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DGE Review 1: "Why I Became an Atheist", by John W. Loftus

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(This is the first in my "Does God Exist" series of reviews. There will be six or seven books on whether God exists or not. I'll read them for you, give a recap here, and then try to draw it all into some conclusions at the end. This is not meant as a religious discussion, more of an examination of the way smart people argue about really tough subjects.)

John Loftus is a passionate guy. You have to be a passionate guy to spend so much of your time preaching and arguing about God. As a former minister, Loftus spent a lot of time being a Christian Apologist. (An apologist is not somebody who apologizes, although the root words are the same. An apologist is somebody who defends something)

John just knew that God existed, and he was willing to tell and argue with anybody that he was right. He went through all of the classic pro-God and anti-God argument points.

Then John lost his faith. Don't ask me why, that's a question for him, but best as I can gather, people in the church let him down (severely!) and he had a big problem with why God would allow evil and suffering in the world. So he decided to become an atheist. And, as a result, decided to write this book.

Which is where we begin.

The book is big for such a simple question, weighing in at over 400 pages. He goes over what his control beliefs are (and the basis for them), takes a look at the biblical evidence, and then tells us what he's left believing after all of this.

Loftus is the kind of guy who just has to know. When he knew God existed, I mean he really knew it. Now that he knows God doesn't exist, he really knows that as well. I guess the search for enlightenment wasn't in John's schedule.

My biggest fault with the book is this is not a book about atheism, per se. This book should be titled Why Christianity Sucks. If you're a currently practicing Christian, and you want to put your intellect and faith to a test, go get this book and read it right away.

But there's a long, long way from pointing out all of Christianity's flaws to not believing in a God at all. It's like if I asked you if you believed in extraterrestrial life, and you responded with a 400-age book railing against Marvin the Martian. I'm asking a general question, you're cherry-picking your case to maximize your debating points. Not exactly an honest way of going about being an atheist.

I'm not going into the historical biblical critique. Suffice it to say that the bible and Christianity in general are much different than commonly understood. Like I said, I found that part (which is most of the book) tedious. It's like he went through other books on what's screwed up with Christianity and just copied large hunks of stuff over, perhaps rewriting as he went. He says ancient people were superstitious. Fine, I can believe that. But then we get 80 pages of exactly each quote in the bible where it matches up with archaeological evidence of superstition. Thanks John, but really didn't need to beat that dead horse so much.

Getting to the point of atheism, wondering if God exists, takes second place with Loftus over bashing his former faith. He admits that some of the arguments for God actually hold up better than those against, but these would only be for a "philosopher's God" or a far away God. At this point, instead of conceding that the entire book may be in error, and then continuing with what a "Philosopher's God" might mean, he throws all of that away and continues with his Christianity-bashing. In another place, he points out that "process theology" could be a workable reason for the problem of evil and suffering. Once again, instead of going somewhere with this idea as a possible item of interest, he says only "but there are problems with this approach as well". The steam-roller continues rolling along.

Grant your opposition some points if they exist. If you're writing polemic, that's fine, but then don't pretend to be having a good honest look at things. You can't have it both ways.

But the main problem I have with this book is, well, the childishness. i expect to find this in all of the books, actually, on both sides of the debate. John has a big list of things he'd like God to do. Why do children suffer? Why was there the holocaust? Why can't we fly? If heaven is so cool, why not have it right now, instead of waiting for it? Can I have a pony?

By insisting that God fit inside his ability to reason and moralize, Loftus is denying God the one principle that everyone agrees he has: being unknowable. It's a lesson that any child understands -- there are systems of things outside of your ability to understand and comprehend. Yet John feels, like the rebellious teenager, that if he can't understand them they aren't worth understanding. Something along the lines of "No God that allows billions to live in agony and die suffering is worth my worship"

Well we're not asking your worship, or whether you expect to spend eternity at the big bar-b-que. We just want you to address the topic of the book honestly: atheism.

But no. John Loftus has a bone to pick, and this personal God of his is the one that's getting all of the venting. No matter that his own limitations and emotional-setup might be causing both his conversion and deconversion: his previous concept of a personal, Christian God has let him down and it's time for him to use his argumentation skills to liberate the rest of us from any concept of a God, whether we need it or not.

In his defense he realizes how personal such discussions can be during the early parts of the book. But then, typically, he casts that key kernel of truth aside -- that this topic has a deeply personal nature and should be approached as such -- and launches into his argument.

I admire John for taking the time to write about his feelings and personal situation from an honest viewpoint, and I'm not trying to impeach his arguments with ad hominem attacks. I'm simply explaining why, I think, he goes on and on so much about certain areas of the debate. If I were him, I'd take what I knew worked -- there is some sort of God and some kind of process theology works -- and see where that led me. True debate is about the discovery of common truths, not about kicking the other guy in the ass.

So where is he now? What's all of this arguing and debating got him? In the final chapter Loftus goes over what he believes now. He says he was agnostic and believed in a philosopher's God for a while, but it became too uncomfortable for him. He kept asking why, why, why? So it was easier just to say something like "random things happen and people are always trying to organize them into larger patterns whether those patterns exist or not, so there is no God"

This is a bit of sleight of hand -- the fact that people organize things into patterns really doesn't address the reasons for John's personal beliefs. It's, once again, a critique of others. John seems really good at pointing out where everybody else is wrong. This is a great skill to have -- as long as you use it on yourself as much as others.

So we're left with Loftus sitting around talking about how pointless life and the universe is, about how pessimism is really the only honest way of approaching any of it, and how depressing it all is.

John is quite the party animal.

Color me crazy, but that's kind of where I would expect a book like this to start. It's like the book ends where it should have began: with the pointlessness of everything: existential anxiety and it's effects. We began with this deeply personal story and ended up with this cold, lifeless, meaningless swamp. Seems like you'd start with agnosticism (nobody can know whether something exists, after all), realize that most of the arguments are about equal, and then take ownership of your personal emotional life in response, moving towards meaning, joy, and optimism.

This was a good book for people who don't like Christians and want to go over all of their faults. For that reason it has earned a spot on my shelf. But it doesn't seem to go anywhere. It just kind of peters out into hopelessness and low-level despair.

Thanks for the read, John. Good luck.

9 Comments

The idea of a 'philosophers god' sounds like the concept of Deism - the idea that there is an originating Supreme Being that does not take an ongoing interaction with the universe. I would be interested to see arguments against this concept because they are just as difficult to disprove as they are to prove.

Mr. Loftus certainly seems to come down against Theism (an extension of Deism in that the Supreme Being takes an ongoing and active interest in it's creation). In this case arguments are easy to come by to validate his position.

Unfortunately, as with most 'Born Against' he concentrates on his own previous beliefs rather than compare them with other religions and show how the same historical superstitions apply to all.

This is (unfortunately) the problem with most books about atheism - they are either written by people who have never had belief (and rip shreds out of all religions even though they have never been a part of any) or they are written by people who have lost their faith and tear shreds out of their ex-religion without considering any others.

Since I fall into the previous category (having never had belief) I would be interested to see the views of people who have struggled from belief to belief in search of meaning before becoming atheist.

Hey Daniel - thanks so much for the intelligent review.

You hit the nail on the head when you indicate that we can't seperate ourselves from whatever bone we may have to pick.

I look forward to more reviews.

I sent John an email and got a reply this morning. If I understood him correctly, he didn't like the name of the book either, since atheism has little to do with it. the marketing folks wanted it. But he's happy I bought the book.

I think this might be a nice way of calling me a sucker, but I'm not sure.

In either event, John's doesn't seem interested in joining the discussion here, and that's fine. It's an okay book, but if I were him perhaps I'd be a little more concerned about suckering people in with one title and then delivering something else.

Hi Daniel.

You say."By insisting that God fit inside his ability to reason and moralize, Loftus is denying God the one principle that everyone agrees he has: being unknowable"

Im picking you are most likely a Christian and so most likely believe much of whats written within the bible.

If you are quite happy to be prepared to knock John for denying the one principle that supposedly everyone agrees on ."God Being unknowable"

Why do you then go being quite prepared to be believing whats written within this bible ?.

Seems a bit double dutch to me.

Its like you are saying those that wrote the bible are not to be held accountable and controlled by the same laws that you are quite happy to simply go imposing on some others.

John might not know this unknowable god like you say,so what makes you so sure that those that wrote these books actually did either?.

Hey Dave,

Thanks for the comment, but you're arguing with yourself here. You begin with "you're most likely a Christian" and end with "what makes you so sure that those that wrote these books actually did either?"

I'm not somebody who believes that the bible is the literal word of God and knows these things. I haven't been to church in decades. If I'm a Christian, the pope is a devil worshiper.

I'd like to consider myself pleasantly agnostic, with a hint of deist.

But I think you're really hit the nail on the head in regards to Loftus. He makes this assumption that it all has to make sense, and then he's upset when it all doesn't make sense -- thereby proving himself right. It's this extreme form of circular thinking -- on all sides of this discussion -- that seems so pernicious.

Once again, thanks for the comments. Be sure to check out the rest of the articles in the series.

Hi Daniel.

Sorry that i thought so wrong,didnt mean to upset.

You have nothing saying you are agnostic with a hint of deist etc.And seemed to have plenty of links to online bible studies and the true jesus christ and free bible lessons etc.

My mistake.

I still say you might be a little wrong in suggesting ,"the one principle that everyone agrees he has: being unknowable"

Seems some folks specially the ones that wrote these faith books surely must have seemed to think he is somehow somewhat knowable.

Unless you are saying these particular folk are nobodies ?

If not then maybe your suggestion that "the one principle that (everyone agrees) he has: being unknowable",surely cant be quite so correct can it ?.

Yeah for sure i will check out the rest of the articles in the series.

Dave,

You're putting me in a weird position here. I'm really not interested in debating religion, much less defending what others believe.

As I understand most forms of belief in the world, belief in God involves some kind of appreciation for how we don't understand him. Even those folks with the big lists of things they "know" about God still have even bigger lists of things they don't know.

In fact, and this is important to grasp, the only recurring theme in belief in God across all religions and eras has been the universal acknowledgment that somehow he's outside of our ability to understand.

I'm not advancing a religious opinion for you, I'm trying to make a generalization. Perhaps there are folks that understand everything about God, but I don't see how that is possible.

As for the religion -- ads I guess? -- that you see? That's google AdWords. Ads are selected based on the topic in the article. If you go to one of my photographic articles you'll see ads about photographs.

I don't have anything to do with that stuff.

Hi Daniel.

I personally agree,like you i dont see how folks can think they really know so much about god/s.I think at the moment i fit somewhere in what some call, the agnostic type.

All i can say is i personally think (opinion) it would be kinda nice and might even be a little more helpful if more folks agreed with what you say is a "universal acknowledgment that somehow he's outside of our ability to understand."

But it seems to me that there does still seem to be very many who still seem to think they do know so much about these Gods.If not a whole lot have written heaps on such matters of Gods which universally they supposedly know is outside of our ability to understand.These books by (very many) are often not thought to be so fictional either.

What ever it was that made me think wrong,i dont see that it matters so much.Ive apologized honestly! ,im not so afraid of making mistakes or being imperfect.

Great blogs!, enjoyed the reading.

Cheers Dave.


Great review. I agree 100%. My review was a little harsher and is creating a bit of controversy. http://bibliofreakblog.com/nonfiction/atheist-iby-john-loftusi/


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This page contains a single entry by DanielBMarkham published on July 24, 2009 11:22 AM.

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