Calilasseia

Pot. Kettle. Black.

Funny that Dave, given that your idea of 'truth' comes from a religious text. Or at least, your somewhat idiosyncratic interpretation of it.

Then why are you so dismissive when people give you answers?

A portion of it, yes. That portion that involves the way in which a billion people on this planet think, and the system upon which they base their lives and judgements. Which, if you care to cast your mind back to 2001, was claimed by 14 people as the justification for flying two airliners into two tall buildings in New York and killing 2,801 people. There's a bit of reality it can help you understand, including whether or not those 14 people who committed that act were deluded in their belief that this book justified their actions. Which has had quite a knock on effect upon US foreign policy, which is a pretty big whack of reality you ought to be interested in, as big mistakes on that front could end up costing you personally even though you're not one of the power brokers responsible.

That part of reality involving the behaviour of living systems, yes.

Oh, you closed your mind in advance. Just as I thought we were making an atom of progress.

Only because of the vast gaps in your knowledge, Dave. Gaps that AiG will never help you fill, because they are the ones who have a vested interest in 'adherence to dogma'. Darwin doesn't have any such interest because he's been dead for 150 years.

The saddest part of all this, Dave, is that you have no idea how pitiful your words appear to the rest of us in this respect. You have effectively said "I know all I need to know, why bother with anything else?" You've denied an essential part of your own humanity in pursuit of a doctrine, you've deliberately atrophied it to fit a vision of a small, mean, and entirely nonexistent supernatural entity and in the process shut yourself off from the grandeur of the universe. Everything you see is refracted through the distorting prisms of biblical inerrancy and creationism, and the resulting tunnel vision is shocking to behold.

phrog

Yes. When I ws about 15. I attended Bible camp with the Baptists. I didn't get it all read that week, in fact it took me the whole summer, but I was determined. I've been Atheist since 3 hours after conception, reading the Bible really locked things up for me. I was going to follow up that with reading the Book of Mormon. Let me tell you, if you think THE BIBLE is a bit droll, try the BoM. Sheesh! I only made it about 80 or 90 pages and decided I had better things to do with my time, so I put that aside and read Falukner's The Reivers. Much better I must say.

Baalazel

So for all practical purposes you have read nothing that disagrees with your Christian teachings. I thought as much. While I was in Bible college we were forbidden to read many things critical of what the school taught. The willful ignorance of Christians never ceases to amaze me.

I continue to read the Bible thirty years after I stopped calling myself a Christian in order to understand the culture I am a part of. How could I arrive at that understanding if I ignore my societys dominate religion? How do you expect to minister to those whose intellectual lives you make no effort to grasp.

I am of the opinion that the fear of other viewpoints that is so pervasive in Christian teaching is a direct result of the unconscious expression of the underlying magical nature of Christianity. Christians often believe that evil possesses inanimate objects such as books and can ‘infect’ the individual who holds the object or reads the book. In the practice of Magic this is know as the Law of Contagion.


That you are partial to the Bible was never in doubt. That you have a well founded understanding of anything other than the Bible is in doubt. You do your apologia no service by trumpeting your ignorance of religious thought in general and of Biblical criticism specifically.

This is the weakest argument you could raise in defense of scripture.

Having never read any volume containing evidence that this assertion is false how do you intend to convince us that it is true?

The book of Joshua is replete with examples of the human condition. Sadly that condition for many thousands of people is death at the hand of the god you so earnestly advance to defend. Please read it.

I offered this question in an earlier post, how did King Saul die? I ask it because it was one of the Biblical conundrums that began to lead me away from Christianity. I would very much like to know your thoughts on this puzzle.


Well of course you will. This was never in doubt.

Baal

Minimalist

No one will ever accuse religious literature of being GREAT literature.

khalimirov

I will Some writings more than others though.

Calilasseia

Yet you do not seem to think that the same standard applies in reverse, and that you should read assorted texts that you criticise here. It's illustrative of your biases that you referred to Darwin's Origin Of Species as a 'religious book' above, while having repeatedly maintained a position here and at RDF that the bible is somehow not only 'scientific' but should be granted a privileged position of supremacy over all other human intellectual endeavours and be immune from critique. The inherent cognitive dissonance involved in this collection of inverting elisions is truly stunning to behold.

khalimirov

What's RDF?

Calilasseia

RDF = Richard Dawkins Forums. Linky. Home of many of Dave's "finest" moments, as it were, before he decided to pay IIDB a visit (though in some respects his output at IIDB has been even more spectacular).

GenesisNemesis

Because he said he had no reason to read them. He set it up that way.

Jayco

AFDave, I have a question:

Do you read everyone's posts? If so, why don't you respond to everyone's replies or answers to your questions?

You're asking a question, you're receiving answers, but then you're saying you're not receiving any "good" answers. Regardless of that, you are still receiving answers so why aren't you responding to those answers?