Debuncking the Atheist Fortres of Facts part 1

 

This is part of a larger framework that includes the theories of Thomas Kuhn and argues that science is a social construct. That part of it will be saved for another time. This section, although long is answering an argument that I see atheist touting all the time. They always deny it but it's unmistakably there. 

 Section one documents that there such an attitude among atheists and gives some preliminary arguments. Section 2 shows the truly unscientific nature of the attitude.

Nowhere is the arrogance of humanity more apparent than in the many tendencies to treat God as a big man in the sky and try to subject him to scientific analysis. This is a move that most thinkers of the previous century would have laughed themselves silly over. One cannot second guess the nature of the divine by insisting that God operates under rules like a biological organism? Richard Dawkins is a major purveyor of this view but Victor Stinger is even more so. Stinger, in his God the Failed Hypothesis[1] is the genius who stated the "who created God" thing, one of the hallmarks of atheist ignorance. The method is super simple. Stinger does mess not with trying to probe the heavens or reaching beyond our tiny little sample of reality on this dust mote, he does it the "obvious way" by creating a straw man argument for God then knocking it down. The straw man is based upon a selective understanding guaranteed to denude belief of a factual basis and to load a pile of facts in the unbelieving camp so as to create the impression that atheism is a choice based upon the full brunt of scientific fact, and religious belief has nothing going for it but ignorance and superstition. This tactic I call the “fortress of facts.” The fortress of facts is something atheists deny vehemently but it’s obvious in almost every argument they make. Most scientifically inclined observers know that science is not merely the accumulation of a pile of facts. Science is not about proving facts or manufacturing a pile of facts so much as it is about testing hypothesis in a systematic fashion. Science is more about disproving than about proving. There are aspects of reality that beyond the ability of science to disprove. God is one of these. Yet, even though atheists will deny the words “fortress of facts” if we observe the way they argument this is undeniable consequence of their logic and their approach.

Science and the “God Hypothesis.”

The whole idea of referring to God as an hypothesis in the first place is an attempt to classify the God concept under the rubric of scientific domain. If God is an hypothesis then he’s something science can dispute, because science is about testing hypothesis. Of course the notion weather or not God can be so classified is a theological question and must be answered theologians. Since atheist denuded theology of any valid content (through sheer mocking and ridicule) then there’s no one to respond who atheists wont mock and ridicule. Thus truth by stipulation is written into the atheist ideology. This overall move turns upon the fortress of facts idea because a hypothesis without fact can’t be maintained. Thus while denying up front that they think about science in this manner we can see the fortress of facts as the basic assumption in the over all atheist approach to belief. We see the fortress of facts at work in the writings of Singer:

says Victor Stenger in "God: The Failed Hypothesis." The book is subtitled, "How science shows that God does not exist." Chapter by chapter, the author shows that the existence of God would suggest certain realities in the world that would be verifiable by scientific inquiry. But the data don't support these would-be realities, thereby providing evidence that no God exists.

Stenger, retired professor of Philosophy at University of Colorado and of Physics and Astronomy at University of Hawaii, is successful in this line of reasoning because of his clearly stated definition that he is not just talking about any kind of god, but specifically the capital-g God of the Judeo-Christian-Islamic tradition.[2]

We can see the assumption of the fortress of facts in Skeptic Magazine article reviewing[3] Stinger’s book: “conspicuous by his Absence.” "Stinger lays out the evidence from cosmology, particle physics and quantum mechanics showing that the universe appears exactly as it should if there is no creator." This is a factual approach. The facts show God doesn’t exist because if he did things would be different. To show this we use our tremendous fact finding potential in science.

How does he reckon it should if there is no God? He constructs his own fundamentalist driven version of what God would be like. Of course he has no knowledge of that. It's really a disproof of the atheist big nightmare of the fundamentalist concept of God, in other words, a straw man argument not a real disproof of anything valid. Beyond that, which is a deal breaker--because how you set up the inquiry in the first place determines everything-- there are other criticisms. For example his take on the issue of prayer studies. This is also proof of the "fortress of facts" concept which I am always pointing out that atheist ideology teaches. No atheist has of yet accepted the notion when I point it but it's clear that they argue from it all the time. The idea science gives them a big pile of facts but we believers have no facts. The facts are going to tell us if we can believe in God or not, of course the facts are only facts if they are “scientific” (ie in this case that means if they work against belief in God).

For instance, he tackles the question of the efficacy of prayer, in which the followers of these faiths fervently believe. If God exists, he argues, prayers could be shown to have been answered, using verifiable, replicable studies. And indeed, such studies have been conducted, with universally negative results. (Some studies, which supposedly yielded positive results, used flawed methodology and thus the conclusion is dismissible.) "If prayer were as important as it is taken to be by Jews, Christians and Muslims, its positive effects should be obvious and measurable," Stenger concludes. "They are not. It does not appear - based on the scientific evidence - that a God exists who answers prayers in any significant, observable way."[4]

Here again we have the same idea at work, science gives us a fortress of facts that religion can’t match, never mind the fact that we have selected which facts are important to observe and what assumptions about God set up the facts we want to select. For example consider the flip flop that has happened in regard to these prayer studies. Back in the day when they were being done (late 80s, early 90s) they were big news the atheists were on defensive grasping at whatever straws they could to answer, since they had no counter studies and counter data. One of the major arguments they used to make on every message board, every blog, ever news group where this was debated was that you can’t control for outside prayer. The defenders of the studies, such as Dr. Byrd and Dr. Harris did their own straw-clutching to answer this argument about control. Since that time, however, thing have turned around. A study with the largest data base was done that showed very little or no difference in the two groups. The atheists have gone ape making the argument that “prayer is disproved.” The study detractors (now the theists) argue “you can’t control for outside prayer, the argument atheists used to make. The atheists say “O sure you can.” When I point out that they used to make this argument themselves many of them have said “no atheist ever argued that.” How quickly we forget. I remember. I have the article. Gary P Posner did argue it:

The most striking flaw in this study's methodology is one forthrightly acknowledged by Byrd. "It was assumed that some of the patients in both groups would be prayed for by people not associated with the study; this was not controlled for ... Therefore, 'pure' groups were not attained in this study." In other words, the focus of the study - prayer - was "not controlled for," except that three to seven intercessors were assigned to pray daily for each patient in the IP group, and none was assigned to the controls. Thus, although unlikely, it is nevertheless theoretically possible that the control group received as many prayers as did the IP group, if not more.

If "intercessory prayer" was not controlled, except that each IP patient was assumed to have received somewhere between X+3 and X+7 prayers daily, as opposed to X+0 for the control patients, what are we to conclude? That God is conditioned in a Pavlovian manner to automatically respond to the side with the greater number of troops, even though the assigned intercessors had no emotional ties to their patients, and even though the IP patients were otherwise no more worthy of healing as a group than were the controls? Does God not know that the side with fewer troops is in just as much need of assistance? Where is the evidence of his omniscience and compassion?

And what can be said about the evidence for God's omnipotence? It is true, assuming that Byrd's data are valid, that in the IP group, 5 percent fewer patients needed diuretics, 7 percent fewer needed antibiotics, 6 percent fewer needed respiratory intubation and/or ventilation, 6 percent fewer developed congestive heart failure, 5 percent fewer developed pneumonia, and 5 percent fewer suffered cardiopulmonary arrest. But no significant differences were found among the other twenty categories, including mortality, despite explicit prayers "for prevention of ... death." And, reports Byrd, "Even though for [the six seemingly significant] variables the P values were less than .05, they could not be considered statistically significant because of the large number of variables examined. I used two methods to overcome this statistical limitation ... [the] severity score, and multivariant [sic] analysis" (emphasis added).[5]

So what happens if we say Posner was right? These studies don’t measure the truth of prayer because you can’t control for outside prayer? The study that shows no difference is meaningless. Of course the atheists will say but the theist still has no facts to back prayer. Of course they are just selecting the facts that support there view. There are facts that back prayer but they are ignored because they counter the ideological assumptions of naturalism. That will be dealt with in subsequent chapters.

The assumptions that Stenger has to make to make his straw man work is that God is exactly as he wants him to be. The reviewer at Simply Einstein (ibid) defends him against the charge of straw man.

The logical purist may object that one can't "prove a negative," that one can no more disprove God than disprove the existence of Santa Claus or an invisible unicorn in the backyard. But the fact that most people do believe in God while rejecting the latter two is part of the point. Given no real reason to believe in Santa Claus or invisible unicorns, people reject such beliefs. Yet they hold tenaciously not only to belief in their God, but specifically to the tenets that their religion teaches about him. It is really these tenets that Stinger is addressing. By showing that they are wrong, like the efficacy of prayer or the notion that God fine-tuned the universe specifically for the sake of existence of humanity, the author demonstrates that belief in God is equally unfounded.[6]

Yet this is not much of a defense. The so called "tenets" are self selected to be one's he picks out that he thinks he can beat. No religious creed or Bible passage commands us to believe on the basis of the fine tuning argument. No scientific argument can disprove the notion that God has fine tuned the universe to bear life. The only thing science can prove about fine tuning is that we can't prove it. On the other hand far greater scientists than Stinger say his arguments against fine tuning are not so good. The person answering mail for John Polkinghorne’s website (formerly physicist at Cambridge second only to Hawking, who retired to be a Christian minister) says:

Stenger did some marginally useful scientific work but his claims are far too dogmatic. As for his suggestion that Anthropic Fine tuning is a non-problem because of his simplistic program MonkeyGod that purports to simulate universes and “show” that anthropic universes are commonplace, I know of no serious cosmologist who takes this seriously. Martin Rees’s “Just Six Numbers” is a good guide to the real science.[7]

Polkinghorne himself says: “I have read several of the books expressing the current outburst of militant atheism, but not the two you mention. My impression is that they are polemical rather than presenting reasoned arguments of a truth-seeking kind, and that they largely depend upon attacking caricature distortions of religious belief.”[8]

Others find the straw man to be Stenger's usual method:

Stinger—a retired physicist who is leveraging his scientific background to try to discredit anything and everything that smacks of spirituality—doesn’t respect his intellectual opponents enough to get their positions right; in some instances he appears to deliberately misrepresent their views; and, most important, his own reasoning is characterized by unremitting carelessness. Moreover, there is a method to his carelessness—it enables him to systematically avoid addressing the tough arguments of his opponents. Hence we find him frequently setting up a straw man by misrepresenting the debate as a simple matter of science and reason versus superstition. Once having defined this as the issue, all he needs to do is assume the attitude of an outraged scientist and heap on the ridicule. But if he had done his homework and taken the trouble to really understand the science and logic supporting quantum spirituality, he would have discovered that it is harder to dismiss than he had imagined. Indeed, the more carefully—and yes, critically—one considers the issues, the more one finds quantum spirituality to
be eminently worthy of serious consideration, as a plausible and measured approach to the most long-standing and intractable questions at the basis of science.[9]

Stenger doesn't deal with what I consider to be the major God arguments, the ground of being stuff of Tillich and Schleiermacher. Like most of the cult of atheism he's in thrall to his own version of science which is laced with metaphysics. Like most of them they think they are being scientific and philosophical when they denounce philosophy and theology and talk about how science is the only form of knowledge, and then they are bringing ontology in through the back door to put fiber into their world view. Stenger's straw man making is standard procedure for the new atheist. They are always spitting out some line with a dashing air of how theology is stupid so they don't have to read it. They know it's stupid even though they haven't read any. The whole point of showing they haven't read is usually because they are getting the ideas wrong but they never seem to care.

The fortress of facts concept is seen in the works of the high priest of New Atheism, Richard Dawkins.

An atheist before Darwin could have said, following Hume: "I have no explanation for complex biological design. All I know is that God isn't a good explanation, so we must wait and hope that somebody comes up with a better one." I can't help feeling that such a position, though logically sound, would have left one feeling pretty unsatisfied, and that although atheism might have been logically tenable before Darwin, Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist.[10]

Intellectually “fulfilled atheist” is code for “we have the facts.” What he’s clearly saying is that it was unsatisfying when we didn’t have the facts, God is still be rejected even though he has no real reason for it, but it’s not satisfying. The only thing that makes it satisfying is when we get a pile of facts. That’s because of the explanatory value. He makes it quite clear this is his motive reason for saying these things that he’s after is expletory power and what constitutes an explanation is a scientifically verifiable fact that can’t be disputed.

An even clearer example:

-Faith, being belief that isn't based on evidence, is the principal vice of any religion. And who, looking at Northern Ireland or the Middle East, can be confident that the brain virus of faith is not exceedingly dangerous? One of the stories told to the young Muslim suicide bombers is that martyrdom is the quickest way to heaven — and not just heaven but a special part of heaven where they will receive their special reward of 72 virgin brides. It occurs to me that our best hope may be to provide a kind of "spiritual arms control": send in specially trained theologians to deescalate the going rate in virgins.[11]

As juxtaposed to the next paragraph:

Well, science is not religion and it doesn't just come down to faith. Although it has many of religion's virtues, it has none of its vices. Science is based upon verifiable evidence. Religious faith not only lacks evidence, its independence from evidence is its pride and joy, shouted from the rooftops. Why else would Christians wax critical of doubting Thomas? The other apostles are held up to us as exemplars of virtue because faith was enough for them. Doubting Thomas, on the other hand, required evidence. Perhaps he should be the patron saint of scientists.[12]

The implication is we have the facts, that are why we understand the world. Further implication is that the world is only the surface level of physical workings. The first paragraph is clearly arguing from guilt by association. It’s asserting that if there are some brutal dangerous religious people they must be that way because of religion; therefore all religious people are potentially that way. If a Christian apologist for example were to talk about the Nazis and how their scientifically engaged members conducted inhumane experiments on Jews in concentrating camps, and tried to drawn conclusions about the dangerous nature of science based upon that association, the atheists would set up a howl. It would not take the atheist long to see the fallacy of guilt by association in that case. Never mind that, and let’s also skim over the fact that he’s using a straw man version of faith tailored to make it seem more stupid. While faith per se is not based upon facts there’s nothing in the nature of faith that causes one to ignore facts. He tried to incriminate the joy of discovery which is he hardly in a position to critique since he’s never experienced and can’t understand it. That sense of joy has nothing to do with ignoring facts. For me part of that joy came form the realization that my faith is backed by facts. The more important point is that he’s placing the tailored example of no facts along side the self selected example of fact finding to create the sense of the skeptic haing a huge pile of pile of fact that confirms his world view while in fac the believe purposely rejects having facts. That is a perfect example of the fortress of facts mentality.

While it is anecdotal, evidence from the popular level shows, to some extent, the effects of this kid of thinking upon the rank and file of the atheist movement. There’s a popular website by one of the troops called “God is Imaginary.” It’s far from special, just run of the mill message board sloganeering and propaganda. It does express the fortress of facts mentality clearly.

“God is imaginary: Proof no 11, notice that there is no scientific evidence.”

"There is no scientific evidence indicating that God exists. We all know that. For example:

• God has never left any physical evidence of his existence on earth.

• None of Jesus' "miracles" left any physical evidence either. (see this page)

• God has never spoken to modern man, for example by taking over all the television stations and broadcasting a rational message to everyone.

• The resurrected Jesus has never appeared to anyone. (see this page)

• The Bible we have is provably incorrect and is obviously the work of primitive men rather than God. (see this page)

• When we analyze prayer with statistics, we find no evidence that God is "answering prayers." (see this page)

• Huge, amazing atrocities like the Holocaust and AIDS occur without any response from God.

• And so on…

Let's agree that there is no empirical evidence showing that God exists.

If you think about it as a rational person, this lack of evidence is startling. There is not one bit of empirical evidence indicating that today's "God", nor any other contemporary god, nor any god of the past, exists. In addition we know that:

1. If we had scientific proof of God's existence, we would talk about the "science of God" rather than "faith in God".

2. If we had scientific proof of God's existence, the study of God would be a scientific endeavor rather than a theological one.

3. If we had scientific proof of God's existence, all religious people would be aligning on the God that had been scientifically proven to exist. Instead there are thousands of gods and religions.

The reason for this lack of evidence is easy for any unbiased observer to see. The reason why there is no empirical evidence for God is because God is imaginary."[13]

The major thrust of that bit of flim flam is that “we” (our side) we have all the facts in a great big pile and they don’t have a single one. Most thinking atheists and most scientifically minded atheists put it in terms of “explanatory power.” Appeal to God doesn’t explain the world as well as does science. That’s a more sophisticated version of the fortress of facts. Dawkins has a variation on this argument.

Unfortunately, Dawkins pushes envelope too far. He tries to turn the simple desire to know into a moral virtue in order to make it seem that science is more moral than religion:

Humans have a great hunger for explanation. It may be one of the main reasons why humanity so universally has religion, since religions do aspire to provide explanations. We come to our individual consciousness in a mysterious universe and long to understand it. Most religions offer a cosmology and a biology, a theory of life, a theory of origins, and reasons for existence. In doing so, they demonstrate that religion is, in a sense, science; it's just bad science. Don't fall for the argument that religion and science operate on separate dimensions and are concerned with quite separate sorts of questions. Religions have historically always attempted to answer the questions that properly belong to science. Thus religions should not be allowed now to retreat away from the ground upon which they have traditionally attempted to fight. They do offer both a cosmology and a biology; however, in both cases it is false.[14]

He’s saying that religion is trespassing upon questions of science, yet he doesn’t even bother to point out that religion was there first. Just because people in the prehistoric and ancient worlds mixed religious and scientific explanations—not having developed science religion was all they had to fall back on—doesn’t mean that’s the reason religion came to exist. As science has developed there is no reason why religious people can use it to understand questions that fall into he overlap between the two domains. The questions he’s discussing are overlap questions and modern thinking religious people have used to science to help answer them. In making this point he asserts that science is the fact giving endeavor while religion is content to have faith and do without facts. Of course that’s not a good description of most modern thinking religious people.

Dawkins wants us to think in terms of the fortress of facts, nothing provides scientific facts like science does. Of course he’s not mentioning the fact that it’s only one kind of explanation. There are facets to the question about the origin of life than just the physical workings of evolution. There are questions people have asked for thousands of years that science is not prepared to answer. There are questions that science is not allowed to answer because they are out of its domain. These are questions about the meaning of the life, the reason why life is, and the ultimate “destiny” (for want of a better word) of humans. These are things science can’t tell us they are the reasons religion exits. So the kinds of facts that religion provides the uses for faith are in a different area than those provided by science. The nature of the atheist view point is self selected to focus only upon the kinds of facts that science provides and it offers a biased, fallacious and inaccurate view of religious thinking. It also provides a distorted understanding of what science is. Science is not a pile of facts. Science is not even about fact making. Science is about hypothesis testing; it’s not about proving facts but testing for verification and falsifying premises. The overall “big picture” painted by science is a lot more dependent upon they a particular culture views life than it is the demonstration f a pile of facts.

Not only is this notion of science as a big pile of facts that guarantees an accurate understanding of reality a view that most scientists don’t take to the understanding of science, it’s specifically contradicted by the vast majority of historians and philosophers of science. While there is a great of contradiction between philosophers of science, the one thing they all agree on is that this fortress of facts idea is nonsense. First let’s turn to two major philosophers of science, Karl Popper and Thomas S. Kuhn. These two are destined to be linked since they had a major showdown to so speak over Kuhn’s theory, in the early to mid 60s. In that day Kuhn was thought to have won, his views went on to define philosophy of science for about three decades. I suspect that in this day popper is more popular and is probably now thought to have won. In reality, however, I think talk of who won is foolish because no only is the field still evolving but it’s diversifying and moving away form both, so neither of them won really. There is coming to be a plurality of models. Before going into that I’m going to examine Popper first, then Kuhn. What all of this evolving plurality agrees upon is that science is too complex and problematic to be regarded as anything like a fortress of facts!

---

[1] Victor J. Stenger, God: The Failed Hypothesis:How Science Shows that God Does Not Exist. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2007.

[2] Jerry Petersen, Simply Einstein, Review “Victor J. Stinger, God the Failed Hypothesis.” Online web page:

URL http://simplycharly.com/einstein/victor_stenger_god_the_failed_hypothesis_review.html visited Jan 31, 2012.

[3][iii] David Ludden "Conspicuous by His Absence". Skeptic. April 4, 2007. http://www.skeptic.com/eskeptic/07-04-04.html. Retrieved 2007-10-17. visited Jan 31,2012

[4] Petersen, ibid.

[5] Secular web

Gary P. Posner, “God in the ICU? A Criticique of San Franscisco Hospital Study of Intercessory prayer and Healing.” Originally published in Free Inquiry spring 1990, Secular Web URLhttp://www.infidels.org/library/modern/gary_posner/godccu.html

[6] Petersen,ibid

[7] John Polikinghorne’s staff, formerly on Polikinghorne’s official website, now Star Course, “Polikinghorne Q and A, Stenger and Hitchens. On line reseruce: URL http://www.starcourse.org/jcp/qanda.html#Stenger_and_Hitchens visited Summer 2011.last visited Jan 2 2012.

[8] Polkinghorne,ibid

[9] David Sharf, “Pseudo Science and Stenger’s Quantum gods: Mistaken, Misinformed, and Misleading.” NeuroQuantology, Vol 8, No 1 (2010), online copy URL: http://www.neuroquantology.com/index.php/journal/article/viewArticle/272 visited Jan 2 2012 Sharf received his Ph.D. in 1986 from Johns Hopkins University, in the philosophy of physics. The title of his dissertation was: Quantum Mechanics and the Program for the Unity of Science

[10] Richard Dawkins, The Blind Watchmaker. Why The Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe Without Design. New York: W.W. Norton & Company,inc. 2004, 6.

[11] Richard Dawkins, “Is Science a Religion,” The Humanist: A Magazine of Critical inquiry and Social Concern, Jan-feb 1997, on line copy URL: http://www.thehumanist.org/humanist/articles/dawkins.html

visited Feb 2, 2012

[12] ibid

[13] “God is Imaginary” Example no 11 no scientific evidence URL: http://godisimaginary.com/i11.htm

visited 1/30/2012

[14] Dawkins, ibid.

Old home week on AW: another exmple of hategruop athism.

 CARM
Originally Posted by ShockOfAtheism

A couple of days ago, I came across another example of christianese—for anyone who doesn’t know, “christianese” is the very strange “language” christians use to make their ridiculous “teachings” even more obscure and incomprehensible than they would otherwise be). The term I’m talking about is “the word rightly divided” (why, oh why, can’t they follow the normal rules of English grammar and put the qualifying adverb rightly and adjective divided before the noun word that they limit?).

I have just one very simple question: what is the “right” way to divide the word “WORD”? Is it

(1) W – ORD, or

(2) WO – RD, or

(3) WOR – D?

Also, WHO SAYS that whichever of the three you choose IS the “right” one?

This absurd expression actually has its origin in chapter 2, verse 15 of Sha'ul the Apostate’s SSL (“Second Silly Letter”) to Τιμόθεος (Timotheos), where, for some very strange reason, the King James’s PerVersion “translators” decided to use it to represent the Koinē Greek verb ὀρθοτομέω orthotomeō, a very odd compound that seems to be a combination of ὀρθός orthos (“upright” or “straight”) and an obscure verb τέμνω temno that is apparently connected with τομός tomos (“sharp[er]”).

Words fail me (however you “divide” them)!!!

Holy ridicule BATMAN can you "brown shirt tactics." talk about hate group atheism. O this isn't hate noOOOOOO no no no !

this is just a nice person asking a valid question. it's not hate or ridicule t all.

the silly letter form the moronic apostate.s like I do that with Dawkins. the monron Dawkins who doesn't know **** about philosophy.

that's so adult and profession let sit around and make fun of the way subcultures talk. that proves something. Christan have their own parlance of cousre atheist don't have that? Gays have that do they? drug people don't have that do they? people who sinful life stiles don't have their own way of talking do they?

can any of you not see puerile and infantile to mock and ridicule people for being different from you?

this goes back to the self esteem thesis. the reason some atheist love o mock and ridicule is becuase they hate themselves. poor self esteem means their only way to feel good about themselves is to feel worse about others.


he responds:

 Originally Posted by ShockOfAtheism

Can you answer the thread in an ADULT manner?

 

Meta:

O you mean like you did? Do you think I should take seriously the lecture on being adult by someone who mocks and ridicules other just they have subcultural beliefs and parlance that he's not part of?


 En Hakkore says:

If there was a serious question in your thread header...

...I also missed it amidst all the needless mockery.

Kind regards,
Jonathan

Following the Developpments of Erhman vs Carrier

 
 Historical Jesus

This is really old News. I dropped the ball a couple of months ago when this broke, other fish to fry.  One of the darlings of atheist research, Bart Ehrman, considered almost a skeptic himself turning on the Jesus mythers and defending the existence of Jesus, not just defending it but being sort of nasty to the mythers. I predict the same fate for him that John Dominic Crosson suffered. He too was the Darling of atheist in the 90s until Urbild and I started pointing out that he's a believer and has his own form of faith, he also went up against the mythers. Then he was dropped like a hot rock.

The "Jesus was a myth" theory is important to atheist, even if they don't accept, it gives them an ace in the hole for a get of hell free card.

The Huffington Post
Posted: 04/ 3/2012 5:00 pm Updated: 04/ 3/2012 5:00 pm

In "Did Jesus Exist? The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth," Ehrman soundly refutes the arguments -- sometimes made by atheists, agnostics and humanists -- that early storytellers invented Jesus.
As Christians prepare to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus, Ehrman, an agnostic, convincingly demonstrates in clear, forceful prose that there was a historical Jesus, a Jewish teacher of the first century who was crucified by Pontius Pilate. As for the so-called "mythicists" who argue otherwise, Ehrman has some choice words: "sensationalist," "wrongheaded," and "amateurish."
"They're driven by an ideological agenda, which is, they find organized religion to be dangerous and harmful and the chief organized religion in their environment is Christianity," Ehrman said in an interview.
The fact that Ehrman is siding with Christians on the historical truth of Jesus does not indicate a change of heart, much less a conversion. Instead, he said, it's an attempt to say, "history matters."

They throw in this amazing line: "It eventually dawned on him that the Jesus deniers were the flip side of the Christian fundamentalists he had long ago foresworn. Both were using Jesus to justify their relationship to Christianity." Duh. Hate to burst his bubble that's pretty much true of all the Dawkamentalists or "new atheists."


Needless to say Richard Carrier doesn't like it.
http://freethoughtblogs.com/carrier/archives/667
March 21, 2012 at 3:07 pm Richard Carrier

I won’t address his appeal to the genetic fallacy (mythicists are all critics of religion, therefore their criticisms of a religion as myth can be dismissed) or his sniping at credentials (where he gets insanely and invalidly hyper-specific about what qualifies a person to speak on this subject [which as one reader pointed out is the no-true-Scottsman fallacy]), except to note that it’s false: mythicist Thomas Thompson meets every one of Ehrman’s criteria–excepting only one thing, he is an expert in Judaism rather than Christianity specifically. And I know Ehrman knows of him. So did he just “forget” when he says he knows of no one who meets his criteria? Or is he being hyper-hyper specific and not allowing even professors of Jewish studies to have a respectable opinion in this matter? As Thompson’s book The Messiah Myth introduces the subject, “the assumptions that the gospels are about a Jesus of history…are not justified.” He says (my emphasis) that “a historical Jesus might be essential to the origins of Christianity,” but is not essential to the construction of “the gospels” (p. 8), not even the sayings in them come from a historical Jesus (pp. 11-26).

He is hardly dismissing mythers becuase they are critics of religion. He's a critic of religion too. How quickly the myther forgets. Carrier more-so than most, when it suits him. What Eherman is really saying is that they are biased. So Carrier is covering for bias by asserting that when one criticizes the basis of mythers they are committing the genetic fallacy. That is not it. He allude to the atheist misuse of the no true Scotsman fallacy. It's a good thing to demand credentials of the Mythers because they have a  habit of using old nineteenth century people who were dismissed in their day as crack pots. This is not eve similar to the atheist version of no true Scotsman which is not a valid use of that fallacy anyway. They will say "this si the NTSF" anytime yous ay "this is not real Christianity." That has no application to demanding credentials. Carrier defends Thompson as having scholarly credentials although he is an OT guy. The problem is he's not exactly unbiased. Despite his credentials he has certain view points that limit his fairness. Robert M. Prices has reviewed and criticized his works:

RMP Reviews

Thomas L. Thompson, The Messiah Myth: 

The Near Eastern Roots of Jesus and David.

 NY: Basic Books, 2005.

Reviewed by Robert M. Price

And then there is the uneasy implication of Thompson’s work that tends not only to dehistoricize the Old Testament but to de-Judaize it as well, as if the second-remove abstract, figurative reading to which Gentile God-fearers and Christians perforce resorted were really the ancient authors’ intention all along.

Thompson simply dismisses the notion that the messianic motifs in which the gospels are steeped reflect the apocalyptic expectations either of early Christians or of contemporary Jews. No, they all “understood” the various prophecies and miracle stories of both Testaments as utopian fictions and allegories of piety. Thompson fairly sneers at the imagined bumbling of Albert Schweitzer, foolish enough to try to discern the outlines of an eschatologically deluded Jesus from Matthew and Mark. How could anyone, before modern numbskulls, have so grossly misread the biblical, messianic tradition as to imagine that the Kingdom of God might actually dawn in fury and blessing? No, surely they knew better than literalist moderns. And then along comes Simon bar-Kochba! He seems to have taken it all too literally! But why should we assume the train jumped the track with the Son of the Star? Rabbi Akiba certainly shared his perspective, and presumably he was a fairly sharp-eyed student of scripture—as traditionally read. And if Bar-Kochba believed in a literal messianism, starring himself, why cannot a historical Jesus have seen himself in the same light a century before? Not that he did, but it is not clear why we ought to rule out the possibility.

No one is perfect. All scholars can be criticized. Yet it's not totally beyond reason to question credentials and demand some sense of fairness and basic objectivity. The blog Relgion at the Margins has followed the machination of the terrible battle that has ensured between Ehrman and Carrier. Carrier's reputation grew as result of the fray but Ehrman has been assisted by other established scholars.  James McGrath came to his aid, not once, but twice.

Thom Stark sides with Carrier and backs his argument that the Jews believed in dying messiah prior to Jesus. He admits this is indirect. I say it's piss poor. He explains the rationale:

Relgion@margin

Ibid

if it can be shown that some Jews held a belief in a dying Messiah prior to Christianity, then it cannot be argued that the idea of a dying Messiah could only have come about if one who was believed to have been the Messiah actually died in history (as with Jesus of Nazareth). Thus, the crucifixion of Jesus of Nazareth is not inconsistent with the Jesus Myth hypothesis. I’ll look at two major pieces of evidence Carrier provides for his thesis and show why they really come to naught, when examined properly.

To that I say "so what?" I have argued that myself. In fact I said when I first discovered that around maybe 2001 that this might make a good skeptical argument (although not a myther argument). I must congratulate Carrier it only took him eleven years to think of it. I  can't even remember what my response would have been back then. I know what it is now, don't argue that fact as a proof that Jesus was historical. We have much better arguments than that. I invite the reader to see my mythological Jesus pages. At the risk of arrogance I think these pages will beat up any mythicists arguemnts and especially Carriers. I debated Carrier way back when he was still a graduate student and he was posting on the secular web. I was not impressed then I see nothing now that constitutes a threat or that really gives me pause to think. Stork spends most of the artilce going over the evidence to prove the point that some Jews looked to a Messiah who would die. That's not hard to find. I've been documenting it for years. Its' documented by both major scholars Martinez who is a Dead Sea Scroll scholar and by others. it's found at Qumran. As a proof of mytherism they are really dragging eh bottom of the barrel. If this is the best they can to, to try and use one of major arguments that Jesus was messiah to disprove his historicity and all it really does is disprove one argument that's not even major, that's not much of an accomplishment.

Atheists Threatnened by Real Ideas.

Heroshimius Bosch's painting
"the Ship of Fools"



 theists on CARM were making a big production of the idea that there is real meaning to the phrase "God makes life meaningful." Their contention is that their lives are meaningful for them, becuase they want to think they are, and no other form of meaning that makes any difference. I think this is one of their more myopic conceits.

 Here is a more full and explanatory version of what you are about to read. bellow is the version I posted on CARM that drew the fire you will see below. This version will much better explain what it's saying. I don't think the original version deserves the kind of BS response it got.

I gave a little statement n the nature of meaning, the kind of meaning that God provides. I have not seen a single atheist, much less the ones bragging that they understood Nihilism so such much better than any theist, talking about it. the great guru of atheists and dilatant of the board ridicules the major thinkers who forged the notions of modernity on the nature of meaning and existentialism.

the question of meaning in life is an existential question. Those are the guys to cover it, the existentialists, becuase those the guys who raised the question in the history of Western letters. None of them one's who claim they understand Nihilism so much better than any Christian have said pea turkey about this issue or this definition that I put up.

When we say "meaning," as in "God gives us meaning" we have reference to an ordered relation between the idea and the particulars. Not to say it's necessary Platonist although it is Platonic in the sense that it relates the messy business of daily life to an ideal.

God is Truth, Being and love. These three things correlate. they are based upon the nature of being as an eternal necessary reality of depth in which the beings are produced and in turn partake.

Meaning is an ordered relation based upon creative purpose and wisdom and orients the contingent aspects of being to the eternal necessary aspect. It does this enabling us to ground identity and purpose: as SK said "when I find God I am more myself." Paul says In him we live and move and have our being (Acts 17).

Meaning is related to the transcendental signifier and they way it orders relations as the top of the metaphsyical hierarchy. For Heidegger metaphysics is grouping sense data into ordered categories. that's' not a good thing for him becuase it means we lose truth in preconceived notions. The altnaritve according to Heidegger is almost logos sort of move, where we allow the sense data to suggest it's own categories so we let the organization work by itself. SK goes one step further than that and says it's not just the sense data that suggests the categories but the logos, the ordering principle the mind of God.

so it's an ordered relation form the top of the metaphysical hierarchy that enables us to ground our identity and our purpose in an understanding of who we are and what our lives are about and to orient that toward the infinite joys of heaven and knowledge of the divine.

Deist:  Above post has zilch to do with Christianity or the bible. But, then again, most Christians here steer clear of the bible, because they can defend it.

Mad max

 The wonderful thing about the meaning of life to me is that no one gets to dictate to anyone else what it is.

Do you see any big content laden posts so far?  See the deep penetrating analysis? See the obvious recognition of the major thinkers such as Heidegger and Derrida and Kierkegaard? But of cousre we can expect the atheist guru, the mathematical genius from Austria HRG to say something profound:

HRG:

What a pity that they aren't things - except for those who are tempted by a feature of indoeuropean languages to reify merrily along. To say "God is Truth" is as semantically incorrect as saying "God is Yellowness".

Again with the Yellowness. Anytime you say something he doesn't know about, like philosphy  or thinking, he refers to the analogy he once drew to there being no Yellowness. Anytime he deals with anything that he can't handle he calls it Yellowness and bad analogy makes it go away.

But hey he doesn't disappoint us becuase I told you he would say something profound. To the idea that being has depth he says:

Depths are measured with sonar

that's it. that's the whole thing. Didn't I tell you he would be profound.can you say "threatened." they are obviously threaded by the appearance of a definition of something they know nothing about. they probably have heard the names Heidegger and Kierkegaard they feel they should know them but they don't.

So like other Mammals who encounter the unknown they poke it with sticks and try to scare it away.

one of them most hilarious responses comes form "Deist." His second contribution.

Originally Posted by Deist

Well, HRG, what we see is the usual stuff, which is that Christians just make stuff up.

Christians of the middle ages talked about logos as ordering principle so my post is drawing upon a trad ion at least a thousand years old. but I just mad eit up? how does that work?

Meta:
what you really mean is you are totally ignorant. you dot' know anything about majorette issues of modern Western thought. I've got Heidegger and Derrida and Schweitzer and Sartre and Kierkegaard and you can't think of anything to say beasue you don't know any of it.

When you have a document of almost a milliuon words, with sentence structure that is very odd and peculiar, with contradictions galore, with humans interpreting those words to fit their own worldview, you get people just making stuff up.

Meta:
Of cousre it doesn't dawn on little boy lost here that "strange and odd" terminology is a matter o what you have read. "memes" are strange and odd to me because I don't read crap. he hasn't heard about the major thinkers o the 20th becuase he's not well read. So like most people who are not well read he tries to turn his ignorance into a badge of accomplishment, and he tries to make my Erudition into a sin.

this is the outcome of the atheist movement, Ignace personified. A movement based upon being badly read.
This is just another in a huge series of proofs that atheists are essentially badly read and not deep, not thinkers, and their movement discourages any real intellectual life. These are staples of the western tradition. Schweitzer, Heidegger, Kierkegaard. They know nothing of them. they say I'm made them up! They think for something to be Christian it can only be a shallow surface level literalistic take on the Bible. They have never read  a page of theology in their lives they have no idea what it's about but they are intent on telling the guy with the Masters degree in the subject that he doesn't know anything about his field and they do.

Nothing I said in that article is a big radical ideas. It's all very tame and really pretty and conventional and old. They don't understand it and that threatens them. That's really hat the atheist thing is based upon. Badly read, shallow, discourage thinking. Free thinkers are slave thinkers. The Borwnshirts go marching on.

Atheist Propoganda Machine part 2

Today an estimated sixteen percent of Americans—or about 49 million American men, women, and children—live without religious affiliation.^* As a group, religiously unaffiliated Americans are more numerous than any single religious denomination except Roman Catholics.
They are more numerous than Hispanic Americans or African Americans ... more numerous than the estimated gay and lesbian population … more than seven times as numerous as American Jews … more than fifteen times as numerous as religiously active American Jews.
Not all of the religiously unaffiliated would describe themselves as atheists or agnostics, but recent studies suggest that the actively nonreligious make up about two-thirds of this population, with spiritual seekers and persons between church affiliations making up the rest.
How do we know these things? Recent—and authoritative—data comes from the American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) and from surveys conducted in association with the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. ARIS studies in 1990, 2001, and 2008 documented the doubling of “nones” (people declaring no religious affiliation). Studies by Pew and other researchers have confirmed this pattern and offered more detailed information on the makeup of this fast-growing group. For example, a 1994 Pew-University of Akron study gave us our most detailed portrait of the people who make up the unaffiliated 16 percent. It found that about a third of this group identifies itself using labels like atheist and agnostic. Another third does not use these labels, but when asked about their lifestyle (church attendance, beliefs about life, and the like) is otherwise almost identical with the first group; pollsters call these the hard seculars. Combined, self-identified atheists and agnostics and the hard seculars make up 10.7 percent of the total population, equivalent to two-thirds of the unaffiliated. Spiritual seekers and persons without current church affiliation make up the balance.
Many Americans imagine that they don’t know a single person who lives without religion. Yet if confirmed nonreligious people compose 10.7 percent of the population … and if one American in six has no religious affiliation … how likely does that seem? Or is it more likely that you already know neighbors, friends, colleagues, schoolmates, or family members who live without religion?

* NOTE: According to the U.S. Census Bureau’s Popclock, as of February 22, 2011, the U.S. population is 310,868,110. Sixteen percent of this = 49,738,898 religiously unaffiliated Americans of all ages.

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Today an estimated sixteen percent of Americans—or about 49 million American men, women, and children—live without religious affiliation.^* As a group, religiously unaffiliated Americans are more numerous than any single religious denomination except Roman Catholics.
They are more numerous than Hispanic Americans or African Americans ... more numerous than the estimated gay and lesbian population … more than seven times as numerous as American Jews … more than fifteen times as numerous as religiously active American Jews.
Not all of the religiously unaffiliated would describe themselves as atheists or agnostics, but recent studies suggest that the actively nonreligious make up about two-thirds of this population, with spiritual seekers and persons between church affiliations making up the rest.
How do we know these things? Recent—and authoritative—data comes from the American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) and from surveys conducted in association with the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. ARIS studies in 1990, 2001, and 2008 documented the doubling of “nones” (people declaring no religious affiliation). Studies by Pew and other researchers have confirmed this pattern and offered more detailed information on the makeup of this fast-growing group. For example, a 1994 Pew-University of Akron study gave us our most detailed portrait of the people who make up the unaffiliated 16 percent. It found that about a third of this group identifies itself using labels like atheist and agnostic. Another third does not use these labels, but when asked about their lifestyle (church attendance, beliefs about life, and the like) is otherwise almost identical with the first group; pollsters call these the hard seculars. Combined, self-identified atheists and agnostics and the hard seculars make up 10.7 percent of the total population, equivalent to two-thirds of the unaffiliated. Spiritual seekers and persons without current church affiliation make up the balance.
Many Americans imagine that they don’t know a single person who lives without religion. Yet if confirmed nonreligious people compose 10.7 percent of the population … and if one American in six has no religious affiliation … how likely does that seem? Or is it more likely that you already know neighbors, friends, colleagues, schoolmates, or family members who live without religion?

* NOTE: According to the U.S. Census Bureau’s Popclock, as of February 22, 2011, the U.S. population is 310,868,110. Sixteen percent of this = 49,738,898 religiously unaffiliated Americans of all ages.

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New atheist study fudges data to create propaganda. This is a poll done by Center for Inquiry. CFI is nothing more than an atheist propaganda machine and their mission statement basically say so. I'll get to that in a minute. Their poll came up first on Google when I put in the question "what percentage of Americas are self defined atheists?"

The big head line of the study "one out of every Six Americans has no religious affiliation." Assuming that was true, (which it's not becuase it's assinign if you know the studies) it seems totally taken for granted that having no religious affiliation is a bad thing for religion. I'm not sure that's true. They are equating it with unbelief and that's not right. Here's their pie chart break down:

Unaffiliated 16%.
Evangelical Protestant 12%
Evangelical Baptist 11%
Other religions 37%
Catholic 24%

What's wrong with this picture? Do we really think that with the tea party blazing and right wing hysteria foaming that the largest religious group in America is "other religions?" This is totally ludicrous. I fyou study the Pew study, which is the major valid best study done in 2007 (to date the state of the art) on religious land scape in America one can see how they have fudged on this. for one thing all studies give Chrisiantiy at least 75% or more. This one gives it (adding all the Catholic, protestant, and Baptist(?) Christinty as a whole only has 44%.

It is inconceivable to me that just since 2007 things changes this drastically. Here's the Pew findings:


unaffiliated 16%
Evangelical protestant 26% *(not 12)
Catholic 23%
Mormon 1.7%
Historically Black chruches 6.9%
Mainline Protestants 18.1% (separate from Evangelical protestant)
Other Christian 0.3%
Other religions 0.3% (Pew also adds to "other" Jews 1.7%, Muslim 0.6% what it calls "other faiths" as distinct from major world religions, in that slot they put unitarians, new age, mind scinece and so = 1.2%). While CFI has a whopping 37% the better study by far, Pew, has abotu 2%. How

Breaking down the unaffiliated at the top, Pew lists atheists as 1.6%. not 16, but 1.6. If you see my page on Doxa about how atheists inflate their numbers, there are several studies that show atheists down around that figure. Pew figure is the most conservative. Adherent's.com gives them 4%. Gallop in May 2008 give 3% with 3% margin (so between 3-6%).


you see they split Baptist from Protestant for some absurd reason because Baptists are protestants of course. Makes both groups seem smaller. Then they just ignored half the Christian population.

The reason for these discrepancies is not far to seek. CFI is a propaganda wing of the Atheist movement and all do to know this is look at their mission statement. One might also take note they own Skeptical Inquirer Magazine.. Their mission statments pulls no punches in admitting they are out to destroy religion.



mission Statement of CFI.

The mission of the Center for Inquiry is to foster a secular society based on science, reason, freedom of inquiry, and humanist values.

That's the head line on the mission statement. That's no atheist propaganda is it? It's even touting their rhetoric.

To oppose and supplant the mythological narratives of the past, and the dogmas of the present, the world needs an institution devoted to promoting science, reason, freedom of inquiry, and humanist values. The Center for Inquiry is that institution.

To oppose and supplant. Supplant means to replace, to destroy. Like all good little dawkies they confuse scinece with hating religion. Their aim they state clearly to destroy religion. why should we believe they are above lying to achieve that end? We know they don't believe in truth. Their little solider have fabricated data before. I have no evidence on CFI but I have shown atheist websites that just out and out fabricate the statistics. If this is guilt by assocaition one might look at the wildly off target statistics above. Giving 34% to "other religions" when the valid study gives 2%. This survey wasn't done yesterday. Things couldn't change that much since 2007.
more of the mission statement:

At the Center for Inquiry, we believe that evidence-based reasoning, in which humans work together to address common concerns, is critical for modern world civilization. Moreover, unlike many other institutions, we maintain that scientific methods and reasoning should be utilized in examining the claims of both pseudoscience and religion. We reject mysticism and blind faith. No topic should be placed off limits to scrutiny—certainly not fringe science and religion, which have an enormous influence on beliefs and conduct.

If they knew anything about mysticism they would know that it's backed with empirical scientific evidence. They are using that as a pejorative catch phrase that means any and all religion.

We also maintain that values are properly the subject of study and discussion as much as empirical claims. The Center for Inquiry studies and promotes human values based on a naturalistic outlook. Ideological doctrine and religious dogma have no more right to dictate our moral norms than they do to influence scientific research.

That's exactly what their rhetoric has spelled out, ideological doctrine. Look at the obvious philosophical contradiction: "values are properly the subject of study and discussion as much as empirical claims" that means we will teach you to hate religion too. then they ahve the gall to say "Ideological doctrine and religious dogma have no more right to dictate our moral norms than they do to influence scientific research." That statement is ideolgoical in and of itself. To make good on that they have to argue for a philosophical ethical position that has to be justified by argument. They are merely presenting their own ideology and dogma. When they talk about values they stepping beyond the limits of science. Science is not about teaching values.When religious believes talk about values they holding up the progress of science.

The Center for Inquiry supports research, but our mission activities go far beyond sound scholarship.

they sure do! there you have it folks a frank admission of what I'm saying. Going beyond includes lying and fabricating numbers!

The Center for Inquiry, and its affiliates, the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry and the Council for Secular Humanism, also carry out their work through education, publishing, advocacy, and social services. The Center for Inquiry has established dozens of regional centers and communities, which provide a means of delivering educational programs and services on a local level and provide a venue for like-minded individuals to meet and share experiences. In addition, the Center for Inquiry has affiliates and sponsors programs in many different countries. A secular society ultimately should embrace all of humanity, not just selected countries.

what they are describing is the actives of a political campaign. I think this violates their 501c(3)

that statement tells us they are a propaganda machine. I am not trying to accuse all "humanist" of being in a conspiracy, but it's obvious there is an organized group making war on Christianity. We have to oppose them by spreading truth.

ABC Poll = 38% of Americans are Christian, 48% of world.

Eighty-three percent of Americans identify themselves as Christians. Most of the rest, 13 percent, have no religion. That leaves just 4 percent as adherents of all non-Christian religions combined — Jews, Muslims, Buddhists and a smattering of individual mentions.
That's quite different from the world at large: Fifty-two percent of the world's population is non-Christian, compared to 4 percent in the United States; and one-third is Christian, compared to 83 percent in the United States. (These are rough comparisons, because the world figures, reported by the Encyclopedia Britannica, are for the full population, while the U.S. figures are among adults only.)
Non Christian religions given 4% no Religion in America 13% (somewhere in that 13% is the atheists).

CNN (not the best)= 75% say Christian in America (2009)

Seventy-five percent of Americans call themselves Christian, according to the American Religious Identification Survey from Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut. In 1990, the figure was 86 percent.

Newswek Poll = 81% self identified Christian in America (2009)

By Audrey Barrick

Christian Post Reporter

Wed, Apr. 08 2009 11:50 AM EDT

A new Newsweek poll reveals that although most Americans are still holding on to their faith and describing themselves as Christians, fewer believe religion can answer today’s problems.
According to the poll of 1,003 adults, released Tuesday, 60 percent of American adults say religion is very important in their lives and 78 percent say prayer is an important part of their daily lives.However, less than half (48 percent) believe religion can answer all or most of today’s problems. The percentage is the lowest number Newsweek has recorded since it began polling Americans on that issue in 1957 (when 82 percent believed religion could answer the problems of that time).

Washington Post reports on poll in 2009 that finds the group that says it has no religion is at 15% That doesn't mean atheits are at 15%. 12% of the "no religion group" doesn't' mean they don't believe in some kind of God it means they have organized religion. Most polls don't bother to make that distinction but the better one's do.

Gallop = self id Chrsitians in America at 77%. this is probably the same survey all those above are keyed to, it was actually done in 2008, just a year after the Pew study came out.

 Atheist Ideology Brainwashes over Time.

Here is evidence that atheism slowly takes over one's mind with ideological brain washing.
 About five years ago "Fleetmouse" on carm was a very bright guy. He's still bright (now he's "Magritte") but he used to be open minded enough that he actual defended my cosmological argent on a message to other atheists. This is so rare for an atheist to defend a theists God arguments. Over the years he's been ceased by an every strong grip of atheist ideology until today he is about arguing that if one dares to argue for a view point he doesn't like that int itself is proof that it's wrong. Certainly his CARM post today shows that he's very narrow minded because he bases his appeal on two fallacies of logic:

Originally Posted by Magritte

This is a distraction and diversion from examining the claims of religion. It's a HUGE red herring, and the exact same tactic can and will be used in defense of homeopathy, scientology, spirit channeling, the planet Niburu, David Icke's lizardoid theories and God knows what else - when you have no reasonable evidence, throw the ball back into the doubter's court. Ask what a ball is and what a court is. How do I know I'm even asking you questions about your beliefs? Wow, what a sophisticated approach! You must be terribly learned and wise, not like that hamfisted unschooled skeptic asking you annoying questions.

 Here's what he says this in regard to: this is the post he's calling a distraction:


by Occum, who is explaining why he's not a presuppositionist.

 The distinction is that the presuppositionalist wants you to plant Christianity at the base of your worldview, while I'm trying to get you to plant something there that makes sense to you. I want atheists to systematize and organize their worldviews so that they can be assessed objectively. While the presuppositionalist is interested in the foundations of our knowledge in order to stop the discussion, I'm interested in the foundations of our knowledge in order to get the discussion going.

 This  is what he's saying is: "when you have no reasonable evidence, throw the ball back into the doubter's court. Ask what a ball is and what a court is. How do I know I'm even asking you questions about your beliefs? Wow, what a sophisticated approach!"

If he is saying that about Occam's post my point is obvious. He wont even allow one to explain a distinction in one's view and another view or to make arguemnt fro one's view. I have a feeling he will say he's talking peresupperism and not Occam's view. That's cool. I can sort of agree with him there. I have a feeling that does extend that to all Christian apologetic. Look at the comparison. There is no reaosn why he would draw the comparison bewteen homeopathic medicine and presupposition any more than he would between that and all Christianity. Occam seems to have undestood it this way too because he says:

Occam:

That's a very natural and understandable response.

However, I must insist that if you are going to criticize a worldview because it does not measure up to your standards of evidence, you should know what you mean by evidence. Maybe you think "evidence" is too deep and abstract as a concept to be honestly questioned, but then, what is the level of abstraction at which all inquiry must stop? Is this not contrary to true philosophy?

Ultimately, your stance is as anti-intellectual as the theist who never questions the existence of God because he does not trust his mind.

Here are the fallacies he's committing.


(1) black is white slide.

two opposites can be made to seem like the same thing becuase one or two points of contact.

(2) argument from analogy.

"groups I don't like reason this way, I see similarities in your reasoning, therefore, you must be wrong too."

these are the fallacies that make up this appeal. then you do a narrow minded thing where you just close down shop and stop thinking, disallow arguments, intellectual reasoning and the standard means of proving one's view.

IF you look at works there's a clear implication that "If you don't accept the premise of my ideology then you can't be right" which is to say "your view are off the atheist template nothing off temple can be valid."

You are also assuring that scinece proves truth you are assuming those other groups can't be right since they don't past muster on your litmus test of scientific proof for their views.

There's another major problem here. He says "when you have no reaosnable evidence throw the ball back into the doubter's court."  All that really means is he' carping about having to meet the same stadnards of evidence he wants accuse the theist of failing to meet. He wants a pass for being a Semitic. It's a standard ploy of the atheist rhetoric to assume their position is privileged and only the theist has to prove soemthing.