Atheist Essentialism and no True Scotsman

This argument (secular café) began over the issue of  mystical experiences. I had argued that mystical experience is transformative. Studies show that those who have it tend to be socially progressive and less racist. Samnell is a historian of American history so he decided I must be wrong. It challenges his hatred of Christians and he asserts that Christians supporting slavery count as much against the thesis as people answering the study count or it. You can't say the slavers didn't have the experience because that's no True Scotsman fallacy. To be honest he didn't use that phrase but it is the actual argument he's making. I accused him of essentialism. The idea that Christianity is an evil essence and any and all Christianity will result in the evils of the essence.

what I'm doing differently here is answering his final comment at the bottom in a summary comment. My commentary is in blue.


Quote: Samnell

the alarming thing is this guy is educated, he's a professor or instructor at some source of higher learning.

Quote: Originally Posted by Samnell Here we go again. Likely for the last time since I think this is my third round at essentially the same post. If repetition hasn't work before, why would it start now? Quote: Originally Posted by Metacrock Yes but the fallacy in your thinking is you assert with no backing that you use any believer as proof of mystical experience. Not true because no all have them. Moreover you can't just assert that they do because we have a control that enables us to know if one has had t or not. you are not using that controls your data is worthless. Byes not withstanding this is why historians need to know some basic social science research methods.  Samnell And you did the empirical studies of nineteenth century abolitionists before deciding they supported your point. Could I borrow the time machine and the survey some time? Quite a few things I'd like to ask about. [I don't have to a study because there is good reason to assume some abolitionists (the one's in Finney's revival had such experience, either way they contradict his assertion that Christianity leads to slavery.] Quote:Metacrock I understand that but your data is still anecdotal. You re also missing the boat historically. The manifestations of ecstatic behavior inn second great awakening such as Caine ridge witj B.W. Stone is exceptional. The main development of Pentecostalism came after the civil war. You also need to research Charles Finney and the Holiness movement because Finney was radically anti-slavery and his movement was as well. the first organized abolition group in America (excluding Quakers) came out of Finney's group (Phoebe Palmer and Methodist women).  Samnell :I'm familiar with Finney. I do not deny the evangelical movement's influence in abolitionism. Nor do I deny their connection between their religious beliefs and their political belefs. Ever heard of Thornton Stringfellow? He wrote the book I linked you to earlier. Just as much a Christian as the rest. Quote:Metacrock Read Donald W. Dayton's book on Revivals and also a Tim Smith. you do not evenb have good historical anecdotal data to back you. You can't prove one single slave owner who had mystical experience.  Samnell And you can't prove that one abolitionist had a mystical experience. You'd need a time machine. [good reason to believe so because the Finney revival was strongly committed to abolition, and that revival was drowning in the holy Spirit. people. Once Finney went to look at a hat factory people began falling down and repenting must at the sight of him. They fit the findings of gthe modern study so that's reason and that is certainly not my first line evidence.; the 200 studies in my book ]  Samnell "What Jesus said" is as much a constructed thing in the mind of every Christian, and different for each one, as anything else about their religion. Let's stop the nonsense about mystical experiences, since it's clearly superfluous to your argument. When push comes to shove, you deny that proslavery Christians are "proper" Christians. That's what this is all about. If you want to go and say there are multiple and mutually irreconcilable Christianies, each with their own plethora of Jesuses, I'd have no argument. But I suppose you've invested too much into your particular totem to admit diversity in your own religion. It's got to be just the one, from which others fall. Your entire argument is posited on the idea that there's an essential Christianity against which slaveholders can be reasonably judged and found wanting. Yours is the proscription, start to finish. Mine is the description. And I'm the essentialist? Moi? Spare me. Quote:Metacrock I wasn't writing a historical dissertation. I was talking about mystical experience. I have studies and they are empirical you have anecdotal examples and preconceived dislikes.  Samnell In neither Finney's case nor the proslavery have we hopped in that time machine and gone back to even get them to take your survey. If my argument, based on the observed behavior of millions of Christians, is an anecdote and must be dismissed, then so is yours based on a far smaller number of reformers. [Bringing up slavery and defending it with is bunck is just red herring that does not disprove the studies and he had no study that says savers had RE. It's a red herring because it doesn't refute the modern studies.] Quote:Metacrock O of course not. it's just that Christians aren't allowed to defend their beliefs. If a person who says he's a Christian does something stupid it really does make Christianity stupid. But atheism must always be defined by it's best impulses.  Samnell If someone goes and blames Christianity for Stalin's purges, I'll object. If someone wants to deny that Stalin was an atheist, I'll object. Why wouldn't I? They're both bad history. So is denying the Christianity of proslavery Christians. [notice he doesn't say deny Stalin was an atheist so He's supportimg the double standard] Quote:Metacrock you are merely ignoring empirical research because it slaughters one of your sacred cows That's rich. The best I could say about you is that you're a typical example of a science type blundering into the field and thinking you know something about history because, hey, science. Jared Diamond writ small, as you do. But I fear that my capacity for charity has been thoroughly exceeded. You're a two-bit apologist who can't cut it in even the shallow end of the historical pool.

Sam these points sum it all up

(1) I did not advance abolitionists as a primary proof of my position. I brought them in as corroboration against your anecdotal "data" (speculation) your examples of slave holders who you canot connected to RE in way other than superficial membership in a church.

(2) I have much better reason to suspect that the abolitionists where examples of RE having transformed people into social progressives than you can offer for seeing slave owners as the result of the kind of RE i'm talking about.

,...(a) I have examples of abolitionists who converted from slave trade as a result of feeling God's Presence.

.....(b) you have no examples of abolitionists turning slave supported as a result of feeling God's presence.

,,,,/(c) the claim of God's presence is not proof in itself of mystical experience but it is suggestive of it, and you no analogous examples.

.....(d) I have sturdy evidence that RE produces socially progressive thinking I have no reason to assume that psychology worked differently then.

(3) You make the puerile assertion I'm a science type

Quote:

Quote: you are merely ignoring empirical research because it slaughters one of your sacred cows That's rich. The best I could say about you is that you're a typical example of a science type blundering into the field and thinking you know something about history because, hey, science. Jared Diamond writ small, as you do. But I fear that my capacity for charity has been thoroughly exceeded. You're a two-bit apologist who can't cut it in even the shallow end of the historical pool.

[/QUOTE]

I'm not a science type, genius. try reading my blog. My new book is in proof sgae now It's called "God. Science, and ideology." that sound like I'm a big fan of sciemtism? Read my website see the kind of stuffvI say about science


(4) here is one of the most daft stat daft things I' ever heard.

Quote:

You brought up the abolitionists. Now I suppose you're pretending the mystical experience was invented by Finney, et al as though there's not a two thousand year history of Christian mysticism. For most of that time, it didn't move anybody of significance, and certainly not a movement, to reject slavery. In fact, Christianity inspired slavery well before it got into the rejection business. Bringing Yahweh to the heathens, you know.

you are not read in church history. Augustine, Aquinas, Chrysostom, Diyonisius. Luther, Wesley, Eccheaet all major contributors genius.

5) you are the essentialist not I. You construe obviously two totally different approaches. you want to make all Christians responsible for the evil some do burt you don't make atheists responsible for the evil some of them do. You want to make Christianity the sum, of all it's followers so if Christians in some place said raping dogs was Christian them that would become Christian but you don't hold atheism accountable for Stalin. you sluff that off with the most assigning example of side stepping the issue. You don't the bull by the horns and say essentialism is wrong.

(6) your excuse for not understanding Christianity as following Jesus' teachings is that we can't prove he said them. In the thread on corroboration I showed several independent sources that bolster the idea they are Jesus teachings.



Hey come on guys let's hear from people. Are atheists just essentialists? is there a true form of Christianity?
 

Yet more atehist logic, infussed with Fallacies

A comment appeared this morning responding to this post:

Monday, September 2, 2013

New Atheist Ideology Dissected and Disproved

The comment is by someone calling himself "sir Craig" here it is:

Sir Craig said...

Hmm...according to Mein Kampf, Hitler was most assuredly doing what he did to express his brand of religious belief, either Catholic or Protestant. To argue otherwise is to invoke the Not a True Scotsman logical fallacy! because most anyone can point to the religious influences in his writings.

However, even if Hitler were simply the most cynical man alive and had no actual belief in a god, it still cannot be denied that he would not have been able to carry out his actions without the driving force of religion to compel the rest of the German people. Religion was his tool and he used it thusly.

April 25, 2014 at 12:55 AM  

 Here was my answer:

Metacrock said...

Ok Students here we have several informal fallacies working at the same time. First is guilt by association:

"However, even if Hitler were simply the most cynical man alive and had no actual belief in a god, it still cannot be denied that he would not have been able to carry out his actions without the driving force of religion to compel the rest of the German people. Religion was his tool and he used it thusly."

In one case religion was used wrong so therefore religon is always used wrongly. that's just guilt by association.

It's also a doube bind becuase he say ok even if he wasn't religious he an example being a bad thing. Damned if you do damned if you don't. Every case is going to be one or the other but religion is always wrong even it's not really reilgion.

BTW we can also do the same thing with atheism. Even if communism isn't real atheist it still proves that atheism murders millions of people becuase the communists called themselves atheists.

Then of course we have the ever popular "no true Scotsman" always misunderstood and misused by atheists. The real idea says people get to be Scotsmen becsuae they are born Scotsman. So therefore, to say that one is not a true Scotsman becuase true Scotsmen will never behave ih a certain fashion is clearly wrong. But people become Chrsitians by choice. there is a code of behavior to live up to. There's no code of behavior for being a Scotsman there is for being a Christian.

so therefore wee can say so an so is not a true Christian. That is not a fallacy. the fallacy the atheist are committing is trying argue by analogy.

then of course we have a certain gullibility in trust what Hitler says in a propaganda piece. He wrote Mein Kampf as propaganda to persuade the masses he's a good guy. So what's he going to say "yes I am evil and want to kill you for your sacred beliefs becuase I hate them?" that would not be very effective propaganda would it.

Now do you know better than to believe a guy like Hitler? I do. I am from a state where elected Rich Perry three times and even I know not to trust Hitler.

April 25, 2014 at 5:21 AM

Responding to Rex on his Defense of No True Scotsman

I made a criticism of the way atheists use the so called "no true Scotsman  fallacy." Rex writes a long defense of it so I think it deserves attention here.

Rex

One is that when a christian does something wrong, like say murdering a doctor in a church because gawd told him that the doctor was a tool of satan, then immediately all of the other Christians will say, "well he did this horrible thing, so he wasn't a true christian". That is a problem.

Meta:

This is typical of the way this guy thinks. First of all how many Christians murder doctors in chruch? this is a very rare event. It's maybe 1 in a billion? Probably more but more like 1 in 25 million. I know I have not murdered a doctor in weeks. "All the other Chrsitians say..." is that really the case. All Christians said that about the shooting of abortion doctors? I didn't. The vast overwhelming majority of Christians do not kill doctors and do not want anyone to be killed. This is the propaganda o the hate group. They have a hysterical of Christianity and they see Christians as evil stupid monsters they want every to believe that Christians are running around murdering everyone. He's right that the issue is about saying "X was not a true Y" in cases where X is used to commit the fallacy of guilt by association.

This is what Rex is doing and its' what the hate group does, they want to use the fallacy of guilt by association to connect the actions of the loonies to those of the main stream. Now in my original criticism I said that the real no true Scotsman fallacy works by appealing to some group that are not chosen voluntarily. That's why it's called "no true Scotsman" and not true dentist. Because you don't choose to be a Scotsman, that's what makes the idea that we can't predict what a true Scotsman will do. But the same token we can predict what a true membrane of a voluntary group whose membership turns upon the acceptance of the membership upon a code of behavior. You don't sign up to be a Scotsman you are born there. So you can't say "no true Scotsman would do X" because maybe they would, Scotsmen have all kinds of different views. But you can say "no true birdwatcher would knowing kill a cedar waxwing." You can say "no true member of the woman hater's club would marry a woman." They might, especially if they are one of the three stooges. But then they would cease to be members of the club. So it's still a true statement. Birdwatchers and women haters are people do these things becasue they want to so we can say a true birdwatcher would not kill birds. Christianity is also something one joins up for. So we can say "a true is one who lives up to the code of Jesus' teachings." Because that's the idea that one becomes a Christian to fulfill.


Rex:

If someone buys into the whole John 3:16 thing, and SELF IDENTIFIES as a christian, then that is how they are grouped.

Meta:

John 3:16 has noting to do with self identification. It says to enter the kingdom of God you must be born again. It's talking about a spiritual experience, not self identification. Even so Rex's argument is backwards o logic. If you join by your own desire then agree to live up to the code so it is possible to compare one's behavior to a standard and say "a true X does not do that." But the true fallacy, which atheists are misusing doesn't apply to volunteer groups or self identification it applies to where you are born: thus "Scotsman" not psychologist.


Rex:

Hitler self identified as a Catholic.

(1) he was not, he was born into a Catholic family when  he was old enough to choose his own faith he abandoned it in favor of the occult.

(2) you are doing the fallacy in reverse. 

The fallacy says you can't know what a member of a group will do so you can't say a "ture something or other" wouldn't do that. But you are trying to say that a Christian is a  murdering piece of shit looking for a Nazi party to join. So you are actually "a true Christian will X" as long as X is murder, rape, true lies, bunch of bad stuff.

Of course he will play the game they always play and deny that he's saying this. Well then what's the point of saying Hitler was a Christian? Obviously if they are thinking this guilt by association thing anyway then clearly they are associating Hitler with Christianity and then they would have to be blaming Christianity as the cause of Hitler-type behavior. Which is nothing more tan commuting the fallacy they say is a wrong idea and you can't think that way. Rex is going to say that by arguing Hitler was a Christian he's showing "true Christians" don't live up the values they claim to embrace. But he's begging the question because you hasn't given us any way to establish that Hitler was  "true" Christian Since Christianity is a volunteer outfit and it means one intends to live up to a standard of behavior then obviously there's a basis of comparison as to what a "true" Christian does so we can say Hitler was not one.

On any message board where atheists ridicule Christians, any day of the week, you can find half a dozen atheists displaying this kind of circular abarudist attempt at false logic.


Rex

When all of the members of the Hutaree Christian Militia were arrested for conspiracy to commit domestic terrorism, immediately the gawd teamers said that they were not true christians. Sorry, but it doesn't work that way. These loonies were doing gawds work the best way that they could interpret it, they self identify as christians, and the outside world's opinion makes no difference.

Meta:

Yea it does work that way. Because Christians follow Jesus, Jesus said turn the other cheek, He told Peter "put away your sword." So true Christians don't go around fighting with guns becuase that's not what Jesus wanted. Again we see the circular reasoning. Why should we think those guys are Christians? Well because Rex wants me them to be. They follow Jesus' teachings, but they call themselves "Christians" they can't be hypocrites because that we be like saying Christians aren't evil. So what we find is we can committ the fallacy of no true Scotsman if by that we mean something bad bout Chrsitians, but we can't if we mean something good.

No True Scotsman Fallacy: No True Christian would murder a doctor in cold blood.

Not the No True Scotsman Fallacy but a fact: Christians are all evil and stupid and just can't waint to murder.


Rex:

Christianity has tried for centuries to take credit for every good thing in the world, and chalk up everything bad to non belief or the work of the devil.

 Meta:

The Russians did it first. Personally I am willing to admit Christians did not invent diet cola, the game "monopoly" or swizzle sticks . But I wish we had invited the latter two. I love Monopoly and swizzle sticks..


 Rex:

Sorry, but you don't get off that easy any more. You gotta take the good with the bad, and lately with the Catholic pedophiles, and with the christian leadership blaming earthquakes on sin, the bad for the gawd team is front page news.

Meta:

I think the problem he understands so little about Christianity he confesses with American citizenship and membership in NATO and other cultural identification. He doesn't seem to understand that being a Christian is a voluntary act that invovles emulation of a set of principles and the development of an inner life that fosters commitment to ideas of love and peace. He thinks one is born a Christian.

Rex:

When an atheist does something bad, we have to take it on the chin and say yep, he did it and he should be punished.

Meta

Christians would probably stop doing that if you guys would stop making this stupid guilt by association sort of thinking. That's probably half why we say such tings, to try and demonstrate to you how unfair your own stereotyping is. then of course there are the blood thirsty satanic minions who crowd the atheists meeting halls.... what?

Rex:

Besides, christianity is so splintered, with so many sects and sub sects, that they all conflict enough that there is no sorting out who is a true christian any other way than how they identify themselves. The Catholics don't consider any other sect to be true christians, nor do the protestants, or the baptists etc.

Meta:

Then if they are all different how can you blame them for the actions of the extremists? But there is still the teachings of Jesus, which is the origin of Christianity and it's what Christians are converted on the basis to follow.

Rex:

Self identification is the only real way to group them.


Meta

Self identifications provides a basis for comparison. Being  a Christian is about following Jesus. To the extent that one acts contrary to Jesus teachings one is not a true Christian. If you want to base it up on a  standard only God knows, such as the heart, then you still can't stereotype but you can say so and so is not exhibiting true Christianity. So it's not a matter of judging and saying "the guy shot the doctor is not saved, but we can say he's not living up to the idea of a true Christian at the moment." That's part of the problem is many apologists don't bother to keep things straight. It's human nature short hand things. It is an inadequate short hand to say "xi is not a true Christian" we should say "X is not living up to true Christianity in doing Y."

Rex:

Besides, you like to repeat over and over that Christians make up 80% of this country, and that number would be much smaller if the people who are not "true" Christians were removed from the list.

Meta:

yes but arguments about how many there are stem from answering the atheist augments which try to inflate their numbers and their assertions that their views are normal and their little 3% represent the normal people and the 90% who believe in God represent a bunch of crack pot idiots who can't wait to murder. If atheists would cease all of these fallacious and invalid arguments about numbers and association and bad analogies and so forth then Christians would stop worrying about such answers.

Rex:

You can't have it both ways.

Meta:

I don't. you are trying to have it both ways. you are trying to have it  where if they do something evil they are true Christians and if hey do good then they don't represent anybody.

No true atheist would reason like that. btw you have misspelled a bunch of words in this. no true atheist would do that!

no true atheist would laugh at my jokes. nor true Christians either.

Answering the Fallacy of The "No True Scotsman Fallacy"

There is a ploy practiced by many atheist of the type who inhabit places such as the Secular Web and Infidel guy. It's been so institutionalized it's almost a mortar. In fact I've seen this kind of things so many times now, when the Christian apologists get together they can stamp it out, but no soon will they rid the net of one institutionalized atheist fallacy, than another will rear its ugly head.

The fallacy to which I reefer here is the "No true Scotsman," fallacy (NSF). I dot' know the etymology exactly, but the general idea is that in the heat of argument one is likely to say something like "no true American would ever (do whatever)" The way it's used is this:

Atheist claims something like "Hitler was a Christian." The Christian makes the mistake of saying "O but he wasn't a true Christian because bah, so the atheist says 'that's the NTSF So without even thinking about it, they just dogmatically declare anyone was ever a Christian of any kind to have always been one. Once a Christian always a Christian (unless you become an atheist a post on the secular we) and then anything you do that's negative pertains to Christianity as the upshot of being a chrisiatn. So Mao was a Christian because he heard a Bible verse once, therefore, Christianity makes you become the Chairman of the Chinese communist party and write little red books.

This has become such a mantra that it cancels any kind of critical thought. Anytime any apologist comes near any sort of questioning as to one's Christian credentials the atheist says something like "I hear bag pipes playing." We need to make up a Nam for the fallacy of calling everything the no true Scotsman fallacy. What really amusing is that they are using the fallacy in the wrong way, as though they dot' really know what it means! The true fallacy is aimed at people who try to use patriotism to win arguments. No true American would call for pulling out of Irk (or Vietnam or whatever hopeless mess we've gotten ourselves into this decade). But that is not the same saying that any time one says "so and so Is not a Christian" it's the fallacy. That fallacy has nothing to do with the commitment level of a particular individual. It has to do with the way in which I construct another perinea's commitment level. If the commitment level of an individual can be demonstrated toward some affiliation then obviously that person can be said to be or not to be "a true so and so" (whatever it is). The only requisite criteria would be that there must be clear guidelines as to what a true so and so is about. That's why the no true Scotsman thing is a fallacy, because there is no way to know what a true Scotsman would say about any given issue, since being a Scotsman (or an American) is rarely a voluntary affiliation. Of course there are cases in which we CNA say no true Scotsman would do X and it not be fallacious. Fore example; no true Scotsman is born in China of Chinese patrons who no relation of any kind of with Scotland and who have never been to Scotland. Such a person hardly had any claim to being a Scotsman, but even in such a case the idea of being a Scotsman is still rather vel. Perhaps one coulee be a true Scotsman if one pinched pennies, played golf, kept sheep, ate fried Mars bars, and wore lad, even if one had never been to Scotland and was not Celtic origin.

The idea of being a Christian is a bit more voluntary than being a Scotsman, thus it is a big less difficult to pin down. This is true, moreover, because Jesus did says something about what is followers would do and would not do. We can say "no true Christian would be anti-Semitic" since Christ was Semitic. Since worshiping Jesus of Nazareth as the son of God is part of being a true Christian, and this is stated in the manifesto (the Bible) then we just might conclude that one who doesn't' do that is not a Christian. Moreover, the church itself laid down guidelines for being member of the Christian community (the church invented the word "Christian" not Jesus). Those guidelines are embodied in the creeds. So in fact yes we can exactly say with no fear of contradiction or of fallacy that no true Christian would ever say anything contrary to the creeds. Because to say that is to be an untrue Christian. Paul said no one by can say by the power of the Spirit "Jesus be cursed" (1 OCR). He was not committing the no true Scotsman fallacy. He was laying down a statement of spiritual fact. So we can say based upon this fact, "no true Christian prophet can say by the power of God that Jesus is cursed." This is a factual statement, given the assumptions of Christian belief. and not the NSF.

It would not be smart to concentrate too hard on stamping out this silly mortar of the atheists. They will only replace it with another. In the mean time, we know to deal with it, we can always use it to our advantage. If it is a fallacy to argue that so and so wasn't' a Christian, because Christianity is very diverse and we can't say who is and who is not and the attempt to try is always a fallacy, then it must also be the same fallacy to say "all Christians do x." The idea that Christianity causes all these social harms and leads people to be right winners is also the same fallacy.