However, it is problematic that the ardent theist and atheist cannot even engage in the axiological question. It leads to the following:

“If we knew that God necessarily exists, we could value His existence, and, in one sense, see it as making the world better. But we could no longer hold that it would be bad or worse if He didn’t exist. If this view is correct, then views and attitudes expressed by many theists (and, conversely, by many atheists) might not ultimately make sense.” (p. 37)

I agree with Kahane that this epistemic solution is deeply flawed. Oddly, Kahane seems to allow that some views and attitudes might still make sense. Perhaps the idea is that the theist can claim is.5 that God is good in a non-comparative way: God’s existence makes the world as good as it However, notice the kinds of claims the theist must give up if the theist tries to answer the axiological question in a non-comparative way. The theist would be unable to claim that God makes the world better than it would be if God did not exist. Likewise claims that life would be meaningless without God would not make sense. Perhaps some will be willing to bite these bullets. But consider that non-comparative solutions to the axiological problem would be problematic for anyone who thinks that bringing pragmatic reasoning to bear on the existence of God makes sense. Bringing pragmatic reasons to bear on God’s existence involves comparing belief/non-belief in a godly state of affairs to belief/non-belief in a godless state of affairs. Even if one thought that we should not decide what to believe on pragmatic grounds (perhaps beliefs should only be altered for evidential reasons), it is surely odd to claim that Pascal-like considerations makes no sense. Kahane’s preferred solution is for each side to conceive of possibilities that are close to the impossibilities. For example,

“Suppose…that the concept of an omnipotent, omniscient and perfectly good being was incoherent. The existence of an immensely knowledgeable, powerful and benevolent being might still be a genuine metaphysical possibility, and value claims about theism could migrate to this adjacent possibility, allowing us to make rational sense of the attitudes associated with these value claims.” (2012, p. 38)

Moser (2013) makes a similar suggestion. Moser defines ‘God’ as a perfectionist title, which allows one to remain neutral about God’s existence for the purpose of the axiological question. Moser admits that exactly what content should be included with this title might be controversial. To echo Kahane, the very idea of an omnipotent, omnibenevolent, omniscient being might be incoherent. Moser’s solution is to start with the “highest perfectionist level…[and] lower the bar later if the former inquiry fails” (p. 273). So if the traditional theistic concept is incoherent, then we should conceive of a slightly less powerful, good, or knowledgeable being. suggestion.6 However, there is a problem with Kahane’s and Moser’s Kahane’s necessitarian atheist is no longer thinking of a world with God in it, but rather a world with some super-human godlike being. It is plausible that by the time the atheist has weakened each property of God to their liking, it will be a god* unrecognizable. Maybe the addition of a really nice human, with lots of political, monetary, and societal power, and several advanced degrees