See this Atheist Bingo Card that by simply listing them, pokes fun at the questions we often receive right off the bat.
Some of these are quite comical and of course, all of them have an answer. Here are some of the more common ones, in my experience:
You can't prove there's no God: More importantly, you can't prove there is one. You can't disprove Zeus, Invisible Pink Unicorns or that the universe didn't begin 5 seconds ago with the appearance of age. Nobody can prove a negative, but that doesn't mean the assertion is therefore verified. Idiot.
You are so closed-minded: Ironically, it's my open mind that got me this far. Not accepting certain blind faith assertions because they aren't convincing is not being closed minded, it's limiting the amount of nonsense you use to make decisions. The ideal amount of nonsense is zero. Being convinced of a certain point of view and remaining so in spite of your poorly reasoned logical slow pitch lobs is not the same as being closed, merely I'm already past your tired point of view and you can't see past it. Moron.
Where do you get your morals?: I get them from the society like you do. We don't have to consciously vote on morality to determine what we will and will not tolerate. Some would say Homosexuality is immoral, but this view is quickly shifting. When it gains popular acceptance on a larger scale, will everyone be wrong in calling it moral? By what testable standard? (hint: the bible doesn't count. Gays have been around a bit longer) Murder, we can agree, is immoral. I wouldn't want to be murdered and I wouldn't want others to be murdered. I support this as a good place to draw the line between good and bad. I don't use the Bible as a basis and i certainly don't claim an unobservable being created them secretly and waited 4.6 billion years to share them with us. We can see that killing is harmful to a peaceful society, so the morals themselves have evolved. In the Old West, you might have been able to kill more often than today. Morals change with the times. No need for God. Turd.
Hitler/Stalin/Pol Pot was an atheist too, you know?: Aside from the fact that Hitler was a Christian, Stalin and Pol Pot were atheists. But they were never committing atrocities in the NAME of atheism. Religions of all kinds have done far worse in the name of their God than anyone has done in the name of Atheism. Being a thing doesn't mean your actions are driven by that thing. Jackass.
There are no atheists in foxholes: Aside from this being demonstrably untrue, do you really think that belief is valid when it's only motivated by mortal fear? Do you hold your own decisions dear when they are made under duress? Surely people seek comfort in hard times and may trade rational thoughts for irrational ones. Does that make these irrational thoughts suddenly true? Of course not. Don't be silly. Nuts!
Nothing but emotional arguments or logical fallacies. It's amazing to me that so many people continue to believe, though I guess I was on the other side once as well.
Do you have any others you'd like to rebut?
Showing posts with label debate. Show all posts
Showing posts with label debate. Show all posts
Saturday, June 11, 2011
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Faith Based Reasoning
There's a funny thing about faith. It seems that the holder of it is never aware of the massive leaps in logic that they must make to reach a faith-based conclusion.
I don't think faith is evil, nor is it unnecessary. We all take a lot of things on faith like the idea that our cars will continue to work, our parachutes will open and the laws of gravity will not spontaneously reverse and fling us all into a cold, dark oblivion of death.
So faith can be perfectly fine, indeed normal. But Faith-based reasoning is the real problem in the world. It extends itself not just to religion, but really to anything that anybody REALLY wants to be true. If you want to believe that unicorns exist for example, then you can find something that proves it to you. You just have to look hard enough. Is that one too silly for you? What if you wanted to do away with all food and drink and show the world that you can live entirely off of light alone? That's completely real. They have a prophet who claims she has lived on 300 calories a day since 1996. That's 14 years on what amounts to about 5 and a half oreos a day. She's not a strict breatharian, to be fair but that same amount of calories did this to Portia De Rossi.
Nevertheless, people believe in this nonsense without bothering to so much as ask a question like "How does this work?" Instead, they simply trust, or rather put their faith in a smooth talking prophet and then they starve themselves to death next to a lake in Scotland and leave behind grieving family members. It's a tragic fucking thing, really. That's the most common defense of faith based reasoning. You simply didn't have enough faith.
How much faith is in a mustard seed anyway? It must be a tremendously misleading amount because no mountains have been moved around as far as I know. Unless they kept it a secret. Or maybe the faith was misplaced, or mis-asked, or maybe the mountain mover wasn't listening or maybe he changed the rules and is waiting for you to figure that out or maybe he didn't like your request and is waiting for you to ask for something he already likes.
Any of these things are perfectly reasonable explanations when you start with a premise that is unfalsifiable, and untestable.
Bertrand Russell theorized (ironically) that there could be a teapot orbiting the sun somewhere between the Earth and Mars.
"Why, what nonsense!" I hear you vehemently cry, sure enough of your cosmology to know that no such teapot exists. "Where is this teapot, I want to see it!" You further exclaim, perhaps oblivious to the fact that this is just an analogy. Well, you didn't let me finish. This teapot is really, really, really small. Like way smaller than a marble or even a pea. It's so small in fact, that it cannot be perceived by any of our most modern and effective telescopes.
"Well, you just made it up, so that doesn't count" you say, finally coming around.
Here's the thing though, if I wrote it down in a letter to someone. Then wrote another 65 letters and collected them into a book and then buried it in my super awesome time capsule for 2,000 years, then released it to the world. Not only would that, apparently, lend it absolute credibility, but it would also make you a heretic worthy of the inquisition just for doubting it.
The list of faith based nonsense goes on and on, and by its very nature, is literally an infinite list, a list with no end. Any possible thing you can imagine would find its way here. Invisible Pink Unicorns, Flying Spaghetti Monsters, Russell's teapots, breatharianism, chocolate stomping wombats that spin the world with sarcasm, an invisible man who creates galaxies with words, a human who can save us from a fiery place we didn't even know existed until he told us about it, crystals that interact with immeasurable energies, magnets that heal you, vibrations that...well, you get the idea.
Why is it that faith blinds the faithful so? It seems almost cruel. If unicorns, breatharians and teapots are stupid and silly, then in what way is religion any better? What tools, what credibility does it have that these others do not? If you're knee jerk answer is "God says" then you seem to have missed the point.
I don't think faith is evil, nor is it unnecessary. We all take a lot of things on faith like the idea that our cars will continue to work, our parachutes will open and the laws of gravity will not spontaneously reverse and fling us all into a cold, dark oblivion of death.
 | ||
| Pictured above: Racism. |
Nevertheless, people believe in this nonsense without bothering to so much as ask a question like "How does this work?" Instead, they simply trust, or rather put their faith in a smooth talking prophet and then they starve themselves to death next to a lake in Scotland and leave behind grieving family members. It's a tragic fucking thing, really. That's the most common defense of faith based reasoning. You simply didn't have enough faith.
How much faith is in a mustard seed anyway? It must be a tremendously misleading amount because no mountains have been moved around as far as I know. Unless they kept it a secret. Or maybe the faith was misplaced, or mis-asked, or maybe the mountain mover wasn't listening or maybe he changed the rules and is waiting for you to figure that out or maybe he didn't like your request and is waiting for you to ask for something he already likes.
Any of these things are perfectly reasonable explanations when you start with a premise that is unfalsifiable, and untestable.
 |
| Mustard Seed sized faith is still big enough to move a goal post. |
Bertrand Russell theorized (ironically) that there could be a teapot orbiting the sun somewhere between the Earth and Mars.
"Why, what nonsense!" I hear you vehemently cry, sure enough of your cosmology to know that no such teapot exists. "Where is this teapot, I want to see it!" You further exclaim, perhaps oblivious to the fact that this is just an analogy. Well, you didn't let me finish. This teapot is really, really, really small. Like way smaller than a marble or even a pea. It's so small in fact, that it cannot be perceived by any of our most modern and effective telescopes.
"Well, you just made it up, so that doesn't count" you say, finally coming around.
Here's the thing though, if I wrote it down in a letter to someone. Then wrote another 65 letters and collected them into a book and then buried it in my super awesome time capsule for 2,000 years, then released it to the world. Not only would that, apparently, lend it absolute credibility, but it would also make you a heretic worthy of the inquisition just for doubting it.
 |
| Bertrand Russell doing his classic Old Man impersonation. |
The list of faith based nonsense goes on and on, and by its very nature, is literally an infinite list, a list with no end. Any possible thing you can imagine would find its way here. Invisible Pink Unicorns, Flying Spaghetti Monsters, Russell's teapots, breatharianism, chocolate stomping wombats that spin the world with sarcasm, an invisible man who creates galaxies with words, a human who can save us from a fiery place we didn't even know existed until he told us about it, crystals that interact with immeasurable energies, magnets that heal you, vibrations that...well, you get the idea.
Why is it that faith blinds the faithful so? It seems almost cruel. If unicorns, breatharians and teapots are stupid and silly, then in what way is religion any better? What tools, what credibility does it have that these others do not? If you're knee jerk answer is "God says" then you seem to have missed the point.
Friday, December 17, 2010
The Young Earth Myth
This is one of those topics that is important to me. Primarily, I imagine, because I used to accept it quiet readily.
This is the issue of Young Earth Creationism.
The other night I was watching an episode of NOVA, they were addressing the issue of the Sphinx and its origins. One of the most interesting elements to me was that the great sphinx was not made of bricks carted in like they imagine was the case for the nearby pyramids. It had a much cooler sculpting process...
The ground is in the area is made up of many, many layers of limestone. This limestone was formed when the land of Egypt was completely underwater and the decaying animal carcasses formed the separate limestone layers over a tremendous amount of time. The water over Egypt eventually went away, these layers dried out, the Egyptians built some stuff and eventually the sphinx, which they carved directly out of the limestone. That's right. In an age with no advanced tools, just rocks and sticks basically, they were able to pound, chisel and scrape out an amazing work of art. It likely took thousands of man hours just pounding away at this big piece of rock while some arrogant Egyptian, most likely with a French accent, looked out over his outstretched thumb and muttered something about how lime made for an unruly canvas.
Even now if you look at pictures of the Sphinx you can see these layers of limestone. Even more interesting is that if you follow the layers imaginary line into the adjacent walls, then you can see that the layers line up exactly. A feat that would be incredible difficult to manufacture and something that the even the notoriously, extravagant Egyptian architects couldn't be bothered to do.
Now, this is a Young Earth/Old Earth issue because Egypt hasn't been underwater in the last 10,000 years, (a figure often designated as the age of the Earth by the YEC crowd) At least not that they were aware of and that's the kind of thing that's hard to miss even if you see the world in strange picture form.
In fact, that particular part of Giza hasn't been under the ocean for millions of years. The lime sediments date back to the Eocene period which was anywhere from 56 to 34 million years ago. It takes many more than ten thousand years to create solid layers like this, they have to be wet, house life, let the life die and compress on the ocean floor, then have all the ocean water go away and then wait all those millions of years for the fossil record to catch up and then have some people build the sphinx some 4,000 years ago.
The evidence is clear, the idea of an Earth created with age has no basis in fact, but it just a wild guess to explain why the facts don't match the faith. Perhaps the most annoying thing about such a theory is that there is no reason a belief in God must contradict the theory of evolution. The only thing that gets in the way is the assumption that this really old book must be literally true in every respect, and thus nature must be wrong. Sorry Sphinxy, you're younger than you thought.
This is the issue of Young Earth Creationism.
The other night I was watching an episode of NOVA, they were addressing the issue of the Sphinx and its origins. One of the most interesting elements to me was that the great sphinx was not made of bricks carted in like they imagine was the case for the nearby pyramids. It had a much cooler sculpting process...
The ground is in the area is made up of many, many layers of limestone. This limestone was formed when the land of Egypt was completely underwater and the decaying animal carcasses formed the separate limestone layers over a tremendous amount of time. The water over Egypt eventually went away, these layers dried out, the Egyptians built some stuff and eventually the sphinx, which they carved directly out of the limestone. That's right. In an age with no advanced tools, just rocks and sticks basically, they were able to pound, chisel and scrape out an amazing work of art. It likely took thousands of man hours just pounding away at this big piece of rock while some arrogant Egyptian, most likely with a French accent, looked out over his outstretched thumb and muttered something about how lime made for an unruly canvas.
 |
| That gate doesn't keep anyone out. |
Even now if you look at pictures of the Sphinx you can see these layers of limestone. Even more interesting is that if you follow the layers imaginary line into the adjacent walls, then you can see that the layers line up exactly. A feat that would be incredible difficult to manufacture and something that the even the notoriously, extravagant Egyptian architects couldn't be bothered to do.
Now, this is a Young Earth/Old Earth issue because Egypt hasn't been underwater in the last 10,000 years, (a figure often designated as the age of the Earth by the YEC crowd) At least not that they were aware of and that's the kind of thing that's hard to miss even if you see the world in strange picture form.
 | |||
| Proof. |
In fact, that particular part of Giza hasn't been under the ocean for millions of years. The lime sediments date back to the Eocene period which was anywhere from 56 to 34 million years ago. It takes many more than ten thousand years to create solid layers like this, they have to be wet, house life, let the life die and compress on the ocean floor, then have all the ocean water go away and then wait all those millions of years for the fossil record to catch up and then have some people build the sphinx some 4,000 years ago.
 |
| Not Egypt. (Present Day) |
The evidence is clear, the idea of an Earth created with age has no basis in fact, but it just a wild guess to explain why the facts don't match the faith. Perhaps the most annoying thing about such a theory is that there is no reason a belief in God must contradict the theory of evolution. The only thing that gets in the way is the assumption that this really old book must be literally true in every respect, and thus nature must be wrong. Sorry Sphinxy, you're younger than you thought.
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
The Choice to Believe
I was engaged in a friendly debate with a longtime friend about faith vs logic. He was someone I hadn't mentioned my agnosticism to yet, but he's cool headed and intelligent enough to accept such a thing without making an emotional plea.
I was able to explain the general ideas behind my line of thinking, as previously written here. My hope was not that I would turn his mind from his faith, but that I would help him notice the gap in logic that is required by religious faith.
We talked about the origins of the bible and some of the contradictions therein. We talked about the idea of a perfect book and how unlikely that is. We also talked about the concept of an inerrant book and where that even comes from within the community of believers.
My friend had the honesty to say that he didn't have all the answers to every doubt, but that for him, their was enough truth in the bible to convince him that the rest was true. He spoke of the historical accuracy, which was verifiable by separate sources, and that he was able to see the evidence of love being a powerful tool with humanity. That it really is the best way to treat people based on his personal experience.
I personally haven't done a lot of research at this point on the historical accuracy of the bible, so I cannot speak for or against its efficacy. But it really doesn't matter because the points I take issue with are the supernatural claims. This is an important line to draw. Just because the bible mentions things in the natural world that can be verified, does not mean that the rest of it is necessarily true. This is a logical fallacy. Just because something is partially true does not mean that the rest of it is true. Each element should be judged on its own merit, and my argument is that supernatural claims are completely devoid of any merit. They cannot be tested because they have no physical, testable evidence. The problem here is what reason is there to be believe the specific claims of christianity vs the infinite other supernatural ideas that are held by others. The truth is, there isn't. At some point, you just make a choice to believe or to not believe.
Now, there is a fine line here as well. I don't think it's possible to always choose to believe. If you have no reason not to, then it can be an exciting or captivating concept that lures you in and you choose to hold on to such a belief. But if something doesn't make sense to you, if something defies your worldview, or your understanding of how things work, then you cannot believe it. You can try to force yourself to embrace it, but you cannot fight your doubts. Nor should you.
There are some christians who do this and are still within the church. I've met many of those who finally left after years of doubts. They quietly struggle within themselves, but are too afraid to take that final step. The church, indeed all cults, often use fear as a way of controlling the masses. Afterall, if you are more afraid of the consequences than living with the nonsense, you wont leave and they will feel that they've won.
The fear and the control would be a topic best saved for a later post anyway. For those who are reading this and have opinions one way or another, feel free to leave a comment as I enjoy the debate.
I was able to explain the general ideas behind my line of thinking, as previously written here. My hope was not that I would turn his mind from his faith, but that I would help him notice the gap in logic that is required by religious faith.
We talked about the origins of the bible and some of the contradictions therein. We talked about the idea of a perfect book and how unlikely that is. We also talked about the concept of an inerrant book and where that even comes from within the community of believers.
My friend had the honesty to say that he didn't have all the answers to every doubt, but that for him, their was enough truth in the bible to convince him that the rest was true. He spoke of the historical accuracy, which was verifiable by separate sources, and that he was able to see the evidence of love being a powerful tool with humanity. That it really is the best way to treat people based on his personal experience.
I personally haven't done a lot of research at this point on the historical accuracy of the bible, so I cannot speak for or against its efficacy. But it really doesn't matter because the points I take issue with are the supernatural claims. This is an important line to draw. Just because the bible mentions things in the natural world that can be verified, does not mean that the rest of it is necessarily true. This is a logical fallacy. Just because something is partially true does not mean that the rest of it is true. Each element should be judged on its own merit, and my argument is that supernatural claims are completely devoid of any merit. They cannot be tested because they have no physical, testable evidence. The problem here is what reason is there to be believe the specific claims of christianity vs the infinite other supernatural ideas that are held by others. The truth is, there isn't. At some point, you just make a choice to believe or to not believe.
Now, there is a fine line here as well. I don't think it's possible to always choose to believe. If you have no reason not to, then it can be an exciting or captivating concept that lures you in and you choose to hold on to such a belief. But if something doesn't make sense to you, if something defies your worldview, or your understanding of how things work, then you cannot believe it. You can try to force yourself to embrace it, but you cannot fight your doubts. Nor should you.
There are some christians who do this and are still within the church. I've met many of those who finally left after years of doubts. They quietly struggle within themselves, but are too afraid to take that final step. The church, indeed all cults, often use fear as a way of controlling the masses. Afterall, if you are more afraid of the consequences than living with the nonsense, you wont leave and they will feel that they've won.
The fear and the control would be a topic best saved for a later post anyway. For those who are reading this and have opinions one way or another, feel free to leave a comment as I enjoy the debate.
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