Do Theists and Atheists have the same Deepest Experience?
Comparing the fears of monotheists and atheists
In war we demonize the enemy, because if we didn’t and we were to win, we’d be triumphing over our equals and by extension ourselves. The same is true in a culture war, such as that between the religious and the secular. However, those two groups have something ironic in common.
Life with God Watching
To see this, consider what it would be like to be a monotheist, to believe that a single, all-powerful and all-knowing person created and controls or intervenes in the universe. You’d have to believe that God transcends our world but knows everything that happens in it. But what would having that belief be like in practice? One useful analogy is the reality TV show in which contestants know they’re being watched at all moments by the show’s producers and by millions of viewers.
We know from the Hawthorne effect, the Watching-Eye effect, the Pygmalion effect, Goodhart’s law, and similar findings, that knowing you’re being watched can change your behaviour. A scientific experiment can be ruined if the subjects realize they’re in an experiment. So if you were in a reality TV show, knowing there are cameras all around and that anything you do might be observed and judged, you’d likely…
