Dialogue with a skeptic

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steve
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Dialogue with a skeptic

Post by steve » Sun Sep 04, 2011 11:44 am

Darin Duphorne posted an audio clip from my radio program in which I explained to a caller that the naturalistic worldview can only be adopted at the expense of sacrificing open-mindedness. That is, a naturalist can only consider natural explanations of things, whereas a person who does not so artificially restrict his inquiries is free to consider the possibility of explanations that may be supernatural. I said that the fact that secularists find the story of creation and the Garden of Eden foolish and faerie-tale-like is that they have already decided, prior to investigation, that nothing supernatural can be considered, and that every reported miraculous event will thus seem faerie-tale-like to them. But this is merely the manifestation of their own prejudices, not of a more-rational approach. Darin’s friend Frank, an anti-supernaturalist, posted a response to this clip and a dialog between him and me resulted. If you are interested in reading any of that, it can be found at http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=1853899717723

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jriccitelli
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Re: Dialogue with a skeptic

Post by jriccitelli » Sun Sep 04, 2011 12:17 pm

We tried but the facebook url. says content now unavail. (?)
Last edited by jriccitelli on Mon Sep 05, 2011 8:15 am, edited 1 time in total.

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darinhouston
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Re: Dialogue with a skeptic

Post by darinhouston » Sun Sep 04, 2011 3:25 pm

I believe since it's my Facebook page I will take the liberty to re-post it here. Frank is a very old friend of mine and we were college room-mates one year.

See if this link works -- I re-posted the audio to Steve's page https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=1853899717723
Frank wrote:
He's right of course, on many points. And Darin, this is in tandem with our previous thread - which would require SUPREME effort for me to keep brief... But this commentator actually helps for brevity. I agree with his general premise, but the point is there IS no evidence for super-naturality. Certainly not to the extent of a sentient, prayer-accepting entity. A Deist first cause is the only rational possibility and there is no evidence for that either.

Science is open to ANYTHING, but you have to SHOW it. The evidence for evol. for ex. is overwhelming. That's why ID/creationism is immediately discounted. It's a religious perspective with no scientific evidence. Religion, religions and human psychology have been studied like crazy, scientifically, and there is absolutely nothing to show that they are anything OTHER than subjective/collective psychoemotional experiences.

And there is enormous evidence to show that they are ONLY subjective/collective psychoemotional experience. That's why people are able to fully accept, upon pain of death even, ideas and beliefs that in ANY other capacity would be regarded as insane. But a highly intelligent, well-educated religious believer can believe after flying a plane into a building, he'll receive 72 perpetual virgins. Or the Mormons and their Angel Moroni and golden tablets, or the Hindus praying to an elephant-headed pudgy fellow, or the christians and their talking bush on fire and virgin-born god-man.

Unless one psychologically internalizes these beliefs, they seem utterly ridiculous as factual - albeit replete with symbolism and psycho/social elements - that have great power- and some of which I think are quite positive. Ridiculous because they are completely contrary to rational thought (science).

He is correct when he uses the term "assume." But it's in the same way I (you too, I'm guessing) assume there are no faeries and no Santa. They haven't been shown to NOT exist, nor can they, but we we know how very "real" they can be to those who believe in them. In order for science, or a "naturalistic" world view to accept either case, they would have to be SHOWN to be true.

And statements in an ancient document, or current one, stating "self-veracity" is simply circularity. That means nothing at all and in no way counts as evidence. The Koran claims it's all true, as well. That's "faith" as defined in Hebrews, but there IS no "substance" to hope, and there IS no "evidence" of things unseen(unshown). Hope has value, of course, but it is entirely subjective. And this "evidence" is entirely the veracity of one's own subjective experience of their mind and emotionality. This is why the word "faith" means absolutely nothing in science.

This is why people of faith, about the world and of MANY faiths, all regard the OTHER faiths as false or delusions. The scientific claim is that they are ALL assumed to be psychological manifestations, unless shown otherwise. Which they aren't... except ONLY to their respective believers... who are certainly very faithful. Well shoot, that's about as brief as I can be, in my reply to our previous thread. Sorry if this took too much space.
Steve wrote:
No apologies necessary. Thanks for taking all the space you needed to get your thoughts out.

You begin by making a category error. You say, “but the point is there IS no evidence for super-naturality.” You might have said, “but the point is there IS no NATURAL evidence for super-naturality”—though no thinking person would be obligated to accept your word on that! There may be a very large body of natural evidences for the existence of the supernatural, of which you are unaware. On the other hand, if no naturalistic evidence for the supernatural were to be found, this does not prove that no evidence of any other kind (i.e., supernatural evidence) exists outside the realm of your narrow experience.

You are committing the most basic logical fallacy of them all: begging the question. In deciding whether all reality exists within the realm of nature or not, we can not begin the inquiry by establishing a rule that, since only nature exists, we must find evidence only in nature. Any person (you, for instance) may be free to make such irrational presumptions, if he wishes, but he must not expect others who know how to think to respect his methods!

You certainly talk as if you know something about the world’s religions—though nothing you have said here about them would require any research beyond an evening’s reading of any of several popular, pop-philosophical works by Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens, or some other totally subjective and poorly informed (or blindly prejudiced) critic. The sad thing is that most of their readers are even more ignorant than they are about the vast differences between world religions, and mistake them for informed and objective analysts. Only such ignorance would lead a critic to broad-brush all religious beliefs as if they all share equal evidential bases (or lack thereof).

I do not believe any test has been conducted, nor could be conceived, that would demonstrate that every claimed religious experience is “ONLY a subjective/collective psychoemotional experience.” However, if such a canard could be proved beyond credible dispute, I do not see what impact this would have on the validity of such religious experiences. My love for my children is little more than “a subjective/collective psychoemotional experience.” Yet, anyone who would deny its real existence, on those grounds, would simply make himself look foolish.

The statement that “The evidence for evolution…is overwhelming” is incredibly naïve. It either presupposes that “evolution” means nothing more than “change through time” (a long-proven phenomenon which no one of any religion has ever disputed), or else it supposes either that some evidence for evolutionary transitions between major animal and plant groups has been observed (which pure science would require), or that such have been documented (which historiography would require), or that such have been credibly explained (which logic would require). None of the above has been forthcoming, thus far. For the naturalistic philosopher or scientist, the means by which life arose originally, and by which complex organisms sprang into being, remain as speculative as they were when they were first postulated, and are purely a matter of the “skeptic’s” (strangely unskeptical) faith.

The comparison of belief in “a sentient, prayer-accepting entity," with belief in faeries and Santa Claus is a direct swipe from the literature of the “new-atheists”—or, to adopt their preferred (modest) self-designation, the “brights”—whose ideas about God are themselves merely a result of subjective/collective psychoemotional experience—certainly not of science or logic.

I say this comparison must be a plagiarism, since no rational person, thinking logically and independently of these pseudo-scientific pop-philosophers, could make the mistake of seeing any validity in such a bizarre comparison. The basis for belief in God is not even in the same domain as belief in superstitions—which is why belief in God exists (and has always existed) among even the most-imformed and intellectually elite men and women in the world. Such endorsements obviously do not prove the existence of God, but how many people in these classes can be found to believe in Santa Claus or in faeries?

The only thing that God, Santa and faeries have in common with each other is that no one has seen any of them. This is a distinction that they have in common with music, humor, justice, eros, peace, sub-atomic particles, the origin of life, and the brains of those involved in this discussion. But faith that these things exist is generally not regarded as irrational.

The virginal boy, who has never had an intimate relationship with a woman, may scoff at belief in sexual pleasure as much as he wishes. He can even refer to such as “subjective/collective psychoemotional experiences” in which "only fools could believe." However, no happily-married man will be impressed with, nor embarrassed by, the criticism—nor will he envy the inexperienced lad.
Frank wrote:
Well, I wrote a rebuttal and you're wrong about all your points (ha ha! of course...) but man, it is in no way brief. Not really fair to Darin for me to unleash a 3700 word piece on his fb (I used to write... a LOT), but I did take a couple hours to write it, so I would like you to read it if you like, otherwise that's fine, it's good mental exercise for me. If Darin is okay with my posting it (it's not mean or anything), I'll do so, but otherwise I'll just attach and messege you with it. So Darin, that's your call.
Darin wrote:
Of course.
Frank wrote:
I’ll respond to your paragraphs in numerical order. I’m a brusque and say what I think, so please don’t mistake my method for rudeness, as that isn’t my intention. I may not respect your beliefs as objective truths, but that doesn’t mean I disrespect you as a person.

Para. 1.) Nope, I didn’t make a mistake. I’ll rephrase with more qualifications, however. In the way that “we” (and I’m referring to scientific answers/definitions that “we” humans have arrived upon for things – in an objective way) understand what “evidence” is (including the English dictionary – “to make clear”), my statement that “there is no evidence” is true. Maybe there is some “evidence” out there we are unaware of - of course this could be true. This could be true for absolutely ANYTHING, as well. But in the way we define evidence, in the same way we use it to travel in space, make buildings not fall down, and cure small pox…, there is NO evidence (“available to us” if you like). “Evidence” that may be out there may also NOT be out there, and certainly doesn’t count as evidence until it is clear. Moreover, no one could ever make the claim that they “ABSOLUTELY” know anything at all. We do the best we can with what is available or evident to us. I don’t absolutely KNOW that gravity or what we call gravity, is going to work in the same way next year, but I have a strong assumption that it will, based on what we do know about gravity. Your objection to my statement also applies to leprechauns and unicorns, as well as the assertion of the divinity of Gonesh, Jesus and Mohammed’s winged horseback ride to Jerusalem being true. There is no way to prove, disprove or clearly show any of these. Objectively. Which is what proof or evidence entails. Some form of “evidence” that is UNavailable to us is anyone’s ball game and ALL bets are off. Including yours. Descartes might suggest that maybe there’s no god, but a satanic figure is actually fooling you to believe in one, for some purpose that we are unaware of. Your objection gives this statement the same credence. And there is no evidence for it being true, either.

Para. 2) Nope, I’m not begging the question. I don’t absolutely know that only nature exists, at all. I make an ASSUMPTION that all that we know of - that is entailed within what we call “nature” - exists. And the reason being is there is nothing that is available that is recognizable as objective evidence for this not being the case. Perhaps there are undetectable spirits that move my arms and legs parallel to my mind willing them to move, giving me the sensation of mechanically doing so. Or that (a) God, Allah or Zeus is watching and judging me. But without evidence for such forces, I assume that I am in charge of my arm movements, and what all goes into that which is “I.” And that I’m not being judged by a god.

Para. 3) Yes, I do know something of the world’s religions. I’ve studied and traveled about the world a bit. I’ve been to mosques in the Mid East, Africa and Bosnia, Buddhist temples in Thailand, Cambodia, Taiwan and Hong Kong, Spent an early morning in a Hindu temple in northern India once. I spent 14 days in Haiti with the express purpose of going to Voodoo ceremonies and Voodoo doctors so as to experience, learn and write about Voodoo. I’ve experienced Indo-hispanic “catholic-ish” folk religion in a few Central American countries and Mexico. Not to mention my exposure to many Christian and Jewish temples here in America and about the world as well. I’ve also many friends of these different religions and have freely discussed with them. I’ve read the Bible, Book of Mormon, Dhamapada, Tao te Ching, much of the Koran and some of the Bagavad Gita. I don’t feel compelled to belabor proof to you my knowledge of such things, but I also assume you’ll take my word for it.

I do know of those authors, but I must admit I’ve never read any of their books. I’ve been an atheist since long before those books were written. I just googled their bios and Hitchens has a degree in philosophy, econ and politics from Oxford. Harris has a degree in philosophy from Stanford and a Phd in neuroscience from UCLA. I’m not sure how you can say they are poorly informed… those are of the top tier finest programs for such knowledge in the entire world, quite likely THE top.

From a religious believer’s perspective, there are a MULTITUDE of reasons for belief in a particular religion. And a MULTITUDE of differences between them, as well. I’ll agree. But OBJECTIVELY, they ARE all the same. They all have the same elements. Durkheim was perhaps the first to make that distinction widely shown. In a nutshell, they all serve the same social and psychological functions. Some sort of sacred force, a way to get the force/god(s) to work in your favor, a form of justice, social rules, special human spokesmen, assuagement of the fear of death… There are others and other qualifiers, but this is from whence you are getting the sense of others’ “broad stroke” perspectives. And I agree, there are certainly many, many small strokes, which science recognizes as well, but there are also these broad strokes they fit neatly under. They are very clear broad strokes if one is not trying to defend their particular faith. And you don’t have to “believe” the broad strokes, they are objective.

Believers of other religions have the very same objection to this that you do. Psychology says it’s for the same reason, to continue to justify their belief without objective evidence. And yes, in the way that evidence is defined, they do all have the same amount. None. Perhaps Muslims and Christians and Hindus are tuned into some evidence that is not available to others, that only they have, but they will all claim their belief is true and they cannot all be correct. It appears very much that there is another element at work here, a deep desire to believe. 100 yrs ago, Freud called this a “religious illusion.” I also have a degree in psychology, a master’s in philosophy and a phd in sociology/anthropology - whatever that is worth to you as indication of my knowledge base. Based on your assessment of Oxford and Stanford graduates, I’m guessing you discount academic knowledge if it doesn’t jive with your religious position. Degrees don’t make anyone correct, but I certainly don’t regard these topics frivolously, or from ignorance.

Para. 4) That such beliefs are not objective is as utterly self-evident as saying, “what we call blue jays are not what we call swans.” Either ALL religions are false or one particular perspective is true, and that perspective eludes EVERYONE that doesn’t already believe it, and there is STILL no evidence. The “test” if you will is evident in that some people are willing to die believing in X, some believing in Y, and there is nothing objective to show that one or both are true. And a priori they can’t BOTH be. But prayers can and HAVE been studied scientifically and shown to have no bearing greater than chance upon an outcome. Religions that believe in gods to pray to, speciously explain this in a small range of ways, none of which can be proven or disproven. Like the god didn’t want to, or has a better plan, or knows better than what I wanted, or will do it later… etc. But what CAN be shown, is that they don’t alter outcomes. They DO make people feel better though, like they could maybe influence the god in their favor. It DOES assuage fears and bolster hopes. And I see some value in that, but these are of psychology and emotionality, not the cold hard facts of objective reality.

YES! We agree! The experiences are VALID. They are REAL experiences and they can certainly change a person’s life, the way they see it and live it. Wm. James wrote a book about this, “The Varieties of Religious Experience.” However, these experiences are entirely subjective/emotionally based and there is no evidence whatsoever that they are going on anywhere other than the persons’ minds. Like a fantasy, a dream, a thought, a delusion or a hallucination. Those are all real experiences, all subjective and purely psychological. You can pray to Jesus, a Hindu to Shiva, a Rastafarian to Jah (stoned) and a Voodoo believer to Dhambala, and ya’ll will all have meaningful religious experiences. To yourselves, in your minds. A child can be raised to worship a volcano or a river, and as an adult that volcano will give him meaningful religious experiences, also. But not to you. Certainly not in the way that they do for those believers. If you look about the world, and even amongst Christians, you see that most people are very easily led to believe absolutely ANYTHING. You are one of them. So are the Christians that you argue against. Your love for your children is certainly real love, but yes, it is a psychoemotional experience – of your very own. This is very different than stating Shiva is in control of tsunamis and earthquakes or that Jesus or some other god(s) made something happen that we can all experience objectively. I’ve seen the look on a child’s face when he sees that Santa ate the cookie and drank the milk, I’ve been that child myself. Those are valid and real experiences as well. Your children exist, and Santa does not, but these experiences are similarly subjective only.

Para. 5.) Nope, the evidence for evolution is most certainly not naïve. You obviously haven’t studied it academically. True, we can’t go back in time, and there are no ancient documents (altho they themselves wouldn’t mean anything anymore than the Koran/Bible does), but it is very credibly explained, and there is evidence galore. It has been and is continuing to be studied to an enormous degree at the major universities throughout the world, with exceptions only to small schools and a small minority of scientists who are also attached to a religious creation story, usually the Christian evangelical one. All of the fields of science, geog, chem, bio, geol and their subsets like genetics, all point to the same evolutionary mechanism. There is certainly some squabbling amongst scientists regarding some particulars, but the general picture is utterly logical, quite obvious and agreed upon. I’ve studied it extensively at the graduate level myself. I would believe in a god WAY before I could ever cast aside the evidence for evolution. I’d just see it as the god’s method of life speciation. In fact, there are many scientists (altho a minority of scientists) who see it just that very way. If you study evolution academically it is very logical and obvious. The Pope accepts evolution as viable. Reading about it in Christian or apologetic publications is akin to learning about Christianity from a Muslim Imam. That’s just silly as there’s nothing objective about that method.

Yes, you are correct, we don’t know how the biochemical reaction that we call “life” first occurred. Everything from that point on is well known, studied and so logical and obvious that it is regarded as fact. And yes, to my mind that leaves a door open for an unknown force to have “made” it happen. A philosophical Deistic approach is plausible in my book. But there’s no more evidence for that than not. We may in the future discover some way to replicate abiogenisis, rudimentary “life” from non-life, or we may never. Evolution doesn’t know or pretend to know how this occurred. I’m sure there are some interesting ideas out there, but I’m a “show me the money” sort of person and regard it to be simply unknown. And no, it’s not “faith.” There are theories and assumptions in science, based upon evidence, equally ready to be disproven as proven. However, taking the case that we don’t know how life began and wildly extrapolating that point to a talking bush/ donkey, virgin births (a common religious theme), prayers being answered and special men being sent by an entity to lead various socio-cultural groups, is totally a non-sequitur. It doesn’t follow in any way whatsoever, but humans for all of recorded history have craved it like baby ducks following whatever they first see after they are born. It follows a social and a psychological pattern to a tee. Dogs like to be in packs, humans like to believe in religions. People IN it can’t see that, because they are IN it. Mormons don’t see it either, for the same reasons, for ex.

Para 6 and 7. No, I’m not plagiarizing. Those same comparisons have been around far longer than those guys have. Leprechauns and unicorns as well as Santa, Zeus, faeries and the Easter bunny have long been used academically as cultural examples of mythological beings. Socrates regarded the “gods of the city” (Athens) in the same way. I first began to seriously doubt in the 6th grade while attending a private Christian school, and well-remembered when I believed in Santa, and when I stopped. I compared that feeling of doubt and loss to what I was also beginning to wonder about what might be a “Santa” for grown-ups. I’d never even heard the word “atheist” then, or had any idea what philosophy or logic was. But a LOT of stuff I was taught most certainly did not make sense to me. I know now that was because it WASN’T logical. In phil. grad school it was common to use “unicorns” and “leprechauns” as well. It’s likely these authors use those terms too. I guess you could say THEY are plagiarizing from many thinkers before them… but the use of common terms isn’t considered plagiarizing, it’s simply using an apt metaphor. There are also many common theistic metaphorical terms that have been floating around for years, decades and centuries. That doesn’t degrade their use in any way.

Elite intellectuals about the world who believe in god(s) are far outnumbered by those who don’t, because most see religion as a delusion. This doesn’t prove anything either, but those intellectuals also believe in a WIDE range of concepts about “God(s).” Most of which are entirely incompatible. All this shows is that even some intellectuals will cling to a subjective belief that has a positive emotional effect on them that they won’t let go of even without evidence. Religion/God(s) provides a sense of security to humans. We are also a herd animal and like to believe what everyone around us does also. It doesn’t matter what these beliefs are, my statements are still self-evident. Santa can be shown to be false on xmas morning. Faeries can’t, but they occupy the same superstitious role as angels and spirits. Socially, faeries are far more scoffed than angels, or a god, because these are very common beliefs. But if you raise a kid to believe in faeries, the kid may very well grow up to believe in faeries. Will be chastised, tho, so that may change it, or they’ll keep quiet about it, or they’ll just hang out with others who believe the same thing. Fellowship.

Yeah, I’ve heard that term “brights” before, and I think it’s terrible. There is, however, a very high correlation of I.Q and education to LACK of religious belief. This is commonly known/studied and the statistics abound. There is even a higher correlation to LOW IQ/ education to religious belief. This means that people with lower IQ’s and/or lower ed. levels are extremely likely to also be religious. That’s likely why they use the term “brights.” However, there are certainly VERY educated and VERY intelligent people who are VERY religious. They are a much smaller number than those of high levels who AREN’T, but they are not uncommon. In fact, those who flew the planes into the towers were very intelligent and very well-educated people. So were Anselm and Aquinas, who brilliantly put together the Church’s apologetics of the time, many still being used. So was Newton a believer, however he also believed in alchemy and a bunch of occult-ish stuff too. (google) The director of the Genome Project is a Christian, altho very much an evolutionist. I have a number of friends who are believers, one is a believing Hindu even (not common among the educated ones…) who has a PhD in engineering and is extremely intelligent. But there is a human psychological element that makes it very difficult to disengage from such irrationality. And I certainly assume that you regard praying to Lord Shiva, a statue of a 4-armed man holding fire, made of metal no less, as irrational or false. Maybe you believe Shiva exists too, though, I don’t know.

I can’t speak of those authors’ psychoemotional experiences, or their texts, but I did read a review of Harris’s book in the NY Times some years ago and it sounded UTTERLY logical. There is nothing logical about a virgin having a kid with a god, or a boat built by a 900 yr. old man with billions of animals on it, and his sons and wives walking to areas of the earth to start the races (Jews with technology turning black and starting the Negroid race with stone tools and no trace of Hebrew in their languages?) or the god having his kid/himself killed because everyone is guilty at birth because a forebear ate the wrong fruit as tempted by a woman and a talking snake? Or a person turning into salt, or water into wine… or Mohammed flying to Jerusalem on a winged horse and ascending to god incarnate (in front of 1700 witnesses, no less) In ANY other capacity, these stories would be considered absurd and obvious mythology. This is not logical to believe at all. Evolution is ENTIRELY logical. Science is BASED on logic. If the logic fails, the science changes. As far as life goes however, science stops at the beginning of it. It also stops at the “big bang.” At those points we have only ideas with no substance bc there is no evidence. One of those ideas with no evidence is a supreme entity of some sort.

Para 8 and 9) No, they also have in common that people who really believe in them have to WANT to believe in them very badly, or know nothing else, or they vanish as a plausible idea. And no, they are in no way like music or humor, etc. These things are all objectively experienced. Maybe what is funny to you isn’t to me, and much of rap music I don’t find pleasant, but as these ideas are defined, they exist as them. They are ideas with real, objective manifestations (sound, etc.) and treated as such. The origin of life is a question. YOU think you know the answer, but science doesn’t, because science requires evidence. And our brains most certainly exist. If you mean our “minds,” or consciousness, yes, what we call consciousness is certainly existent. It is an electro-chemically caused sensation that our brains produce, allowing us to have thoughts and feelings and such. Dogs and other animals have it too, but to a much lower level of complexity. There is no faith that any of these things exist except your faith of the origin of life. I believe that the IDEAS of God, Jesus the son, Mohammed the prophet, Gonesh and unicorns exist, but I don’t believe they exist beyond idea. Unless shown otherwise, I assume they are false. Jesus and Mohammed were probably real people with followings at the time, but humans sure love to make up stories and believe them, and there is no evidence for their supernatural stuff at all.

I agree with your last statement as you put it, but there is no comparison between sexual pleasure or any other kind of pleasure and the idea of a god, spirits or the like. Sexual pleasure etc., can easily be manipulated, tested, neurologically faked, artificially reproduced or eliminated. We know all about it. It is an entirely physical and mechanical event. The fact that the virginal boy knows not of this pleasure, means nothing other than that. But what he knows not of is an objective event. He may not know that it hurts to cut off a finger, and scoff at those who say it hurts, but this means nothing either. That event is entirely manipulable and entirely mechanical also. These are objective events even tho the EXPERIENCE of pain or pleasure is a subjective one. They are objective events because we know exactly how the pain and the pleasure work. We can manipulate, enhance, diminish or eliminate them all day long.

Because it’s your closing, I glean that you meant I, or those like me are as that lad and know nothing of what you experience, and that you don’t envy me and my lack of what you experience. If that’s correct, I wouldn’t expect you to envy me. I’ve no doubt your beliefs make you happy/satisfied/fulfilled. All religious beliefs do just that, that’s one of the main reasons most humans embrace them, other reasons being thwarting fear of death and explaining things that at the time of the religion’s conceptions were entirely unknown. Or just flat-out fear of what they’ve been told befalls non-believers. Not to mention the sociological elements, which are vast. This is why many religious people have issue with science, because we know stuff now that we didn’t then, and that threatens their belief. My Hindu friend has subjective pleasant experiences with his beliefs that I don’t share and neither do you. But I might say the same thing, of course. I’ve an outlook on life that I would give to you as a gift if you were miserable, and if I could. It was a hard row to hoe to arrive at my place, as I just bet it was for you too…

I regard life as being very precious, and I find meaning in it every way I possibly can. I’m also an artist. I live, I love and I treat others well. I find satisfaction in many kinds of work and the tiniest things, and I find purpose in many ways also. I am very pleased that I can experience these things and my emotions surrounding them without having to believe (and fear NOT believing) in a particular set of stories that to ANYONE who has not psychologically internalized them, would find bizarre, absurd and mythological. I am in no way envious of your experiences with your belief either. Although I wish you could enjoy life without them - because I regard such beliefs (not the experiences) as being inauthentic and in need of constant nurturance to stay functioning - I’m also glad that you are happy, assuming you are. I’m glad my Hindu friend is happy also, even though I think he is just praying to a piece of metal or wood.

I don’t know anything about you, but my guess is that you’ve been run through a gauntlet in life, it was bad, but you came out of it and became a believer or a fervent one. Often there are drugs or alcohol abuse or something debilitating. Many ministers have such painful stories. I could be wrong about you, but you clearly care a LOT more than the “average believer” who is just going along for the ride, and there are some common scenarios behind that fervor. If I’m correct about that, or not, my claim is that it’s your BELIEF that gives you pleasure and purpose, not any entity that you are believing IN. I.e. if I’m right, and there is no god/Jesus, your belief in it/them would still give you the exact same sensations and meaning. Just like it does to all the other people of the world who have religious beliefs of their own – past and present. Belief is extremely powerful, but in no way does it need to be a true belief in order to have that psychological power. Just imagine believing that for killing thousands of innocent civilians, along with yourself, you are rewarded in heaven with a particular number of virgin girls. They weren’t crazy, or morons, they just BELIEVED THEIR RELIGION. Like me, I assume you think that belief was false… I forgot to mention that it’s only Catholics who see the Virgin Mary on moldy walls and cheese sandwiches and stuff, and thousands of them will come to have their experience of it. Non-Catholic Christians don’t ever care about such things. The Catholics’ experience of the cheese sandwich virgin Mary is a very real experience, but it certainly doesn’t need to be based on anything real or true at all. It’s just in their heads. They’re psychologically attached to their belief, been taught to believe Mary can show up on a cheese sandwich, and so they show up as well. And look, there she is…

I actually wrote my dissertation about this sort of stuff. Not atheism, but what I called conventional and unconventional religious belief. If you go to the TAMU Evans Library online and search for “Frank Stanford, The Frozen Lake” you may enjoy it even in disagreement. Have a good day. Frank
Steve wrote:
Frank, Thanks for writing and responding to my points. I will have to stand by my arguments, however. I find nothing objectively evidential in yours—just an unsubstantiated and dogmatic apologetic for your religious beliefs.

A worldview is a faith system. You have put yours (as I have put mine) on display. One difference between us is that I admit to having a worldview, whereas you simply act as if yours is reality itself. For example, it is not in your province, nor in mine, to force restricted definitions upon important words in a discussion—like the word "evidence" (the key word in your first post)—simply because our faith system cannot accommodate the real definitions. You have arbitrarily chosen to limit what you call "evidence" to one narrow category, called "scientific" evidence. This you seem to have done without lexical nor logical warrant. Obviously, this is your prerogative, but it exposes your faith system, stripped of its mask of objectivity.

Obviously, in a court of law, eye-witness testimony is counted as "evidence"—though it is not "scientific" evidence. That anyone should decide, a priori, that "scientific evidence" is all that can be regarded as "evidence" lays bare his hyper-reductionistic prejudices and renders his argumentation mere faith and dogma.

You have become "Exhibit A" in demonstrating the point I made in the above audio clip, viz., that naturalism artificially binds its advocates in an intellectuial straight-jacket. It is, I believe, the most narrow-minded of all available worldviews—and is thus the antithesis of the academic ideal. An open-minded person knows and will consider that the range of available evidences cannot legitimately be limited to those of one arbitrarily-defined category—the only one we dare consult, lest we endanger our position by objectively considering the full range.

I considered taking your statements one-by-one for analysis and criticism, but I have better uses of my time than to debate a Fundamentalist. You are not objective enough to see any possibilities outside your arbitrary, subjectively-based faith system. If you know an open-minded (that is, genuinely intellectual) atheist who would enjoy honest dialogue, please send him my way.

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darinhouston
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Re: Dialogue with a skeptic

Post by darinhouston » Sun Sep 04, 2011 3:32 pm

Further response from Frank:
Frank wrote: Wow, again Steve... I was completely honest with you personally and intellectually. Apparently you don't understand anything I've said or what the term "intellectual honesty" means. I was very clear in stating that I could be wrong about anything, and why. You won't, however. And try telling a court you witnessed a man on a winged horse flying in the sky and see if your eye-witness counts as evidence. Ask them why it doesn't. Then add that you have book that says 1700 people have saw it too. Then add that the book says that the book is true, and you find that supportive of your claim. Then call the judge a "fundamentalist legalist" when you are subsequently dismissed. You will have shown evidence for something else, however. I said I was glad that your beliefs make you happy, and I meant that, but I don't think I still wish you could be happy without your beliefs because it's more important to me that you are happy than which perspective gets you there. Enjoy the day."

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RICHinCHRIST
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Re: Dialogue with a skeptic

Post by RICHinCHRIST » Sun Sep 04, 2011 9:02 pm

I have an uncle who posted on one of my Facebook posts and called the Christian faith "a fairy tale". I saw this excerpt on the homepage of Facebook and shared it on my own wall and tagged my uncle in it. He didn't respond back. I'm glad this man was at least willing to dialogue. Most people just disregard a rational argument such as the one included on that excerpt.

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steve
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Re: Dialogue with a skeptic

Post by steve » Fri Sep 09, 2011 11:27 am

This response is too long to occupy a single post here, so it is posted in two parts...

Hi Frank,

I know that you don’t know me, and have already diagnosed me as an angry person, who has unresolved trauma issues. Therefore, you might misinterpret a testy jab here and there, on my part, taking advantage of the weakness of what I perceive to be one of the many vulnerable points in your arguments, as mean-spiritedness. On the contrary, I’m actually having a bit of fun with this, so I hope you can take it in the spirit of good-natured competition. You are the one who set the tone for this dialogue. Although there was nothing aggressive, nor offensive, in the tone of the audio clip to which you first responded, you nonetheless jumped in, unprovoked, with both guns blazing. I thought you were setting the precedent for the tone in which you wished for others to respond. I hope you won’t cry “foul” upon discovering that the camp you have chosen to assail is heavily armed—and not committed to non-resistance. I give my disclaimer at the outset. I will not pull punches. If we are both honest men, then vigorous, not vapid, debate is the only kind that we can enjoy and respect.

Darin has mentioned to me that you feel you were insulted by me in my former posts. You think it ironic that, in our interaction, the Christian insulted the atheist, while the atheist did not insult the Christian (your apparent perception). Now, since you are schooled in psychology and sociology, you may have a better grasp than would a rank layman, like myself, on the concept of what does, and what does not, constitute an “insult” (certainly an entirely subjective phenomenon). From my benighted point of view, it seems that an ordinary man who is told that his worldview places him in the same psychological category with terrorists, who fly planes into buildings to kill innocent people, might regard this as an insulting remark. I suppose that it takes a person as well-trained as yourself to see that such comparisons should be taken by the one so described only as an objective and constructive evaluation, and that (being the assessment of an expert), such criticisms should be accepted with gratitude—perhaps even with prostrate abjection.

Of course, when I heard the report that I had insulted you, I combed carefully through my previous posts in order to find what element in them might have been so construed by a self-possessed man of learning, like yourself. All I could find in my posts was a reference to you as a “fundamentalist.” Since you have a taste for ironies, do you not find it amusing that the man who is gratuitously likened to an Islamo-fascist must never find this offensive, while a man being referred to as a “fundamentalist” must assume a posture of wounded dignity?

Our mutual friend Darin also shared some of what you wrote off-line to him, in which you apparently had a few more directly insulting things to say—seemingly giving you a slight lead on the insult tally. Perhaps you will think me to have evened-up the score in the present response, but it is not my intention to insult anyone—though it is hard to guarantee that rational criticisms will never be received with offense by the one critiqued. I am an educator. My sole interest in life is in identifying errors in thinking (my own and others’) and attempting to bring more clarity. If you tell a student he is failing miserably, he might feel his pride insulted, but he ought, instead of taking offense, make an effort to correct his trajectory. I realize that you have not asked to be my student, but you have submitted a "paper" for my evaluation, so it seems within my province to give it a grade (with my constructive criticisms attached).

Other than the use of the term “fundamentalist,” I could not find anything that I said that a person of normal emotional health should find offensive (Of course, I am not including “monumental arrogance” within the domain of "normal emotional health"). You must agree that a man who gets his panties in a wad, simply because another man is less than impressed with his pretenses of erudition, is not a healthy boy. Christians may be required to turn the other cheek, but no one ever is obliged to turn the other ear when hearing nonsense that calls for rebuttal. For this reason, I have reconsidered, and have decided to answer your last post after all.

First, a couple of the terms that I will use frequently should be clearly defined. One is “fundamentalist,” and the other is “open-minded thinker.” Without some explanation of my intended usage, one might assume that I intend the first of these as a term of abuse reserved for those with whom I disagree, while the other is being bestowed as a reward upon those wise and good enough to share my opinions. The fact that skeptics typically use these words in this disingenuous manner may engender that presumption.

Though the label “fundmentalist” is indeed used, in our times, almost exclusively as a term of derision, this was not always the case. The term was once used only of a group of conservative Christian scholars, and did not carry the negative associations that it now generally has. The first “fundamentalists” were Princeton scholars of impeccable credentials, who sought, by scholarly argumentation, to reassert what they regarded to be the “fundamentals” of historic Christianity in a time (the early 1900s) when European “modernist” scholars were challenging the reliability of those fundamentals. Fundamentalism was, in those days, an intellectually respectable movement.

That has changed in modern times. Today “fundamentalist”, when applied to Christians, usually means a pig-headed, intractable, religious bigot—who, as likely as not, will be envisaged carrying a sandwich-board with the slogan "God hates fags!" upon it.. Nor is the term popularly confined to “Christian” bigots, but also (even more commonly in our time) to Muslim extremists. The word’s original meaning has morphed to the point that, in common usage, it is thought to mean a (usually stupid) person blindly committed to a religious ideal, and immune to persuasion by any amount of evidence contrary to their position. Since the word hasn’t the same connotations to all people, I must clarify that I mean it in this latter, popular sense.

Thus no gratuitous insult was or is intended. It is being used as a term having a precise meaning—i.e., that of a person whose normal ability to think clearly seems to be paralyzed by a predominant religious prejudice. The word, in my usage, can be applied to any such people, regardless what their religious orientation—including certain people who share my general worldview, as well as atheists.

On the other hand, when I speak of an “open-minded thinker,” I am simply referring to an honest and rational person, who is capable of weighing the value of an argument and is willing to take all the facts into account, and to let them lead to whatever convictions are best supported by the evidence. The truth will always have the best arguments. For that reason, a truth seeker will always be interested in hearing the very best evidence available for every alternative position, so as to be able to recognize which of the alternatives has the best claim on his confidence. This is what I mean by an “open-minded thinker.”

Therefore, it should not be thought that the deck is being stacked against unbelievers by this choice of vocabulary. Some believers are fundamentalists, some are open-minded thinkers; some non-believers are fundamentalists, while others are open-minded thinkers. It is not really hard to tell them apart. One insists upon following the evidence, while the other accepts only what agrees with his prejudices.

It seems that you have gotten in over your head in this dialogue. This is difficult to conceal in your writing. Since you find yourself unable to answer rational objections against, nor present positive evidence for, your worldview, you simply do what any insecure debater does to save face: resort to the use of ad hominem. You strike me as a man who never met a logical fallacy that he did not like—though you are apparently more unfamiliar with them than you think you are, and, amusingly, you denied that you had resorted to them! At least denial is itself not another logical fallacy—it is merely a clinical pathology. In writing me off as one who is allegedly troubled by unresolved trauma issues, rather than answering my points, you commit this fallacy in spades (before denying it, this time, you might look it up—it is the third logical fallacy found in your correspondence thus far). If (as may be the case) you have been out of school too long, I will remind you of the formal definitions of these fallacies:

Definition of “Category Error" (from: About.com)
A category error occurs when someone acts as though some object had properties which it does not or cannot have. The reason why it cannot have those properties is because the properties belong to objects in some other category or class.


This would occur, for example, when a man argues that things existing in the non-natural realm must possess the ability to be tested naturally.

------------------------------------

Definition of “Begging the Question” (from fallacyfiles.org)
The phrase "begging the question", or "petitio principii" in Latin, refers to the "question" in a formal debate—that is, the issue being debated. In such a debate, one side may ask the other side to concede certain points in order to speed up the proceedings. To "beg" the question is to ask that the very point at issue be conceded, which is of course illegitimate.


This would obviously occur, for example, when the "question" being debated is whether scientific evidences are the only legitimate evidences worthy of consultation, and the debater argues that they must be, because they are the only evidences for which scrientific evidence can be found!

----------------------------------

Definition of ad hominem (from Wikipedia):
An ad hominem (Latin: "to the man", "to the person"), short for argumentum ad hominem, is an attempt to negate the truth of a claim by pointing out a negative characteristic or belief of the person advocating it.


This would occur, for example, when a debater, finding himself out of his depth and incapable of addressing the real arguments of his opponent, should begin to call him "a man of little education," or "of a low IQ", or a “religious nut.” Such tactics are intended to misdirect attention from the merits of the actual arguments, by suggesting that the person making them is unworthy of consideration.
Any of these sound familiar? Do I need to quote the actual examples from your posts, or can you find them yourself? I pointed them out in situ. If you wish, I can cut and paste them from both of your former posts (along with your denials of having made them!!!!).

With these preliminary explanations behind us, I will turn to the specific points raised in your last posting to me. I will quote you in black text, and give my responses in blue:

I’ll respond to your paragraphs in numerical order. I’m a brusque and say what I think, so please don’t mistake my method for rudeness, as that isn’t my intention.

Better a “brusque” than a “bright,” I would say! By the way, it is not my intention to be rude either. I suspect that, in the process of making a prolonged presentation, the measured language that is attempted at the beginning tends to get run over by an adamant stream of consciousness. If I succumb to the same tendency, I apologize in advance. If I resort to a short and snide remark, I hope you will recognize that I am being playful.

In my answers to your points I will actually quote your own words, so that I cannot be accused of misconstruing you. This is a far preferable method than that of criticizing a mere summary of what a man’s general position is assumed to be. If you wish to critique my thoughts, please be so responsible as to cite my actual statements (since, without doing so, we will have no way of knowing whether you are answering my actual beliefs or a mere caricature of them).


I may not respect your beliefs as objective truths, but that doesn’t mean I disrespect you as a person.

It is a relief to know that you do not disrespect Christians, as persons, any more than you disrespect the 9/11 airplane bombers, as persons. Nor, apparently, do you recognize any glaring differences between the two. The common tactic of the new atheists is to lump Christians and Muslims together as “religious believers” and then to criticize the actual behavior of extremists, with the pretense that “this is what religious belief does to a person.” Your lumping us all together, I admit, was not in the context of a criticism of religious actions, but of the bases for our beliefs, a matter to which you apparently have not devoted much unprejudiced research.


Para. 1.) Nope, I didn’t make a mistake. I’ll rephrase with more qualifications, however. In the way that “we” (and I’m referring to scientific answers/definitions that “we” humans have arrived upon for things – in an objective way) understand what “evidence” is (including the English dictionary – “to make clear”), my statement that “there is no evidence” is true.

Rephrasing did not help! Your second statement simply confirmed your error. You just now (again) limited the method by which “we… humans have arrived upon for things” to one, narrow subset of knowledge, which you defined as “scientific answers/definitions.” You have required believers in the supernatural to prove their beliefs by natural means, which any clear-thinking person would never do. Your decision to ignore all valid evidence other than that which comes from the realm of science is detrimental to your ability to investigate subjects outside of that realm—and your failure to recognize this is the category error of which I spoke.

Maybe there is some “evidence” out there we are unaware of - of course this could be true. This could be true for absolutely ANYTHING, as well. But in the way we define evidence, in the same way we use it to travel in space, make buildings not fall down, and cure small pox…, there is NO evidence (“available to us” if you like).

This is an example of what I have pointed out earlier to you. No thinking person would require that the evidence of supernatural phenomena must be of the same sort as that which makes discoveries in the natural world, nor would he expect that the knowledge of such matters would be obtained through the same technologies that discovered the existence of germs, the tensile strength of steel girders, or the means of propelling and controlling space vehicles.

Your repeated mantra that “there is NO evidence” for the supernatural does not become more true, more convincing, nor conducive of other’s gaining a high opinion of your intelligence, simply by its being chanted. Nor is the sophistry of the statement diminished by the repeated modifier “available to us”—since those who believe there is excellent evidence would argue that it is available to any objective observer. The question is one of your objectivity. A man with the humility requisite to be regarded as a scholar would be less careless in his cavalier dismissals of evidences that men far wiser than himself have so frequently found convincing.

Your comment would have had a more respectable tone had you honestly said, “I have very limited experience in any realm outside that of my academic training—which has, admittedly, not even begun to scratch the surface of all possibilities. Within that narrow range of my experience and knowledge, I have not yet seen or heard of anything that would convince me that there is a supernatural realm.” Anything more than a statement like this on your part is bound to be written-off by open-minded, thinking readers as the unvarnished arrogance of a religious fundamentalist—and an educated one, who ought to have known better than to think so highly of his own omniscience.


“Evidence” that may be out there may also NOT be out there, and certainly doesn’t count as evidence until it is clear.

An eye-witness testimony may be quite clear and unambiguous. It is not the clarity of the evidence, but the category, that is at issue here
.

Moreover, no one could ever make the claim that they “ABSOLUTELY” know anything at all. We do the best we can with what is available or evident to us. I don’t absolutely KNOW that gravity or what we call gravity, is going to work in the same way next year, but I have a strong assumption that it will, based on what we do know about gravity.

This is what is rightly referred to as “faith.” We have all observed the faithfulness of the laws of physics with sufficient consistency to give us reasons to “believe” that they can be counted upon. The same is true of trusting a person. If you have observed, consistently, over a period of years, that a certain business partner, or employee, or vendor, has scruples and is reliable, then you will reasonably put faith in these qualities continuing to guide him in his future dealings with you. Without such faith, no fruitful human interactions could exist. Contrary to the frequent atheistic protestations, faith is not a synonym for irrationality. Properly understood, it is quite rational and rightly pervades almost all of our attitudes and beliefs, both scientific and otherwise.

We see (in the natural realm) a consistent law that intelligible information always originates only from rational minds, and never from random events. There has never been an observed exception. This being so, one is certainly not irrational in placing confidence in that same natural law when, upon discovering the existence of complex information in the DNA molecule, he deduces that this information, too, has its source in a rational mind—even if the possessor of that mind remains hidden from observation.

To conclude otherwise would be to depart from the normal rational process of placing confidence in established laws—as much as if we were to deny the law of gravity and so believe in flying horses. To discover complex, coded genetic information, and then to decide arbitrarily that, in this case alone, there is not a rational mind behind it, would require that we insist upon an ad hoc conclusion, based upon nothing other than blind, irrational faith. This is what dogmatic naturalists do, when they postulate a non-intelligent origin for the rational information written into all living cells. If this is not a form of religious fundamentalism, what could possibly qualify for such a label?


Your objection to my statement also applies to leprechauns and unicorns, as well as the assertion of the divinity of Gonesh, Jesus and Mohammed’s winged horseback ride to Jerusalem being true. There is no way to prove, disprove or clearly show any of these. Objectively. Which is what proof or evidence entails. Some form of “evidence” that is UNavailable to us is anyone’s ball game and ALL bets are off. Including yours. Descartes might suggest that maybe there’s no god, but a satanic figure is actually fooling you to believe in one, for some purpose that we are unaware of. Your objection gives this statement the same credence. And there is no evidence for it being true, either.

This is transparent nonsense. The mere assertion that we must be open-minded in looking at all credible evidence—whether of a scientific sort or of some other—does not translate into advocacy of gullibility.

I should not have thought it necessary to point out—even if I were addressing a bright child—that some very strange—even unique—events have been reported in history to have happened—some of which really occurred, and some of which did not. The scholar seeking to establish the credibility of any one of these stories is not being a fool if he says he wishes to rationally examine all the relevant data. If the story is a myth, the evidence for its truthfulness will not be impressive, so the researcher is not in danger of being led astray by such a policy.

That I have suggested nothing more than this should be obvious to anyone reading my statements—and that you object to this open-minded policy is equally obvious (peculiar, it seems to me, since you have degrees in psychology and sociology, neither of which are disciplines that depend for their theories upon strictly scientific verification).

Suffice it to say that your cliché comparisons of Christian beliefs with belief in the Olympian gods (if, indeed, anyone really DID believe in their existence—which is disputed), shows only that you either, a) have never bothered yourself to weigh the evidences supporting these respective beliefs, or b) that your formal education left you untrained in the skill of weighing evidences. This is a very common condition among the formally-educated, which can be easily-observed (it can be proven scientifically!). Parroting, rather than thinking, is what I far-too-frequently observe among many, including trained scholars—whether secular or Christian. Please see if you can surprise me by being an exception (you’re not off to a very good start).


Para. 2) Nope, I’m not begging the question. I don’t absolutely know that only nature exists, at all. I make an ASSUMPTION that all that we know of - that is entailed within what we call “nature” - exists.

Yes, you are begging the question—still and again! The phrase, “I make an ASSUMPTION that…” is followed by the very thesis that is under dispute. That is what “begging the question” means. Did you take any courses in formal logic? They should have covered this in the first or second week.


And the reason being is there is nothing that is available that is recognizable as objective evidence for this not being the case.

You keep referring to evidence that is or is not “available to us.” Are you claiming that all the evidence that is “available” to us has crossed your desk, been objectively analyzed and employed in forming of your conclusions? All the objective evidence an unprejudiced man could desire is quite accessible to any literate person with access to a good library. What are these “inaccessible” evidences to which you refer?

You also make frequent reference to such evidences as you are or are not willing to consider, because you say they are not “objective.” If you live long enough, you may yet come to know some human experiences that numbers can’t measure and cannot be charted on a periodic table—things like love, joy, serenity, outrage, sorrow, and such. All of these are 100% subjective—despite your feeble denials, which tell us either 1) that you have known no such experiences personally, or 2) you don’t know the meaning of the word “subjective,” or 3) you are speaking without thinking.

Would not a man, who equates “subjective” with “unreal,” appear to be a shallow, and unenviable, man indeed?

Perhaps there are undetectable spirits that move my arms and legs parallel to my mind willing them to move, giving me the sensation of mechanically doing so. Or that (a) God, Allah or Zeus is watching and judging me. But without evidence for such forces, I assume that I am in charge of my arm movements, and what all goes into that which is “I.” And that I’m not being judged by a god.

The key phrase in this paragraph is “without evidence.” The assumption that Christians must be following convictions that are derived “without evidence” shows that your alleged “research” into the religions of the world (as per the following paragraph) has been fragmentary in the extreme.


Para. 3) Yes, I do know something of the world’s religions. I’ve studied and traveled about the world a bit. I’ve been to mosques in the Mid East, Africa and Bosnia, Buddhist temples in Thailand, Cambodia, Taiwan and Hong Kong, Spent an early morning in a Hindu temple in northern India once. I spent 14 days in Haiti with the express purpose of going to Voodoo ceremonies and Voodoo doctors so as to experience, learn and write about Voodoo. I’ve experienced Indo-hispanic “catholic-ish” folk religion in a few Central American countries and Mexico. Not to mention my exposure to many Christian and Jewish temples here in America and about the world as well. I’ve also many friends of these different religions and have freely discussed with them. I’ve read the Bible, Book of Mormon, Dhamapada, Tao te Ching, much of the Koran and some of the Bagavad Gita. I don’t feel compelled to belabor proof to you my knowledge of such things, but I also assume you’ll take my word for it.


:
I will gladly take your word for your catalogue of religious dabblings. Judging from the many misrepresentations that have appeared, thus far, in your posts, the quality of your “knowledge of such things” has not impressed me. Perhaps what has been lacking in your research has been that element that you profess to prize so highly—objectivity.

I do know of those authors, but I must admit I’ve never read any of their books. I’ve been an atheist since long before those books were written. I just googled their bios and Hitchens has a degree in philosophy, econ and politics from Oxford. Harris has a degree in philosophy from Stanford and a Phd in neuroscience from UCLA. I’m not sure how you can say they are poorly informed… those are of the top tier finest programs for such knowledge in the entire world, quite likely THE top.

The “finest” and “top” programs in the academy have not distinguished themselves for objectivity or fair-mindedness in their discussions of Christianity. If you think that they have done so, then this would explain a lot about your own objectivity.

I have not simply read about these men. I have read them and listened to them lecture and debate. Their understanding of the basis of Christian belief is clearly abysmal (if “evidence” be taken to mean “that which is clear”). I give them the benefit of the doubt when I assume that their arguments exhibit mere abject ignorance, rather than a conscious desire on their part to deceive the public. When the only way you can critique a philosophy is by appeal to its freaks, quacks and cranks—rather than to the most mainstream and erudite of its exponents—you are displaying to the public nothing but the fragility of your own position.

From a religious believer’s perspective, there are a MULTITUDE of reasons for belief in a particular religion. And a MULTITUDE of differences between them, as well. I’ll agree. But OBJECTIVELY, they ARE all the same. They all have the same elements.

If I knew as little on any topic as you seem to know about this topic, I would refrain from pretenses of expertise and devote myself to writing and speaking on subjects that I knew something about.

Do you really think that you have been inside the head of every person who has any kind of belief in the supernatural, and have had the opportunity to see the major elements that inform their beliefs? If you think so, you should come back down to the real world, where people are not all so easily pigeon-holed into a few discrete categories (of course, if your field is psychology, coming to this awareness would ruin the entire “scientific” basis of your discipline—which is one reason I am not expecting you to have the ability to think objectively. So far, you have done nothing that would disappoint my expectations).

Durkheim was perhaps the first to make that distinction widely shown. In a nutshell, they all serve the same social and psychological functions. Some sort of sacred force, a way to get the force/god(s) to work in your favor, a form of justice, social rules, special human spokesmen, assuagement of the fear of death… There are others and other qualifiers, but this is from whence you are getting the sense of others’ “broad stroke” perspectives. And I agree, there are certainly many, many small strokes, which science recognizes as well, but there are also these broad strokes they fit neatly under.
And perhaps we might be such naughty schoolboys as to ask how it is that Durkheim, et al, became the experts on what is actually going on in the heads of people he has never met? The findings of various psychological tests have certainly not spoken with a united voice about either the model of man, nor of the methods of change, which are supposed to be their exclusive domain. Since there is no unanimity about the first points among the “experts” are we to toss a coin to decide which of them to believe? If the real sciences were in such disarray as the “sciences of the mind”, we should expect to find five conflicting views about the speed of light.

I can only speak with real certainty for myself—but with a high level of confidence also about people intimately known to me—that I have never had the motivations described by the venerable Durkheim. I truly have no preference one way or another whether there is a life after death. I likewise do not carry within me a preference for belief in a God who will judge every one of my actions on the basis of the standard of perfection. If I have arrived at any conclusions on such matters, I have done so on the same basis as my belief in anything else—whether in the secular or the religious sphere: I follow the evidence—ALL of it that is available to me.

If I believe that Jesus rose from the dead, it is because the evidence for this fact is better than any that can be found against it. The evidence for this is, of course, of no different order, requiring no more exceptional disciplines, than the evidence for other historical events (although the evidence in favor of the resurrection quite exceeds that which we have for most historical events, of which we never think of raising a question).

The simple fact is that there is abundant evidence of the standard historical sort to suggest that Jesus rose from the dead (Please! Please! Please! Attempt to refute this!). On the other hand, there is not a single piece of “objective” or “scientific” evidence that would suggest that He did not do so. I am a reasonable man. If a proposition is put forth for which abundant evidence (following the standard canons of historiography) exists, and against which there is no evidence whatsoever, then my vote would be to follow the evidence. How about you?

They are very clear broad strokes if one is not trying to defend their particular faith. And you don’t have to “believe” the broad strokes, they are objective.



This is quite a claim. I would like to see what you are packing. Since you are a man of “objective” inquiry, perhaps you might refer to some of the “objective” evidence that all religious people have the same reasons underlying their beliefs. Please present only “objective” evidences, since it would seem hypocritical of you to rely upon the subjective opinions of psychologists, which are often as “scientific” as is the belief in unicorns.

Believers of other religions have the very same objection to this that you do. Psychology says it’s for the same reason, to continue to justify their belief without objective evidence. And yes, in the way that evidence is defined, they do all have the same amount. None.

If I were to assert that you had zero evidence, or objective basis for believing, that there is such a thing as a “science of human behavior,” would you recognize similarity between my statement and that which you have just made? The only difference between the two statements is that mine could be argued on the basis of objective evidence, whereas yours is demonstrably nothing more than an expression of prejudice.

Perhaps Muslims and Christians and Hindus are tuned into some evidence that is not available to others, that only they have, but they will all claim their belief is true and they cannot all be correct.

You are right about the law of non-contradiction. Not all belief systems can be correct—and to the list we must add the belief in naturalism, which is as arbitrary a faith as is the silliest of them.

You are certainly wrong, however, in assuming that all religions depend upon evidence that is available to some and not to others. This may be inherent in the claims of many religions, but it has never been one of the claims of Christianity. From the beginning, Christians have asserted that the principal evidences for their beliefs are in the public domain, and may be checked by anyone who has sufficient curiosity to look into it. This, of course, has never been true of narturalism, which is a proposition that no reasonable person would mistake for a testable worldview.

Truly, not all faith systems can be correct, and naturalism is as likely to be incorrect as any other. So whence comes the arrogance of the naturalist who stands in presumptuous mockery of other religions—most of which have as much evidence in their favor as naturalism has in its favor, and one of which one (Christianity) actually has more evidence in its favor than has any other faith system (which is probably why it is the only worldview that has ever been the majority view of our evidence-oriented, post-enlightnment, Western Civilization)?

It appears very much that there is another element at work here, a deep desire to believe. 100 yrs ago, Freud called this a “religious illusion.” I also have a degree in psychology, a master’s in philosophy and a phd in sociology/anthropology - whatever that is worth to you as indication of my knowledge base. Based on your assessment of Oxford and Stanford graduates, I’m guessing you discount academic knowledge if it doesn’t jive with your religious position. Degrees don’t make anyone correct, but I certainly don’t regard these topics frivolously, or from ignorance.

Should we defer to the religiously indoctrinated opinions of the popular priests of naturalism any more than to the religiously indoctrinated views of the Roman Catholic scholars, just because the former came from Stanford and the latter from Notre Dame? Anyone can become indoctrinated, and those who devote years and fortunes to learning to parrot and imitate their professors can hardly be suspected to be among the least affected by this influence!

A worldview is a religious conviction. As you have aptly pointed out, “religious” people are notoriously unobjective—and none is more worthy of this assessment than the naturalistic zealot. Freud’s “religious illusions” of atheism are no less illusory than those illusions associated with any competing worldview. Freud’s religious commitment to atheism is a matter of record, and had much to do with his parting of company with his former associate, the supernaturalist, Karl Jung.

No man really knows why another man does what he does, though theories can possess varying degrees of credibility. That Freud would be regarded as an expert in the inner workings of a man, other than himself, is not someplace that I would go, until I were to become more convinced that his own demons were not coloring his vision. A man who was so fearful of death that he could not attend a funeral is not a man in normal psychological health. In his theory of Oedipus Complex, he clearly tells us a great deal about what perversions he had discovered in his own head and heart—but he shows no insight into anything I, or the majority of healthy people have experienced. And no surprise! Psychologists do not primarily study the healthy, since such are not as likely to present themselves as patients. It is not surprising that those whose life study is conducted upon disturbed subjects might come to think all people (including those who have never been examined by them) to be disturbed—many such “doctors” have proven themselves to be among the ranks of the disturbed, as well!

It takes no special observational training to see that humans are demonstrably religious by nature. Is this because “religiosity” is a trait favored by natural selection? If so, then maybe there is some advantage in retaining it, and a disadvantage in seeking to destroy it. But, one might ask, is there any other universal animal impulse known to our natural sciences, which craves for what does not exist? All creatures crave food, water, a mate, and other things that exist in their environment. Can Freud explain why natural selection would favor a craving for the illusory? If so, then who can justify any confidence in his religious opinions (or yours) which arguably may be a mere illusion, which he inherited through such natural selection?

So that you might not be left guessing, I will state plainly exactly what my mindset is: I am hugely skeptical—and of nothing more than of religious counterfeits. I have spent 40 years of my teaching career examining and challenging illusions that have no basis other than a “religious impulse.” This includes such illusions as exist within Christian circles, as well as those of the religion you have been presenting for our examination here.

No one can be sure that he has reached absolute truth, but the man who has the best reason for confidence in his views is the one who has reached them through an agenda-free search for the truth, and is not afraid to change his mind when new evidence undermines his former beliefs. The God in whom I believe, and who has been a very practical (not theoretical) reality in my life, values and honors honesty in a man. If Christianity is a myth, God would wish for us to discover this as early as possible, and to abandon it in search of the actual Truth. According to my belief system, if anyone loves anything more than the Truth itself, God does not consider that person honest enough to be trusted with that commodity.

Para. 4) That such beliefs are not objective is as utterly self-evident as saying, “what we call blue jays are not what we call swans.” Either ALL religions are false or one particular perspective is true, and that perspective eludes EVERYONE that doesn’t already believe it, and there is STILL no evidence.

You keep saying this. However, the repetition of nonsense does not increase its correctness. It only begins to look like a form of mania.

The “test” if you will is evident in that some people are willing to die believing in X, some believing in Y, and there is nothing objective to show that one or both are true. And a priori they can’t BOTH be.

So if one man dies believing that Nazism is evil and needs to be opposed, while another man dies because he believes that Nazism is virtue itself, are you suggesting that neither man is more correct than the other? Of course, consistent naturalists (of whom there are very few) would actually affirm that neither the Nazi nor the anti-Nazi has any transcendent validity behind his beliefs. Values, after all, are “subjective.” Killing Jews would, in that case, be no more absolutely immoral than killing cockroaches. It’s just natural selection taking its course. Peter Singer is one of the few who is willing to say this unashamedly (though he targets human babies of all races, not just Jews).

Most naturalists appear to be more squeamish than Singer about admitting this, though it is only consistent with their worldview. If nature is everything, then there can be nothing truly transcendent to determine ultimate values. If there is nothing transcendent, then there is no transcendent value to human life. When a naturalist says that he values human life, he is merely saying that he is unable to live with the real implications of his professed philosophy (and, probably, that he knows better than to really believe it).

We may agree that there is nothing irrational about giving our lives to save civilization from fascism, but this agreement cannot be proved to be correct by reference to anything resembling “scientific evidence.” That is because every rational person necessarily (as a consequence of being rational) accepts the validity of many propositions, concerning which science has no competence to speak. So why pretend otherwise? Isn’t it preferable to be honest?

But prayers can and HAVE been studied scientifically and shown to have no bearing greater than chance upon an outcome.
Yet more nonsense. Prayers cannot be studied scientifically any more than children’s requests to their parents can be. One may do a statistical analysis of how many such requests are granted and how many are denied, but this tells us nothing about whether there are parents who sometimes do and sometimes do not answer their children’s requests. Are you unaware that many parents override their children’s requests, due to parental considerations, and yet grant them on other occasions? Could we please speak like rational men?

If you are a psychologist, you have already bought into a bizarre definition of “science”—as in a “science of human behavior.” This is not science any more than religion is science—and many psychological experts have pointed this out (as you surely must know, since you have read widely on the subject).

Real “science” includes the element of predictability. Once you have discovered a truly scientific law, its predictability is absolute. Pseudo-sciences often can predict generalities. For example, psychology can predict that a certain, unpredictable number of persons enduring a significant loss will undergo five stages of grieving. However, there are too many exceptions to this general “rule” in real life to allow us to make hard and fast predictions. This is not true in real science. However, if you heat water at sea level, it will predictably boil at 212 degrees Fahrenheit. That is science.

By appeal to your imaginary “science,” you have diagnosed all religious believers as having certain motivations—an absolute statement which professes to know what no man can really know about so large a study group (all humanity!). The only motives that you can really know for certain are your own (and these are not always rigorously appraised).

Your diagnosis, for example, is not correct about me (the only person whose motives I know intimately, but one of the many that you know nothing about). Nor does it appear to be true of the class of believers with whom I generally associate. The fact that you are mistaken on these things shows the sketchiness of all such “science.”

Religions that believe in gods to pray to, speciously explain this in a small range of ways, none of which can be proven or disproven. Like the god didn’t want to, or has a better plan, or knows better than what I wanted, or will do it later… etc.
True, these explanations are sometimes given, and (as you say) they can neither be “proven or disproven.” The fact that they cannot be disproven, then, retains the possibility of their being true. It is the person who insists that these explanations are invalid that has the closed mind. How can a proposition, believed by the majority of rational people, and admittedly incapable of being disproven, be confidently rejected—I mean, other than by the hubris of the objector?
But what CAN be shown, is that they don’t alter outcomes. They DO make people feel better though, like they could maybe influence the god in their favor. It DOES assuage fears and bolster hopes. And I see some value in that, but these are of psychology and emotionality, not the cold hard facts of objective reality.
There is that red-herring “objective” again. Just so I might understand your use of words (since you often do not use them in their ordinary sense) let me ask if the following is an “objective” or a “subjective” phenomenon:

Some years ago, a friend of mine, living in Idaho, became alienated from me and was refusing to have contact with me, though I was interested in reconciling and wishing to know what offense had been taken. This concerned me and I knew that any contact would have to be accidental, since he would not agree to meet with me. On one occasion, this became a matter of prayer for me. That occasion was while I and my family were driving back to Idaho from Ontario, Canada. While I drove, and my family slept, I was praying and made the specific request that God would orchestrate a providential meeting between this man and myself, perhaps in some public place.

That night, my family stayed in a hotel in Billings, MT. As I was repacking the car the next morning, I saw this man loading his vehicle in the same parking lot. He had, unbeknown to me, embarked on a family trip from Idaho to Eastern Montana, and had stayed in the same hotel, the same night, as myself. The striking thing is that, had he or I packed and left a half-hour later or earlier, we would never have encountered each other. As the result of this meeting, he and I were able to have the conversation that I had prayed for.

Of course, one could speak of this as a “coincidence.” It could also be called a coincidence that, when I go into a bank to cash a check for $500, I actually leave with $500 cash. “Coincidence” is one possible explanation—but hardly the most plausible! Why reach implausible conclusions when a perfectly reasonable one is available?

Now, was this an “objective” or a “subjective” evidence of answered prayer? The prayer, coupled with its immediate answer, did not constitute an instance of mystical subjectivity, but involved just the kind of “cold hard facts of objective reality” of which you claim to be so fond.

You might argue that the events were objective events, but my religious interpretation of their connection is a subjective one. Of course, this gives up way too much, because it could as justly be argued that any other construction placed upon the situation (your explanation, for example) would be equally subjective. In fact, this argument calls into question every interpretation of every event (all interpretations are subject to our subjective worldviews), and leaves us adrift in infinite uncertainty about everything in the world—including our own objective existence (which might be entirely an illusion).

Of course, the reason we do reach any sound conclusions on many subjects is that we wisely ignore the irrelevant fact that all interpretations are subjective, and we look for the most plausible interpretations, given all the known factors—the shortest distance between two points, rather than an unnecessarily circuitous route.

In the case above, there is nothing to disqualify the most apparent explanation, other than an a priori prejudice against the supernatural. The religion of Naturalism is, by its very definition, institutionalized prejudice. I have never had any respect for prejudice, whether institutionalized or otherwise.

If this answer to prayer were an isolated case, it could more easily (but not very easily!) be discounted. However, such prayers, and their answers in “cold hard facts of objective reality” have characterized my ordinary life for over forty years, and have not been included in your “scientific” studies. I was never interviewed.

YES! We agree! The experiences are VALID. They are REAL experiences and they can certainly change a person’s life, the way they see it and live it. Wm. James wrote a book about this, “The Varieties of Religious Experience.” However, these experiences are entirely subjective/emotionally based and there is no evidence whatsoever that they are going on anywhere other than the persons’ minds. Like a fantasy, a dream, a thought, a delusion or a hallucination. Those are all real experiences, all subjective and purely psychological.
Dr. James’ venerable reputation notwithstanding, I must protest that his thesis is irrelevant to the kind of evidences that I, and most of my Christian friends, depend upon for our beliefs. The title of his book itself delineates the restricted nature of his study—religious experience. He apparently did not study believers, like myself, who are not leaning upon experiences but in historical and logical evidences for their convictions. You see, your field does not adequately explore all the relevant data, nor examine all the relevant study subjects.

You can pray to Jesus, a Hindu to Shiva, a Rastafarian to Jah (stoned) and a Voodoo believer to Dhambala, and ya’ll will all have meaningful religious experiences. To yourselves, in your minds. A child can be raised to worship a volcano or a river, and as an adult that volcano will give him meaningful religious experiences, also. But not to you. Certainly not in the way that they do for those believers.
But what has this to do with our topic? Who, other than yourself, is linking belief to “meaningful experiences”? This is where you reveal your ignorance of what inclines believers to believe. You believe in naturalism. Is there anything more or less respectable about your reasons for your belief than my reason for my beliefs? At least my beliefs are based upon positive, objective phenomena—something which cannot be said about naturalism. Its case is merely that of subjective disdain and ridicule. The position naturalists feel compelled to ridicule must first be egregiously misrepresented before it can be made to look ridiculous. This speaks well for the invincibility of the position being critiqued.
If you look about the world, and even amongst Christians, you see that most people are very easily led to believe absolutely ANYTHING. You are one of them. So are the Christians that you argue against.
And you are another (I’m sure you cannot think yourself to be the only exception to a universal human condition). Since you and I both belong to a race given to credulity, we both stand obligated to show that our beliefs have something beyond our own gullibility as their basis. This I can do. Can you?
Your love for your children is certainly real love, but yes, it is a psychoemotional experience – of your very own. This is very different than stating Shiva is in control of tsunamis and earthquakes or that Jesus or some other god(s) made something happen that we can all experience objectively.
It is a relief to hear that you are capable, in some cases, of distinguishing the credibility of one subjective experience over another. You have not shown this aptitude consistently, which has caused you to make the egregious error of assuming that Christianity is as bankrupt of evidential confirmation as is Islam, belief in Shiva, or belief in naturalism. I would encourage you that, if you keep on this road, you may be able to begin making more responsible assessments.
I’ve seen the look on a child’s face when he sees that Santa ate the cookie and drank the milk, I’ve been that child myself. Those are valid and real experiences as well. Your children exist, and Santa does not, but these experiences are similarly subjective only.


The references to Santa are significant. I never was permitted to believe in Santa as a child, nor were my children allowed to believe him, nor in any other elves. This is because my parents and I both felt that parents ought not to delude their children. It sounds as if your parents did not share this conviction, and your disillusionment upon learning that they lied to you about Santa may actually be the explanation of your additional rejection of the religion they taught you. I am no psychologist, of course, but it isn’t rocket science. Anyone might easily see the possibility of a connection between these two experiences in one’s life. There is no similarity between the rational basis of belief in Christ and the irrational basis of belief in Santa. Even to this day, as you have declared, you remain ignorant of this incredibly assessable fact.

Para. 5.) Nope, the evidence for evolution is most certainly not naïve. You obviously haven’t studied it academically. True, we can’t go back in time, and there are no ancient documents (altho they themselves wouldn’t mean anything anymore than the Koran/Bible does), but it is very credibly explained, and there is evidence galore.


Few things could be more gratifying than to publicly debate, on the basis of pure science, a person affirming what you have just affirmed! I have done so numerous times. If you would like to volunteer to debate this point formally and publicly, let me know, and I know it can be arranged.

You are altogether too unskeptical. Concerning evolution, you write “it is very credibly explained, and there is evidence galore.” If all it takes to persuade you that a thing is true is to bring a “credible explanation” in interpreting “evidence galore,” then I wish I had gotten to you sooner! There is no shortage of credible, non-evolutionary explanations of the abundant evidence around us that can be offered by less gullible folk.

Of course, there is a larger factor deciding what we will believe and what we will not believe about origins. Our worldview pre-limits what we are willing to regard as “credible” explanations. Surely you have noticed that there is more than one possible explanation for many observed phenomena. But which explanation is the most “credible”? That question will be answered by our worldview.

Your naturalistic worldview, as you have already declared, will accept no explanation as “credible” if it must invoke a supernatural element. For maintaining this limitation you can give (or at least have, as of yet, given) no rational reason. It is an arbitrarily chosen opinion, which you allow to determine the limits of what evidence you are willing to consider.

My approach, by contrast, is that of the open mind. If things can be explained naturally, well and good! If they cannot, then a supernatural, or other, explanation may be considered. For this reason, I am free to consider the evidence for naturalistic evolution (on the one hand) and the evidence for supernatural creation (on the other). Not being a fundamentalist of any kind, I am at liberty to maintain an open mind, and conduct a preference-free inquiry.

You, however, must accept evolution, no matter how lacking in the evidential support, since it is the only game in town for the naturalistic fundamentalist. You have not shown in our discussion so much a penchant for free and independent thought as for bowing to educated pundits. Perhaps you have not questioned whether the arbitrarily-chosen worldviews of these “brights” may have crippled them, as it has crippled you, in the enterprise of open-minded inquiry? They run in packs like lemmings. I am of the opinion that an unexamined life is not worth living, and an unexamined worldview is not worthy of my loyalty. This appears to be the primary respect in we differ from one another.

I enjoy academic freedom. The fundamentalist (of any religious persuasion—including yours) must do all he can to stifle such freedom and to delimit broader inquiry. You are welcome to that world, if you like it! I will not envy your confinement. I prefer the company of those who place a higher value on discovering the truth than of artificially bolstering a failing paradigm by suppression of evidence.

[Evolution] has been and is continuing to be studied to an enormous degree at the major universities throughout the world, with exceptions only to small schools and a small minority of scientists who are also attached to a religious creation story, usually the Christian evangelical one. All of the fields of science, geog, chem, bio, geol and their subsets like genetics, all point to the same evolutionary mechanism. There is certainly some squabbling amongst scientists regarding some particulars, but the general picture is utterly logical, quite obvious and agreed upon. I’ve studied it extensively at the graduate level myself.


It is precisely this fact—namely, that “It has been and is continuing to be studied to an enormous degree at the major universities throughout the world”—that renders it the more striking that no proof has yet emerged for any of evolution’s major claims. What are those claims? Certainly not merely that there is change through time. That is not debated! If we are going to have a robust debate, we must first legitimately define the distinctives of the thing under dispute.

We can let a leading evolutionist of the past define the special claims of naturalistic neo-Darwinism (feel free to let me know if anything on the list has subsequently been redefined by his modern-day successors). A generation ago, in his book “Implications of Evolution,” Prof. G. A Kerkut (Dept. of Physiology and Biochemistry, University of Southampton), observed that evolutionists must necessarily make the following seven assumptions (note: “assumptions” are unproven “worldview” components—not features of a purely scientific model):

1. Spontaneous generation occurred.
2. It occurred only once.
3. Viruses, bacteria, plants and animals are all interrelated.
4. Protozoa gave rise to metazoa.
5. The various invertebrate phyla are interrelated.
6. Invertebrates gave rise to vertebrates.
7. Fishes gave rise to amphibia, which gave rise to reptiles, which gave rise to birds and mammals.

To my knowledge, the most up-to-date evolutionist still depends upon the veracity of these seven assumptions. Without them, there is nothing left of Darwinism. How comforting it would be for evolutionists to be able to prove any of these seven assumptions! However, after listing them, Dr. Kerkut quite reasonably observes:

"The first point that I should like to make is that these seven assumptions by their nature are not capable of experimental verification…we have to depend on limited circumstantial evidence for our assumptions. There is the theory that all living forms in the world have arisen from a single source, which itself came from an inorganic form...and the evidence that supports it is not sufficiently strong to allow us to consider it as anything more than a working hypothesis."

Many honest evolutionary scientists have admitted the same thing about the status of the case. Since you are scientifically-oriented, perhaps you could suggest even a “thought-experiment” by which one could scientifically test any of these seven faith statements. In a thought experiment, as in a lab experiment, you must have a control group as well as an experimental group. If the same results come up in the control group as in the experimental group, the experiment fails. Likewise, if you are thought-testing a hypothesis about the origin of things, and some alternative theory fits the facts as admirably as does your theory, then your hypothesis fails the test. This does not make it false, but it certainly deprives it of any scientific validity.

Drs. Paul Ehrlich and L.C. Birch are committed evolutionists, but were not shy in stating the obvious, when they wrote: "...Evolution is therefore outside empirical science, though not necessarily false. No one can think of ways in which to test it. Ideas - either without basis, or based on a few laboratory experiments carried out in extremely simplified systems - have obtained currency far beyond their validity. They have become part of an evolutionary dogma accepted by most of us as part of our training." [in “Nature,” April 22, 1967 ]

“Dogma?” But isn’t that a religious word?

In 1981, Colin Patterson, Senior Paleontologist at the British Natural History Museum, and the author of the museum’s general text on evolution, gave a lecture at the American Museum of Natural History, in which he asked, “Can you tell me anything you know about evolution, any one thing...that is true? I tried that question on the geology staff of the Field Museum of Natural History and the only answer I got was silence. I tried it on the members of the Evolutionary Morphology seminar in the University of Chicago, a very prestigious body of evolutionists, and all I got there was silence for a long time and eventually one person said ‘I do know one thing - it ought not to be taught in high school.’”

Until someone can observe macro-evolution occurring (which is admittedly never going to happen, due to the alleged long periods of time required) the particles-to-people theory of evolution will never belong to the realm of experimental science. If it occurred, it is a matter of history, not science—as is the question of the resurrection of Christ. Both evolution and the resurrection of Christ involve apparent miracles—processes and energies never observed by science, though the Christian belief resurrection, of course, has more in its favor than does spontaneous generation, since there is at least historical documentation for it. Belief in spontaneous generation defies scientific law as much as does the Resurrection. The difference is that the Resurrection is part of a self-consistent worldview that allows for events beyond the explanation of science. Spontaneous generation is a component of a worldview that does not allow such phenomena. Ouch!

Evolution is, and will remain, the “creation myth” of the naturalistic religion, in competition with the “creation myths” of opposing religions. As long as the academy prefers the religion of naturalism (a modern vogue, certainly not dictated by “objective evidence”) evolution will continue to be, in the academy, the dominant paradigm for interpreting the evidence—regardless of its level of credibility. The supernaturalist can interpret the evidence in an evolutionary way, if he thinks the evidence compelling, but the naturalistic fundamentalist has no options—fewer, in fact, than were available to real scientists 100 years ago—before the days of secular fundamentalism.


(continued next post)

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steve
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Re: Dialogue with a skeptic

Post by steve » Fri Sep 09, 2011 11:28 am

I would believe in a god WAY before I could ever cast aside the evidence for evolution. I’d just see it as the god’s method of life speciation. In fact, there are many scientists (altho a minority of scientists) who see it just that very way. If you study evolution academically it is very logical and obvious. The Pope accepts evolution as viable. Reading about it in Christian or apologetic publications is akin to learning about Christianity from a Muslim Imam. That’s just silly as there’s nothing objective about that method.
It is good to discover something upon which we can heartily agree! This is the very reason that I have been concerned to read more on this subject from evolutionist authors (Dawkins, most recently) than from anti-evolutionist ones. What is the point of exploring a worldview without consulting its ablest advocates? Wow! Come to think of it, this would also be an irresponsible procedure by which to seek conclusions about Christianity, wouldn’t it?
Yes, you are correct, we don’t know how the biochemical reaction that we call “life” first occurred. Everything from that point on is well known, studied and so logical and obvious that it is regarded as fact.


Great! I am apparently not as well-read as you, so maybe you can answer, from this pool of generally well-known explanations of evolution, a few questions that have been bugging me? Since you have studied this academically, and are savvy about things that most evolutionary experts say they can only dream of someday understanding, maybe you can help by answering a few basic questions. Feel free to use the standard, scientific, “well known,” and “obvious” explanations, to which you allude. The questions I have in mind are basic to the validity of the theory, so it should be easy to give reasonable answers to things that are universally understood among “brights”:

1) Please explain how protozoa, creatures consisting of a single cell, gave rise to metazoa, which have millions of diversified cells. Make the explanation as simple or as complex as you like. I’m sure that the best minds in science have been working on this for 150 years. I am assured by your comments that they have a good explanation, and that it can be shared here.

But before you start, let me prevent your falling back on non-answers that come quickly to some people’s minds (and are dismissed just as quickly by thinkers). I mean answers like: “No problem! We see the same thing in every human fetus. The zygote begins as a single cell, and develops into a complex human being—and this in only nine months—not even billions of years! Case closed!”

Uh, except for one minor problem: The human zygote may be only one cell, but it is a cell that possesses human DNA as part of its constituent nature—which is the only reason it does not remain a single cell, and develops instead into something more complex. If it were a protozoan, it would possess only the DNA of a protozoan…which does not code for any kind of multi-cellular organism.

This problem, I suppose, extends to every increase in complexity which evolutionists have not been able to observe, but which they assure us really did happen a billion times in history. Can new structures be introduced without new genetic information being introduced? You can’t have an eyeball or a lung occurring where there is no DNA calling for its inclusion in the organism. Where does an organism that is adequate and complete, without extraneous structures, obtain this new DNA information so as to get new features that in no sense resemble those of ancestral organisms? Maybe the first cell had all the DNA necessary to eventually become human? That postulates a very large number of recessive genes! And of course, it means that life did not really begin with anything simple at all, but the first creature was as complex as a human.

Could a thought-experiment possibly be conceived? “This happened gradually.” Okay, so, like, this amoeba-thing splits into two (a promising start on a theory! They actually do that!), and then these two stick together somehow, maybe with several others and…oh drat! That doesn’t help! All that gives us is a congress of amoebas stuck together. They’re all the same kind of cells! We are gonna be needing blood cells, muscle cells, nerve cells, organ cells—eventually, bone cells… and a lot of others kinds of cells that are not very much alike! Where are we gonna get some of those?

The only kind of cells that amoebas reproduce are other amoebas. They don’t need any additional cells, because they are a complete organism in themselves. Sticking two or more amoebas together would only create a Siamese-twin-like phenomenon—hardly a promising variation to be favored by natural selection. Drat! I am out of ideas. Help me out here…

The transition from protozoa to metazoa is no peripheral matter, but is at the very heart of the claims of evolution. Scientists need to discover and explain these things—and you have informed us that this has been done. I am relieved to hear it. Share it with us.

2) May I ask a few other very basic questions, which should be pretty easy for you to answer, since (we are told), “Everything from [the origin of the first living organism] on is well known, studied and so logical and obvious that it is regarded as fact”?

I am interested in a few other thought-experiments (since no other kind are available). How do we get one kind of complex structure, in one organism, to give rise to a different complex structure in another organism, without losing the functionality of the first in advance of gaining functionality in the second? Of course, no one has seen any such thing happen (a bit of a weakness for a concept wishing to present itself as a “science”), nor have the fossils necessary to document any such transitions been found, but perhaps we can make up for this deficiency by coming up with a good imaginary series of events that would be logical enough to command our confidence.

So, for example, a reptilian forelimb is going to develop into an avian wing. The forelimb serves the lizard admirably. The creature competes well in its ecosphere without the power of flight. But, in one or more lines of descent, we begin to see changes in the forearm in a wing-like direction. A triangular membrane, let us say, is forming between the wrist and the hip of a certain group. Someday, 100 million years from now, the descendants of this group will be flying (if they can survive with the burdensome, unwieldy appendage until then). It is not obvious how such intermediate conditions could be said to confer selective advantage on their possessors in competition with their cousin lizards who are doing much better with the old-fashioned, original forelimb model. Do we know how this process could really work out? Fortunately, we are not compelled by anything like evidence to believe such “Just-so Stories,” unless we are naturalistic fundamentalists, of course. In that case, we have to believe faerie tales, since that is all we have. If you would like to inform me of the scientific theory about this that best satisfies your natural skepticism about faerie tales, I will be awaiting your reply.

The change from a terrestrial quadruped to that of a marine creature, like the cetaceans, has always intrigued me also. Since the former walk and run as an efficient means of locomotion, and bear and nurse their young on the land, while the former neither walk nor run, and give birth and nurse their young underwater (without drowning), the stages of transition—especially in the area of terrestrial to marine birth and nurture, would be great to have explained. Especially, how it became advantageous to lose functional limbs suited to one environment and seek a livelihood in the sea. Since these changes would require thousands of generations to take place, there would presumably be some intermediates who had either functionless or non-existent limbs, prior to gaining fully-functioning flukes and fins. Thus, being ideally suited neither for life on land nor for life in the sea, it is hard to imagine the selective superiority of these intermediate body designs.

Obviously, these are only two of literally hundreds of changes of a similar order that must be explained, if we are to have confidence that evolution is anything more than the creation myth of a secular religious faith. However, you assured us that this has been accomplished. It is surprising how many evolutionary experts disagree with you.

3. Just one more (…for now. There are plenty more where these come from). I know that some evolutionists assure us that the fossil record is the strongest proof available for evolution, but can someone then explain, to this simple questioner, why it is that leading evolutionists, from Darwin himself, to modern times, up to and including Stephen Jay Gould, insist that the fossil record is in fact the theory’s greatest liability? Darwin stated this plainly, but he believed the situation would improve. Gould (in his lifetime, America’s leading evolutionist) said the situation remained the same at the time of his recent death. Between Darwin and Gould there has been a steady stream of the best informed evolutionary scientists who have complained that their theory requires verification in the form of fossilized transitional forms, but that the fossil record does not provide them. Gould referred to this as “the trade secret of paleontology.”

So my question would be, if these indispensable transitional fossils have not been found, then how can any evolutionist have confidence that his imagined outline of history is anything better than a pipe dream? On the other hand, if they have been found, why do the evolutionary paleontologists not know this, and why would they misspeak concerning a matter which is their special field of expertise, and in a manner so damaging to their actual worldview preferences?

This is, I think, a conundrum worthy of an answer—especially since you have said that such answers are now neatly and securely in hand among the evolutionary experts. Perhaps you should speak to them. It would seem that they need to know what you know.

And yes, to my mind that leaves a door open for an unknown force to have “made” it happen. A philosophical Deistic approach is plausible in my book. But there’s no more evidence for that than not.
No, not if we arbitrarily limit ourselves to strict scientific evidences—not a stitch of evidence—unless, of course, we require reality to conform to the scientific Law that for every Effect there must be an adequate Cause. That might shed a little rain on the naturalist parade, since no one can think of plausible explanations of how mindless, lifeless matter could ever be regarded as an “adequate Cause” of such Effects as “life,” “consciousness,” “reason,” etc.

However, even scientific laws are expendable when we grant ourselves fiat-authority to exclude any evidence from consideration in our “objective” inquiry as to how real-world facts can be shoehorned into our arbitrary worldview.

We may in the future discover some way to replicate abiogenisis, rudimentary “life” from non-life, or we may never.
It would be irrelevant to our query in any case. If this happens, it will have been as a result of the investment of impressive resources, both material and intellectual. Thus the only theory that will benefit from this accomplishment will be that of intelligent design. We will then have proven, as much as anything about evolution can be proven, that nothing less than enormous intelligence, itself in possession of both life and purpose, is required to manufacture a living entity.
Evolution doesn’t know or pretend to know how this occurred. I’m sure there are some interesting ideas out there, but I’m a “show me the money” sort of person and regard it to be simply unknown. And no, it’s not “faith.” There are theories and assumptions in science, based upon evidence, equally ready to be disproven as proven.


No theory is “ready to be disproven” when one’s naturalistic religion is at stake. You are truly more naïve about human nature than I would have expected of a man in your field. The evidence can never disprove evolution, which is an untestable philosophy of history—not a scientific discipline. The evolutionary fundamentalist will always shoe-horn hostile evidence into his religious paradigm, just as all other religious fundamentalists do.

I thought you had studied human religious impulses. Have you learned no more than this about human nature? Or are you like one of those naïve laymen, who imagine that there is a class of scientists who are something other than humans—a more highly-evolved type of being, immune to the religious impulses and illusions, the hopes and fears, moral preferences, the itch to maintain status among peers, etc. that plague “ordinary” men? I trust you are not so naïve. One must examine and draw conclusions from the evidence for oneself, and not be the lemming who thinks that the consensus is necessarily the truth? When was that ever the case?

However, taking the case that we don’t know how life began and wildly extrapolating that point to a talking bush/ donkey, virgin births (a common religious theme), prayers being answered and special men being sent by an entity to lead various socio-cultural groups, is totally a non-sequitur.
Finally you are seeing clearly how things are and are not logically connected to each other! This burst of rationality encourages me to think we may be able to connect on other rational points. So far, though, there have been few encouraging indicators.
It doesn’t follow in any way whatsoever, but humans for all of recorded history have craved it like baby ducks following whatever they first see after they are born. It follows a social and a psychological pattern to a tee. Dogs like to be in packs, humans like to believe in religions. People IN it can’t see that, because they are IN it. Mormons don’t see it either, for the same reasons, for ex.
You mean “humans” other than yourself, of course? You certainly could not be accused of following your Momma Duck, could you? Certainly no one should be permitted to doubt that you have broken free of the mold to think objectively for yourself. But, if this can be done by you, what assurance can we have that others have not done so as well? Unthinkable! If others might learn to think for themselves, then, theoretically, everyone might do so! What then is to be done with our baby duck analogy? “We are herd animals! There is no free will!” say it over and over until it begins to sound convincing. Do not allow that others may be thinking for themselves. Once the duck analogy is rejected, what can we seek in its place as a justification for our cavalier dismissal of everyone who thinks differently than we do? This is philosophically treacherous. Perhaps we should reconsider using this dehumanizing metaphor. Dang! If we allow that people can think for themselves, then others, besides ourselves, might claim to be doing so. Yet, if we disallow it, then we cannot claim it for ourselves! We’re damned if we do, and damned if we don’t! The whole argument may backfire on us. After all, we might become the ones accused of walking lock-step with the prevailing mood.

Why would you flatter yourself that you alone see all things objectively and are not following any cultural Pied-Pipers? An open-minded observer can clearly detect your group-think of choice as clearly as any non-Mormon can see it in the Latter Day Saint. You are the last to learn that your zipper is down. No one else misses it.

Para 6 and 7. No, I’m not plagiarizing. Those same comparisons have been around far longer than those guys have. Leprechauns and unicorns as well as Santa, Zeus, faeries and the Easter bunny have long been used academically as cultural examples of mythological beings. Socrates regarded the “gods of the city” (Athens) in the same way.


You mean everyone in your camp has always been equally irrational? This is not a helpful admission to your side. Better it would be for the respectability of your position had you said, “Oh, right! DUH!!!! My mistake! Of course there are people smarter than me in my camp who do not habitually make such logical blunders.”

How can such an irrational and inane cliché flourish unchallenged among a group of people who flatter themselves that they are superior intellects? I guess it is the same human impulse that causes Roman Catholics to believe someone who sees the Virgin’s face in a pot of refried beans. It is a very cogent demonstration of the blinding power of irrational prejudice, is it not?

I first began to seriously doubt in the 6th grade while attending a private Christian school, and well-remembered when I believed in Santa, and when I stopped. I compared that feeling of doubt and loss to what I was also beginning to wonder about what might be a “Santa” for grown-ups.
Hmmmm. I first challenged my teacher on a point of worldview propaganda in the second grade. I guess some of us are just late-bloomers.

In your case, you began to question what your Christian school taught you. I was questioning what my public school teacher was teaching. You and I both rejected unsubstantiated things taught to us by our educators. I guess we differed only in that I required evidence for the view that I was to adopt in its place.

We both made the same connections in our minds about Santa. I knew that no one should ever lie to children about Santa, since the older, more sophisticated child would likely deduce that what he had been taught about God was similarly a lie foisted upon children by the parents. Children are not unreasonable to suspect this.

Of course, when a child really grows up, he can be expected to recognize the difference between Santa (for whose existence no evidence can be adduced) and Jesus (whose existence no objective historian would debunk). Grown-ups learn to make such distinctions, and thus they give up talking like children. I am eagerly waiting for Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins to grow up in this sense.

I’d never even heard the word “atheist” then, or had any idea what philosophy or logic was. But a LOT of stuff I was taught most certainly did not make sense to me. I know now that was because it WASN’T logical.
In logic, one must consider proper premises prior to reaching conclusions. If one’s premises are awry, the best logic in the world will lead to false conclusions. At that critical stage in your life, did you ever identify and assess the premises from which you were beginning your logical analysis? Have you done so yet?
In phil. grad school it was common to use “unicorns” and “leprechauns” as well.
Proving one thing beyond dispute: that children go to grad school too!
It’s likely these authors use those terms too. I guess you could say THEY are plagiarizing from many thinkers. before them…
This is what you call “thinking”?
...but the use of common terms isn’t considered plagiarizing, it’s simply using an apt metaphor…
The “aptness” is not self-evident, something real thinkers would recognize immediately.
There are also many common theistic metaphorical terms that have been floating around for years, decades and centuries. That doesn’t degrade their use in any way.


It does, if they are irrational—at least, in my book.
Elite intellectuals about the world who believe in god(s) are far outnumbered by those who don’t, because most see religion as a delusion.


It seems that you are referring to the Western mainstream academics as the intellectually elite. Some men and women in the academy are indeed worthy of this label. However, It would be interesting to see your statistics on this. I doubt they exist.

Even if this proved to be true among the naturalistic fundamentalists in the Western academies, I doubt that anyone could show such to be the case among the studied and wise of other cultures. Perhaps you disdain them, and do not reckon them in your tally. Fundamentalism often runs in the same circles with delusions of ethnic superiority.

This doesn’t prove anything either, but those intellectuals also believe in a WIDE range of concepts about “God(s).” Most of which are entirely incompatible. All this shows is that even some intellectuals will cling to a subjective belief that has a positive emotional effect on them that they won’t let go of even without evidenc
e.

Too true. Let’s avoid that trap! I will, if you will!
Religion/God(s) provides a sense of security to humans.
Not to everyone. Some are terrified by their beliefs in their deities, and would give anything to become disabused of their superstitions.
We are also a herd animal and like to believe what everyone around us does also.
There’s that little ducky talkin’ again. “Quack! Quack!”
It doesn’t matter what these beliefs are, my statements are still self-evident. Santa can be shown to be false on xmas morning.
Actually, Santa’s non-appearance does not constitute “proof” of any such thing. While we agree that Santa is a myth, you have consistently demonstrated an intellectual weakness in the realm of assessing evidences. The logical fallacy in the above statement goes a long way to explaining your inability to recognize the multiple logical fallacies in your arguments against religion and supernaturalism. You might seriously consider a freshman course in logic. It could transform your entire outlook on life.
Faeries…occupy the same superstitious role as angels and spirits.


If you have “scientific evidence” for this “objective” assertion, I would be excited to see it! If you don’t, then why are you allowed to believe and assert scientifically-untestable worldview pronouncements, and others are not allowed to do so? Are we interested in intellectual honesty here, or simply putting our ethical inconsistencies on public display?
Socially, faeries are far more scoffed than angels, or a god, because these are very common beliefs. But if you raise a kid to believe in faeries, the kid may very well grow up to believe in faeries.


…or even in naturalistic evolution! There seems no end to the gullibility of children!
Yeah, I’ve heard that term “brights” before, and I think it’s terrible. There is, however, a very high correlation of I.Q and education to LACK of religious belief. This is commonly known/studied and the statistics abound. There is even a higher correlation to LOW IQ/ education to religious belief.
This is quite possibly true. At least, it is nothing that I would be interested in disputing, since it has no bearing on reality or truth. When was the last time that truth was determined by a majority vote of the top IQs?

Those possessing high IQs are often focused on narrow fields of study. An expert in physics, for example, would be a layman in a discussion of metaphysics. If the main way to discover the existence of the supernatural is one’s IQ, then such a counting of noses might be of value in the inquiry. However, if there is such a thing as a supernatural realm, likely as not, the means of detecting it will not be the same as those used in studying nature. How would such intellectuals suggest that we test for God’s existence—litmus paper, perhaps? Maybe a Geiger Counter?

Jesus said that it is the “pure in heart” who will see God. I am not going to make any estimates as to what percentage of academics possess such purity of heart, but, if they do possess it, it will be a separate aptitude from their intellectual expertise.

The point of my paragraph was not that the majority of intellectuals have been believers in something beyond nature (though I think this is probably the case). There would be no sense in making such an observation, since it is irrelevant. My point was (as I said rather clearly) that belief in Santa, et al, is not in the same category with belief in the supernatural in general, since no informed intellectuals have ever believed in the former, while a very impressive list of the smartest men in history have believed the latter. It proves little—only the fallacy of placing the intellectual respectability of all such beliefs upon the same plane.

…there is a human psychological element that makes it very difficult to disengage from such irrationality. And I certainly assume that you regard praying to Lord Shiva, a statue of a 4-armed man holding fire, made of metal no less, as irrational or false. Maybe you believe Shiva exists too, though, I don’t know.


If a significant number of otherwise-rational intellectuals were to affirm that Shiva had revealed himself in history, I would at least have to take a look at the credibility of the documents that allege such events, before simply adopting a posture of arrogant mockery toward men more intelligent than myself. Circumstances being as they are, however, this will never become necessary. If Yahweh reveals Himself in history, I am also obliged to look at the credibility of the historical records prior to believing or disbelieving. This I have done. This is the reason I am a believer.
I can’t speak of those authors’ psychoemotional experiences, or their texts, but I did read a review of Harris’s book in the NY Times some years ago and it sounded UTTERLY logical. There is nothing logical about a virgin having a kid with a god, or a boat built by a 900 yr. old man with billions of animals on it, and his sons and wives walking to areas of the earth to start the races (Jews with technology turning black and starting the Negroid race with stone tools and no trace of Hebrew in their languages?) or the god having his kid/himself killed because everyone is guilty at birth because a forebear ate the wrong fruit as tempted by a woman and a talking snake? Or a person turning into salt, or water into wine
Some of these events are unknown to me, as they form no part of my religious beliefs. However, I would remind you that men of flawless “logic” may lead to entirely untrustworthy conclusions due to the failure to begin with correct premises. I have read Harris’s books. His logic is not the problem (for the most part). If his premises were less those of a dogmatist, he might even reach some conclusions that an open-minded thinker could respect.
…Evolution is ENTIRELY logical. Science is BASED on logic. If the logic fails, the science changes. As far as life goes however, science stops at the beginning of it.
An admission which would seemingly have to leave room for the possibility of valid explanations that are beyond the competence of “science” to answer on such matters.
Para 8 and 9) No, they also have in common that people who really believe in them have to WANT to believe in them very badly, or know nothing else, or they vanish as a plausible idea.
You are more religiously naïve than you can imagine! I know many believers (you apparently have known few) who would fit none of these childish stereotypes. Once more, you can be an expert in no one’s motives but your own. It is even possible to fail to be an expert in one’s own motives. This is an area where an objective self-examination could prove to be enlightening to you. As your childhood religion said, there is a certain principle about motes and beams that you may be neglecting.
And no, they are in no way like music or humor, etc. These things are all objectively experienced.


No, they are subjectively experienced. No one can see music or humor. Sounds and events can be observed scientifically, but to determine what sounds can rightly be called “music” (and not mere “ruckus”) and what events can be regarded as “funny” (rather than merely “irritating” or “dumb”) are not objectively testable—even if there is widespread cultural agreement about them. Again, you are simply using words wrongly. Unfortunately, since they are words of primary importance in our discourse, such misuse reduces what could be fruitful dialogue into adventures in missing the point.
The origin of life is a question. YOU think you know the answer, but science doesn’t, because science requires evidence.


So do I, which is why naturalistic answers are so unconvincing to me. If you can catch up with me in this matter—that of requiring evidence for your beliefs—we will have a better chance of talking sensibly about the alternatives.
And our brains most certainly exist. If you mean our “minds,” or consciousness, yes, what we call consciousness is certainly existent.


No, I meant our brains. The organ in the head, not the immaterial “mind.” Of course, that could have been added to the list as well, but the brain (I could as justly said “the lung” or “the liver”) works fine for my point. Under ordinary circumstances, these things (like miracles) are not seen. I do not say that they cannot be seen. Nor would I say such a thing about miracles (since, according to credible reports, they sometimes have been seen). No man has ever seen my brain. This does not mean it will never be seen by a surgeon or a thug, but to date it remains in the realm of “unseen things.” There is evidence for its existence, however, which was the point I made.
Jesus and Mohammed were probably real people with followings at the time, but humans sure love to make up stories and believe them, and there is no evidence for their supernatural stuff at all.
You keep asserting the same fallacy about which you were confronted at the beginning of this discussion! You cannot say “there is no evidence…at all” simply because you have decreed, by Pope-like fiat, that only one narrow strand of evidence is allowed into the court. No rational courtroom would accept your limitations, nor would any professional historian, nor, for that matter, would any open-minded thinking person.
I agree with your last statement as you put it, but there is no comparison between sexual pleasure or any other kind of pleasure and the idea of a god, spirits or the li
ke.

You have not shown yourself to be very capable at recognizing valid comparisons thus far. Shall we accept your authority on this now? The truth is, sexual pleasure is indeed a subjective experience. It doesn’t matter how many voyeuristic researchers may observe someone else experiencing it, nor how many learned explanations they may publish about their research. The fact remains that, without having it, you do not know it.

If you do not realize that this is “subjective” then you are apparently not in touch with the meanings of “objective” and “subjective” as categories. That’s okay, you have shown yourself quite eager to pronounce authoritatively on things about which you apparently know little, throughout this discussion. There is no possibility that anyone reading your statement will make the mistake of believing it! An uneducated adolescent can be more expert on this subject than a credentialed, though frigid, sex therapist.

Sexual pleasure etc., can easily be manipulated, tested, neurologically faked, artificially reproduced or eliminated.
Yes, but what has this to do with my point? Are these the criteria by which you define ‘objective” things? That they can be manipulated and faked? Religious experiences can be manipulated and faked as well. This does not tell us anything about the existence of genuine encounters with the supernatural—any more than a woman faking an orgasm disproves the existence of the real thing.
It is an entirely physical and mechanical event. The fact that the virginal boy knows not of this pleasure, means nothing other than that. But what he knows not of is an objective event. He may not know that it hurts to cut off a finger, and scoff at those who say it hurts, but this means nothing either.
No, it means a great deal, in that it tells us a great deal about the scoffer himself! It is a clear demonstration that he is an arrogant fool who thinks that only such things as he has personally experienced can be genuine in the lives of others. It also means he is a good candidate to become a “bright”—since this quality of arrogance seems to be the only requirement for inclusion in the group.
That event is entirely manipulable and entirely mechanical also. These are objective events even tho the EXPERIENCE of pain or pleasure is a subjective one. They are objective events because we know exactly how the pain and the pleasure work. We can manipulate, enhance, diminish or eliminate them all day long.


You are now getting closer to an honest use of words like “subjective” and “objective.” However, if a researcher had never known any kind of pain, his observation of others could tell him only that certain stimuli cause certain measurable reactions in his test subjects. Without himself experiencing it “subjectively,” however, he could never know what pain is—just as a congenitally-blind researcher, no matter how brilliant, could never know the phenomenon of color, which can only be known “subjectively.”

My point is that we accept many realities that can only be known experientially. If we do not have the same experiences ourselves, we can observe others and speculate about what it must be like to be them, but we remain “virginal.”

Because it’s your closing, I glean that you meant I, or those like me are as that lad and know nothing of what you experience, and that you don’t envy me and my lack of what you experience. If that’s correct, I wouldn’t expect you to envy me. I’ve no doubt your beliefs make you happy/satisfied/fulfilled. All religious beliefs do just that, that’s one of the main reasons most humans embrace them, other reasons being thwarting fear of death and explaining things that at the time of the religion’s conceptions were entirely unknown. Or just flat-out fear of what they’ve been told befalls non-believers. Not to mention the sociological elements, which are vast.
Not to mention the actual reason that a huge number of us have believed, namely, because we make an unprejudiced assessment of the evidences, just as we would do in choosing any other of our viewpoints. No doubt there are many believers who are of lesser intellectual prowess than you or me (just as there are skeptics in such ranks), but your critique should be made, not of the lowest, but of the highest reasons that would induce faith in the intelligent and the open-minded. If you wish to debunk a position, the only honest way to do so is to meet it at its strongest point, not its weakest.
This is why many religious people have issue with science, because we know stuff now that we didn’t then, and that threatens their belief. My Hindu friend has subjective pleasant experiences with his beliefs that I don’t share and neither do you. But I might say the same thing, of course. I’ve an outlook on life that I would give to you as a gift if you were miserable, and if I could. It was a hard row to hoe to arrive at my place, as I just bet it was for you too…


I never was a very religious guy, and I have never had any issue with science. Science is a source of knowledge about some aspects of reality, and I am a reality junkie. I can’t get enough of the truth, regardless which discipline may bring it—though I also can distinguish between essential truths and less-essential truths.

I can’t imagine any thinking person having any issues with science. However, I do have issues with bigotry and fundamentalism, whether among scientists or any other professional group. The history of science should be more than sufficient to demonstrate the vast difference between “science,” on the one hand, and “the opinions of the majority of scientists,” on the other. The naïve naturalist doesn’t distinguish between these two. He is out of touch with history and either has forgotten that the majority of scientists have usually been wrong in the past about a number of major issues, or forgets that we are a part of that same history, and many of today’s scientific dogmas and orthodoxies will be consigned, a generation hence, to the dustbin of discredited theories. It is interesting, by contrast, how the facts of the Christian Gospel have escaped such a fate, and, despite the feverish research of those who want nothing more than to discover facts that will discredit it, still is the view enjoying the best evidential support in its favor, even in ultra-modern times.

“Scientism” is the religion that believes science is the only source of information, and the most loud-mouthed scientists and scientific popularizers are their chief priests. To those with a larger view of reality the whole thing looks so juvenile. It’s like if I, being a radio talk show host were to try to convince the world that radio talk shows are the only source of true information, and that we hosts are the only people that radio listeners should ever believe.

It takes a scientist to produce experimental data. It takes thinking people to know what the data does, and what it does not, prove. I am not a scientist, and have no interest in becoming one. However, I do insist upon being a thinker…which is often more to be desired, in knowing how to apply what scientists report to the facts of a larger reality.

I regard life as being very precious, and I find meaning in it every way I possibly can. I’m also an artist. I live, I love and I treat others well. I find satisfaction in many kinds of work and the tiniest things, and I find purpose in many ways also. I am very pleased that I can experience these things and my emotions surrounding them without having to believe (and fear NOT believing) in a particular set of stories that to ANYONE who has not psychologically internalized them, would find bizarre, absurd and mythological. I am in no way envious of your experiences with your belief either. Although I wish you could enjoy life without them - because I regard such beliefs (not the experiences) as being inauthentic and in need of constant nurturance to stay functioning - I’m also glad that you are happy, assuming you are. I’m glad my Hindu friend is happy also, even though I think he is just praying to a piece of metal or wood.

I don’t know anything about you, but my guess is that you’ve been run through a gauntlet in life, it was bad, but you came out of it and became a believer or a fervent one. Often there are drugs or alcohol abuse or something debilitating. Many ministers have such painful stories. I could be wrong about you, but you clearly care a LOT more than the “average believer” who is just going along for the ride, and there are some common scenarios behind that fervor. If I’m correct about that, or not, my claim is that it’s your BELIEF that gives you pleasure and purpose, not any entity that you are believing IN.
I am not sure what the row was that you had to hoe, or what role that played in your adoption of your present worldview. I had the luxury of forming by core beliefs in the rarified air of the 60s and 70s, in a happy and comfortable family situation, without any pain, sorrow or trauma ever having reached my door. Though I appear to be a hippie, I, in fact, drew most of my basic worldview conclusions prior to the hippie movement, and thus never experimented with drugs, alcohol or promiscuity. I am not saying I was a saint, but merely that my vices were not of the type that shipwreck a person’s life in a general sense.

Those beliefs, which I formed in times of relative tranquility, were subsequently tested in the real world of pain and loss, but they easily stood every test and have proven their adequacy through the fires. The few hardships I have had in my lifetime have been unexceptional, and have not been characteristic of my general lot in life. I knew many people of the type that you describe—they “got religion” only after they had hit bottom, and many of them retained lasting relationships with God through the intervening decades. Others I have known, apparently, had merely emotional experiences with religion and never discovered God Himself. Many of them have since departed from their former beliefs. I suspect their faith never had quite the evidential foundation that is the basis for a lasting life of conviction. Pity! How tragic to reach correct views and never to know why they are correct, only to be moved from them for irrational reasons (I have never met any whose reasons for leaving the faith were well-informed and rational—almost all have done so for emotional reasons).

As a man trained in psychology, I am surprised that you were so unperceptive as to diagnose me as a man given to emotional experiences and influences. The greatest criticism I receive from those who have worked with me long-term is that I am possibly too much of a Vulcan, and not sufficiently emotional.

Another thing that has been abundantly demonstrated is that the psychologist may talk about the phenomenon of “projection” without getting the slightest hint that this is what he is himself guilty of—e.g., in assessing religious people in terms that would be far more descriptive of the analyst himself! He can arrive at his view for which not a stitch of positive evidence has ever been presented, but will accuse evidence-based believers of gullibility!

I have fortunately never known such a phenomenon as a crisis of faith, nor worldview disillusionment—partly because I did my research well, followed the evidence objectively, and settled on the only worldview that is apparently capable of reasonably absorbing and accommodating all discovered data (the truth has this quality).

Naturalism cannot do this (try though it may!), and so it has never had the ring of authenticity about it, and is not likely to ever commend itself to the majority of thinking people (historically, it never has). Any view that requires so much pseudo-intellectual posturing, and continuous, outright misrepresentation of its strongest rival, in order to keep itself alive is far too sickly for my tastes. I prefer an indestructibly robust worldview—one for which abundant positive evidence exists, and against which no positive evidence has been found.

By the way, as nice as happiness is, it is not the gauge by which we can measure the truthfulness of our beliefs. If our thinking sinks to this point, then we will be compelled to choose beliefs for their emotional payoff, rather than their objective validity. Perhaps that is what you have done, as you may be admitting above. I have not. Given the choice between happiness and integrity, I would choose integrity, hands down. However, I do experience gratification in knowing that my beliefs enjoy the best objective evidence in their favor—and I guess such gratification is itself a specie of happiness. It is happiness arising from integrity…the best of all worlds!

I.e. if I’m right, and there is no god/Jesus, your belief in it/them would still give you the exact same sensations and meaning. Just like it does to all the other people of the world who have religious beliefs of their own – past and present. Belief is extremely powerful, but in no way does it need to be a true belief in order to have that psychological power.
True—though “sensations” have never played even the smallest role in the formation of any of my basic beliefs. As sympathetic as you are now trying to sound, you still have made no serious attempt to understand why it is that intelligent people believe in Christ. You assume, apparently, that they are addicted to mystical experiences and sensations. I am not sure that I could locate a Christian of that type among my acquaintances. Could you give an example of a mystical experience which you expect may have played a significant role in birthing Christian convictions in the minds of Blaise Pascal, Sir Isaac Newton, C.S. Lewis, Werner von Braun, Simon Greenleaf, or Frances Collins? If you were to ask any of these men what it was that convinced them to believe in Christianity, they would, no doubt, provide a long list of objective, historical, scientific and logical evidences (something no atheist can provide for atheism). If you were to cut them off after the tenth item on any of their lists, and examine the material, I believe you would not find a single reference to anything that could be categorized as mystical, subjective or prejudicial—though, at some point they might add, by way of personal testimony, that, in addition to their reasons for believing, they also have had the confirmation of a personal relationship with the Creator in whose existence and credibility they had come to be convinced by evidences.

Contrast this with what you have presented in these paragraphs as the basis for your particular faith. You have provided nothing like positive evidence pointing toward the validity of a naturalistic or atheistic worldview. Perhaps you have not noticed this about yourself? Are you aware that every argument you have presented against Christianity essentially boils down to nothing else but “It sounds really silly to me.” In this, you have proved what I said in the audio clip to which you were responding. You might wish to listen to it again. I described you there.

You must certainly be aware that some Christians are not fundamentalists, Pentecostals or extremists, but are as a class just as intelligent, objective, and concerned about the truth as you believe yourself to be. If your globe-trotting investigation into world religions has not unearthed that fact, then you have not yet begun to responsibly research the evangelical movement in your own back yard. Yet another irony!

I actually wrote my dissertation about this sort of stuff. Not atheism, but what I called conventional and unconventional religious belief. If you go to the TAMU Evans Library online and search for “Frank Stanford, The Frozen Lake” you may enjoy it even in disagreement. Have a good day. Frank
Steve:
I have, in fact, just had a very good day in writing this correspondence. Hopefully, the fruit of it may be that you and others will have a great number of better days as good as mine, as a result.

Steve

CThomas
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Re: Dialogue with a skeptic

Post by CThomas » Sun Sep 11, 2011 7:52 pm

Wow.

One little side-note on the question of the correlation between intelligence and atheism. I agree with the point that this question is irrelevant, but I would add one other point. I don't know the evidence on this question myself, but I would tend to predict that atheists tend to be smarter for reasons wholly unrelated to the truth of atheism. I suspect that, assuming atheists tend statistically to be smarter than Christians, the causation runs in the other direction. That is, it seems intuitively most plausible that whatever happens to be the dominant intellectual paradigm in a culture, adherence to that paradigm will be correlated with higher intelligence in that culture, e.g., because intellectually successful people tend disproportionately to become immersed in the institutions that promulgate the dominant paradigm. So in a culture like ours where atheism is the intellectually dominant worldview, it seems plausible that if, in fact, atheists tend to be smarter, it is because smarter people disproportionately end up immersed in academic environments where atheism is strongly inculcated.

CThomas

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look2jesus
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Re: Dialogue with a skeptic

Post by look2jesus » Tue Sep 13, 2011 8:40 pm

Frank,

Are you there? I am trying to be patient while awaiting your response. Take care,

l2j
And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more, with knowlege and discernment...Philippians 1:9 ESV

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look2jesus
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Re: Dialogue with a skeptic

Post by look2jesus » Fri Sep 16, 2011 7:12 pm

Darin,

I am in the middle of various discussions within my family circle regarding atheism/evolution and I am really looking forward to this continuing dialog. Has Frank spoken with you to indicate a response to Steve is forthcoming? So far, it's been a captivating debate.

l2j
And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more, with knowlege and discernment...Philippians 1:9 ESV

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