CNN: What Happened to God in America?

Christianity and the Virtue of Unreason

"I can't believe that!" said Alice.
"Can't you?" the Queen said in a pitying tone. "Try again: draw a long breath, and shut your eyes."
Alice laughed. "There's not use trying," she said: "one can't believe impossible things."
"I daresay you haven't had much practice," said the Queen. "When I was your age, I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast." -Alice in Wonderland

Pete Edwards of Durham University On The Scale of the Universe

Edwards says we cannot get our heads around how big the universe is. Matthew Cobb at Why Evolution is True corrects his numbers, which are out of date:

Here’s how astronomers breakout the visible universe within 14 billion light years:
Superclusters in the visible universe = 10 million
Galaxy groups in the visible universe = 25 billion
Large galaxies in the visible universe = 350 billion
Dwarf galaxies in the visible universe = 7 trillion
Stars in the visible universe = 30 billion trillion (3×10²²)

A new study suggests that 90% of the most distant (and therefore oldest) galaxies in the universe could be unseen, hidden by clouds of dust. That would mean that – assuming the same number of stars in each galaxy, and that older galaxies don’t deviate from this rule – that the number of stars in the visible universe would be 270 billion trillion or 2.7 x 10 to the power of 24).

With this as a backdrop I want to discuss Jeff Lowder's criticisms of my argument that the size of the universe leads to atheism. I have looked in vain to see if Lowder has any educational credentials at all, so I look forward to him sharing them with us if he responds.

Robert Ingersoll On Life, Death, Hope, Afterlife

The Great Infidel, as he was known everywhere in the last half of the 19th century, was often called upon to speak at funerals – no better occasion to reflect on the greatest mysteries of life. And no one could do it better. He said no one knew or could know whether there was a life after death; but he was absolutely certain that if there were, the notion of eternal punishment for anyone was an ghastly priest-made libel upon a “loving and merciful” God. In some of these tributes he shows signs of hope for an afterlife -- the source being a longing to one day be reunited with those we have loved and who have loved us. -- Compiled by Julian W. Haydon.

William Lane Craig’s Views on Animal Suffering Debunked Further

The first video response to him can be found here.

"I Can't Believe You're an Atheist"

In October a good Hispanic friend of mine named Juana learned I was an atheist. She is the captain of our pool league team in Ft. Wayne. I told her I couldn't play the following week because I was going on a speaking tour of four Colorado Universities. She asked why, so I told her I was speaking about my books. She asked about them and learned for the first time I was an atheist. Then she said, "I can't believe you're an atheist." She went on and on about it as if this was an extremely bad thing. She went to a few other people and asked them if they believed in God, almost as if to determine by majority vote whether God existed or not. I don't think she ever met someone she liked so much who was an atheist. You see, we have known each other for over six years and the subject never came up. I do not force my views on people I personally know and I do not get in anyone's face about what I think. I'm not afraid in the least to tell people I'm an atheist if the subject arises. But when it doesn't then there is nothing to say.

"Hey Girls, We're Talking About Religion"

Today I'm going to hang out with my brother-in-law Kim (his name), who is a right-wing Obama-hater and Rush Limbaugh fan. Our wives are getting together for a girl's day out. Usually when Kim and I are together the girls forbid us from talking religion or politics. But whenever we're out by ourselves we do, and we have a great time of it. Over a beer or two we'll shout out, "Hey girls, we're talking about religion and loving it." It's sort of a passive aggressive rebellion I suppose. But he's a great guy even though we disagree quite vehemently. And he likes getting together with me just as much as I like being with him. Almost all of my personal friends are Christians, just in case anyone wants to know. Online people paint me with broad strokes as if I don't care about Christians. If I didn't care about them then I wouldn't have any personal friends at all.

Ahhhh, the Mind of the Believer

I'm tired of getting hit with, "Hey, that doesn't describe me." Okay, I get it. Nonetheless, I have a good Seventh Day Adventist friend whose vehicle wouldn't start. So yesterday we tried to get it running. I'm not much of a mechanic but we did figure out it was his fuel pump located in the gas tank. He's a painter so he decided to finish a job over the weekend in order to get the needed money to fix it. I deviously suggested his vehicle broke down because God was punishing him in advance for working on Saturday (which is forbidden by his sect). The funny thing is that he seriously considered this. I had a good laugh with him about it. Maybe so, I said, who knows? ;-)

Five Ways To Know If You've Granted Too Much And Aren't A Threat

We all grant for the sake of argument a few things from time to time. The reason we do so is to reach across the great divide between Christians and ourselves. But we should not grant too much, depending on the argument. How do we know if we have? I have a five-fold answer.

Seek And Ye Shall Find

I started to write something and realized I had already done so. There are over 4000 posts in the archives with a really good search engine in the sidebar. Try it. Do a search for "The Accommodation Theory of the Bible." See, that was easy. Now do another one for "The New Evangelical Orthodoxy." Do other searches. Repeat. Rinse. Repeat again.

Robert Ingersoll On the Outsider Test for Faith

Before I argued for it Ingersoll did.

5 Obviously False References in the Bible

As the ages march on, it is a delight to find fewer attending churches and more making time to sit around doing other, more enjoyable things come Sunday. But even while classes full of growing students are satiated in going to their professors for answers instead of their priests, the age-old debate on the existence of God / validity of [insert religion here] somehow still rages on. The question should by now be settled, but those states where the collective IQ hasn’t exceeded 57 still have people who are clinging tightly to mom and dad’s hard-shell faith to define us.

However, it is a breath of fresh air to know that the seeds of doubt are first planted, not by scholarship or by secular parenting, but by common sense questions and healthy brains at work. Below are 5 biblical mentions that are in that camp known as “It don’t take no gosh-darn edjamucations to see this ain’t right.” Some things in God’s holy book are wrong simply because they defy any real level of sense. We begin the countdown with...

There Isn't a Bad Reason to Reject the Christian Faith, Part 4

Previously I argued there isn't a bad personal reason to reject the Christian faith. Christian apologist Dr. Vincent Torley understood my argument fairly well so I'll use what he wrote to describe it (edited for brevity without the digressions). Then I'll comment on it.

For With God All Things Are Possible (Mark 10: 27)

MEA MAXIMA CULPA: SILENCE IN THE HOUSE OF GOD
Oscar winning filmmaker Alex Gibney examines the abuse of power in the Catholic Church through the story of four courageous deaf men, who in the first known case of public protest, set out to expose the priest who abused them. Through their case the film follows a cover-up that winds its way from the row houses of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, through the bare ruined choirs of Ireland's churches, all the way to the highest office of the Vatican.

Dr. Rauser Asks: Should Christians Help Atheists Make Better Arguments?

He asks us to consider two scholars, Chris the Christian philosopher and Alan the atheist philosopher.

Alan writes a new paper in which he argues that God does not exist based on the problem of evil. He sends a draft to his friend Chris and asks Chris for feedback. Chris reads through the paper and identifies a serious problem. Chris writes a critique in which he identifies the problem and identifies a way to make the argument much stronger. As a result Chris has a reasonable ground to believe that many people may read the revised paper and come to the conviction that God doesn’t exist based in part on the alterations suggested by Chris. However, Chris still believes God does exist and that anybody who concludes that God doesn’t exist will have adopted a false belief about a very important issue. And so Chris must accept that based on arguments he has fine-tuned many people will adopt false beliefs about a very important issue. Has Chris done anything wrong by offering that critique to Alan?

He concludes by saying:

Upstate South Carolina School District Fights to Keep Prayers in Meetings

As Al Roker on NBC’s Today Show says: Here’s what's happening in my neck of the woods. (Pickens is 14 miles from my house.) Wait for video to load.

Hundreds showed up at the Pickens County school board meeting Monday night begging the board to keep its routine invocation despite a Wisconsin-based organization asking them to refrain from prayer.

There Isn't a Bad Reason to Reject the Christian Faith, Part 3

To see what I've been arguing recently read Part 1, and if so desired read Part 2. Now for Part 3 where I'll attempt to deal with another objection, this time coming from Matt DeStefano, an atheist who is a philosophy student in a master's level program. I remember those days myself a long long time ago in a far away galaxy. I hope you're enjoying this period in your life Matt, because you will probably look back on it as the best time in your life, as I do. DeStefano presents a scenario that is supposed to be the exception to my blanket claim that there isn't a bad personal reason to reject Christianity. If an exception can be found then my blanket claim is false. So let me say first of all that if DeStefano's counter-example works then it doesn't undercut anything else I said, only that there is an exception or two or three. I can live with this if so. Nonetheless, I don't think his scenario works.

I’m Not a Christian or Theist, But You’re Wrong about the Bible!

As I continue to gather more facts for my forth coming post on the Canonization of the Bible, I became aware that this post on the Bible (like many of my others) will draw negative critics from supposed friendly fire.

There Isn't a Bad Reason to Reject the Christian Faith, Part 2

Previously I argued there isn't a bad personal reason to reject the Christian faith. This argument is aimed at Christians who believe in the following Doctrinal Statement (DS): An omniscient, omnibenelovent, omnipotent God exists who sent Jesus to atone for the sins of all who believe in him and desires that everyone should be saved with no one lost (See 1 Timothy 2:4; 2 Peter 3:9). Other believers need not apply. Other beliefs that people have are not specifically relevant to my argument except as they illustrate how bad human beings generally reason about things. In the next few posts I'm going to answer some criticisms of what I had written. Be sure to read my original post to understand what follows.

I've found that the more well-known an atheist becomes then the more often atheists criticize him or her for this, that, or the other. I don't like it but it comes with the territory. It's a sign of some kind of success, believe it or not. Atheists disagree with each other quite a bit anyway, but in my case I have put out thousands of words over the last seven years, so atheists who want to nitpick at this, that, or the other, can find plenty of nits to pick, especially since I like being a provocateur from time to time. One atheist critic of my argument is Jeff Lowder, who has recently been dogging my steps for reasons that totally baffle me.

Christianity Today's Condescending Review of Ingersoll

Anyone who has written a book critical of Christianity sees exactly what Timothy Larsen is doing in reviewing Susan Jacoby's new book, The Great Agnostic: Robert Ingersoll and American Freethought. It's what most Christians do when reviewing such a book. They claim the infidel is ignorant or a second class intellectual. As many of you know, Julian Haydon has been sending me essays by Ingersoll over the last few months in order to keep his memory alive. Julian responds to Larsen as follows:

My Interview For An Article On "The Christian Post"

I was asked a few questions for an article by Diana Bridgett on the rise of atheist churches. You can read the result here. Below are the questions and my full answers. I just don't want to waste 'em.

There Isn't a Bad Reason to Reject the Christian Faith, Part 1

I have been thinking about Christianity for over forty years. I believed it. I preached it. I earned several master's degrees in it. I taught it. I learned to reject it. Then for over seven years on a daily basis I have sought to argue against it. I have written, co-written and/or edited five published books in five years containing the results of everything I have learned, which should lead thinking people to reject it. But I have to confess here and now, up front and center, that there isn't a bad reason to reject the Christian faith. I don't expect people to agree. It's a conclusion I have come to from everything I have learned. Again, there isn't a bad reason to reject the Christian faith. Since there might be one I'll leave it up to someone to suggest it. Otherwise, my claim stands.

So let me merely introduce what appears to be an overly simplistic claim and see what happens from here. As I said, I'm only introducing this line of thought. Christian people have said of me that, "Of the many atheist and theist blogs that I follow I would have to say that you are the best at consistently coming up with interesting topics and arguments even though I disagree with almost everything you say." Okay then, here goes. I want to defend the claim of the title to this post. Let's see if I can by taking an absurdly ignorant argument against Christianity and show why it's still a good reason for rejecting the Christian faith.

Lawrence Krauss on Science vs Religion

In a recent debate with a Muslim apologist, Lawrence Krauss lays out the differences between the scientific and religious mindset.

The full debate is excellent and can be found here.

Interview with Baba Brinkman (evolutionary rapper extraordinaire)!

Recently, (on SIN) I ran a couple of posts sharing some of the utterly awesome work of Canadian science rapper Baba Brinkman. He is a fascinating guy who has kindly agreed to an interview which I am sharing with you here. Before I get down to the interview, let me share with / remind you of his truly great work:

Mindlessly Quote-Mining the Bible is Not Thinking