The Pot, the Preconditions, and the Problem with Atheism
By Joel Settecase | The Think Institute*
Let me cut to the chase.
If Christianity is true, the preconditions of intelligibility—logic, science, and moral absolutes—make sense. If it isn’t, you don’t get any of those. And no amount of pot analogies, clever hypotheticals, or shrugging agnosticism is going to get you there.
This is exactly what played out in a recent debate I had with an atheist who calls himself “Random Guy.” It was a conversation that started casual but quickly got down to the bones of worldview conflict. And if you care about giving a defense for the hope that is in you (1 Peter 3:15), especially in a culture that's increasingly skeptical, you'll want to understand how this kind of conversation unfolds.
A Worldview Without a Foundation
Random Guy calls himself an agnostic atheist. Right out of the gate, I asked: Does agnosticism steal from Christianity?
He said no. But his reason why was telling—he said that for it to be stealing, I would have to assume Christianity is true. In other words, “Sure, if I grant your worldview, I guess it follows.”
Exactly.
That’s what a transcendental argument does. It asks: what must be true in order for anything to be intelligible? And the answer, inevitably, is the Triune God of Scripture. If knowledge is possible, Christianity is true. Knowledge is possible. Therefore, Christianity is true.
What Random Guy didn’t realize is that the moment he acknowledged the conversation itself was intelligible—rational, coherent, governed by logic—he was already standing on Christian ground. He was borrowing from my worldview just to argue against it.
The Hubris of Neutrality
His main objection was that I was being arrogant—"hubristic," he said—by claiming Christianity is the only viable worldview. But it’s not hubris to say that 2+2=4 and not 5. It’s not arrogance to say that there’s only one cure for a disease, or that only one key opens the lock.
Christianity is not a made-up system. I didn’t invent it. I’m submitted to it. I believe it because it’s true—not because I needed a psychological crutch or a tidy explanation for the cosmos. And so when I say there’s only one worldview that can account for the laws of logic, scientific regularity, and objective morality, I’m not boasting—I’m testifying.
Romans 1:19–20 says that what can be known about God is plain to people, “because God has shown it to them.” His “invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived... so they are without excuse.”
That includes Random Guy. And it includes every person who uses their God-given rational faculties to deny the God who gave them.
Three Preconditions for Knowledge
Let’s make this concrete.
I told Random Guy that in order to explain knowledge, you need three things:
The laws of logic (necessary for rational thought)
The preconditions for science (like the uniformity of nature, math, and induction)
Objective moral obligations (necessary to make moral judgments)
You can’t just use these and pretend they’re neutral. They are not.
These are not optional features of thought. They are the very tools that make thought possible. And within the Christian worldview, they make perfect sense. Logic flows from the rational nature of God (John 1:1). Science is grounded in God’s providential ordering of creation (Genesis 8:22; Colossians 1:17). And morality reflects God's unchanging character (Isaiah 5:20; Micah 6:8).
Now, if you’re going to critique Christianity, you can’t use those tools while denying their source. You don’t get to swing an axe while sawing off the very branch you’re standing on.
The Pot Analogy (and Why It Fails)
To counter me, Random Guy offered a thought experiment.
Imagine a mysterious pot shows up on someone’s doorstep. They don’t know where it came from, but they use it to cook pasta. Later, someone lies and says they made the pot. But that doesn’t change whether the pot works.
The analogy was meant to say: “See? You can use logic and morality and science without knowing where they come from—or even believing the wrong story—and they still work.”
Here’s the problem: The analogy assumes the pot exists.
It’s not enough to say, “I’m using it, therefore I don’t need to explain it.” That’s pragmatism, not epistemology.
If person B claims to have made the pot but can’t explain how, or worse, is just lying, then person C (the user) is basing his actions on a delusion. The analogy proves my point.
God made the pot. The atheist uses the pot. The only reason he can boil water at all is because God gave him the tools—rationality, morality, and a uniform cosmos. He’s just using those tools while denying their source.
That’s not clever. That’s theft.
“But It Could’ve Been Someone Else…”
When pressed to offer an alternative grounding for these preconditions, Random Guy posited a universe-creating alien species.
Yes. Really.
Now, aside from the fact that this is science fiction and not philosophy, what’s the takeaway? To escape the God of the Bible, the atheist must invent a deity—a being with the power to create universes, with rationality, intentionality, and moral structure. Sound familiar?
But these aliens (unlike God) can’t ground morality. They’re finite. They’re contingent. They’re just a cosmic dodge.
When you try to build a worldview apart from God, you end up borrowing His attributes and pasting them onto something else—aliens, abstractions, or brute facts. But only the biblical God has the necessary attributes to ground the universal, immaterial, unchanging standards of logic, science, and morality.
Holes, Not Contradictions?
Toward the end of our discussion, Random Guy said, “Well, I wouldn’t say there’s a contradiction in my worldview. Just holes.”
That’s not a compliment.
If there are holes in your boat, you’re going to sink. If there are holes in your epistemology—if you can’t explain how knowledge is even possible—then everything downstream becomes suspect. It’s not just a matter of “I don’t know.” It’s a matter of you can’t know—not apart from God.
And here’s where the conversation became truly revealing. He admitted: “If you assume what you assume, your worldview works. I’m just not convinced.”
That’s what Romans 1 is all about. People know God is there, but they suppress the truth in unrighteousness (Romans 1:18). It’s not that the evidence isn’t there—it’s that they won’t submit to it.
Why the Christian Worldview is the Only One That Works
Only Christianity gives us:
A rational Creator whose mind accounts for logic.
A provident sustainer of nature whose ordering makes science possible.
A moral lawgiver whose nature defines good and evil.
All other attempts either:
Borrow from Christianity,
Invent a lesser deity,
Or shrug and say “I don’t know.”
But “I don’t know” isn’t an argument. It’s an admission of defeat.
The Impossibility of the Contrary
Here’s the heart of the issue: the impossibility of the contrary.
Any worldview that denies God cannot account for the very tools it uses to deny Him. Logic, science, and morality all require a foundation that is personal, absolute, unchanging, and eternal. That foundation is the Triune God revealed in Scripture.
Take away that God, and you lose the pot. You’re trying to make pasta in midair.
And yet, Random Guy kept trying to cook with no pot, standing on no floor, arguing with no basis. He wanted to say Christianity is just “one possibility” among many. But when asked to give a real alternative, he gave a fictional one—or punted.
That’s not good enough. Not if you want to live in a rational world. Not if you want to make sense of science, ethics, or conversation itself.
And that’s why I said what I said:
“If Christianity is true, you get the preconditions of intelligibility. If it’s not, you don’t get any of them. My point is that you’re acting as if the Christian worldview is true.”
Because, at the end of the day, he was.
Want more?
*This article was adapted by ChatGPT from the transcript of my debate with “Random Guy,” an atheist.
🎥 Watch the full debate with Random Guy here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7Cfq_ytCJA
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