Strong and Weak Arguments

[The Grand Nudger]

From your point of view, I understand your skepticism (!) about my motives. I'm asking people to take a moment to open up to each other in a somewhat kumbia kind of way that is rather unusual for the forums. It's about sharing our vulnerabilities. As a believer, I think with a little reflection I could rank most of the apologetic argument in terms of my opinion of their strength with Aquinas's 5 ways at the top and Pascal's Wager and Paley's Watch near the bottom.

You've conned yourself into god belief, I've conned myself into a great many other things.  Our vulnerabilities -are- shared, they simply haven't been applied to the same things.   Kumbaya?  

I think you took my request the wrong way. If three skeptics say they do not accept belief proposition P1 based on objections O1, O2, and O3 respectively, I do not think each skeptic would believe all the objections have the same strength. One might see his own objection O1 pretty damning to P1 whereas he might think O2 and O3 are lame.

You don't always catch the fish you want.   Personally, I think that -all- of the time and arguments people waste rationalizing their status of belief is lame.  When's the last time anyone twisted their scrotum into knots over whether or not elves were real, and whether or not they could rationally justify whatever position they held on that question? 

Personally, I find comparing God to unicorns, etc. is the lamest of lame objections. It's such an obvious category error. The second lamest is the "Who created God?" response. I mean, c'mon guys. You have to admit these are just not at the same level as Kant or Hume.

"Who created god"  is an academic nail in the coffin to a particular argument, but it's not compelling to you, whereas others find it to be so.....but does it matter at all...either way.... when the gods in question are not creator gods?  "God's and unicorns" doesn't express any obvious category error...it only expresses your subjective valuation of unicorns respective to gods.  Many gods -are- magical animals.  Many atheists share your assessment, unicorns are silly.  Kant and Hume, responding to one myopic god concept out of many might appeal to a believer or non-believer in that specific god concept...as it can offer the appearance of credibility or of dismissal....but to me, it;s no different than people arguing about the theoretical top speed of a tie interceptor. Sure, I'll join in, because I think it's fun........but I don't ascribe any meaning to it, lol.