Not all atheists are arrogant.
Some of them are like my friend The Faithiest Atheist — honest seekers of truth, and with a sense of humor. The more “normal” the atheist is, the more likely that person will be to sincerely engage in serious conversation with someone who doesn’t share their existing worldview.
When I speak of the arrogance of atheism, I’m primarily talking about the academic types. For example, Richard Dawkins once famously said that he would refuse to debate Dr. William Lane Craig because “it would look good on his CV (curriculum vitae), but not so good on mine.”
Never mind the fact Dr. Craig would probably eat him alive in a formal debate. As Sam Harris famously quipped, Dr. Craig has put the fear of God into more than one atheist.
Even so, if Dawkins will not even condescend to speak with one of the most famous and well-respected Christian apologists in the world, what chance would I have of gaining an audience with the (self-) esteemed biologist? The correct answer is, none whatsoever.
Never in a million years would a man like Richard Dawkins deem any opinion I might wish to share with him as being worthy of his time. In his mind, he occupies a different stratum in society, one where intelligence and academic credentials are carefully vetted before entry is allowed. My personal thoughts and opinions are literally beneath a man of his stature.
As a result, I’ve never made a concerted effort to communicate with Mr. Dawkins, other than perhaps a random email or two over the years, but none written with the expectation that he would ever read them. He is famous. I am not. I’m sure he would think, “Why should I bother?”
My answer might be, “You never know. You might learn something.”
In fact, I learn something just new about every day.
For example, a little while ago I learned that not only are plants intelligent, they can communicate with each other. How amazing is that? Not only may humans not be as smart as we think we are, we’re now learning that organisms we’ve assumed were unintelligent aren’t nearly as dumb as we originally thought. We can’t even compare brain sizes, because acacia bushes don’t have brains — but apparently they can think and communicate. Amazing, isn’t it? Fun facts to know and tell.
Therein lies the arrogance of atheism — when you’ve reached the point you simply assume you can’t learn something new from an unexpected source.
Dawkins isn’t the only one, of course. British philosopher A. C. Grayling alerted me to this phenomenon a number of years ago after reading his book The God Argument. I figured Grayling isn’t nearly as famous as Dawkins, and there might be a chance he’d actually respond to me.
So, I found contact information for Dr. Grayling and sent him an email that attempted to raise a couple of points in reference to his book. I had not yet written The God Conclusion. I didn’t wish to speak with him on a podcast. I simply wanted to have a brief conversation with him about a couple of the points he’d raised in The God Argument. Naturally, Dr. Grayling was much too busy to respond himself, of course. He had an assistant email his reply which, if memory serves me correctly, initially inquired as to the nature of my questions. To make a long story a bit shorter, the assistant’s final response was that Dr. Grayling was too busy to converse with me, and would remain so for the rest of his life.
Was it something I said?
He sure put me in my place, didn’t he? Or, did he?
As it stands, I’m not sure there’s any other place I’d rather be, which is beneath the contempt of the average “intellectual” atheist.
Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you. — Matthew 5:11-12
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