A Serious Question From a New Deconvert

How does someone know that the Bible is the inspired, inerrant, infallible, absolute truth, perfect word of an omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, omni-benevolent, perfect God?

Stephen Law On Playing the Mystery Card (from his book, Believing Bullshit)

This seems pertinent from recent discussions with Victor Reppert. Enjoy.

Victor Reppert On What It Would Take To Convince Me Christianity Was True

Vic links to my original 2007 post so you can see what I said for yourselves. He asks if I'm arguing for the god of the gaps right here: "Isn't [Loftus] just saying here 'Gosh, I wish the gaps were bigger?'" It's an interesting question I'll admit. But we need to see what's going on. In my original post I had said:

But let’s say the Christian faith is true and Jesus did arise from the dead. Let’s say that even though Christianity must punt to mystery and retreat into the realm of mere possibilities to explain itself that it is still true, contrary to what my (God given?) mind leads me to believe. Then what would it take to convince me?

I would need sufficient reasons to overcome my objections, and I would need sufficient evidence to lead me to believe. By “sufficient” here, I mean reasons and evidence that would overcome my skepticism.

What Is So Bad About Christianity?

I'm getting some of the chapters from contributors for my new anthology Christianity is Not Great as I write. They are really good too. We're writing on the harms of Christianity. Imagine my surprise to find that James McDonald has an excellent website dealing with many of the same issues we're dealing with, seen here. I hadn't noticed it before. From what I read it looks really good. We're told: "Many Christians and non-Christians remain largely unaware of the history of Christianity. This website lays out the facts as clearly as possible," and it looks like he delivers the goods. He has also written a large book, Beyond Belief: Two thousand years of bad faith in the Christian Church.From my investigation I highly recommend it.

Roger Penrose On "Before the Big Bang"

Dr. Matt McCormick On Talking Believers Out of God

This is good!

"God or Godless" Named Among the Top Ten Religion Books of 2013

The Dubious Disciple, a self-described "agnostic Christian" (there's such a thing?), named my co-authored book with Randal Rauser as one of the top ten religion books in 2013. Here is his list which isn't a bad one at all for a believer. If you click on the book cover it will take you to his review of it. Someone likes it! Wooooo Hooooo! ;-)

Using the Bible to Prove Jesus Was a Sinner

I have pointed out over the years here at DC (and elsewhere) that the religious system of reasoning called theology is one of the most flawed and defective so-called logic systems ever devised in human history; bar none! For me, people who are immersed in this pseudo-logic system are similar to an alcoholic or drug addict who, although he or she can’t hold a job, has lost both family and friends, still dogmatically maintains they don’t have any problem at all.

Further Discussion On the Hallquist vs Rauser Debate

Previously I had argued that Chris Hallquist lost his debate with Randal Rauser. Here is our further discussion, below for learning and comment.

Jesus Behaving Badly: The Smoke of Their Torment

When it comes to dealing with the violent, angry, bi-polar god of the Old Testament, many Christians use Jesus as their get-out-of-jail-free card.

If we atheists bring up some of the many examples of the despicable actions and character of Yahweh, as described in the Bible, we hear: “But… Jesus… grace… New Covenant...” 

It’s as if sometime during the inter-testamental period, their god attended anger management sessions or got in touch with his kinder, gentler side.  Perhaps an image consultant advised him that all the smiting and killing was starting to give him a bad reputation? God 2.0 (aka Jesus) is supposed to magically override the trail of carnage that the Bible tells us that Yahweh left in his wake.

Christopher Hitchens On Minority Opinions

“My own opinion is enough for me, and I claim the right to have it defended against any consensus, any majority, anywhere, any place, any time. And anyone who disagrees with this can pick a number, get in line, and kiss my ass.” ― Christopher Hitchens. I quote him in reference to this opinion of mine. Cheers.

What Kind of Atheist Are You?

Not a Good Year for Dinesh D'Souza

...writes Jerry Coyne.

We are Nonbelievers, We Don't Believe, Period.

I used to think the position I now hold to was philosophically naive at best, and I have taught university level philosophy classes. Tell me this, do you know the sun will rise this morning, or do you believe it will rise? I know it will rise. Could I be wrong? Yes, but I don't need certainty in order to know something. If a truth proposition has that degree of probability to it then the fact I could conceivably be wrong means nothing. I know it. What does saying "I believe" the sun will rise do? It allows Christians to claim all knowledge is based on faith. Then they slip their Trinitarian incarnational god into that same crack. If the odds for a truth claim are calculated to be 70% then what does faith add to them? 50%? 15%? If we go exclusively by the probabilities there is no room for faith, no reason to believe anything at all. The problem is that we don't have separate words to describe the various probabilities. We only have one word, the word "belief." It covers the whole range of probabilities when we should be using different words to describe them. Other words better describe what we mean, like hope, trust, accept, think, know, conclude, and so on. The word "belief" is a Christian one supporting the Christian faith in the western world. We need a new nomenclature. We are nonbelievers. We don't believe. Let's use language commensurate with what we know.

"Is Belief in God Irrational?" Chris Hallquist Loses This Debate to Randal Rauser Who Wins a Pyrrhic Victory

I wouldn't want to debate a professional Christian philosopher on the topic of this debate. But Chris Hallquist did. He made some good arguments against Christianity but in terms of the question itself, debate judges would unanimously proclaim Rauser the winner, by a landslide. For Rauser it is nothing more than a Pyrrhic victory though. He won the battle but suffered serious loses in doing so. I judge Chris to be out of his league here, but he did manage to raise some issues Rauser didn't have good answers for, so Kudos to him. The problem of evil was his best argument. Rauser hammered Hallquist on the word "irrational" and won the debate because of it. However, unbelievably, given someone's ignorance about science then a Flat Earther would be considered rational too. Big crapping deal. What we want to know is if one's belief in God is true and Plantinga, Rauser's guru, never addresses that question. Hallquist did, but we all hold some conclusions that are false and we're not irrational in doing so.

If I were to debate Rauser on this question I would focus on the word "belief." Belief is always irrational. We should think exclusively in terms of the probabilities when it comes to the nature of the universe and it's workings. Hallquist didn't even do this. He thought if he could just show that believing in God was improbable then this is all he had to do. For anyone who continues believing despite Hallquist's arguments is irrational. Yet based on this standard of Hallquist's it is only irrational to continue believing in God once someone grants the arguments to God's existence fail, and these types of judgments are person related. Rauser thinks Hallquist's arguments fail instead. So until Rauser thinks those arguments succeed and continues believing anyway, his belief in God is not irrational. Check the debate out and see for yourselves.

Hallquist's position is just too extreme to be taken seriously. He thinks the arguments against the existence of God are so devastating that when it comes to William Lane Craig, and some other Christian apologists, they are intellectually dishonest. What Hallquist simply fails to understand is that there are many cognitive biases that keep honest people believing despite the strongest evidence to the contrary. There are many Christian apologists who think the opposite, that the arguments for God's existence are so strong that non-believers are being intellectually dishonest. If I were a Christian apologist I would hold up Hallquist as exhibit "A" in showing non-believers are intellectually dishonest, for surely he isn't ignorant about the effects of these cognitive biases. So they could conclude he is being intellectually dishonest when claiming William Lane Craig and others are intellectually dishonest. Because of this I must distance myself from him, even though I wish him well.

Neil deGrasse Tyson on Science, Religion and the Universe

Since the multiverse is mentioned here is the evidence for it.

Sodom and Gomorrah

Jesus Christ visits Sarah Silverman to discuss women's reproductive rights.

Open Thread for Comment

Yes, I've been silent lately. I'm working on a new book and dealing with other exciting things in my life. So give it to me. What's up? Anything new?

If Religious Faith Isn't The Problem Then What Is It?

A Screwed Up Book From the Beginning: Does the Bible Ever Know What It’s Talking About?

Left: The Jarvik 7 Artificial Heart (Could Jesus Live Here?)
Over a decade ago I debated a Christian apologist over the fact that the Biblical writers had no idea of what the human brain was.

My point was that, if the Bible was literally correct, than both the first artificial heart recipients Barney Clark and Robert Schrader (who died while on these machines) would have been totally  "unable to have asked Jesus into their hearts" since they had in fact had no hearts for Jesus to live in and thus ended up in Hell. This Christian apologist said this was "ridiculous" and was very adamant that the term "heart" in the Bible was used as a purely symbolic term being that the Biblical authors knew full well that the muscle we call the heart was not really the place emotions and thought.  By contrast, I strongly disagreed and reaffirmed the fact that what the Bible said about the heart (Greek: Kardia, from which we get Cardiac) is exactly what is meant. (You see, we atheists are basically Bible Believers!)

Why Didn't Jesus Tell Us About Germs?

This is a nice little argument from Richard Carrier. His debate with David Marshall can be seen here.

What's the Difference Between Fundamentalism and Evangelicalism?

[First published on October 2, 2013, now updated]: Fundamentalist Christianity represents yesterday's conservative faith whereas Evangelical Christianity represents today's conservative faith...and the goal posts keep being moved. Evangelical Christianity therefore is the liberal faith that conservatives of yesterday rejected, while the Evangelical Christianity of the future will reject the theology of today's Evangelicals. Liberalism is the trend into the future. It's palpably obvious too.

Evangelicals in the eighties rejected Karl Barth, inclusivism, Hell as annihilation, the mythical interpretation of the Genesis creation stories, the late dating of 2nd Isaiah and Daniel, and they especially rejected evolution. These former Evangelical views are now being rejected by today's Evangelicals. The goal posts have simply been moved! For more read these posts of mine:

1) The New Evangelical Orthodoxy, Relativism, and the Amnesia of It All

2) The More Conservative The Church, The Less Likely It's True

Two New Bible Movies Hit the Theaters for 2014

Tonight I decided to see Lone Survivor which is an excellent movie about an ill-fated mission by Navy SEALs in Afghanistan (Highly Violent). As usual before the main movie, our sold out theater watched about six movie trailers for forth coming titles in 2014. Among the secular titles; I was intrigued to see two trailers for upcoming Biblical movies.

It's Okay That Bill Nye Debates Ken Ham

The Science Guy Bill Nye is going to debate Ken Ham at the Creation Museum in Kentucky on February 4th. Ham believes the universe is not more than 6,000 years old and that there was a world-wide flood that took place about 4,500 years ago. He believes the animals saved by a guy named Noah in his ark can explain biological diversity. Ham also believes dinosaurs co-existed with humans. Ham, in other words, is a crack pot. He represents the absolute worst kind of creationist there is, although they are all wrong. Scientists from Richard Dawkins, Jerry Coyne, PZ Myers, and a whole host of atheist bloggers are saying Bill Nye shouldn't debate Ham. Here are some reasons why: