Babblings on religion

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Ok, this is probably driven more because certain antics have sort of upset me. Who has read these proofs of God?

http://www.godlessgeeks.com/LINKS/GodProof.htm

Are there any proofs anyone likes as in they find them funny? Does anyone recognize these arguments as being used to prove God? Why do you think that there are so many dishonest apologetic methods or dishonest apologists?

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/cre-error.html
http://mypage.direct.ca/w/writer/gish.html

Are Christians commanded not to use such tactics?

Exodus 23:1 "You shall not spread a false report. You shall not join hands with a wicked man to be a malicious witness. "

Romans 3:7-8 But if through my lie God's truth abounds to his glory, why am I still being condemned as a sinner? (8 ) And why not do evil that good may come?--as some people slanderously charge us with saying. Their condemnation is just.

1 Peter 3:15 but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect,

Any thoughts on the psychology of extreme versions of Christianity(or even other extremism in other religion) as opposed to atheism or more moderate variants of religion?

How should society/people deal with extreme versions of the religion? How should people with extreme religious beliefs interact with their society?

Blind pupils. -- As long as a man knows very well the strength and weaknesses of his teaching, his art, his religion, its power is still slight. The pupil and apostle who, blinded by the authority of the master and by the piety he feels toward him, pays no attention to the weaknesses of a teaching, a religion, and soon usually has for that reason more power than the master. The influence of a man has never yet grown great without his blind pupils. To help a perception to achieve victory often means merely to unite it with stupidity so intimately that the weight of the latter also enforces the victory of the former.

from Nietzsche's Human, all too Human

They are intellectually dishonest because they don't actually care about the science. They follow the concept of Presuppositionalism, that is, they assume their beliefs are correct and then cherry-pick data that fits their beliefs. They think they already know "the truth" and they just use scientific-sounding rhetoric as propaganda.

I read the first 50 before getting a bit bored. Three that I liked particularly, because I recognised them, having used them myself about certain beliefs in the past, or have read/seen and disliked/been irritated by others use of them:

Argument from Intimidation: "See this bonfire! Therefore God exists".
Internet Authority: "There is a website that successfully argues for the existence of God. Here is the URL. Therefore, God exists.
Sheer Will: "I do believe in God, I do I do I do...! Therefore, God exists."

Those made me laugh. But they all involve the conclusion "Therefore God exists" whereas I don't see belief in g/God as a declaration of "existence". It is a question of belief.

But perhaps that is exactly where religious extremism/fundamentalism problems arise, because they make it a matter of argument/proof/, of the same reality for everyone.

Last edited by ouinon on 12 May 2008, 5:58 pm, edited 2 times in total.

This is a very interesting question.

I have been through evangelical phases about a couple of things, though never religion, ( I "do-belief" in god in bursts, for a few days or weeks at a time, but don't think this necessarily has any more to do with other people than my gluten free/paleo diet ... ... ) !

I know that one major factor in my "dishonesty" was self-delusion. And another one was dependency. It was as if I "had" to believe; always it was because something seemed to offer a way out/a solution to "pain".

So I didn't allow myself to see that, for instance in the case of a personal development programme, one had to stay involved for it to work; recruiting, doing work for nothing at course weekends, calling people almost every evening for support sessions which could last hours especially because one became addicted to them, ( causing many people serious financial problems), doing the "processes" sometimes for hours a day to achieve the reaffirming rush of "clarity", and accepting the leaders/trainers words as gospel because they simply did not allow discussion of the material, not at least until you had attained a sufficiently senior position.

I insisted to many people for several years that it worked; I was convinced and would point out how this or that in my life was better etc, when nothing was really different, just the time, and money, and mental and emotional energy, ( even when not taking courses or doing the processing I would be aware of its teachings, though not that they were oppressive) , I was spending on this programme. I stopped seeing clearly, ironically because the message was that this programme helped you "see reality clearly".

I think it is a bit like an addiction. And perhaps people who behave like this need help to quit because it isn't easy. When I finally managed to throw off the blinkers and yoke I actually felt a sort of nausea/retching sensation as if I was vomiting up a poison that I had swallowed, and I could hardly believe how much my vision of things had been controlled and limited by it.

So yes, reason for a new dx maybe.

Last edited by ouinon on 12 May 2008, 6:09 pm, edited 7 times in total.

You are all going straight to hell.. and you KNOW it

There is no such thing as hell.

If people want to believe something strongly enough they will believe it, despite all inconsistencies and contrary evidence. It’s just how the majority of people’s brains are wired.

The most disturbing part is when they claim that they are the ones being completely objective and logical. I’m far more comfortable being a wishy-washy relativist aware of my own potential for bias than an absolutist completely unaware of his/her bias. I don’t think I could ever become an extremist unless I was tortured or brainwashed.

I know I’m a little biased towards atheism just because I see a lack of elegance and consistency in organized religion. As a rational thinker, there’s something aesthetically unpleasing to me in the idea of a psychologically anthropomorphic “being” that can exist outside everything (it would have to if it created everything) while still maintaining human-like emotions. That notion makes my brain hurt. But then again, maybe the world doesn’t have to make sense just because I want it to make sense. Maybe there is a "spiritual" realm after all.

That's basically how creation “science” works. No matter how many times you debunk their cherry-picked arguments they keep finding new ones. They never address that they were wrong about their previous argument.

The funny thing is they always deny that they are using Presuppositionalism. In fact, they are known to accuse the other side of Presuppositionalism. To them evolutionary theory presupposes atheism.

Awesomelyglorious, there are extremists on every side.

Now about the hardline Christians, they do so because what else would they have? Some prefer not to read contrary information, or hear anything that runs contrary to their ideas. They only want to be near that which makes them comfortable (a great majority of people are this way however).

Yes, this quote is very true. BUT, how many people truly want to know? From what I experience many question, not to understand, but to give weight to their beliefs. This is where the hardliners spread misinformation as well. As they are only looking to strengthen their beliefs, they do not bother learning of contrary information. If they happen to become informed, they'll exclaim "This is a minor exception, the rest is still incorrect." or they will say "This does not fall in line with what I know." There is nothing else.

However, I agree that false information is still false and will not help anyone in their religious services. This is why I find that a great deal of Christians who preach about or try to make you to donate money (Televangelists) are corrupt both in spirit and in teaching. Their teachings of "And HE will multiply" is something that I cannot accept because they will only multiply their own pockets.



My beliefs can be considered extreme compared to other people. I've no problem interacting with society. I just stay away from the people I don't want to be with. Although I will note that I find a majority of people very annoying. I also see them as living a corrupt lifestyle.

I consider myself an agnostic, I was also raised a catholic, by a very religious mother, who
always made this one belief very clear, other peoples opinions or beliefs should be respected.
Religious people are only trying to defend their beliefs in a god that may or may not exist,
and some are going to be extreme in their views, just like people who are agnostic or atheist,
this whole issue is getting real old, each side has to keep poking a stick into it to keep the
flaming and bickering going forever. You don't have to like each others beliefs, but you really
haven't the right to put down how other people believe in something.

I would say that a cognitive bias could lead to a lack of knowledge/intelligence, so the first two options are both applicable.

I personally am religious, but I don't try to shove it done people's throats, for a couple reasons. First, it's obnoxious when people do that. Second, it would be really arrogant of me to say "I know the path to salvation better than any of you, follow me!" There are plenty of people more intelligent and well-informed than myself who hold conflicting views on the subject of religion, so my level of intelligence and knowledge is probably not sufficient to determine conclusively who's right and wrong. I only know what seems to make sense to me, and for the most part I'm fine with other people believing what makes sense to them.

"For you your religion, for me my religion." -Muhammad

The sad fact is that no single person can see things totally objectively and free from bias (which is why we have peer review), we all carry around a mental model of reality in our heads that tries to pigeon-hole incoming sense-data into the model. Neuroscientist V. S. Ramachandran has hypothesized that the left hemisphere of the brain builds and maintains the mental model while the right hemisphere acts as a sort of internal critic, dismantling chunks of the mental model if the conflict with sense-data is too overwhelming. His evidence for this is people who are paralyzed in the left side of their body after a stroke in the right hemisphere often deny that there is anything wrong with them, the internal critic of the mental model has malfunctioned.

Usually that's true, but not always. There's actually a school of thought in Christian apologetics called "Presuppositionalism" whose proponents contrast it with "evidentialism". I've seen some argue that because everyone starts with unfounded premises, any are as good as any others. This school of thought actually goes so far as to say that certain Christian beliefs are the best set of premises to start with, and tend to assert that one cannot have logic or rationality or inductive reasoning without it. It's a bizarre world, eh?

lack of intelligence. they fail to comprehend the entirety of what's around them and so they out and out lie because the lie is more easy to digest than the reality.

most people would rather have a wrong answer than die never having an answer. i consider those people mentally weak and below me.