Nature in general and human nature in particular has incessantly received so much bad press that a mere mention of it in most gatherings is the surest way to attract ridicule. One must grudgingly give it to the atheists that while they have never made a coherent case for their atheism, such has been the persistence of their crusade against human nature that they have succeeded in making it something unmentionable on almost all forums. So much so that not only are theists reluctant in public to invoke nature or arguments based on it, but many of them have come to feel ashamed of even privately subscribing to them.
Why the idea of human nature is utterly unacceptable for the atheist and must therefore be rejected with all the force at his disposal is that it is not easy, if its reality is conceded, to reject its implications. It is an extremely slippery slope for him once he admits human nature, for then he finds it impossible to explain its source.
The atheist’s standard response to any mention of it is therefore a parroting of the materialistic, empirical view of man that has been in vogue for some time now. That there is no such thing as an objective human nature– it is all nurture instead. People develop differently in different parts of the world and have also been different in the various ages. At any given time, they are what they are solely because of their individual experiences and environments.
So it is that despite its obvious and many weaknesses, John Locke’s tabula rasa continues to remain popular, especially among those who feel threatened by anything that might hint at a common, objective human nature. For once that is granted, the appearance of God, as the author of that nature is only the next logical step. The atheists would have none of that.
And yet, even in this world full of strife, and where evil and injustice so often prevail, men still cannot help believing that injustice is wrong. Even those who are guilty of atrocities and brutalities deny committing them or (at the very least) rationalize them by putting a favourable spin on the situation. What accounts for this agreement if not a default human setting?
In contrast, the theistic stance is this: Man arrives in the world equipped with the capacity to distinguish between true and false, right (good) and wrong (evil), and beautiful and ugly (cognitive, moral and aesthetic senses respectively). What is more, he cannot help passing judgment in terms of these categories on all things that he subsequently comes across. That although the data that he passes his judgments on only comes via his senses once he starts experiences the world, he comes pre-wired in a particular way to process that incoming information. This default setting is referred to as human nature, and it is the same for everybody. Man is not always true to his nature, as it is not binding on him like some of his animal behaviour and dictates of his bodily functions and limitations are, but all men start their lives from this setting. It is this default setting that the atheist rejects. He insists instead on the ‘blank slate’ at birth for everybody.
The atheist goes to great lengths to reject human nature. He claims that morality, being subjective, cannot be a common denominator for all– implying in turn that there is no Creator. This argument suffers from two major weaknesses. The first problem is that when he dismisses morality by citing different stances on euthanasia or some such issue (for example), he sweeps under the carpet a thousand moral stances on which there is universal agreement. Also, the differences (whatever they are) are usually on the application of moral principles; not on the principles themselves, on which there are hardly any differences. When he concludes then that morality in its entirety is subjective, and therefore cannot possibly have any metaphysical roots, there is a definite method to his madness.
The second problem with the atheist’s argument is that even if (for the sake of the argument) morality is relative, nobody (with the possible exception of psychopaths) disputes that there are good and evil things, and that one ought to adopt the former and shun the latter. If there is no default human condition, what explains this general agreement?
Another weapon in the atheist’s arsenal against objective (or absolute) morality is the appeal to utilitarianism. Now utilitarianism is the last thing that could explain morality. Moral things are rarely, if ever, rewarded in utilitarian terms. Having a moral sense means believing that there is good, that there is evil, that one can tell the two apart, and that one ought to prefer the former regardless of the immediate and even longer-term results. Morality can neither be explained nor explained away by utilitarian principles or by citing pragmatism, because such is the world at large that morality seldom has a direct correlation with prosperity and success. Where it has, it can clearly be seen as the exception rather than the rule.
And yet, even in this world full of strife, and where evil and injustice so often prevail, men still cannot help believing that injustice is wrong. Even those who are guilty of atrocities and brutalities deny committing them or (at the very least) rationalize them by putting a favourable spin on the situation. What accounts for this agreement if not a default human setting?
