Singer hit on three of the problems I hammer on: the problem of evil (with a highlight on non-human animal suffering); on the failed prophecy of the coming eschaton (following Bart Ehrman); and on the barbaric and superstitious nature of the God of the Bible.
It's encouraging to see the argument from Jesus as failed apocalyptic prophet used more frequently. I hope it becomes a standard argument in such debates.
Why would anyone waste his time after this D'Souza guy used the "Einstein argument" (Einstein believed in God so we are entitled to believe in God, too) against Christopher Hitchins. You don't have to read more than 3 quotes of Einstein on religion to see that he doesn't believed in a personal God. And yet, a "professor", a "truth seeker", a christian apologist is trying to use Eistein to make his delusion look acceptable.
D'Souza is a great excuse for everybody to disbelieve christianity. Imagine on Judgement Day God asking: "Why didn't you believed in me?" "Well, people like D'Souza were those trying to convince me of your existence" "I see your point. My bad!" :)
I have to say that I have a very hard time listening to Dinesh. He argues in a way where he builds his final arguments on extensive lists of debatable, half-truth, uninformed and sometimes just wrong assertions. Then he adds an air of cockiness to his answers. All this makes it very hard for anyone to debate him and it makes it hard for me to listen to him.
Hear hear! His assumption is that what we think of as morality—protection of the innocent, the belief in the specialness of living beings—is fundamentally Christian morality. This is what always bugs me.
The corollary to D'Souza's assumption is the assumption that non-Christian peoples do not adhere to the same morality.
But that's silly.
(Moreover, Christians through history haven't put this morality into practice much anyway.)
This is one of the worst debates I've even seen for Dinesh. Not that I am fond of his arguments, but I found the first 15 minutes of arguments shameful and dishonest.
Disesh D'Souza is the male equivalent of Ann Coulter. (And interestingly, those 2 used to date!) I hope you're not going to waste time debating him, John.
In his credit though, he was able to win his debate against Daniel Dennett. I get the feeling Dennett doesn't take philosophy of religion enough seriously; he can't deal with theistic arguments properly.
13 comments:
Singer hit on three of the problems I hammer on: the problem of evil (with a highlight on non-human animal suffering); on the failed prophecy of the coming eschaton (following Bart Ehrman); and on the barbaric and superstitious nature of the God of the Bible.
Singer is good!
The two of them will be debating again this evening here at Princeton. I'll be taking notes and post my response on the CADRE blog.
Dinesh has told me that he would be interested in debating me, but someone must set it up for us.
I'm game!
It's encouraging to see the argument from Jesus as failed apocalyptic prophet used more frequently. I hope it becomes a standard argument in such debates.
They are debating again tonight on Princeton University's campus (where I am a student). It should be pretty exciting.
Dinesh D'Souza -- The sniveling, ferret-face, Frank Burns of christianity.
--S.
Dinesh actually opened with ad-hominem attacks??? How low can you sink?
Did he ever stop using ad hominems and actually debate the existence of a god? I gave up watching halfway through.
Why would anyone waste his time after this D'Souza guy used the "Einstein argument" (Einstein believed in God so we are entitled to believe in God, too) against Christopher Hitchins.
You don't have to read more than 3 quotes of Einstein on religion to see that he doesn't believed in a personal God. And yet, a "professor", a "truth seeker", a christian apologist is trying to use Eistein to make his delusion look acceptable.
D'Souza is a great excuse for everybody to disbelieve christianity. Imagine on Judgement Day God asking:
"Why didn't you believed in me?"
"Well, people like D'Souza were those trying to convince me of your existence"
"I see your point. My bad!" :)
I have to say that I have a very hard time listening to Dinesh. He argues in a way where he builds his final arguments on extensive lists of debatable, half-truth, uninformed and sometimes just wrong assertions. Then he adds an air of cockiness to his answers. All this makes it very hard for anyone to debate him and it makes it hard for me to listen to him.
--Tim
Hear hear! His assumption is that what we think of as morality—protection of the innocent, the belief in the specialness of living beings—is fundamentally Christian morality. This is what always bugs me.
The corollary to D'Souza's assumption is the assumption that non-Christian peoples do not adhere to the same morality.
But that's silly.
(Moreover, Christians through history haven't put this morality into practice much anyway.)
This is one of the worst debates I've even seen for Dinesh. Not that I am fond of his arguments, but I found the first 15 minutes of arguments shameful and dishonest.
Disesh D'Souza is the male equivalent of Ann Coulter. (And interestingly, those 2 used to date!) I hope you're not going to waste time debating him, John.
In his credit though, he was able to win his debate against Daniel Dennett. I get the feeling Dennett doesn't take philosophy of religion enough seriously; he can't deal with theistic arguments properly.
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