Anthony Flew was, for the last half of the twentieth century ( 1923 -2010 ) the worlds most famous atheist and long before the likes of the Richard Dawkins, the Christopher Hitchens and the Sam Harris, Flew was the preeminent spokesman for atheism.

 

Anthony Flew shocked the world in 2004 when he announced he had come to believe in God and although he was no Christian he accepted the deistic, Aristotelian concept of God and thereby becoming one of the most surprising atheist converts.

 

Anthony Flew has recounted his conversion within his book 'There is a god, how the worlds most notorious atheist changed his mind' and a few months before the release of his book he sat down with Dr Benjamin Wiker to speak about his book.

 

 

Dr Benjamin Wiker  -  You have said within your book 'There is a God' that "it may very well be that nobody has been as surprised as myself that my exploration of the Divine has after all of these years transformed from one of denial to discovery"

 

Everyone else was certainly surprised, perhaps all the more so since it seemed so sudden, but in your book 'There is a God' we find it was a gradual process, a two decade migration where God became the conclusion of a rather long argument.

 

But wasn't there a point within the argument where you found yourself suddenly surprised by the realisation that there is a God after all, so that in some sense you really did hear a voice which says 'within the evidence itself, can you hear me now'.

 

 

Anthony Flew  -  There were two factors in particular which were decisive, one being my growing empathy with the insight of Einstein and other noted scientists that there had to be an intelligence behind the integrated complexity of the physical universe and the second was my own insight that the complexity of life itself which is far more complex than the physical universe, can only be explained in terms of an intelligent source.

 

I believe that the origin of life and reproduction cannot be explained from a biological standpoint despite numerous efforts to do so and with each passing year the more we discover about the richness and inherent intelligence of life, the less it seems likely that a chemical soup could magically generate the genetic code.

 

The difference between life and non life seems to be ontological and not chemical and the best confirmation of this radical gulf is Richard Dawkins comical effort in his 'God Delusion' to argue that the origin of life can be attributed to a 'lucky chance' and if that is the best argument you have then i am afraid the game is over and no i did not hear a voice, it was simply the evidence which led me to my conclusions.

 

 

Benjamin Wiker  -  You are famous for arguing for a presumption of atheism in as far as the arguments which are for and the arguments which are against the existence of God and a Supreme being, the burden of proof, you say, lies with the theist.

 

Given that you believed you only followed the evidence where it led, and it led to theism, it would seem things have changed so the burden of proof lies with the atheist, he must prove that God does not exist, what are your thoughts on this.

 

Anthony Flew  -  As i note in my book, some philosophers have indeed argued in the past that the burden of proof is on the atheist and as the origins of the laws of nature and of life and the universe point clearly to an intelligent source, the burden of proof is upon those who argue to the contrary.

 

 

Benjamin Wiker  -  As for evidence, you cite a lot of the most recent science yet you say your discovery of the divine did not come through 'experiments and equations' it came from 'a thorough understanding of the structures they unveil and map, does this mean that the evidence which led you to God is not really, at heart, scientific ?

 

Anthony Flew  -  It was empirical evidence which was uncovered by the sciences but it was also a philosophical inference drawn from the evidence. Scientists as scientists cannot make these kind of philosophical inferences, they have to speak as philosophers when they study the philosophical implications of empirical evidence.

 

Benjamin Wiker  -  You are obviously aware of the spate of books by such atheists as Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens who think that those who believe in God are behind the times, but you seem to be positively asserting that they are behind the times, insofar as the latest scientific evidence tends strongly towards a theistic conclusion, is that a fair assessment of your position ?

 

 

Anthony Flew  -  Yes, Dawkins is selective to the point of dishonesty when he cites the views of scientists on the philosophical implications of the scientific data and two noted philosophers, one an agnostic 'Anthony Kenny' and the atheist 'Thomas Nagel' pointed out that Dawkins has failed to address three major issues which cite the rational case for God 1. the laws of nature 2. life and its teleological organisation 3. the existence of the universe, issues which led me to accept the existence of God.

 

Benjamin Wiker  -  You say the existence of God and the existence of evil are actually two different issues which require two distinct investigations but within popular literature, even in much of philosophical literature, the two issues are regularly conflated. Especially among atheists, the presumption is that the non existence of God simply follows upon the existence of evil and so what is the danger of such conflation, how as a theist do you respond ?

 

Anthony Flew  -  I am a deist, i do not accept any claim of divine revelation though i would be happy to study any such claim ( and continue to do so within Christianity ) and for the deist the existence of evil does not pose a problem because the deist God does not intervene within the affairs of this world while the theist can turn to the free will defence and another recent change in my philosophical views is my affirmation of the freedom of the will.

 

 

Benjamin Wiker  -  According to your book the evidence led you to not only accept there is a cause within nature but to accept the existence of a self existent, immutable, immaterial, omnipotent and omniscient being and so how far are you from accepting this to be a person rather than a set of characteristics, i am thinking of C.S.Lewis whose acceptance of Christianity was realising that God was not a place or a set of characteristics but a person.

 

Anthony Flew  -  I accept the God of Aristotle who shares all the attributes you cite and like Lewis i believe that God is a person but not the sort of person with whom you can have a talk, it is the ultimate being, the creator of the universe.

 

Benjamin Wiker  -  Do you plan to write a follow up to the book 'There is a God' ? Anthony Flew  -  As i said within the opening of the book, this will be my last will and testament.