Today, I feel, once again, compelled to address the atheists among my readers, or at least, the readers who think they are. 


  
                                     global atheist's convention (Melbourne, Australia, 2012) 


  
      Richard Dawkins, Dan Dennett, Sam Harris, and Ayan Hirsi Ali at Melbourne convention




The principles embedded in the major world religions - the principles, that is, that we can see from our study of history do work to make nations that survive ...those principles are what matter. The atheists among us can believe that those principles do not require any "deity" or "holy scripture" to give them the authority to be accepted by everyone. Reasoning and evidence, that is, evidence based in the universal patterns in the histories of the various peoples of the world - these are what we should use to guide us in our work on a universal moral code. 

In short, I'm fine with the atheists of my world refusing to accept or say that there is a consciousness in this universe. I can be good friends with the atheists of the world as long as they are willing to give up moral relativism and get to work with the rest of us on building a universal moral code. In fact, any delegates to the convention, to use a political metaphor, who come to the table already determined to promote only one agenda, namely the one informed by their religious belief system and scripture, are immediately suspect. 

Our whole process of debate and compromise must be dedicated to the proposition that all people can be persuaded rationally if we give the whole process enough time. But the final arbiter of our debates must be the evidence of history, all history, in all nations. The arbiter can not be a scripture, a dogma, or a set of theocrats from any one belief system. These all have been wrangling and shedding each other's blood for far too long already. It is past time that the rational people of the world confronted them in open public debate and deconstructed the moral codes that they claim are indisputable. 

In any such confrontation, we can always ask fundamentalists of any stripe: "What results will your ways and rules produce for the human species over the long haul? What reasoning tells you so? What evidence in history supports your claims?" 

The principles of courage and wisdom, grounded in the physics of entropy, along with the principles of freedom and love, grounded in quantum uncertainty, if they inform all that we do, will steer us to survival, and health and happiness. Let courage, wisdom, freedom, and love, embedded in a balanced ecosystem of beliefs and lifestyles, be our guides. No single ruling individual or religion; genuine respect and tolerance for the ways of others. Open markets of ideas. Then, let reality be the arbiter.   

All of these guidelines for our negotiations, I believe, will be quite acceptable for the atheists of the world, especially once they have had the theory of moral realism and the evidence of world history explained to them. The principles that will guide our behavior so that our species moves forward in time to greater knowledge, skill, happiness, and health for all people -- these, I think, the atheists will have no problem with. 

At that point, I'm fine with all of them, far more so than I am with religious fundamentalists of every stripe, who are keen to bring about a world state under one brutally enforced, totalitarian code of behavior for all. In fact, given the diversity that already exists in the world, the number of radically different nations that are implicitly willing to live and let live, I question whether totalitarian visions of the future are not mere childish delusions. The genie is out of the bottle. Pluralism is here to stay. Get used to it. Or better yet, learn to revel in it and enjoy all kinds of foods, music, apparel, sports, and so on just as much as you do a fine day in nature when you can see all of the species interacting and making the whole ecosystem stronger. 

To close today's post, let me also say, gently, to my atheist friends one more time: if you do come to believe that a single, tolerant, wise, loving code of behavior for all humans could be drawn up and that it really could work for us all over the long haul, and if that belief comes to inform all that you do and say, day by day, in your lives, then you actually do have a kind of faith, and you do believe, in your own, individual way, in God. 

You just don't believe in the kind of deity that any of the fundamentalists in any of the world's major religions still cling to. Neither do I. And why should we? The evidence is clear: their ways can't work to make a vigorous and happy life for us all over the long haul. But believe in God in your own way? At that point, oh, yes, you do. I hope one day in a quiet way, privately, inside yourself, that realization will make you happy. 

In the shadow of the mushroom cloud, nevertheless, have a nice day.