Are We Living In God's "Matrix"?

[bennyboy]

Well, that was only slightly insulting. Honestly, it seemed much more effective to start a new thread

If you had started a new thread, I would have welcomed you and examined your position, theist, xenopsychic, agsnotic, or whatever, with much tolerance and interest. But you didn't. You swamped the forum with perhaps half a dozen or more new threads challenging Darwin and the Big Bang, talking about Scientism and atheistic "dogma." Clearly, you came in knowing where most atheists would stand on these issues, and volunteered to enter with a bullseye on your back. You're like the proverbial party girl with her cleavage hanging way too far out, shouting "Like, omg, why does everyone keep staring at my boobs?!"

That being said, I'm interested in the words "neutral monism," and you have made some philosophical points that I agree with in a couple threads. Once I recover from the shock of the carpet-bombing you started with, and once you stop trying to make yourself the center of the AF universe, I suspect I will discover you have something interesting to offer.

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Further, including "God" in the questions posed in the titles was done out of respect for the theists that I thought would also be part of these discussions. I didn't realize that it wasn't a welcoming environment for theists to participate in discussion. I realize that now.

A large proportion of atheists here (and generally, everywhere) treat any discussion that does not support atheism with hostility. A theistic position is dangerous and needs to be isolated and controlled. You'll find that in an exchange not perceived as threatening the same people will be supportive of the ideas they vigorously attack.

I don't think that's accurate. I've seen people take religious arguments seriously, and seen those threads go on for as many as fifty pages before everyone realized that the theist was never going to directly answer questions, was never going to provide support, and was going to keep throwing one bald assertion after the other. You want hostility, go to any X-tian site and say Dawkins and Dennett more than about two times.