Considering that many (most?) people who've deconverted from Christianity have done so partially with the help of skeptical arguments/debates, it seems clear to me that the opposite is true. Not only is it worthwhile, it is also directly beneficial.

We take the person seriously, but we don't take their ideas seriously.

Big difference. Schizophrenia is an organic disease of the brain. Faith-based religion is a contagious memetic disorder, a disease of the beliefs. The treatments are decidedly different.

And yet, people do believe it, whether literally or just devoutly. We don't take the Bible *literally* seriously. We take it seriously as a contagious memetic disease. Debunking the Bible with rational argumentation techniques is the first line of defense for the 'immune system' of rationality. Our arguments against it are like 'anti-bodies' against the various memes propagated via the Bible. The more people who hear good reasons *not* to believe, the more 'immunity' spreads through our society, and the fewer people who will be 'infected' in the first place.

We don't engage them on their own terms. We're atheists, not theologians! We engage them with reality.

You're failing to make the distinction between the ideas and the people. It is actually the ideas that are ridiculous. The people are 'infected' by the ideas. They are just people; billions are infected. These memes are tenacious and insidious, exploiting natural, innate weaknesses in human intuition and reasoning. So it makes no sense to blame the people for their flawed human nature. What needs to happen is to wake them up to the ridiculousness of the ideas. Help the person by hurting their faulty beliefs, not by hurting the person directly.

People deconvert. It's a fact. Some things help deconversions, some things hinder it. The contagious memetic diseases of religion have adaptations to prevent deconversion. One of these adaptations is the idea that faith is a virtue, with the consequence that there is a cultural taboo against criticizing faith and religion. That's a huge advantage to contagious delusion if that taboo is enforced. Breaking that taboo is a primary challenge for rational atheists. One very effective technique of breaking the taboo is to publicly, loudly, and directly confront it by breaking it unapologetically. That can, and often does, mean using ridicule. But the best target for the ridicule is usually the ideas or the resulting behaviours. Only indirectly, through the conventions of the taboo, does that ridicule rub off onto people themselves.

This distinction is important, because it plays a major role in how effective the tactic is for deconversion. If you ridicule a person directly, that's just being a jerk, and the taboo is untouched (or worse, reinforced). But if you ridicule an idea, and the believer gets all hot-and-bothered about it, it brings the taboo right out into the open so that it can be confronted and dismantled. If the taboo did not exist, the believer would not be offended by ridicule of an idea. But they are offended, because they believe in the taboo. They believe that criticizing religion/faith is inherently offensive, and that their beliefs are a core part of their personal identity, and thus they will try to enforce the taboo. Once they try to enforce the taboo, the cat is out of the bag, the taboo is exposed. And we can then ridicule the taboo, and argue rationally against it.

The effect of this is that the taboo is weakened and steadily eroded, and our 'anti-bodies' spread farther than they would if the taboo were untouched and unchallenged. Criticism of religion becomes more common-place and accepted. More deconversions are the result. Merely ridiculing people directly does not have this effect, and actually has the effect that you're railing against: It hardens their defenses.

For the ridicule to be effective, it also needs to be backed up by solid argument. This is where debunking specific religious beliefs and dogmas (like the Bible) comes into play. These debunking arguments are the anti-bodies that do the real work of disabling contagious memetic disease. The ridicule of the taboo just disables the primary defense of religion and allows the anti-bodies to do their work.

Read more deconversion stories. I've read hundreds by this point. It's a fascinating study of the psychology of rational atheism. How many have you read that culminated in, "... and then an atheist called me a moron and that's when I realized how stupid religion is." That's not how it works. How it works is, "... and as my doubts were growing, I couldn't find an answer to the problem of evil, and nobody I asked could answer it either, and so I finally gave up on god altogether." Deconversion is usually a long process of step-by-step dismantling of religious ideas. The primary tools are curiosity and doubt. The believer almost always has to do their own thinking to get out of it. What helps them, what boosts this process, is to have a wide range of anti-bodies (anti-religious ideas/arguments) available to them. Ridicule of people is not one of those anti-bodies. Ridicule of ideas can be. But that requires that such ridicule be available in the public sphere, and the only way that can work is if we break down the taboo against criticizing religion.

If you don't make the distinction between people and their ideas, your efforts against religion will be much less effective, and even counter-productive, since ridiculing people can reinforce the taboo rather than weaken it.

If you don't talk to them, they're just going to talk to their fellow-believers instead, reinforcing their beliefs with the assurances they receive. It's much more effective to discuss their beliefs with them directly.

Another thing you're not making a clear distinction with is *how* to debate religious beliefs. You seem to think it involves reading the Bible and making biblical arguments, like, "Well, Jesus said you should do X, or believe Y." Now *that's* ridiculous, if you think that's how we argue here.

There are lots of effective techniques for getting believers to think for themselves. Pointing out absurdities in their holy books/dogmas is one technique. Another technique that is particularly effective is the Socratic method. If you've ever heard The Infidel Guy, Reggie Finley is a master of this technique. Also, Todd Allen Gates has a book specifically on this technique, Dialogue with a Christian Proselytizer, although I haven't read it, so I don't know how well written it is.

Using the Socratic method, as you probably already know but I'll briefly explain for everyone else reading this, involves primarily asking probing questions. You don't have to take the Bible seriously at all to do this, because you're asking about what the believer *believes*, not what their favourite book has written in it. Another proponent of the Socratic method is Matt Dillahunty from the Atheist Experience show, whose motto for discussion is, "What do you believe and why do you believe it?"

That's the basic starting point, and you just keep asking harder and harder questions, chipping away at the believer's rationalizations, introducing doubts all along the way, and teaching them how to think for themselves the whole time. It is very effective if you are persistent, don't give up when you hear a clever apologetics-type answer, and come up with creative questions targeting specific beliefs that the believer holds, rather than generic beliefs obtained from the holy book.

Another thing that you seem to be unclear on is that when we debate theists, we're not just talking to them, we're talking to everyone who's listening, including people who do not have exactly the same position as the believer in the debate. This allows ridicule of absurd ideas to have an especially powerful effect. "Hmm, I thought Joe was pretty smart, but how can he believe that silly idea? Come to think of it, lots of fellow believers believe silly ideas that I don't believe. Maybe our book isn't as great as I thought." or "... And Joe's more of a devout believer than I am. If that's where his denomination leads him, I don't want anything to do with it." or "... And I was always unsure of that idea. I asked the pastor about it and he didn't have a real answer. Now that I think about it, that idea really is absurd." Using the Socratic method is particularly effective here, since it becomes a game of, "Count how many absurd beliefs I can get the believer to admit they believe on faith." When the tally starts reaching 4 or 5, the audience starts to get the idea: Faith leads directly to absurd beliefs. One after another after another. Just asking questions, and allowing the answers to be heard publicly, can itself be a powerful anti-religion argument.

That's why I never carry on private email debates. I bring them into a public forum like this one and post my counter-arguments for everyone who'll read them, not just the person I'm addressing. Admittedly, I don't get many people asking for private debates, but *for those of you reading to this besides Marquis*, you might consider converting some of those annoying email debate offers into public posts. (Of course, respect privacy where appropriate, but you can always strip out the names/addresses.) Then you just send the person a link to your public post, and if they want to continue the debate they can. But now you have an audience of more than just 1.

Still, even so, one-on-one conversations with believers can also be very effective, especially for people in your life who know you already. The key is to know how to pick the fight. Some people are in proselytization-mode, and it will be time-consuming to confront them. If you're good at it, even proselytizers can be deconverted, or at least de-fanged so they don't keep trying to proselytize to you. But if you're not so good yet, it can be a waste of time and potentially damaging to a personal relationship. In that case, go online and sharpen your skills first, then come back to the proselytizer in your personal life later.

Usually a better opportunity is when the person is at least a little bit open-minded and knows you well enough to know you're a real person, not just an acquaintance. In these cases, it's worthwhile to offer deconversion support (remember, only the believer can deconvert themselves), because you already know this person and they likely have a concrete effect on your life. Whether it's a friend, relative, spouse/partner, if they're at least a bit open-minded, it's worth a shot. But if all you have up your sleeve are personal insults and personal ridicule, forget it; you'll damage the relationship with no good coming out of it. Try the Socratic method instead. Try the unapologetic approach if you want to also challenge the taboo against criticizing faith/religion.

I say this to end the debate. I tell them to first prove that any god is real, then prove it is the biblical god (bc I mostly get in arguments with xtians). Then I say prove that your version of god is the right one, the we can discuss his philosophy and morality. Most religious arguments dive straight into the attributes and characteristics of their god. I always find myself arguing about gods morality. "Why would god have his people commit genocide?" "why would god kill every baby on earth?" I always find myself getting into these debates, then I remember that I am validating them bc we are discussing god as if he really exist. So I then ask them to prove gods existence. Once we have done that we can move to the next argument, then the next, and so on. But of course it never goes beyond proof of any god. 

That is my point exactly.

It seems to me that "faith" is a personal and emotional issue which needs quite a lot of feeding, through endless debating and discussing of the finer points of "theology". What I have a problem with is to become shanghaied into such feeding events by psychic vampires who want validation. (And such validation can be as simple as to feel righteous excitment after having - gloriously victoriously - confronted some 'godless atheist' or other for no better purpose than that of feeding your own vanity of piousness.)

So don't do that. Focus on what the believer *believes* and why he believes it. Like I said, we're atheists, not theologians.

The point is that you show the absurdity of what they *believe*. It's not, "Well if God is X, then he should do Y, and that's absurd." Instead it's, "You believe God is X? Why? That's absurd. So, you also believe God should do Y? That's even more absurd. Why do you believe all these absurd things? Don't you care about what you believe?" Etc. Just hammer away on the believer's beliefs, not the specific dogmas of their religion. You're not ridiculing the dogmas, you're ridiculing the belief.

Blog readers want bullet point and quick conversation. So your style only in this forum hampers your message. But you got me interested right away. I actually started to read it, then skimmed it. Felt it was important enough to digest and  came back to it to read it again two more times. Now I am not much better at brevity either, after all I was a minister. My blogs can get lengthy, but I find ways to break up the text so stands out more.

I offer this as an example

http://www.rationalresponders.com/forum/19565?page=1

number 70.

I too have been told to cut down what I write. It was on PZ Meyers website. Someone kindly pointed out that blogging implies brevity.

My deconversion is a long story and frankly one that I don't entirely understand. I started commenting on an evolution blog back in December. The owner has strong opinions, but he was helping me understand evolution. He was intrigued that I was an ex-minister who was interested in science. He ultimately invited me as a co-owner. So I post my own article some of which deal with my struggle away from belief.  I am using it as a dumping ground of my religious experience. It is becoming a great vehicle to bringing to light things/doubts that festered inside of me. This is quite valuable to me. Someday I may be able to give an executive summary of my deconversion, but for now this blog will have to do.

If you are interested click on over and feel free to comment.

http://darwin-killed-god.blogspot.com/

If you click on label ex-minister you will see all my articles. The label block is on the right side of page down a few pages.

I recently saw Julie Sweeney's Letting Go of God video.  While not the same story I identified with her awakening.

Don't worry - you were answering the question seriously as usual. It was a big answer but it made sense. You can make points in a single sentence or a page, obviously, but it depends on the issues you consider as you go. It's possible to pare things back to their barest form but an online conversation where keystrokes are working in three dimensions is not a haiku contest. The format of web sites like this, unbroken by graphics or 'breathing' layouts has a way of creating a textual colditz once you get past about 350 words...

Who enjoys banging their head against a brick wall, anyways?

I'll have to say that I really do agree with this. I've had this experience with christians that I've engaged. They seem to get some kind of kick out of having someone take their nonsense seriously. In a way, I think it empowers them.

It would appear to me that religions can have important influences in successful personality development because they are the primary way that cultures promote the virtues associated with each stage of life according to Erikson's Theory of Psychosocial Development. So we should assume that your position that theists are mentally sick is just lacking basic psycological knowledge. I think this could be insulting to people with genuine psycological disorders.

Good day.

I have never mentioned ''successfully personality'' but rather the successfully development of ones personality. 

Anything that relies on persuading people of the existence of something without justification/evidence, thus encouraging irrationality, is not beneficial to social progress or the ability to address complex problems.

The evidence from surveys of various countries, and regions within nations, shows that overall psychological health has a reverse correlation with religiosity. Any positive correlation between personal religiosity and happiness within a society should not be allowed to obscure the broader perspective.

The 'virtues' promoted by religion do not match all that well to what is part of a properly based ethics or moral code. They perpetuate many ancient and primitive taboos and superstitions.

The ability of a practice or belief to allow people to cope with difficult social circumstances reduces the motivation to address the factors in society which contribute to that personal distress, thereby ultimately contributing to the problem.

There is good reason to accept that mental well-being does require some beliefs and/or practices in addition to adequate reasoning skills, to address those aspects of our psychology which religion addresses.

However those ideas associated with many traditional beliefs, especially of the Abrahamic variety, are becoming increasingly inadequate or even dysfunctional, as actual knowledge of both physical reality and the mind is gained by scientific study. The cognitive dissonance involved in trying to reconcile traditional creation stories with the conclusions of careful study, as typified by the evolution 'debate' in the US, is an example of the negatives of clinging to such belief systems.

The practices of various Eastern religions in such things as meditation seem far more successful here. As Sam Harris urges, we should study them, not so much the less-well founded beliefs associated with them, but what is it  that contributes to the enhanced ability to find 'peace'. I only caution that we don't really want a universal Prozac to take away any drive to improve society and address real problems. As always, balance is required.

There is evidence that this enhanced ability to not attend to bad things occurring in the outside world can allow real evil to arise, such as the Pol Pot regime in the highly Buddhist nation of Cambodia, or the atrocities committed on both sides of the long-running conflict in Sri-Lanka.

We definitely need something to address this fundamental aspect of life, but something more consistent with current knowledge of the nature and origins of the Universe and Life itself, better able to address a very different and more complex world than that of a few millennia past.

That reply is very hard to read - it shows up on my browser as a solid block of text, with little or no distinction between other posts and your response.

We have not proved that religion is unambiguously damaging, but there are results that point that way.

This is a major relevant study: http://moses.creighton.edu/JRS/2005/2005-11.html, which has many references to other studies.

It does not prove the case against religion, but does disprove the idea that religion is inherently and strongly beneficial.

Cambodia and Sri-Lanka are examples where the population was strongly observant of a belief system which would seem to be inconsistent with such acts.

In Stalinist Russia, the population itself was predominantly of Eastern Orthodox faith, suppressed during the Communist regimes, but re-emerging extremely rapidly once those constraints were removed, indicating that the basic beliefs were in that direction rather than in that of the rulers.

The model of absolute obedience to authority is clearly in line with the religion, rather than with Atheism.  And in any case, more people died in Hitler's camps than in Stalin's, and Hitler was not an Atheist.

Stalin was opposed and eventually brought down by other communists, so he really isn't a good example for you, that and the fact that he trained as a seminarian.

In all cases, a highly observant society was readily subverted to either allow or assist in horrific acts. Neither Stalin nor Pol Pot personally killed all those people.

Once again, I am not proving that religion is harmful, just providing very strong evidence that is not inherently beneficial to society at large, even when and if it provides personal benefits to the individual believer.

I don't think i know anyone who deconverted because of rational arguements (at least outside the internet). I deconverted because i just didnt by it anymore, just didnt see how there could be a god certainly was no debate or arguements about it, just realised i didn't believe it anymore. My friend deconverted because christianity clashed with his worldview. Hell i didnt even know any arguements for or against god at the time.

im not saying debating is bad thing and im aware you didnt say all. just thought id mention it. look maybe i did maybe i didn't i duno hard to tell when things arent a conscious decsion. the question that made me realise i was an atheist was why should there be a god? was probably an atheist before then just hadnt thought about it. but its not even a very logical question for determining weather there is a god. but it was enough, im not sure i had even thought of the idea that god might not exist until then

Im not disagreeing with your point, but i will  say sometimes debate will help reenforce believe... infact most of the time. But later maybe they will revisit those questions and it will help. But has anyone ever said yup now im an atheist after a debate.. probably not. Thats my thoughts on it.

Q: What is it then?

If a Christian is going to find validation for his/her beliefs in your actions, it honestly doesn't really matter what you do.  Here's a few scenarios for you:

Scenario A (your scenario)

You: The Bible cannot possibly be true because of A, B, C, and D

Christian: Ahh but you're paying attention to me, therefore deep down you realize that the Bible is an important book! My faith is now validated because of you!

Scenario B (my scenario)

You: Dude, that is so crazy I'm not even going to respond

Christian: You're just afraid because you KNOW you can't refute it! My faith is now validated because of you!

In either case, the Christian is going to walk away feeling that they've won. That's what they're programmed to do.  If they've entered into a dialog with a predetermined conclusion, you've already lost. It doesn't matter what you say.

Mentally sick people are in hospitals. They are there because they have posited delusions that have not been accepted by society as whole. But what happens when people start LISTENING to them?  Scientology, Raelianism, Kim Il-Sungism, Heaven's Gate, People's Temple. THAT to me is what's harmful about religion. It's not the beliefs, it is the mental conditioning the religious go through as children in order to become receptive to harmful and demonstrably false beliefs.  Acknowledging the Bible is important because over 2 BILLION people on this earth believe it in some form or another to be the literal truth. These people are RUNNING things.

No it is not futile and so what if they get some twisted validation out of it.

Why do we have to take them seriously? Not just Christians, but Muslims and even the dogmatism of a state like North Korea. The powers in all of these have a global influence. It may seem indirect on a local scale, but people make up governments, and governments have power and weapons.

It is not futile because if we never challenged social norms our species would still believe the earth to be flat, and women would not be able to vote and blacks would still be slaves.

Whatever validation a believer may get short term is being out paced by scientific discovery and the age of technology is making them take on increasingly a more secular watered down version of their belief. If we did nothing and never spoke up against blind worship of a god or a state, those forms of fascism would over run us.

If no one had questioned me when I believed, I never would have taken the journey to the atheist position I hold today. It took me years after that specific question to end up an atheist, it did not happen over night. Most de conversions take months or even years. Rarely does someone have an overnight epiphany.

It is a slow process and multi generational. You cannot think that because you don't change most people's minds that there are not others whom you do question, may crack in the future and give up on their beliefs.

The rate of non religious, including merely non-church goers to agnostic/atheist IS on the rise. Trinity College survey that the (no religious affiliation) percentage of Americans almost doubled from 8% in 1990 to 15% today.

http://www.trincoll.edu/AboutTrinity/News_Events/trinity_news/030909_Religion.htm

It is because we live under one government, and because our species lives on one planet, that we cannot ignore these claims. People who believe these things can have power over us, be it our boss at work, or our local city council, or our hired teachers, or our state school boards who decide school textbooks. Or our Senators all the way up to our president.

But to say it never works is absurd. I am an atheist today because someone in my past questioned me when I told them I believed in Jesus. And since believers can be our law enforcement, and our lawyers and judges and law makers, I find it extremely important.

What I give most of a fuck about is why Australia's top order is unable to score fifty fucking runs without losing all their fucking wickets. This is a bigger and more complex fucken question than whether or flying fucken not there's a fucken god, flying around the fuck.

Maybe god's doing it given Australia is so fucken secular and beer soaked. He's fucked up, the fuck.

Also, why the fuck did my mother give me a fucking bible for christmas? Probably the same reason I gave her The Evolution of Morality. We got a laugh out of it, anyway.

Get fucked toidi and stop whinging about our fucken whinging.

A: An unsurprising logical pre-requisite of your asking such a question.

You obviously missed the following part of my signature: