lpetrich

And I think that the best defense of the Jesus-Christ-myth hypothesis I've ever seen is Earl Doherty's.

He is essentially rational, or at least tries to be, unlike Acharya S, with her New-Age beliefs, and he does not indulge in Acharya-S-style hostility to Xianity and Xians. Instead, he calmly quotes their Pascalian fulminations and lets them discredit themselves.

Layman

You've heard some of it before. Some of the threads remain here on this site. Heck, you've been in some of the threads we've hashed these things out in.

Whether or not it would be admissible in a court of law is a pretty irrelevant question.

Kosh

??? Because you think our court system is
corrupted by a bunch of slimy lawyers who twist
things to their need using falacious logic?
Or because the evidence falls into the
category of hearsay?

Layman

Because our legal system is not the only--or even the best--means by which to establish the truth.

And by legal system you are only focusing on one aspect of it--the Court system. And the American court system at that. Arbitration and mediation are also important parts of our legal system--resolving disputes involving billions of dollars every year--and hearsay evidence figures quite prominently in arbitration and mediation proceedings.

Opera Nut

the lawyers changed the rules of civil procedure to force mandatory arbitration. Did they do this out of the goodness of their little hearts? No. They make just as much or more money as certified arbitrators as they would as trial lawyers. They did it out of greed -- they didn't want to pay court reporters for depositions and discovery, expert witnesses and all, and besides 80 percent of court reporters are women. I was one for 20 years and they destroyed my profession completely in 1996.

<img src="graemlins/banghead.gif" border="0" alt="[Bang Head]" />
Mediation is a good thing where the parties are far apart in their demands, but in a case of a fixed amount of money, like a sworn account, it's useless.
By the way, I have a Juris Doctor myself.

Tharmas

Layman,

Sorry the link isn't there to your discussion. I had a suspicion there is a certain energy of invective from Acharya’s followers that I was hoping to savor.

Point of fact: in the radio discussion to which you link Acharya never claims to have conversed with aliens. One has to “interpret” the transcript quite freely to derive that interpretation. Nevertheless she's flaky enough without that!

My intrigue with Acharya simply reflects my fascination with flakes of all stripes. It’s fun to read a conspiracy theorist on the ‘Net who believes Christianity and Masonry share a common origin, or that AIDS is a Christian conspiracy. It’s a refreshing change of pace.

And, after all, she's a member of the American Anthropological Research Foundation (AARF). This is high quality stuff.

Cheers!


[ May 12, 2002: Message edited by: Tharmas ]

[ May 12, 2002: Message edited by: Tharmas ]</p>

godfry n. glad

We have wandered far-afield from the original question, so, to get us back on track, here's the original question, keyed in by Methodissed:

My short answer is that you will not find such a book. That's because not only are these "big topics", but "religion" is a humungeous topic compared to just christianity. There exist a large number of texts which address various rationales as to why one should not take christianity too seriously, but to combine that with _all_ other religions is a big task. So...

My recommendations are:

Michael Martin, _Atheism: A Philosophical Justification_ and any other book by Dr. Martin. He is a philosopher teaching at the university level who writes for the layman (obviously not Layman) reader.

Although not personally familiar with his work, George H. Smith's _Atheism: The Case Against God_ looks as though it might be in the same vein.

As for rationales for not suppressing one's intellect to the vagaries of christian dogma, I recommend the work by the last century's leading logician, Bertrand Russell, _Why I Am Not a Christian_. I'm sure that there is no shortage of tomes that will fulfill this particular aspect, which the folks here will be more than willing to provide leads. Dan Barker's books come to mind, too.

These are only a few of the many texts written for the non-scholar that can get you started along the path you seem interested in, but don't expect to find it all in one book. Aside from that kind of information not being included in one book, to depend upon one book places you at the whim of the opinions and biases of one author...not a recommended manner of critical thought. Read widely. Compare opinions. Think.

Don't rely upon one author or one opinion.

godfry

[ May 13, 2002: Message edited by: godfry n. glad ]</p>

Haran

I like that... Humungeous... Sounds kinda "sponge-like" or something.

Haran

godfry n. glad

Y'know, you're right. Actually, I think "fungal" would be closer to the intended meaning.

heh...

godfry

Layman

The point was that the legal system has many facets that rely on hearsay evidence to resolve very important cases. We just won a $20 million case in the AAA. And it wasn't mandatory arbitration, it was contractual arbitration.