We're horrible people and we should stop right now.
Offline What is wrong with us? Can't you see what we're doing? We're making people irrational!
Let me explain. A fair portion of theists who come to this site have never heard a good argument against the supernatural, junk science, or holy scriptures. Thus, they would not be irrational having no knowledge of the fallacies, but merely ignorant of the logic.
But oh, my dear comrades, look at what we're doing. We're actually talking about all the things that are wrong with these ideas. And when hardcore theists acknowledge the argument at hand, understand it, and continue to believe because of faith, they've become irrational.
We're making people irrational.
We're spreading irrationality. Though, to be precise we're really converting the ignorant into the irrational. How will we ever live with ourselves? How can we go on, knowing that we've created so much chaos? The guilt will surely tear us all apart, and we will be forced to eat at least one pint of chocolate fudge ice cream. Maybe even two.
And then we'll get fat, and sit in our homes in front of our respective computers, and make 5 YouTube videos everyday where we talk about how horrible we are. Eventually we'll have to wear sunglasses, because even the dim lights in our homes will strain our eyes. We'll all talk in deep voices about the perils of militant atheism and then it will hit us.
We'll have turned into irrational atheists.
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Nah, I think we're possibly doing a good thing, sewing the seeds for a change in the zeitgeist and promoting healthy skepticism and spreading the knowledge of critical thinking. At the worst, we'll have no impact, but we're not making anything worse. I'm assuming this post isn't an ironic piss-take. If it is, I think mostaches will be back in fashion very soon. And I'm scared.
Wish in one hand, shit in the other, see which one fills up first.
Lol, I was just thinking the other day, that by giving people reason to doubt that which they will believe anyway (at least for a while), we are actually strengthening their faith. Doh! Everything we do is wrong!!!
jk
"I've yet to witness circumstance successfully manipulated through the babbling of ritualistic nonsense to an imaginary deity." -- me (josh)
If god can do anything, can he make a hot dog so big even he can't eat all of it?
I was also thinking this the other day.Is it possible we're creating a generation of theists who will be familiar with common arguments and study their apologetics? But then I realise I shouldn't worry, if they all actually looked properly at what they believe and had to ty defend it I think a fair number would become atheist.
Psalm 14:1 "the fool hath said in his heart there is a God"-From a 1763 misprinted edition of the bible
Argument from Sadism: Theist presents argument in a wall of text with no punctuation and wrong spelling. Atheist cannot read and is forced to concede.
Yeah, I'm not really worried either. It's just kinda funny to think about it that way.
Is this like the argument before about missionaries creating heathens? I think the idea was that if people were completely ignorant of Jesus their whole lives, then they could go to purgatory or something, but if they *knew* about Jesus, and thought it was nothing special, then they for sure went to hell. Making the whole missionary effort a kind of Cruelty Russian Roulette.
I think you have it bang on, though - if people move from ignorant to irrational, I'd say that's a step up.
Saint Will: no gyration without funkstification.
fabulae! nil satis firmi video quam ob rem accipere hunc mi expediat metum. - Terence
Yeah, that's the idea I had in mind. Of course something else that's pretty funny is that when we flip around any of those kind of self-reflecting theistic arguments to fit atheism it goes from the metaphorical consequence of "we cut your balls off" to "we write you an angry letter."
I know this is all tongue and cheek but I'm just wondering, how can we actually stop what were doing. Stopping doing what we're doing would make things a hell of a lot worse. The RRS is a vital part of the battle against irrationality and as long as it brings some people out of fundanmentalism we're doing a good thing.
Atheist Books
Haha - it's so true! I think that springs from who's more likely to say "Now, hold on. Let's be reasonable about this" instead of "Their evil must be purged from the earth!"
Saint Will: no gyration without funkstification.
fabulae! nil satis firmi video quam ob rem accipere hunc mi expediat metum. - Terence
Good point. I think it will just create a new generation of apologetics. I have been studying the 10 arguments for the existence of god and can't imagine that there will be any really new and interesting arguments come from it. However, I believe you're spot on when you say that more theists will be more familiar with the skepticism of non-believers.
"Always seek out the truth, but avoid at all costs those that claim to have found it" ANONYMOUS
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"I guess it's time to ask if you live under high voltage power transmission lines which have been shown to cause stimulation of the fantasy centers of the brain due to electromagnetic waves?" - Me
"God is omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent, - it says so right here on the label. If you have a mind capable of believing all three of these divine attributes simultaneously, I have a wonderful bargain for you. No checks please. Cash and in small bills." - Robert A Heinlein.
Ok, then we need to stop teaching children about safe sex because then if they know about safe sex but choose to have unsafe sex anyway we have made them behave irrationally. So we have made them irrational.
We need to stop teaching people about nutrition and healthy eating because then if they choose to eat junk food anyway we have made them behave irrationally.
We should not teach children about the dangers of drugs or alcohol because then if they use drugs or alcohol....
"The Bible looks like it started out as a game of Mad Libs" - Bill Maher
Yeah. Pretty much.
Reductio ad absurdum FTW. I'm glad I brought the silly argument up before "anti-militant" atheists thought of it.
I HOPE so. The apologetics thus far have been weak in the extreme. The only way an argument seems to extend beyond a few exchanges here is through the use of outright dishonesty, miscommunication, or total willful ignorance.
The more we respond, the more material there is for those people who kind-of doubt, but get stuck by apologetic bullshit. And it's bullshit - I'll call it every time. The apologetic arguments are just so obviously unfounded, confused, and misdirecting that all the right people get repelled by them.
I say let them go for it.
Saint Will: no gyration without funkstification.
fabulae! nil satis firmi video quam ob rem accipere hunc mi expediat metum. - Terence
This article seemed appropriate for this thread:
http://education.guardian.co.uk/egweekly/story/0,,2275308,00.html
"True, you don't have to be religious to be crazy, but it helps. Indeed, if you are religious, you don't have to be crazy in the medically certifiable sense in order to do massively crazy things. And - this is the worst of it - religious faith can give people a sort of hyperbolic confidence, an utter unconcern about whether they might be making a mistake, that enables acts of inhumanity that would otherwise be unthinkable."
"The Bible looks like it started out as a game of Mad Libs" - Bill Maher