(January 31, 2017 at 1:16 am)Astonished Wrote: Firstly, you cannot start with the presumption that there is any truth in your holy book. That has already been proven false scientifically in so many cases, and has failed to overturn this determination, and for obvious reasons. Do not make the claim that your holy book contains any truth, you make yourself look like either an ignoramus or a liar
No truth? None whatsoever? Zero? Nada? That’s a bit of an overstatement. First, none of the 66 books in the canonical bible are science manuals. You must take each as they are. Otherwise let’s suppose that as just raw documents handed down to us from ancient history, let’s assume that they are not entirely reliable. Neither are Thucydides, Tacitus, Plutarch, or Aeschylus free of the fantastic or apparent fabrications and yet few scholars find it problematic to say that they contain plausible and discernible truths related to real people and actual events.
(January 31, 2017 at 1:16 am)Astonished Wrote: It doesn't help anyone to ignore scientific findings or things that are simply blindingly obvious, and again, gives you a bad impression in the eyes of skeptics. One of the main problems we have is the denial of or discounting of the value of the scientific method.
I agree that’s a pretty pathetic approach. That kind of thinking by some Christians is pernicious. God is the god of all knowledge, not a gap-filler. Two of the central and unique beliefs of Christianity are that the physical universe has a rational order and Man’s capacity for reason reflects a rational Creator. The efficacy of the scientific method is one of the key justifications for belief in that type of God. This could easily lead to a discussion about the inadequacy and magical nature of modern materialism, but that is generally beyond the scope of your justifiable rant.
(January 31, 2017 at 1:16 am)Astonished Wrote: Thirdly, please consider that statistically speaking (this goes to point 2) skeptics know more about your holy books than you do. …-The holy book contains contradictions, outright falsehoods and numerous signs of deliberate tampering in most cases -Morality based on a carrot-and-stick reward-and-punishment system is to fail to understand what is moral and thus morals do not come from any holy book, authority figure, and are not in any way absolute nor objective -If you attempt to discount or discard parts of your holy book because of how they fail to appeal, or have been proven misleading, your attempts to give validity to the rest are completely pointless;
Perhaps. Many atheists come, not surprisingly, from fundamentalist backgrounds. They also carry with them a literalist approach to the biblical texts that has a modern origin. Your critique is damning not of the texts themselves but rather a flawed way of looking at them. This leads into your fourth point…
(January 31, 2017 at 1:16 am)Astonished Wrote: … you do not get to exempt yourself from the fundamentalism of other believers if you claim that you get your worldview and morals from your holy books…until you acknowledge that you are really using your own internal moral compass to reject the bad parts of your holy book. It will do wonders for your self-esteem, too. This will also save you the trouble of attempting to justify atrocities in your holy books…
Mmmmm…yes I can. Just because there is debate about how to approach a religious text doesn’t mean that all interpretations are equally valid or even reasonable. Historians have legitimate debates about purely secular texts, particularly those that come from ancient and medieval sources. No one would suggest that because historians disagree about certain events it follows that they are all wrong. The solution to bad theology is good theology.
(January 31, 2017 at 1:16 am)Astonished Wrote: Without the threat of a terrible afterlife, the bribe of a wonderful one (though this is impossible in principle anyway), other emotional appeals, can you give a single good reason why we should not look at you like you are someone in desperate need of psychological assistance?
Are you suggesting that reasonable people cannot disagree? Why do you belief that someone with a different opinion than you must have some pathology? It sounds like the person who sent you that PM was not very informed or tactful.
