http://secularoutpost.infidels.org/2006 ... ogist.html

Some of you should see yourselves here.

Atheist apologists? Fail from the outset.

There's a second one of these, you know.

Spinozasgalt wrote:There's a second one of these, you know.

But it's minor.

Well, lt's see.

1. Actually, I'd like any argument that isn't the equivalent of, "Oh, look at the flowers, therefore God" or, even better, "Oh, look at the flowers. Therefore specifically my religion's god but not the god of anybody else's religion". The latter is the one I find annoying.

2. Education may be a factor but intelligence has little to do with it. People believe in religions because those religions meet their needs. That's not getting into why most people end up in a specific religion which is mostly cultural and theists for some reason want so to avoid that reality.

3. Theists are not inherently stupid and it takes tremendous intelligence to work out some of these philosophies and they are necessary often to explain why the world isn't logically consistent with an omnipotent god.

4. The problem is that argument has to start with the assumption that moral values are objective and then use it to "prove" God so, in that case, objective moral values are the blind assertion and the existence of God the blind assertion within a blind assertion.

5. Ahem. I'm not entirely arguing on that one.

6. I whistle innocently and look at the next one.

7. I think few claim science is the only means to truth. But theists love to claim something exists as a fact and not a philosophical one, and then cry foul when they are asked for empirical evidence for an empirical claim.

8. The people who primarily use atheism as other than a lack of belief in "God" are primarily people who are trying to put believing in something without evidence on the same level as not believing it without evidence.

9. Many religious claims are testable. Many are not. Religious people tend to evade the ones that are testable and then ignore it when every testable claim fails the tests.

10. I primarily compare mythical entities that traffic in flaming swords, magic trees that give knowledge and have angels and demons running around equal probability to Santa and invisible unicorns. Gods like that are the gods most people believe in or are just derivative updates and modern facelifts of such gods. For most people, no matter how much they try to play that game, they are really talking about some ancient, tribal god. Aside from that, I've seen arguments that are based from a core concept of "God" and theists pretty much do the inductive routine as you said, just as they always do.

Let's define what God would be.

Atheist: Okay, so God is omnipotent and Love Incarnate and guided the process of life. Does reality seem to indicate that such a being exists? Honestly, no.

Theist: Okay, God is omnipotent and Love Incarnate and guided the process of life. Does the evidence support that hypothesis? Well, once we start adjusting the definition and throwing in things to force fit things as they really are then yes.

Same things that always happens with theists.

The core problem is how theists today view themselves. We live in an allegedly Rational age or at least an age where it is possible to access tremendous empirical information. They want to view themselves as having rational reasons.

But people do not believe in religions because they make sense or fit the evidence or are rational because religions do none of the above. People believe in religions because those religions give them something, meet their needs.

As to the core concept of "God" bereft of any religious agenda, I've yet to meet that person here.

Scientism doesn't actually get many supporters around here.

Mick wrote:http://secularoutpost.infidels.org/2006/12/sarcasm-how-to-be-atheist-apologist.html

Some of you should see yourselves here.

Wot moonwatcher said, except to add that that list is woefully incomplete; it only mentions capital-G-God and Jesus!

Just like the author of the article, this atheist disbelieves in many many more religions apart from just Christianity.

Perhaps the Jeffery Jay Lowder ought to include his own atheistic-apologetic arguments for disbelieving in all those other religions as well. He might discover we have more in common than he thinks.

I notice that the title of that article is, wait for it:

Sarcasm: How to be an Atheist Apologist

Which suggests very strongly that the author is, if anything, taking the piss out of supernaturalist strawman caricatures of atheism.

Tell me, Mick, what part of the word "sarcasm" don't you understand?

Haha I didn't detect sarcasm either, despite it being clearly marked in the title. Guess the author and I have more in common than *I* thought.

The post is clearly a joke just trying to stir shit up. Not a bad effort as well.

I wouldn't be surprised if Mick was just posting it as a joke as well. But should use the emoticons in future if he was

Also it's about five years old. So nothing new there.

Lowder was being facetious, of course. however he is critical towards village atheists, and so I suspect there is some underlying seriousness to this post in some degree or another. He takes the case for theism seriously as well as the case for Jesus' resurrection, and in fact I have seen him criticize his fellow scholarly atheists quite a bit. Skeptics should take note.

LucidFlight wrote:How to make typographic errors ib thread titles

1. Don't bother to copy and paste the title from the original article.
   Type it out yourself. There's more chance of introducing errors that way.
2. Try not to be too careful when typing important parts of a thread, say, the thread title.
3. Don't spell check what you have just written.
4. Don't bother reading what you've just written. Just post it already.
5. Have you posted it already? Greeeaaaat...

But is it a typo? Mick is the resident language expert, after all. He might know more than the average member...

Mick wrote:Lowder was being facetious, of course. however he is critical towards village atheists, and so I suspect there is some underlying seriousness to this post in some degree or another. He takes the case for theism seriously as well as the case for Jesus' resurrection, and in fact I have seen him criticize his fellow scholarly atheists quite a bit. Skeptics should take note.

Noted... now what?

Mick wrote:Lowder was being facetious, of course. however he is critical towards village atheists, and so I suspect there is some underlying seriousness to this post in some degree or another. He takes the case for theism seriously as well as the case for Jesus' resurrection, and in fact I have seen him criticize his fellow scholarly atheists quite a bit. Skeptics should take note.

What do you think "village atheist" means Mick? Do you think it is pejorative?

It really irritates me when message board software does not allow the first poster to fix spelling. Misspelling should not be a deadly sin.

Tero wrote:It really irritates me when message board software does not allow the first poster to fix spelling. Misspelling should not be a deadly sin.

Does it not? I seem to remember that other phpBB boards have that option...I haven't checked it out here, though.
But apart from that, Mick really can't be bothered.

Rumraket wrote:

Mick wrote:Lowder was being facetious, of course. however he is critical towards village atheists, and so I suspect there is some underlying seriousness to this post in some degree or another. He takes the case for theism seriously as well as the case for Jesus' resurrection, and in fact I have seen him criticize his fellow scholarly atheists quite a bit. Skeptics should take note.

Noted... now what?

We point out the logs in the theist apologists' eyes.