Most personally convincing reasons you don't believe.

[Crossless2.0]

Meh, maybe I'm just obstinent on this one..but it's difficult for me to imagine a scenario where a person slams a door behind them...says to me "there's a fucking werewolf in there, we've gotta run!" - really believes it........and then just -lets- me open the door because I dared to smile and say "I don't believe you".  No effort made, whatsoever.

-and I'm not just being an optimist here, study after study show us that that really isn't the way that people behave with each other in the sorts of situations where we perceive ourselves or others to be in even -minor- danger.  The chances of our resident liar for christ being one of the vanishingly few aberrations of humanity that would behave like this beggars belief almost as much as his stories about monkeymen.

I've thought that same thing. My mother is a devout Christian and she knows exactly where I stand when it comes to ideas of that sort, but I remember she came to visit a few years back and the subject came up. I asked her what she thought heaven would be like, and she painted me a euphoric picture of bliss. I said that was weird that she was able to picture being in heaven and enjoying herself there...she asked why? I said "because I won't be there, and you'd know why...and IF you WERE in heaven and I wasn't-then you'd know where I was instead...and for an eternity, you'd feel entirely blissful knowing that I was simultaneously being tortured in some alternative other realm?...I don't think I'd be able consider that state of mind to be paradise...an eternity of knowing my son was in agony somewhere praying for death...(awkward silence) -Lets have a drink!

How can anyone hold such conflicting views without the slightest hint of dissonance?...Unless, they really don't believe one of them...

..We try to find other things to discuss.

Some believers get around the dissonance by claiming that their resurrected selves in heaven will be mercifully granted a kind of divine amnesia, and they will simply be unaware of or otherwise unconcerned with the torments of the damned. The problem such people have is explaining how their heavenly selves are somehow still them.

Others embrace the thought of eternal torment for non-believers as a kind of pleasant bonus. Tertullian, for example. Such people exemplify Nietzsche's claim that much of Christianity is based on resentment.

[The Reality Salesman01]

Unless, they really don't believe one of them...

Ding ding ding, what we know of human nature suggests that people who make claims to a belief set without the demonstrable patterns of action associated with that very same belief set don't -actually- hold to those beliefs which they are espousing.  That people, for example, who perceive others to be in danger act as though people are in danger.  Not as though they're the snotty kid at their local highschool debate club meeting whose said his peace.

The pen is Rrrrr....The pen is RRRRRR....

[drfuzzy]

---

Meh, maybe I'm just obstinent on this one..but it's difficult for me to imagine a scenario where a person slams a door behind them...says to me "there's a fucking werewolf in there, we've gotta run!" - really believes it........and then just -lets- me open the door because I dared to smile and say "I don't believe you".  No effort made, whatsoever.

-and I'm not just being an optimist here, study after study show us that that really isn't the way that people behave with each other in the sorts of situations where we perceive ourselves or others to be in even -minor- danger.  The chances of our resident liar for christ being one of the vanishingly few aberrations of humanity that would behave like this beggars belief almost as much as his stories about monkeymen.

---

I've thought that same thing. My mother is a devout Christian and she knows exactly where I stand when it comes to ideas of that sort, but I remember she came to visit a few years back and the subject came up. I asked her what she thought heaven would be like, and she painted me a euphoric picture of bliss. I said that was weird that she was able to picture being in heaven and enjoying herself there...she asked why? I said "because I won't be there, and you'd know why...and IF you WERE in heaven and I wasn't-then you'd know where I was instead...and for an eternity, you'd feel entirely blissful knowing that I was simultaneously being tortured in some alternative other realm?...I don't think I'd be able consider that state of mind to be paradise...an eternity of knowing my son was in agony somewhere praying for death...(awkward silence) -Lets have a drink!

How can anyone hold such conflicting views without the slightest hint of dissonance?...Unless, they really don't believe one of them...

..We try to find other things to discuss.

Heh.  MY Mother is a bat-shit crazy fundie devout Xtian - - she'll tell anyone who will listen that she's going to be up there in her heaven taunting all of the evil people who are burning because they didn't believe in Jesus.  She wants to watch them burn.  (She never got invited to go evangelizing door-to-door, too dangerous.  But I gotta admit, she had quite a style when it came to getting out of jury duty.  She would start preaching and . . . the bailiffs practically carried her out of the courtroom - - twice.     )

[The Grand Nudger]

Your mother is likely as full of shit on that count as any of our resident apologists.  Allow me to propose that seeing me (you..or anyone) crush a persons skull under their boot would be jarring and damaging to her...and that this is nothing compared to whatever misery she is supposed to believe will be inflicted after death by demons in hell.

People would be sickened if their christer fantasies became reality, and they don't act as if they actually expect them to become so.

[Losty]

I won't throw tomatoes, but I will remind you that either his ASK nonsense is bullshit or that post is bullshit, and even -he- can't believe both simultaneously.  We're told..in that post, that god will do -whatever- needs to be done to establish or maintain belief...but just a few breaths ago (and for a year or two now) he's been telling  us there's only -one- way that god is going to respond..that he's not willing to do whatever...he's only willing to respond to ASKing.

His theology is a hot mess...and his posts exists as a record of that.

Both. Everything he says is bullshit. That's why I didn't bother to read it

[TheRealJoeFish]

The thing I find most amusing is that there are probably at least a billion christians out there who would immediately label Drich's, ahem, rather idiosyncratic version of christianity heresy and consign him to hell with complete certainty and without a second thought.

[vorlon13]

The thing I find most amusing is that there are probably at least a billion christians out there who would immediately label Drich's, ahem, rather idiosyncratic version of christianity heresy and consign him to hell with complete certainty and without a second thought.

I've been noting his copious heresies for months if not longer.

It just isn't possible for a heretic to lead anyone to God.  Even myself as an old piece of sinning atheist scum can sniff out a supposed Christer that ain't doing it right.

[robvalue]

A truth teller or teacher -must- convince.  I don't really think he takes this god shit seriously at all.  Are we to believe that he's here in the midst of us....our eternal souls in terrible peril...and he figures showing us a picture of bigfoot will assuage his sense of culpability or empathy as we face the flame..even if we don't believe or he fails to convince?  That he can get away from his own conscience and humanity by saying the words in our presence...and calling it a job done?

As much as I enjoy the notion as a foundation for an endless line of jokes at his expense, it's unlikely that he's -that- sort of a terrible douche.

Does God need Drich's help, I wonder? Does he need help convincing us that he's real? That he is in any way relevant?

Did God know all the theists would fail spectacularly to convince of anything, or was it a surprise? Does he think it's funny?

Due to the lack of answers, I can only assume our theists don't even know if God needs their help.

[pocaracas]

Does God need Drich's help, I wonder? Does he need help convincing us that he's real? That he is in any way relevant?

I've used this quote before... but sometimes, I feel like it's not understood...
Now, within context... maybe?

[The Reality Salesman01]

imagine a scenario where a person slams a door behind them...says to me "there's a fucking werewolf in there, we've gotta run!" - really believes it........and then just -lets- me open the door because I dared to smile and say "I don't believe you".  

Only in the real life version of this hypothetical, we are able to repeatedly open the door and discover that the closet does not contain any of the properties associated with the concept of "werewolf", nor does it inspire anyone to run! The part that makes it all so damn absurd is...in reality, any person would not be able to maintain their warning or their fear after the door to the charade is swung open. And if they tried to revise their claim by assigning more abstract properties to the werewolf and why we should be afraid of it, they would be doing so from the inside of a loony-bin. The double standard we have for cognitive malfunctions like these is better left out of my attention, because it annoys the shit out of me when I think about it.