Open discussion of the Christian Why We're Here thread

[Edwardo Piet]

And this is why I say the crucial difference is that he's wrong.

To clarify, are you saying that it's ok to insult people and generalize groups in an unflattering way so long as you're on the correct side of the argument? I may have misunderstood.

No I'm saying it's not a generalization if the generalization is correct. Just as it's not a generalization to say that all squares have four sides or generalization to say that all Nazis who followed Hitler all followed Hitler.

Of course, nowhere did I suggest that all theists are anything--besides irrational in their theism--but the point is that what I said wasn't judgmental or patronizing because what he actually quoted I was right about, as Mathilda confirmed (all I was doing is saying what I think Mathilda was trying to say and it turns out it really was what she was trying to say)... but what he said was judgmental and patronizing because he literally spoke of atheists being ignorant of the truth and yet his beliefs about atheism being wrong have no basis. And what's more: he went much further than that... he said that we didn't even want hope, that we weren't even seeking the truth in other words--the truth from his perspective i.e. Christianity--and... ironically he flat out admitted (albeit implicitly but regardless of what he said it was an admission) that he is not interested in furthering knowledge for its own sake... a position which is guaranteed to lead to confirmation bias... so, ironically, is an example of him shutting his own eyes to truth (or at least the possibility of being wrong. If I'm wrong about atheism and God really does exist... at least I seek knowledge for its own sake so I have no reason to shut my eyes to anything that supports theism. Because I don't seek knowledge merely to further atheism... I seek knowledge to seek knowledge).