Why belief isn’t illogical: A conversation with an atheist peer

I have many colleagues in the IT industry who have a decided distaste for religious belief.

This is quite understandable because the IT industry attracts people who are more inclined to rely on deduction. Deduction involves applying a general premise to a specific observation in order to reach a logical conclusion. A general premise might be, for example, that "all autonomous vehicles use advanced sensor technology" which you apply to a specific observation that "Tesla's self-driving cars are autonomous vehicles", leading you to a logical conclusion: "Tesla's self-driving cars use advanced sensor technology".

In contrast, for everyday life and religious belief, we are all more reliant on a different but equally valid form of reasoning, known as induction.

Induction is the reverse of deduction, and it begins with making several observations from which we discern a significant pattern of resemblance. Through that pattern, we infer likelihood which, in turn, becomes the basis for declaring a firm persuasion about something.

To be clear, such firm persuasion can and does have life-altering consequences. For example, jurors rely on induction to arrive at their verdict. Based on the evidence that has been presented to them, they declare that a majority are firmly persuaded of the defendant’s guilt or innocence.

Yet even though we rely on induction to make such grave decisions, for many in my industry, the preference for deduction holds sway, especially when religious belief is being discussed.

Approaching religion deductively

For example, on a recent exchange on LinkedIn (the online business networking platform), one of my peers in the IT industry, who is an atheist, addressed religious belief deductively by writing: “All I know is that atheism is simply the observation that no one has ever seen or heard a god, it's as simple as that.”

Despite that deductive focus, I replied by reminding him that atheists do actually engage in induction (as much as any religious person does) because so many of them have expressed public support for the billion-dollar Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence (S.E.T.I.).

In fact, the 2021 Pew Research Center poll revealed that a staggering 85% of US atheists and agnostics indicated that their best guess was that intelligent life exists on other planets.

His reply went: “It's just that you're misinformed. The SETI program, which I know extremely well, isn't about believing or disbelieving, it's about research - the very basis of the scientific approach, which is once again the exact opposite of the religious approach.”

At this point, I remembered the apostle Paul’s declaration of reliance on the power of the Holy Spirit. He wrote: “For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh: (For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;) Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ” (2 Corinthians 10v4–5, KJV),

So, I wrote back that I wasn't misinformed, and reminded him that the famous cosmologist and atheist Carl Sagan said: "I'm frequently asked, 'Do you believe there's extra-terrestrial intelligence?' I give the standard arguments - there are a lot of places out there, the molecules of life are everywhere, I use the word billions, and so on. Then I say it would be astonishing to me if there weren't extra-terrestrial intelligence, but of course there is as yet no compelling evidence for it."

I added in my reply: “So, in the absence of compelling evidence for extra-terrestrial intelligence, why would Sagan have been astonished at the prospect of there being none? Despite his claim of reserving judgement, he would not be "astonished" at the absence of ETI, unless, in the absence of hard evidence, he expected ETI to exist.”

To that, he replied: "Certainly the laws of probability, as you know, which are completely scientific, teach us that there is virtually no chance that some form of extra-terrestrial life doesn't exist".

In response, I wrote: “That rationale resembles the infinite monkey theorem” (which states that "a monkey hitting keys independently and at random on a typewriter keyboard for an infinite amount of time will almost surely type any given text, including the complete works of William Shakespeare").

In fact, just like "almost surely", the assertion that there is "virtually no chance that some form of extra-terrestrial life doesn't exist" is indicative of inductive reasoning which, when acted upon, is akin to religious belief.

When I told him that, his closing comment went: “In any case, I'm not necessarily going to continue this lengthy discussion here, but I'd like to thank you for taking part politely and, above all, calmly, and for not joining the pack.”

Certainly, my previous discussions with atheists have neither ended "calmly" nor well. In fact, I can only attribute that change in impact to the grace of God in Christ.