Two Questions From the Grave, by Antony Flew and Carl Sagan

Read and respond to two similar stories, one by Antony Flew, and the other by Carl Sagan. They both have to do with the OTF:

More Hand Waving From Matthew Flannagan on the OTF

[Written by John W. Loftus] Dr. (they hand out PhD's to anyone these days) Matthew Flannagan said: "As to the OTF you'll see I have pointed out that argument is incoherent." Really? No, Really? That's a very large claim of his, akin to the claim to have refuted it. I don't think in these debates of ours I would ever claim to have refuted an argument. Remember, the larger the claim is then the harder it is to defend. Does he know this? A refutation of an argument is a very difficult thing to produce. My response:

Underhanded Biblical Interpretation: Deuteronomy 25:11-12 in Context

How Dr. Copan Explains Away Biblical Violence

Debunking Christianity Ranks Third Place Among the SBL's Bibliobloggers

Yep, not bad for an atheist site. Link. They don't like us there so they started a new ranking system where only registered Bibliobloggers can vote on the top blogs, and guess what, we're never on that list. ;-) I even suspect that the present urge to revamp the SBL ranking system is to somehow try to exclude DC, or reduce our ranking. Link. Christians and their double standards, Sheesh.

Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence

This is known as the ECREE principle mentioned by Carl Sagan and others. I think it's expressed better as "extraordinary claims require an extraordinary amount of evidence," or better yet, "extraordinary claims require an extraordinary amount of ordinary evidence," or even better yet, "extraordinary claims require an extraordinary amount of ordinary evidence, especially when we should expect that evidence to be there," but the point is the same. It's no surprise that Victor Reppert objects to it in these words:

Victor Reppert Now Claims He's a "Graduate of the OTF"

Reppert has been thinking and responding to the OTF longer than any other informed believer I know of, so if you are a believer and you object to the OTF then learn from him. When first confronted with the OTF Reppert criticized it as embracing too radical of a skepticism. Then over the years as I explained it to him further he now says he's a graduate of the OTF and wants a diploma. Cute. As far as I can tell most believers criticize the OTF when they first hear of it. Then they go through the same stages Reppert has gone though, by subsequently embracing it in the face of my arguments, basically wanting their diplomas too. Should I start printing them off and signing them just because they say so? First, here is what Reppert recently admitted:

What Is Faith?

Faith is pure wishful thinking, nothing more and nothing less. It offers a person a leap beyond what the probabilities actually lead us to think. For if something can be known to be the case we wouldn't need faith. Faith therefore is not a virtue when it comes to knowing the truth about anything. Skepticism is.

Vic Reppert's "Argument From Reason" is Against a Strawman

Yep, he does not deal with what scientifically minded skeptics actually think.

An Open Question to Victor Reppert About the OTF

I just cannot seem to disabuse him of his inconsistent position. He said:

What is the Outsider’s Perspective?

Almost all of the objections to the Outsider Test for Faith (OTF) are red herrings placed in the road to sidetrack us from getting at the truth. They do not understand the perspective of an outsider, or they grossly misrepresent it in favor of faith. Since I like beating my head against the wall, let me try again.

Flannagan Versus Westbrook: Understanding the Problem

Why Dr. Flannagan is still Wrong

The End of Christianity is Here!

Amazon is now shipping my anthology The End of Christianity. I hope the effort was worth it. Let me know as you get your copy. It'll surely be hotly contested on Amazon and elsewhere. The reaction should prove to be intense. Stay tuned.

The Science of Why We Don't Believe Science, by Chris Mooney

Head-on attempts to persuade can sometimes trigger a backfire effect, where people not only fail to change their minds when confronted with the facts—they may hold their wrong views more tenaciously than ever. Link.

Dr. Flannagan Denigrates Science, Why Am I Not Surprised?

[Written by John W. Loftus] This is getting ridiculous and predictable. So let me get this straight, okay? In order to believe, Flannagan must denigrate science. Get it.? What utter rubbish. This alone should cause believers to question why they believe what they do based on their upbringing in a Christian culture. Science is the only antidote to how easily we can believe and defend what we were taught on our Mama's knees.

Why Dr. Flannagan Fails History, Dr. Hector Avalos Responds

Dr. Flannagan's use of sources shows some careless scholarship.

Dr. Matt Flannagan, of the MandM blog, has directed a few criticism at my chapters (“Yahweh is A Moral Monster” and “Atheism was not the Cause of the Holocaust”) in The Christian Delusion. Those criticisms rest not only on a basic misunderstanding and misreading of my arguments, but also on a very selective and uncritical reading of the sources Flannagan cites for support.

Believers Really Ought Not to Argue Against the OTF

Because by doing so only makes my arguments stronger, and they were already strong enough. One continuing objection is to turn the OTF against non-believers, that we ought to subject our non-beliefs to the skepticism of an outsider. I've addressed this ad nausea. But let's see with a thought experiment why this does not work. Let's say there are no non-believers at all, none. Everyone on earth believes in a religion of some kind. Let's say no skeptic ever proposed the OTF either. Christian, how would YOU propose to assess religions fairly without any double standards? This is how you do it now. Surely at least one believer would come up with the thought that since he already uses the OTF in examining other religions then why not use it to examine his own faith? This reveals that if there is any inconsistency at all in the OTF it is how believers themselves assess truth claims. As I've said, it should only take a moment’s thought to realize that if there is a God who wants people born into different religious cultures to believe, who are outsiders, then that religious faith SHOULD pass the OTF.

What Jesus Christ Had to Say About the Outsider Test for Faith!

This is my chosen title for a guest sermon I'll be preaching for the "One True Church of Jesus Christ That Has Ever Existed in History." The preacher is away on vacation. This church meets in a little building on "Faith" Street in a town called Saint Paul, Missouri, the "Show Me" state (never-mind the oxymoron). They have a membership of 10 people, all related to each other in some way. Here are my chosen texts. How should I develop my sermon?

Quote of the Day, by Articulett

I agree wholeheartedly with his assessment of the OTF:

Debating Critics On The Outsider Test for Faith (OTF)

[Written by John W. Loftus] I have had several debates in defense of the OTF. This post will serve as the key resource for these links.

First look at The Outsider Test for Faith, along with a link embedded within that post.

In no particular order here are several debates I've had about the OTF with several people:

Chris Gadsden who obfuscates on The OTF

Cameron Bertuzzi of "Capturing Christianity" .

EricRC, a Ph.D. student in philosophy, On the Fundamental Objection to the OTF.

Dr. Matthew Flannagan.

Dr. Randal Rauser.

Dr. Steve Lovell.

Dr. Thomas Talbott.

Dr. Victor Reppert.

David Marshall.

Thrasymachus.

Rev. Phillip Brown.

Steve Hays and Jason Engwer.

Paul Manata.

Is it over yet?

The Ledge, a Pro-Atheist Movie to be Released July 8th

Here's a clip with the standard Christian responses to reasoned arguments:

Dr. Flannagan Just Does Not Get it, The OTF Again and Again and Again...

[Written by John W. Loftus] Christian philosopher Matthew Flannagan wrote a review of The Christian Delusion for Philosophia Christi, the journal of the Evangelical Philosophical Society. He offers nothing but canards against the OTF. Was he not paying attention?

On Rejecting the Gospel Because of Sin

That's the Christian claim, that non-Christians reject the gospel because we prefer to sin (or do wrong). Let's try to put this canard to rest.

For the Love of God: Or Hell as a Tool for Secular Morality

Written by TGBaker:

I developed this ditty from a Facebook spat with a friend of mine who is a Christian Philosopher, Dr. James F. Sennett. I had never really thought about this area before. But I think it produces another problem with the omni-attributes of a proposed god.

Good without gods

This video is from QualiaSoup:

"The End of Christianity," My Biggest Problem, and My Promise to You

I have received some copies of The End of Christianity already. Prometheus Books is in the process of distributing them. It has the look and feel of The Christian Delusion, my previous book. From the planning stage to the final production TEC took a year and nine months of hard work. It is much easier to grab already published material and place it in a book than in getting new essays from scholars. The chapters in both books are new essays. They both took a lot of work.

And they are both great books, as the recommendations tell us coming from both Christians and skeptics who agree. There are several chapters worth the price of the books themselves. Which ones might only depend on your own particular interests. Even though I read and re-read them several times, editing and going back and forth with the authors, Richard Carrier, the copy-editor and production staff, I am reading it again in hard copy format wondering if the decisions made were good ones, and trying to locate any typos we may have missed. I just re-read Jaco Gericke's chapter titled: "Can God Exist if Yahweh Doesn't?" That chapter alone is worth the price of the book. It's awesome. I can only guess how Christians will try to gerrymander around it, since he closed all the loopholes they might want to use in escaping his conclusion, that God doesn't exist because Christians no longer believe in Yahweh, a tribal god among others in the Israelite religion.