Theist "Why I am not an atheist".....

[Jackie]

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

I've often wondered why Swinburne is taken seriously by informed people. His entire apologetic structure is build on the sort of staggering credulity one would expect of a Ken Ham, not of an otherwise towering intellect. Apart from his fetish that people should believe what they see and what they are told by believers, Swinburne is a pretty smart fellow.

Boru

[Jackie]

I've often wondered why Swinburne is taken seriously by informed people.  His entire apologetic structure is build on the sort of staggering credulity one would expect of a Ken Ham, not of an otherwise towering intellect.  Apart from his fetish that people should believe what they see and what they are told by believers, Swinburne is a pretty smart fellow.

Boru

I think anyone who has read enough of my posts knows I don't take prisoners (strictly as a matter of debate and criticism) on any label of any religion, and will even go after other atheists depending on the claim.

It is simply stupid for any human to think a label or old holy writing has magic power or makes them more special. It still remains, including atheists, we are still all the same species, and still stuck on the same rock. 

Yea, smart and so what? I think J K Rowling is smart, and she wrote an elaborate fantasy series. Shakespeare was smart too. The problem with ALL religions is that they take our natural human behaviors and distort them into legends and myths and create political social orders and that causes humans to be divided needlessly. If religion were not causing political divides or wars, or sub divisions, there would be no reason to question any religion.

I will never stop repeating that you certainly cannot force any religion out of existence without becoming a monster yourself, but we have to stop being afraid of criticism of old claims and bad claims no matter where they come from. It still remains that our species is much older than our current religions, boarders, nations or economic systems. The reason you must question, isn't to seek a perfect utopia putting one label over others, but to foster a world where we accept more that what matters first, is that we are still the same species.

[KevinM1]

I love it when Christians throw out the three O's when their own bible doesn't even support that view of their god.

[Wyrd of Gawd]

The idea that man needs a god is silly. According to the major fairy tales the god characters are despicable. They inflict unlimited pain and suffering on humanity. They promise spectacular rewards for the few idiots who actually believe in them and do their bidding. The rest of humanity gets eternal punishment.

Since no god of any kind has ever shown up in all of its reputed splendor everyone has to imagine what his favorite deity really is. Therefore all gods are imaginary. The con men who came up with the stories never saw the gods they fabricated. Yet today countless people think that the popular images of Jesus are factual. That's evidence of insanity.

[Jackie]

The idea that man needs a god is silly.  According to the major fairy tales the god characters are despicable.  They inflict unlimited pain and suffering on humanity.  They promise spectacular rewards for the few idiots who actually believe in them and do their bidding.  The rest of humanity gets eternal punishment.

Since no god of any kind has ever shown up in all of its reputed splendor everyone has to imagine what his favorite deity really is.  Therefore all gods are imaginary.  The con men who came up with the stories never saw the gods they fabricated.  Yet today countless people think that the popular images of Jesus are factual.  That's evidence of insanity.

I don't think most humans who believe are con men, and I don't even think the founders of all the ancient religions were always con men. Humans back then didn't know any better so some were merely deluded and others were not only deluded, but con artists as well. Not really that different than today, other than humans really don't have much of an excuse in the developed western free world especially with the age of the internet. You simply look silly clinging to that old stuff now.