An Atheist's God

by Rucha Lim

"Why do people have to be this lonely? What's the point of it all? Millions of people in this world, all of them yearning, looking to others to satisfy them, yet isolating themselves. Why? Was the earth put here just to nourish human loneliness?”

― Haruki Murakami, Sputnik Sweetheart

I’d like to begin with a quick clarification because I know that “atheist” is a loaded word. It carries the connotation that an atheist is someone who denies the existence of God. Because of this, I identify myself as an “atheistic agnostic” to avoid any form of confusion brought about by connotations.

Just to be sure, I define that phrase by examining its etymology. The word “atheistic” is composed of the suffix “a-“ which is used to mean “absence of”, “theist” which comes from “theos” which was the old Greek for “god” (probably the origin of the Latin, “deus” as in “deus ex machina”), “-ic” which is a suffix used to mean “to have characteristics of”. The word “agnostic” uses “a-“ in the same way, and “gnosia” which means, “knowledge” (hence we have the Gnostic gospels) and the “-ic” suffix which means “to pertain to”. Therefore I am “absence-of-god-characteristics-of-absence-of-knowledge-pertains-to”. Rearranging that
to be more sensible to the English language paradigm, I am one who claims no knowledge
on gods and act as though were was none.

With that aside, I’d like to begin sharing my unsolicited reflection.

After listening to Gangnam Style for the nth time, I asked a friend what the hell the song was really about. He explained that it was a guy who is describing his ideal girl. Hearing the word made me go into a musing on its meaning and implications while rudely spacing out from my friend’s conversation. I was fortunate that he did not notice and I just nodded and said “Yeah.” When I was finally alone, I decided to put my thoughts into order and here’s the result.

What does ideal mean? I’ve been asked countless times to describe my ideal girl (and on certain strange occasions, guy). Each time, I’ve given almost the same set of answers. Of course, the qualities I give are distinct and would not be the same for everyone else. We all have our individual notions of an ideal partner. For that matter, we all have our individual notions on what an ideal world is. Some would say it’s a world with no taxes, a world with no wars, a world where everybody shares their resources, a world where nobody is ever friend-zoned, etc. But an important thing to note is how these notions came from individuals, people with perceptions. I tried crafting my own ideal world in my head but at some point I randomly thought on what a caveman’s notion of an ideal world would be, or that of someone from an ancient civilization or of the medieval era. The notion of a perfect world changes as ways of living change. My notion of a perfect world would probably be crude to a person who lives centuries from now. Who am I to construct a set of ideals for an ideal world that would encompass all things discovered and undiscovered, and that has
happened and has yet to happen?

Despite all of my disagreements on Descartes premises, I have to admit that perhaps this was what he was trying to say when all ideas are mere simulacra to their source. Our ideas are affected by our perceptions, which are affected by various things like values and the zeitgeists we belong to and cannot account for things unknown in the span of our existences. And Descartes himself was subject to this. So now I arrive at my notion of a God. I abandoned my Catholicism for several reasons but the primary one being that as human beings with limited perception, I believe we can never absolutely know anything, especially the existence of a supernatural being that is omniscient and omnipotent. One of Richard Dawkins’ famous quotes is “We are all atheists about most of the gods humanity has ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further.” A friend of mine disagreed with the statement, saying Zeus and Thor were not Gods. However he
confuses gods with Gods (and that is with the big letter “G”) in that they were not omnipotent and omniscient.

So here we see how the notion gods of the ancient Greeks evolved into the God of Judeo-Christians. A characteristic that remained however is the intervention in human affairs. I’d love to divulge into the reasons for my disagreement for this by expressing my opinion of the mimetic nature of religions but that’s a discussion (not debate) for another place and time. Suffice it to say that I do not agree with it. I am, however in agreement with Carl Sagan when he said, “The idea that God is an oversized white male with a flowing beard who sits in the sky and tallies the fall of every sparrow is ludicrous. But if by God one means the set of physical laws that govern the universe, then clearly there is such a God. This God is emotionally unsatisfying... it does not make much sense to pray to the law of gravity.” But to me, it extends beyond these physical laws (which I am sure Sagan did not limit to those known only in his time), my God includes each and everyone person, (That’s right, you’re my God, part of it at least) myself included. My God is this amorphous, (every)thing, not in any way singularly sentient. You could say that for me, the universe is God and not the other way around.

This is what I believe is what David Foster Wallace called “the mystical oneness of all things deep down.” and if I’m not mistaken, what Heidegger was referring to as the “sophon” and that as I continue my studies in philosophy (because I lack the confidence to say that I’m truly philosophizing), I find a way to connect to this oneness. Maybe it’s the buzz from the coffee while listening to Georges Cziffra play Franz Liszt’s “Liebestraume” but I want to connect to all those people I see outside my window, know their stories, their hopes and dreams, and serendipitously make friends, fall in love, and make this world a world a better
place, even a bit. So now I’ve given my Miss Universe statement, where do I go from here? And where do you go from here? Well, go ahead and pick up whatever you can from this and do whatever you want with it. Throw it away, throw it in my face, or keep it and make it grow. The choice is yours. As for me, I still have several questions left unanswered and I don’t think there’s anything substantially final on this little blog post. I guess it’s time to continue my loving struggle. If you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go lazily look up pantheism on Wikipedia.