows regardless of the gymnastics; I'm actually seeking to prove the very definition you thought I meant. Secondly, the fact that I built a fortress to protect it even from sight shows that I genuinely don't believe it's immovable. Faith is always just a stalling tactic until you can scrounge up more time for supposed evidence. Furthermore, faith is always proven by evidence. Therefore, it is evidence, not faith, that truly matters.
At this point, someone saying faith has a purpose has two options. Admit, this is about evidence, in which case FOLLOW THE EVIDENCE! Or admit you’re being irrational and circular and merely presupposing faith for its own sake, not because of validity. But if you do that, then stop expecting to be rewarded by your God in an afterlife or whatever it is you believe. Just chase yourself infinitely in circles. However, even still, that doesn’t work either. Because of faith’s submissive position to evidence, in this case, faith is just used as evidence for itself. But then that just puts you back where you started.
I argue that faith is not just irrational but actively anti-rational. It is a deliberate strategy for evading the demands of reason and evidence, a way of preserving belief in the face of potential falsification. At its core, faith is implicitly dependent on evidence. It is a form of deferred or projected evidentialism, where the believer is essentially saying, "I believe this now, without conclusive evidence, but I expect that evidence to be forthcoming at some point."
The problem, of course, is that this expectation is often indefinitely delayed (like Christ’s return) or relegated to an unfalsifiable future state (like the afterlife). This allows the believer to maintain their faith in the absence of evidence, or even in the face of straight-up contradictory evidence, by continually pushing the horizon of expected vindication further and further away.
But as I keep saying, this is ultimately a fallacious and dishonest move. If faith is truly validated by evidence, then the absence of evidence is a problem for faith, not a feature of it. A genuine commitment to evidence-based reasoning would require the believer to proportion their belief to the available evidence, not to maintain a dogmatic belief in spite of the evidence.
Moreover, if evidence is the ultimate arbiter of truth, then faith becomes, at best, a provisional and tentative stance, not a fundamental virtue. It is a kind of epistemic placeholder, a way of navigating uncertainty in the absence of conclusive evidence. But it should always be ready to yield to the verdict of evidence, should that evidence arise.
If your partner got arrested but you had faith that they didn’t commit the crime, your faith is not what would save them. It would be evidence that was presented to the court that changed the verdict. Hell, for you Christians (and other religions, especially of the Abrahamic tradition) out there, even your judgment and account in the afterlife works this way. If God has faith in you that you’re ultimately a good person (the Bible says he’s faithful), it means nothing compared to the evidence of your actions. God wouldn’t just say well, I have faith that you’re a good person, so go on to Heaven. He would be holding you up to the evidence. What are you going to do then? Have faith in your own goodness despite God’s judgment that you’re not good? If even your own God doesn’t operate this way, why in the world would you?
If faith is rooted in a promise of future evidence, then it cannot be a self-sufficient foundation for belief. It is always beholden to the tribunal of reason and empirical investigation. And if the evidence is truly the last word, then faith must always be secondary and subordinate, a temporary stance in the face of uncertainty, not a bedrock principle of epistemology.
I digress, so let’s get back to the Q&A.
Q: Doesn’t the special pleading test prove too much, and wouldn’t it lead to a complete relativism where no religious claim could be privileged over any other? I can argue that the existence of religious diversity and disagreement doesn't mean that all religious claims are equally valid or invalid and that it's still possible to make reasoned judgments about which religious traditions are more plausible or credible than others.
A: The special pleading test doesn't necessarily lead to a complete leveling of all religious claims. If it did, I would have just posted that instead of this 100+ page document. Some religious traditions may indeed have better evidence or arguments in their favor than others. The key is that these advantages must be demonstrated through reason and evidence, not simply asserted as a matter of faith or assumed as a matter of tradition.
Q: The special pleading test doesn't fully consider the historical and cultural contexts in which different religious traditions have developed. Can’t I claim that each religion has its own unique history, cultural setting, and social function and that these factors can create meaningful differences between them? Can’t I argue that it's not special pleading to recognize these historical and cultural distinctions?
A: Appeals to history and culture are another form of special pleading in this case. While they may explain the origins and development of religious beliefs, do not justify those beliefs or exempt them from critical scrutiny. The fact that a belief has a long history or is deeply embedded in a culture does not make it true or give it a free pass from the demands of reason and evidence.
Atonement for Edenia
Imagine a devout Jewish woman named Edenia living in Israel at the time of Jesus. She has followed all the laws and commandments of the Jewish faith, believing that this is what God requires of her for a righteous life and a place in the world to come.
Now, Jesus comes along and preaches a new way of relating to God, saying that he is the way, the truth, and the life and that no one comes to the Father except through him. But Edenia, being old and not getting out much, never hears about Jesus or his message.
Then, just minutes after Jesus dies on the cross, Edenia also passes away. According to Christian theology, Jesus' death initiated a new covenant and path to salvation that requires faith in him. But Edenia died without ever having the chance to hear about or accept this new covenant.
So here's the problem: According to the old covenant rules, which Edenia followed faithfully all her life, she should be right with God and assured of her place in the afterlife. But according to the laws of the new covenant, she's condemned because she didn't have faith in Jesus, even though she never had the opportunity.
This scenario seems to paint a picture of a God who is unfair, even deceitful. It's as if God changed the game's rules at the last second without telling all the players. It suggests that God broke his promises to the Jewish people, abandoning faithful servants like Edenia on a technicality.
This is what the "Atonement for Edenia" argument is all about. Not only is Edenia unfairly condemned, but God himself seems in the wrong, needing to atone or make things right for this betrayal lest his word become meaningless.
Now, this is obviously a hypothetical edge case… or is it?
I’m going to break down why this is such a devastating argument to Christianity because, on the surface, it seems like I’m tossing a minor “what-if” at a juggernaut of a religion that should easily be able to disarm it. But in reality, this argument alone invalidates Christianity on its playing field. No outside logic necessary.
Firstly, the contradiction in this arises from the fact that, by Christianity’s admission, Judaism was the true, valid religion before it was. So we have this rather swift invalidation that occurs with the birth, rise, and eventual sacrifice of Christ. There’s a huge problem with this, though. Who makes a promise knowing they don’t intend to keep it? God apparently. For the Jews who followed Judaism faithfully yet never had the opportunity to hear of Jesus, you have this strange situation where this person (Edenia in this example) did everything right and to the letter and yet must still go to Hell. Christianity would have you believe that Jesus' miracles were an all-encompassing widespread phenomenon, but that simply wasn’t the case. Assuming his miracles did, in fact, happen, when you look at the number of Jews that existed in the region at the time (likely in the millions), then having five hundred or even five thousand witnesses to anything, in particular, wouldn’t have even scratched the surface.
And when you consider that ancient communication methods were little more than a game of telephone with months and years in between discussions between distant insular communities, you can begin to see the massive problem here. The Bible acknowledges this as Christ himself requested his disciples to travel and spread the word. Even with the Bible, Paul, who existed about 120 years after Christ’s death, was still spreading the messages to insular groups of Jews. Couple this with the fact that supernatural events were “supposedly” commonplace at the time.
Look at us now in the 21st century, and it’s not hard to find someone among you who isn’t even religious and yet still claims to have had a supernatural experience. Hundreds of people claim to be the second coming daily. And you mean to tell me that in ancient times when people were significantly more superstitious, more insular, and had even less time to sit around that you didn’t have claims out the wazoo of your neighbors’ cousins’ friends’ uncle seeing a completely unrelated supernatural event when in reality he just had a bad dream? And don’t even get me started on up for grabs events like eclipses, earthquakes, and powerful storms. Everybody was claiming they had control or foresight over them. Today, we have algorithms to curate our interests. In the ancient past, you were in your insular community and tangentially would incorporate semi-foreign views within your scope.
It raises serious questions about the justice and trustworthiness of the Christian God. How can we trust a God who would condemn his faithful followers based on a last-minute change in the rules?
So you’d have to understand that for millions of Jews, this whole Jesus thing not only had to compete with similar myths but also, there was a massive chance that they’d never even heard of it. Christianity hadn’t even become influential until more than a hundred years after Christ’s death. Suddenly, Edenia isn’t the only innocent person going to Hell. A God who changes the rules on what to those people would have been an impromptu technicality would have totally blindsided many people. The fact of the matter is that the only way this wouldn’t reveal God to be lying would be if all of Judaism had taught since inception that a figure like Christ was coming. However, this simply isn’t the case. We have Jews now who don’t feel that way, and the number was only larger than in a sense because they didn’t even know who Jesus was. Some Christians use hindsight bias to try to retcon the Jewish diaspora into believing in a messiah. Still, when you realize that the diaspora stretched out to lengths as far as Ethiopia, that becomes impossible.
So what we have here is a God who could at any time switch up the rules the way he switched up the rules even then to millions of faithful followers practicing the original covenant. If this God were real, your faith would be nothing to him, and people like Edenia would prove it. It would genuinely not matter if you did everything right because even given our modern-day communication if another figure like Christ were to return, there would still be massive delays in the communication of this figure. Look at Covid. It existed almost half a year before it went literally viral. In those six months, hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of Christians, would have died living within an outdated/false covenant. And keep in mind that we’re taught that nobody will come after Jesus and that he is the final piece of the puzzle.
This brings me to another point: Proverbs 22:6: “Train your children in the right way, and when they are older, they will not depart from it.” This verse seems to endorse childhood indoctrination explicitly and would have indeed been floating about at the time of Jesus. It presents a huge problem of hypocrisy, though, as well as special pleading. If the bible admits that children are malleable when they’re young but punishes adults for not being malleable to Christ’s teaching, then this is a large contradiction.
After all, next to nobody purposely trains their children in the “wrong way.” What this verse means when taken into context is, "Look, I know that people are heavily biased by their upbringing, but I'll make an exception for those who are raised Christian/Jew. For everyone else, tough luck - you should have somehow overcome your indoctrination and found your way to the truth, even though I never gave you a fair chance to hear it or, in the case of my Jewish followers, expected you to abandon your old covenant with me by deciphering through tons of conflicting information. Toodles." Even Paul alludes to this later in the bible when he is discussing the hard-heartedness of Jews who won’t accept his door-to-door salesman/ Jehovah’s Witness tactics. He says the quiet part out loud with Romans 9:16-18. You were screwed from the get-go.
The same proverb that would be afforded to Christians about being trained in rightness at a young age despite also being known by Jews is now weaponized against them. Jews at the time did think they were doing the right thing and standing up for their beliefs. To return to the very beginning of this article, this is why the bad faith of religion is so detrimental. Religion never aims to be honest enough to be disproven. It only exists within a shield of confirmation bias. When this bias was used against Christians, they hated it, but when it was used for them, they took great joy in it. Hypocrisy at its finest.
So let’s lay out our argumentation as clear as day.
According to the religion of Christianity, Judaism, which came before it and from which it emerged, was true.
There were devout Jews living at the time of Jesus who had faithfully followed the terms of the old covenant.
Some of these Jews, due to geographical, social, or other circumstances, never had the opportunity to hear about Jesus or the new covenant before they died. An ultra-conservative estimate of this number is a minimum of 1.5 million.
According to Christian doctrine, salvation after Jesus' sacrifice is only possible through explicit faith in Christ or reaction to the revelation of Christ’s light.
Therefore, these faithful Jews who died without knowing about Jesus are condemned, despite their righteousness under the terms of the old covenant.
Due to the points in 1-5, the only feasible premise to arrive at is that God betrayed about 1.5 million faithful followers on an impromptu technicality, breaking his promises to his chosen people.
If he did it once, he could easily do it again. His word is entirely suspect and called into question.
If he did it again, there would be no way to know for sure. Many people would be as clueless as the potentially millions of Jews who passed without the knowledge, even given the modern forms of communication we have.
These 8 points together constitute a powerful and logically rigorous argument that exposes a profound problem in the traditional Christian understanding of God's justice and faithfulness. They show how the core doctrines of Christianity, when combined with uncontroversial historical facts, lead to a conclusion that is deeply troubling and difficult to reconcile with the idea of a loving and trustworthy God.
The argument proceeds step by step, from establishing the premises of Judaism's truth and the faithfulness of pre-Christian Jews to the fact of many Jews dying without hearing about Christ to the Christian doctrine of salvation through faith in Christ alone. From these premises, it inexorably concludes that God has betrayed his promises and condemned his faithful servants on an arbitrary technicality.
Points 6, 7, and 8 then draw out the broader implications of this conclusion, showing how it undermines any basis for future trust in God's word. They reveal the "Atonement for Edenia" scenario not as an isolated incident but as a fundamental revelation about God's nature and reliability. Atonement for Edenia can be considered a subset of the broader “problem of the unevangelized” that Christianity still doesn’t have the answer to. However, where it differs is that it represents a unique type of unevangelized. Those who are righteous by God’s very words and promises and yet still must burn in Hell on an impromptu rule switch they couldn’t have possibly heard about.
Now, this is a deep topic, so I would be remiss without adding a Q&A to discuss further points. I’m sorry if the wording here seems a little juvenile, but these are things I’ve heard Christians say in some way or another. If some of these questions aren’t something you’d ask, then that’s great, but I’ve seen plenty who would.
Q: So what? It was likely only a small amount of Jews. It couldn’t have actually been that many. God would have enacted some type of super-death barrier so that no Jews could die before at least some morsel of the news reached them. And even if they did die, then God would have just grandfathered in those Jews under the old covenant for being faithful.
A: Really? Arguing for this by diminishing numbers is abhorrent and immoral. This happening to even one person still makes God a liar. This is why I phase this argument down to Edenia. To make it more personal. One person being tortured infinitely in the lake of fire is inexcusable. But I can see why someone would want to diminish the numbers. Because once they’ve whittled down the number, simple goalpost-shifting excuses can be made like “He would have just grandfathered in those fifty people.” In reality, though, that then insults the moral absolutism that many of these same people claim of the bible and their religion. It would make the religion morally relative and being held together by a few “almosts” as opposed to definites, which it is in reality; you can’t have it both ways here. There is genuinely no way out of Atonement for Edenia unscathed. And besides, if he were to grandfather in the Jews, then Judaism would be all we needed. This couldn’t be the case because the bulk of early Christian efforts were spent trying to convert Jews. They’d have just skipped over them if that was the case.
Q: But I was told the Jews at the time were evil, and that’s why God needed to let Jesus come down. I know for sure the Pharisees were evil, weren’t they?
A: This perspective is problematic, to say the least, because it perpetuates stereotypes and historical inaccuracies. In actuality, the “Pharisees” were a small group of Jews that not even all Jews answered to. Not every Jew was a pharisee by any means. And this also paints a broad picture of Pharisees by saying they’re all corrupt. I only hear white supremacist/neo nazi types say this, but even still, this needs to be stated so it can be called out for how harmful it is. Now, I want to say again this is not all Christians who are like this. I would argue this isn’t even most. But even I’m not the only one(Source: Oxford University Press, Religion of Whiteness) who’s looking at the staggering numbers of white Christian nationalism that vie for political power. This is a large reason for my anti-theist stance. A book I’m planning on reading and dissecting called Religion of Whiteness has recently come out, which discusses the complex political machinations of that group of Christians, so they’re certainly not a small minority. And it’s not just their numbers. It’s their ability to influence policy that’s truly startling. Religion is dangerous when people start using it as a proof text to justify their biases and beliefs.
Q: Wouldn’t we know if there was a second coming? We live in the age of video evidence and modern forms of communication.
A: You absolutely wouldn’t have any clue if this happened again. We still, due to our human psychology operate in pseudo-tribes or groups. It’s one reason why, unless you’re Brazilian or an affiliate of the culture, you’d have a hard time telling me of a single popular Brazilian YouTuber or the drama in the Brazilian music scene, for example. The information simply wouldn’t come to you, nor would it be necessary to you in any way. Coupled with the fact that, as I stated earlier, dozens if not hundreds of people claim to be the second coming daily sifting through, let alone hearing about these people, would be impossible. God could rechange the covenant at any moment, and you’d never know. And the irony is that people who lived in the age and vicinity of Christ themselves didn’t believe, and many supposedly saw. In this age where evidence is negligent at best and everything can be explained away as “fake” on the internet, through which power would you be able to ascertain the truth? If it were that simple, we wouldn’t have many denominations now.
Q: The covenants they lived under were always meant to be temporary, so His promises are not broken.
A: This contradicts large swaths of the Old Testament that claim that God's promises are everlasting, such as the meaning of the rainbow, David's lineage, and Jerusalem. Furthermore, for Christians who believe in biblical prophecy, this invalidates the majority of that system. We have great evidence to support that Jews did not think their covenants were temporary, namely that Jews still exist in large numbers today.
Q: God judges people based on their heart and available knowledge, so Jews like Edenia, who faithfully followed what they knew, would be saved, even without explicit faith in Christ.
A: This begs the question of why even proselytize, especially to fellow Jews. It also begs the question of why religion is in the first place. It contradicts precisely what Jesus said about how hard it would be to get in. And trust me, I can go on and on. Romans 9:16-18 states: So it depends not on human will or exertion but on God who shows mercy. The scripture says to Pharoah, “I have raised you up for this very purpose, that I may show my power in you that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth.” So then he has mercy on whomever he chooses, and he hardens the heart of whomever he chooses. Oh, or how about how, in the literal beginning of the book, he flooded the Earth, killing entire families with children and infants as well as almost all animals? But get this: I know you’re about to say they were “wicked,” so they deserved it. But this takes place at the very beginning of the Bible when there were no codified laws. At best, if this whole time period were real (which it isn’t), any sort of basis for any law would have been spread through tribal word of mouth. So wickedness here makes no sense because they were given no direction on what else to possibly even be. No laws for what to be are in the Bible at this point, so unless Christians want to admit that there’s some sort of meta-Bible we haven’t found yet, then these people are innocent. Entire families supposedly drowned for being evil when they were given no guidance on what else they could be. So this whole thing of God judging people on their heart and knowledge when he deprives them of said knowledge, sets their hearts up to be hardened and regularly betrays and murders his creations means nothing. He absolutely would have set Edenia up.
Q: We just don’t know because God is so mysterious. We can never really know what he’s got cooking. How can you claim to know what God desires?
A: This is incredibly cheap, and at that point, I have just as much of an argument to insert whatever I wish, given that tactic as well. It would devolve into a rhetorical tennis match. It shows that the person has no reliable basis for what they’re saying and must pull out this faulty excuse that wouldn’t work anywhere else as a last-ditch effort to save face.
Q: Well, how about Universalism? Eventually, those Jews would be brought up to Glory even if they had to suffer in the waiting line of Hell for a bit.
A: First of all, I’m extremely suspicious when Christians pull out Universalism because I’ve never actually met a universalist in my life. The only universalist I’ve ever seen was someone on TV who the church shunned because this belief is heavily discouraged. This is often used as a last-ditch effort to fend off someone with good questions. Even so, this still breaks promises. Just because you make up for it doesn't mean you didn't break it. If a person cheats on their partner, they are breaking the traditional wedding vows. Making up doesn't erase that fact. It also makes Hell arbitrary. And even if you wanted to argue for instant Heaven upon death, that breaks Jesus’ and God’s promises and invalidates the whole religion.
Q: I have enough faith that he won’t do it again. Doesn’t that mean something?
A: I really want to stress that faith that “he won't do it again” is a pitifully weak argument here. Again, the Jews who were being oppressed and slaughtered by the Romans were in a very harsh predicament that especially many first-world Christians simply could not even come close to comprehending. Their faith was not lacking in any capacity, and they focused their entire essence on God. Faith means nothing in this circumstance. It just makes God all the crueler. The Jews who remained faithful to the Mosaic covenant during this period of Roman oppression and persecution demonstrated an incredible level of devotion and trust in God. They were clinging to God's promises amid immense suffering and hardship. To suggest that their faith was somehow lacking or insufficient is not only insensitive but also fails to take seriously the depth of their commitment.
Q: Can’t we just reinterpret the religion? I mean, God has to be in there somewhere, right? So if we hit a bump in the road, we could get back on the right track.
A: My argument's 8th and final point shows that reforming the religion wouldn't help. It also begs the question of how God-inspired a religion is if it can just be shifted around to solve an argument. In a way, it tells on itself. The shift they would need to take to even somewhat escape atonement for Edenia would “Ship of Theseus,” the religion into something nearly unrecognizable, and its patriarchs likely know that. However, given the argument's validity, the 8th point shows that any reformulation would ultimately be rooted in faith that "this right here would be the line he doesn't cross." But as we just discussed, faith means nothing, given this argument. You can never be sure that whatever you land on would be stable because had the Jews “known better,” there wouldn’t be Judaism now.
Q: Aren’t you just using faith to come to your conclusions?
A: No. Faith, as it is used in religious circles, is often described as “belief without evidence.” I have a trust-based specifically on evidence. The terms shouldn’t be equated here.
Q: Sources?
A: In all honesty (Source: Oxford Academic), many sources are quite honest about the numbers of the Jewish population being hard to get precisely. I haven’t seen many go under 2 million; however, to be extra fair, I cut the number down even lower. I’m taking the number 1.5 million because I’m not just counting for a static population. I’m counting every Jew who was alive past Jesus’ death (approximately 32 CE) and died before Christianity could have ever graced their ears, which is somewhere between the years 150-300 CE. Assuming a starting figure of 1.5 million as well. Even then, Jews who were nomadic or in India or China still wouldn’t have heard much about it, if anything.
In Rodney Starks “The Rise of Christianity: How the Obscure, Marginal Jesus Movement Became the Dominant Religious Force in the Western World in a Few Centuries,” On the second and third pages of chapter one. He estimates that by the end of the first century (the year 100 CE), there were approximately 7,000 Christians. It’s common to see other scholars put this number as high as 15,000. But to give the argument a masochistic amount of rigor, let’s assume there were 100,000 Jews who had at least heard of Christianity out of earshot by the end of the first century.
This is what the chart would roughly look like. It’s a straight line because certain years would have had more or less death. Given the numbers I’ve put into this graph, it averages out looking that way. This graph is a conservative approximation.
Y: Number of Jews who died without hearing a single thing about Christ/Christianity
X: Year
Given a generous 100,000 people who would have at least heard of Christianity by the year 100 CE, the number comes out to around 1,800,000 Jews who would have passed without ever hearing about Jesus. And again, let’s be extra nice and chop the number down to 1,500,000. You can cut the number any which way you like but I already showed you that’s missing the point. This happening to even one person makes God a liar if he were real. And to be honest with you, a real God wouldn’t let something like this happen. It’s obvious, given what’s happening here, that this religion is a social fabrication.
Okay, cool; now that we’ve gotten that out, let’s move on to the next part of my argument.
The C.O.S.T of Christianity
The COST stands for Christianity’s Overlooked Soteriological Trilemma. Soteriology(Source: Britannica) is the Christian theological study of salvation and how to attain it. It’s always been a contentious issue and is typically at the root of denominational splits within the religion. However, the COST challenges all sects and denominations, and it goes like this.
Due to their circumstances, people with severe mental handicaps and people who, due to no fault of their own, never heard the gospel in the first place are necessarily linked. Neither had the option for one reason or another.
If one of these groups goes to Heaven or Hell, so does the other because they are necessarily linked.
There are only three options in place of this realization. 1. Inclusionism, which I call the ideology that believes morality or some other thing grants access to heaven, in which case the group will be fine even if they never heard. This includes Inclusivism but also stretches out more broadly. 2. Exclusionism states that only those who confess consciously can be allowed into heaven, which means that all of them, due to no fault of their own, will be doomed. This includes Exclusivism but also stretches out more broadly. 3. Equalism, which is the belief that in some way, shape, or form, all will be evened out. This includes universalism, which is the belief that everyone, regardless of what they've done or who they are, goes to the same place. Due to making claims about the entirety of something being put in the same place, Universalism is a piece of Equalism.
Each approach has massive holes. With Inclusionism/Inclusivism(Source: University of St. Andrews), if morality is all you need, then why even have the religion? With Exclusionism/Exclusivism(Source: University of St. Andrews), that take is morally hideous, and whoever agrees that people with mental handicaps, as well as people who, through no fault of their own, never heard of Jesus, deserve hell is quite nasty. This concept is stomach churning to me in how profane it is. And then there's Equalism/Universalism(Source: Yale University), and in this case, the problem becomes if everyone goes to heaven, why bother with the religion at all?
In light of these, the religion itself becomes the problem, and the only way to justify enforcing it is exclusivism, but as we can see, that is morally hideous.
So, let’s break this argument down for people who might not get what I’m saying. It should be obvious if you’ve lived on this planet long enough that some people are born with severe mental handicaps to the point they need lifelong assistance. You can take them to church all you want to, but it is obvious that they will only tangentially understand even the slightest thing at best. These people did not ask to be this way, yet can not comprehend God’s laws. Now, let’s take people who, due to no fault of their own, never had the chance to hear the Gospel of Christ Almighty. These people are in the same predicament as people who have severe mental handicaps. Neither could do anything one way or the other. Think of it like Christianity being a driver’s license and a car. People with severe handicaps could never get a license in the first place because they are essentially blind. You could explain the rules of the road to them all day, but they would never get it. People who have never heard of the bible or God or Christ are like people who live in remote areas who have never even seen a car for the most part, and even the few who don’t have access to a testing center to get the license or pass the exam. Therefore, these two people are necessarily linked. One can never drive despite having access, and one quite simply doesn’t have access. But Christianity is a test of judgment on the driver. You must use your license to drive directly to the pearly gates. And nobody can ride in with you. You drive there alone.
In lieu of this situation, there is a response in which three answers are given, each with their own issues—thus the trilemma. I’ll go into them in more detail here. Some things fit into more than one category, but that just means they have the drawbacks of both at the end of the day despite the pros.
Inclusionism: Inclusion includes Inclusivism. This view holds that while salvation is ultimately achieved through Christ, individuals may be saved without explicit knowledge of Jesus if they respond positively to the revelation they have received (e.g., through general revelation in nature or conscience). Proponents argue that God's grace is not limited to those who have heard the gospel message. However, Inclusionism as a whole simply means anything that makes way for non-believers so that explicit faith in Christ is not the only way. Inclusivism is a part of it, but other forms, such as post-mortem evangelism and other unique perspectives that aren’t popular in religion, are usually here.
Inclusionism is still morally questionable because spreading the Gospel actively complicates someone's afterlife judgment. Once they become aware of sin, they must consider the laws that govern sin and morals, which are by no means mutually exclusive. For example, homosexual male intercourse is considered sinful but not immoral. Given this circumstance, it would just be better not to spread awareness at all. If Inclusionism is true, then actively spreading the religion is neutral at best and detrimental at worst. It ironically shows that morality is all you need.
If individuals can attain salvation through their own moral behavior and response to general revelation, then introducing the specific claims of Christianity only complicates their spiritual standing. It places an additional burden of belief upon them. It potentially jeopardizes their eternal fate if they fail to accept the Christian message, which is decently high, given even the Bible acknowledges how powerful childhood indoctrination is. In this light, the evangelical impulse at the heart of much of Christian history and missionary activity seems unnecessary and actively harmful.
Moreover, the inclusivist position within Inclusionism still rests on the troubling premise that one's eternal destiny hinges on the contingencies of geography and culture. Even if the criteria for salvation are expanded to include those who respond positively to the light they have been given, it still implies that the specifics of one's birth and upbringing play a decisive role in determining one's ultimate fate. This doesn’t reconcile with a God who is supposed to be just and impartial.
With Inclusionism, the burden of faith is entirely negated. Once they're dead, they get asked to submit to Christ after they see him glowing before them. This is significantly easier than the massive legwork Christians must put up with in the earthen realm. If one truly cared about salvation, ironically enough, the most moral and best option given an inclusivist stance is to let the religion die out and just teach morality.
Exclusionism: This is mainly encompassed by Exclusivism. This perspective asserts that conscious faith in Jesus Christ is necessary for salvation. This view is often based on a literal interpretation of passages such as John 14:6, where Jesus states, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." However, different forms of Exclusion occur as well, such as Annihilationism, which is the belief that the unrighteous or excluded will simply be annihilated upon death and turned into nothingness.
I cannot express enough how disgusting Exclusionism is. Can you imagine sending people with mental handicaps to burn? Or sending people who spent their entire lives getting tortured in North Korea where they could have never heard the gospel, only to finally die and get some peace and then be told that they're going to Hell? It's disgusting, and I’ll have no part in it. Unfortunately, this position is the most biblically supported. If you paid attention to the previous argument, you know God is more than willing to burn even the most faithful Jew. This is by far the most evil Ideological/Soteriological stance but its pro is that it is biblically supported.
There are even stories in the Bible of people who were good or had the potential for good but still suffered and went to Hell. It makes it clear good deeds aren't enough. Even the fact that God has a chosen people is itself exclusivist. It’s nationally exclusive toward the nation of Israel and ethnically exclusive to the Jewish race. The fact that, according to the text, he actively separated and glorified the Jewish nation of Israel is telling and reeks of an exclusivist mindset regardless of whether he eventually “opened up the borders.” They were getting into wars and enslaving other people. The most consistent and least hypocritical option out of the trilemma is exclusivism, yet as we stated already, it's the most disgusting. And forget about even just the modern-day people all throughout history who, due to no fault of their own, couldn't have possibly heard the gospel, are then damned to Hell (possibly for eternity.) Imagine being an honorable Japanese man in the 9th century and then being met by a man in robes in the afterlife dragging you to hell. This damns vast swaths of people throughout human history.
Equalism: This belief holds that all individuals will eventually be reconciled to God and experience salvation, regardless of their beliefs or actions during their earthly lives. While this view avoids the moral problems associated with exclusivism, it undermines the urgency and significance of the Christian message. It can be seen as conflicting with biblical passages that speak of judgment and eternal punishment.
Universalism is morally strange. Imagine a young woman being stalked, harassed, and then ultimately murdered by a man, only for him to kill himself right after so they can spend eternity together in his demented dreams. The irony is that they would be spending eternity together because, due to universalism, she spends eternity with her killer. One can argue that she'll be stripped of her pain and grief, and he'll be stripped of his warped tendencies. But in the young woman's case, is it ultimately fair that she is essentially mind-wiped into loving this man unconditionally? That he’ll be reconfigured into a new person to the point that the old version of him is simply annihilated? Does she not even own her grief? This is just bizarre. And again, like Inclusionism, it begs the question of why even spread the religion at all. You can make the argument that he’ll be perfected into being her loving neighbor through a lengthy correction process in Hell, but why does she ever have to see him again?
Furthermore, the universalist view challenges the concept of divine justice that so many Christians claim. If all are saved regardless of their actions or beliefs, then it would seem that there is no ultimate reckoning or accountability for the evils committed in this world. Given the way Christianity brands itself, this is a deeply unsatisfying and morally problematic conclusion. As a side note, Universalism, as defined by this argument, can also include the incredibly rare belief that we’re literally all going to Hell permanently. And finally, Equalism or Universalism is simply irrelevant. I guess thanks for telling me the good news that I’ll be going to Heaven no matter what I do. This message completely ruins the message of the gospel and even introduces a kind of arbitrariness. At best, what you’d be preaching is how to get closer to the front of the line to get out of the hellfire first for those who are taking a quick dunk in the magma while they’re processed in line. But what does that even help? Given an infinite afterlife in Heaven, no matter what happened, your experience in Hell would be so miniscule that it wouldn’t matter.
In the end, the COST lays bare the inadequacies of all three horns of the trilemma. Exclusionism is morally abhorrent, Inclusionism is self-defeating and arbitrary, and Universalism is ethically incoherent and undermines the very foundations of human meaning and responsibility, which is one thing if you’re a hard determinist like me. Even I believe we should strive for responsibility and meaning. But it’s a different thing when you’re claiming a religion in the way people claim Christianity.
Moreover, the need to find a solution to this trilemma can be seen as acknowledging the inherent tensions and difficulties within Christian soteriology. If the doctrine of salvation were clear, coherent, and morally unproblematic, there would be no need for such complex theological maneuvering. The fact that Christian soteriology is gridlocked within this trilemma is a devastating indictment of its claims to truth and moral authority. It suggests that the religion's core teachings about salvation and the afterlife are fundamentally flawed and cannot be reconciled with our deepest moral intuitions and logical principles.
It raises serious questions about the Inclusionist position's fairness and coherence. It suggests that the surest path to salvation is to shield people from Christianity's claims and simply encourage them to live moral lives according to the light of their own conscience and reason. Ironically enough, the most effective way to save souls is to let the religion die out, which is quite telling that many people haven’t realized that.
Moreover, the idea that a post-mortem encounter with Christ determines one's eternal fate seems to make a mockery of the concept of faith. In the Christian understanding, faith is typically portrayed as a willful choice to believe and trust in God despite the absence of direct empirical evidence. It is seen as a virtue precisely because it involves a leap of trust in the face of uncertainty and doubt.
But if everyone ultimately gets a chance to see the glorified Christ and make their decision based on direct experiential evidence, then faith becomes a mere formality. The scales are tipped so heavily in favor of belief that the choice becomes meaningless. It is hard to see how this could be reconciled with the biblical emphasis on the importance and difficulty of faith.
Some people like to bring up “crowns in heaven”; however, this is still either Inclusionist or Exclusionist depending on how the person wants to wield this particular subdogma. It can still be Exclusionist, considering that the mentally handicapped and those who never knew still wouldn’t be able to get these “prestige points” on their scorecard. That’s still vile because glory, “which these crowns are often depicted as granting,” would be meaningless as earning it literally wouldn’t be an option for the majority of people in Heaven. To take it the other way and say they could earn crowns up there is just inclusionist and runs into those problems all over again. If you’re really feeling snarky, you can argue that over an infinite span of time, all crowns will become equalized given an inclusionist stance, but then that’s just universalist and again begs the point of why even bother? Crowns would become meaningless. Infinity renders these things absurd. Even still, I’ve debunked an infinite afterlife in my last post.
For example, here are a few niche examples someone can try to come up with to escape the COST.
Arguing for a form of "Optimal Grace": This view might suggest that God, in his perfect knowledge and love, provides each individual with the optimal chance for salvation given their unique circumstances. For those with severe mental disabilities or no access to the Gospel, this might mean God judges them based on their response to the light of conscience and reason they do have. This is a variation of Inclusionism that tries to maintain God's justice and mercy.
Postulating a post-mortem opportunity for salvation: Some Christian thinkers have suggested that those who never had a chance to hear or understand the Gospel in life may be given a chance after death. This could be seen as a way to maintain the necessity of faith in Christ for salvation (Exclusionism) while still providing a way for the "invincibly ignorant" to be saved.
Re-interpreting Hell and damnation: Some Christian universalists argue for a view of Hell as a place of purification and correction rather than eternal conscious torment. This allows for maintaining some notion of moral accountability and divine justice while still holding out hope for the ultimate reconciliation of all souls to God.
Here are the problems with all three:
Optimal grace is still Inclusionism. That's why I didn't just call it Inclusivism outright. I knew there would be little nudges that try to say otherwise, but this is still firmly in the Inclusionist camp.
Post Mortem is still Exclusionism with a hint of Inclusionism.
This is still Inclusionism or Universalism, depending on how you specifically want to flavor it. Everything you can say is one or two or all of these things, but that means more weaknesses. It dilutes and doesn't strengthen. Nothing escapes the COST.
All of these things, in some way, just loop back out and mock the faith.
Pick your poison
You essentially have a choice between being irrelevant, vile, or both. Universalism is in the middle because of the whole mindwiping thing, as well as the way it can be interpreted that we can all go to Hell.
In lieu of this trilemma, the only moral option is anti-theism or becoming anti-religion. I have a parable that reveals why anti-theism and the gradual relinquishing of support for these lifestyles while education is offered to them are the only moral options. Why should we support cults? This only locks the victims in by pretending to give them legitimacy.
Maze parable: Someone struggling in their faith is left stuck in a perpetual maze trying to figure out how to make it fit with an observable, amoral reality. Some people are better at doing this than others due to no fault. As a Christian, you're essentially taught to stay in the maze because God is pleased with how you dance around it. Have more faith and get deeper into the maze. Forget the outside world and focus only on the maze. In fact, you must, and I quote this from Christ himself, "hate your spouse, family, and friends by comparison." That's how much the maze matters. And you're likely going to ignore me, so let me say it again: I'm not saying actually to hate but hyperbolically to hate by comparison is what Christ meant. If someone is struggling with the maze and has the possibility of escape from the maze, if they finally make it to the exit, some people, as outsiders redirecting them back into the maze or letting them remain in the maze, leads to their harm. Even if they learn to love the maze at some point, you stop them from being free. This reason ultimately boils down to fear, not love. Fear of either rocking the boat too much or some other type of fear. Religion puts a gun to your head, so to speak, by saying if you don't run around the maze, you'll be damned and suffer the consequences. By nudging them back in to make sure they don't get out or even just sitting idly by without trying to help them escape, you're keeping them under that fear for fear that they may piss off the guy who runs the maze or because it’s too much work. The irony is many of them see no problem proselytizing to you. This also actually weakens their faith because faith needs trials to grow. Being trapped in the maze only leads to a paradox of faith because faith is the maze, and faith is the answer. This is a non-sequitur and circular. This faith ultimately grows when you're trying to push them out of the maze. And to push this back to the COST that still helps them because the fewer people who know of Christianity, the more likely they are to go to heaven. It wouldn’t even damn the parent, as I’ve shown earlier in this article. You could never be sure if the covenant hasn’t changed right from under your nose. But even if it did, it encourages their children to be saved by not knowing. This is a hard predicament because to encourage or just leave someone to stay in the maze is morally dubious and prioritizes our privileged comfort of not being in the maze while watching people struggle to reconcile the irreconcilable. And by its own logic, even if you wanted to "be respectful," you're still better off trying to deconvert them because faith only grows when it has something to fight against.
There is genuinely nothing you can think of that doesn’t fall into one of the categories of Inclusionism, Exclusionism, or Universalism and thus takes on their massive flaws. Some responses may be both inclusionist and exclusionist, but as I said previously, that means it takes on their worst traits. Nothing will escape the COST. I can go on and on about this issue, but this will already be the longest post I put on this blog. Anti-theism is not simply atheism. I think a lot of people equivocate the terms. There are plenty of atheists who are completely fine with letting religious people do their thing. I’m not one of them. It is fundamentally unfair the Stockholm syndrome that believers have to be indoctrinated into. That if they wake up and see the sham, they still can’t leave because they’ll be tortured for eternity. Not only is this illogical, but it’s immoral. It’s disgusting.
What I mean by anti-theism is that I’m opposed to government recognition and acceptance of religions. I’m not the type to just believe they should be privileged just for being in a specially plead cult. I also think that they should not be allowed to operate their own kind of schools or home school their children. These people from what I’ve seen have a tendency to make children for the express purpose of creating soldiers in this imaginary war they think they’re fighting. Christianity in a large part operates on the narrative that it’s adherents are soldiers in a cosmic warrior for divine justice. That they are to hold the front lines while they wait for their commander-in-chief to return.
And the Bible shows that almost nothing should be off the table in this quest for divine justice. Christ said it himself. It must appear that you hate your family, friends, and even very life in comparison to this cosmic quest. I’m a veteran and don’t need to tell you how doggedly militaristic this all sounds. I’m not against individual spiritual pursuits or “cosmic journeys” or whatever people want to do. But when these religions organize and coalesce into large groups the cons can start to outweigh the pros pretty quickly. The fact that anyone is allowed to literally breed harmful ideologies into children is horrible. It should be considered the abuse that it is.
There’s a difference between you raising your child and doing what you think is right for them. And you keeping your child within an echo chamber and beating out any sign of resistance from them. As a child I was often threatened with physical assault if I didn’t sing my heart out in praise and worship on Sunday service. And the laissez-faire attitude that people and the government seem to have about this is insane to me. This is not all religions and those aren’t the one’s I’m talking about. I’m talking about societies attitude toward religion of “it can do what it needs.” How many lives have to be lost, how many futures destroyed, how many children indoctrinated before we finally realize we’re letting cults operate freely?
Apologetic Paradox
I told myself I would be done by now but once you see how the sausage is made you just can’t unsee some things you know. So I’ll go through this last one for any unwitting apologists who happen to be reading this. For those of you who haven’t encountered the term apologetics(Source: Britannica) is a term used to describe the defense of religious (often exclusively Christian) belief as logical and coherent through rational argumentation.
I’ve just realized how much of a sham apologetics as a field is.
On a meta level apologetics invalidates itself and it thoroughly debunks appeals to mystery as an escape route. Here’s why:
If you’ve ever spoken to an apologist for long enough or seen them questioned deeply enough they will often resort to a fallacy called “Appeal to mystery.”(Source: Rational Wiki)
Appeals to mystery as I’ve shown earlier in this post are extremely cheap and rarely valid within any respectable argumentation. However when this fallacy is committed by an apologist it reveals the entire profession to be absurd. If what you’re claiming is ultimately based in a mystery that humans cannot fully know then how can the apologist themselves know what they’re talking about?
Their entire existence would be pointless. An apologist will then necessarily try to defend their position by saying that the things they discuss just so happen to be a part of things that can be known. But how do they know? Eventually once you've swatted enough circular reasoning (they’ll say something to the effect of this is true because the Bible says it is true and the Bible says it’s true because God says it’s true because the Bible says it’s true, etc.) away they'll switch back to an appeal to mystery. So this creates an infinite regress of things that can supposedly be known without a solid basis as to why on pure assertion and when questioned it flips back to mystery.
If anything you say at any point becomes an appeal to mystery you become irrelevant. But if you claim that only that thing is an appeal to mystery or that area over there is an appeal to mystery and not yours then on what grounds do you draw this line in the sand? Drawing a distinction between knowable and unknowable truths is itself problematic. If an apologist claims that only certain areas are mysterious, they must explain both the knowable and the mysterious, which contradicts the appeal to mystery. Once you do this you’d have to invent a new mystery to justify having the line. And so the cycle repeats ad infinitum.
I find myself asking: Can there be a defense of religious belief that doesn't fall into this paradox? But inevitably I always realize: I don't think so. Even just brute force faithing your way through it doesn't work because you'd have to be asserting that it's the logical thing to do given the situation. Thus roping what you’re doing back into the realm of logical responses taken. To say that this escapes the realm of logic would itself have to be logically argued or once again brute force faithed through as a logical response to the query. Ad infinitum.
In the end this paradox occurs because of these two components that every single apologist will defer to at some point.
Circular Justification: The continuous cycle of explaining and then invoking mystery leads to circular reasoning, as each explanation is ultimately based on an assertion that can’t be fully defended rationally.
Epistemic Boundaries: The arbitrary nature of drawing lines between what can be known and what remains mysterious perpetuates the regress, as each boundary demands justification that itself cannot escape scrutiny.
So at this point you only have two options. Admit you’re irrational or continue to wear the guise of rationality.
Here's a step-by-step breakdown of the apologetic paradox if I didn’t make it clear enough earlier:
Step 1: Apologists attempt to defend religious beliefs using reason and argumentation.
Apologists are people who try to prove that their religious beliefs are true and rational. They use arguments and evidence to show that their faith makes sense.
Step 2: When faced with a difficult question or challenge, apologists often resort to "appeals to mystery."
Sometimes, when an apologist is asked a really hard question about their religion, they'll say something like: "Well, that's just one of the mysteries of faith. We can't fully understand it." This is called an "appeal to mystery."
Step 3: The use of "appeals to mystery" by apologists creates a paradox.
Here's the problem: if an apologist says that something is a mystery that can't be understood, then how can they claim to understand it themselves? It doesn't make sense for them to say "This is true, but it's also a mystery that we can't understand." This differs from science because unlike needing to wait to die to figure anything out science is actively searching for answers. It does not hide behind a claim of ultimate truth that it can’t even demarcate where the line is at.
Step 4: If apologists claim that only some things are mysterious, they must explain how they know which is which.
An apologist might try to solve this problem by saying: "Well, only some things about my religion are mysterious. The other things can be understood and defended with reason." But then they have to explain how they know which things are mysterious and which things aren't. But doing this is impossible as in order to explain something as mysterious you’d have to in some sense explain the mystery but then this lessens the mystery thus pushing that portion into the non-mysterious.
Step 5: Attempting to explain the difference between mysterious and knowable things leads to circular reasoning.
When an apologist tries to explain why some things are mysterious and some things aren't, they often end up going in circles. They might say something like: "This is true because the Bible says so, and we know the Bible is true because God says so, and we know God says so because the Bible tells us." This kind of circular argument doesn't really prove anything. Furthermore it undermines their entire stance since if ultimately their supposed ultimate truth can’t be known then why are they trying to help people know parts of it? It’s like teaching someone to get used to solid ground over an abyss.
Step 6: The apologist's argument gets stuck in an endless cycle of mystery and unsupported assertions.
Every time an apologist tries to defend their religion, they get stuck in this cycle. They claim something is true, but when asked to explain it, they either have to say it's a mystery (which undermines their authority) or they make a circular argument (which doesn't prove anything). They're stuck!
Step 7: This paradox shows that apologetics, as a way of rationally defending religious belief, is fundamentally flawed.
In lieu of this paradox, the apologist has only two options.
Admit having irrationality at the core of their beliefs
Continue to act as if they don't which is itself irrational, dishonest, and pointless but it still admits the paradox unintentionally. The apologist is damned if they do and damned if they don’t.
The only rational thing they can do is number 1. However, this does not absolve them of their irrationality either. If they admit irrationality, then their very stance as apologists becomes totally obsolete and dishonest to say otherwise. If they are to follow rationality, then they ought to retire from their stance. Even admitting irrationality, which is itself rational, doesn't absolve the stance in any way.
The rational course of action for an apologist who has accepted this paradox would be to abandon apologetics altogether. They would need to acknowledge that the project of rationally defending religious faith is a futile one and that any attempts to do so will inevitably be mired in contradiction and logical inconsistency.
But due to pride, they likely couldn’t, so then they fall into number 2.
I already know exactly some questions an apologist might ask.
Q: Okay, so what about science? Science is no different than apologetics. In fact, it’s worse.
A: The goal of science is not to prove things definitively but rather to disprove hypotheses. The scientific method is essentially a process of falsification - scientists make predictions based on their theories and then test those predictions against evidence. If the evidence contradicts the prediction, the theory is revised or discarded. If the evidence aligns with the prediction, the theory is provisionally accepted but always remains open to further testing and potential disproof.
This is a key difference from the apologetic approach, which starts with a conclusion (the truth of a particular religious belief) and then seeks to find arguments to support that conclusion. Science, in contrast, starts with questions and hypotheses and follows the evidence wherever it leads, even if that means abandoning long-held theories.
Q: You don’t see it, do you? Science doesn’t end up doing that. It ends up becoming just as dogmatic as you claim we are!
A: Actually, no, and here’s why. Unlike religion, where a claim is taken and then assumed, science can’t do that. While individual scientists or even entire scientific communities may resist new ideas, the scientific method itself is designed to overcome this resistance. By constantly subjecting theories to empirical testing and by making all evidence and arguments open to public scrutiny and debate, science ensures that, in the long run, the evidence will win out. Incorrect theories will eventually be discarded, and new theories that better explain the evidence will be accepted. If religion does this, it invalidates entire pieces of religion. When science does this, it’s doing what science is supposed to do. Contrast this with the apologetic approach, where there is no built-in mechanism for self-correction. Apologists start with their conclusions (the truth of their religious beliefs) and work backward to find supporting arguments. There is no way for evidence to definitively disprove an apologetic claim because any contradictory evidence can always be dismissed as a "mystery" or reinterpreted to fit the pre-determined conclusion. It’s the reason we know, for example, that seizures are not signs of demonic activity despite the fact that the church used to think this. Or that left-handed or queer people aren’t demon possessed despite what the church used to assert. Or that the earth isn’t flat with a dome-shaped firmament on top, just like the church used to assert. I can go on and on. But I will absolutely agree that scientific communities and even philosophical ones can get dogmatic. But that happens not because of science but because of not having it. The method tends to autocorrect. Science is a process and a method, not a collection of facts or beliefs. That’s religion’s shtick.
Q: But isn’t that process and method necessitated by a collection of facts or beliefs?
A: Yes; however, the beliefs themselves are also put under the same scrutiny. The facts and beliefs occur in the formation they do because nothing has been able to disprove them yet. The things that are conclusively disproven get ejected. This is nothing like something making an ultimate claim on reality with a collection of facts or beliefs that it doesn’t allow itself even to question.
In (the current philosophy of) science, no belief is sacred or immune from scrutiny. Even the most fundamental assumptions and theories are constantly being tested and challenged. If new evidence arises that contradicts a previously held belief, scientists are compelled to modify or abandon that belief.
This is in stark contrast to the apologetic approach, where certain core beliefs (like the existence of God or the truth of scripture) are treated as inviolable and beyond question. Apologists start with these beliefs as unassailable premises and then seek to defend them against any challenge.
Q: You say science doesn’t hold any beliefs as sacred or immune from scrutiny, but what about things like human experimentation and eugenics? All of which Science supported!
A: So there’s a key factor you’re not getting here. What you described isn’t actually science but the philosophy of science. The philosophy of what science ought to be doing is always up for debate and change. Which leads me to my next point. Scientists supported those things because their philosophy of science is not what people have today. This is why science no longer supports these things. The philosophy changed in great part due to scientific advancements that helped the philosophy of science change. It’s the same exact reason why the church used to support slavery but now condemns it for the most part. Because your philosophies changed on how to interpret and enforce scriptures. The difference is that given an ultimate divine knowledge text like the Bible is supposed to be, there should be no ideological and philosophical divide. Some of you hate queer people, some of you hate left-handed people, some of you still believe in slavery, some of you believe in demons, and some of you believe that women are beneath men. What do these all have in common? They come from a stagnant, mostly unchanging(unless someone finds some hidden Bible verses) proof text that you just arbitrarily assume provides you powers with logic only being used after the fact to validate it. This entire process is dishonest from top to bottom.
Q: But some Christians do question their faith and conclude that Christ is the only or mainly valid conclusion. Doesn’t that make this valid?
A: Still no. If asked why they pick one faith and not the other, the answer is never thoroughly logical. I can just as easily ask, “Why not Buddha?” When pressed on why they choose Christianity over other faiths, the answer is rarely a purely logical or evidential one. More often, it comes down to subjective factors like personal experience, cultural familiarity, or emotional resonance—"It just feels right."
However, personal feelings and experiences, while psychologically compelling, are not reliable indicators of truth. People from all faiths (and none at all) can and do have profound personal experiences that they interpret as confirmations of their beliefs. The fact that a belief feels right to someone does not make it true, and I really feel like I shouldn’t have to say this.
Moreover, the fact that someone questions their faith and still concludes that it's true does not necessarily mean that their conclusion is rationally justified. It's possible (and common) for people to question their beliefs in a limited or biased way, seeking only confirmatory evidence and ignoring or downplaying contradictory evidence. As I mentioned earlier, this is called confirmation bias.
A genuine, impartial questioning of faith would need to consider all evidence and arguments equally, including those that challenge the faith. It would need to apply the same standards of logic and evidence to one's own beliefs as to others'. And it would need to be open to the possibility that one's current beliefs are wrong perpetually. If it only does the barest minimum just to justify clamping down on an ideology, this is not at all a respectable position. It actually reveals this to be more about existential comfort than truth.
The fact that apologists rarely apply this kind of rigorous, impartial questioning to their own faith but demand it of others is a double standard that undermines the credibility of their position. If the reasons for affirming Christianity could just as easily be used to affirm Shintoism, Hinduism, or any other faith, then those reasons are not compelling grounds for accepting Christianity as uniquely true.
Q: What about the historical evidence for Jesus' resurrection? Doesn't that prove Christianity is true?
A: This question asserts that there is compelling historical evidence for the central miracle of Christianity. However, the historical evidence for Jesus' resurrection is far from conclusive. The gospel accounts are contradictory, were written decades after the events they describe, and make extraordinary claims that strain credulity. Moreover, even if one accepts the historical existence of Jesus merely existing, the leap from "Jesus existed" to "Jesus was the divine son of God who rose from the dead" is a huge one that requires far more than historical evidence to justify. There is no way to test that claim because we’d have to have a method to test everything’s relation to God. Which we don’t. One might argue that sin is our method of testing one’s relation to God, but then infants, angels, Buddha, divine figures from other religions, and people with severe mental handicaps, as well as all animals, plants, and bacteria, are all closer to God. We’d also have to test God (which I have a feeling Christians wouldn’t like for some reason) and the distance sin separates us from him. There are so many variables that we simply cannot account for, and so you’re just asking people to swallow an iceberg(more like a fatberg) of claims with no valid evidence. The Christian claim about Jesus' unique divine status and salvific role is a metaphysical and theological claim, not a historical one. It is not something that can be proven or disproven by historical evidence alone. It is equal in validity to someone claiming they were Jesus in a past life. And what do you know? Literally tons of people claim that and literally tons of people believe them. Yet you know these claims are false. Why?
Q: Well, we don’t need Logic. Faith is always higher than logic. What do you have to say to that?
A: You’re always using logic whether you admit it or not. Logic, in the broadest sense, is simply the principle of valid reasoning. It's the tool we use to distinguish coherent, consistent, and well-supported ideas from incoherent, contradictory, or unsupported ones. As such, it's not something one can choose to use or not use. It's inherent in the very act of thinking and arguing. You’re at any point in time, either using logic or flawed logic. Logic is the way human brains process things. Yes, even emotions are governed by some form of logic that is unknown to us at the moment. Here’s how I can prove this. If I tell a Christian the claim, “God literally just honestly told me that he doesn’t exist.” How do you know it’s wrong? The response you would have to that would necessarily either come from logic or flawed logic. You don’t need to be a logician to know that the claim I just made is paradoxical and refutes itself. You would use logic to refute the statement, and good on you. So, to sit here and call something faith when it’s really just flawed logic and then claim it’s higher than logic (likely because it makes you feel comfortable) is a no-go. In essence, the claim that faith is higher than logic is itself a logical fallacy. It's a form of special pleading, an attempt to exempt religious beliefs from the standards of rational argumentation and empirical verification that we apply to all other claims about reality. In fact, on a meta-level, you just refute yourself because in order to even ask the question you just said to me, you are necessarily using a form of reasoning. You’re proving my point! Anything you can say as a response to this, even if it’s to just stomp your feet into the ground and bury your head in the sand, is due to you using flawed reasoning and logic, not valid faith. It's essentially saying, "My beliefs are true because I have faith in them, and faith is superior to logic and evidence, which is a belief of mine," which is a circular and self-justifying argument.
Q: Can science really explain everything? Aren't there questions that science can't answer, such as the meaning of life or the nature of consciousness?
A: This question tries to set up a false choice between science and religion, suggesting that if science can't explain everything, religious explanations must be valid. However, the fact that there are currently unanswered questions does not mean that religious answers are correct. Science's inability to explain something yet is not evidence for God - it's simply evidence of the current limits of our knowledge. Moreover, many questions that were once thought to be beyond the realm of science (such as the nature of life or the origin of the universe) are now the subjects of rigorous scientific investigation. This is starkly contrasted with apologetic attempts to leverage mystery in their favor by injecting that the mystery must be evidence of a deity.
Q: Isn't it possible that some religious truths are beyond human reason, but that doesn't mean all religious truths are irrational?
A: This question tries to create a distinction between "beyond reason" and "irrational," suggesting that some religious truths might be supra-rational rather than irrational. However, this is a semantic distinction without a meaningful difference. If a truth is beyond reason, then by definition, it cannot be rationally defended. Attempting to argue for the truth of something that is admittedly beyond argument is still a paradox, regardless of the terminology used.
Q: Couldn't God, being omniscient, know things that appear paradoxical to us but are not actually paradoxical from His perspective?
A: This question appeals to God's omniscience to suggest that what appears to be a paradox to human reason might not be a paradox to divine reason. However, this argument is a form of special pleading. If we accept that God can know paradoxical things, then we have no basis for trusting any of our reasoning about God, including the reasoning that led us to conclude that He is omniscient in the first place. This argument undermines itself.
Q: Isn't it arrogant to assume that human reason can comprehend all truth? If there are limits to human reason, doesn't that leave room for faith?
A: This question suggests that the limitations of human reason justify faith in religious claims. However, recognizing the limits of reason is not the same as abandoning reason altogether. The fact that we cannot know everything does not mean that we can know nothing or that all claims are equally valid. Faith is not a reliable method for distinguishing true claims from false ones, especially when those claims contradict the evidence of our senses and the conclusions of our reason. In fact, it’s arrogant to assume that your interpretation of God has the specific maximum properties and answers to everything.
Q: Can't reason and faith coexist? Many great thinkers have been both rational and religious.
A: This question points to examples of intelligent, rational people who have also been religious as evidence that reason and faith are compatible. However, this is a form of the appeal to authority fallacy. The fact that intelligent people have believed something does not make it true. Moreover, many great thinkers have also been wrong about many things. The compatibility of reason and faith in any individual's mind does not resolve the fundamental logical tension between the two.
Q: But isn’t your jump to anti-theism based on faith? You can never definitively disprove the existence of God, after all.
A: Actually, if you stick around and get comfortable, I’ll show you exactly how I plan to do something very similar. And also, my stance on anti-theism isn’t faith-based. It’s based on trust. Faith, as I’ve been discussing it here, is belief without evidence. If you can’t tell by the length of this article alone, my beliefs are the result of reasonable conclusions given the evidence.
Q: Isn't the claim that apologetics is always irrational itself an absolute claim that goes beyond the evidence?
A: You wish you could catch me slipping like that, don’t you? My argument is a logical deduction that leads to a necessary claim, not an absolute claim in the sense of a dogmatic assertion. But seriously, though, if you can find an error in my logic, please let me know, and I’ll retract or correct the statement. The deduction once more goes like this:
Apologetics attempts to rationally defend religious beliefs, some of which are ultimately mysterious or beyond reason.
Attempting to defend beliefs that are admittedly beyond reason rationally is paradoxical and irrational.
Therefore, apologetics, insofar as it relies on appeals to mystery, is based on irrationality.
This is a valid deduction, and the conclusion follows necessarily from the premises. If the premises are true, then the conclusion must also be true.
So, when I say that apologetics is based on irrationality, I’m not making an unconditional, blanket statement about all apologetic arguments. I’m making a specific claim about the logical consequences of the apologetic paradox: when apologetics resorts to appeals to mystery to defend beliefs that it claims are rationally defensible, which tends to happen when pressed far enough it is revealed that the premise of apologetics is grounded in irrationality because it has a ceiling and that ceiling exposes the irrationality and the unnecessary existence of the apologetic stance.
This is a crucial distinction. I’m not saying that every apologetic argument is always irrational, but that the core strategy of apologetics when it involves appeals to mystery, is fundamentally irrational. This irrationality is not an accidental feature of some apologetic arguments but a necessary consequence of the apologetic method itself.
So, in response to the question, the answer is no. My claim is not that apologetics is always irrational but that it is necessarily based on irrationality when it relies on the paradoxical strategy of appealing to mystery to defend supposedly rational beliefs. This is a logically deduced claim, not an absolute assertion.
Thank you for reading this far. I greatly appreciate it and understand that this is a long post. Many of you will probably have realized something by now in this post. It seems like I’m setting up a false dichotomy between Christianity and Anti-theism. That’s not actually the case, though. You see, I have more argumentation to reveal to you why I’m saying ALL religious beliefs should be largely denied by institutions. I want to stress that I’m not arguing for the non-existence of God here but that it wouldn’t matter if there were a god. It wouldn’t necessarily lead us to form these religious groups.
My claims here with these next sections are simple enough.
Whether or not a deity exists doesn’t matter in the slightest.
No god has free will and so can ever be anything more than a cosmic puppet.
Even if they did exist, none of them could ever be maximal or omnipotent.
The rule paradox
Self-reference is an interesting feature of our linguistic and cognitive landscapes. The famous Liar paradox is perhaps the most famous example of what can go awry when something references itself. I’m told what I’m about to share with you is a bit like a self-referential paradox, and it’s something I’ve been studying for a few months. It’s incredibly simple but the conclusions that can be drawn from it are numerous. For the sake of our discussion, I’ll just keep that to a minimum.
What do you suppose happens when someone makes the claim, “There are no rules that exist higher than God Almighty?”
Well, aside from the moral absolutism, potential for abuse and exploitation, and lack of accountability that such beliefs can generate on a logical level, something special happens. It creates what’s called an infinite regress.
The statement there are no rules that exist higher than God Almighty is itself a rule. It’s an assertion about what God must be and his relationship to everything supposedly underneath him. If the statement is true, then it contradicts itself because it establishes a rule above God that is superimposed onto God. If it’s false, then your belief system (Because, let’s be honest, when they say God, they also mean their core beliefs) isn’t omnipotent anyway. And trying to escape it by saying, “But that’s the only rule!” Actually only digs you in deeper. To make that claim, you’d have to assert that the rule is higher than the rule you’re positing.
“But Danni, I’m not making a statement; I’m making a general observation on the nature of ultimate reality and our observable universe.” Doesn’t matter. In fact, you run into further problems even when you say this. In order for that statement to be true, some rule or force must make it true, thus trapping you back into the paradox. There would necessarily be a rule that organizes and establishes the relationship between God and all these rules, and whatever that thing is would be separate, distant, and higher than “God Almighty.”
This paradox continues indefinitely no matter what you do the moment you try to say God is the ultimate anything. Ergo, it reveals that the very statement is incoherent. It’s logically self-refuting. Here. I’ll show you via a modal logical formulation. Please keep in mind I’m still a student of logic, so while there may be one or two things off in my formulae, they still lead back to the same conclusion.
Let's start by defining some basic terms and symbols:
Let R be the set of all rules.
Let r be the rule "there are no rules."
Let s be the rule "r is the only rule."
Now, we can try to express this paradox as a series of logical statements:
Assume a theoretical reality where there are no rules. In other words, R = ∅ (the empty set).
However, the statement "there are no rules" (r) is itself a rule. So, r ∈ R.
But if r is the only rule, then we have another rule (s) stating that r is the only rule. So, s ∈ R.
Now, we have two rules (r and s), which contradicts the original assumption that there are no rules (R = ∅).
We can try to resolve this by stating that r and s are the only rules. But this introduces a new rule (let's call it t), which states that r and s are the only rules. So, t ∈ R.
This process continues indefinitely, generating an infinite sequence of rules: r, s, t, ...
We can express this more formally as a recursive definition:
Let R₀ = ∅
Let R₁ = {r}
Let R₂ = {r, s}
...
Let Rₙ₊₁ = Rₙ ∪ {the rule stating that Rₙ contains all the rules}
This defines an infinite sequence of sets, each containing one more rule than the previous set. The union of all these sets (⋃ₙ Rₙ) would represent the total set of rules generated by the paradox.
Let's try to reformulate my paradox in intuitionistic terms:
Assume a theoretical reality where there are no rules above God Almighty. In other words, R = ∅ (the empty set).
The statement "there are no rules" (r) is itself a rule. So, r ∈ R.
But if r is the only rule, then we have another rule (s) stating that r is the only rule. So, s ∈ R.
Now, we have two rules (r and s), which contradicts the original assumption that there are no rules (R = ∅).
We can try to resolve this by stating that r and s are the only rules. But this introduces a new rule (t), which states that r and s are the only rules. So, t ∈ R.
This process continues indefinitely, generating an infinite sequence of rules: r, s, t, ...
The key difference in intuitionistic logic is that we cannot automatically assume that the statement "there are no rules" is either true or false. However, the paradox still seems to hold, because the very act of asserting that there are no rules (even if we don't assign a definite truth value to this assertion) generates the infinite regress of meta-rules.
Even in a paraconsistent logic that allows for true contradictions, the paradox would still generate an infinite regress of meta-rules.
Let's consider the paraconsistent version of the paradox:
Assume a theoretical reality where there are no rules (R = ∅) and there are rules (R ≠ ∅).
The statement "there are no rules, and there are rules" (p) is itself a rule. So, p ∈ R.
But if p is the only rule, then we have another rule (q) stating that p is the only rule. So, q ∈ R.
Now, we have two rules (p and q) in addition to the original contradictory rules.
We can try to resolve this by stating that p and q are the only rules. But this introduces a new rule (r), which states that p and q are the only rules. So, r ∈ R.
This process continues indefinitely, generating an infinite sequence of meta-rules: p, q, r, ...
So, even in a paraconsistent framework that accepts the initial contradiction of "no rules and rules above God Almighty," the attempt to state this as a rule generates an uncountably infinite hierarchy of meta-rules, just as in the classical version of the paradox. And this is truly something for a multitude of reasons. I’m not the most well-versed in paraconsistent logic, but I found it pertinent to share this all the while. From what I understand, paraconsistent frameworks reject something called the ‘principle of explosion.’ This essentially is a causal chain that sparks from a contradiction. So, in my other formulations, one contradiction definitely sparked everything else after. What makes this so different is that in paraconsistent logic, each step has to be evaluated on its own regardless of previous contradictions. But what you’ll see here is that no matter what, the contradiction always arises anyway. It is the process or essentially the statement about there being no rules above God Almighty that continually generates this paradox infinitely.
But what I’d like to show is something even more devastating. I’m going to propose a specific system of logic that has a single axiom. Axioms are the grounding statements that give a system of logic its foundations. This system of logic I’m about to propose ought to do away with the rule paradox. Let’s see how it fairs.
I want to show you the power of the rule paradox from an excerpt I have on it:
Let's have a logical system called "Finitary Logic" (FL), which has the following core axiom:
Axiom of Finite Grounding (AFG): Every true statement in FL must be grounded in a finite sequence of inferential steps, each of which is itself finitely grounded.
In other words, FL prohibits any form of infinite regress in its proofs or justifications and requires that every true statement be traceable back to a finite set of foundational axioms or primitive truths.
Now, let's see how the rule paradox would play out in this system:
1. Assume a theoretical reality where there are no rules. In other words, R = ∅ (the empty set).
2. The statement "there are no rules" (r) is itself a rule. So, r ∈ R.
3. But if r is the only rule, then we have another rule (s) stating that r is the only rule. So, s ∈ R.
4. Now, we have two rules (r and s), which contradicts the original assumption that there are no rules (R = ∅).
5. We can try to resolve this by stating that r and s are the only rules. But this introduces a new rule (t), which states that r and s are the only rules. So, t ∈ R.
6. This process continues indefinitely, generating an infinite sequence of rules: r, s, t, ...
At this point, FL would be forced to reject the paradox, as it violates the AFG. The infinite regress of meta-rules generated by the paradox cannot be grounded in a finite sequence of inferential steps and thus cannot be admitted as a valid or true statement within the system.
However, this rejection itself reveals a deeper problem. By rejecting the paradox, FL is effectively introducing a new meta-rule (let's call it MR):
MR: Any statement that generates an infinite regress of rules is false in FL.
But MR itself is a rule and one that is not finitely grounded, as it refers to the infinite regress generated by the paradox. So, by rejecting the paradox, FL is forced to admit a rule that violates its own foundational axiom (the AFG).
In other words, the paradox has effectively forced FL to contradict itself and admit an infinite regress, even as it tries to avoid or prohibit such regresses. This shows that the infinite regress generated by the paradox is not merely an artifact of certain logical systems but a deep and inescapable feature of the very concept of rules and logic itself.
Even a system like FL, which is explicitly designed to avoid infinite regresses, cannot escape the paradoxical implications of this. By trying to reject the paradox, FL is forced to admit a meta-rule that itself generates an infinite regress, thus undermining its own foundations.
It suggests that the infinite regress of rules is not merely a feature of certain logical systems but a fundamental and inescapable aspect of the very nature of logic and reality itself.
No matter how hard we try to avoid or prohibit infinite regresses, the paradox shows that they are always lurking just beneath the surface, ready to emerge and undermine any attempt to establish a finite or bounded logical system.
It has the potential to revolutionize our understanding of the nature and limits of logic and human knowledge. By showing how my paradox arises even in systems designed to avoid it, I hope to have demonstrated its truly universal and inescapable character.
The Axiom of Finite Grounding (AFG) that I posit for this system as the core principle of FL is an articulation of the common intuition that truth and validity must ultimately rest on a finite and stable foundation. Take it as a metaphor for our intuitions on the subjects. It captures the widespread assumption that infinite regresses are somehow logically or epistemically illegitimate and that a well-formed system of reasoning must be traceable back to a set of basic axioms or primitives that are themselves beyond question.
Ultimately, my work on the rule paradox aims to show that the very notion of logical or philosophical certainty is itself deeply problematic and maybe even incoherent. The quest for ultimate foundations or finite grounds is a kind of mirage that always recedes as we approach it, leaving us with an infinitely complex and regressive picture of reality. Truth can only be somewhat relative. This is not to say that facts don’t exist but that they have no grounding outside of relation. There are things that are absolutely true on Earth but not on Mars. There are things that are true in Hawai’i but not in Seattle. And yet, despite this infinite regress, there are things that are never true.
Once again, I want to reiterate that what this conclusively shows us is that there’s no such thing as an ultimate deity from ANY religion whatsoever. The moment one even hints at such a thing a paradox that is generated which creates an uncountably infinite amount of rules, meta rules, meta-meta rules and so on. And if you’re the type that thinks rules need to have a conscious creator, then this puts you in even deeper of a bind because what this paradox also shows us is that God in all his glory would himself have a God that he worshiped or that was equally hidden and unknown to him as he is to us. There would be infinite meta-gods and meta-meta gods, each more hidden and powerful than the last. So, no matter how you slice it, nothing you believe in could ever be omnipotent. This would average out to mean that God is infinitely weak, just like us in the face of this whole situation. Due to the way infinity works, his lack of omnipotence would mean he’d be just as useless as us when it came to the meta-reality and even this one since that meta-reality governs him. There would be some governing law and/or deity that allowed him to function ad infinitum. This can also be extrapolated with my next argument to reveal that God has no free will whatsoever, even if he did exist. Let’s just get to the Q&A.
Q: “Rules” here isn’t explained at all. There are many ways to interpret the concept, and this could lead to equivocation or mistake. Could you explain your definition of “rules”?
A: Yes, of course. I shouldn’t just assume the term rules. Rules are prescriptive principles or statements that define or govern behavior and properties. Examples include logical principles (like the rule of non-contradiction) and theological statements (like "God is omnipotent").
Q: This is far too abstract to be of any use logically. You’re making up something incredibly abstract just to take down a religious belief. This is straw-manning at its worst. Don’t you see that?
A: You realize that God is an abstract concept, right? In order to connect anything to him at all, I have to meet him where he’s at at some point to connect something to him. So, of course, there would be something abstract in the argument. When did abstraction have anything to do with the truth value of a claim? A lot of people don’t know this, but the field of mathematics is abstract. Especially when you get into some of its deeper areas, it can altogether forgo reality but still come to sound conclusions. So, I find it strange that you would make an appeal to concreteness.
When we say "there are no rules above God," we are not just making a claim about God's power but about his ontological status. We are saying that God is not subject to any external constraints and that there are no principles or laws that govern his existence or actions. However, the paradox shows that this claim is inherently self-refuting. The statement itself is a rule about God and thus contradicts its own content.
In theological terms, this might be expressed as a challenge to the idea of divine aseity (Source: Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy) or self-existence. If God's nature is genuinely independent and unconditioned, then it can’t be subject to any rules, even self-imposed ones. But the very claim that God is not subject to rules is itself a rule, leading to a logical contradiction.
Or, to put it another way, the paradox suggests that the concept of a rule-transcendent being is not logically coherent. Any attempt to define or describe such a being necessarily involves making claims or rules about its nature, which undermines the very idea of transcendence if the claims are to be believed as accurate.
And I really want to be clear here. If this is what you take away from the rule paradox, then it is you who are straw-manning me.
Q: This is just a cheap rebranding of the paradox of the stone! Why can’t you see we’ve already solved this issue because God can only do what’s logically possible?! (Sorry, I’m having a bit too much fun, but this is genuinely what some people have told me before)
A: To be real with you, I didn’t have that on my mind at all when I discovered the rule paradox. I can admit, though, that on a superficial level, they are similar. It’s completely uncharitable to straw-man and minimize this by relegating it to a theological argument that most people don’t take seriously. Of course, I can think of a few reasons why you would do that. But I won’t get into that here. For those of you who don’t know, The Paradox of the Stone focuses explicitly on God's ability to limit his own power, asking whether God can create a stone so heavy that he cannot lift it. If he can, then there is something he cannot do (lift the stone), and if he cannot, then there is also something he cannot do (create such a stone).
The Rule Paradox is qualitatively different. It makes a broader and more fundamental point about the coherence of the idea of a rule-transcendent being. It's not just about specific abilities or inabilities but about the logical implications of saying that God is not bound by any rules or limitations whatsoever. This is a meta-level that occurs before the abilities of such a being can even be discussed. It’s like discussing whether flying cars are even possible (rule paradox) before we discuss whether they should be gas or electric (paradox of the stone). The self-referential nature of this claim generates the paradox, not any particular scenario or thought experiment.
Also, I really don’t understand how people don’t get this. What is “logically” possible is relative to divine entities. For example, it’s logically impossible for something finite to interact with something infinite. In order for something infinite to even interact with finitude, it would need to be processed, but the thing processing it would need to have greater processing power than the thing it’s processing. But if the thing you’re processing is infinite, it can’t be processed. Or to make it simple. There’s no such thing as an infinite afterlife (sorry, heaven, you’re not confirmed). I have already discussed this in my last article on the philosophy of time. Likewise, if God were infinite, he wouldn’t be able to communicate with us in any way (and this is where we get into The Paradox of the Stone.) because he would have to process himself into our finite reality.
Anyway, you can say the two paradoxes are related in a parent/child sort of way if you’d like. They are distinct arguments with different logical structures and implications at the end of the day. Dismissing the Rule Paradox as a cheap rebranding is an uncharitable and superficial reading that fails to engage with the specifics of my argument. If you’re dull, admit that. If you’re afraid of the argument, then admit that. But don’t straw-man it.
Q: No, you daft ignoramus! You’re the one who’s setting up a strawman of omnipotence! Don’t you see?! (Seriously I got a lot of this over on Reddit)
A: Again… First, it's not clear that this limited definition of omnipotence is universally accepted by theists. Many theological traditions do, in fact, ascribe to God the power to transcend ordinary logical limitations (because, as I said, when you’re discussing a divine being, that all becomes relative anyway), even if this leads to apparent paradoxes. The idea of God as the ultimate ground of all beings, the source of all possibility and necessity, is a common one in theistic metaphysics, and it's not obviously compatible with the idea of God being bound by logical rules.
But more importantly, I don't think this objection really engages with the substance of the Rule Paradox. The paradox isn't claiming that God should be able to do the logically impossible, like creating a square circle, married bachelor, or hot ice. What it does do is show that the very idea of a rule-transcendent being, one who is not bound by any rules whatsoever, is itself logically incoherent.
The point is that the statement "there are no rules that apply to God or past God" is itself a rule that applies to God or past him because it governs him and is thus self-refuting. This isn't a matter of logical impossibility in the sense of violating the law of non-contradiction or something like that. It's a matter of the inherent self-reference and instability of the concept of rule-transcendence itself.
The Rule Paradox operates on a meta-level, questioning the coherence of the framework within which we attribute omnipotence (or anything) to God.
Q: Can any form of spirituality escape this paradox?
A: Oh yeah, plenty can. As long as they admit they have no claim to any ultimate reality, deity, landscape, or truth. Many religions are greedy, however, and try to “go for the gold,” so to speak. They know since it can’t be proven one way or the other, inserting them into this made-up area can give them a veil of legitimacy. (To be charitable, some people also just have what they feel are all-encompassing spiritual experiences and that the rest of the world needs to catch up.) But as I’ve just shown, this isn’t actually true. That’s why I said earlier if you want to do your own individual, humble thing, then that’s different as long as you’re not hurting anyone. But these ridiculous claims that these religions make are a no-go.
Q: Can’t I just say that whatever is at the top is where God is?
A: No, because technically, there isn’t a top. This would also reveal that you are making an ad hoc grab for power in lieu of this paradox. It’s uncountably infinite, so the moment you define something like God, it’s already past him and above him.
Q: I don’t understand logical formulas and symbols. Can you summarize and translate this for a layperson?
A: Of course. I’m not the most well-versed in logical formulation either, but I’m always learning. In essence, what this paradox shows is that no matter what happens, you can always ask “Why?” and there be a legitimate answer. Even if you don’t ever come to realize the question, you can always ask, “Why this, why that, why the third?” Eventually, you’d be able to ‘outwhy’ even God. To expand on what this means, it also shows that if you wanted to assert there was a deity above everyone, that deity and, by extension, you would have two options.
Admitting its limited scope from the outset.
Falling into this paradox and being made irrelevant
These are the only options if you want to play the God game.
Q: Okay, but can’t we just say that the arbitrary rules this paradox generates are the only rules that technically stem from this? After all, if it’s just a bunch of arbitrary rules about rules, then what does it matter? My God is still supreme!
A: Actually, no. In fact, stating that actually reactivates the paradox all over again. I wasn’t exaggerating when I said it was uncountably infinite. In fact, you are saying that is merely repeating the very thing that created this paradox in the first place. That in itself is now also a rule. Rules, principles, and forces now have to exist to make it stay that way. But the moment that happens, it becomes untrue anyway. Here, let me say it in a different way.
The paradox starts with the premise that "there are no rules."
But this statement itself is a rule which generates a contradiction.
Trying to resolve the contradiction by saying "the rule 'there are no rules' is the only rule" just introduces another rule, perpetuating the paradox.
Now, if we try to contain the paradox by saying, "the arbitrary rules and meta-rules generated by the paradox are the only rules," we're essentially making the same move as in step 3.
We're introducing a new rule (let's call it N) that says, "The arbitrary rules and meta-rules generated by the paradox are the only rules."
But N is not one of the arbitrary rules generated by the paradox. It's a new rule that we've introduced to try to contain it.
So, N is absolutely not arbitrary; it has a specific and crucial role in our reasoning about the paradox.
But then N needs to be included in the set of rules we're considering, which means it's not true that the arbitrary rules and meta-rules generated by the paradox are the only rules.
So we're back in the paradox because we've introduced a new rule that contradicts the premise we were trying to establish.
Q: Okay, so how does this make you an anti-theist? You haven’t conclusively disproven that a deity exists with this formula/paradox. All you’ve done is show that They would be a part of a pantheon.
A: I hope nobody is actually thinking this, but I’ll spell this one out just in case. This also couldn’t be true because the moment you group this infinity together as a pantheon, you actually limit it, and the infinity runs past it still. My goal is not to conclusively disprove the existence of God or whatever deity you believe in per se (although a strong argument can be made from my work, in my opinion). Although, in some cases, that’s exactly what I’m saying, especially if you claim this being to be an omnipotent ultimate authority. That’s not possible. But what I am doing is getting you to look at these things in perspective. Due to this paradox, even if your favorite flavor of divine did exist, they would be infinitely weak. No stronger than you or I in the face of it and certainly by no means omnipotent. Up to this point, if you still haven’t come to terms with your ‘omnipotent’ God not existing, I’ll go further. I want to clarify that my position as an anti-theist is more of a political one than a theistic one. In terms of theology, I believe in what this formula shows. That it simply doesn’t matter. To that end, I simply call myself an “atheist” in the sense that, as this formula shows, there’s no one ultimate entity. Any God you fathom could be real, but they would be a cosmological bacterium to the beings above them, which they could scarcely fathom. What’s to stop me from going around your God and beseeching a higher, more alien God or Force? Two can play that game. (Or I suppose infinite amounts of beings could play that game, given the paradox.) You’d have to be bound to your one infinitely weak deity. I’m going to move on to the next part of this argument. Let me show you how even if this deity existed, He/She/They wouldn’t have free will. Not even a shred of it.
Q: Where do you even get off saying this? All you're showing is that rules may exist over God. There are no Gods before him.
A: I find it very funny the type of people who would ask this question and say this type of statement. That you would take an atheistic stance now. You see, because the irony is that for a large majority of you, you posit that due to the detailed laws holding our reality together, there must be an architect who orchestrated them. All I'm asking you to do is be consistent. If your reasoning is that detailed laws mean someone made them, then the infinitely more detailed laws that would be in effect over your deity would come from other deities per your own logic. It feels arbitrary and strange to stop the buck now just because you want to cut the head of the snake off at your particular deities’ feet. As the paradox shows, this doesn't work. But I'll tell you what. It still wouldn't matter if you wanted to switch things up at this point. Because forces and rules above your God or deity alone would still minimize and relegate them into irrelevance. A force or law can be something as poetic and abstract as the Tao. So what am I to say? Is Taoism the law over Christianity that governs even Christ Almighty? Whether or not you want to be rational and consistent and admit other deities is of no concern. It doesn't change it. So, in this case, you have two options if you’re being rational (at least from what I can see):
Admit that a detailed reality doesn’t necessarily imply a creator.
Claim that it does, but then give in to the infinite regress and admit your God is irrelevant on an objective basis.
Q: What about the Kalam Cosmological Argument? If this were really an infinity, we’d never have reached this reality.
A: Actually, no, and my last article debunks the Kalam. You should give it a read if you want to hear a philosophy on time. To make a long story short, your brain is a physical, finite object with limits. You can only perceive finitude. And you must know this because many of you theists are the main ones saying, “We are limited before His infinite power and wisdom.” This is an explicit admission that you know your mind is limited. You would have no way of knowing if you were in the infinity.
Now, we have a few more details to go over.
The four worlds paradox
This paradox I’m about to share not only conclusively disproves free will for humans but also any type of deity, thus rendering omnipotence moot. I’ll just get straight into it. I’ll be making the argument using a kind of modal logic so as to examine all possibilities. It’s an expert from my upcoming book about the non-existence of free will.
Four worlds paradox: There are no possible worlds where free will exists.
In this case, there are four possibilities.
I: this looks at you as a necessary being. (God is often described as such) If you are the same in all possible worlds that shows you lack free will because you possess an immutable, internal nature and can't have done differently.
E: this looks at your differences across all worlds as necessary. This means you are absolutely different in every possible world, with the only similarity being that this is somehow “you.” This still shows you lack free will because the only reason you're different is because you're in a different world or circumstance. Your ability to be changed by your external circumstances is immutable in this instance. Or rather, only whatever is outside of you decides what you are and what you do.
C: this is a compatibilist model. If we talk about the subject of possibilities where you are the same in some worlds but different in others, that still shows you lack free will because your similarities are chalked up to you (I), and your differences are chalked up to the world (E). This world is in essence our real ordinary world however now that you understand I and E I hope it's clear that this world not only isn't free it's actually the most restricted. You are permanently stuck in this tug-of-war between your internal world and the external world, and what this world shows is that you are not the tugger. You are the rope itself.
F: this is a model where you are completely unbound by yourself or the world. Everything would be completely random and have nothing to do with previous rules, thus leaving you no choice but to “decide” to do anything. In this reality, you would be completely nonsensical because you wouldn't be reacting to external or internal stimuli, and you wouldn't act in any consistent way.
These are your four possibilities for what ‘free will’ looks like. Try as you might, nothing escapes them. Please feel free to try if it behooves you. Ultimately, it bottoms out to internal necessity, external necessity, a deterministic interplay between the two, or arbitrariness.
Q: But Danni! How is world C not free? You get more choices.
A: I can see why you’d think that. But in actuality, you’re more constricted. My favorite way of describing this is by imagining a cool, young lass named Sarah who lives in Victorian England. Now Sarah, unbeknownst to the rest of society, is a trans man. He actually prefers to go by Douglas. Unfortunately, Douglas can not be who he truly is in this society, as he was assigned to be of the female sex at birth. In order for World C to possess the properties you claim it does, Douglas would have needed to be able to pick his internal state. This leads to an infinite regress, however, because if he could pick the internal state, he’d need to be in a meta-state that contained its own state to be able to do this ad infinitum. What actually happens is that Douglas was born a trans man through no choice of his own. He never asked for it, but his urges and traits are coming to the forefront of his consciousness. The society he lives in requires him to marry, ironically, a man named Douglas (the name he always wished he’d had.) Unfortunately, our chap Douglas (the cool one) only has one option disguised as two. Give in to the internal urges that he didn’t choose or submit to the external boundaries placed upon him by a patriarchal society. However, whatever he decides comes from an internal state that he didn’t pick either, and when you have a harsh society that threatens death for those whose very existence challenges the status quo, I understand entirely why Douglas “decides” to bite the bullet and present as Sarah. To marry the man she wished she could have been allowed to present as. Can you blame him? He’s essentially got a gun to his head.
Q: Okay, but not all situations are that fierce. You’re straw-manning an extraordinarily complex situation.
A: Keep in mind this is supposed to be for a God for whom nothing is complex. The situation absolutely still holds. And even for the case of us humans and our niggling, little complexities, the situation holds as well. You’d have to be able to pick the state in which you are going to react in order for your reaction to be chosen freely. You know our rule paradox. It can also be extrapolated to show how this would be the case.
Q: So you support those trans people, huh? I knew it. You’re just a leftist shill trying to taint us with your agenda.
A: I know some of you may think this. But here’s the thing: I’m not gonna spend too much time with this. Trans people are people just like you and me, end of story. I used the example of a trans person because queer people have suffered disproportionately more from this ‘lapse in judgment’ on society’s part when it comes to free will. I figured it would be pertinent to use a real-world example. If you’re so sensitive that my mentioning a valid position bothers you that badly, then you were likely engaging with this in bad faith anyway, which wouldn’t surprise me if you were religious in some way. Also, I’m an independent, so you should ask for a refund from whoever gave you the psychic lessons.
Now, let me show you something more about this paradox. If you’ve been paying attention, we have everything we need to sharpen the paradox further.
Let’s start with world F:
This was actually invalidated as a true world via our rule paradox from earlier. If you switch the term from “No rule exists higher than God Almighty” to “No rule exists,” the exact same thing plays out, making sure uncountably infinite rules exist. Thus, this world is untrue.
How about world E?
Still invalid. This is because, at the end of the day, the one thing you’d have in common no matter what world you were in is that you’d be a part of the four worlds paradox. Which actually just bottoms out to the ‘I’ world. This even applies to world F, which is another reason that the world is invalid. Now, let’s take common arguments for God and show you how this funnel works.
Person: God can’t be put in boxes. He simply transcends these meager categories.
Me: Oh, cool, the rules don’t apply? F.
Person: No! God is stronger than this!
Me: Oh, cool. Strength! The way you’re using it in this sentence is… (checks dictionary) Oh yes, that’s World I.
Person: No! No! He’s wiser than that!
Me: Hang on a sec. Let me get that dictionary again… Yup, that’s also ‘I.’
Person: He transcends the bounds of causality!
Me: That’s F, and again, remember this all gets funneled down to ‘I.’
We can go on all day, but the fact is that most of the metaphysical contortions used to attempt to escape the four worlds will likely be from F or ‘I’. It wouldn’t matter either way because everything comes down to ‘I’, and remember, none of these equate to freedom whatsoever.
A problem with circularity
So up to this point I’m going to predict that some of the resistance to what I’ve been saying is circular in nature. A form of “He just is” in a sense. So now’s a good time to address those fallacies. It’s really quite fascinating to me as I’ve been hit with so much circular reasoning over the course of my life that I’ve learned something unique about how worthless it is.
It typically occurs when someone makes a blanket statement of "it just is.” And I need to show you with a silly example first so you can get the whole picture.
As a contrived example:
Person 1: Why is God the ultimate deity?
Person 2: He just is!
Person 1: Who made God?
Person 2: He just is!
There seems to be a subtle equivocation in person 2's attempt to shut down person 1's inquiry. Despite the words being the same, they have different implications.
Another example:
Person 1: Why did God allow sin if he knew the pain it would cause? Why are we in this predicament?
Person 2: It just is!
Persona 1: okay so why is the answer to that question “it just is?”
Person 2: It just is!
So what you can see here is despite the two terms being made of the same words they're a bit different and the questions of person 1 make a clear distinction. Person 2 appears to use a mixture of equivocation and circular reasoning. But there's a problem.
We can represent this with exponents for clarity.
Person 1: Why did God allow sin if he knew the pain it would cause? Why are we in this predicament?
Person 2: It just is!¹
Persona 1: Okay, so why is the answer to that question “it just is?”
Person 2: It just is!²
As we can see here, despite the words being the same, what is being conveyed couldn't possibly be the same. Mainly because, in this case, it is² is dependent on it is¹. One wouldn't exist without the other because a qualitatively different question was asked. This can also happen with phrases that are implied to be "it just is," which is very common in religious questioning. Like “he just willed it this way” or “we can ask him when we get to heaven.”
As you can see ‘it just is’ when used to justify circularity falls apart under scrutiny when pressed.
Now, someone might try to bring up math as a counterargument. For example, 1+1 does equal 2, just like 42-40. The 2, when cut apart from the context, are essentially the same. However, this is a category error for several reasons. With math, a number is simply a number and can be neatly separated from an equation, especially when it's the answer to said equation. But this doesn't work with linguistics. For example, who do people in Judaism worship? God. Who do people in Christianity worship? God. Who do people in Islam worship? God. Who do people of the Baha'i faith worship? God. But these "God's" are qualitatively different. To say otherwise is to equivocate them to some degree.
The subtext is being equivocated in these types of arguments. This is why apologetics doesn’t work, as I showed earlier in this essay. And what they’ll often do is the most poetic prose imaginable to walk around the fact that they’re just “it just is-ing” at you. Heck, they’ll actually just Bible at you most of the time.
This is a laughable attempt to shield a dogma and it falls apart when you point this out to them. That they don’t know and it just is but somehow they “just know” that it just is.
Theorem of sufficient complexity
Lastly, here’s a theorem that, if I can explain adequately to you, you’ll understand it to be intuitively true. However, I feel the need to explain it here anyway. In a way, it’s derived from the preface paradox(Source: Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) and Gödel's incompleteness theorems(Source: Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
To put it simply first:
Any sufficiently complex system contains at least one element that is absolutely false.
However, this falsehood cannot be detected beforehand, even with deep, stringent analysis by professionals.
Therefore at best a sufficiently complex system can only be considered “mostly true.”
This however compounds when you take into individual interpretations of said systems which also house their own absolute falsehoods.
Even if each and every individual thought or subsystem of thought is inspected to make sure it’s absolutely true when combined into a system falsehoods will emerge.
Okay, so what does this mean? Let’s get some terms squared away.
Absolutely False: Think the four humors(Source: National Institutes of Health/NIH) in medical science. Think Miasma theory (Source: National Institutes of Health/NIH). Think Phrenology(Source: National Institutes of Health/NIH). Think Eschatology(Source: Britannica), Which I’m saying is false because this entire essay is about how religion but especially Christianity, couldn’t possibly be true. These are absolutely false systems, and no matter how much they studied them, it wouldn’t lead them anywhere practical or to the goals these systems themselves are supposed to be answers to. It’s not like something is somewhat false and just needs a few tweaks. I hope I don’t have to explain how studying Phrenology won’t lead to breakthroughs in genetics or psychology. Let’s say, for example, that you’re close to discovering a cure for colon cancer, and in reality, almost all of your components are good, but you’re missing a few things.
Interpretation: an individuals loosely objective view on a system. They allow for some subjectivity but overall believe the view is legitimate. As an example a person can be a Christian who goes to church but think on their own that Jesus was a vampire because he resurrected from the dead. This is not widely accepted in Christendom and thus this is solely of that person's own interpretation. This is a drastic shift, but interpretations can also have more minor shifts that are less easily noticed. For example a Christian may believe that queer people are going to Hell. This is a wildly debated topic in Christendom but this still falls into that person's individual interpretation because even though there are various denominations and churches who believe this there are also plenty who don't. So, it's this person's "loosely objective" intuitions that would decide how they felt on this issue. Interpretation is also what decides how complex a system is. For instance, explaining something technical within the medical profession, like the latest midwife techniques, would take me significantly longer than an actual midwife. However we each possess a unique perspective and thus have different interpretations even if the differences in our interpretations are minuscule. I noticed when I was a Christian that you could never find two Christians who had the exact same interpretation of a given concept. In fact, many of them clashed. Husbands, wives, and even twins would have slight, at best, differences in their interpretations.
Sufficiently Complex System or SCS: can be held by an individual or collective. A sufficiently complex system links multiple thoughts together in a central theme. The term “sufficiently complex” is typically subjective but in this case is meant to mean a system with enough beliefs that one could not simply learn it in an afternoon or even over an intensive and productive weekend study session. It would likely take a decent amount of study to learn it. Systems that are not as sufficiently complex like how to make an omelette or even isolated notions don’t fall into this.
Mostly True: The highest amount of truth an interpretation or system can attain. This simply means that the system has a valid, possible objective and is heading in the right direction toward reaching that objective but will experience hiccups along the way.
Currently True: Something that is true but only currently. For example, “I am eating pizza.” Is not currently true.
The theorem involves an interplay between modal logic, epistemology, and the philosophy of language. Here’s a breakdown and analysis of the components to validate it.
Formal Components
1. SCS(S)
- "Sufficiently Complex System" \( S \)
2. MT(S)
- "System \( S \) is mostly true"
3. CT(P)
- "Statement \( P \) is currently true"
4. AF(c)
- "Component statement \( c \) is absolutely false"
5. MF(c)
- "Component statement \( c \) is mostly false"
Theorem Breakdown
1. ∀S (SCS(S) → (◇MT(S) ∧ ¬◻MT(S)))
- For all sufficiently complex systems \( S \), it is possible for \( S \) to be mostly true, but it is not necessarily the case that \( S \) is mostly true.
2. ∀S ∃c (c ∈ S ∧ AF(c))
- For all sufficiently complex systems \( S \), there exists a component statement \( c \) such that \( c \) is absolutely false.
3. ∀x ∃P (P ∧ ◻(¬◇(⊢I(x, S) ¬P)))
- For all individuals \( x \), there exists a statement \( P \) such that \( P \) is true (in the metalanguage sense), and it is necessarily the case that it is not possible to prove not-\( P \) within individual \( x \)'s interpretation of system \( S \).
4. ∀S ∃P (P ∧ ◻(¬◇(⊢S ¬P)))
- For all sufficiently complex systems \( S \), there exists a statement \( P \) such that \( P \) is true (in the metalanguage sense), and it is necessarily the case that it is not possible to prove not-\( P \) within system \( S \).
5. ∃P (CT(P) ∧ ¬MT(P))
- There exists a statement \( P \) such that \( P \) is currently true but not mostly true.
6. ∃P (MT(P) ∧ ¬CT(P))
- There exists a statement \( P \) such that \( P \) is mostly true but not currently true.
Detailed Validation
1. SCS(S) → (◇MT(S) ∧ ¬◻MT(S))
This states that if a system is sufficiently complex, it can be mostly true but not necessarily so. This aligns with the notion that complex systems can embody a degree of truth without being entirely true in every aspect.
2. ∀S ∃c (c ∈ S ∧ AF(c))
This asserts that every sufficiently complex system contains at least one absolutely false component. This is plausible, as complexity increases the likelihood of falsehoods or contradictions.
3. ∀x ∃P (P ∧ ◻(¬◇(⊢I(x, S) ¬P)))
This means for any individual, there exists a statement that is true and is necessarily unprovable as false within that individual's interpretation of the system. This is coherent with the idea of personal interpretations maintaining certain truths that cannot be disproven within their own framework.
4. ∀S ∃P (P ∧ ◻(¬◇(⊢S ¬P)))
This is similar to the previous point but applies to the system itself. It suggests that within any complex system, there exists a statement that is true and cannot be disproven by the system's own standards. This mirrors the concept of systems having foundational truths or axioms.
5. ∃P (CT(P) ∧ ¬MT(P))
This indicates the existence of a statement that is true at a given moment but not mostly true. This acknowledges that transient truths can exist within a system.
6. ∃P (MT(P) ∧ ¬CT(P))
This suggests the presence of a statement that is generally true but not currently true. This is reasonable, as broader truths might not hold in specific instances.
This formulation captures all the key points I've outlined:
Sufficiently complex systems can, at best, be mostly true, but never totally true.
All sufficiently complex systems contain some absolutely false components that will never lead anywhere.
Neither individuals' interpretations nor the systems themselves can prove everything that is absolutely or mostly false within them.
Statements can be currently true but not mostly true, and vice versa.
The addition of the component statement predicate (c) and the absolute/most falsity predicates (AF and MF) allows us to express the idea that even if a system's components can be perfected, some irredeemably false elements will remain.
Now, let's use this theorem on religion, as discussed earlier. What this shows is that in a religion like Christianity, for example, there are simply things in it that are absolutely false, not mostly true and perfectible. Religious institutions can't accept this, but let's just say they make the claim that they're still mostly true, and that doesn't mean their core beliefs are false. Well, this violates the theorem because the whole point is that we don't know where the absolute falsehoods are. If we did, they wouldn't be there. And two, even if we did insulate the core doctrines, that begs the question of why that "purification" wouldn't just lead to more falsehoods the moment individuals' interpretations were accepted into the generally agreed upon canon, which is how any sufficiently complex system starts in the first place. Thirdly, it would also lead to an infinite regress in that even once the system is purified, it's no longer sufficiently complex. The individual interpretations would fill in the gap of the bareness of the landscape ad infinitum. And this is what tends to happen to believers when you ask them questions like “How did Adam and Eve procreate the rest of the world without being incestuous?” Or “If Noah’s family were the last humans on Earth, how did other races come into being so fast, given the Earth is only six thousand years old? Wouldn’t they need to be changing features so fast that the Egyptians would have been cousins of the Jews that they supposedly oppressed?” When you ask these questions, they insert their beliefs and opinions into the question.
Also even when stripping down a system to it's bare bones that necessarily involves a consensus or individual interpretation of what to leave in and throw out. In the case of the Bible which has many contradictions this is impossible.
Christianity, as this theorem suggests, is absolutely false itself as a system, and that’s for multiple reasons:
In a rather black-and-white manner, it refers to itself as absolutely true, but this makes that claim absolutely false
Lack of Empirical Evidence: Many religious beliefs and doctrines, including those in Christianity, are based on faith, tradition, and interpretation rather than empirical evidence. This lack of empirical grounding makes it difficult to validate or invalidate specific components definitively.
Absolute Falsehoods: Because these beliefs are not empirically verifiable, they can be considered absolutely false within the context of my theorem. This is especially true for supernatural entities like demons, which lack empirical substantiation.
Demons and Denominational Views: The concept of demons varies widely across different denominations of Christianity. Some view demons as literal beings, while others see them as metaphorical or symbolic. These differing interpretations add layers of complexity and potential falsehoods.
Individual Interpretations: Each individual within a denomination may further interpret these views, adding personal beliefs and experiences to the mix. This further complicates the system, introducing additional layers of undetectable falsehoods.
Layering of Interpretations: As interpretations build upon one another—from the original doctrine to denominational interpretation to individual interpretation—the complexity of the system increases. Each layer is fraught with its own undetectable falsehoods.
Endless Complexity: This layering creates an infinite regress where the system continually generates new potential falsehoods. The process of investigating and interpreting these beliefs leads to a never-ending expansion of complexity and falsehoods.
Empirical Absence: Since these beliefs cannot be empirically verified, they remain within the realm of absolute falsehoods, according to my theorem. The system, therefore, perpetually contains and generates new falsehoods as interpretations evolve. This happens because there’s no empirical anchor that provides a solid chain. At best, one of the only empirical facets we can determine is that Jesus(Yehushua) likely existed. Him walking on water and resurrecting and all of that? There’s nothing empirical about it. So, the entire system of belief is absolutely false.
Assertions and Beliefs: Complex systems like Christianity are grounded in numerous assertions and beliefs, many of which cannot be empirically verified. This reliance on assertion makes the system vulnerable to containing falsehoods.
Systemic Integrity: If any component of the system is absolutely false, it undermines the integrity of the entire system. This is because the components are interconnected, and the presence of falsehoods affects the overall truth value of the system.
Indivisibility of Complex Systems: In sufficiently complex systems, components are often interdependent. Identifying one absolutely false component implies that other parts of the system that rely on or are related to the false component are also called into question.
Systemic Falsehood: If one part of a complex belief system is absolutely false, and the system relies on assertions rather than empirical evidence, the entire system's validity is compromised. This is because the falsehood affects the reliability of the entire network of beliefs.
Q: You’re joking, right? By that logic, everything is absolutely false!
A: Not really. Here, let me see if this helps explain it.
Empirical Systems
Grounded in Evidence: Systems that are based on empirical evidence, such as scientific theories or non-ideological social movements, are capable of being mostly true. They can acknowledge their limitations, adjust to new evidence, and refine their understanding.
Admitting Mostly True: When such systems acknowledge that they are mostly true, they maintain credibility because they are open to correction and improvement based on empirical findings.
Example: A scientific theory, like the theory of evolution, is, at best, mostly true because it is supported by substantial empirical evidence. It is also open to revision with new data and can be eliminated if new, more compelling evidence is discovered.
Ideological Systems
Grounded in Assertion: Ideological systems, like specific interpretations of Christianity, often make absolute claims without the backing of empirical evidence. They are typically based on faith, doctrine, and ideological assertions.
Claiming Absolute Truth: When an ideological system claims to be absolutely true, it becomes vulnerable to the presence of any falsehood. Since it cannot be empirically verified in its entirety, the assertion of absolute truth makes the system absolutely false as soon as any component is proven false.
Example: Christianity's claim to absolute truth is compromised by the presence of contradictions and unverifiable beliefs. This absolute stance means that even a single falsehood undermines the entire system.
What makes it worse is that sufficiently complex systems tend to be downright terrible at understanding their flaws from within their own lens. So, you can’t use Christianity to explain why Christianity is so lacking in truth.
Q: By your own logic, isn’t the system you’re describing at best mostly true?
A: No, actually. This formula is validated through logic however it can be described quite easily to someone without the logic. It can easily be explained to someone in under an hour. In fact it’s essentially just an argument for epistemic humility. If you take the bullet points out of my formula those can easily be discussed with someone without them needing to do an intensive weekend course on it.
Q: But Danni people need religion! Shouldn’t you recognize the profound human needs and desires that religious systems seek to address, even if they do so in ultimately flawed and limited ways? The yearning for meaning, purpose, and transcendence is a deep and abiding feature of the human condition, and religious traditions have evolved over centuries to provide frameworks and practices that speak to those needs.
A: This is literally just a naturalistic fallacy and doesn't have any room in this conversation of logic. I understand the need to beg for this but the truth is there are significantly healthier ways to find personal meaning in one’s life that have a lot less cons and dogmatism.
Q: Why are you using logic in something like this? You can’t use logic on these sorts of things!
A: Again? We’ve been through this already. Here’s another way to explain why I absolutely can.
Logic boundary paradox: If logic really has limits, it can't touch, and a logician or person using logic argues for or learns this through logical reasoning. This ironically proves that logic can operate in that area. Where the boundary lies would need to be ascertained logically. However, the more logic is reasoned with the boundary, the further back the boundary pushes, as once a boundary is explained logically, it expands. Thus, the only place logic can't exist is in sheer vacuousness.
If we are to say there is a boundary logic cannot cross, then the only way for that statement to have validity in a categorically logical discussion/argument is for it to be meant logically. But that just leads to the logic boundary paradox, which mutually affirms the rule paradox.
Q: So you use login in your interpersonal relationships?
A: It would be logical for me to think about not being overly logical when a friend is upset with me for telling them lousy news in a blunt manner. I’m using a form of logical reasoning to know when not to use sheer logic. It’s that simple. Logic is not as cold and distant as people make it sound. That’s a false dichotomy that people operate under.
I should also mention in my theorem things that are mostly true always have the potential to turn absolutely false. For example, let's say we're on the right track to curing colon cancer, but then we go down a dead end that the medical industry wastes 20 years on. At one point, we were mostly true, but we veered off track into being absolutely false because it was a dead end all along. What's unfortunate is that the absolute falsehood had mostly true elements, but that in and of itself doesn't make it mostly true. It's like if I want to make a cake. I have all the ingredients but no bowl or mixing utensil. If I don't know, I need those and just bang all the ingredients together, thinking it will make a cake. I have mostly true pieces, but I am absolutely false. The potentiality of mostly true is lost. Even if I get a mixing utensil but no bowl, my system is still absolutely false if I don't realize I need the bowl.
Anti-Theism: The solution
An ideal world would be one in which these people can begin to recover from the trauma that these systems inflict on them. People may say they don’t feel bad about their religion, but that’s the thing about these terrifying power structures. They don’t even let you know you’re being oppressed. They give you the illusion of peace while they play politics with your “soul.” In a sick way, you become their validation for the religion. It’s a circular system that tries to use appeals to history, community, bandwagon, culture, and architecture(the cathedrals really are beautiful, though) to justify itself because it knows it isn’t true. Now, in the minds of its victims, whenever people try to get them to question the religion. The beautiful painted glass, the community they are a part of, and the trance they enter when they sway to the praise music are subconsciously referenced.
“Of course, it must be real.” You think to yourself. “No other religion provides this feeling. Mine must be genuine.” The number of people I’ve seen struggle who are almost out of the maze only to be “Pascal’s Wagered”(source: Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) back to the beginning is stomach-churning. I want to make it clear and show my solidarity right now. I don’t have any dislike for religious people. I actually see them as victims bound to a system they didn’t ask for that terrifies them so badly that they can’t leave or, even worse, use the system to oppress other people. It’s a harsh life being forced to spin in circles within a maze that you’ve been indoctrinated into by being told it will give you answers.
Yes, even the Christian woman I referenced in the very beginning. Thank God (Oh wait…), many Christians aren’t like her. But even still, she is a victim, like so many others who think they’re suckling at power from this illusion. Sometimes, that power and privilege attract bad people or warp them malignantly. But there are many other groups, such as more progressive-leaning denominations, who still have this heavy burden that they have to subconsciously bear the dissonance while also being ostracized by their more conservative counterparts. Some of them would ban medical science because they see it as an affront to God. You know the woman I mentioned earlier. She recommended I forgo life-saving medical intervention because it was a mismanagement of my faith. Instead, I should have prayed my disability away also without calling it a disability somehow because that speaks the wrong spirits into existence.
Do you see where I’m coming from? If these people were given a proper education instead of being placated, they would spend less time trying to kill people with rare diseases like me with primitive superstitions and more time contributing to a safer world. I shudder at the amount of children who die or suffer in these homes because the family considers it an insult to God to seek medical help. Again, this isn’t all Christians, yet absolutely all Christians are victims who are suffering from this ideology, whether they realize it or not.
Now, before I wrap this up, I want to leave one final message for the people who are reading this post. I know this is going to sound insulting, but I genuinely don’t mean it in an insulting way whatsoever. Many people will read this post, nod their heads to it, and then go on about living their lives. And there are a few reasons for that, depending on the religious stance of the person reading. First and foremost, I want to offer my compassion to people who are way too busy in their lives and have too many things to do. All I can ask is that you take this post to heart and think deeply about suffering that you can, in some sense, help alleviate. Perhaps by donating to humanist charities or learning about organizations like Recovering from Religion. And for those of you who are reading this who just so happen to be religious, I suggest you take a good, long look in the mirror. And ask yourself what you’re so afraid of. A truly loving God wouldn’t torture you for all eternity. In the end, there are five types of people I predict will read this post and do nothing.
Those who are intellectually dishonest in some way
Those who are willfully ignorant in some way
Those who are morally corrupt or negligent in some way
Those who prioritize comfort, tradition, culture, community, or self-interest in some way
They’re in a situation where a Christian has some authority over them, like a young person who’s questioning the faith but knows their parents will put them out on the street if they don’t submit
And really, a lot of these just boil down to cowardice of some sort. For the fifth and final person, I completely understand. I had a similar childhood myself. I grew up in an abusive Christian home and would be beaten if I didn’t sing with my full force at every praise song. This post is actually for you and for me in the past. I’m sorry you were born into that household. You don’t deserve it, and you will likely suffer the scars for the rest of your life. But you may persevere. Scars don’t have to be wounds. YOU can decide the value of your life, not your family, community, or culture. I don’t know you personally, but this is my goal. That you persevere long enough to be able to find a way to escape that environment. I did it, and while my life has had its ups and downs, I’m free from the tormentors.
Ethics, as I’m told, is the study of what humans owe to each other. For those of you who consider yourselves ethical, I sincerely ask that you try to find a way to help people in the situation I mentioned above. For those of you who are still trying to squirm your way out of the implications of this post, I implore you to find a way out of these three arguments. And when you can’t, you need to stop and pivot with all your might to the actual ethical imperative.
I totally understand that this was a lot. It can be a lot for the brain to absorb so much information so fast and expect to change. Some people genuinely just lack the ability. That’s why I won’t damn anybody for what they decide to do, given this post. You’re either in the position to be strong enough to pivot, or you’re not. You didn’t choose, just like you didn’t choose to be exposed to Christianity. I can only encourage my fence-sitters out there to come back to this post and reread it until you get the understanding you need…
So! Here’s a breakdown of everything we’ve covered in this post.
Summary
The home invasion metaphor:
It’s always better to switch your views in light of new evidence
Many forms of Theism incentivize but do not necessarily cause dishonesty
Asking someone to verify their beliefs forces them to show their true colors
This metaphor highlights the intellectual dishonesty and reliance on ambiguity inherent in theistic belief systems, contrasting with the skeptic’s commitment to truth through testing and evidence.
On Rationality:
The section synthesizes empiricism (sensory experience and evidence) and rationalism (reason and logic) into the concept of "rational fairness."
Rational fairness requires subjecting all claims to logical scrutiny and evidential testing, ensuring intellectual honesty and integrity.
This approach undermines special pleading and double standards in theistic arguments, promoting a consistent and fair evaluation of beliefs.
Rationality, as defined here, is presented as the most ethical and effective method for pursuing truth, contrasting sharply with the avoidance and ambiguity in theistic beliefs.
The Deep Ugliness of Theism’s Ethics:
Theistic ethics combine the worst aspects of moral absolutism (claiming universal truth) and moral relativism (based on specific religious doctrines).
This combination leads to ethical hypocrisy, where theistic systems assert moral authority while being fundamentally inconsistent and self-serving.
Theistic ethics can justify harmful behaviors, such as intolerance and violence, by claiming divine mandate, further demonstrating their moral bankruptcy. Essentially they are allowed to do whatever they want when it suits them with morality only being engaged after the fact.
The "ugliness" of theism’s ethics lies in its inherent contradictions and the real-world harm these ethical inconsistencies cause, making it both intellectually and morally problematic.
Theorem of Sufficient Complexity:
The theorem posits that sufficiently complex systems cannot be fully understood or controlled by any part within the system, challenging theistic claims of divine mandate.
Theistic claims of an all-knowing, all-powerful deity are undermined by the practical and logical limits imposed by sufficient complexity.
Any sufficiently complex system (something that can’t be simply learned over an afternoon or even an intensive weekend study session) is absolutely certain to have absolutely false dead-ends within it that it doesn’t know about and can’t detect, especially within the system.
Individual interpretations of sufficiently complex systems compound the absolute falsehoods as one’s perceptions only introduce more instability.
The "Atonement for Edenia" argument:
Judaism was the true faith before Christianity.
There were faithful Jews who followed the old covenant during Jesus' time.
Some of these Jews died without hearing about Jesus due to geographical, social, or other circumstances.
Christian doctrine holds that salvation after Jesus' sacrifice is only possible through explicit faith in Christ.
Therefore, these faithful Jews were unjustly condemned despite their righteousness under the old covenant.
This implies that God broke his promises and betrayed his followers, undermining his trustworthiness.
If God did this once, he could do it again, leaving believers in perpetual uncertainty.
COST (Christinaity’s Overlooked Soteriological Trilemma):
People with severe mental handicaps and those who never heard the gospel are necessarily linked, as neither had the opportunity for salvation.
Christianity offers three possible responses to this problem: Inclusionism, Exclusionism, and Universalism.
Inclusionism suggests that morality or other factors can grant salvation, but this makes the spread of Christianity unnecessary or even harmful.
Exclusionism condemns those who never had a chance to accept Christ, which is morally abhorrent.
Universalism implies that all will be saved regardless of their actions or beliefs, which undermines the significance of faith and the concept of divine justice.
The fact that Christian soteriology is gridlocked within this trilemma reveals that its core teachings about salvation are fundamentally flawed.
Those who stick by Inclusionism (the least strange soteriological stance) must also come to terms with the fact that it necessarily leads to the conclusion that the best way to get as many souls to Heaven is to let the religion die out.
Apologetic Paradox:
If you press an apologist hard enough, they will eventually resort to an appeal to mystery, saying there are some things that just can’t be known
This very claim undermines their position as if the ceiling of their argument is unknowable, then they’re arguing for something they don’t know about
If they say, “Yeah, but it must be good though because my book says it is.” They’re further undermining their credibility because now, all of a sudden, they do know something about the unknowable thing (knowing your holy book or deity somehow stakes a claim in it is a knowledge claim about the unknowable thing)
Furthermore, in order to demarcate where the line is drawn between knowable and unknowable, they’d have to know the thing they’re talking about to be unknowable, thus making it known to a degree and pushing the boundary up infinitely.
This process reveals the root of apologetics to be irrational, which is ironic given the profession’s description of trying to enforce faith rationally
Rule paradox:
When you say something to the effect of “the only rule is there are no rules,” it reveals an infinite regress of rules and meta-rules that can’t be contained
This shows that by asserting “there are no rules past God Himself,” you’re essentially guaranteeing there are
In lieu of this, God would essentially be infinitely weak and not capable of anything as the entities and forces over him would dictate anything She did
This also disproves free will and many things that consider themselves self-evident
Four worlds paradox:
God, even if God existed on top of the rule paradox showing They would be weak; this paradox shows She wouldn’t have free will
There are four possible ways to dictate free will, and all of them prove free will (yes, even divine free will) not to be a valid concept
Since God, in all her beauty, can’t escape the four worlds, then she is a mere puppet like the rest of us
A problem with circularity:
This shows how circularity tends to function using equivocation that people don’t examine
This shows why throwing the Bible at someone doesn’t prove anything
Saying, “we’ll figure it out when we get to Heaven,” is a tacit admission that you don’t have the ability to deal with the question and must then relegate it to an imaginary future state
Theorem of sufficient complexity:
Any decently complicated system of ideas or beliefs always has at least one thing that is completely wrong.
People, especially those who believe in the system, can never know exactly where all the errors are. If they could, they would fix them.
Systems that are mostly true can still turn out to be absolutely false if they miss something important or go down the wrong path.
These errors are always there, and it's impossible to fully eliminate them because the system is so complex.
Some statements might be true right now but not true in the long run. Focusing on these temporary truths can lead to mistakes.
People’s different understandings and interpretations of the system add more layers of potential mistakes.
Complex systems can improve by finding and fixing mistakes, but they can never be perfect because new issues will always come up.
The limits of what the system can know or solve keep expanding as we learn more, but we can never reach a point of absolute certainty.
Let me say it this way. You may be wondering what the harm of letting these people believe in lies is. If you can't see the potential and actual harm and suffering that letting entire hordes of people live lies and not even have the empathy to help them out, then you're a part of the problem. This is not a matter of "What's the harm? It's not hurting anybody." That's exactly the kind of laissez-faire attitude I'm against. I'm not arguing for forceful mass deconversion or any kind of aggressive or coercive anti-theism. The call is for education, dialogue, and support for those questioning or leaving their faith. The goal is for a gradual shift in societal understanding through reason and compassion, not a forceful imposition of anti-theistic views. Our society is nowhere near secular enough to do what I'm talking about currently. We merely placate them, which is downright harmful to them and our future as a species. That we damn entire family lines to these primitive superstitions.
I can honestly go further and further, but I don’t just want to be known as the anti-theist philosopher, so I’ll end it here. If you want to see me argue that free will is a form of pseudo-religion, stay tuned for a YouTube video where I’ll be discussing free will in general. In the meantime, I’d love to chat with you if you have any questions or comments about this or anything else. This can be a heavy place to leave a reader in, so I understand those who deeply want a positive vision for a world without religion and have a desire to discuss this in more detail. Don't hesitate to get in touch with me, and then I can work on some material for that or refer you to other sources. However, this post is already long enough, and trust me, if it weren’t for my ADHD, I’d go on longer. I understand this was a lot to digest, even for non-believers; however, I sincerely think it’s important to talk about these things. I am the Gadfly after all.
