RantingAtheist wrote:One last thing: this is usually where the discussion goes of the rails, and we get the inevitable response, "How dare you call me crazy!"

To reiterate, statements like this make you look like a douchebag.

One last thing: this is usually where the discussion goes of the rails, and we get the inevitable response, "How dare you call me crazy!"

<i>...your fairy analogy falls apart because questioning fairies just makes us sane. Questioning fairies does not put us in the same boat as you atheists wrt God..</i>

Right, and the obvious point here is that the reason that "belief in faries" is the sign of a deranged mind, and "belief in the Judeo-Christian-Muslim God" is not is purely a social construct--it's a function of numbers.

There's no difference as far as evidence goes, it's just that more people share your hypothesis. That's why it's just as impossible to "refute" fairies, FSM, Teapots, etc, etc... as it is to refute the existence of the Judeo-Christian God.

Anyway, not to belabor the point, but the unexamined cultural assumption here is that "belief in faries == crazy" but "belief in angels == totally sane".

Labels do matter, because they carry lots of meaning. Just look at the conservative attempt to change the meaning of "liberal." The atheists' attemp to relabel everyone, with the illogical consequence that Mother Theresa with her occasional doubt fits your definition of "atheist," falls right in this pattern.

Also, please stop pretending the theist response is "don't challenge my faith." Nobody here has said that, in fact we're trying to engage you. That's a red herring and it's bad faith on your part.

We were talking about your fairy analogy. In fact, far from "don't challenge my faith," the response to your fairy analogy is that a little doubt is fine. Questioning your belief is good. It makes us normal. But your fairy analogy falls apart because questioning fairies just makes us sane. Questioning fairies does not put us in the same boat as you atheists wrt God. You can't create some labels based on specious analogies to fairies anthose these labels to define people of faith.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You can't claim With 100 percent certainty that there aren't green fairies dancing around me right now, it doesn't make it any lesS ridiculous. Look up "the scientific principle".

You make a valid philosophical point. And it cuts to the very heart of the atheist/agnostic hairsplitting. Unfortunately, PP will miss the point entirely, and rather than addressing the underlying epistemological question, will take this as a personal, below-the-belt attack on her personal beliefs.

Actually, the issue here is the way you use ad homimen attacks when you don't have a good answer! Trust me, my "belief system" can stand hearing a reasoned response instead of a silly ad hominem attack like this one.

Here, why don't you try again, go for it! Explain how your labels below make sense. Because, on the face of it, these labels DON'T make any sense:

- PERSON OF FAITH: 100% sure God (or fairies) exist. Includes Tea Party and other fundamentalists (and people who believe 100% in fairies).

- ATHEIST: 1% to 100% sure God doesn't exist. Includes Mother Theresa, people who currently call themselves agnostics and might be unhappy that you are relabeling them, Richard Dawkins, and all people who are 100% sure God doesn't exist and can ignore the intellectual failure of such a position. (Also, anybody who believes with less than 100% certainty in fairies is an "atheist.")

Maybe I'm being clueless, but I'm not sure why you're so keen on this point, as though you've found some sort of deep philosophical inconsistency rather than a meaningless debating point. It's pretty clear when you read Dawkins that he's making a point about what sorts of positive assertions one can make about the world--not just about metaphysical phenomena, but about whether the sun will rise tomorrow, or whether water will run downhill. So when he says he's a "six out of seven" on the Atheist Scale (or whatever), he's not expressing some sort of 1% likelihood that the Christian hypothesis of "God" is true. He's saying that rational people don't make those kind of assertions.

It's in line with saying "We know the Earth is round." It's not, it's an "oblate spheroid". Can we say this with 100% certainty? No. (Perhaps the concept "round" is meaningless in if we were to see things as they "truly" are. Does that mean we're open to the possibility that it's flat disk?

And "the Earth is round" is a positive assertion. The problem gets even thornier with the question of supernatural beings for whom there is no *positive* evidence, because proving a negative is a logical impossibility. Which is why arguments like the "Teapot Hypothesis" or "Flying Spaghetti Monster" are essential to understanding the critique.

A theist who is interested in having a good-faith debate about the issues would make an attempt to grapple with that critique. One who is arguing in bad faith will ignore it or get pissed off and disengage from the argument claiming "ridicule of my beliefs".

Anonymous wrote:"You make a valid argument" = Ranting Atheist

Yup; stupid mobile device.

"You make a valid argument" = Ranting Atheist

Serious question for 7:11: Where did you study rhetoric? Because you should ask for your money back. When a five-year-old can figure out you're dodging the question, it's time to upgrade your skill set.

Seriously PP. It doesn't make you look more intelligent. It just makes you look like a douche bag.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You can't claim With 100 percent certainty that there aren't green fairies dancing around me right now, it doesn't make it any lesS ridiculous. Look up "the scientific principle".

You make a valid philosophical point. And it cuts to the very heart of the atheist/agnostic hairsplitting. Unfortunately, PP will miss the point entirely, and rather than addressing the underlying epistemological question, will take this as a personal, below-the-belt attack on her personal beliefs.

Actually, the issue here is the way you use ad homimen attacks when you don't have a good answer! Trust me, my "belief system" can stand hearing a reasoned response instead of a silly ad hominem attack like this one.

Here, why don't you try again, go for it! Explain how your labels below make sense. Because, on the face of it, these labels DON'T make any sense:

- PERSON OF FAITH: 100% sure God (or fairies) exist. Includes Tea Party and other fundamentalists (and people who believe 100% in fairies).

- ATHEIST: 1% to 100% sure God doesn't exist. Includes Mother Theresa, people who currently call themselves agnostics and might be unhappy that you are relabeling them, Richard Dawkins, and all people who are 100% sure God doesn't exist and can ignore the intellectual failure of such a position. (Also, anybody who believes with less than 100% certainty in fairies is an "atheist.")

Ooh, Latin! Time for you to learn about a false dichotomy!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You can't claim With 100 percent certainty that there aren't green fairies dancing around me right now, it doesn't make it any lesS ridiculous. Look up "the scientific principle".

You make a valid philosophical point. And it cuts to the very heart of the atheist/agnostic hairsplitting. Unfortunately, PP will miss the point entirely, and rather than addressing the underlying epistemological question, will take this as a personal, below-the-belt attack on her personal beliefs.

Actually, the issue here is the way you use ad homimen attacks when you don't have a good answer! Trust me, my "belief system" can stand hearing a reasoned response instead of a silly ad hominem attack like this one.

Here, why don't you try again, go for it! Explain how your labels below make sense. Because, on the face of it, these labels DON'T make any sense:

- PERSON OF FAITH: 100% sure God (or fairies) exist. Includes Tea Party and other fundamentalists (and people who believe 100% in fairies).

- ATHEIST: 1% to 100% sure God doesn't exist. Includes Mother Theresa, people who currently call themselves agnostics and might be unhappy that you are relabeling them, Richard Dawkins, and all people who are 100% sure God doesn't exist and can ignore the intellectual failure of such a position. (Also, anybody who believes with less than 100% certainty in fairies is an "atheist.")

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

RantingAtheist wrote:
Just to clarify, atheists don't say Christianity is a fairy tale, or that God is a fairy in the sky, but rather that there is exactly as much evidence for belief in gods as for any given fairy in the sky. While you may not like this, this is objectively true. Furthermore, the Bible is some book that some men wrote. It's a perfectly valid opinion to find it silly to believe in that with no evidence.

Sorry to break this to you, Ranting Atheist, but you've just described an agnostic not an atheist. An agnostic is uncertain about the possibility of God, but not an atheist. I know some atheists like to try to define away the distinction between agnostic and atheist, so that whether you have some or total doubt, they call you an atheist. Obviously the people who want to redefine all agnostics as atheists realize that 100% certainty that God doesn't exist is intellectually indefensible. But this has always struck me as silly, because if everybody with a even slight question about God is an atheist, then you've redefined Mother Theresa as an atheist, and you've also redefined all people who call themselves "agnostic" right out of existence by relabeling them all atheists.

Not to mention, the agnostics who would prefer to redefine doubt/agnosticism into atheism are doing a real disservice to Mother Theresa
and all the other agnostics, by calling them atheists when they would prefer to be called normal people with doubt, or just agnostics, thank you very much.

You can't claim With 100 percent certainty that there aren't green fairies dancing around me right now, it doesn't make it any lesS ridiculous. Look up "the scientific principle".

You make a valid philosophical point. And it cuts to the very heart of the atheist/agnostic hairsplitting. Unfortunately, PP will miss the point entirely, and rather than addressing the underlying epistemological question, will take this as a personal, below-the-belt attack on her personal beliefs.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think I recognize OP now. She's the one pretending all atheists are sweetness and light, and then she turns around and bullies other Christians. Not exactly what the good book says.

Oh, I think the bible is very clear. "But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you" (Luke 6:27-28)

That is not meant to be taken literally, but rather, it is a very complicated and cryptic metaphor. Similar to the "rich man / camel / eye of needle" passage that socialists-masquerading-as-Christians are always trying to claim is relevant to modern society. When in fact it's just a anodyne description of 1st century logistics.

-RantingAtheist

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Actually, some Hindus DO take offense at the cultural appropriation going on in US yoga -- sanskrit chants and whatnot. My SIL is Indian, and she told me she was quite surprised to walk into a yoga class in the US and hear Hindu prayers.

And to make matters more complicated ... yoga is not really purely Hindu anyway. The emphasis on physical postures (asana) is a new thing. There's been a lot of research on this lately, and there's evidence that the physical postures are actually derived in part from British gymnastic practices taken to India in the 19th century. When yoga came to the US, it got mixed up with all sorts of traditional US things, like the religious revivalism of the late 19th century.

Good one!...not. yet another attempt to warp history to fit the "greatness of the white man".

You do realize that Patanjali's Yoga Sutra was written before the "dawn of christ". Let's not forget that it is also in the written in Vedas, Upanishads, and the Bhagavad Gita. But you'll probably find some "reliable (christian) source" that says they were all copied from the bible as well.

Thanks, PP. That gave me a good laugh as well. I was going to say the same thing. The asanas are not a 'new thing' at all. Practice yoga if you want, but tradional forms of yoga are based in Hinduism. Now, if you're talking about power yoga at Gold's or something, yeah, it might not be the same thing.

Anonymous wrote:OK, yes, thanks for reminding me of hypocrisy quote, and I'll try not to use it too much against you. I guess the only relevant thing is that you seemed to direct it right at me, and that's what riled me up.

Yes, the NT is very accepting to non-believers and strangers. And Jesus was also not bothered about the guy who did miracles in His name. For me the bottom line is really that a non-Christian celebrating Lent is welcome to get whatever he or she wants out of it.

However, the issue of nasty atheist posters is a separate issue, and I do think they need to be challenged. If it takes some frank talk, instead of sweet talk, then I don't see a problem with challenging them frankly.

Oh no, I didn't mean it toward you. I don't really know which poster you are. I thought that you were commenting that my post was judgmental, and I was defending it by pointing out that Jesus also criticized people who tried to deny access to God. Maybe I should have quoted Luke so that it would have been clearer: '“Woe to you experts in the law, because you have taken away the key to knowledge. You yourselves have not entered, and you have hindered those who were entering.” It's the same passage, but Jesus' point is that the Pharisees tried to put barriers between ordinary people and God by denying them access to knowledge.

In any case, I do agree that there are some mean-spirited atheist posters. I'll probably post something on that at some point. But I mostly post if I think I can change something for the better. But I can't convince Christians to be more Christian, so what influence would I have on atheists?

Sadly, I really didn't get much discussion going about inclusiveness aside from your comments, which is a shame. That was the purpose of this whole thread.