Can you be an atheist and an environmentalist?

Written by Darren Hewer

Ask anyone “Should we protect our environment?” and almost without exception they will answer yes. Thousands of square meters of forest area are lost to deforestation every second around the world: A total of 20,000 hectares per day, equivalent to an area twice the size of Paris.[1] Who would say that we shouldn’t be at all concerned about air pollution, animal rights, or the permanent destruction of our planet’s rainforests?

The trickier question is why we should be so concerned.

Why save the Earth?

It may seem like an absurd question, because concern for our natural environment seems so obvious, and … well, natural.

“Naturalism” is the worldview that the natural world is all that exists: Nothing that cannot be explained physically and via scientific experiment exists. But if the natural world is all there is, what’s to stop human beings from doing what comes naturally to them? If humans are merely animals, essentially no different than cats or monkeys, shouldn’t humans just do what’s natural, including wreck the environment if that’s what they “naturally” do? Where does responsibility to the Earth come in?

When we say we “should” do this or that, it implies a moral responsibility: That a particular action is morally preferable, or, on the other hand, morally deplorable. But this is exactly what naturalism does not allow for. There is no “ought”, there only “is”. If we are merely animals, what we call morality is merely an illusion, for a moral law requires some sort of outside standard, which is exactly what’s missing in a naturalist view of the world.

Where morality comes from

Contemporary philosophers struggle with the issue of morality when they approach it from a naturalistic perspective. Atheist philosopher Michael Onfray for example says our society is not truly secular, it is actually more like secular Christianity, and that without God we can be free to devise our own morality. He concludes that the basis for our understanding of what is moral is rooted in God’s existence.

The argument could be stated something like this:

1) Real moral laws exist. We are obligated to do good and avoid evil.

2) Either the atheistic (God doesn’t exist) or the theistic (God exists) conception of reality is correct.

3) But the atheistic view is incompatible with the existence of real good and evil.

4) Therefore the theistic view of reality is correct; God exists.[2]

Naturalism is incompatible with morality. Philosopher Greg Koukl gives the following illustration:

One evening in the middle of a Scrabble game, you notice the phrase “do not go” formed in the random spray of letter tiles on the table. Is this a command that ought to be obeyed? Of course not. It’s not a command at all, just a random collection of letters.

Commands are communications between two minds. Chance might conceivably create the appearance of a moral rule, but there can be no command if no one is speaking. Since this phrase is accidental, it can safely be ignored.

Put simply, a moral law requires a moral law-giver. In atheism, no moral law-giver exists; therefore there can be no real moral laws.

Can you be an atheist AND an environmentalist?

So this helps explain why there is (or should be) internal tension for the atheist environmentalist. This does not mean an atheist cannot, in practical terms, be moral and/or an environmentalist; of course a person may be both. But it leads us to question where the grounding for such a combination could possibly come from.

On one hand they (or you?) believe that the wanton destruction of our natural environment is wrong. And it is wrong. Not just wrong in the sense of “I don’t personally like it” but in the sense of being objectively wrong.

But on the other hand, there’s no grounding for such a belief in objective right and wrong apart from belief in God. Greg Koukl continues:

If I stood at an intersection and put my hand up, cars might stop voluntarily, but they’d have no duty to respond. They could ignore me with no fear of punishment because I have no authority to direct traffic. If, on the other hand, a policeman replaced me, traffic would come to a halt.

What is the difference between the policeman and me? My authority is not grounded. It doesn’t rest on anything solid. The policeman, however, represents the government, so his authority is justified.

Standing firmly in mid-air

Without God claiming an objective moral rule loses its grounding because there is nothing (no one) to give it legitimate authority. You lose your grounding: It’s like trying to stand firmly in mid-air. So it seems as though a person can be an atheist, or be an environmentalist, but not both:

A moral atheist is like a man sitting down to dinner who doesn’t believe in farmers, ranchers, fishermen, or cooks. He believes the food just appears, with no explanation and no sufficient cause. This is silly. Either his meal is an illusion, or someone provided it. In the same way, if morals really exist, as I have argued, then some cause adequate to explain the effect must account for them. God is the most reasonable solution.[3]

Something to think about

If you believe that destroying our Earth is wrong, really wrong, this necessitates belief in objective moral values, which in turn necessitates the existence of a God to provide the grounding for moral laws. Think about this, and please continue to think about some of the resources for further reading listed below.

Talk back: Are religion and spirituality the same thing?
You decide your own faith
Do God and science conflict?

[1] “Net forest loss 20,000 hectares per day”, Cited 20 March 2008. Online: http://peopleandplanet.net/doc.php?id=2980

[2] Adapted from Peter Keeft, “Twenty Arguments For The Existence Of God” Cited 20 March 2008. Online: http://peterkreeft.com/topics-more/20_arguments-gods-existence.htm

[3] Gregory Koukl, “Evil as Evidence for God” Cited 20 March 2008. Online:http://www.str.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=6023

Tags: atheism, environment, God, questions, religions