Wednesday

Answering atheist NonStampCollector

Everything stated in the video could also be stated about atheism and atheists themselves.

The video argument summarised in reverse:

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"In a serious mood because it's time to knock something on the head. When atheists run out of comebacks in these debates, rather than coming up with verifiable evidence to support their claims they tend to try other tactics to stay in the game for reasons that are, ironically, self evident. It's nothing new but I've been seeing a lot of this lately. The old unverified idea that we believers are all delusional and that all religion is a virus that should be destroyed. Seeing as it is going to fall on deaf ears I really don't know why I'm bothering because even when their ideas are held up to them and they see for themselves the transparent rubbish that these arguments are, they tend to hold onto them and keep repeating them anyway. So not knowing why I am bothering, here I go.

Atheists do things that believers usually don't bother emulating:
- Some actively campaign daily against something they don't believe exists
- Some seem to think that insult is a form of valid argument (It isn't)
- Some seem to think that they are more intelligent because they are atheist (They aren't)
- Some want the laws of the land they live in changed to discriminate against believers
- Some have a blind acceptance of scientism with knowledge of the flaws as demonstrated by the philosophy of science (The problems of induction and verification)
- Some have a blind acceptance of empiricism without understanding it's problems as demonstrated in philosophy
- Some want all religious knowledge banned in schools and universities
- Some discriminate against all religions and want all religion destroyed
- Some want to describe themselves as persecuted minority and state that this is why they should be so aggressive, insulting and abusive (Compare to the pacifist tactics of the minority group led by Rev Dr Martin Luther King Jr)
- Some want to imitate the religion that they hate and form atheist churches and atheist TV programs and channels
- Some openly state that they are reactionary protest group against believers and without a God / gods or believers there would be absolutely no need for atheism.
- Some taunt believers with straw man fallacies such as "You believe in a sky daddy". (It would really help if atheists knew about that which they are against.)
-Some believe that belief in a God has a detrimental affect on society and believers themselves (Atheists really should study more history and read outside their quaint little books written by people with no qualifications in the subject area)
- Some pontificate about matters outside their area of expertise (A biologist ranting about religion is an example.)
- Some want to force all people to become atheists with no freewill choice of belief in a God / gods.
- Some believe they are entitled to wave their lack of belief around and demand special respect for it
- Some wish to deny believers the same equal rights as atheists
- Some think that they do not have to provide any verification or positive logical rational argument for their lack of belief. (Atheism has no positive argument for its existence - it proceeds from a negative argument against theism.)
- Some repeatedly shift the burden of proof for atheist claims away from atheists even when confronted with verifiable atheist claims that "God probably doesn't exist" in the atheist British bus campaign.
- Some repeatedly lie that "atheists never make any claims about God" (despite a verifiable plethora of atheist books and websites that do make claims about God)
- Some think they have rational justification to destroy another's belief. (They don't.)
- Some hold on to cruelty, prejudice, bigotry, hate, terrorism and war.
- Some are guilty of the very same hypocrisy that they claim to see in others

A-theism is as irrelevant to daily life as a-invisiblepinkunicornism or a-fairyism or a-flyingspaghettimonsterism or a-santaclausism or a-toothfairyism or a-leprechaunism.

The new atheists have adopted empiricism, verificationism, scientism and humanism on top of their lack of belief in a God. Empiricism, scientism and humanism do not directly and logically flow from a lack of belief in a God.

Atheists, do you see how pathetic these arguments and tactics are? These arguments that you use against us believers are irrational and illogical and sometimes plain spiteful. We believers will stand up against your atheism when you want to militantly attempt to destroy our religion and God / gods. If you want atheism then keep it to yourself. If you choose to take it into the public arena, which is your right also, then expect that believers will demand that you provide a verifiable positive rational logical argument for your lack of belief in a God / gods. You have not yet done so as a negative argument against theism is not a positive argument for atheism. Both could be wrong. Also expect that your hypocrisy and lack of knowledge about religion, theology and philosophy of religion and philosophy of science will be exposed. Just don't make ridiculous unverified claims and straw man fallacies about believers and their God / gods.

Dusty Smith & The Cult Of Dusty


I find it interesting that an atheist requires a cult. Dusty Smith's "Cult Of Dusty" also has many features of a cult such as:
- cult leader speaking outside his area of expertise
- asking for money
- brainwashing
- calling for the destruction of those he disagrees with
- cult leader advocating practices that he doesn't himself use. Example his catchphrase "Logic!"

Is this the pinnacle of atheism? Is this how atheists want everyone to be?

Capitals for emphasis.

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FROM http://www.cultofdusty.com/about-dusty/

Dusty Smith is an American comedian, author, actor, Internet entrepreneur, and musician. ...

At 20, Dusty discovered a loophole in popular search engines that allowed him to dominate the search results for many of the most searched keywords and by 24 had MADE HIS FIRST MILLION IN ONLINE REVENUE. ...

At 30, Dusty began to research heavily into Christianity in order to prove to an atheist friend that it was true. However, this research led him to become one of the world’s most outspoken atheists. ...

The Cult of Dusty is currently one of the most popular Atheist channels on Youtube with tens of thousands of subscribers and millions of video views worldwide.

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Where did the million dollars go? Dusty Smith asking for money after his wife's car accident and his failure to buy insurance. (His wife has recently left him and he moved house.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHxbEGk25QA

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A sample of Dusty Smith's "logic". (NSFW)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4DZd91j3R9g

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Dusty Smith's recent posts on Facebook.

Dusty Smith
18 hours ago · Edited

So people ask me all the time, "How can we destroy Christianity?" Well its actually pretty simple. Christianity is one large Meme made up of many smaller memes. To destroy Christianity you simply have to learn the counter-memes. It's like a video game. When a Christian tries to infect you with a Christian meme, you simply turn the tables and infect them instead with the "counter-meme". Memes are just mental viruses and once you infect a Christian's mind with enough counter-memes, eventually Christianity dies the death of a hundred viruses. I have deprogrammed thousands of cult members and its always the same.

Dusty Smith
17 hours ago · Edited

Just got a good question. "Why bother to try to change a 40 year old's mind about God?" Because it actually benefits you to destroy religion as soon as possible. They are holding back the evolution of our society. An evolution that could help you live much longer with a much higher quality of life. The sooner it's destroyed, the more benefit you get out of it. You'd really have to be an idiot not to get involved and try to make our society evolve as quickly as it can. If for nothing more than selfish reasons alone.

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FROM https://www.facebook.com/cultofdusty

ABOUT

Cult Leader at Cult of Dusty

Studied at Google
2005 to present
...
Followed by 11,601 people

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It appears that Dusty Smith is the "William Lane Craig of atheism."

RESPECTFUL DIALOGUE - Facebook Group


Join the discussion at https://www.facebook.com/groups/respectful.dialogue/

WHY DID I START THIS GROUP?

This group was started because of my experience with atheists.

The vast majority of atheists that I encountered in atheist forums eventually resorted to insult and / or ad hominem fallacy when I did not agree with them 100%. ( There were also many polite, educated atheists with whom it was a joy to discuss.) The Moderators approved of atheists insulting non-atheists but those who insulted atheists were warned or banned. This type of hypocrisy was rampant in the vast majority of atheist forums I was a member of or visited.

The obnoxious type of atheists were as “angry [mean], argumentative, dogmatic [closeminded]" as any fundamentalist creationist Christian I had ever met. (See http://shadowtolight.wordpress.com/2013/07/18/science-shows-new-atheists-to-be-mean-and-closed-minded/ & http://www.atheismresearch.com/ ) Many philosophers and theologians indeed call them "fundamentalist atheists". The only difference was that fundamentalist creationist Christians were not as insulting as the atheists.

Along with being “angry [mean], argumentative, dogmatic [closeminded]" the obnoxious type of atheists wrongly assumed that they had a higher IQ and were more logical and rational than any non- atheist though the vast majority had never studied the domain of logic and rationality - philosophy. Many atheists had never read the religious texts that they criticised or, if they did, could only read them in a naive amateur literalist manner. They knew very little about the nuances of hermeneutics. They regularly criticised religions though they had never met in person anyone from the religion they were criticising. They, again, knew very little about the religion's various dogmas and the different denominations within the religion.

One quite famous atheist who has a "cult" regularly uses his catch phrase of "Logic!" while at the same time sprouting some of the most illogical and irrational nonsense in an “angry [mean], argumentative, dogmatic [closeminded]" manner peppered with as many swear words that he can think of. “angry [mean], argumentative, dogmatic [closeminded]" isn't any way to persuade people to adopt your worldview.

Each month new atheists are added to this group. I have blocked more atheists for not following the group rules than any other group of people.

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1. No personal insult of members or individuals.
2. No insult of deities / prophets / spokespeople
3. No posting threads irrelevant to the aim of the group.
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One would think that these minimal rules would be easy to follow but apparently they are quite difficult for some atheists who are regularly encouraged to to do the exact opposite on many forums.

Learn how to dialogue.

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FROM http://www.emotionalcompetency.com/dialogue.htm

Dialogue is the creative thinking together that can emerge when genuine empathetic listening, respect for all participants, safety, peer relationships, suspending judgment, sincere inquiry, courageous speech, and discovering and disclosing assumptions work together to guide our conversations. It is an activity of curiosity, cooperation, creativity, discovery, and learning rather than persuasion, competition, fear, and conflict. Dialogue is the only symmetrical form of communication. Dialogue emerges from trusting relationships. ...

- Balance Inquiry and Advocacy ...

- Listening to understand ...

- Suspending judgment ...

- Respecting all: Attribute positive motives and constructive intent to each participant. Appreciate all that is good about them, all that you share in common with them, and all they can contribute. Acknowledge the dignity, legitimacy, worth, and humanity of the person speaking. Allow for differing viewpoints and learn all you can from them. Examine the origins within your self of any tendency you have to disrespect participants. Resist your temptation to blame. Remain humble and accept that they can teach us and we can learn from them. Attain and appreciate their viewpoint; do not attack, intrude, deny, dismiss, dispute, or discount their comments. Banish violence.

- Speaking your voice ...

Quotations:

“People don't listen, they reload.” ...

“The unity of contraries is the mystery at the innermost core of dialogue.” ~ Martin Buber ...

“Inquiry and violence cannot coexist.” ~ Peter Garrett

“The magic of dialogue is that it really does enhance respect and acceptance of others.” ~ Daniel Yankelovich ...

“There is something valid in every position.” ~ Johan Galtung ...

Friday

IQ TESTS FOR POLITICIANS

The time has come for IQ tests in order to be a politician. Those with less than 120 should be instantly dismissed. One should also have academic qualifications that address agreed standards in areas such as politics, philosophy and the arts or sciences as well as a well rounded tertiary education. Bean counters need not apply. All jobs, except those for politicians, have skill and knowledge requirements and levels for employment. The only current qualifications to be a politician in Australia are:
- be over 18 years old
- not be a criminal
- have money for associated fees
- fool enough sheeple so that they will vote for you (Of course, 50% of the voters have a less than average IQ which explains a lot. The regulations also mean that 50% of politicians have a less than average IQ which also explains a lot. )

Thus any idiot can become a politician in Australia ... and usually does. I could point to some ignorant members of Federal, State and Local government.

The following article also works for all levels of Australian politics.

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From http://nypost.com/2013/04/08/we-need-an-iq-test-for-politicians/

... I’m starting to think that what we really need are IQ tests for political officeholders. The only problem is, that might leave us with a lot of vacancies in Congress and America’s statehouses.

... ignorance and incompetence are on regular display among our political class. Its members are good at what they do — but what they do, really, is raise money and win elections. There’s no particular correlation between those skills and any other kind of competence. In fact, given their record of passing increasingly dumb laws, if there’s any correlation at all, it’s a negative one. ...

Politicians getting smarter on their own is probably too much to hope for. But maybe if voters wise up, a smarter crop of politicians will follow.

Sunday

ATHEIST LOGIC - Dusty Smith ( Cult leader of The Cult Of Dusty)


"The bible is nothing more than an ancient monkey text written by primitive screwheads who didn't know hat the fuck the were talking about." - Dusty Smith, Facebook 27/01/2014

A very logical comment by Dusty that is empirically verified ... or maybe not.

What academic qualification does Dusty have in logic or biblical scholarship? Oh, that's right - none. Dusty boasts that his logic and knowledge all comes from Google and YouTube which are hardly definitively true. As a philosopher trained in logic at a university I could tell Dusty about the logical fallacies that atheism is built upon.

First, the rationale for non-belief is that there this is no empirical evidence for God therefore God does not exist. Therefore atheists demand empirical evidence from all believers in God for the existence of a non-empirical God. That is a category mistake. One can never provide empirical evidence for a non-empirical God. The non-empirical is not empirical.

Secondly, it is also a Straw Man fallacy as no contemporary theologian posits an empirical God yet atheists wrongly assume that all theists somehow believe in an empirical God. It is a really good idea to understand the type of God that you are arguing against and not to misrepresent it.

Science cannot measure non-empirical items such as consciousness or beauty or God. There are no empirical units of measurement that one can use on the non-empirical.

Dusty Smith's catch phrase is "Logic."

I have presented logic above by one who has studied at a university and knows logic.

Logic is part of the domain of philosophy. It should be noted that logic does not automatically lead to atheism.

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phi·los·o·phy (fĭ-lŏs′ə-fē)
n. pl. phi·los·o·phies
...
2. Investigation of the nature, causes, or principles of reality, knowledge, or values, based on logical reasoning rather than empirical methods.
...
6. The discipline comprising logic, ethics, aesthetics, metaphysics, and epistemology.

The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition copyright ©2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

Saturday

ATHEIST LOGIC - Marcus Mergett case study


It is utterly amazing how many atheists boast of using logic yet have no formal training in logic and have arguments that are quite illogical.

Marcus Mergett (using a clown face for his Facebook profile) is a case in point. Quoting his own words from Facebook on 24/1/2014:

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Anyone who claims to be a scholar of the bible is the scholar of a fictional fairy tale book full of murder, rape, genocide, misogyny etc.... no history classes use it as material..... atheism is the ability to think logically and look at evidence with a skeptical eye.   

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He then posted the first paragraphs of an article by Dr Joel Hoffman in the Huffington Post without attribution thus leaving readers to think that he had written the text himself. Marcus Mergett stated that no church ever mentioned such things. He is absolutely incorrect. Many liberal churches do say exactly the same as Joel Hoffman. See http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-joel-hoffman/the-bible-isnt-history_b_2803409.html This is worth quoting at length ....

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One way to understand the difference between history and fiction in the Bible is through the Old Testament's natural division into three parts:

Sometimes 'believing the Bible' means believing that a story in it didn't happen.

The world and its nature (Adam to Terah).

The Israelites and their purpose (Abraham to Moses).

The Kingdom of Israel and life in Jerusalem (roughly from King David onward).

Even a cursory look reveals a clear and significant pattern. In the first section, characters live many hundreds of years, and in the second, well into their second century. Only in the third section do biblical figures tend to live biologically reasonable lives.

For example, Adam, in the first section, lives to the symbolic age of 930, and Noah lives even twenty years longer than that. Abraham, from the second section, lives to be 175, his son Issac to 180, and Jacob "dies young" at the age of 147. But the lifespans from King David onward, in the third section, are in line with generally accepted human biology. ...

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Marcus Mergett quoted the above paragraphs to prove that the bible was a complete work of fiction and unrelated to history. Marcus failed to either read or comprehend the next part of the article which contradicts everything that Marcus previously stated. I quote again (captials for emphasis):

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... Furthermore, HISTORIANS mostly agree that only the third section represents actual HISTORY. ... HISTORY and fiction mingle throughout the Old Testament ... Jeremiah's HISTORICAL description of the siege on Jerusalem is not the same as Ezekiel's non-historical vision of the dry bones, just as there are HISTORICAL elements (like the invention of fire-hardened bricks) even in the non-historical account of the Tower of Babel. ... The New Testament similarly offers more than just stories, and, as with the Old Testament, only some of the stories in the New Testament were meant as HISTORY. Others were intended to convey things like theology and morality. ...

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Marcus Mergett fails in logic on all the points he mentioned:

1. "The bible is a fictional fairy tale."

Incorrect. The bible is a collection of books by different authors and at different times that has been edited. It contains some history.

2. "No history classes use the bible as material."

Incorrect. Many universities use the bible as source material for the history of ancient Israel.

3. "Atheism is the ability to think logically and look at evidence with a skeptical eye."

Incorrect.  One does not automatically become logical by being an atheist. Nor does logic automatically lead to atheism. "The ability to think logically and look at evidence with a skeptical eye" is the domain of philosophy and not atheism.

Monday

A female Christ?

Think about the possibility of Christianity with a Christ named Jessica, the Daughter of God. What would Jessica Christ say about the male dominance in Christianity? Would you want to wear a crucifix featuring a crucified Jessica around your neck? Would a Jessica Christ be beautiful and sexy? Or would she be ugly? ( See Isaiah 53:2 adapted "when we shall see HER, there is no beauty that we should desire HER.") Would a resurrected Jessica come back to vanquish all Christian foes in a huge bloody battle of Armageddon? Is Jessica Christ a type of female Amazon warrior? Would males want to follow a female Lord Jessica? Would you want to eat Christ Jessica's body and drink her blood in remembrance of her? Would Christian males want a women to rule them considering Colossians 3:18, Ephesians 5:22-24 & 1 Peter 3:1? Would the Catholic church then decree that only women could become priestesses? How would males feel about that?

Jessica Christ would change everything.