Tercel

If "collective backs are against the wall" means there are 10 atheists vs 1 Christian in a thread, with all 10 ready to jump all over anything the Christian says regardles of how logically correct or logically incoherent it might be, then I can see why they bail...

Agreed. That's one of the reasons why I post here.




:banghead:

Right... hmm... okay...
So I take it you think debates should go on forever? 4 pages? 7 pages? 10 pages? 15 pages? 20 pages? At what point is the Christian allowed to say "I'm utterly sick of you guys repeating the same thing, you haven't convinced me, and I have nothing new to add" and go away, without being declared "beaten" by you?
I take it you think a Christian is not allowed to leave because they are intimidated by 20 atheists bearing down on them with "You're wrong...", "That's a stupid argument...", "You're stupid..." etc. ?


Did I mention that it is my firm believe that whenever an atheist leaves off debating me it is because either I have convinced them or they refused to confront the Truth?

...Probably I didn't, because I am not quite arrogant enough to believe that.

seebs

I've had "conversations" with all sorts of people, and I've seen people on every side of every debate do exactly what you describe.



Recursion is fun, innit?

Anyway, it certainly seems odd that you'd believe this about Christians, but not about everyone else, even though I've yet to see an issue on which people don't bail from debates. I mean, what next? "People who think White Wolf games are better than D&D bail from debates about gaming systems because they are uncomfortable with the truth"?

But whether or not a debate *seems* to be going in circles depends a lot on the reader. We mostly have pretty huge filters.

I'm willing to give a defense of my faith (the thread is still in here, probably). However, beyond a certain point, it's no longer a defense of faith, it's just endless trench warfare about details of words, and any possible point was lost long since. I have other stuff to do.

GeoTheo

[Edited out off-topic blather: how many times do you have to read "take it to Bugs & Complaints" before the lightbulb goes on? - BJM]

seebs

I think context matters a lot. Questioning a specific person in detail can derail a productive thread on a topic of more general interest.

Demigawd

Perhaps I went too far in my pop-culture reference. What I was invoking is the phenomena of white middle-class Americans who think just because they have an association with black Americans, they therefore have some sort of credible understanding of said sub-culture's experience.

In other words, to say that simply because two or more groups have an opposing view, therefore opposing views are equally valid, is naive.

I used the word "not" once.

*sigh* Where did I say that anyone owes me anything? You're throwing out rhetorical landmines here. It's blatantly obvious that anyone putting forth an observation that she or he is expecting the other to consider her or his position. I considered yours, and came up with the rational opinion that you are invoking the basic argument "I know you are, but what am I?"

Commitment to position means jack-squat. To borrow from your own perspective, I owe nothing to you because you have a position. Stance means nothing, no matter how clever your rhetoric is, unless you have evidence to back it up. Otherwise, it all boils down to stubborness and prejudice, as I stated earlier.

It's an interpretation that's supported by honest (ie. non-presupposition to support a commonly-accepted mythology) scholarship. That's what.

Tercel

I was intrigued by this so I had a browse through the thread.
What simple logical argument are you referring to?

All I could find that came close was this:
The non-spatial immaterial laws of physics appear to be quite capable of exerting causitive influence on matter. Most dualists would probably argue that the mechanism the soul uses to in collapsing the quantum waves functions in the brain in such a way that it causes the desired macro-level events in a properly functioning brain structure.

And this,
Which seems strange: truth is immaterial too as is the law of gravity... do they exist nowhere?

ex-xian

I find nothing odd about this positions. You are drawing a false analogy; disagreements concerning aesthetics are in one class, while the beliefs that a xian must hold in order to be xian are another thing all together.

Of course a person should not endure abuse. I insinuated nothing of the sort. Inherent in my argument is the assumption that the discourse be rational above all else. If a debate degenerates into name calling and abuse, it is no longer a debate. I lurk much more than I post and even when I was a fundy, charismatic xian, I never read a thread wherein the xian made better or more successful arguments than the atheist.

ex-xian

Tercel, I don't wish to derail this thread, as it seems to be progressing quite nicely.

If you will post a reply in the thread that you referred to, I will be more than happy to respond.

seebs

Nonetheless, there comes a point where you lose interest in a debate for whatever reason.

I've seen some. You know how you get newbie fundies who come here and try to convert you? We get newbie atheists at ChristianForums. I remember one guy whose big attack on Christianity was this:

Most miracles are *scientifically impossible*!!!!!

He didn't seem to understand that the people writing them down, even when they barely had agriculture figured out, were *aware* that these things were normally impossible, or they wouldn't have thought them interesting.

Atheism has the advantage that it has very few tenets to defend; this makes it an easier position to defend in a debate. However, I have seen a number of utterly irrefutable arguments on both sides. For instance, my reason for being a Christian is "this fits my personal experience of the world". I have seen no refutations of this positionn.

Badfish

That's because it's impossible, the perfect argument.