A Manual for Creating Atheists

by Peter Boghossian

  Based upon data with human subjects, psychiatrists have posited that therapeutic interventions work by creating an environment where the therapist continually frustrates a pathogenic belief; this causes the patient to redouble their efforts to prove the pathogenic hypothesis. For example, a patient’s pathogenic hypothesis is that people don’t like her. She goes to her therapist, sits down in her office and says, “It’s such a cold room in here. You never have flowers. My other therapist had cut flowers.” She expects or even wants the therapist to confirm her pathogenic hypothesis and respond, “Well, I don’t like you either,” but instead the therapist says, in proper psychoanalytic technique, “Tell me more about your feelings of coldness here.” This response causes the patient to further redouble her efforts to seek a rejection, and she becomes even more wedded to her pathogenic hypothesis. Consequently, the patient might say, “I’m really disturbed by the fact that you don’t have flowers. That’s incredibly thoughtless of you.”

  The patient’s verbal behavior makes it appear that she’s getting worse, but actually she’s getting better. While she appears to double down and become more strident, she’s actually becoming more self-aware. (We see this in Book I of The Republic with Thrasymachus, toward the end of the Meno with Anytus, in the Hippias Major with Hippias, in the Gorgias with Polus and Callicles, and in the Euthyphro with Euthyphro. In the Clitophon, often rejected as non-Platonic because it’s so uncharacteristic, Clitophon denounces Socrates for not really making people virtuous. In the cave allegory at the beginning of Book VII of The Republic, Socrates says that those in the cave will become angry at the one who tells them that all they see are shadows—and will try to kill him if they can lay their hands on him. Through Socrates’s questions people become more assertive the more they doubt, or rather the more assertive they become the more reason one has to suppose they are unsure.)

  For the Street Epistemologist, the conclusion to draw from increasingly resolute verbal behavior is that if you make headway into someone’s epistemic life—in helping them to question their beliefs, and the way they come to acquire knowledge—you may observe the opposite in their utterances and behavior. Once you expose a belief or an epistemology as fraudulent, you’re likely to hear statements of greater confidence. It seems that Street Epistemology has made your client more doxastically closed, when in fact this strident verbal behavior indicates a glimmer of doxastic openness.

  If you’re worried that your intervention has made someone’s epistemic life more disconnected from reality because they seem more resolute after treatment—don’t be. Their verbal behavior is a natural and expected consequence of Street Epistemology. What appears to be doxastic closure is really doxastic openness.

  BELIEF, EPISTEMOLOGY, AND “ACTING ACCORDINGLY”

  “No one goes willingly toward the bad.”

  —Socrates in Protagoras

  Helping someone value and use an epistemology that brings their beliefs into alignment with reality is no guarantee that their behavior will follow suit; this failure to see behavioral change can dishearten nascent Street Epistemologists. You’ve invested time and energy helping someone abandon their faith, and then to your surprise they mention they were just at temple last week. How is it someone can recognize they have a flawed epistemology but fail to act by not changing their behavior? (An answer perhaps is the supportive community surrounding the faithful.)

  Having a reliable epistemology doesn’t guarantee that one will act accordingly. There are many reasons people might not act upon their conclusions. Chief among these are:

  Moral disengagement. Canadian-American psychologist Albert Bandura developed interesting research around what he termed moral disengagement (Bandura, 1990, 1999, 2002). For Bandura, one could know what to do, but then not do it because one morally cut oneself off—disengaged—from the action. For example, I’d really like new headphones. While in the changing room at the gym, I see a new pair of unguarded headphones. I’d feel bad about taking them, but I shut down and divorce myself from what I know I should do and take them anyway. This is an example of moral disengagement because I knew what the right course of action was, but morally I cut myself off from doing what was right to instantly get what I wanted.

  Akrasia. The ancient Greeks used the word akrasia, which means “lack of command over oneself” or, in common parlance, “weakness of will.” One could know what one should do—not cheat on one’s spouse, for example—but one may not be able to muster the will to do so.

  Social benefits and pressures. People adhere to certain behaviors so that they can receive benefits like respect, recognition, friendship, and solidarity from their community. For example, a person in a public restroom plans to immediately leave after urinating, but when someone comes out of a stall they feel compelled to wash their hands. In this instance a person may also exhibit a behavior in order to avoid shame.

  In many cases, individuals may also be pressured into participating in faith rituals. Failure to acquiesce may mean being stigmatized (Jehovah’s Witnesses call this “disfellowshipping” and “shunning”) or worse (Scientologists denigrate apostates by calling them “squirrels,” and countless fallen members have reported instances of relentless harassment, including aggressive legal action).

  Sooner or later in your practice as a Street Epistemologist, you’ll disabuse someone of their faith and they’ll behave as if nothing happened. Do not let this deter you. There are many factors that prevent one from leaving a faith tradition, pull one back into a faith tradition, or, even after one has abandoned faith, push one to stay connected with a religious community. These factors are largely outside of your control.

  What is not beyond your control are the number of people you engage and your desire to constantly improve your interventions. By making Street Epistemology your default communicative interaction, you’ll reach more people and improve the effectiveness of your interventions. Over time, failure to engender doxastic openness will become increasingly rare.

  Intervention 1

  I was at a natural food store waiting in line when the woman ahead of me struck up a conversation. She was in her late 30s, had wavy hair, and wore relaxed clothing (RC). The conversation started when she asked me something, twice, but I didn’t hear her.

  PB: I’m sorry. I didn’t hear you. I’m deaf in one ear.

  (We briefly discussed her initial question regarding moving the item divider.)

  RC: May I ask, were you born deaf or did something happen?

  PB: Sure. Funny you should ask. A few years ago I woke up and couldn’t hear out of my left ear. I just assumed it was wax. I asked my wife to check it out—she’s a medical doctor—and she told me to see a specialist right away. I was diagnosed with sudden, unilateral, idiopathic hearing loss.

  RC: I’m really sorry to hear that.

  (We briefly talked about living with hearing loss and treatment.)

  RC: Have you tried acupuncture? I ask because I’m an acupuncturist.

  (She handed me her card. I took it and read it. She was a Doctor of Naturopathic Medicine.)

  PB: No. I haven’t tried it because it doesn’t work.

  (I held the card.)

  RC: Oh, it works all right. I know it works.

  PB: Really? How do you know it works?

  RC: Because I’ve cured people of illnesses. I’ve seen it work.

  PB: Do you think selection bias has anything to do with that?

  RC: No.

  PB: What illnesses have you cured?

  RC: Everything. You name it, I’ve cured it.

  PB: Parkinson’s, Ebola, autism?

  RC: I’ve never treated anyone with those.

  PB: But if someone came in with one of those illnesses, could you cure them?

  RC: I don’t know. I could try.

  PB: Let’s take something more pedestrian, like my hearing loss. Could you cure it?

  RC: If I did, would you believe me?

  (I was at the cashier and RC stood off t
o the side.)

  PB: Yes. And once you did, I’d personally fly you out to every children’s hospital in the world. Frankly, if you could cure these illnesses it’s monstrously immoral not to and should be a criminal offense. My feeling is that you’re a decent and kind person. I don’t think you’d withhold inexpensive treatment from people who needed it. If you really believe acupuncture works, why don’t you volunteer your services?

  RC: There are acupuncturists at hospitals all over Portland—

  PB: You’re right, there are. And acupuncture still doesn’t work.

  RC: I don’t understand why you’re so confident it doesn’t work.

  PB: Because there’s no evidence for it. In fact, there’s actually evidence against it. You should read Bausell’s Snake Oil Science (Bausell, 2007).

  RC: There are a lot of studies that support acupuncture. I’ve seen them and I know from my experience it works.

  PB: Name one.

  (Pause)

  RC: I can’t think of one right now.

  PB: But yet you’re confident that there’s literature out there that supports the efficacy of acupuncture.

  RC: Absolutely.

  (End of the conversation)

  Intervention 2

  I had the following discussion with a professor (OM) who teaches at an evangelical university. He’s smart and Christian, and surprisingly he claims to base his religious beliefs on evidence. The conversation begins in medias res.

  PB: So I just want to be clear. You’re 100 percent sure that Jesus Christ is the Son of God—

  OM: Yes.

  PB: You’re also certain that the claims in the Bible constitute sufficient evidence to warrant belief. I don’t want to mischaracterize your position. This is correct, yeah?

  OM: Yes, that’s correct.

  PB: Okay. Just so that I can understand this, and I’m sorry if I’m not getting it—

  OM: You’re fine.

  PB: Okay, thanks. So, you think that there was an actual man named Jesus—

  OM: Definitely.

  PB: Okay, and he more or less behaved as it’s written in the Bible. Is that correct?

  OM: He did what the Bible said that he did. Yes.

  (We discussed some of the alleged miracles Jesus performed and whether what’s written in the Bible constitutes reliable evidence.)

  PB: Okay, and this is the part I have a hard time understanding. You believe that there’s sufficient evidence to warrant belief in these things, right?

  OM: Yes, as I’ve said.

  PB: Okay, so for all evidence-based beliefs, it’s possible that there could be additional evidence that comes along that could make one change one’s beliefs. What evidence would you need to make you change your mind?

  (Responding instantly)

  OM: The bones of Christ.

  (Which would mean Jesus didn’t ascend to heaven and the myth would be exposed as such.)

  PB: The bones of Christ would make you doubt?

  OM: Absolutely.

  PB: But how would you know they were the bones of Christ?

  (Long pause)

  PB: I mean let’s say a famous archeologist said, “We’ve found Christ’s bones in this ancient tomb in Israel.” Wouldn’t you ask how he’d know they were the bones of Christ?

  OM: I certainly would.

  PB: And what answer would satisfy you?

  (Looking at me as if he didn’t understand)

  PB: I mean, what would he have to say to you to convince you that they were indeed the bones of Christ?

  OM: Well, I don’t really know. I’d have to see why he said that.

  PB: I don’t understand how you could not have a response to something so central to your life. So you’re not sure what would make your belief falsifiable?

  OM: I am sure. As I told you, the bones of Christ.

  PB: But what evidence would it take to satisfy you that they were actually the bones of Christ? If you could never know—or if there would be no way for you to know—that they were the bones of Christ, then your belief isn’t falsifiable. If your belief isn’t falsifiable then do you really believe on the basis of evidence?

  (Brief pause)

  PB: I don’t say this lightly, but I don’t think you’re being sincere. You know that there’s absolutely no evidence one could present that would make you change your mind.

  OM: There is. I already told you.

  PB: But you don’t believe that. That’s verbal behavior. You’ve created impossible conditions and you’re okay with that? That’s not the intellectual attitude one has when forming one’s beliefs on the basis of reason and evidence.

  (Silence)

  PB: Here’s what I don’t get. Why don’t you just say that you’re not open to evidence and that you’re going to believe anyway? Isn’t that a more honest and sincere way to live your life?

  OM: I told you. I am open to evidence. I’m willing to hear what someone would say.

  PB: I don’t believe you. You’re pretending that you’re open to evidence but you’re not really open to evidence.

  OM: I am open to evidence, but you’re not open to faith.

  PB: This isn’t about me being open to faith; this is about you being open to evidence. You’ve just told me you’re open to evidence, but when pressed you can’t provide details of that evidence. Specifically, what would that evidence look like?

  OM: Faith is belief in things hoped for that reason points toward.

  PB: That’s a deepity. Let’s get back to the question at hand. If a famous archeologist announced that he’d discovered the bones of Christ, what evidence would you need to believe that he was telling the truth?

  (End of the conversation)

  DIG DEEPER

  Articles

  Brock and Balloun, “Behavioral Receptivity to Dissonant Information” (Brock & Balloun, 1967)

  David Gal and Derek Rucker, “When in Doubt, Shout! Paradoxical Influences of Doubt on Proselytizing” (Gal & Rucker, 2010)

  Book

  Cass Sunstein, Going to Extremes: How Like Minds Unite and Divide (Sunstein, 2009)

  Videos

  Peter Boghossian, “Walking the Talk” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ARwO9jNyjA

  Peter Boghossian, “Critical Thinking Crash Course” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7zbEiNnY5M

  NOTES

  The Danish philosopher Kierkegaard writes that anxiety is a key human experience. Most people are afraid of feeling anxiety, and they’ll do anything they can to distract themselves from it. What Kierkegaard means is that if you want to live a full, meaningful human life—catch hold of anxiety and don’t let it go. Use anxiety to follow your thoughts as a guide to see where it leads you. Don’t try to escape. Let it energize your life; let it bring you awareness not only of your ignorance but also of your desire to understand moments in every experience. At least for Kierkegaard, holding onto anxiety is a key to a fulfilled life.

  When people aren’t reasoned into their faith, it is difficult to reason them out of their faith. Many people of faith come to their beliefs independent of reason. In order to reason them out of their faith they’ll have to be taught how to reason first, and then instructed in the application of this new tool to their epistemic condition. The totality of this endeavor is indeed challenging, but a goal of the Street Epistemologist is to provide people with hope. Reason has emancipatory potential.

  There’s something to be said for Pascal Boyer’s account in Religion Explained that can help to understand this strategy (Boyer, 2001). Boyer is one of the leading figures in what can generally be referred to as neurotheology. Thinkers like Jonathan Haidt, Michael Gazzaniga, and Boyer, research in the areas of anthropology, linguistics, cognitive science, neurology, experimental psychology, etc. They’re all moving in similar directions, which is to seek reductive explanations for the appearance of religion in human affairs. They provide interesting albeit speculative answers to a range of related questions: Where did religion come from? What purpose does it
serve? How can these issues be viewed from the standpoint of evolutionary biology? In what way does religion help the survival of the fittest? What is religion’s survival value from a cultural standpoint? Why do human cultures invariably develop religious superstitions and ideologies?

  There’s a vast body of literature in sales, marketing, and advertising about persuasion and convincing people to buy products they don’t need. Entire industries revolve around figuring out how to influence consumers’ purchasing behavior. For more on these industries and the techniques they use, I recommend two PBS Frontline documentaries: The Persuaders and The Merchants of Cool.

  An interesting but highly technical paper that relates attitudes about information sources to doxastic attitudes is Baltag, Rodenhäuser, and Smets’s “Doxastic Attitudes as Belief-Revision Policies” (Baltag, Rodenhäuser, & Smets, 2011). They write, “This paper explores the idea that an agent’s ‘information uptake’ (i.e., what she does with some new informational input) depends substantially on her attitude towards the source of information: her assessment of the reliability of the source” (p. 1). Their research is applicable to faith-based beliefs formed on the perception of the evidential accuracy of ancient texts. This article also opens up potential new interventions that target attitudes toward sources of information. Additionally, I’d recommend social psychologist Arie Kruglanski’s body of work on what he terms “the need for closure.” Kruglanski has published interesting, though not entirely accessible for a lay audience, articles about the importance of being closed-minded.