The Outsider Test for Faith is For People Who Really Want to Know the Truth

The Outsider Test for Faith (OTF) is for people who really want to know if their faith is true. If they do, then it can be likened to a commitment to go on a diet. Just like a person who wants to lose weight so also the OTF demands the same kind of personal commitment. No one can make such a commitment for another person. But that's the first step. It takes resolve. It takes discipline to begin it and to consistently carry through with it.

It's Possible God Exists Even Though All Life Has Evolved

The implications of evolution are enormous, as I have said before. But even though all life has evolved it's still possible for a supernatural force (or being) to exist. To see this all we need to do is look at what dog breeders do on a regular basis. They manipulate the breeding habits of their dogs to produce new breeds all of the time. In a like manner some kind of god could act like these dog breeders by manipulating the environment and breeding habits of the various species on earth to produce new ones. Doing so would not violate the evolutionary process. It would merely inject purposeful direction into it. I admit this. It's possible God exists even though all life has evolved. But how reasonable is it to suppose this scenario is the case? Not much. Let me discuss such a claim, and then open it up for more discussion.

John Green is Now Writing for "the Other Team"

John Green is a missionary pastor's son from a Pentecostal background who has written some things for Discipleship Journal and Wittenburg Door. Below is his brief story and an article he wrote on hell.

"My Christianity is Right"

Romulus and Jesus Compared

Richard C. Miller's "Mark's Empty Tomb and Other Translation Fables in Classical Antiquity," Journal of Biblical Literature, v. 129, no. 4 (2010) is a good read. According to Miller the story of an empty tomb as found in the earliest Gospel owes more to similar Hellenistic stories than Christian scholars have been wont to admit.

"Here it Comes" I'm Done With My Revised Book Files

This clip from "The Wrath of Khan" expresses my thoughts as I ponder the impact of my revised book, Why I Became an Atheist, which I am now officially done editing.

My Top 25 Substantive Posts in 2011

Here they are:

That Which Disconfirms UFOs From Mars Also Disconfirms God’s Existence

In 1971 a NASA space orbiter named Mariner 9 discovered that the canals on Mars were illusory. This discovery strongly disconfirmed the claim that there was intelligent life on that planet. Before this discovery many people claimed they encountered Martians. Afterward, Martians stopped visiting us and aliens started visiting us from Venus. Then after the surface of Venus was found to be hot enough to melt lead Venusians stopped visiting us too. Now they come from far more distant places in our universe. What best explains this? It’s because there were never any Martians or Venusians who visited earth.

The 2012 Debunking Christianity Challenge

Four years ago I challenged Christians to take the Debunking Christianity Challenge. Just like last year I'm proposing twelve reasonably priced college level books, one per month.

My challenge is for Christians to read our books and test their faith to see if it can withstand our arguments. As I argued recently most believers do not seriously question their faith. Do you want to be different than other believers? Do you want to do what most of them don't do? Then take the DC Challenge. I challenge you! Hey, what do you have to lose? If the books cause you to become stronger in your faith that's good, right? But if your faith cannot survive our assault then we've done you a favor. No more soundbites. No more reading one blog post at a time. Sit down for yourselves and read through whole books written by the skeptics. Here then are the twelve books for this year's DC challenge:

Oprah Winfrey's Half-Sister and The Odds of The Resurrection of Jesus

There are a lot of things that happen to people that go against the overwhelming odds. Let's take the example of Oprah Winfrey's revelation in November 2010 that she has a half-sister named Patricia who was adopted out by her mother shortly after being born. What are the odds of someone discovering late in life that she has a half-sister? I don't know, but surely it's extremely rare. It wasn't a miracle, that's for sure. Things like that do occur from time to time. By contrast, if Jesus arose from the grave then such a thing was a miracle, and as such has even less of a chance of happening than a sister discovering she had a half-sister, by far!

Why Do Christians Disagree?

Why is it Christians cannot agree to the point where they have condemned each other to hell and/or slaughtered each other because of doctrinal differences that other Christians don't think are essential for salvation? My answer is that Christianity is man made, and as such, doctrinal differences are due to different human ways of understanding the Bible. There is no divine mind behind the Bible, otherwise God should have communicated his will much better than he supposedly did. That's the major reason why there is no doctrinal Christian unity. These different doctrinal understandings continue to be used by denominational leaders to differentiate between Christianities for financial gain and power. Christian, what's your answer?

Stenger's New Book: God and the Folly of Faith: The Incompatibility of Science and Religion

I have had the privilege of reading through Victor J. Stenger's soon to be released book, God and the Folly of Faith,and it's a tour de force. Among the published atheists trying to bridge the gap between scientifically minded people and people of faith, I think Stenger is the best.

Bruce Gerencser on Atheism, The Bible, and Jesus

Atheists have a wide and divergent view on most everything. There is no atheist position, atheist viewpoint, or atheist worldview. Atheists can’t even agree on what the words atheist or atheism mean.

Religionists are used to narrow, defined, sectarian beliefs. Methodists believe__________. Catholics believe______________. Mormons believe ___________. That’s not how it works with atheists. Every atheist must determine how to proceed from the basic premise of atheism…..the rejection of belief in the existence of deities. From this departure point atheists believe a variety of things and it is unlikely that any two of them will agree with one another on everything.

Link.

Ten Reasons Why Most Believers Don't Seriously Question Their Faith

[Written by John W. Loftus] This topic interests me to no end. Why don't most believers seriously question their faith? Does it take a special type of individual? Does it require some personality trait that believers don't have? Does that make skeptics different people? Could it be intelligence? Could it be that skeptics have a higher self-esteem than others? Is it that we don't need social approval? Is it that life's experiences have shown us we cannot accept the dominant opinion on a matter? Is it that we question what we're told in general? Perhaps, but when we look at skeptics in general there doesn't seem to be a set pattern. Perhaps a scientific poll might help answer that kind of question. What I do think is that the following ten reasons are almost certainly necessary conditions even if they are not sufficient ones:

You Should Get Guy Harrison's "50 Popular Beliefs That People Think are True"

Having been sent a copy of Guy Harrison's new 458 page book, 50 Popular Beliefs That People Think Are True,I heartily endorse it as do many others:

Is Christianity the Worst Religion in the World? Ben Cain thinks so.

See what you think.

There is No Atheist Community, No Atheist Movement

I want to briefly make the case that there is no atheist community. There are only atheist communities. There is likewise no atheist movement. There is only an atheist momentum. Atheists do not even share the same goals. Again, briefly, because my time is limited, here goes.

Stay Tuned I'm Coming Back

I've decided to return to blogging here. I like it better. Stay tuned.

If Republicans nominate Newt Gingrich for President it will signal the further erosion, and maybe even death, of Christian conservatism as we once knew it.

Dr. Avalos's guest editorial was published in the politically influential Des Moines Register, and centers on how the nomination of Newt Gingrich would signal the erosion of self-described Christian conservatism. Follow this Link.

James Rachels' Book, "Created From Animals" Is Wonderful!

The late moral philosopher James Rachels wrote a textbook on moral philosophy I used in preparation for my Introduction to Ethics classes called Elements of Moral Philosophy. I highly recommend it. He writes extremely well and makes the scholarly arguments accessible to the educated reader--something I aim to do as well. Rachels' book, Created From Animals: The Moral Implications of Darwinism, is also extremely well written and accessible to the educated reader. It's wonderful!

Tommy G. Baker Has Spoken His Last Word From the Grave

I had mentioned our good friend Tommy had died and had six posts yet to be released. Unfortunately upon examination two of them were duplicates. So he has spoken his last word. To see his posts follow this link.

I hate death. It's the final enemy. Paul was right about that. 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 or more. I hate the fact that I'll never see my Dad again, or my grandparents, or my stepfather that my Mom married after Dad died. I hate it.

We are mere mortals. This life is all we have. It's mere delusion to think otherwise. But knowing the truth hurts. What would hurt more is to think there is a God who punished them with death because of what some curious mythical bastards did in some Garden, and that they're now being tortured in hell. Do believers even care to actually think about this? So I raise my middle finger to people like that and to their concept of God. I raise it to believers down through the ages who have used hell as a cradle to grave threat. I raise it to death itself.

A Jealous God and Divine Domestic Violence

If a human husband said that to his wife, we would classify it as domestic violence. And rightly so. It reflects a view of the wife as property, and the husband as her lord and owner with sovereign rights to inflict punishment on one who has “stolen” from him his exclusive right to “sow his seed” in a “field” that is his property....Presumably an image of God who would himself commit assault and battery against his wife is one that it is crucial to examine critically and rethink. Link.

A Neglected Atheism: A View from Sam Harris

If atheism is the rejection of belief in gods then Buddhism is an atheistic system!  Buddha himself was an agnostic who said in Deer Park, "I can not say whether there is a god, no god or not a not-god. But I can tell you how to obtain enlightenment" 

I Ate Some Crap the Other Day

Yep. I am not exempt from this. I own a carpet cleaning business and one of my best paying customers decided to talk to me about Jesus as I was cleaning. She asked if I had “a personal relationship with the Lord.” I said, I did at one time but now I have some doubts. She replied that she has doubt too. I said I used to be a minister but don’t even go to church anymore. She said she and her husband don’t go to church either. When I asked why, she said they haven’t been able to find any church that teaches the truth. Really? I said. She and her husband listen faithfully to Pastor Andrew Wommack’s radio program instead. Interesting I said. She offered me one of his books, and I said that was not necessary, “You don’t need to do that.” She insisted, saying they buy several copies and give them out so it’s no trouble at all. Not to offend her I said, “sure, that would be very nice of you,” and she handed me two of them. I thumbed through them, and once again said, they looked interesting. She told me that life isn’t worth living without Jesus, and I said I’ll look into it. Then I escaped without her offering a prayer. Bullshit! Now the next time I clean she’ll ask me what I thought of them. I’ll probably say “interesting.” ;-)

That’s how it is sometimes. We must eat crap once in a while. I’m sure if I had argued with her I would’ve lost her business and she would not recommend our services anymore.

Idealism Is Hardly Ideal

I think "external material world" is a dualistic habit we continue to carry from religious language. It presupposes that there is some homunculus that is presented the external world in a mental theatre inside our head. But it serves our syntax well . The use of a subject and predicate places the I in the brain by tradition. Our language almost insures it. But if we posit a monism would not the only difference between a physical monisim and a mental one be semantics? What would be the means of comparison? What is internal to that spiritual/mental "external world?"

Omni-Faults: The Conflicts of the Attributes of God

If god is omniscient there is no free will. God sees the entire contents of the world's unfolding events from beginning to completion prior to his creating or actualizing of it. If he creates the world as he sees it prior to its existence his act is the first cause of all constituents of that world. Those events will occur necessarily if god acts. The only resolution to this dilemma is, if there is a god he must sacrifice omniscience in the act of creation in order for there to be freewill. In other words he must make a boulder too big for himself to lift.

Darrin Rasberry, A Former Team Member at DC Now Claims to Be A Christian

[Written by John W. Loftus]
Yep, so long as this is not a ruse. Darrin was never an atheist in the first place though. ;-) I wish him well. That's the power of the delusion. It has a pull on some of us to return to the fold. He writes about it here. When I first invited him to DC Darrin wrote this Greetings. Darrin and I traveled together to the 2008 EPS Apologetics Conference which I wrote about here. Hey, people believe and disbelieve for a wide variety of reasons, and that's it. There is no need to discredit his conversion. Why do Christians try to discredit our deconversions?
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Edit: If you see the smiley face after the second sentence above I'm being sarcastic. I'm saying about Darrin what Christians ignorantly say about people like me who leave the faith. Unlike them I don't mean this seriously.

Christian, Are You Praying for the Return of Jesus?

So I was talking to a Christian mother whose daughter is an atheist and sure to go to hell. I asked her if she's praying for Jesus to return to earth soon. She says yes, every day, and she thinks he'll come back soon too.

Duh. Where is the compassion when it comes to faith? Wouldn't the reasonable thing to do is pray that Jesus does NOT return soon so her daughter might come to repentance and be saved? Are believers brain dead or something?

Baha'i Practice as a View to Early Christianity

For two years I worshipped with and studied the Baha'is. They are a group who believe that they originated from direct revelation by god. However their guardian, Shogghi Effendi, acknowledges, "A handful of students, belonging to the Shaykhi school, sprung from the Ithna-'Ashariyyih sect of Shi`ah Islam."

NOVA The Fabric of the Cosmos: Universe or Multiverse?

If you want a great primer on the existence of a multiverse watch this PBS program. Take particular note of how cutting edge science works.

Watch The Fabric of the Cosmos: Universe or Multiverse? on PBS. See more from NOVA.

Suffering as Evidence of God's Failure

This is a weak argument concerning theodicy that is meant to address the premises of an ontological argument for god. It requires one to look at the attributes of god before they are assumed for the ontological argument itself. It focuses on "capability" rather than omnipotence:

"God or Godless" Nears Completion

My co-written debate book with Dr. Randal Rauser will be finished in a few days. It was a rewarding exchange of ideas. Randal announces it right here. This will be a must have book, great for discussions in colleges and reading groups! Now I have the copy-edits to do for the revised edition of WIBA. Then I will be able to blog more.

Tommy G. Baker Died But Speaks From the Grave

I sadly learned that a team member here at DC has died. I feel a great sorrow for this since Tommy G. Baker had so much more to share. There are six posts of his that I have yet to release and will do so one at a time this week. So he will speak from the grave. But first I'll share what he told me when I asked him to join DC and also link to his previous posts:

Greta Christina: Why Are You Atheists So Angry?

A Smorgasbord of Links for Your Enjoyment

Bruce Gerencser on Who Determines What the Bible Says?

Stephen Uhl, a former Catholic priest, is interviewed (with his wife Diane) by Tucson TV about their "Out of the Closet" billboards.

Harry McCall sent me this link on Biblical Illiteracy at Bob Jones University

Jerry Wilson sent me a link of his debate with a Christian apologist.

Articulett shared a link where a former believer named Anthony mentioned me as a major factor in his deconversion.

Brian sent me a link to a Nova documentary made a few years back on the creationism vs evolution trial in Dover. It's really good.

I'm Too Busy to Blog Much Right Now

I'm doing the copy-edits for the revised book, Why I Became an Atheist, and also co-writing the book with Dr. Randal Rauser. Use the comments section below to provide some interesting links. Cheers.

Mike Licona Responds to Norman Geisler

Link. I am so glad I don't have split hairs like they do. It's all so delusional.

Slavery, Abolitionism and the Ethics of Biblical Scholarship: Reflections about Ethical Deflections

Dr. Avalos reflects on how ethics is practiced by modern biblical scholars, and on why Christian academic scholars can't seem to unchain themselves from viewing Jesus as perfect. Link

The Famous Thomas More / William Tyndale Polemic.

They debated each other for 2000 pages. Both were also executed. Harsh words, harsh times. Link. Parts of this are a fascinating read!

Andy Rooney on Atheism

Andy Rooney spoke briefly (beginning at 1:12) on his atheism and his views on all the faith talk coming from presidential candidates. Rooney, who died on November 4, 2011, was best known for his reporting on CBS’ 60 Minutes. Link

Robert Gundry Was the First Scholar Norman Geisler Outted

In 1982 he published Matthew: A Commentary on His Literary and Theological Art analyzing the Gospel of Matthew. Gundry used redaction criticism in his work. He thus argued that Matthew adapted the story of Jesus to appeal to the intended audience. Especially problematic was Gundry's assertion that Matthew made ahistorical additions to the infancy story in Matthew 1 and 2.

This sparked a major controversy in the Evangelical Theological Society. Gundry contended his work did not question the inerrancy of Matthew. Rather he argued that inerrancy must be considered in light of authorial intent. Matthew, Gundry claims, "treats us to history mixed with elements that cannot be called historical in a modern sense." Thus, the book of Matthew should not be measured against the standards of the genre of modern historical writing in order to be called inerrant. On the other hand, "Luke states a historical purpose along lines that run closer to modern history writing…" Gundry's view was supported by a significant portion of the ETS. The Society's executive looked into the matter and at first cleared Gundry. However a campaign against Gundry was launched, spearheaded by Norman Geisler. This campaign succeeded and in December 1983 Gundry resigned from the ETS. Link

Michael Licona Loses His Teaching Position Over Matthew 27

Jeff Lowder comments:

The incident casts doubt on the ability of Evangelical scholars, qua Evangelicals, to follow the evidence wherever it may lead. To his credit, Licona apparently questioned the literal historicity of Matthew 27, without letting the perceived implications of his commitment to Biblical inerrancy get in the way. At the same time, however, I can't help but be struck by the fact that apparently many Christian scholars were unwilling to publicly defend Licona, presumably because they were afraid they might lose their jobs, too. It is precisely because of this sort of mentality that I have previously questioned whether evangelical Christians can consistently affirm the ethics of belief required by freethought. Link

Quotes of the Day

Here are a few salient quotes in context for further discussion:

The more often Christians have to resort to background beliefs—the more often they have to resort to their overall religious worldview to defend a particular tenet of faith—then the less likely their faith is true. Link

Christians must be convinced that their faith is nearly impossible before they will ever consider it to be improbable, which is an utterly unreasonable standard. Link.

When Christians criticize each other I think they're all right. Link.

Morality 3: Of objectivity and oughtness

Hector Avalos’s New Book is a tour de force, Part 3

This is the final part of my review of Dr. Avalos's new book, Slavery, Abolitionism, and the Ethics of Biblical Scholarship, which I began writing about right here. You'll just have to get it at some point and read it for yourselves. But it is really really good, just what the doctor ordered! ;-)

My Bookstore

To help me keep blogging I'd appreciate my readers buying books on Amazon from one of these links below (or anything else for that matter). I get about 7 cents on the dollar from what you purchase at no extra cost to you. Thanks so much in advance! And thanks too for any donations you can send me. Blogging is a very time consuming activity that takes away from my ability to earn some more needed money.

Avalos: Secular vs. Religious Harm

Dr. Avalos explains why modern wars don't prove that secularism has done more harm than religion. Enjoy. By the way, have I said recently that Hector is one of my main intellectual heroes? He is!

Hector Avalos's New Book is a tour de force, a Classic Text, Pt. 2

I began my review of Dr. Avalos's book, Slavery, Abolitionism, and the Ethics of Biblical Scholarship, in a previous post you can read right here. His book is divided into two main parts. Chapters 2-6 discusses the various strategies used by biblical scholars to mitigate the negative ethical implications of slavery in the Bible, while in chapters 7-16 he illustrates how the Bible was used to sustain slavery, arguing that "the Bible's stance on slavery posed an enormous, and sometimes insuperable, challenge for abolitionists." (p. 17) I'll not review part two of his book except to say that it is devastating to the apologist claims that the abolitionist movement was inspired by the Bible. We can see this in part one of Avalos's book alone, for in it he discusses the most important biblical passages on slavery in the Bible since that's what the abolitionists had to work with. Hint: they were backed up against the wall. Their movement went against the thrust of the passages found in the Bible.

The Barna Group On Six Reasons Young People Are Leaving the Church

Reason number one: "...unprecedented access to ideas and worldviews as well as their prodigious consumption of popular culture." But we knew that already. Josh McDowell said it before, and *ahem* yours truly. If you want to know the latest before the information brokers do, see me. ;-)

Guess What? My Newest Book Will Be in Christian Bookstores!

Yep, it's the one co-written with Dr. Randal Rauser, as introduced here. We have until January 1st to finish it. So if I'm not making much noise until then you'll understand. During this same time I'll be working on a revision to WIBA. If you don't want to miss a thing become a follower of DC.