A Christian Drive By

More and more Christians notice DC and then proceed to make a lot of comments on some of the posts here as if they had the answers to all of the questions posed. It's an interesting phenomena, really. Some of them move on thinking they shot "holes" through all of our arguments. Others get in our cross-fire and stay longer. We've got another one today named bfniii. Let's give him or her a big DC welcome. ;-)

We Must Require Hard Evidence to Believe

Christians, you do realize that there are many believers in different religious sects who are just as convinced of their faith as you are, don't you? You see, brainwashed people do not know that they are brainwashed. The ONLY way to know whether you're one of the brainwashed or not is to subject your own faith to the same level of skepticism that you use to evaluate the other faiths you reject. You must require hard evidence for that which you accept. Hard evidence convinces others. What else is there?

Dr. Hector Avalos on Darwin and Nazi Ideology

I just uploaded a two part essay of Hector's on this subject since he refers to it in chapter fourteen of The Christian Delusion. If you haven't read it yet check it out. BTW: TCD is being printed as we speak and will be available on time. A Kindle version at Amazon will follow, but I can't say when.

Death is the Final Enemy

I hate death. It's the final enemy. The older I get the more I think this way. I hope in the future people really can live to be 160 years old with their minds who can be productive in their final years. I hope someday that if we have an incurable disease we can be frozen and later revived and then healed so we can see the future. I hate the fact that I'll never see what human beings have done on this planet in 100 or 200 or 1,000 years. I hate the fact that I'll never see my Dad again. I hate it. My stepfather of about eighteen years has just been given two weeks to live. Maybe the doctors are wrong. But I'm here in Indiana. He and my Mom are in Nevada. I may never talk to him again. He's only responding with touch right now. He's 80 years old.


We are mere mortals. This life is all we have. It's mere delusion to think otherwise. But knowing the truth hurts. What would actually hurt more is to think there is a God who is punishing him with death because of what some curious bastards did in some Garden. What would actually hurt more is to think he'll end up in hell. Since he is a liberal Presbyterian some Christians think he will. I raise my middle finger to people like that and to their concept of God. And I raise it to death itself.

Here's How Christian Evangelist/Apologists Can Impress Me

Christians are claiming their faith is growing around the world, and it is in the Southern Hemisphere and Asia. Big deal. You want to really impress me? Then put a rubberband around my two books Why I Became an Atheist, and The Christian Delusion, and give them to prospects before they decide (or similar books). Also give them any two Christian apologetics books. Have them translated into their languages if needed. Then give these prospects a couple of weeks or more to decide. If they choose to believe THEN I'll be impressed. Until then I remain unimpressed.

AC Grayling: Religion Is In its 'Death Throes' / ABC Lateline

Check it out. Hat Tip: Atheist Media Blog

A Real Christian Apologetics Conference!

I've been asked to remind people that on March 13th I'm debating David Wood at the 2010 Virginia Regional Apologetics Conference. You'll notice that attending can cost you $49 and it's at a church. But the fee for people who just want to attend the debate is $10, should you be interested. In any case this is what an apologetics conference should look like to any Christians out there interested in putting one together. Have an "apologetics in action" debate in it.

David and I previously debated the problem of evil. I responded to Mary Jo Sharp's criticisms later.

Three Interesting Blog Entries

Three blog entries came to my attention this morning. Here is a pretty comprehensive entry on Why I Am an Atheist. Another one criticizes some trends among atheists, although you'll see I don't agree with everything Bud says. A third one concerns atheist morality. Enjoy.

A Question About My Book on the Beginning of the Universe

Dear Mr. Loftus,

I have just started your very informative book, “Why I am an Atheist.” I am trying to better understand your arguments. You said on page 83 that the big bang theory shows that “our universe began to exist.” Then, on page 85 you state, “Craig’s second premise is that the universe began to exist. It too has difficulties.” This seems to be a contradiction. Could you help me understand what you mean by these statements? Did our universe begin to exist or not? You seem to be saying that science proves the universe did begin to exist when refuting Thomas Aquinas, but that it did not begin to exist when refuting William Craig.

Glad to know people are reading my book and think it's informative and hopefully helpful. Thanks for your thoughtful question. I wrote the book over a decade. Some of the chapters began as handouts in classes which I later revised for the book and so you can see development in it. The chapter on prayer was originally written for a church study group. As my thinking changed I tried to harmonize everything with my later perspective, but was probably unsuccessful. The fact is that we cannot say time began. There was no cosmic singularity so we don't know what took place before. So while our universe began to exist we cannot say that it did not come from out of a previous black hole explosion or through tunneling from another universe. The point about the Kalam argument is that it does not show our universe had a beginning in time. To repeat. Our universe began to exist but we cannot say time began to exist with our universe. My argument against the Kalam is that it doesn't show time began to exist either.

Cheers.

A List of Former Team Members of Debunking Christianity

[Written by John W. Loftus]Someone recently asked me for a list of former Bloggers. I started DC in January of 2006, four years ago. Some Christians took notice and I was pummeled every single day by some of them, mostly by Calvinists, and in particular presuppositionalists. A Ph.D. student helped me argue with them, so I soon invited him on as a team member. His handle was exbeliever. Since this worked well I began inviting others as team members. Some of them didn’t work out too well, just wanting to post their deconversion story or promote their book and that was it. Others stayed for a few years. While I haven’t listed them all, team members here at one time included (in no particular order) Hector Avalos, Dan Barker, Farrell Till, Ed Babinski, Joe Holman, Jason Long, Valerie Tarico, Ken Pulliam (Former_Fundy) Marlene Winell, exapologist, Harlan Quinn, Harry McCall, DagoodS, Matthew Green, Spencer Lo, Kenneth Daniels, Bart Willruth, Darrin Rasberry, Dennis Diehl, Robert Bumbalough, Bill Curry, Craig Duckett, Paul Harrison, Glenn Kachmar, Troy Walker, Theresa, Glenn Dixon, Zac Taylor, Sharon Mooney, Scott Burgener, Anthony, Shygetz, Touchstone, Evan, WoundedEgo, Brother Crow, nsfl, and a few others who posted once or twice. A few of them already had their own Blogs while a few others moved on to Blog themselves. Others dropped out of Blogging for one reason or another. It became time consuming for me so I took it back in September of 2009. You can do a "Search This Blog" for their names to see what they wrote.

Former Baptist Pastor Became an Atheist

Which of Dinesh D'Souza's Arguments Won Him Our Debate?

Okay, we have beat to death the horse of who won our debate which can be seen here. And I already expressed what I learned from debating him, while Ken Pulliam offered some insightful observations on it. So here is the next question: Which arguments of D'Souza's do you think were so good that won him the debate? Forget for a moment that I didn't answer everything he regurgitated up. What did he say that was a good argument for his faith?

Dinesh D'Souza Comments On Our Debate

Link. The real debate takes place in our books. Read them. Go ahead. Do it.

Dr. Marlene Winell on Recovering From Religious Indoctrination

Dr. Valerie Tarico interviews Marlene in this 24 minute video below. When this blog was a team blog both of these scholars could be found here.

What I Learned From Debating Dinesh D'Souza

After looking at the debate myself I didn't do well. I did okay, but not well.

Mr. Deity and the Really Hard Time

Even though some of their episodes are not so good, this one is a keeper.

We Should Only Accept What Science Tells Us.

That's what I think. Since science tells us prayer doesn't work then it doesn't work. It tells us the universe is 13.7 billion years old. It tells us we evolved. It tells us there was no Israelite Exodus from Egypt. It tells us the Nativity stories in the Gospels could not be true. It tells us virgins do not have babies. It tells us that dead people do not bodily rise from the grave. Christians must denigrate science in order to believe. Science or Faith? Science has a track record. Faith flies planes into buildings. Science all the way, hands down. End of story.

The Video of My Debate With Dinesh D'Souza is Now Online

Click here to watch all 13 parts on YouTube. Cheers.

I'm Going to Be Taking a Much Needed Break

I've decided to take a break from Blogging. It may be for a day or a week or a month, I don't know. What I do know is that I spend too much time here and neglect to do other things, like earn some money. At the very least I'll not be posting as much. I have much more to say so it may be hard to stay away. In any case there is a lot to read in the archives. You should become a Follower or a Subscriber to this Blog if you don't want to miss anything. Keep in mind I'm still available for speaking engagements. An interview of me is going to appear on YouTube on the 26th. And in March I'll be debating the existence of God as announced here. Set the odds on when I'll post again if you want to! ;-) If you're a first time visitor check out the two important books of mine in the sidebar. Cheers.

The Audio of My Debate with Dinesh D'Souza is Now Online

Here is the link. As you listen this is what to look for. Enjoy. Here is my opening statement.

The Trouble With Natural Theology

[Written by John W. Loftus] I love the way Dr. Jaco Gericke describes the reformed philosophy of Alvin Plantinga as fundamentalism on stilts. The stilts metaphor pictures Plantinga as rising above the mire of Biblical criticism without actually dealing with the basis of his faith.

William Lane Craig repeatedly says he does not intend on debating the reliability of the Bible. Of course not, because he can't. Recently he turned down a debate against Jaco Gericke on whether Yahweh of the Old Testament exists. Yep, that's right. He said it wasn't his specialty. But wait just a minute. He's going around debating whether or not God exists, right? Then that means he believes Yahweh exists. So why can't he defend the existence of his God? It's because he can't do it. It would require him to get down off his stilts and wallow in the mire of biblical criticism which completely undermines his faith.

Which brings me to Bill Craig's specialty, Natural Theology.

Temples, Temples They All Had Temples

The oldest temple in the world was just discovered in Turkey. Every civilization in the ancient world had some kind of a temple to some different kind of deity. It was the natural evolutionary process where humans came to wonder about why they existed and how to please the god or gods that put them here on earth. It's pure human imagination, all of them, from Egyptian to Mesopotamian to Canaanite to Israelite to Japaneses to Chinese to Mayan to Incan cultures and many others around the world.

The Historic Argument Against Organized Religion

I was raised a Catholic but it surely looks to an outsider like me that it is not a divine institution at all. The failings of the church down through history and now with recent sex scandals are strong indicators of this. And if this is so why should I believe ANYTHING that it teaches as divine truth? Why should I even accept the canon it chose? If any other institution did the horrendous wrongs as the Catholic church has done then Catholics would join me in condemning it. William Lobdell's book, Losing My Religion: How I Lost My Faith Reporting on Religion in America-and Found Unexpected Peace is a page turner. You see, it's not just the harm that some priests did to children. It's the massive cover-up that is so horrendous. The Catholic church even knowingly sent molesters to parishes in Alaska where nearly every boy was molested. That is, the church facilitated these molesters.

Morality Without God, by The Thinking Atheist

This video highlights the problems for any kind of credible Natural Theology:

Steven Pinker: A Brief History of Violence

There is actually less violence in modern society and Pinker tells us why.