If the
greatest physicists on Earth openly acknowledge that their discoveries
transcend reason at the quantum level, why do so many new atheists still
believe their logic can police the limits of reality?
The quantum physics community has thrown a substantial challenge into the purely materialist worldview. Their discoveries are reality-bending, logic-defying, and profoundly strange, so much so that leading experts frequently concede their confusion. Physicist Philip Ball offers his insight:
"…our language is built around the logic we know, but that logic simply won't work for quantum mechanics."
Beyond Language and Logic
Imagine
traveling to the quantum realm, witnessing impossible events, then being asked
to describe them, but using only everyday language. It would be like trying to
explain green to someone blind from birth.
Now picture
your blind friend confidently lecturing you on colour theory. Seems absurd,
right? Yet this mirrors exactly what occurs when staunch materialists dismiss
spiritual or metaphysical experiences.
Centuries
before quantum labs existed, yogis, mystics, and spiritual explorers
consistently described a similar "language failure" when sharing
transcendent experiences. Modern medical research echoes these accounts through
thousands of documented near-death experiences (NDEs). Patients who've been
clinically dead describe verifiable observations, encounters with spiritual
beings, and journeys to places "beyond logic, intellect, and reason."
Psychiatrist
Bruce Greyson's forty-year research program has catalogued over a thousand such
cases. He concludes standard physiological explanations consistently "fail
to explain NDEs, and challenge current mind-brain models."
Similarly,
Dr. Sam Parnia's AWARE study highlights cases of people recalling precise
events during periods when their brains were completely inactive, defying
conventional explanations.
How New Atheists Respond to Unexplained Phenomena
Rather than
seriously engaging with such evidence, prominent New Atheists often resort to
dismissing metaphysical claims outright. Ironically, they do so with precisely
the unwavering and unevidenced certainty they criticize in others.
For
example, in his book "Darwin's Dangerous Idea," philosopher Daniel
Dennett meets the "above logic" claim by suggesting God could
therefore be a "ham sandwich wrapped in foil."
But note
the rhetorical sleight of hand: those reporting spiritual experiences describe
them as being "above logic"; Dennett quietly replaces that with
something clearly beneath logic, invents a lunch-meat deity, slaps mustard on
it, and declares victory through a textbook straw-man fallacy.
Curiously,
I doubt he has ever stormed a quantum lab yelling, "So if the quantum
world is beyond our logic, then the wave-function could be deli meat?" No,
the ham sandwich analogy seems reserved exclusively for metaphysical targets.
Professor
Richard Dawkins pushes harder than Dennett: instead of attacking the concept,
in his book The God Delusion he tries to discredit the experiences
themselves.
He writes:
"The argument from personal experience is the one that is most convincing
to those who claim to have had one, but it is the least convincing to anyone
else" (pp. 88–89, 2006 UK ed.)
And his
reasoning? He argues there is insufficient evidence for supernatural claims,
therefore natural explanations are more probable. He concludes that because
some hallucinations exist, all spiritual perceptions must be hallucinations.
Yet he
offers no data, no research papers—just asylum anecdotes and a pink-elephant
quip—to make a hasty leap of faith no first-year methods class would tolerate.
However,
the reader is expected not to notice that his position conveniently ignores
well-documented NDE cases where clinically brain-dead patients accurately
reported verifiable events, evidence that, as earlier confirmed by Dr. Greyson,
defies conventional neurological explanation.
By
selectively addressing only the weakest examples while ignoring stronger
evidence, Dawkins demonstrates the very confirmation bias he critiques in
theists. However, the validity of his arguments, or lack thereof, is easily demonstrated
through his claim that these experiences are "least convincing to everyone
else", which is demonstrably false.
Heaven Is
for Real, a book based on direct NDE testimony, has
sold over 10 million copies to Dawkins' 3 million, while YouTube hosts
countless similar testimonies with millions of views. So much for his
insistence that "I just put out the truth, which is scientific truth, take
it or leave it." I think we'll leave it, thank you.
Sam Harris
approaches the issue differently, suggesting NDEs can't be genuine because only
10-20% of near-death patients report them. Yet the AWARE study already
explained this low recall rate, attributing it to sedation or brain trauma. We
don't deny the phenomenon of dreaming simply because most people forget them
upon waking, so why apply different standards here?
He also points to cultural variation. If NDEs really reflect a non-physical reality, he asks, shouldn't the reports be more uniform? But what's his expectation of uniformity based on? Harris never explains. It seems he simply assumes that rules based on his understanding must apply to whatever lies beyond it.
His objections are easily challenged through a simple speculative idea. Most of us fear death, whether because of the unknown, annihilation, or inherited images of judgment and hell. Now imagine, to ease what could otherwise be a hugely traumatic event, a supreme consciousness, like a skilled therapist tailoring the session to each client, guides us through that moment in a way that is deeply personal, comforting, and suited to our individual psyche. How can Harris be sure that isn't what's happening? Obviously, he can't. And yet he declares:
"One
certainly wouldn't expect the after-death state of South Indians to diverge
from that of North Indians, as has been reported."
Isn't it
true that physicists once wouldn't have expected particles to exist
simultaneously in multiple places or communicate instantly across vast
distances? Clearly, what we 'expect' isn't a reliable guide at the boundaries
of our understanding.
The Limits of Certainty in Materialist Thinking
Spiritual
teachers have always maintained that the metaphysical lies beyond human logic
and comprehension. Quantum physicists, exploring reality's outer edges,
consistently confirm this limitation.
To support
their claimed certitude, if Dawkins and co. held the same level of hard data
they expect from others, they would be shouting it from the rooftops. And yet, it appears their strongest arguments consist of ham-sandwich fallacies, unevidenced bravado, or
speculative expectations about realms they simultaneously claim don't exist.
If, without
that hard data, and as often claimed, logic and rationality are the atheists'
chosen weapons, the exact tools quantum physics have confirmed fail at the edge
of our known reality, how can the new atheist use them to insist what can or
cannot exist beyond it?
Short
answer: they can't. It's back to our blind friend insisting he understands
vision better than those with sight.
Ultimately,
the unwavering certainty displayed by many New Atheists rests on an arrogantly
delusional assumption: "Nothing can exist beyond my current
understanding." Ironically, that may be the most unscientific position of
all.
