Atheism vs. the Quran

[theVOID]

Are you kidding me? Do you know how many miscarried foetuses there would have been for people to look at? The Maori (my countries native population) used to have ritual burials for them over a thousand years ago, they've found graves of dozens of them in various stages of development... Knowing rudimentary things about foetal development IS NOT the domain of revelation.

It's not rudimentary knowledge for people who lived 14 centuries ago...

Oh, so what was rudimentary to a primitive population 10 centuries ago was not rudimentary to a less primitive population 400 years earlier? Yeah, that makes so much sense Rayaan...

I'll at least give the Arabs of the time some credit, they were more intelligent and aware than the Maori from 1000CE, and the Maori figured it out with no concept of science at all, just simple association. Man ejaculates in woman, something grows in the woman's stomach (evinced by expansion) and then a baby exits some time later, plus they had the miscarriages corresponding to different sized female stomachs and a sense of time.

There is absolutely no need for revelation or electron microscopes, any old cannibal with half a clue about reality (they thoughts mountains were alive...) could figure it out, all that says about o'l Pedo Mo is he is at the least as intelligent as a cannibal tribesman knocking about in the pacific, so congratulations!

"O mankind! If you have a doubt about the Resurrection, (consider) that We created you out of dust, then out of sperm, then out of a leech-like clot, then out of a morsel of flesh, partly formed and partly unformed, in order that We may manifest (our power) to you; and We cause whom We will to rest in the wombs for an appointed term, then do We bring you out as babies, then (foster you) that you may reach your age of full strength." (Surah 22:05)

If the Quran was invented by men who lived in such a primitive age, then, shouldn't there be at least a single scientific error in the verse above?

The first error is the very first event described... There is no "dust" stage, or is that a reference to the Muslim Genesis? either way it's false.

Dust -> Sperm -> Clot -> Flesh -> Time -> Baby

What part of that is supposed to be impressive? The only 'accurate' points are Sperm, Time and Baby. Big fucking deal, every culture knew that. I bet most animals have the capacity to gather than association. At least a mention of the process involved would have been nice, No big trouble for Allah to describe "splitting cells" now is it?

1. It's more time-saving to post quotes and links instead of elaborating it myself.

Except you've failed to post any arguments, just conclusions and assertions. If there is an argument you like then post it, but snippets of opinion are completely useless.

2. Why is it a bad thing to quote from people who are intelligent in a certain field (or "authorities" as you say) if it is coming from a credible source?

Because if we are going to go back and forth with authorities instead of posting the arguments themselves for evaluation then as far as science is concerned we will win every single time because the number of scientists who are atheists outnumber theistic scientists, however, that would make it a twice fallacious argument, both an argument from authority and an argument from popularity.

Also, posting links doesn't show you have any understanding of what it is you are arguing. You're just like the people who come here with a wall of text from some creationist website.

3. It's always better if we can support our views with the opinions of more knowledgeable people than ourselves. Isn't that what we are taught to do in research papers?

In research papers you use references to build an argument, you are bypassing that stage completely and going straight to the conclusions and opinion.

I specifically said that it's acceptable to post an argument, but what some MD thinks is of no consequence, for example, I can find MD's who believe all sorts of stupid shit from ESP to Alien abductions to Geocentricism to Vaccines cause autism, is that evidence for any of those things? No, posting it would just be demonstrating that there exists someone with that view, that is exactly what you've been doing.

Dunking flies into your drink? ... yeah, actually it doesn't make any sense.

Neither do flying unicorns.

Yes, Muhammad didn't write a single word because he was illiterate. He recited the verses that were revealed to him, and a lot of the people who heard him began to memorize the verses while his appointed scribes were busy with putting them into a book form.

That's wrong, the Quran was not put together during his life time.

And there is nothing to rule out either 1) It was a person who read to him 2) He could read and lied 3) He made up his own theology (or claimed authority) based on his understanding of the Torah and NT and his own opinion.

3 Has happened several times, notably with Joseph Smith.

1. How do you know that Muhammad had a series of revelations?

How do you know he wasn't a greedy bastard who made it up for power?

Is it not told in the Qur'an that he had 6 months of visions?

Not only that but there is the story where he had a revelation and convinced some Arab tribes that they could follow Islam and still worship their tribal gods, then he had another revelation and changed his mind, followed by threats to the new tribal Muslims to renounce their other previously permitted deities.

And there is also the part were he married his daughter-in-law and was scorned for it by the community because it contradicted the previous laws he had set out, that was until he had a revelation with Allah's approval....

Or how about when he was conquering tribes, decapitating people and taking slaves near the end of his life? He had several revelations then.

He's quite clearly making it up as he goes.

2. How do you know that his wives had noticed any such revelations? And where did you learn this from?

It's in the Qur'an, there are dozens of examples of post-hoc revelations.

3. What are these "interests at the time" that he had which you are speaking of?

Marrying his step daughter as I mentioned above.

4. If we assume that he managed to convince a bunch of illiterate Arabs that God spoke to him, then it contradicts your statement that all the verses in the Quran are only being "attritubted" to Mohammad, because you just said that he convinced people to believe that he was talking to God.

The passages being attributed to mo simply means that after his death when the content was being gathered many people bought forth things that had been believed to have said, being over 100 years after his death there wasn't an eye witness in sight, so undoubtedly some of what is attributed to him was not his own words, much of it was from the Torah and a great deal of it was likely genuine or very close to what he meant.

The fact that he convinced people he was a prophet has no impact on that process or that.

5. And who could be these mysterious authors of the Quran if the book was neither transmitted from God nor Muhammad?

You need a dictionary, look up attributed. It does not mean "necessarily incorrect" which is what you seem to be using it to mean. And don't fool yourself Rayaan, a huge portion of it was from the Torah and NT, perhaps the majority, so there are those authors as well as passages that were attributed to (meaning not necessarily from) mo.

What about the embryo? Isn't the shape of the embryo too small to be seen by the naked eyes? Also, why was this confirmed only in the last century?

Fetus =/= Embryo.

Clot =/= Embryo or Fetus.

And inferring a stage between sperm and fetus isn't much of a stretch. It's like inferring something happened to a tire if you've seen it first deflated and then inflated. Neither is assuming it's made of the same stuff as us (flesh).

They have trained you well have they not? Because you're really fucking good at retreating to authority whenever you want to support your beliefs.

There's no training involved, I just got good at it by myself.
But you make it sound as if retreating to authorities is a bad thing. What's the reason for that?

It is the way you are doing it, which I have already explained. The arguments are what matter and not whether you can find a person with a vaguely relevant qualification who agrees.

Again, if you think there is an argument that supports your conclusions then PRESENT THE ARGUMENT IT'S SELF and not just a quote from someone saying that they agree with the argument.

I did present the arguments as well as backing them up with credible and trustable sources. What else are you looking for?

Re post what it is you think was an argument. All you had was a doctor asserting a position. That is not an argument.

You are truly the fallacy king.

I disagree, but think whatever you want about me. I know myself better than you do.

Your fallacies are demonstrable and objective, unlike your opinion about whether or not they exist.

It's not actually purely subjective. There's an objective way to test if one's work is better than the Quran.

See this:
http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/M.../ijaz.html

The challenge is to produce, in Arabic, "three lines, that do not fall into one of these sixteen al-Bihar, that is not rhyming prose, nor like the speech of soothsayers, and not normal speech, that it should contain at least a comprehensible meaning and rhetoric, i.e. not gobbledygook."

I shouldn't even need to point out how utterly arbitrary that is, but it was so fucking easy to refute that I couldn't resit. Again with reference to the Confucians.

Refutation by parallel argument:

The challenge is to produce a Traditional Chinese Confucian poem of less than thirteen lines than contain all possible dictates regarding how a junior should treat a senior, without forming incomplete sentences or resembling any of the classics in language or style or becoming self-refuting, hasty or rhetorical.

If you can't do that Confucian teachings are all true and necessarily divinely inspired, agreed?

That means you couldn't think of something more intelligent to say ...

You said almost the exact same thing already, I didn't see the benefit in repeating myself that often.

Why don't you pick out the very best verse in the Quran and we'll beat that k?

The smallest chapter in the Quran is only 3 lines, and no one has yet been able to write something better than that chapter given the style of the Quran.

What is this verse?
what makes it good?
who decided that it was good and by what standard?
why does it have to be in arabic?
Why does it have to be in the style of the quran?
Why only 3 lines?

I offer you another challenge. Can you think of a 5 word combination that has more meaning than the following:

“star-stuff contemplating the stars” - Carl Sagan.

If not atheism is true by default, according to your reasoning anyway. And we get to decide what is good, just like you've been claiming the right to for islam.

Or maybe they do exist, but you can't see them. The Jinns are a part of the unseen world.

And you have what evidence for these Jinns? Any more than I have for the tooth fairy? I have a missing tooth that was under a pillow, what have you got?

This is not a good comparison to the Quran's challenge, because there is an objective reason on why it is not possible to imitate the Quran.

All you've done is present some entirely arbitrary conditions and claim that they are "objectively good". I have provided two refutations by parallel argument already. It's your turn to deal with them now.

"The inability of any person to produce anything like the Qur’an, due to the uniqueness of its language, is the essence of the Qur’anic miracle. A miracle is defined as 'events which lie outside the productive capacity of nature'. The argument posed by Muslim Theologians and Philosophers is that if, with the finite set of Arabic linguistic tools at humanity’s disposal, there has been no effective challenge to try and imitate the Qur'an, then providing a naturalistic explanation for the Qur’an’s uniqueness is not sufficient. This is because the natural capacity of any author is able to produce the varying expressions known in the Arabic language. The development of an entirely unique expression is beyond the scope of the productive nature of any author, hence a supernatural entity, God, is the only sufficient comprehensive explanation" (Source).

Again, ZzZzZzZzZzZzZzZzZz

And no, it's not because I've got nothing else to say, it's because you're a little parrot.

The Quran is awesome whether you believe it or not.

In your opinion. Too bad you're the only one here trying to pretend it's anything other than opinion.

Here's another quote for you:

“....the Meccans still demanded of him a miracle, and with remarkable boldness and self confidence Muhammad appealed as a supreme confirmation of his mission to the Koran itself. Like all Arabs they were connoisseurs of language and rhetoric. Well, then if the Koran were his own composition other men could rival it. Let them produce ten verses like it. If they could not (and it is obvious that they could not), then let them accept the Koran as an outstanding evidential miracle” (Hamilton Gibb, a well-known Arabist from University of Oxford).

Another form of the same parallel argument:

Can you make better used of these 5 arbitrary words than Carl Sagan?

1. Stuff
2. Contemplating
3. Stars
4. The
5. Stars

If you can't make a more meaningful combination of these arbitrary constraints then Carl Sagan was obviously more than human. And furthermore, people who already believe Sagan was the epitome of awesomeness get to decide (because we want to be as blatantly biased as you, after all this is a parallel argument and we can't be seen to be less fallacious).

You can't read my mind and I can safely say that you're wrong if you think that I'm being biased. You may still disagree, though.

And I am not biased in my assessment than Sagan > Mo and that The Demon Haunted world > the Quran.

See, and you can't read my mind so you can't claim otherwise, I win!

Btw, I love having the chance to use all these parallel arguments, it's not often something leaves it's self so widely open to such easy refutation. Thank you Islam & Puppets!

1. Yes, but the historical accuracy of the Quran's preservation is much greater than any other holy books.

Says who?

2. You still didn't give any good arguments on why the Quran is a counterfeit (but only making some conjectures without citing from anything).

I never claimed it was counterfeit as a whole, some of it is definitely original, unless you are referring to the sections from the OT and NT? There are some sections that are almost verbatim from that book of Hebrew.

Can you show me any references or citations to verify that claim? If not, then why should I believe you?

He was betrothed to Ashia at 5 and consummated at 9. It's in the Quran, go have a look.

So, when I make a statement of my own, it's the "personal credulity" fallacy. And when I back up my statements by using other sources, it's the "argument from authority" fallacy. How clever.

You said "I'm just convinced" or something along those lines. A statement of your own would not be credulity, but that statement is practically the definition of credulity.

You should at least give a reason on why it's a bare assertion.

You offered nothing in support.

I said that the people who have ill notions about Muhammad (pbuh) are not knowledgeable about the history of his life.

There are plenty of ex-Muslim scholars who have contributed most of the "ill notions" about ol' Mo. There are secular and Christian historians who think the same.

But instead of proving that sentence wrong, you just simply threw out the words "bare assertion" even though I've already said that there are many authentic biographical information about him which negate the idea that he was an evil person.

Because that is exactly what it was. You made the assertion that nobody who thinks ill of mo knows much about his life and you offered nothing in support of that assertion (which is the "bare" part). A more perfect example of a bare assertion is hard to find.

Base Assertion Fallacy. <- (See, I can play that stupid game also).

If you're going to accuse me of a fallacy you should at least check.

From Saihi:

'A'isha (Allah be pleased with her) reported: Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) married me when I was six years old, and I was admitted to his house at the age of nine. She further said: We went to Medina and I had an attack of fever for a month, and my hair had come down to the earlobes. Umm Ruman (my mother) came to me and I was at that time on a swing along with my playmates. She called me loudly and I went to her and I did not know what she had wanted of me. She took hold of my hand and took me to the door, and I was saying: Ha, ha (as if I was gasping), until the agitation of my heart was over. She took me to a house, where had gathered the women of the Ansar. They all blessed me and wished me good luck and said: May you have share in good. She (my mother) entrusted me to them. They washed my head and embellished me and nothing frightened me. Allah's Messenger (, may peace be upon him) came there in the morning, and I was entrusted to him. Book 8, Number 3309.

Argument from authority does not equal to a bad argument. Why don't you examine the argument itself?

Your argument has a false premise, that being an argument from authority. If the premise is false the argument is not valid.

If you truly think that, then you don't know anything about the history of the Quran. You are very incognizant of the scholarly works on the Quran.

There is absolutely no empirical evidence for the Quran before the last decade of the 6thCE. There were scant Muslim writings prior to this, but the Quran had not been devised. Carbon dating of the parchment puts it at late 665-690CE and Calligraphy at 710-725CE (likely means the parchment was not new or it was corrected).

It was believed to have been distributed by Uthman who commissioned it in approx 651CE already 20 years after Mo kicked the bucket and was not in circulation (there were 5 copies believed to have been made) until some time after it was commissioned.

And that is the TRADITIONALIST view. You don't want to know about the skeptical view, which is based on the historical critical method and puts no credible sources for the Quran until 790CE.

Again, argument from authority doesn't mean that it's a bad argument. The same thing can be said by me, a scientist, a philosophy teacher, or even by a 5th grader.

It's a logical fallacy, for example:

Historian x believes that Joseph Smith could not have invented the book Mormon, therefore it was divine revelation.

Doctor y believes that 14th CE man could not have known these facts therefore the Quran is divine revelation.

Essentially: X believes that P and X has relevant experience therefore P.

It's a fallacy, and any argument that depends on a fallacy is invalid.

No numbnuts, you haven't satisfied your burden of proof, you've made some shockingly bad arguments.

I disagree because your counter-arguments are not strong enough to show that mines are shockingly bad.

I've addressed this already.

The same as any other religious texts.

By that, if you mean to say that the Quran was invented by men, then, I think you have certainly failed to support that view (unlike I did with links).

There is no knowledge in the Quran that even comes close to demonstrating that it was not written by men, which is what your argument was contingent upon, it's all the same hogwash about revealed truth.

A religious text...

Of course it's a religious text. But the question is, who's the author? I've already made my case.

And I refuted it. Address the refutations and then we'll talk.

And i've dismantled your "points" one by one already.

Actually, you didn't dismantle the points very well. Each of the 5 points that I discussed in the original post are well-supported by scholarly research. You weren't able to show me otherwise.

Your "scholarly research" was presented in a way that was fallacious. I've explained the argument from authority and why it is a fallacy as well as why a false premise makes an argument invalid.

Like i've said before, find the arguments that these scholars use and don't just present opinion and conclusion.

You've made next to no case at all.

That's not true, because I proved with enough sources that the Quran cannot be anything else but the word of God based on the scientific, literary, and historical aspects of the Quran.

You didn't. My refutation by parallel argument makes that plainly obvious.

Anyways, be happy for all the kudoses that you got.
You deserve it for the effort, at least. But that doesn't mean that you're right. You're smart enough not to fall into the kudos fallacy.

Kudos just means people share my sentiment, not that my sentiment is necessarily true. The validity isn't contingent upon opinion...

...Unless I got Kudos from some scholars right Rayaan?