Many people assume that they are able to think rationally without God. They think that they can trust their own reasoning. Many make their case that evolution could build and develop rationality through trial and error starting from basic survival instincts of finding food, avoiding danger, and finding a mate. They reason that this trial and error could over time allow reasonable thinking to develop over many generations.

This thinking is missing an essential point by assuming that “natural selection” would not accept lies that would permit survival. Natural selection would still allow falsehoods for survival. Therefore, one would expect the evolved brain to be susceptible to lies and falsehoods that deny reality. Evotion would determine one’s perception of reality whether true or not. Furthermore, no trial and error from others could attest to truth and overcome lies if humanity evolved together to accept the same lies for survival. The evolution of unguided changes over times undermines the ability of intelligent life to perceive any truth without errors. Proposing that evolution and natural selection would allow rationality, accept falsities for survival, and produce the assumption that one has an accurate perception of reality is self-defeating of knowing if any of this is true.

Logic and the Mind

Someone could argue that evolution would produce brains that are in some part rational and irrational for survival. The human mind would be hindered by a fallible brain. No one could rely on one’s ability to think logically. Logic at it core is the ability to compare and contrast and its origin would have begun with chemical reaction with what is local for survival than what is not. The first law of logic is the law of noncontradiction as a being must perceive what something is and what is not. However, the laws of logic are constant and unchanging preexisting all life on earth, yet logic cannot exist without the mind. Therefore, a constant mind must exist.

Rational thinking cannot be based on survival alone or on oneself but absolute laws of reasoning. Many people assume the rationality needed for survival is an absolute and rational view of reality. Reasoning for survival does not equate to reasoning by what is factual and true. Because of the fallibility of humanity, humanity needs a reasonable corrective. Absolutes for logic require an absolute source and standard.

This comes down to the basis of reasoning. Without God, no one can account for the basis of rationality — the laws of logic. They cannot account for the unchangeable nature of logic. Logic cannot begin without logic, and so logic’s existence must be timeless and constant. However, logic cannot exist without the mind thus requiring an eternal mind. Only the God of the Bible is eternal.

From a Right View of God

The Bible reveals that the Christian can lead unbelievers from a reasonable view of God into presenting the gospel of Jesus’s death, burial, and resurrection. Paul preached a right view of God and then shared Jesus and the resurrection before the Epicureans and Stoics in Athens (Acts 17:18). However, the unbeliever tries to reason in the futility of one’s mind darkened in understanding, because they are harden and callous in heart by lewdness and sexual impurity (Ephesians 4:17–19; cf. Romans 1:18–28). The apostle Paul knew the philosophers in Athens were suppressing the truth (cf. Romans 1:20). However, he reasoned about what is not true about God to present the ultimate truth that God will judge the world by a Man giving assurance by raising Him from the dead. Paul’s reasoning brought everyone again back to the gospel of Jesus’s resurrection (Acts 17:30–31).

Conclusion

The human mind cannot know anything without fallibility. Without the infallible and sinless nature of God as in Jesus Christ, no one can think rationally or know that they really know anything with certainty. Only with God can humanity rely on rational thinking to know what is true. Without God, people do not have the rational ability to know what is true either according to evolution or when evil keeps one from seeing God’s light in Christ (John 3:19–21).