Posted: Aug 30, 2013 3:43 pm
Rumraket wrote:Anyway, I watched this discussion. It's not a debate of the kind Craig normally does with multiple rounds of structured rebuttals. Just a more general moderator-guided back and forth.
I like Krauss a lot as an engaging public speaker, educator and popularizer of science. His public lectures are very engaging on the subject of physics and cosmology. But when it comes to his ability to deal with standard theistic crap on morality and the like, he sucks in my opinion. The only thing he did right here was when he exposed Craig's misrepresentations and bullshit in the beginning and pointed out how Craig relies on his audience's lack of training in the subject matters. I've been waiting for someone to call the shithead out on this for a while now, so it was satisfying to see. I can only hope it becomes a common event when Craig debates someone, that they take some time to expose how Craig does these kinds of misrepresentations and underhanded, less than charitable interpretations of his opponents positions often. I'm tired of seeing this charlatan being offered too much undeserved respect.
Anyway, that said, when it comes to defending the atheist viewpoints and responding to standard theistic bullshit on the topics of moral and ethical philosophy, Krauss is pretty crap I'm sorry to say. He spent way too much time being synthetically outraged over nutbaggery Craig's erected in the past about the whole caananites shit, and had laughable non-answers and strange misunderstandings when it came to the points made by Craig and the moderator. The simple fact is that there's much better atheistic answers to these things than whay Krauss came up with, and it was frustrating to listen to his messy rants of only tangential relevance.
This is exactly why I want to see Craig debate someone who has at least comparable expertise in dealing with theistic arguments. Krauss just sort of wings it at an amateurish level, but given his complete lack of experience and training debating this particular subject, he comes off ranting and confused. He rarely made a good point and when he did (like the thing about theological "theories" basically just constituting making shit up to make it fit), didn't know how to carry it effectively through Craig's smokescreens. That takes practice and preparation, none of which Krauss had apparently done.
I only really know of one or two people who has the experience and qualifications to effectively challenge Craig here, and Craig won't debate them.
On the subject of secular vs theistic morality and ethics, I'd love to see Craig vs Matt Dillahunty or even Richard Carrier.
Yeah I'm not sure why he bothers with arguing ethics. He should plainly state that he spent his life researching cosmology, and hence didn't get much time to consider the ethical implications of the biblical god's existence. He understands much more about the fundamental nature of the universe than any scholar of Jesus resurrection as a result though, so it's damn well worth it.
Maybe it's an American thing, where he feels compelled to stand up for the non religious on every front? I probably would too in a society full of anti abortion wackjobs forever trying to influence politics.