Skeptics I no longer have any respect for.

[Shell B]

I apologize if it took me a while to get back to this. I rely on email notifications, so I don't have to check back and they are not always reliable. I'm with you in chat, though, so score.

[NoMoreFaith]

It does no such thing. Separating it from public schools ensures that the government has nothing to do with religious teachings. If parents were not allowed to send their kids to private religious schools, they would just teach their children their religions at church and at home.

I fail to see why this is a bad thing. Sorry. That's EXACTLY where it belongs. Isn't the discussion here regarding whether private faith schools should be allowed?

I'm not convinced by the argument that its discriminatory against the religious by not allowing private faith schools. You aren't putting them at any positive or negative disadvantage to any other person by rights of their deeply held belief.

Telling people that they cannot send their children to private religious schools promotes tolerance?

Yes. It does imho. Unless the logic here is that if you tell anybody they cannot do something it is therefore intolerant. I can think of several reductio ad absurdium points on that immediately to say the least.

Schools have a responsibility to teach a fair and equitable viewpoint of philosophical matters including religion. You breed intolerance when you have a "special" school which has an agenda of promoting only a single theological viewpoint, to the extent that it excludes, and warps subjects beyond the theological.
The popular and most obvious example is seen regularly in the debates over whether a creationist school can teach the creation myth as equally if not more valid than natural selection and evolution in science.

It would be easy to look at this point of view and demand that this is just an opposing point of view that equally shouldn't have precedence, and that shows the very problem with theological thinking in terms of the above example of science. It denies the scientific method, and gives validity to opinion and strongly held belief as valid balancing views in ALL aspects of the curriculum beyond science, including history and religious study/philosophy.

Anyway, this is getting away from the point of this thread, which has been somewhat derailed by some spectacular and unwarranted personal abuse and worth looking at the points raised themselves. I just had some opinions I wanted to share on those comments, although that's all they are.

It wasn't his style I had a problem with, it was the content. It has "converted" a load of people to atheism for all the wrong reasons imo. Like I said before, I still respect him as a biologist, but biologists should keep out of philosophy.

This is an interesting outlook. What are the wrong reasons you have specifically. Simply that you are aware of a more complex counterargument to the points posed by Dawkins incomplete philosophical method? That the reader should only allow themselves to be swayed if they have engaged in a study of philosophical thought?

Without being belligerent about it, that appears to be a little elitist.

[thesummerqueen]

I'm curious about that too, Tiberius. What makes one way of deconverting better than another?

[leo-rcc]

There is a very real danger in deconversion with faulty logic behind it. It is very feasible that a deconverted person with its newfound atheist resolve, engages into a discussion with a theists who can debunk the atheists' arguments with ease showing its faulty logic behind it. Which in turn can actually make not only make the deconverted a believer again, but actually a stronger more resolved theist than ever before. This is not just a what if scenario, I have seen this play out on more than one occasion, thanks to the likes of Zeitgeist.

[thesummerqueen]

This all confuses me. Maybe because I have little to no use for philosophizing and my deconversion had nothing to do with logicking my way to it.

[leo-rcc]

This all confuses me. Maybe because I have little to no use for philosophizing and my deconversion had nothing to do with logicking my way to it.

Me neither, I never deconverted to begin with, but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen.

[thesummerqueen]

but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen.

Not arguing that...it just astounds me.

[NoMoreFaith]

There is a very real danger in deconversion with faulty logic behind it. It is very feasible that a deconverted person with its newfound atheist resolve, engages into a discussion with a theists who can debunk the atheists' arguments with ease showing its faulty logic behind it. Which in turn can actually make not only make the deconverted a believer again, but actually a stronger more resolved theist than ever before. This is not just a what if scenario, I have seen this play out on more than one occasion, thanks to the likes of Zeitgeist.

If you are in a position to be convinced by a counterargument such as Dawkins, you were on the edge already. I have not seen any conversion through The God Delusion whom were not already teetering on the edge.

If you are then swayed by a counterargument.. I don't see a problem with this. Does it logically follow that you would become a stronger theist at this point? I suppose its a possibility, but I doubt there's any real statistics on this point to support it.
Is it not equally likely that Mr "TeeterTotter Theist" would equally come back and ask for clarification on the counterargument proposed. If it cannot be answered, I would not blame them for running back to the warm cuddlies of whatever cult they came from.

Truth is, I have NO idea. I have no personal or statistical information on that, but as an opinion it appears to be based on a small sample of personal experiences, which I am loathe to trust as conclusive. I daresay its an indication, but it doesn't sit right with me.

My earlier point on the God Delusion being a basic primer to atheism by covering a very wide range of reasoning is central to this. We are talking the scientific, the philosophical, with a large chunk of sociological and psychological reasoning to boot.

If you are swayed because of a SINGLE faulty piece of philosophy and nothing else.. you've probably missed the entire point in the first place. If you are equally "reconverted" on the basis of a single philosophical piece, and ignoring all other aspects.. its probably safe to say that you simply didn't want to give it up in the first place.

The respect due to that particular book was its attempt to be a panoptic criticism of theism. If one element is proven to be faulty, then hopefully the other elements serve as a background to examine that one fault in more detail, and not to go running back to your imaginary friend. If you are still not thinking for yourself at this point.. there was probably no hope for you.

Maybe I give people too much credit.

[Tiberius]

Basically, what leo said. If you convince someone with faulty logic, they will eventually realise that logic was faulty, either by thenselves or by getting completely destroyed in a debate with a knowledgable theist. I've seen Ryft do it on these very forums.

Far better to convince someone with sound logic so they get can defend their beliefs later.

[thesummerqueen]

That's why Ryft says he doesn't have the training to deal with "problems" of my capacity - ie, logic doesn't help dontgiveashititis.