Comments on The Secular Outpost: Vic Reppert on Misconceptions about Atheism

SC... if sober drivers of late had caused more acc...

2009-01-07T18:37:00.000-08:00

SC... if sober drivers of late had caused more accidents than drunk ones, then it would either lead us to drop the warning against drunk driving, or at least to explain what spurious factors created the surface appearance that drunk driving was safe, despite its lack of safety.

(I'm assuming your analogy is posted in response to my prior comment. If not, then never mind me - I'm just here for the pixels

Atheism is lack of belief in a god, just as sobrie...

2009-01-07T16:52:00.000-08:00

Atheism is lack of belief in a god, just as sobriety is a lack of alcohol.

Should we warn about the dangers of drink driving if drunks point out that sober people crash cars too?

Many people in car crashes had one thing in common. They had drunk no alcohol.

Should we conclude that a lack of alcohol is a cause of car crashes?

I enjoyed your post as well. I think that the per...

2009-01-07T14:23:00.000-08:00

I enjoyed your post as well. I think that the perception that atheists are arrogant comes not from the notion we hold that we have not seen evidence for a deity, but from our tendency to mock mercilessly those who accept as evidence arguments or facts that we reject.

Also... I agree with the assessment of "atheism's" contribution to the state sponsored mass murders of the 20th century. However, I think that if we are to use this assessment, we must either abandon the argument against belief that it, per se, was the cause of various horrors of past centuries or we must be extremely careful how we formulate that argument.

There can be a tendency to finesse our standards depending on whose ox is being gored.

Keith,I enjoyed your post, especially the lines ab...

2009-01-07T13:39:00.000-08:00

Keith,
I enjoyed your post, especially the lines about revelation,

What are the credentials of revelation? The sheer multiplicity and diversity of purported revelations makes them all suspect. As Mark Twain said, “Mankind has discovered the One True Religion—lots of ‘em.” Therefore when someone asserts with ringing assurance that his purported revelation is the one true one, and that all others are false and their adherents deluded chumps, I have to wonder who is really being arrogant here.

I chuckle when I think of the god of Abraham whispering differing revelations to Jews, Christians and Muslims, then each of them being solipsistically secure in the idea that their deity has lied to each of the other two.

On the topic, is there any evidence for the Judeo-...

2009-01-07T13:24:00.000-08:00

On the topic, is there any evidence for the Judeo-Christian God hypothesis? I'd answer, yes there is. For example, the Judeo-Christian God posits that there will be an Earth with a variety of life form, including humans. This evidence is consistent with the hypothesis. The problem is, it's also consistent with a other hypothesis, some more parsimonious than others, and some that just don't just explain this particular fact, but all others relevant to the initial hypothesis. We call these later explanations theories, as they are consistent with all the relevant data, and continue to do so after experimentation adds more data. The Judeo-Christian God hypothesis is not consistent with all the data. For example, it posits that people were formed from dust. This does not cohere with all the data. The theory of evolution does tough.

So, is it fair when atheists claim there is no evidence for the Judeo-Christian God? If we're being pedantic, yes. However, I believe the thought process for most atheists that reached their atheism through rational thought is that the Judeo-Christian God hypothesis isn't consistent with the data, it isn't even internally consistent*.

* - http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/by_name.html

KEITHI would add that Eric Hoffer was right in The...

2009-01-07T12:00:00.000-08:00

KEITH
I would add that Eric Hoffer was right in The True Believer when he said that extremist ideologies adopt a 100% mentality: Either you are with us 100% or you are evil and must be eliminated.

CARR
Is that the test of an 'extremist ideology'?

Somebody who says 'He is not with us is against us' is an extremist?

'And must be eliminated'?

What about somebody who says 'The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.'

Is comparing people to trees that are cut down and thrown into fires an example of an extremist who wants elimination of people?