The False Dichotomy Between Theism and Naturalism: Why Ardent Atheists and Theists are Wasting People's Time

I want to discuss what I think is a false dichotomy between religion and science, or more correctly between theism and naturalism. It is a basic working assumption of 10s of thousands of Internet debaters along these fault lines that there is a fundamental choice that must be made between believing in a world where magical stuff happens and a world that must be conceived of as having no possibilities for such. I am using the term magic here as a shorthand for anything that breaks laws of nature i.e. of what we learn from physics and the other sciences. I could use the term “supernatural” but that term is problematic for reasons I can’t get into here.  Another term I like to avoid is “miraculous,” since it can be defined in ways that it can either encompass the operation of laws of nature or not.

It is a strange confluence that most of the ardent religious and most of the ardent atheistic naturalists agree on the following fundamental claim: The world either has magical elements or it does not. The bulk of religious people assert that it does, so they are able to assert their theism. The atheists assert that it does not, so they reject religion and assert the non-existence of gods or God.

This seems a false dichotomy.  As the longstanding tradition of diverse forms of so called "Deism" makes clear, it is possible for this world to be one in which no magic occurs, but that an ultimate source of it is some form of eternal agency.  Or it might be possible that there is no ultimate agency behind it, but that the world, despite originating in a purely non-agent eternal source, such as say chaotic matter, is still capable of manifesting mind-bending alterations and exceptions to the operations of laws of nature. The recent fictional portrayals of movie multiverses illustrate visions of such.

With all these possibilities on the table one must consider the question this way:

1. Reality (all possible worlds) is founded in a natural non-agent eternal source such as random matter.
2. Reality (all possible worlds) is founded in an eternal agent (or agencies) source.
3. The question of the manifestation of magical elements cannot, as a simple empirical matter, decide the issue of the existence of an eternal agency as the proposed ultimate source of reality.

So, the debate is not just about the existence of an eternal agent at the source of reality. The debate must also encompass the possibilities for “the magical” and to be real and its significance. But many on both sides seem committed to the belief that the mere presence of the magical can determine the judgement on the question of gods or God without major argument about why this dichotomy must be accepted. 

Radical breaches or inexplicable aspects of the operation of natural laws are compatible with either possibility being true. Indeed, there is a growing recognition of this possibility in popular culture.  There are untold numbers of people who are skeptical about or even outright hostile towards the God of traditional theism, who still none-the-less believe in all kinds of wonderous possibilities, such as UFOs, ESP, telekinesis, alternate universes, or more humble “spiritual” conceits such as that “love conquers all,” or that there is someone out that they are fated to love, or that moral obligations can transcend the brute realities of the exercise of power and so on.  As the saying goes “The truth is out there.”

And yet untold oceans of ink and digital bits are wasted trying to argue the issue based on this supposed unavoidable choice. But if one rejects the dichotomy and believes instead that the question of the existence of God or gods cannot be decided by empirical evidence or counter evidence for the existence of magical elements of reality, this opens a whole new issue. Can one avoid agnosticism about the issue of naturalism?  Regardless of arguments about the issue of God one must also resolve the independent question of naturalism, which is:

Can knowledge be obtained to decide the issue of whether reality can involve breaches to laws of nature?

One might be tempted to call this “the problem of miracles,” as many philosophers and theologians have traditionally done, but clearly it can include a host of other less traditionally religiously specific topics.  The problem of explaining the "everyday miracles" of human consciousness, the experience of meaning, free will and the power of moral obligation, and the possibilities of our speculations about alternate dimensions or universes, apparent evidence for fine tuning, the emergence of life from dead matter, and its very definition, etc. Theists have been accused of resting their faith irrationally on a “God of the Gaps”, which is to say, to feel entitled to believe in God as possible explanation for aspects of nature not yet fully explained.  But it is just as much a problem to believe in hoped for future naturalistic explanations of everyday phenomenon like these, which have so far avoided such.

In the meantime, people can speculate on such issues.  And to the extent that their reasoning about matters of practical ethics and sense of self-worth depend on it, utilize their best judgements about such matters.  Such philosophizing is an inescapable aspect of the human condition.  In the absence of the resolution of metaphysical and epistemological conundrums like those of naturalism or theism or their perceived conflict, people must make their best judgments and be prepared to defend those judgements based on their practical implications for themselves and others. 

In short, most theists are magical thinkers, but many atheists seem merely to be magical thinkers who have been disappointed. For example they both expect that the miraculous events portrayed in scriptures must actually have occurred just as they are presented if they are to be adjudged useful or "true," or meaningful and in doing so are unable to draw more subtle insights or to appreciate the beauty of these unique and often profound narratives. Both camps are wooden literalists, who miss the mundane miracle of scriptures, which is that they emerge through contingent processes of human imagination and reasoning working through immensely complex interactions of communities grappling with the implications of their metaphysical judgements through time. They are wonderous because they emerge from such natural processes, not despite of those origins. And that we today are also able to join in those discourses simply adds to the wonder.

So, there is a significant practical conclusion that can be drawn from consideration of the issue of the supposed forced choice between naturalism and theism. First, in the absence of resolution to such high metaphysical matters people have a more potentially achievable epistemological obligation of discussing the ethical, self-identity and practical benefits of their decision-making drawing on their working assumptions about these matters. So, exploring the psychological and sociological impacts of metaphysical postulates on the functioning of specific communities, whole societies and individuals is a practical intellectual imperative. Exploring the empirical benefits and harms of religious belief and practice or their rejection for individuals, religious groups and the academy, therefore, should have much greater priority than debates intended to decide the matter of the existence of God.

Second, the fact that people inclined towards naturalism believe that their work is done if the  possibilities of magic are put in doubt reveals that many of them simply assume that all deities by definition must be inclined towards magic and disinclined from creating naturalistic worlds. It is only by holding this assumption that they can draw the conclusion that evidence for the absence of magic allows them to proceed directly to the conclusion that no ultimate agency exists.  Otherwise, they would have to notice their obligation to provide an explanation for why the absence of magic necessarily implies the non-existence of an ultimate agent. This is what I call the real core question of theism:

Is there an obvious reason for a God not to make worlds like those naturalists might expect could emerge from purely natural (i.e. material) processes like the operation of chaotic matter?

The belief that gods or God would never make such worlds seems to be a mere assumption on the part of most naturalists, which again, they seem strangely to share with a substantial body of their theistic opponents.

So if the presence or absence of magic in reality cannot decide the matter of the existence of God, and since an apparent majority of theists and their naturalistic opponents share the belief that no creator gods or God would ever make naturalistic worlds, they may be wasting everyone's time with fruitless arguments that also distract from the discussion of two more critical metaphysical matters.  I wish the people debating the supposed conflict between naturalism and theism who flood my internet feeds, would move along.