It's Not Too Late to Take the Debunking Christianity Challenge in 2010

Several Christians have decided to take the DC challenge as I first wrote about here, including a master's degree student, a pastor, and others. Just today I heard from a fifteen year old named Kyle who has decided to do so (via email). The official DC challenge is to get and read the ten books I suggested in that link. Don't accept any imitations. This is the real deal. I also encourage believers to read both sides, but this is the official Debunking Christianity Challenge. ;-)

8 comments:

J said...

Hello John. I'm going to "adopt" one of your challenge participants: Micah, the master's degree student. For the past school semester months we've been meeting regularly at a local coffee shop where we attempt some sort of dialog on theological matters. I haven't read everything on your DC Challenge list, so this would be a good opportunity.

Anonymous said...

Nice to know Oliver, great.

Breckmin said...

What if you don't read (hardly any) Christian apologists books but ONLY read books 'against' creationism and Christianity because you do not believe that Christian apologist books correctly answer (or provide enough explanation to)your book?

There is a good reason that Christian apologetics is always behind in answering questions put forth by atheists, btw.

Just look at the numbers..and how their time is divided (when it comes to people who can actually answer).

Anonymous said...

I'm doing this, John. Just finished The New Atheists and starting God: The Failed Hypothesis tomorrow. I wish I had a Freethinker discussion group here to bat these ideas around with.

The more I read the more convinced I am that the way one thinks about the issues raised, the more one reaches the conclusions he started with. God/no god is not an intellectual decision, but an emotional one based on many factors.

Dan

Anonymous said...

Dan, it seems surprising to hear you say this. It's something that I agree with in my book as you know where I try to deal with it in the first part of the book. This conclusion of yours leads us both to agnosticism.

One of the factors is a social one, whom we listen to.

Elsewhere I admitted this:

"I do, however, think we can convince ourselves to believe in most anything. Two examples in my own life illustrate this. As a teen I found an interesting book by Frank Edwards on UFO’s. I read it and then several like it. So I became convinced there were UFO’s because what a person reads or experiences shapes what he thinks. Later, having graduated from Great Lakes Christian College, I was a conservative in every respect. But I had not yet studied the Biblical feminist arguments. A graduate from Emmanuel School of Religion presented the case and recommended some books which convinced me of that position even though I was a conservative in every other area. It was because of his influence and the books I first read on the topic that convinced me of that non-conservative position which was inconsistent with everything else I believed."

Link.

Be careful my friend.

Anonymous said...

I am being very careful. Thanks for the warning! :-) I think my comments only lead to intellectual agnosticism. In fact, I think I believe there is no other possible end intellectually (kind of like the perfect game of checkers will always end in a draw).

However, decisions about faith, in fact decisions about everything in life, are almost never only about the intellect. That's what I'm looking for in all these books I'm reading -- an acknowledgment that even after all our intellectual gerrymandering on both sides, our decision about whether or not a supreme supernatural being exists is swayed more by experience and emotion than any other factor. That's why you and I and Hitchens and Craig and Dawkins and D'Souza and Stenger, et al can all look at the same "evidence" and reach different conclusions.

Religion is ultimately about the will, not about the brain.

That's why we can all intelligently and coherently defend our positions and be accused by the others as being unintelligent and incoherent. Neither "side" (I hate that way of looking at it) has the upper hand based on evidence alone. If the evidence was that one-sided and convincing we would not be having this conversation.

Arguments about religion are the same as the arguments about politics in that sense. Who's right, the Republicans or Democrats, conservatives or liberals? Well, who gets to define "right" and who gets to determine what "evidence" is valid? Who's spin do you believe? It's about the will.

Anonymous said...

I think there is enough evidence to settle these religious disputes, but only if people demand hard evidence for what they believe, like I do. Believers implicitly acknowledge this when they argue against each by claiming the other faiths lack sufficient evidence.

choda boy said...

Hi John, this will apparently be my first post on your blog. I thought I had posted the other day but... not to be found.

I'll make a general comment about your challenge and follow that up with a question.

I follow the debates on frdb and I've noted that much of the discussion takes place largely from within the context of the NT, although there is significant debate re the role of the "church fathers" in shaping the texts we have. I see little discussion re comparative religious history from the centuries or even the millenia preceding the first century.

I think this has the effect of keeping the discussion too narrowly focused within an area that the christian is generally aware of and comfortable with, and one which is open to myriad interpretation. In my opinion, comparative religious study reveals that the christ figure is a necessary event in religious evolution. In essence, if he hadn't existed we would have had to invent him (and of course we did). Cultures have repeatedly made their divinities more accessible, and more relevant to their daily needs. Jesus is no exception.

My question is which, if any, of these 10 texts address the formation of christian doctrine as it relates to other religions?

As to your discussion with Dan re whether one can ever know, I would propose that one can know that there is no god. I would say that there exists no god but one that has been conceived within someone's mind. While these are beyond number, I have yet to see anyone provide a workable model of how their god exists and functions. The convenient response would seem to be that god is unknowable. I think I know why.

I hope to be able to contribute in some small manner.