Not sure what this expression means.
Don’t forget that I don’t live in your country. Far from being in the minority, if you list all the christian denominations and other religions separately in my country then I am in the plurality with those with ‘no religion’. Not all of them would sign up to the word atheist, but then I have the previously mentioned reservations about that word myself.
These two sentences of yours go hand in hand. It doesn't matter where you live, the majority on the planet have always believed there is a deity (because it makes the most sense of what we see and experience). Thus your myopic view is tainted by 'padded numbers.' It doesn't matter how many in your small country aren't theists.
LOL, because it is both audacious and ridiculously, thus absolutely. We should give up the absurd. Look how your eye works, something 'designed' you. To think otherwise "isn't wise," it isn't thoughtful. Intelligence is the ability to add and subtract correctly. A godless universe of incredible engineering does not, frankly, add up. There is no atheist worldview that can possibly happen 'naturally.' Things do indeed add up.
I really think you have an inappropriate analogy here. If you take the acronym on face value then there is little question that there have been flying objects that remain unidentified. Is your god like them in some way? What happens to your god during the equivalent of flying object identification? Might it be like the moment of the calling out of the Emperor’s New Clothes?
Then, by your own observation, analogy works pretty well here: . 1You recognize that I don't believe in them and you do. 2 You recognize 'a-UFO' is absurd. For that alone, it proves a couple of pertinent points in this conversation.
Richard Dawkins’s life’s work is in evolutionary biology, and he has spent a fair amount of his energy on communicating for the public understanding of that field. He is one of the best writers and speakers ever to take on that challenge. Inevitably that has included taking on religious opponents of evolutionary science, which must have been like constantly batting away blowflies in a never-ending Australian summer.
My family is full of scientists. None of them are like Dawkins. He wrote a best selling book, so he's caught someone's interest but after having listened, read, and watched, God Delusion is thin, at best. A good number of Christians I know read him, simply to see what he had to say. When Dawkins ran a $ raising event, being a millionaire himself you'd wonder why he didn't use some of his own money, the goal was to 'educate' kids about atheism. Strange if it were the default position (it isn't). He is reactionary and doesn't think very well regarding the big-picture. He simply caveman'd "evolution good, Christians who say 'no' bad." God Delusion is reactionary.
Dawkins has also made a lot of money out of trashing religion. Your criticism is quite friendly compared to the real hate mail he gets from fundamentalist christians. All that seems to me to balance out nicely. The only annoying thing for the christians would be that he finds the abuse hilarious.
Sure, I'm not reactionary...
Audacious? He would be too reservedly British to accept the honour. Ignorant? You haven’t given a single example of that. Blind? He can explain the general principles of how eyes evolved without the need for any meddling god. Hates? It’s not him sending the abusive emails with the death threats and ear-curling language. Deaf? He would listen carefully then answer any question in a way that served it back to you doubled.
:nono: You cannot explain the eye any better than you could explain cars without design. Its impossible, despite attempts.
Points or people on TOL? Both are easy enough but let's name you among them: Did you make yourself? "No." Someone or something else made you, correct? "Correct." There you go. proof is simply that easy. You and I have a god, regardless of objection and easily, provably so. The rest of the discussion about God is this easy, the principles of reality cannot be denied and they build on each other, just as above. If any atheist listens, I can easily prove the existence of God by steps. This first one, alone, would destroy the name and definition of 'atheism.' Atheism, itself, cannot exist by the above proof.
If I can prove that the great Jupiter is the best of the Classical Pantheon, will you believe in him?
You can't. If you could, I'd be stupid not to believe in him. The reason I know you cannot is because I think logically and truth points elsewhere but at least you have 'god' right. I did not, could not create myself. Something/someone else did. That is the start against atheism in the only viably correct direction.
The evidence seems to say otherwise.
Guess again, this is not the logical, reasonable, truthful position. You did not and could not create yourself.
Are you thinking of the kind of quiz which asks general knowledge questions and gives a choice of four answers? When the audience is polled and the answers are split so that 49% get it right and the three wrong answers run at 17%, 16% and 18% then the graph clearly shows that the audience got it overwhelmingly right by plurality, but still a majority got it wrong, which was my claim.
In some instance. If you watch Millionaire, the audience generally gets it 70%.
Truth is truth is truth is truth. Statements contrawise are not truth. Whenever you see percentages, don't jump on the bandwagon with whichever ones 'seem' to favor your position. That is called 'padding' the numbers.
I think specifically on the point of christianity, were I to become convinced that the mythologies of christianity were also historically accurate (they are so laughably unbelievable and historically untenable that I would say your workload there is going to be overwhelming) I would be unrelenting in my opposition to it on the grounds that it is an immoral proposition whether it is reality or not.
Let me do this without being perceived as insulting: Simpletons. It isn't that these atheist websites etc. don't ask good questions, it is that they settle for simpleton answers without any further investigation. It isn't that I'm special pleading: Sight unseen, I can doubt someone walking on water, but I've seen bugs do displacement and carry out the task. Afterwards, a few magicians and scientists have pulled this off, just to do it. Why? Because they wanted to pull it off, not to fool people, but to do it. Its good science NOT to be skeptical but to 'see' if it can be done. Simpletons (those settling for simplistic) don't do this, they become the crowd of naysayers and thus are duped by their simple thinking and the shallow evaluation.
What does being against things have to do with atheism? Haven’t we dealt with the origins of ‘atheism’ already? It’s ‘a’ for without, not ‘a’ for against. A child is clearly born without gods. How could they know anything about them? What on earth do you mean by purposeful ignorance in the case of young children? What conspiracy is this of indoctrination to kill off something that doesn’t yet exist? Good grief, you are paranoid.
You are padding again. Follow data where it goes instead of making wrong assessment. I'm not paranoid. Not remotely. 'Without" and "against" are the same thing else you'd not be in this discussion. It is 'accurate' assessment, and I'm right.
I hope you laugh with me: They said 'religion' was the default position (against your previous notion). Further? One of my degrees is education. I know how to assess intelligence. While it is true that Christians don't have to be brilliant to be Christians because God doesn't want just the intelligent to be saved, (make sense on those numbers?) it is wrong to suggest that atheists, by pool, are more intelligent than Christians, by pool. IOW, the statistics don't really measure what that supposedly intelligent 'atheist' thinks they measure. They are good numbers, they just don't say what that guy thinks. It is misleading to say atheists are smarter (by only four I.Q. points or test answers no less). That, again, is the simpleton/simplistic answer.
Do I need to explain the concept of ‘on average’ to you? Do I need to explain what I meant by intelligence not being prophylactic to infection by religious memes?
I may have to explain data interpretation, confirmation bias, and significance to you. The above article was not written by the most intelligent among us.
Maybe. But back at our original point of contact in this thread, what you were doing was heckling people whose hobby is not collecting stamps, telling them they shouldn’t complain about their stamps.
…dogmatic?
Stuart
Correcting (appropriately) is seen as 'heckling?' :think:
lain: Dis-inviting, no?