Apologetics: Atheism Confuses Me – Is Atheism a Monoclaim Philosophy?

A few weeks ago, I posted a short video on my YouTube channel reacting to an atheist’s reason for rejecting God. Essentially, his reasoning all boiled down to the existence of Hell and the question of “How can a good God allow Hell to exist and allow people to go there?” I gave my response, explaining how his rejection of God is based on a giant misunderstanding of how Hell work, and a few weeks after posting that video, I got an atheist in the comments who wished to debate me about how free will can exist when God knows everything.

We commented back and forth for a bit, and while I also went off on a sort of tangent about how atheism can’t support the existence of free will (which I’ll do a post on at some point; my backlog of post ideas is ridiculous), he went on a massive side quest about how atheism is superior because it’s a monoclaim philosophy. The commentor wrote:

You also brought up atheism. But atheism and agnosticism are monoclaim philosophies. Atheism says: God does not exist. Agnosticism says: we don’t know. That’s it. Compare that with organized religions. Most religions don’t stop at “God exists.” They make a million claims. God exists, and He wants us to stay virgin till marriage. God exists, and He wants us to gather at place XYZ once a week. God exists, and He wants us to have children. God exists, and property should be distributed a certain way. God exists, and don’t eat certain foods. God exists, and men and women should behave differently. God exists, and this scripture is divine. God exists, and this prophet is correct. God exists, and this is the only path. God exists, and there is heaven. God exists, and there is hell. God exists, and the universe was created in a specific sequence. That’s a million claims, not one.

Some monoclaim theists exist too. People who simply say: “I think God exists.” They don’t claim to know what He wants. They don’t assume He’s loving. They don’t assume He interferes. They’re open to the possibility that God could be indifferent, cruel, absent, or impossible to understand. But they’re rare. Most believers belong to organized religions that go far beyond “God exists.”

It’s an interesting point, but if we think about it, atheism and agnosticism can’t really be “monoclaim philosophies.” As the commentor said, atheism makes the claim that God doesn’t exist, and agnosticism makes the claim that you simply don’t know either way. However, while these are single claims, if you are to follow them down the logical rabbit hole, they don’t stay that way for long.

When you make a claim as big as “God doesn’t exist,” then logically, you must start explaining other aspects of reality, such as “How did the universe get here? Why is morality a thing?” One major claim about reality must lead to other major claims about reality.

Similarly, agnosticism also has to make major claims about reality after its central claim of “I don’t know if there’s a God.” Once again, it also has to explain how we got here, how morals exist, etc.

Ultimately, the argument that atheism/agnosticism is somehow better than belief in a God or gods because it just claims one thing is ridiculous. No matter if you’re an atheist, agnostic, Hindu, Christian, Muslim, whatever, the claim that you base your beliefs on must naturally lead to other claims to explain other aspects of our existence.

For instance, if you say there is no God and the question of morality comes up, then you must make some big claims to figure out where they came from. Did we evolve morals? Are morals subjective or set? Who/what determines morality? What if one person’s sense of morality doesn’t align with mine?

However, if you believe there is a God and you’re asked the same question, it’s likely easier to answer since you can point to that being as the final arbiter of morality instead of coming up with some theory about how chemicals in our brains evolved to allow us to create morality. It’s still a big claim that you’re making, especially when you get into specific things God wants us to do, but it’s one that makes a lot more sense.

Until next time,

M.J.