During a chilly winter break last year, I was sitting in a hookah bar with a few friends discussing a comment I had made earlier to one of my friends. In a sudden seizure of enlightenment I had proclaimed, "Dave, faith is the ultimate level of analysis."
His response: "You're full of s-t."
Yet, sitting over summer rolls in a haze of strawberry smoke after four hours of discussion, we all finally agreed that faith was in fact the ultimate level of analysis.
While appearing to be somewhat of a ridiculous statement, this idea is crucial to any discussion of faith versus reason, as reason actually stems from faith. Malina fails to grasp this concept in his Nov. 8 op-ed submission entitled, "Not a belief system, but a reason-based alternative to religion."
However, before elaborating on this idea, it is necessary to clarify two terms: atheism and agnosticism.
Seeing as we have seemed to designate the American Heritage Dictionary as the official semantics referee, I found my definitions for the two words there. Atheism is defined as "Disbelief or denial in the existence of God or gods; the doctrine that there is no God or gods." The belief in the nonexistence of something is still an active belief, as much so as the belief in something.
Both make claims about how reality functions; the onus of proof lies on both parties to prove their respective cases. It is this doctrine of the nonexistence of God that unifies atheists, a doctrine that I think is a bit too big to fit in the category of "just about nothing."
Malina defines his belief in atheism as the lack of a belief in God, rather than the active belief in the nonexistence of God.
A second definition from the American Heritage Dictionary: "Agnostic: One who believes that it is impossible to know whether there is a God; one who is skeptical about the existence of God but does not profess true atheism."
As Malina accurately points out, clarity is the antidote of confusion. Yet using misnomers to define one's spirituality will only cause more confusion.
I can understand why someone may ascribe to agnosticism, and I could even understand an argument for its somewhat intellectual superiority, at least in the realm of modern rational thought.
Acknowledging that it is impossible to know either way, agnosticism abstains from taking a stance on the spirituality argument, something altogether different from atheism's assertion of the nonexistence of God. However, I wrote my op-ed in response to an atheist claim, not an agnostic one, so I will stick to a critique of atheism.
Malina buttresses his arguments with a deep investment in modern rational thought and reasoning. Yet, where did this reasoning come from? Part of reasoning has been inquiry, examining and scrutinizing our conceptions about the world, including our method of reasoning, in order to make them stronger. Many a philosopher has attempted a rigorous and sometimes ultimate questioning of reality.
One example that comes to mind is René Descartes' questioning of his own existence. Descartes attempted to throw out all assumptions and start from scratch, in order to construct a concrete base for his logical framework of reality. Yet, while many say he succeeded with his famed quote "I think, therefore I am," I would strongly disagree. Descartes had to still hold assumptions about the soundness of his reasoning as well as what constituted existence, such as the idea that thinking explains existence. The conclusions he reached were still based on unexamined assumptions he had to maintain.
Whereas many a religionist have not attempted such a rigorous analysis of reality, choosing instead to accept the dogma handed to them, most subscribers to modern rational thought have done the same.
To undertake such a thorough analysis of thought would bring you to the conclusion that at a fundamental level, reasoning dissolves and one must accept faith before going forward.
In "Leviathan," Thomas Hobbes eloquently illustrates this dilemma: "Curiosity, or love of the knowledge of causes, draws a man from consideration of the effect to seek the cause; and again, the cause of that cause; till of necessity he must come to this thought at last, that there is some cause whereof there is no former cause, but is eternal; which is it men call God. So that it is impossible to make any profound inquiry into natural causes without being inclined thereby to believe there is one God eternal; though they cannot have any idea of Him in their mind answerable to His nature."
To Hobbes, God is this rudimentary faith, a faith which then enables man (and woman) to employ their mental faculties to intellectually explore the world around them.
Whereas Hobbes' claim doesn't necessarily make it more likely there is some old bearded man floating around in the sky, I think it quite clearly illustrates the rudimentary need for faith in order to establish any form of reasoning.
It is by this same token of faith that I have fostered my belief in God. If one wishes to stay strictly "rational," only accepting what can be proven under our mode of logic and not using faith in the least, then reasoning will quickly come crashing down, as it is in part based on the fundamental assumption that human reasoning is sound, an assumption that cannot be proven.
While Malina may be correct in noting the validity of reasoning, its soundness is another matter altogether. Under critical analysis, modern rational thought is not sound unless one is willing to take a leap of faith akin to Hobbes' notion of God above.
To "swim in the shallow end of inquiry" would be to accept what you are told and not question it. It would be to proclaim a God without considering the possibility that that God does not exist. It would be to unconditionally accept from your conservative parents that all homosexuals are evil and all who get abortions are going to hell, turning your head to how this contradicts your religion's emphasis on good will and love.
But the shallow end is also reserved for those who do not fully question their logic and reasoning, for those who do not ask themselves why they think and what they do, for the ones who do not question if their mode of reasoning is sound or valid.
Once you do get to the deep end, however, you have to exert yourself to stay afloat. Constant questioning of everything around you can get tiresome and be somewhat disorienting as all your beliefs are called into question and any anchor for reality disappears. It is through faith that people recreate this anchor, and from that anchor, they begin to build their own logical framework about the world.
I believe in most, if not all, of the major scientific discoveries humans have come across. Yet I also believe in God.
I understand that neither can be ultimately proven, but that they both come from this rudimentary level of faith that is required for any rational thought to occur.
Kevin Dillon is a junior majoring in sociology.
