When an atheist points out the harm religion does, you almost assuredly will get a response about what harm atheists have caused. This argument does not understand the point. Lets take a look at why it is reasonable to say religion causes harm but atheism by itself simply cannot not. Firstly religion is a set of beliefs, where as atheism is the lack of belief in god. Now in order to get from one belief ( or lack there of) you need a 2nd belief or premise. Amazingly religion can provide multiple beliefs and premises, atheism cannot. Lets look at killing children by prayer as an example. Here are the beliefs that lead to this:
The bible is the truth and says what jesus taught.
In the bible jesus clearly taught that anything can be done through prayer.
If the person believes these 2 things it logically follows that prayer should save your child from dying.
The result dead children, all from religious beliefs.
Lets take a look at other examples:
Islam teaches that sex outside marriage is punishable by death.
Woman gets raped and that is sex outside marriage.
Woman gets stoned to death. This has legitimately happened to woman in islamic countries.
Want another:
The bible says that one should not suffer a witch to live.
People believe the bible is the word of god and instructions on how to live.
People in undereducated parts of the world are still killing witches over this religious teaching.
Im exactly curious how does this one premise lead to harm:
Not believing in a god.
You can't logically get there without bringing more to the table. That is the point, religious teachings lead you right to harm if followed as taught, atheism cannot get there on its own.
Thursday, October 28, 2010
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
"Survival of the fittest" and morality
I had a friend claim that morality and "survival of the fittest" creates a problem. This is only so when you think one dimensionally at what is meant by "survival of the fittest." Survival of the fittest does not mean that the literal strongest survive. It means the animals that are most fit for survival survive. For instance cheetahs use their speed to survive and the fastest of them are more likely to survive. Other animals may actually use their strength to survive. The strongest of them tend to survive. Are humans a strong animal, not really in comparison, are humans a fast animal, definitely not. What then causes us to survive?
Lets explore this for a moment. We like many animals are social animals. Between being social and communication we have surpassed all other animals in ability to survive. Now, social animals must work together to survive. The animals that work together and don't cause problems are the best at survival. This is where morality comes in. Morality is doing what is right by other people. This benefits our survival. Who was more likely to survive when civilization was beginning a person who worked with others or the person who did bad things to the others. That person would be shunned out and was less likely to survive on his own.
So we are seeing that this helps individuals and the entire species to survive. So actually our own survival is a good reason to be moral and very well could be where morality comes from. As humans we have learned how to communicate as well, so that increases the common understanding of morality, adding to our ability to survive.
This explanation also explains why morality has changed. It has evolved, because we have learned certain actions benefit society and certain ones don't As we learn this we create rules of thumb in terms of morality and live by them which make us more likely to survive. Now being we a lot of the times are using rules of thumb in regards to morality, issues can come up that make for moral issues. If two rules of thumb contradict, or if a rule of thumb actually doesn't benefit survival in a certain time, we may experience problems. But these rules of thumb benefit, because an overwhelming amount of times they do work towards helping us to survive.
Now I admit this contains one assumption, that we have a will to survive, and animals that have a will to survive are more capable of surviving as they avoid death. Where this will to survive came from is irrelevant to this argument, as the argument was morality can't come from "survival of the fittest" or evolution? Now go ahead and pull the old infinite regress into god the gaps fallacy on the instinct to survive.
Lets explore this for a moment. We like many animals are social animals. Between being social and communication we have surpassed all other animals in ability to survive. Now, social animals must work together to survive. The animals that work together and don't cause problems are the best at survival. This is where morality comes in. Morality is doing what is right by other people. This benefits our survival. Who was more likely to survive when civilization was beginning a person who worked with others or the person who did bad things to the others. That person would be shunned out and was less likely to survive on his own.
So we are seeing that this helps individuals and the entire species to survive. So actually our own survival is a good reason to be moral and very well could be where morality comes from. As humans we have learned how to communicate as well, so that increases the common understanding of morality, adding to our ability to survive.
This explanation also explains why morality has changed. It has evolved, because we have learned certain actions benefit society and certain ones don't As we learn this we create rules of thumb in terms of morality and live by them which make us more likely to survive. Now being we a lot of the times are using rules of thumb in regards to morality, issues can come up that make for moral issues. If two rules of thumb contradict, or if a rule of thumb actually doesn't benefit survival in a certain time, we may experience problems. But these rules of thumb benefit, because an overwhelming amount of times they do work towards helping us to survive.
Now I admit this contains one assumption, that we have a will to survive, and animals that have a will to survive are more capable of surviving as they avoid death. Where this will to survive came from is irrelevant to this argument, as the argument was morality can't come from "survival of the fittest" or evolution? Now go ahead and pull the old infinite regress into god the gaps fallacy on the instinct to survive.
Thursday, September 2, 2010
My response to a theists review of my debate
www.truefreethinker.com/articles/kerrigan-skelly-vs-erik-dickerson-%E2%80%93-christian-vs-atheist-debate-existence-god-bible.
http://www.truefreethinker/trackback/1562
Ok so I found this lovely write up on my debate I had months ago, last night. Hmm how many ways am i going to destroy this guy, Mariano Grinbank, its funny to read as its kind of cute in the toddler trying to figure things out kind of way. He actually thinks he's made a point. So let me post it and destroy it piece by piece ok:
http://www.truefreethinker/trackback/1562
Ok so I found this lovely write up on my debate I had months ago, last night. Hmm how many ways am i going to destroy this guy, Mariano Grinbank, its funny to read as its kind of cute in the toddler trying to figure things out kind of way. He actually thinks he's made a point. So let me post it and destroy it piece by piece ok:
Kerrigan Skelly vs. Erik Dickerson – Christian vs. Atheist debate on the existence of the God of the Bible
Where does morality come from?
I don’t know.
You don’t know anything, it seems like.
I don’t know.
This is a very interesting debate and a case study in presuppositional apologetics/debate.
What this means is that, for example, Erik Dickerson condemns the God of the Bible for committing and allowing immorality yet, when challenged to provide a premise for his condemnation he simply has nothing to offer but further baseless condemnations. This alone discredits about 5 cubit tons of atheist literature.
So I think its quite telling that this guy starts right off supporting Mr Skelly's Red Herring argument. This was not the subject of the debate. For those who don't know what a red herring is here is a perfect example:
Kerrigan Skelly and this guy- Where do Erik Dickerson's morals come from? Or where do people's morals come from?
Actual topic of the debate- Does god exist?
See how they are using a subject to detract from the actual topic at hand. Thats what a red herring is, is simply a logical fallacy, based on using an argument attempting to detract from the original argument. Something tells me this is going to be like bad boxing and he's setting up the god of the gaps/argument from ignorance fallacy next, I know that's what Kerrigan did.
Now, be on the lookout for a favorite atheist debater’s tactic: peppered through Erik Dickerson’s statement is a very, very powerful lesson: since his statements are so very, very unfounded—by his own admission—he constantly seeks to prop them up by making emotive statements: rape, the Holocaust, murder, you name it.
That is to say; a debater will do this when they seek to get the audience on their side by bypassing their reasoning faculties and appealing directly to their emotions. Since emotions are actually felt and ideas are abstract, a debater can get the feelers in the audience on their side merely by pushing their buttons.
If you are not sidetracked by this tactic you will see that there is nothing upon which he bases his statements.
Kerrigan Skelly actually notes, “I wonder why Erik keeps give up time, because he really has nothing else to say…”
Hmm why did i give up my time, maybe cause i was there to debate the existence of god, and Kerrigan's assertion that morality makes god necessary was debunked many times by alternate ideas I had thrown out there. You know like societal influence mixed with other factors or even moral fairies or invisible pink unicorns. Hey if you're going to assert ridiculous supernatural beings like yahweh and zombie jesus why be prejudice against the IPU.
Next we look at what he is saying a little differently. I don't need to know where morality necessarily came from to know certain things it didn't come from. I can also very easily know that murder and genocide are terrible acts without knowing exactly why. I am using what people know is moral and showing god contradicts it, much like if a person didn't know what was the actual cause of something falling down instead of floating up, that person could easily understand its not a upward breeze.
It is particularly at t=52:58 that Erik Dickerson falls apart when his assertions are challenged and he is forced to admit that there is nothing supporting his claims.
On the issue of morality he ultimately states —when back into a corner by his own statements—that it is all about survival of the fittest. Yet, for example, he referred to that which is moral being based on whatever causes the longevity of society. But this is problematic since we know what was thought by Nazi society to provide for its longevity. Also, why is the longevity of society the standard? Well, because it is all about survival of the fittest. Fine but what if my society can survive as the fittest by exterminating other societies? See the problem?
See the blatant, i would dare say intentional ignorance here. How does nazi germany benefit the overall society of the world. HUH? Come on now this guy is quickly showing he's a jackass. I mean seriously does it benefit everyone to let other people go around exterminating other people who could potentially actually help out in some way. It is more beneficial for society to not worry about your race being exterminated and to actually work together as one. Doing a face palm right now as this dumbfounding ignorance.
Based on his baseless moral condemnations and survival of the fittest assertion he is asked about a particularly case in which a society is in dire shortage of women and whether it would be moral for (the majority) men to commit rape in such a case: at t=1:21:33 he affirms that in such a case he does not know if rape would be immoral thus, making rape only relatively immoral and also devastating his arguments about the God of the Bible allowing rape (even though the penalty for rape in the Bible is capital punishment Deuteronomy 22:25-27).
The point is that he knows that he can imagine a circumstance in which an immoral act could be moral. Now, if God is allowed the same standards the “problem of evil” is not problematic and shown to be an illogical assertion—see:
So far he has taken an extreme example here, that is highly unlikely and based everyday evils on it. This is a very poor way to argue. Does he really want to say that his god sitting around watching every child rape is like this example where there is a dire situation. Plus he missed the fact that, the problem of evil is actually just icing on the cake for the atheist argument. The failure of the theist to present evidence of their positive claim is the true reason to be atheist.
Was “the Problem of Evil” Solved Before it was Ever Proposed?
Does God Command You to Beat Your Slaves
Does the Bible and its God Condone Slavery?
Erik Dickerson made various references to supposed atrocities in the Bible. These mount to well-within-the-box-atheist-group-think-talking-points which I have responded to variously in essays such as Positive Atheism - Cliff Walker : Relative Ethics and Absolute Condemnations and within the section on rape and evilbible.com
As a side note: somehow Erik Dickerson concludes that in the Bible God causes 2.5 million deaths. The Bible covers a span of time reaching into the millennia (various millennia) and so it is interesting to think what a lightweight God is when we consider the fact that within the most secular and bloodiest century in human history atheists murdered millions upon millions and millions more people in a couple of years—see Adolf Hitler / Nazism / Communism.
So yes I stand by my words the bible is filled with atrocities carried out and supported by the evil sadistic god of the bible. If this guy even read it he would know that if god were on a dating site his favorite activities would be listed like this:
Likes: praising myself, good old genocide, slavery, child sacrifice.
I would love to see a logical flow chart that shows how some atheists being evil detract from gods actions being evil. Not even going to get into the ridiculousness of Hitler being atheist. I mean yeah if someone claimed Hitler was the source of morality this might be relevant. But, I fail to see in anyway how this was relevant to the debate topic, or the red herring argument Kerrigan engaged in.
For another atheist vs. Christian debate see Atheist vs. Christian debate - Morality: Natural or Supernatural?
A few words on the actual debate. So lets first just list the logical fallacies that Kerrigan used and this guy fell for. Right off the bat we get the false dichotomy, where kerrigan tries to rule out other gods or other explanations and make the source of morals and inductive reasoning god or nothing. In case you don't know what a false dichotomy is its when you eliminate other explanations with no reason and don't have all actual possibilities on the table. Its trickery, its like saying there is either shoes in the box under toms bed or nothing. That is simply not the case. He has special pleaded his god to be a better possibility then moral fairies or inductive reasoning fairies or the invisible pink unicorn. Are we seeing a trend in prejudice against her horniness.
So the next step he eliminates other possibilities is to assert his god. This, when referring to a god, is a god of the gaps fallacy, also known as a argument from ignorance. The basic concept is "well I can't think of anything better, so it must be god." We see how that worked for the greeks and other cultures asserting gods for the sun rising, thunder, the ocean tides. Not so well might we say.
So in closing his fallacies: Red Herring, argument from ignorance/god of the gaps, special pleading, and a false dichotomy.
I stand accused of appeal to emotion, because I dared to say that genocide and slavery was wrong. Hmm don't we all know that about morality by now.
Saturday, July 17, 2010
Story of Sally: the ordinary Christian girl(problem of evil)
Sally and her mother have just arrived home from a family get together at aunt Jacky's house. Its 9:00 pm that night so its past Sally’s usual, school night, bedtime. Sally gets ready for bed; brushes her teeth, changes into her pajamas, etc. As she is getting ready for bed she kneels next to her bed says all her prayers to Jesus. As most 9 year olds do she grabs her favorite stuffed bear and is off to bed.
As to know a little more about our main character, lets get to know Sally a little bit better. She is a small girl for her age and has brown wavy hair down just below her shoulders. Sally is a third grade student, she struggles at math but is good at English and really coming along at reading. Her favorite things are Jesus, unicorns, and her stuffed bear, who wears a blue and red plaid vest and has big black eyes, that she got from Santa only 2 months earlier.
Sally has just dosed off, when she is awakened by a loud bang and crashing sound. Her mom screams "Who are you?" This is immediately followed by what sounds like a struggle her mom groaning in pain. After a few moments of this a thud and the floor vibrates. This is followed by silence. After a few moments, which to Sally feel like an eternity, footsteps start moving towards her door.
Sally in the meantime has rushed into her closet to hide. She clasps her little hands together as tightly as she can and begins to whisper " lord o mighty if you hear me now please protect my mother and me, please be with us today amen. " Just as she finishes a large bang, that sounds like a large body hits her door. The door holds. Second bang comes even harder, with a crackle. Still the door has held. Third crash into the door and an even louder crackle the door is seriously cracked. On the fourth bang the door comes down. A large imposing man enters the room.
The man proceeds to look around. Sally is dead silent in the closet, still with her hands clenched tightly continuing to silently pray to god. Then the man turns towards the closet. He rips the closet door open. Sally and the unknown man lock eyes. The man quickly grabs at sally and she tries to squirm away. Unfortunately the man is too strong, and he grabs sally and throws her out of the closet. Sally's head slams into the wall. Sally is dazed but not unconscious. As a drop of blood starts to trickle down Sally's forehead the man begins to walk towards her again.
Sally laying on the floor bloody and in terror with tears rolling down her face is too terrified to move. She is absolutely paralyzed with fear. The man once more picks Sally up and this time throws her on the bed. The man proceeds to rip Sally's pajamas off and he brutally rapes her. After this is done the man walks away. After a few moments the sound of a car can be heard pulling away.
Sally coming to about an hour, later after coming out of the shock, slowly emerges from her bed. She walks to her kitchen where she heard the struggle earlier. As she approaches the kitchen she sees a small stream of blood running out into the hallway. She turns the corner to see her mom with a knife stuck in her side. Her mom is still breathing but barely. Sally reaches for the telephone and dials 911. After not really being able to talk to the operator the, the operator is able to pinpoint the location of the call and sends help. The time between this and the help arriving feels like an eternity. A siren is heard in the distance, and at this moment Sally turns to look out the door which had been ripped off. She sees the flashing lights of a police car approaching.
She then turns back to her mom. There is not a motion in her mom. Not the faintest movement or breathing. The police arrive and shortly after an ambulance shows up as well. The paramedics declared Sally's mom dead on arrival. They rush sally to the hospital.
Years go on and still no suspect has been found. Sally has spent her life in and out of therapy for emotional problems stemming from this event. She as time went on questioned this event in terms of faith until she got to the point she could no longer believe in an all loving all powerful Christian god. She is now atheist from her experience.
So with that story told, and no its not a true story, per say, but based on many true events that happen around the world on a regular basis. As you were reading it, I'm sure you could picture it happening, however disturbing the imagery may have been. I tried to make the story as brutal as possible while sparing the explicit details of the actual rape. I also carefully chose rape as the example because there are people sick enough with the disease of religion to use the excuse that if Sally died that at least she was in a better place. We as a society live in mostly sheltered worlds where these terrible things happen to other people but not us. It actually helps to be shocked by the poor grotesque violence used in this illustration to get you in the true understanding of suffering. With that said onto the religious relevance of this example.
Firstly I will discuss the problem here with the Christian god and Jesus in this situation. Its widely excepted that god is all loving and all powerful and sees the entire world. So I ask you as Sally sat there suffering was it god didn't see it, didn't care to stop it, or couldn't stop it? Which answer makes you most comfortable in your own little world . Which answer makes your security blanket still work?
One has to be the case cause if god sees everything he must have seen this. If god is all loving, its impossible for an all loving anything not to act against such an atrocity. If he’s all powerful he surely can act because there is nothing that can stop him from doing so.
The first argument I usually here for this is free will. This usually comes in different forms. Some people argue just for free will to believe in god and some argue for free will as a whole would be destroyed if he interferes. These are equally appalling arguments and disgusting excuses to hold onto your security blanket in my opinion. Again I remind you while this story is a work of fiction as I’m not writing about somebody in particular, similar events have occurred somewhere in the world in the time it has taken you to read this far.
:Lets first look at the free will to believe in god argument. If god shows up and stops this event we wouldn't be able to choose to believe in god anymore. If you actually buy this argument I ask you to consider to you really consider a cosmic game of hide and seek a good enough excuse for watching this? Even if we know god exists it doesn't take away our free will to worship him or not.
Secondly, lets look at the argument that it would take away all free will and turn us into zombies, which is basically the argument. Sorry this has one huge assumption that fails all tests. The assumption here is that taking away one idea of free will takes away all. I ask you based on this assumption how god stepping in to save Sally effects my decision on whether to go to Las Vegas or New Orleans for vacation this summer. You guessed it there is zero connection. This argument absolutely falls flat on its face right there. Each event of free will is independent of another so god could step in anytime and take away certain parts of free will and not break the others.
Free will also has another huge issue with me. The same people who argue free will believe god is our creator. This creates a problem in the entire idea of free will to me. Its ridiculous to believe god can't limit freewill when if he created us he created a design for us that in its very nature limits our free will. No matter how much you want to explore the entire bottom of the ocean your body is not designed for you to be able to get there. No matter how hard you flap your arms you will never fly with just your body.
The final nail in free will's proverbial coffin is this, if freewill is required and a requirement of free will is that there will be evil, how does one go back and explain heaven. Obviously for it to be a great place there must be free will, Oh, but wait there is no suffering in heaven. How can this be. Did god teach us how to exercise free will in heaven without suffering? Does he interfere there? If either of those are your excuses why doesn't he do this here.
Any other excuses have a big issue to get around. This issue is if there is no excuse for a person to willfully watch a child raped shouldn't we hold god to a higher standard than that. To give him an excuse brings him below human moral standards. There is only one time I can conceive of when a person could watch a child raped and not be judged morally wrong in my book.
This one example is what I call the "other victim" example. This would be per say, if a person was being held at gunpoint and forced to watch and knew with a reasonable amount of certainty that any action to prevent it would result in their death or harm and the child still being raped. Does this excuse pertain to god? I don't see how it can unless he’s not all powerful. He can't have such a negative side effect because if he’s all powerful hens always able to fix it. Again just for those dense enough to still buy it freewill is not even close to the same level of a side effect as god if all powerful can always go back and give it back to the people.
Now back to our story as it creates another moral problem on the part of a lot of Christians. Sally has suffered an atrocity and cannot bring herself back to believing in god. Who could truly blame her if she died and met god and was bitter that he just watched this happen. This would in most Christian cultures means she goes to hell. Wow, Sally is victimized and thinks about this in a rational way and is sent to hell for this.
Now meanwhile the man who raped little Sally and killed her mother has since reformed and accepted Jesus into his life. This means his sins will be forgiven and he will then in turn go to heaven. He is now a devout catholic and has confessed all his sins. Now do not get hung up on which form a Christianity because a good portion of them do believe this as well.
I don't see how you can ignore this as a huge problem. Its morally void of any goodness. Its absolutely disgusting when you place this one event into the Christian views of the world. I ask how can this be? What type of monster actually still buys this?
As to know a little more about our main character, lets get to know Sally a little bit better. She is a small girl for her age and has brown wavy hair down just below her shoulders. Sally is a third grade student, she struggles at math but is good at English and really coming along at reading. Her favorite things are Jesus, unicorns, and her stuffed bear, who wears a blue and red plaid vest and has big black eyes, that she got from Santa only 2 months earlier.
Sally has just dosed off, when she is awakened by a loud bang and crashing sound. Her mom screams "Who are you?" This is immediately followed by what sounds like a struggle her mom groaning in pain. After a few moments of this a thud and the floor vibrates. This is followed by silence. After a few moments, which to Sally feel like an eternity, footsteps start moving towards her door.
Sally in the meantime has rushed into her closet to hide. She clasps her little hands together as tightly as she can and begins to whisper " lord o mighty if you hear me now please protect my mother and me, please be with us today amen. " Just as she finishes a large bang, that sounds like a large body hits her door. The door holds. Second bang comes even harder, with a crackle. Still the door has held. Third crash into the door and an even louder crackle the door is seriously cracked. On the fourth bang the door comes down. A large imposing man enters the room.
The man proceeds to look around. Sally is dead silent in the closet, still with her hands clenched tightly continuing to silently pray to god. Then the man turns towards the closet. He rips the closet door open. Sally and the unknown man lock eyes. The man quickly grabs at sally and she tries to squirm away. Unfortunately the man is too strong, and he grabs sally and throws her out of the closet. Sally's head slams into the wall. Sally is dazed but not unconscious. As a drop of blood starts to trickle down Sally's forehead the man begins to walk towards her again.
Sally laying on the floor bloody and in terror with tears rolling down her face is too terrified to move. She is absolutely paralyzed with fear. The man once more picks Sally up and this time throws her on the bed. The man proceeds to rip Sally's pajamas off and he brutally rapes her. After this is done the man walks away. After a few moments the sound of a car can be heard pulling away.
Sally coming to about an hour, later after coming out of the shock, slowly emerges from her bed. She walks to her kitchen where she heard the struggle earlier. As she approaches the kitchen she sees a small stream of blood running out into the hallway. She turns the corner to see her mom with a knife stuck in her side. Her mom is still breathing but barely. Sally reaches for the telephone and dials 911. After not really being able to talk to the operator the, the operator is able to pinpoint the location of the call and sends help. The time between this and the help arriving feels like an eternity. A siren is heard in the distance, and at this moment Sally turns to look out the door which had been ripped off. She sees the flashing lights of a police car approaching.
She then turns back to her mom. There is not a motion in her mom. Not the faintest movement or breathing. The police arrive and shortly after an ambulance shows up as well. The paramedics declared Sally's mom dead on arrival. They rush sally to the hospital.
Years go on and still no suspect has been found. Sally has spent her life in and out of therapy for emotional problems stemming from this event. She as time went on questioned this event in terms of faith until she got to the point she could no longer believe in an all loving all powerful Christian god. She is now atheist from her experience.
So with that story told, and no its not a true story, per say, but based on many true events that happen around the world on a regular basis. As you were reading it, I'm sure you could picture it happening, however disturbing the imagery may have been. I tried to make the story as brutal as possible while sparing the explicit details of the actual rape. I also carefully chose rape as the example because there are people sick enough with the disease of religion to use the excuse that if Sally died that at least she was in a better place. We as a society live in mostly sheltered worlds where these terrible things happen to other people but not us. It actually helps to be shocked by the poor grotesque violence used in this illustration to get you in the true understanding of suffering. With that said onto the religious relevance of this example.
Firstly I will discuss the problem here with the Christian god and Jesus in this situation. Its widely excepted that god is all loving and all powerful and sees the entire world. So I ask you as Sally sat there suffering was it god didn't see it, didn't care to stop it, or couldn't stop it? Which answer makes you most comfortable in your own little world . Which answer makes your security blanket still work?
One has to be the case cause if god sees everything he must have seen this. If god is all loving, its impossible for an all loving anything not to act against such an atrocity. If he’s all powerful he surely can act because there is nothing that can stop him from doing so.
The first argument I usually here for this is free will. This usually comes in different forms. Some people argue just for free will to believe in god and some argue for free will as a whole would be destroyed if he interferes. These are equally appalling arguments and disgusting excuses to hold onto your security blanket in my opinion. Again I remind you while this story is a work of fiction as I’m not writing about somebody in particular, similar events have occurred somewhere in the world in the time it has taken you to read this far.
:Lets first look at the free will to believe in god argument. If god shows up and stops this event we wouldn't be able to choose to believe in god anymore. If you actually buy this argument I ask you to consider to you really consider a cosmic game of hide and seek a good enough excuse for watching this? Even if we know god exists it doesn't take away our free will to worship him or not.
Secondly, lets look at the argument that it would take away all free will and turn us into zombies, which is basically the argument. Sorry this has one huge assumption that fails all tests. The assumption here is that taking away one idea of free will takes away all. I ask you based on this assumption how god stepping in to save Sally effects my decision on whether to go to Las Vegas or New Orleans for vacation this summer. You guessed it there is zero connection. This argument absolutely falls flat on its face right there. Each event of free will is independent of another so god could step in anytime and take away certain parts of free will and not break the others.
Free will also has another huge issue with me. The same people who argue free will believe god is our creator. This creates a problem in the entire idea of free will to me. Its ridiculous to believe god can't limit freewill when if he created us he created a design for us that in its very nature limits our free will. No matter how much you want to explore the entire bottom of the ocean your body is not designed for you to be able to get there. No matter how hard you flap your arms you will never fly with just your body.
The final nail in free will's proverbial coffin is this, if freewill is required and a requirement of free will is that there will be evil, how does one go back and explain heaven. Obviously for it to be a great place there must be free will, Oh, but wait there is no suffering in heaven. How can this be. Did god teach us how to exercise free will in heaven without suffering? Does he interfere there? If either of those are your excuses why doesn't he do this here.
Any other excuses have a big issue to get around. This issue is if there is no excuse for a person to willfully watch a child raped shouldn't we hold god to a higher standard than that. To give him an excuse brings him below human moral standards. There is only one time I can conceive of when a person could watch a child raped and not be judged morally wrong in my book.
This one example is what I call the "other victim" example. This would be per say, if a person was being held at gunpoint and forced to watch and knew with a reasonable amount of certainty that any action to prevent it would result in their death or harm and the child still being raped. Does this excuse pertain to god? I don't see how it can unless he’s not all powerful. He can't have such a negative side effect because if he’s all powerful hens always able to fix it. Again just for those dense enough to still buy it freewill is not even close to the same level of a side effect as god if all powerful can always go back and give it back to the people.
Now back to our story as it creates another moral problem on the part of a lot of Christians. Sally has suffered an atrocity and cannot bring herself back to believing in god. Who could truly blame her if she died and met god and was bitter that he just watched this happen. This would in most Christian cultures means she goes to hell. Wow, Sally is victimized and thinks about this in a rational way and is sent to hell for this.
Now meanwhile the man who raped little Sally and killed her mother has since reformed and accepted Jesus into his life. This means his sins will be forgiven and he will then in turn go to heaven. He is now a devout catholic and has confessed all his sins. Now do not get hung up on which form a Christianity because a good portion of them do believe this as well.
I don't see how you can ignore this as a huge problem. Its morally void of any goodness. Its absolutely disgusting when you place this one event into the Christian views of the world. I ask how can this be? What type of monster actually still buys this?
Friday, July 16, 2010
The theist's atheist compared to me. (strawman)
After watching a debate between Dan Barker and Adam Deen, I realized how annoying the theists constant misrepresenting of what atheists actually believe. A chart to show the problem:
Questions Theists atheists answer
Do you believe god exists?
my answer: no
Theists version of an atheists answer: no
Do you believe the universe came from nothing?my answer: no
theist version of an atheist: yes
Where did the universe come from? my answer: I don't know
theist version of an atheist: nothing
What's the source of logic? my answer: I don't know
theist version of an atheist: nothing
See how many answers are different. That is because theists tend to debate a strawman atheist. The first question is the only one they get right. The second one is clear that the answers are different. The third and fourth questions to some may seem like semantics but i assure you they are not. Let me explain using my box example. Its pretty basic you can not know whats in a box and still not believe that the box is empty or has nothing in it. Those are 2 very different positions to hold. If you pick up that box and its heavier then its suppose to be you make the guy who says its empty look bad, but the guy who didn't know what was in the box never said it was empty so he still doesn't look bad.
This is key for theists to start to understand, not knowing is not the same as saying nothing did it. I am really tiring of this twisting of the position to make an argument. It occurs all the time. This is often used side by side with a god of the gaps argument. For instance, when a theist says that the universe came from god, then goes on to say the atheist has to say the universe came from nothing and that's irrational. What's irrational is the theists complete misrepresentation of the atheists position there. The universe could have come from any number of gods, or a sequence of multiverses, or any other number of possibilities, and yes perhaps nothing at all. Amazingly unlike the theist tends to think I have not ruled out any of the other possibilities and just picked the last possibility of nothing.
This argument seems to me to be an attempt to put the atheist down on their level since they have picked a position on something for which there is absolutely no evidence, they can't comprehend that someone is actually withholding a positive belief on a claim until the evidence is in.
Questions Theists atheists answer
Do you believe god exists?
my answer: no
Theists version of an atheists answer: no
Do you believe the universe came from nothing?my answer: no
theist version of an atheist: yes
Where did the universe come from? my answer: I don't know
theist version of an atheist: nothing
What's the source of logic? my answer: I don't know
theist version of an atheist: nothing
See how many answers are different. That is because theists tend to debate a strawman atheist. The first question is the only one they get right. The second one is clear that the answers are different. The third and fourth questions to some may seem like semantics but i assure you they are not. Let me explain using my box example. Its pretty basic you can not know whats in a box and still not believe that the box is empty or has nothing in it. Those are 2 very different positions to hold. If you pick up that box and its heavier then its suppose to be you make the guy who says its empty look bad, but the guy who didn't know what was in the box never said it was empty so he still doesn't look bad.
This is key for theists to start to understand, not knowing is not the same as saying nothing did it. I am really tiring of this twisting of the position to make an argument. It occurs all the time. This is often used side by side with a god of the gaps argument. For instance, when a theist says that the universe came from god, then goes on to say the atheist has to say the universe came from nothing and that's irrational. What's irrational is the theists complete misrepresentation of the atheists position there. The universe could have come from any number of gods, or a sequence of multiverses, or any other number of possibilities, and yes perhaps nothing at all. Amazingly unlike the theist tends to think I have not ruled out any of the other possibilities and just picked the last possibility of nothing.
This argument seems to me to be an attempt to put the atheist down on their level since they have picked a position on something for which there is absolutely no evidence, they can't comprehend that someone is actually withholding a positive belief on a claim until the evidence is in.
Burden of Proof
Hi, this will be my first blog on atheism. I will mostly be addressing christianity, but also other religions. Today's blog will be able to address all religions but I will use christianity in the examples.
Many theists I talk to claim that it if we don't know about god they just accept the positive claim while atheist just accept the negative claim. This simply is not true. Atheist do not believe the positive claim that a god exists. Lets look at an example of how this works. If there is a box in the middle of the room and you have never seen it before and it does not have any clue as to whats in it, do you believe a pair of size 9 red and white nike shoes are in the box. Probably not. Would you say with absolute certainty that those shoes are in the box.(assuming the box is big enough to hold them) No you wouldn't. Now if we could start seeing some evidence that that is what is in the box it might be rational to believe those shoes are in the box.
Lets look at things another way. Before, I wrote this sentence did you believe in Maranamacons? Nope you had never even heard of them. Do you believe it now? Nope, how could you you have no concept of what they are. So naming something certainly does not make the proposition of existence seem even. How about we define them as aliens from venus who are eternal and are the route cause for why the laws of gravity work(beyond everything we know about gravity, the next step in our understanding). Now that they do something does this make it just as rational to believe in them as not to believe in them. I have my doubts that this assertion made anyone with any sense believe in them. Why do you not believe in them at this point? Well its simple you require evidence to support the claim. Asserting they cause something is not enough to get you to believe in them.
I think everyone knows right away that before ever having heard of the Maranamacons you did not believe in them, which was the base belief. We have followed this base belief up through giving a name and then defining the being and still we find it is not something you just up and believe in. Yet theists when it comes to their god will special plead that by doing the very thing with their god without any evidence to back up their assertions that both stances are equal. They know this is not true for Maranamacons, Invisible pink unicorns, Flying Spaghetti Monsters and more but once their god is involved, all bets are off with this way of thinking. No one in their right mind would say its just as rational to believe in Maranamacons after this post as it is to not believe in them. You will require more evidence for them, so that is what an atheist expects for god. So for the love of Maranamacons please start having the same standards for your god.
Many theists I talk to claim that it if we don't know about god they just accept the positive claim while atheist just accept the negative claim. This simply is not true. Atheist do not believe the positive claim that a god exists. Lets look at an example of how this works. If there is a box in the middle of the room and you have never seen it before and it does not have any clue as to whats in it, do you believe a pair of size 9 red and white nike shoes are in the box. Probably not. Would you say with absolute certainty that those shoes are in the box.(assuming the box is big enough to hold them) No you wouldn't. Now if we could start seeing some evidence that that is what is in the box it might be rational to believe those shoes are in the box.
Lets look at things another way. Before, I wrote this sentence did you believe in Maranamacons? Nope you had never even heard of them. Do you believe it now? Nope, how could you you have no concept of what they are. So naming something certainly does not make the proposition of existence seem even. How about we define them as aliens from venus who are eternal and are the route cause for why the laws of gravity work(beyond everything we know about gravity, the next step in our understanding). Now that they do something does this make it just as rational to believe in them as not to believe in them. I have my doubts that this assertion made anyone with any sense believe in them. Why do you not believe in them at this point? Well its simple you require evidence to support the claim. Asserting they cause something is not enough to get you to believe in them.
I think everyone knows right away that before ever having heard of the Maranamacons you did not believe in them, which was the base belief. We have followed this base belief up through giving a name and then defining the being and still we find it is not something you just up and believe in. Yet theists when it comes to their god will special plead that by doing the very thing with their god without any evidence to back up their assertions that both stances are equal. They know this is not true for Maranamacons, Invisible pink unicorns, Flying Spaghetti Monsters and more but once their god is involved, all bets are off with this way of thinking. No one in their right mind would say its just as rational to believe in Maranamacons after this post as it is to not believe in them. You will require more evidence for them, so that is what an atheist expects for god. So for the love of Maranamacons please start having the same standards for your god.
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