John Lennox and Richard Dawkins

[TheMonster]

What are your thoughts on their debate? Why didn't Richard counter a lot of the arguments?

For those of you who haven't heard of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J0UIbd0eLxw

[Minimalist]

Science deals in fact - the bald clown wants to talk about fairy tales.  There is no common ground between these two.

I gave it 13 minutes.... that was about all I could stand of Lennox' pontificating about his silly god.

[Jehanne]

Science deals in fact - the bald clown wants to talk about fairy tales.  There is no common ground between these two.

I gave it 13 minutes.... that was about all I could stand of Lennox' pontificating about his silly god.

I have listened to Lennox quite a bit -- he likes to appeal to his granddaughter who died in her early 20s from brain cancer.  So very sad, of course, but we (nor I) cannot create an afterlife any more than we can raise people from the dead or even cure cancer.

Lennox needs to understand that Mother Nature is a cruel (fill-in any word of your choosing); it's just the way the World is.

[ukatheist]

Misread the thread title, thought it said John Lennon...then when I saw it was a video of a debate I was very confused for a moment.

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[Expired]

Misread the thread title, thought it said John Lennon...then when I saw it was a video of a debate I was very confused for a moment.

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John Lennon would have talked more sense.

[Jehanne]

Misread the thread title, thought it said John Lennon...then when I saw it was a video of a debate I was very confused for a moment.

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John Lennon would have talked more sense.

That's Lennox's problem; for him, religious faith provides condolences and hope for his dead granddaughter.  What he can't understand is that having religious faith in the World is like standing a pencil on its head.  For some, they will take belief to extremes and do all sorts of silly and nasty things; for others, they will recognize that its all bullshit and simply abandon it.  In this respect, religious liberalism is in decline while fundamentalism is growing, as is secularism.

[brewer]

I have listened to Lennox quite a bit -- he likes to appeal to his granddaughter who died in her early 20s from brain cancer.  So very sad, of course, but we (nor I) cannot create an afterlife any more than we can raise people from the dead or even cure cancer.

Lennox needs to understand that Mother Nature is a cruel (fill-in any word of your choosing); it's just the way the World is.

Off topic but thanks for putting this 70's bit in my head.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLrTPrp-fW8

[_Velvet_]

I really enjoyed this debate, very calm and respectful unlike most debates I watch on the matter.

I would like to point tho that I find very dishonest the way SO MANY Christians debaters use Deist arguments to supposedly support Christianity, the Atheists debater often has to spend great deal of the debate having to constantly separate one idea from the other.

The reason I find this so important its that the way I see Deism, it can be seen as something reasonable, like Dawkins said, something that someone "could make a case of" and speak seriously about what could or couldn't point us to that and what difference would or wouldn't make if such a unpersonal deity/force exists if it doesn't interacts with his creation in any religious way.

The Deist arguments just shouldn't be used to try to defend such an undefendable position, an internally incoherent non-sense like Christianity.

Its like saying all forces and wonders of the universe exists to make sure you don't jerk off or eat pork.

EDIT: Final notes.

As on many other Dawkins debates I could notice that Dawkins's knowledge far exceed his rhetorical skills, he is in my opinion, most of the time, simply unable to sound convincing to anyone who's not already a skeptic, such arguments like "its far less reasonable to suggest an unexplained complex godly entity than stick with the (yet) unexplained natural "simple" universe." are useless to address those who doesn't understand Occam's razor necessity.

[TheMonster]

Thanks for the input! What I find baffling is that a man whose expertise is mathematics, arguably the most objective study of nature, can blur the lines between reality and belief. He uses language that makes him sound intelligent, but in fact is nothing more than another iteration of the tired old talking points.

A friend of mine, a very intelligent doctor in a good hospital... well versed in politics, music, literature, history.... a man who can basically hold a conversation on any topic... yet believes in the Catholic God. He is obviously highly educated. How they dupe themselves is beyond me.