Battleground God: An interesting for theists and atheists.
Posted on: August 29, 2010 - 4:04am
Offline
Battleground God: An interesting for theists and atheists.
I followed a link in a forum here, and found this game. It's kinda interesting.
I'd like to see what other people score. 1 Rule: it has to be your first attempt. Here's my results.
- 503463 people have completed this activity to date.
- You suffered zero direct hits and bit zero bullets.
- This compares with the average player of this activity to date who takes 1.37 hits and bites 1.09 bullets.
- 8.13% of the people who have completed this activity, like you, emerged unscathed with the TPM Medal of Honour.
- 46.06% of the people who have completed this activity took very little damage and were awarded the TPM Medal of Distinction.
“Hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side, kid.”
- Login to post comments
Awesome! Let's see what I get.......
Ow. I should have been more careful.
Our revels now are ended. These our actors, | As I foretold you, were all spirits, and | Are melted into air, into thin air; | And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, | The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, | The solemn temples, the great globe itself, - Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, | And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, | Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff | As dreams are made on, and our little life | Is rounded with a sleep. - Shakespeare
Zero direct hits but I had to bite one bullet - that was the insistence on absolute proof for god despite the fact I said I accept evolutionary theory although it's slightly incomplete. After some thought I chose to insist on a higher standard of evidence for a supernatural god.
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
Interesting. I didn't hit that one. I suppose my standard according to the quiz is the same for whatever the claim is.
“Hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side, kid.”
I guess I baulked at normal frames of reference for magic but that was intellectually inconsistent according to the quiz.
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
You stated earlier that evolutionary theory is essentially true. However, you have now claimed that it is foolish to believe in God without certain, irrevocable proof that she exists. The problem is that there is no certain proof that evolutionary theory is true - even though there is overwhelming evidence that it is true. So it seems that you require certain, irrevocable proof for God's existence, but accept evolutionary theory without certain proof. (I always thought that there IS certain proof of evolutionary theory).
Earlier you claimed that it is not justifiable to base one's beliefs about the external world on a firm, inner-conviction, paying no regard to the external evidence, or lack of it, for the truth or falsity of this conviction. But now you say that the rapist Peter Sutcliffe was justified in basing his beliefs about God's will solely on precisely such a conviction. That's a bull's-eye for the intellectual sniper! (because the rapist is a Christian, so he internally can justify ANYTHING for himself).
In saying that God has the freedom and power to do that which is logically impossible (like creating square circles), you are saying that any discussion of God and ultimate reality cannot be constrained by basic principles of rationality. This would seem to make rational discourse about God impossible. If rational discourse about God is impossible, there is nothing rational we can say about God and nothing rational we can say to support our belief or disbelief in God. To reject rational constraints on religious discourse in this fashion requires accepting that religious convictions, including your religious convictions, are beyond any debate or rational discussion. This is to bite a bullet. (I do NOT HAVE religious convictions!
)
You claim that it is not justifiable to believe in God based only on inner-convictions, but earlier you stated that it was justifiable for the serial rapist to draw conclusions about God's will on the same grounds. If this form of justification is good enough for the rapist, why is it not good enough for the believer in God? There's an inconsistency here. (see above)
You took 2 direct hits and you bit 2 bullets. The average player of this activity to date takes 1.37 hits and bites 1.09 bullets. 503554 people have so far undertaken this activity.
Yah, I got nailed on the evolution thing myself.
=
How disappointing! I got an error message saying, "Oops! This link appears broken." I tried to google 'Battleground God' and found a few link with the same message. I suspect that I would have gotten a low score.
Congratulations! You have made it to the end of this activity.
You took zero direct hits and you bit 2 bullets. The average player of this activity to date takes 1.37 hits and bites 1.09 bullets. 503599 people have so far undertaken this activity.
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
1 direct hit, 2 bullets.
The direct hit was on the serial rapist one because I misread it as "would he feel justified" rather than, "would he be justified". Whoops.
The bullets where evolution (I'm still not sure what proof I would accept for a true supernatural God because the concept is confusing. My standard for following something that claims to be a God would be quite a bit lower though, but I wouldn't believe it was 'God'.) and:
"You've just bitten a bullet! In saying that God has the freedom and power to do that which is logically impossible (like creating square circles), you are saying that any discussion of God and ultimate reality cannot be constrained by basic principles of rationality. This would seem to make rational discourse about God impossible. If rational discourse about God is impossible, there is nothing rational we can say about God and nothing rational we can say to support our belief or disbelief in God. To reject rational constraints on religious discourse in this fashion requires accepting that religious convictions, including your religious convictions, are beyond any debate or rational discussion. This is to bite a bullet."
Which is true, I don't think an omni-max deity can live within the rules of logic and I don't think it is possible to discuss anything supernatural, by definition. But it is tricky because I don't think God can break logical rules (since I don't think God exists), I think the concept of God that most people put forward can break logical rules simply by having the traits assigned to it. So I don't feel I was biting a bullet by answering the way I did...but I might be overthinking the whole thing too.
Everything makes more sense now that I've stopped believing.
Congratulations!
You have been awarded the TPM medal of honour! This is our highest award for outstanding service on the intellectual battleground.
The fact that you progressed through this activity neither being hit nor biting a bullet suggests that your beliefs about God are internally consistent and very well thought out.
A direct hit would have occurred had you answered in a way that implied a logical contradiction. You would have bitten bullets had you responded in ways that required that you held views that most people would have found strange, incredible or unpalatable. However, you avoided both these fates - and in doing so qualify for our highest award. A fine achievement!
Comparative Statistics
Oh yeah, I got the God/evolution thing too, but I chose to take the hit.
Our revels now are ended. These our actors, | As I foretold you, were all spirits, and | Are melted into air, into thin air; | And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, | The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, | The solemn temples, the great globe itself, - Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, | And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, | Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff | As dreams are made on, and our little life | Is rounded with a sleep. - Shakespeare
I'm not quite sure what anybody could have gotten wrong on this quiz... what was the evolution thing?
This wasn't working for me yesterday, so when it finally loaded today I was excited... but it's really short.
I'm going to take it again and pretend to be a theist and see what happens.
If you claimed a higher standard for God than the theory of evolution (neither of which having been "proven"
, you bit a bullet.
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
I went through on the basis that 'god' is illogical and inherently false. I'm not sure where that comparison came up? I'll have to try it again.
Aha, do you guys mean this:
No, it's not foolish because there is no certain and irrevocable proof that 'god' does exist- it is foolish because there is certain and irrevocable logical proof that 'god' doesn't exist, and it is foolish because there is overwhelming empirical evidence against all of those things ascribed to this 'god' and no objective evidence for it at all.
It's foolish to believe without any objective evidence and in light of logical impossibility and evidence against it- it's not foolish to believe without certain proof.
That's almost more of a word trick than a legitimate philosophical problem.
And actually:
I tend to disagree with that anyway; I'd dare to say that there is certain proof that "evolutionary theory" is true. That's not to say that tentatively accepting something requires absolute proof, though.
I think the 'test' was written a little bit dishonestly really. I think they were mainly interested in getting cutesy and showing off how clever the authors are.
That is assuming the test is even comprehensive enough to function. At least one of my answers needed qualifiers for me to feel like I agreed with either solution.
Everything makes more sense now that I've stopped believing.
I'm with mellestad 100%. Once I admit that no such thing as a god exists, why on earth should I consider the consiquences of a possible/maybe she/he type god would do or not do. There is no consideration beyond that point!
"Very funny Scotty; now beam down our clothes."
VEGETARIAN: Ancient Hindu word for "lousy hunter"
If man was formed from dirt, why is there still dirt?
I was tricked... I shouldn't have taken the direct hit...
You have reached the end!
Congratulations! You have made it to the end of this activity.
You took 1 direct hit and you bit zero bullets. The average player of this activity to date takes 1.37 hits and bites 1.09 bullets. 504031 people have so far undertaken this activity.
Click the link below for further analysis of your performance and to see if you've won an award.
Vote for Democrats to save us all from the anti-American Republican party!
Please become a Patron of Brian Sapient
Yeah...I'd never take it to be a rigorous test of any sort. I thought it was kinda fun...but then again, I'm a philosophy nut. The wording on some of the questions I think was doused in academic philosophical rhetoric...
“Hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side, kid.”
Signature ? How ?
For the questions about God I went with a rather run-of-the-mill type of god that seems common amongst monotheists.
1. I said that God does not exist.
2. I then said that God must want to reduce suffering
3. I later said that God could flip sinful/unsinful
The quiz then points out to me that 2 and 3 are contradictory. The options presented are "bite the bullet" and basically admit that at least one of 2 or 3 must be wrong, or take a hit and admit that my beliefs are contradictory. But of course 2 and 3 both accurately represent what a lot of people think about God and they are contradictory. This is one of the many reasons for my belief as expressed by 1. So I took a hit here, but I don't think this hit/bite even applies to those who answer false for the first question.
I also eventually got:
"You've just bitten a bullet!
In saying that God has the freedom and power to do that which is logically impossible (like creating square circles), you are saying that any discussion of God and ultimate reality cannot be constrained by basic principles of rationality. This would seem to make rational discourse about God impossible. If rational discourse about God is impossible, there is nothing rational we can say about God and nothing rational we can say to support our belief or disbelief in God. To reject rational constraints on religious discourse in this fashion requires accepting that religious convictions, including your religious convictions, are beyond any debate or rational discussion. This is to bite a bullet."
But this is false. To say that God has the freedom and power to do that which is logically impossible is to demonstrate that God itself is a logical impossibility, not to remove discussion of God from the realm of rationality. The rational response to this is "God does not exist because he/she is logically impossible," which is what I said from the beginning.
This thing seemed to think I was a theist or something. It kept pointing out contradictions or problems in the definition of God that I used, but the whole point is that these are just some of the many reasons I don't believe in that sort of god.
Anyway, 1 hit and 1 bitten bullet.
Questions for Theists:
http://silverskeptic.blogspot.com/2011/03/consistent-standards.html
I'm a bit of a lurker. Every now and then I will come out of my cave with a flurry of activity. Then the Ph.D. program calls and I must fall back to the shadows.