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Bashing atheism with misrepresentations of atheism is one of the best arguments for atheism.
I have news for you Bulma, which is of the kind the Theist, having to keep a belief going without anything but the belief to support it, cannot comprehend. Atheism isn't ripped off from anything or about anything. It isn't anything, but a failure to believe a claim that isn't believable.
Sound like the picture from another thread from `` political indoctrination #13 post ``of the BS notice of hatred of the Bible , just more ideas which are usually not true ............................. See there is a lot of arrogance and hatred of the bible and of Christians and this is just part of it................... See there is false religions which have demonic gods of a form of godliness but lack power , and Christianity which has the true God were Jesus had all the power of the living God and say No one go to the Father God but through Him
This is probably wasted effort, but if the exegesis of the Bible is not BS - and much of it is not, even if I don't agree with it - then you should be against BS as much as we are. Because impressive -sounding waffle can be used to lead receptive - minded people anywhere they like without any sound arguments, and that can be done with religion, too. False prophets, in fact.
But the problem is kneejerk rejection of everything an atheist says, simply because an atheist has said it. The fact is that Christianity, if it is true -has nothing to fear from atheism and could benefit from critical thinking.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by hljc
Sound like the picture from another thread from `` political indoctrination #13 post ``of the BS notice of hatred of the Bible , just more ideas which are usually not true ............................. See there is a lot of arrogance and hatred of the bible and of Christians and this is just part of it................... See there is false religions which have demonic gods of a form of godliness but lack power , and Christianity which has the true God were Jesus had all the power of the living God and say No one go to the Father God but through Him
Hatred of the bible? Really? I don't hate Grimm's fairy tales, and they have more real moral teachings in them than that book cobbled together by committee.
But the problem is kneejerk rejection of everything an atheist says, simply because an atheist has said it. The fact is that Christianity, if it is true -has nothing to fear from atheism and could benefit from critical thinking.
Theism has withstood philosophers, has branched out into several flavors, and generally stood the test of time. I would think the naysayers would have found holes to poke by now.
Atheism generally was a minority belief, and when it was a majority (as in Communist Russia), it was enforced by force. This is a might makes right, which is not a definition of validity (almost the opposite, in fact).
Atheism today when it isn't aligned with authoritarian groups (remember, if spiritual power is not acknowledged, what is seen as of merit is worldly power), has a sort of wishy-washy "Life live to the fullest" mentality. Not only is this blatantly ripped off from Zen Buddhism and the country folk song (largely of Christian origin) "Live Like You Were Dying." However, divorced from Zen Buddhism's higher call of spiritual development and Christianity's call to worship, what you are left with is shallow nihilism and materialism, and left with the question "What happens after?" Buddhism has a plan, and they are cool with dying. So does Hinduism. So does Christianity.
What happens when everything you do or work for dies with you? What point is there to living?
I'm pleased to see that in their opening statement they referenced one of my favorite works: Harry G. Frankfurt's On Bullsh..it (Cambridge 1998, Princeton 2005). It's a tiny book (no, really, not only is it short but it's physically tiny) but is it ever full of good sense! I especially love his critique of post-modernism near the end of the book, and his sobering observation that it can be difficult to spot even one's own bullsh it.
Edit: Is this a children's forum or what? Bull****? What a bunch of bull sh it.
And yes, it spells out BS in full. I've shortened it to initials in the following abstract:
Although BS is common in everyday life and has attracted attention from philosophers, its reception (critical or ingenuous) has not, to our knowledge, been subject to empirical investigation. Here we focus on pseudo-profound BS, which consists of seemingly impressive assertions that are presented as true and meaningful but are actually vacuous. We presented participants with BS statements consisting of buzzwords randomly organized into statements with syntactic structure but no discernible meaning (e.g., “Wholeness quiets infinite phenomena”). Across multiple studies, the propensity to judge BS statements as profound was associated with a variety of conceptually relevant variables (e.g., intuitive cognitive style, supernatural belief). Parallel associations were less evident among profundity judgments for more conventionally profound (e.g., “A wet person does not fear the rain”) or mundane (e.g., “Newborn babies require constant attention”) statements. These results support the idea that some people are more receptive to this type of BS and that detecting it is not merely a matter of indiscriminate skepticism but rather a discernment of deceptive vagueness in otherwise impressive sounding claims. Our results also suggest that a bias toward accepting statements as true may be an important component of pseudo-profound BS receptivity.
Keywords: BS, BS detection, dual-process theories, analytic thinking, supernatural beliefs, religiosity, conspiratorial ideation, complementary and alternative medicine.
Some of their other published papers include: (I haven't perused them yet)
I suspect most apologists will get a blank look in their face, and not read or comment on this. After all, it's not scripture, which many don't understand either.
Now they should do a study to see what sort of people reject statements that are perfectly true but which don't sound like they are true
Now they should do a study to see what sort of people reject statements that are perfectly true but which don't sound like they are true
Yes. In fact quite a bit of study is done about those who argue from incredulity.
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