Can you help me debate better?

[FreeTony]

Remember that they have the burden of proof. At least let them explain why they believe. Don't go in all guns blazing saying there is no God without reading what they are saying.

You'll find after several wasted hours it always boils down to "No one really knows anything so belief in God is justifiable".

[ManMachine]

There are no absolute truths, even in the field of scientific endeavour

How did you work that out?
How do you know that something that can be infinite can be compared with something that we know it is finite like the physical science?

That is another debate. I'm happy to jump in if you want to start another thread, let's not hijack this one.

[archangle]

So, I go into a huge debate with a bunch of religious people. I think I started off strong but sucked at the end. Here is the argument http://www.christianforums.com/t7812141/

I was wondering if you can tell me what I can do to improve myself.

on the net?? lmao, worse place to do it. Unless you have some real reasonable people. But on forums things go bad fast.

avoid using negative adjectives. And when they use them try to ignore them as best you can. Stay on facts. Stay on "fact divin faith". Most theist understand that.

I have found when people hit the limit of their understanding they begin to use negative adjectives or bullying.. But I have to be honest. The hardest people I have ever debated was atheist. They are downright mean, especially when they hit information that is past them. teaknow.


But, The best trick the hard core religous theist will use is to "ignore you" or not engage in conversation further their beliefs. They call that intellect. Lmao, yep, its intelligence all right ignoring all the information.


also, make sure you understand what science is. The worst thing I see is when 2 non science people are debating using science. Science does not say a thing. It is data collection. Then scientist come and lay out all the data on the floor and seeing how it all relates. I usually start there.


For example. Jesus rising. "science"= we tracked as many people as we could. Not one rose from the dead. We then tried to raise some people and we could not yet. Scientist then say "based on this information we don't think the jesus rose as you are teaching. The fundie christian mite say we have "X-number of witness". It os ok to politely say "ok you have 2 or 3 and the data against that is in the billions." "what is more reasonable to ask us believe?" What "faith" seems to be more reasonable?


But most important, if you are like me, leave alcohol out. Unless you both can wake up and still be friends after punching each other out the night before.

That forum actually emailed for me to come back. i didnt resepond.

[Doggey75]

Ok. I will get on it as soon as this debate is over. Whenever that will be. May the Flying Spaghetti Monster help me.

[The Valkyrie]

I'm a member there.

Honestly, I couldn't be bothered reading through all the self-congratulatory bullshit these people tend to post but I did post a link to the first question regarding creation of life in the lab - which a geneticist has done.

Advice for debating, know your target and try to antici[ate all the responses you'll get from them.

They'll bend over backwards to defend their crap.

Watch them move the goalposts nowfor the link I posted.

[bennyboy]

You should know the following techniques, and focus on those:
1) God of the gaps. A lack of knowledge about how things works is (to them) support for the God idea. "We don't know how life (or mind, or whatever) is caused to exist, so God must have done it."
2) Appeal to intuition. "We can't prove, using facts and evidence, that God is real. But luckily, we don't have to, because our souls are inspired by God. That's the best proof a guy can have!"
3) Unsubstantiated claims: "Only God could have made such a perfect book as the Bible."
4) Lies: "The Bible is perfectly consistent." You gave a list of 20 or 30 inconsistencies, and saw the degree to which Christians will tap dance to get around obvious truths.
5) Special pleading: "Yes, many people with many religions have intuitions and strong beliefs unsupported by facts. . . but only Christ Jesus is the real God."

Your biggest problem is that you are clearly approaching them dishonestly. You went in there looking to cut your debating teeth-- and both you and they knew so right away. Saying "Oh I just came in with an open mind, but what you said didn't make sense so I have questions" is clearly bullshit. The atheist position is the non-bullshit position, so you don't need to go in like this. As LastSeven pointed out, copy-pasta is a no-no. You should pick a few of the main points, or identify the source of your list.

[Angrboda]

In my view, there are no shortcuts that will make you a better debater. Some think you can teach people to be better critical thinkers than they are, but I'm skeptical of such. As others have suggested, reading and experience will have the most effect, but you can't teach yourself how to think. You'll just have to do the best you can do and try not to worry about it. What you do have some control over, however, are your expectations. If you are hoping for a specific good result in debates, and you aren't very good, you'll face a lot of disappointment. Try not to worry about whether you win or lose, don't get attached to winning, just enjoy debating for the pleasure of it, and even if you're not that good, you won't be disappointed.

[psychoslice]

I don't debate myself, but if you do, you should never debate something your not sure of, or something that is not 100% true, this is why its useless to debate religion, both of you cannot ever truly win.

[truthBtold]

When in doubt. .. kick them in their nuts

[tor]

I don't debate myself, but if you do, you should never debate something your not sure of, or something that is not 100% true, this is why its useless to debate religion, both of you cannot ever truly win.

Yeah and since nothing is 100% certain(solipsism) we can stop talking about anything.
The only reason I debate religion is because of influence it has on the world. If it would have no influence I would not give a shit.