"Jesus Christ Superchimp?" by Robert Price and Edwin Suominen

Most readers of Debunking Christianity have been deep enough into Christian theology at one point or another to appreciate a nuance to the evolution vs. Christianity conflict that is significant but little discussed: How could the half-human, half-divine nature of Jesus possibly be rationalized scientifically? As this excerpt from Robert and Edwin's book Evolving out of Edenmakes clear, the whole idea of a virgin birth is utterly foreign to modern science, based on ancient, paternalistic ideas about fertilization. The book goes on to explain what a theological mess believers are left with, even if they can make that impossible leap of faith: Jesus would’ve had all the supposedly sinful natural inclinations that Christianity gives humans so much grief about—lust, anger, etc.—because he carried Mary’s human DNA and a supposedly divine portion that would have needed to be defective by design in order to match up with it.

There was no Jesus, there is no God – Why I wrote the book

There are many excellent atheistic books available today. We have mega-selling books on the social issues, such as whether religion is good or bad for society (The God Delusion, The End of Faith). We have inspiring books by prominent atheists who have liberated themselves from religion (Godless, Why I Became an Atheist). We have books on specific issues, such as the traditional claims that are often at odds with science (A Universe from Nothing, The Fallacy of Fine-Tuning, Why Evolution Is True). There are books that expose some of the more horrifying aspects of the Bible (The Skeptic's Annotated Bible), there are books that question the truth of the Biblical sources (Forged), there are books that raise questions on methodology (The End of Biblical Studies), and there are books advocating a religious-but-not-religious way of life (The Good Book, Religion for Atheists). There are even books on the seemingly irrelevant issue of Jesus’ possible ahistoricity (Proving History, The Christ-Myth Theory And Its Problems, The Christ Conspiracy). So why would I, a scholar, throw one more into the mix, when traditionally, academics keep to themselves?

My "New Books in Secularism" Interview

Looks like I've joined a great cast of growing interviews here. I haven't listened to it yet. I'm interviewed about my new book, "The Outsider Test for Faith." Check it out. Now I'm off to a bicycle beer run. Seriously!

5 Best Books To De-Convert A Christian

Whenever you see posts titled like this one always consider the source and the intended target audience. How widely read is the person recommending these books? Is he or she a former believer? Which type of Christianity do the recommended books target? On what level of scholarship do the books deal with? Are the recommended books philosophically oriented, biblically oriented or scientifically oriented, or general ones? Take for instance the recommendation to read the Bible itself. A fundamentalist won't deconvert upon reading it. A Catholic like Julia Sweeney did. Remember, Isaac Asimov's famous quote is this: "Properly read, the Bible is the most potent force for atheism ever conceived." The question is which books help which readers properly understand the Bible? That's my focus, my specialty. My target audience are educated evangelicals in the pews and colleges. So with that let me whittle down my list of recommended books to just five (excluding my own):

Raphael Lataster's New Book on Jesus Mythicism

Raphael Lataster is bright young scholar from Australia.  In 2012, he submitted a Master's Thesis on Jesus Mythicism that was approved by the University of Sydney. As such, he may be among the first to have a thesis sympathetic to Jesus Mythicism approved by a world-class university.  Now, Lataster has used that thesis as the basis of a new book, There Was No Jesus, There is No God, to be available shortly on Amazon (Kindle version already available).

Although I am not a  Jesus mythicist, I do think that Lataster makes a good case that one cannot simply dismiss all versions or all aspects of Jesus mythicism. His work addresses the work of Bart Ehrman and W. L. Craig, among many others.  See Book Description. Here is also another link that may be more useful: Alternative link.

Questions In Genesis: Ken Ham’s Creationist Shtick

I have a confession to make. Over a decade ago, I took my family to a Ken Ham creationism event. My kids were taught that dinosaurs and humans coexisted, a few thousand years ago, and they also learned a magic phrase – one guaranteed to stop evolutionists in their tracks. More on that later.

In a presentation for the adults, Ken talked about how evolution attacks the very foundation of Christianity – the book of Genesis. After all, if Genesis is not literally true, then there was no Adam and Eve, no Fall of mankind through eating a forbidden fruit. No Original Sin. No need for a savior. This is something which I actually agree with Ken on.

My Further Response to Ken Ham of Answers in Genesis

As my readers know, I recently visited Ken Ham's Creation Museum in Kentucky and wrote about it here. Ken Ham responded with a post of his own, to which I responded, and I'm sticking to my story despite his claims otherwise. Now I want to dispel a couple of other things he said. He wrote:

I recently posted a Facebook comment about this man (me), with the title, “Atheist debunking—or an advertisement for the Creation Museum?” Like most atheists who write negatively about their museum experience, he simply described some of the exhibits and, with lots of hand-waving, just said we were wrong. His lengthy piece really offered no real rebuttals of the scientific displays. He mocked the exhibits more than anything.

First off, I went to Ken Ham's Facebook page and posted a link to my first response. Guess what? It was deleted within a couple of hours. Looks like he won't stand for a free debate and/or discussion. So much for him having the evidence on his side such that he can allow it to win in the marketplace of ideas. He can do what he wants there, of course. But that should be the first clue he is not being intellectually honest. Secondly, I want to show why his views are ignorant and delusional, not just tell what I saw at the museum. So here goes.

Prayer Failed for Jesus!

We can keep this simple. According to the Gospel of John, Jesus was God incarnate. In John 17, Jesus prayed that his current and future followers would have the kind of unity that he and his heavenly father enjoyed. He requested this so that the world would have a basis to believe that God had sent him.

“I do not ask on behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word; that they may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may believe that You sent Me.” John 17:20-21 (NASB)

That was the prayer.  What kind of results did the self-proclaimed Son of God get?

An Open Letter to the Secular Community

On April 2, 2013, Hemant Mehta published the following letter to the secular community. Let's all compare how we're doing after six months. If you've read my blog posts then you know that two of my biggest beefs are with divisive people within the secular community and atheists who embarrass the rest of us. That does not make me a divisive person or an embarrassment. I'm responding to them. I can only tolerate the tolerable and this isn't tolerable to me. I think I can tolerate a great deal more than most others though. I know there are reasonable people who disagree with me, who are not ignorant or irrational, simply because I have read widely and experienced a great deal in my life. So I support the following statement as well, with the caveat that I don't want the frustration and headache of moderating every comment. Shall we try again?

A Brilliant Discussion Flowchart!

A model for all future discussions. ;-)

Is PZ Myers a Demagogue an Opportunist or a Principled Man?

[Michael Shermer responds. Edited further on 8/25/13] What do you do when someone pulls the pin and hands you a grenade? I'm dyin’ here, people. It’s like people trust me or something. So I've decided to say what I think. There is a great deal of infighting going on between atheists and has been for some time. I could provide a fairly long list of issues that have divided us along with a number of people who have been trashed on both sides. There is one common denominator to this divisiveness, PZ Myers. I'm not saying he is the cause of it all. He's not. He has, however, conferred a measure of authority and power to other atheist bloggers by giving them a large audience, who would never have gained such an audience on their own. Many of them are divisive too, following in his steps. As far as I can tell, you either love PZ Myers or you hate him. There doesn't seem to be any middle ground among most atheists who are aware of him. PZ Myers is a polarizing figure, hands down, no ifs ands or buts about it. He is divisive whether people think he's usually right or usually wrong. When PZ Myers declared he was leaving the skeptic movement in May of this year, professor Massimo Pigliucci even rhetorically asked, "should we care?" Now this is some real divisiveness, apparently cutting ties with the large and influential James Randi Educational Foundation and like-minded skeptics around the world. Who does he think he is? So I got to wondering about the characteristics of a polarizing person and did some searching online. This is what I found:

A Christian Man Is Dead for ¾ of an Hour Having Never Seen God, Jesus or Heaven

"A 37-year-old diesel mechanic, Yahle said he had no awareness of what happened until family members told him. He said he did not have any afterlife experience that he can recall."

“I have no memory of anything. I went to bed … woke up five days later in the hospital.”

'The Bible Belt Is Collapsing;' Christians Have Lost Culture War, Says ERLC President Russell Moore

LINK. What took them so long to admit this? I wonder why this is the case? Could it be that their arguments were lame and based on an ancient superstitious pre-modern book? ;-)

This is a must read. Look at the spin he puts on it. No matter what happens Christians always think it's good because they blindly believe God is in control. Spin doctors them all, and pathetic!

One Reason and One Reason Only to Reject Christianity

When placed even within its own Biblical context and especially in the Post-Modern World; Christianity Just Doesn't Make Sense!

Here's a Pretty Cool Recommendation of My Work!

From the concluding chapter of Russell Blackford and Udo Shuklenk's excellent book, 50 Great Myths About Atheism:

Rhetorical Bullshit: The John Loftus Trinity Argument

My Favorite Book, by Hume's Apprentice at SIN

Which one? The book is On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection by Charles Darwin. He offers a nice summary of it and then replies to a few difficulties.

Quote of the Day, by Sam_Millipede

It's always amusing to read these synopses and critiques of the problems of fitting inconvenient aspects of reality with the nature of an omniscient, omnipotent and benevolent god. I find my patience wears thin after a short read and I want to scream at the authors, "can't you see? you've demonstrated the absurdity of your god, can't you understand that the simple and most reasonable resolution to all your problems is that Your God Does NOT Exist?"

Why does God not reveal himself more often? Simplest answer: because he does not exist. Why does God allow evil? Simplest answer: because he does not exist. Why does God allow believers to lose their faith (hi John!)? Simplest answer: because he does not exist. Why does God not heal the sick? Simplest answer: because he does not exist. Why is the Bible inconsistent? Simplest answer: because God didn't write it (because he does not exist), rather these are human fables and tales.

Yet apologists and religious philosophers prefer to construct rivers of fabulating argument to try to shore up their Fortress of Faith on the Island of Insanity that is the Crumbling Church of Christianity. Faith is their defense against reason.

Two Newer Books on the Bible You Should Get by Steve Wells

Steve Wells has put out two books that look very good:



He probably doesn't know Hebrew and Greek. It would have been very helpful if he did. People may forget, or not know, that before The Skeptic's Annotated Bible there was Isaac Asimov's massive work, Asimov's Guide to the Bible: Two Volumes in One, the Old and New Testaments.Asimov was not a biblical scholar who knew Hebrew or Greek either. Nonetheless, these books are very helpful in highlighting why we are non-believers, atheists. Check them out.

My Review of "God and Evil: The Case for God in a World Filled with Pain" edited by Chad Meister and James K. Dew

The title of my review on Amazon is, An Interesting and Informative Book, But an Epic Fail. If you think it's a helpful review then upvotes would be appreciated. To see other chapters reviewed in reverse chronological order click here.

A Note on the Passing of Old Testament Scholar John H. Hayes

John H. Hayes

As a graduate student at Columbia Theological Seminary in the mid 1970’s, I had the honor of being involved with two seminaries that shared faculties on a regular basis.  The other school was Candler School of Theology at Emory University and this is where I first got to know John Hayes.   

Thus, when John Hayes and Maxwell Miller came out with a new  history of ancient Israel and Judah , I bought a copy and made sure I was there when they introduced it at the 1986 SBL meeting in Atlanta, Ga.

(While both Hayes and  Miller answered questions on their new book, I noticed there was a professor from the University of Sheffield challenging them on their information; Philip R. Davies.  I remember Hayes was trying to answer one of Davies criticisms of their book with “Well, maybe it happen like this . . . “, to which Davies quipped, “Well, maybe it didn't.  So what have you really said?  Nothing!”  That really made an impression on me.)

Why Do Christians Speak for God?

The god of the Bible sure has a lot of self-appointed press agents.

In the Old Testament, Moses and the prophets spent a lot of time talking about what their god hated and loved. They detailed what behavior he expected, the loyalty and sacrifices that he demanded, and the ways he would retaliate if not obeyed. They revealed who god wanted killed, and under what circumstances. Whenever God was upset, feeling betrayed, or benevolent, his spokesmen let be known, as if they were divine mood rings.

Quote of the Day, by Cipher

That's the thing about fundamentalists; they are the least introspective people on the planet. Try to explain that their version of God is a projection of their own fractured psyches, and they'll either look at you like a deer caught in the headlights or launch into a tirade about carnal mind, inherent depravity and not wanting to be held "accountable".

As I keep saying, arguing with these people is a complete waste of time. Manage them, marginalize them, vote them into irrelevance - but don't try to change their minds. The ones who want out of that world will come to you with questions. The ones who only know how to repeat what their pastors tell them are a lost cause.

This is a pretty bleak assessment isn't it? But even if Cipher is partially correct, and he is, this is the power of a delusion on an indoctrinated mind, a brainwashed mind. Just yesterday I offered a copy of my book God or Godless?to a good friend. He said he was not interested, even though I told him that his side was represented in the book by Dr. Randal Rauser, an evangelical Christian apologist. His mind is closed.

Dustin Lawson's Review of the Book "God or Godless"

Dustin as you already know, is a friend of mine who is Josh McDowell's Infidel Disciple. Via email he said this:

I finished God or Godless?I have a hard time believing that I used to be like this Randal guy, so often avoiding answering his critics tough questions even though he thinks he is answering them. It was like he was in the ring getting beaten up but he didn't realize it. It is hard to believe I used to be like him, but I know I was.

A Few of My Favorite Cartoons

Here are a few of my favorite cartoons...