An Excerpt From Chapter 2, From "The Outsider Test for Faith", pp. 33-44

Chapter 2: The Fact of Religious Diversity

This chapter supports my first contention—that people who are located in distinct geographical areas around the globe overwhelmingly adopt and justify a wide diversity of mutually exclusive religious faiths due to their particular upbringing and shared cultural heritage. This is the Religious Diversity Thesis (RDVT), and it is a well-established fact in today’s world. The problem of religious diversity cries out for reasonable explanation, something that faith has not provided so far. Attempts to mitigate it or explain it, as we’ll see, either fail to take it seriously or explain religion itself away.

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God or Godless: One Atheist. One Christian. Twenty Controversial Questions.

I'm done writing and editing books, so I'm highlighting each one of them in thirteen separate posts.

Today I'll tell you about my co-written book with Dr. Randal Rauser, God or Godless?: One Atheist. One Christian. Twenty Controversial Questions, published in April, 2013.

The first thing to say is that Rauser contacted me to co-write the book without first reading my magnum opus Why I Became an Atheist. That's instructive, since he didn't research into how formidable of an opponent I might be.

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"HUME ON PROOF AND MATHEMATICAL PROBABILITY" by John W. Loftus

What follows is the Appendix to my anthology The Case against Miracles (pp. 551-560). I consider several parts of that book to be a major defense of David Hume. I know there is some debate on Hume, but what Hume said on miracles withstands the criticisms leveled at him. They come from both Christian apologists and philosophers (as one would expect), but also from some atheist philosophers, like Michael Martin (Atheism: A Philosophical Justification, pp. 194-196), Michael Levine (The Cambridge Companion to Miracles, pp. 291-308), and Graham Oppy (Arguing About Gods, pp. 376-382), who strangely says "Hume's argument against belief in miracle reports fails no less surely than do the various arguments from miracle reports to the existence of an orthodoxy conceived monotheistic god" (p. 381). Agnostic/atheist John Earman thinks Hume's argument is an Abject Failure (as seen in his book by that title). And while J.L. Mackie defends Hume against some objections, even he thinks Hume's argument needs "improvement" (p. 25) by being "tidied up and restated" (p. 17) due to "inaccuracies" (p. 27), with one part he calls "very unsatisfactory" (p. 23).

Here's a brief introduction to the debate on miracles LINK. Now for my Appendix:

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Day Five of the Twelve Days of Solstice

We're celebrating the 12 days of Solstice rather than the 12 days of Christmas. I'm done writing and editing books. So I'm highlighting each of my twelve books leading up to the 25th of the month when we party. I'll tell you something about each of them you probably don't know. [See Tag Below]

Today I'll tell you about my co-written book with Dr. Randal Rauser, God or Godless?: One Atheist. One Christian. Twenty Controversial Questions, published in April, 2013.

The first thing to say is that Rauser contacted me to co-write the book without first reading my magnum opus Why I Became an Atheist. I think that's instructive, since he didn't research into how formidable of an opponent I might be. More on that a bit later.

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John Beversluis Has Died at the Age of 86, But He Will Speak from the Grave!

John Beversluis was 86 years old when he recently died. His life was lived between these two days, November 10, 1934 and May 22, 2021. From his obituary we read:

John received his Ph.D from Indiana University and his Bachelor of Arts from Calvin College. He taught Philosophy and Ethics at Butler University (Indianapolis, IN), Emory University (Atlanta, GA), California State University, Fresno, Clovis Community College, Monterey Peninsula College, the University of the South (Sewanee, TN), and Grand Valley State College (Allendale MI). He participated in three National Endowment for the Humanities seminars for College Teachers: at the University of Illinois (Urbana, IL), the University of California at Berkeley, and the University of Texas. He presented papers at the American Philosophical Association, various universities in the United States, and at Oxford and Cambridge in the United Kingdom. While at Oxford he also presented several papers to the Oxford C. S. Lewis Society. His publications include works in the areas of Ancient Greek Philosophy (focusing on Socrates and Plato), the Philosophy of Religion, Kantian Ethics, and Philosophy and Literature. SOURCE.

In 2008 I got to know John in an exchange of emails. I had contacted him about his masterful book, C.S. Lewis and the Search for Rational Religion: Revised and Updated, which had just been published by Prometheus Books (PB) on November 29, 2007. I had bought it and loved it. Let me tell you this interesting story.

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Victor Reppert: Trump apologists are shooting Christianity in the foot

Previously I had argued Bernie Sanders is the atheist's candidate because his policies will raise societal health, which will in turn decrease people's need for a god. Now Christian apologists Victor Reppert chimed in, giving me permission to quote him:

If I were an atheist, and only concerned about the credibility of atheism and didn't care about the country, I would say go for four more years of Donald Trump. That is because evangelical Trump apologists follow him, and they do more damage to the credibility of Christianity than atheists like John Loftus. I seem to spend more time arguing with Trump apologists than atheists these days, because even though they don't know it, they're shooting Christianity in the foot.

This is an interesting proposal, but we do care for people and our country so we cannot do that. He's right though, Trump and his evangelical fan-boys are destroying the credibility of their Christian faith.

Bernie Sanders Is The Atheist's Candidate!

[Published 10/19/2015] Bill Curry of the Salon magazine wrote a timely piece on Bernie Sanders titled, Bernie Sanders is right on the big issues, now we must spread the word! Okay, I fudged the last part of his title, but I think Bernie is the man, if for no other reason but that climate change is our most pressing issue, and Bernie Sanders is making it a top priority. But there are many other reasons, not the least of which is that he looks to democratic atheist countries like Sweden, Denmark and Norway as the wave of our future. It has been shown that when there is high societal health, where people's needs are being met, the people in those societies don't have a need to believe in God, so they don't. Since I stand against religious faith then I must also stand with Bernie Sanders, regardless of whether he is a believer or not.

I'm tired of ignorant fear-mongering Christian apologists like Victor Reppert telling his readers:

I remember the well-intentioned ideas that launched the French Revolution and the Russian revolution, and remember also where these movements ended: with guillotines and gulags. As a result I am concerned about what is going to happen if the secularist movement today gets a lot of political power. These people started off with combining secularism with a passion for social justice, and look what happened to them. The death tolls of the Soviet Union far outstrip all the "holy horrors" of Christianity, such as the Inquisition. It's not even close.

Look, if you want to know the direction of democratic atheist societies then look to the Scandinavian countries like Sweden, Denmark and Norway. They aren't perfect but they are much better than ours, by far. And since the American people stand with Bernie Sanders on the most pressing issues, that makes him electable. I have not spoken much on politics because I have been jaded after decades of seeing little or no change. Nothing ever changes it seems. That's because we need a political revolution and I aim to do my part. I love Bernie's message. I like how Bernie boldly puts it out there. I think he is electable and I think social media can make the difference. Social media reigns over the establishment. It brought down a few dictators in the Middle East and it can bring down the American establishment, if we want it bad enough. So if you don't help put Bernie in the White House then you are part of the problem! No worries. I'll vote for Hillary Clinton if he fails to get the Democratic nomination. After all, the Republicans are all nutcases. I'm throwing my intellectual weight in favor of Bernie Sanders. First and foremost, Bernie is the best candidate for achieving a good healthy society for everyone, one where everyone can take part and live a better life. But secondarily, there is something else. Bernie Sanders is the atheist's candidate!

My name is John W. Loftus, who says a vote for Bernie Sanders is a vote for atheism. I just put the pieces together and will provide more documentation of it in the months to come. I approve of this message. No one paid me a dime to write it. [Click on the tag "Bernie Sanders" for more]

Robert Ingersoll On Thomas Paine On Reason & Science

The following is an excerpt from a lecture Robert G. Ingersoll (1833-1899) gave all over the country commending Thomas Paine. It can be found in full right here. To see more of Ingersoll's speeches and writings check out fellowfeather's site, The Ingersoll Times, from whom I first heard of this lecture. In the excerpt Ingersoll hails reason, knowledge, and science while excoriating belief. It's fantastic!

There are Christian apologists who argue that a god exists because reason can only be accounted for, and justified by a god. Even non-believers must acknowledge god's existence, they argue, for by using reason we acknowledge god as its foundation. This is the Argument from Reason, of which Victor Reppert is the leading defender, hitchhiking on what CS Lewis had previously written. What Ingersoll shows us, by contrast, is that Christians denigrate reason, knowledge, and science in favor of belief. Imagine that, there are people who reject reason who ironically argue that reason leads to god! What an astounding amount ignorance and hypocrisy! If reason leads to god they should be the champions of reason and science rather than belief. But they denigrate it every chance they get. They only use it when it suits them in this fallacious argument, but fail to apply reason across the board to the nature of nature, it's behavior, and whether there's a religion that has sufficient objective evidence for its miracles. In other words, to paraphrase accurately from Christian apologist Frank Turek, they steal reason from non-believers since nonbelievers are the people of reason.

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Do Muslims and Christians Worship the Same God?

I wish Christian apologists would get their stories straight on this question. Apologists who seek to soften the problem of religious diversity, and who want to explain why a diverse number of religious believers have their prayers answered, will say Yahweh and Allah are the same god by different names. So say Paul Moser, David Marshall, Victor Reppert, Randal Rauser and many others.

Christians who seek to be honest however, will say no they're not the same god! Interestingly enough, William Lane Craig says they are not the same god! Jack Cottrell agrees with Craig. Roger Olsen's answer is both yes and no! Olsen:

Do Christians and Muslims worship the same God? It’s not as simple a question as it appears and therefore no simple, straightforward answer should be given. The question itself begs analysis—before any answer can be given. I worry that people who jump to answer “yes” may be motivated more by political correctness and/or fear of persecution (of Muslims) than by clear thinking about the theological differences between Islam and Christianity. I also worry that people who jump to answer “no” may be motivated more by Christian fundamentalism and/or fear of terrorists than by clear thinking about the historical-theological roots of Islam in Jewish and Christian monotheism.

I've laid out what's at stake in several posts:

--Who Answers Prayers?
--The Empty Rhetoric of Christian Apologists.
--Do Christians Worship the Same God As Muslims and Jews Do? The Larycia Hawkins Test Case.
--It's Preposterous That Victor Reppert and David Marshall Believe in Allah.

Again, let me stress it's about being honest. Honesty has it's price though.

Quote of the Day on Determinism, by Patricia Churchland

This quote comes via Michael Williams, something Victor Reppert should take note of in his argument to his particular god from reason:

That determinism rules out reasoning is one of the most annoying arguments ever. It's just thrown out there as if it's obvious (kind of like "you need free will to love"). Even Edward Feser in his book Five Proofs of the Existence of God says, "Human beings are rational animals and for that reason capable of such free action."

I think Patricia Churchland addressed this very well: "If determinism is correct, it does not in the least follow that we do not reason... On the contrary, what follows is that our reasoning and our reasoned behaviour is causally produced. So far from denying that humans are purposeful and reasonable, determinism is the thesis that there is a causal network which produces such behaviour."[Is Determinism Self-refuting? -- Patricia Smith Churchland -- Mind, New Series, Vol. 90, No. 357. (Jan., 1981), pp. 99-101.]

How Can We Decide Between Experts? Reviewing Mittelberg's "Confident Faith" Part 10

I'm reviewing Mark Mittelberg's book Confident Faith. [See the "Mark Mittelberg" tag below for others]. Mittelberg had argued we need authorities since we cannot be experts in everything. So the "question is not if we'll be under authority, but which authorities we'll trust and respond to?" (p. 66) When some red flags go up we need to consider second opinions and better authorities. Trust! That is a key point. Who ya gonna trust?

I'm talking about experts with regard to the truth and their level of competence. What are we to do when experts disagree? How can we non-experts choose between experts? Do we have to be experts to choose between experts? There is a whole lot of literature to sift through on these questions.

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The Top Three Christian Apologetics Books As Recommended By Some Top Apologists

Here's a listing of the top three Christian apologetics books. Several Christians and apologists were asked for their recommendations. Then the top three books were compiled from their suggestions. Of those who comment here from time to time, neither David Marshall, Victor Reppert nor Randal Rauder's books made the list.

When it comes to recommended book lists, my first book ranked as the top atheist book of the last decade on one of them! Kinda humbling but kinda cool too.

Quote of the Day On Chronological Snobbery

I just read something that reminded me Victor Reppert. He has repeatedly used the "chronological snob" straw-man aphorism against me (coined by C.S. Lewis) simply because I say some belief is no longer respected in today's world. But this is a misuse of the aphorism, if it can ever be used at all. For I also provide reasons why said beliefs are no longer respected.

Chronological snobbery doesn’t apply to any criticism or rejection of thinking from previous eras. If that’s the case, we’re all chronological snobs. If your doctor tried to treat your cancer with leeches, you wouldn’t be snobbish to object because we now know better. If your neighbor told you that the biblical story of Noah’s son Ham proves that some races are superior, you wouldn’t be snobbish to reject that theology because we now know better.

Chronological snobbery refers to the notion that all ideas from previous eras are inferior because they are old and that modern ideas are superior because they are new. And, frankly, I don’t know anyone who actually believes this. I certainly don’t. --by Jonathan Merritt, "The truth about ‘chronological snobbery’"

The One True Faith: Just How Many of Them Can There Be?

If only we had a way to test them all…

In the small, rural mid-western town where I grew up—and long before my arrival—the Christian souls had been sorted into Protestant and Catholic camps; I was in the former. Naturally, this was well after the eras of armed combat, so folks got along quite well despite the religious chasm. There were frictions, of course: Protestant kids were taunted by Catholic kids that they were going to hell: only followers of the Pope had the lock on heaven. But the insults were returned; one Protestant woman, whose nephew had become engaged to a Catholic woman, with wedding to be in her church, refused to attend because she had no intention of “setting foot in that heathen temple.”

If there was anything that both camps shared it was certainty. We knew that we were right, and those on the other side were wrong. And they knew that they were right, and we were wrong. This certainty was guaranteed by faith.

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Victor Reppert Just Cannot Ignore the Force of the Outsider Test for Faith

Dr. Reppert keeps trying to chip away at my argument in The Outsider Test for Faith (OTF), and there's a reason why. There's a force to it he cannot ignore. Inside his head one side says there's got to be something wrong with it. The other side comes up with something, anything, to deflect the force of it so he can continue believing. You would think if he's demolished it there would be noting left to say, right? But his other side keeps thinking about it, wondering if there's something to it, and subsequently false about his faith. In Vic's post, titled "The Outsider Test for Human Rights, or OTHR" he said,

We might ask what evidence there is that rights exist. You have a feeling that everyone ought to be treated equally. Isn't that just your social conditioning? If you grew up in India, and were raised to believe that people occupy different positions in the caste system based on the Law of Karma, wouldn't you think that the idea that everyone was created (or evolved?) equal was slightly ridiculous? LINK.

In the comments I wrote,

As the person who has named and argued for the OTF, let me say that an OTHR is merely asking for a justifying reason for embracing this or that human right. Since no religion passes the OTF this means the justification for human rights must be found in secular reasons based on whatever evidence is available. The OTHR does not automatically entail people will agree, but it does offer a standard that reasonable people should embrace.

If nothing else, since people without religion are demanding to live under secular democracies, a secular democracy is probably the best way to eventually achieve a consensus about human rights, even though it's far from perfect.

I answered this type of objection previously. Just substitute "Human Rights" in place of "Moral/political views" in what I wrote here. Until next time...

Dr. Victor Reppert Is Our Gullible Person of the Day, Part 3

This is the final post of three on Victor Reppert, our ignorant gullible person of the day. [See the "Gullible" tag below.] Reppert again, about the gaps to god argument:

Look, when I raise this kind of question, I mean show us by providing evidence. Yes, God could sovereignly perform the act of causing Loftus to believe by going "Loftus, believe," and the next Sunday, Loftus will show up in church on his knees praying to God. But providing evidence is by definition not coercive. Of course God could shove belief in his existence down your throat if he wanted to. But could he give us a good reason to believe in his existence, such that no matter how disinclined we were to want to believe in a being greater than ourselves (so that we would have to admit we were not the supreme beings) whose commandments to us are our moral duties (however much we would like to avoid performing them). Wouldn't there be an escape clause available, no matter what we did?

Reppert says he has reservations about coercive belief, that his god only wants non-coercive belief. For one thing I don't see anyone refusing to believe in Reppert's god because he's bigger than they are. What utter indoctrinated ignorance that is!! Would Reppert say he rejects the existence of Allah due to the fact Allah is bigger than he is? I do however, see a good reason to disbelieve in any god that has commanded and taught the kinds of morality ISIS does, which can also be found in this religion. Any god that allows or commands or regulates slavery, or allows or commands or regulates how that women are to be treated as chattel, is not one I could stomach, much less believe.

Perhaps more to the point of non-coercive belief, if Reppert's god coerced belief in Moses, the Egyptian Pharaoh, Gideon, doubting Thomas, or Paul on the Damascus Road, which the Bible says he did without abrogating their free wills, then he could do it again and again. Surely Reppert knows of Theodore Drange's argument (from memory) that if there are people who want to know the truth it's not coercive to provide them with what they want. I find it extremely difficult to accept the faith-based claim that only a small number of people want to know the truth, such that only evangelicals like Reppert receive the needed evidence to believe.

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Dr. Victor Reppert Is Our Gullible Person of the Day, Part 2

These are Vic Reppert's two atheist talking points:

Here is my real point, which I think has gotten lost here.

There are two atheist talking points that don't mix. Here they are:

1) Look, guys, if God would just give us evidence of his existence, we'd believe in him. The only reason we don't believe is because he hasn't provided evidence of his existence.

2) God of the gaps arguments are always wrong. Any gap in our naturalistic understanding of the world should be dealt with by waiting for science to produce a naturalistic explanation, not by appealing to God.

But anything God might do to reveal his existence could be dismissed as a gap, thus leaving the atheist unaffected. The ban on god of the gaps arguments would allow the atheist to escape no matter what God did to convince us of his existence.

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Dr. Victor Reppert Is Our Gullible Person of the Day, Part 1

"Gullible Person of the Day" is a new feature here at DC. Enjoy. I recently argued that differences between believers and nonbelievers are not primarily about worldviews. My contention is that believers are simply ignorant! I did so here and I mean it. To believe is to be ignorant to some degree. Our differences are not centered in disputes about the rules of logic either. We can all agree about them. They are centered in the accumulation of knowledge that in turn produces a reasonable/healthy skepticism. This skepticism leads knowledgeable people to apply the rules of logic consistently across the boards without any double standards, or special pleading on behalf of one's own particular religious faith. So believers are naively gullible. They aren't sufficiently skeptical people. Their subconscious brains are lying to their conscious brains about the quality and quantity of evidence for their faith. Their subconscious brains even lie to make their conscious brains see evidence where there isn't any at all.

Think of the saying, "It's as easy as taking candy from a baby." A gullible person is not sufficiently knowledgeable enough to be skeptical of the motives of someone else. So a gullible person can be taken advantage of easily. We can see it in recognized defenders of faith, like Victor Reppert, who is today's Gullible Person of the Day. I intend nothing personal here. Yet I maintain Reppert is ignorant. Like the baby in the aforementioned aphorism, he's but an intellectual babe. No matter how much knowledge he may have or retain, and regardless of whether he knows more than I do, Reppert lacks the knowledge to be skeptical of his inherited religious faith. Like the Sophists in the days of Socrates he's pretending to know what he doesn't know. As an intellectual babe he's playing a childish pretend fantasy game of faith, one that in my book is indeed a dangerous idea.

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Victor Reppert asked what it would take for his god to convince us

Reppert:

OK you tell God (just in case he exists) what it would take for him to give you sufficient evidence of his existence, so that you would be on your knees at your local church this Sunday. The stipulation here is that he has to use evidence to get you there, so he can't just fix your brain and make you a believer. We know an omnipotent being can do that. But what you would be asking him to do would be to give you sufficient evidence of his existence.

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Conclusion Driven Philosophy of Religion: Victor Reppert's God of the Gaps Argument

I wrote the book Unapologetic: Why Philosophy of Religion Must End. Christian apologist Reppert has not read it, and I don't expect him to, even after reading this post of mine where I explain why he should. Maybe others will. He recently put forth a God of the gaps argument which begins by acknowledging some sort of puzzling phenomenon that science cannot explain, which is supposed to lead to the existence of his sect-specific god. This argument is one example among many of conclusion driven philosophy of religion used in defense of Christian faith. It's Christian apologetics plain and simple, something taught by him as an instructor at two of Arizona's secular colleges, Arizona State University and Glendale Community College. Today's lesson, boys and girls, is to present this concrete example of what I mean when I say philosophy of religion must end.

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