Herbert Von Karajan

Today, I seemed to be confused with these two statements:

- Atheists are evil because there is no benevolent God to follow. Look at Stalin for example

- Jihad suicide bombers are not true Muslims.

The obvious case we have for statement (1) is a terribly blatant generalization while number two is an obvious "True Scotsman" fallacy. But what do you do when you get Muslims who digress when you argue with them about the connection of suicide bombers, and pointing out that it is only mutually exclusive to religionists in your case?

"Oh, so you can use it on religionists but not on you atheists? Isn't the "True Scotsman" also another form of blatant generalization?"

I hope everyone can get the meaning of this post.

Radorth

It does not apply to atheists.

It does apply to Christians. In the case of violence, you must show that Christ was a violent person, otherwise it is valid for Christians. It is valid where a group claims to follow a certain set of teachings. Thus "no true Marxist" is valid, and "no true atheist" is not valid. Scotsman do not claim to follow any set of rules, therefore "no true Scotsman" is not the same as "no true Christian."

Rad