Friendly Atheism Analysis

William Rowe claims that an atheist can hold three different opinions about the rationality of theistic belief: unfriendly atheism, indifferent atheism, and friendly atheism (307). All three positions maintain their atheism by not believing in a supremely good, omnipotent, omniscient, eternal being (308). The first and most extreme of these varieties of atheism, unfriendly atheism, is the position that theistic belief is not rationally justified (312-13). The second variety of atheism, indifferent atheism, is the lack of an opinion concerning the rationality of theistic belief (313). The final variety of atheism, friendly atheism, is the position that theists are rationally justified in their theism (313).
Rowe examines three different versions
It is extremely challenging for the friendly atheist to hold that some evidence can rationally justify a belief in theism without also appearing to believe that theism itself is true. When two equally rational individuals encounter the same exact evidence for and against a belief, it seems that they should reach the same conclusion regarding that belief. So if two equally rational individuals have been shown the same evidence for and against the existence of the theistic God, they should come to similar conclusions. But the atheist and the theist do no such thing. Sure, the atheist can think the theist is justified in his belief if the atheist thinks himself better at analyzing evidence and arguments than the theist (Kasser, 2017). But if the atheist believes the theist is rationally justified for this reason, he makes himself a less friendly atheist, holding that the theist is in some way less rational than he is (Kasser, 2017). Either the theist is irrational (or less rational) and wrong, or he is just as rational and correct. The friendly atheist cannot have
By saying that friendly atheism is rational if the atheist “has some reason to think that the grounds for theism are not as telling as the theist is justified [emphasis added] in taking them to be,” Rowe makes a solid argument for the rational stability of friendly atheism (314). In this case, the friendly atheist would hold that the theist is justified in their theism because of their internal states, which are inaccessible to the atheist (313). The friendly atheist may simultaneously hold that theism is “not as telling as the theist is justified in taking [it] to be” (314). The theist takes theism to be obviously true because of past experiences, emotions, or mental states. The friendly atheist, lacking those particular experiences, emotions, or mental states, takes theism to be obviously false. Both are justified in their disjoint beliefs because their lives have been shaped in different ways, which has caused them to interpret evidence inherently differently. Further, the presence of an internal state in one is not enough to confirm a belief, for the lack of that internal state in one carries as much justification as the presence of that internal state in