Hmmm levels of irrationality. In my opinion:

MOST IRRATIONAL

Satanism (I'm talking about actually worshipping the Biblical Satan, not the Levayan[sp?] version)
Scientology, various other Cults
Christianity, Islam
Judaism, Hinduism, Jainism
Nature religions/Paganism/Pantheism
Buddhism, Taoism

LEAST IRRATIONAL

This is far from a complete list, but it gives some idea of my opinion on how irrational each religion is. Atheism is, of course, completely rational and not a religion!

I was sitting in my living room with my born-again Christian niece one night when we got into a conversation about "mother nature". She informed me that the concept of "mother nature" was satanic because it meant ignoring Jesus's role in creating the natural universe (we'll ignore the interchangeability of Jesus and God in the Christian mind for now). We discussed this for a little bit before she finally informed me that I couldn't understand the concept because I wasn't "saved" and therefore would go to hell. I asked her about the people that existed for thousands of years before biblical accounts purported to begin. She informed me that anyone who wasn't saved went to hell, including those who were unfortunate enough to live before the savior even existed! So I asked her, if Charles Manson were to accept Jesus Christ as his savior would he gain entrance into heaven? "Yes", she answered. I was floored! So I said, "Let me get this straight. If I brokered world peace but didn't accept Christ as my savior, then I would go to hell. But if Charles Manson accepts Christ into his heart, then he'll go to heaven?" Again she answered, "Yes". This is why theism is irrational. It may be worth noting that she later became the leader of a female gang in Texas and is now a recovering drug addict. My sister's other daughter had two children out of wedlock and her son is a meth addict.

Speaking for myself, I feel that I don't need to be kept in line under the threat of punishment from some higher being. I'm a good person and always try to do the right thing simply because its the right thing to do. Christians and other proselytizing religions help their fellow man, not to do good for good's sake, but in order to convert people to their religion. So atheists are undoubtedly more moral than Christians!

There's a lot of stuff that's wrong in the Bible. Obviously, if there is a god, he/she/it didn't write the bible. Or he did it as a joke to fuck with his creation to see just how absurd of shit he wrote he could get his creation to believe!

Cool, I posted it in our young library. Check it out.

Cyber high five.

Why Theism Is Irrational
By David Coss (AKA, Chaoslord2004)

Theism is irrational because it is logically impossible for theism to be rational. When I say it is logically impossible for theism to be rational, I am talking about more than mere inductive probability. Assuming theism is rational leads to inconsistencies. What, however, causes theism to be irrational? The concept of theism has built into its very meaning, the notion that it must be irrationality by nature. Even if the concept of theism wasn?t inherently irrational, it would still be irrational based on the lack of evidence. Immanuel Kant once said ?You cannot prove the existence of God,? and I wholeheartedly concur.
What does theism mean? Theism means the belief in God. This is obvious, so I hope this doesn?t sound condescending. However, within the very concept of theism is the additional concept of faith. As a philosopher, I hate to play petty semantic games, and I will therefore go to great lengths to define something properly. Faith is defined as the belief in something, with flagrant disregard of evidence to the contrary. Furthermore, faith persists even if there is no evidence for what the person believes. If there could be a cardinal sin of rationality, it would be faith; this should be ubiquitous to anyone of rationality. People of reason use evidence, science and cogent argumentation to persuade people to their beliefs. Moreover, people of rationality hold their beliefs based on rigorous investigation using the scientific method, and, the rules of deductive reasoning.
Theism, therefore, has a latent component which needs to be made manifest. Theism is not simply ?belief in God? but it is belief in God, based on faith. Without faith, theism would crumble from a lack of foundation. For this reason, if one holds one set of theistic propositions and also holds another set of propositions which demand rationality, they will be inconsistent. Theists cannot have it both ways. Theists can be rational, and therefore abandon theism or they can be irrational and cling to theism. Theists cannot have their cake and eat it too.
However, what if the concept of faith was disjoined from the concept of theism? Would it then be rational? It is possible. However, as of now, it is inductively improbable. One of the principles of critical thinking is that one must have good reasons (i.e, good justification) for holding to their set of beliefs. Without a good justification, their set of beliefs must be deemed irrational.
Many theists claim they have good reasons to believe that their God exists. I do not doubt their sincerity, but I explicitly deny the fact that they have good reasons. As of right now, every single argument for the existence of God has been shown to be fallacious. I will not delve into the arguments for God?s existence, because we are all familiar with them (on some level or another).
The theist not only has no evidence in his or her favor, but the theist must deal with various arguments against the existence of God; this is where the theist?s metaphorical goose is cooked. For instance, given that the theist agrees that there is evil in the world, how can he or she claim God is all good? My favorite argument against the existence of god has as its conclusion that the concept of God is incoherent, and therefore, meaningless. S?ren Kierkegaard, a famous 19th century theologian said that rationality carries the theist only so far; after that, one must take a ?leap of faith.? Kierkegaard confirms what we already know: Theism is inherently irrational. I would like to end this essay with a quote by Daniel Dennett:
?The kindly God who lovingly fashioned each and every one of us and sprinkled the sky with shining stars for our delight -- that God is, like Santa Claus, a myth of childhood, not anything a sane, undeluded adult could literally believe in. That God must either be turned into a symbol for something less concrete or abandoned altogether (Daniel Dennett, Darwin's Dangerous Idea, p. 18).?

Theism is a school of religious philosophy which recognizes that most existing religious thought is based on outdated myths and superstitions.
More needs to be said about theism as a philosophy, especially about certain questions traditionally attached to the philosophy of theism. For example, in speculating on theism, one of the questions that arises is about the relation of human language to God, i.e., How is human language (with its reference to finite beings) predicable of an infinite being? Another question deals with whether it is possible to demonstrate rationally, or at least to justify rationally, belief in God's existence. Philosophers of religion also ask whether a particular mode of experience is specifically religious. Likewise, they ask about the relation of the providence and soverignty of God to the freedom and responsibility of man. Finally, there is the question about the internal consistency of theological systems that hold to the existence of an all powerful, all loving God along with the presence of evil in the world.

Just post it right here. If it's too big, email it to me. Email address should be below.

Indeed. To quote Dan Dennett:

"The kindly God who lovingly fashioned each and every one of us and sprinkled the sky with shining stars for our delight -- that God is, like Santa Claus, a myth of childhood, not anything [that] a sane, undeluded adult could literally believe in. That God must either be turned into a symbol for something less concrete or abandoned altogether."
-- Daniel Dennett, from Darwins Dangerous Idea

Theism is irrational because it originated in an attempt to provide an explanation for natural events, whether it be earth/wind/fire or social organisation. Its few remaining pretences of rationality are in those areas in which there are competing scientific claims to validity. The advance of science has deprived it of much of human fears upon which it provided assurance/comfort, whilst post-traditional forms of social organisation - concepts such as citizenship etc - have deprived it of the role of social glue for human societal reproduction. Theism is irrational because it objectifies idealisations of human existence and posits them beyond human experience, and leads to delusions of deferred gratification, a tolerance of the status quo, whether it be a caste system or class system. Modern society has sufficent rational capabilities in terms of moral/practical knowledge to check those aspects of scientific knowledge that operate on what can be done over that which should be done and if anything moral reasoning is inhibited by theism, as it detaches it from human authorship of the world. 100 words yet?

On the Irrationality of Theism
by Richard Spencer

Theism is irrational because it fails to meet the standards of evidence required of rational beliefs. In order for a belief to be considered rational, the probability that the belief is true must be above fifty percent; unfortunately, however, beliefs do not come with neatly quantified probabilities. Consequently, for beliefs like theism, it is our task to examine all of the evidence available to us both for and against the belief and then determine which direction the evidence points. Then, to be a rational person, we should choose to accept beliefs supported by the evidence available to us and reject beliefs unsupported by the evidence. In the case of theism, my experience thus far has convinced me that not only are there no good arguments for theism, there are many good arguments against it. My purpose in this essay is to explain briefly why I accept this sort of evidentialism and have concluded that theism is unsupported by the evidence and should therefore be considered irrational.

There are at least three potential responses to the line of reasoning above. First, it may be claimed that one is entitled to believe in God irrationally. Strictly speaking, one is entitled to believe any irrational thing he or she wants, but this is no way implies that we should desire to possess irrational beliefs. Without some kind of standard for determining which beliefs we should hold and which we should reject, one's beliefs will become hopelessly arbitrary and self-serving. Although such a person may be happy in some trivial sense, we simply have no cause for supposing anything he or she believes is true.

Second, one may make the following claim of Reformed Epistemologists:

(1) Belief in God is properly basic and therefore can be held rationally without evidence or arguments in its favor.

However, I find this position to be deeply flawed and question-begging. Before we accept (1), we should be given some rational grounds for believing that (1) is true. However, upon defending (1), it has become an argument that attempts to rationally justify belief in God. Thus the defender of (1) cannot argue for this position without falling into contradiction. Furthermore, even the leading Reformed Epistemologists admittedly can provide no sufficient criteria for proper basicality when theism is accepted as properly basic. Consequently, (1) appears to be a self-defeating position.

Quite obviously, the third response to my opening paragraph would be that theism is rational--that I have either improperly evaluated the evidence for and against theism or that I have not examined enough of the evidence before reaching my conclusion. This may well be the case. I will therefore take it as my duty for the remainder of this essay to explain why I believe various theistic arguments fail and atheistic arguments succeed.

Theistic Arguments
The Big Three

Any discussion of theistic arguments must include examination of "the big three," that is, the ontological, cosmological, and teleological arguments. It is important to note that these are not three arguments, but rather are three types of arguments. Since a detailed analysis of all variations of these arguments is far beyond the scope of this brief essay, I can only list some general reasons for rejecting these broad types of arguments.

First, ontological arguments (OA) deserve consideration not because they are particularly convincing, but rather because they have experienced a certain popularity among some theists in the past. There are few today who defend OA; instead, the discussion of OA is directed not at whether or not OA fails, but where and how it fails. As it now stands, every form of OA I have encountered, including Anselm's, Descartes's, and those of modern theists, reduces to unfounded assumptions or question-begging. While proponents of OA attempt to define God into existence, they appear to forget that existence is not a property--it is that which without no properties could be held. Because of this common error (and a few others) OA fails and therefore provides no evidence for theism.

Next, proponents of comsological arguments (CA) make a variety of claims about the universe itself as evidence for theism; these claims include the contingency of the universe, the very existence of the universe, the discovery of the Big Bang, and the impossibility of an infinite regress of causes. The problem with CA is usually specific to the version of CA being presented (we've just seen four), but there are a few general points we may note. First, the question "why does the universe exist rather than nothing at all?" is no more of a problem for atheism than the question, "why does God exist rather than nothing at all," is for theism. Neither the theist nor atheist knows for sure why the universe exists (if there is a reason) or how it came from a state prior to the Big Bang to exist in its current state. Theists are free to speculate about the necessity of God's existence but at no point have they produced any real evidence for their conclusions. Also, it is important to note that the Big Bang does not require us to believe the universe popped into existence from nothing. The Big Bang was not the beginning of the universe; it was merely the beginning of the state of the universe we now live in. Overall, CA seems to present us with nothing more than a string of "god-of-the-gaps" arguments that lose credibility with every scientific advance in cosmology.

Third, and finally, proponents of the teleological argument (TA) claim that the "orderliness" of the universe, or apparent "design in nature," proves the existence of a God. Richard Carrier easily exposed the flaws of this position in a debate when he pointed out that not knowing what causes certain things to happen does not justify one to conclude that an intelligent being is the cause. He further pointed out that unexplained order in the universe can never count as evidence for theism because we cannot know that a natural explanation is not forthcoming. We must be careful to note that we are not appealing to ignorance by claiming that a natural explanation could exist. To the contrary, because the hypothesis that supernatural agency is the cause of anything has consistently been replaced successfully by natural explanations, there is no reason to suppose that this trend will not continue. In this way, we are appealing to what we know about the world, not what we don't know (that is the strategy of the theist). Although it is logically possible that supernatural agency does exist (arguably), because natural explanations have not been ruled out, we would be wrong to conclude that any form of TA offers evidence for theism.

Moral Arguments

Another popular form of theistic argument is the appeal to our sense of right and wrong. The claim is often made that without God morality must be subjective, and since there are certain things that we wish to label absolutely wrong, subjective morality cannot suffice. Instead, we must acknowledge the existence of a moral law provided by a moral law giver, i.e., God. This form of argument fails to provide any evidence for theism for a multitude of reasons. First, it confutes absolute morality with objective morality; it is not necessary for something to be absolutely wrong in order for it to be objectively wrong. Furthermore, it is entirely possible to construct a theory of objective morality that does not require any appeal to a god. Instead, it needs to appeal only to the fact that we are temporal, mortal beings who desire one state of affairs over another. More problems arise for the theist when we pry beneath the surface of his or her argument and ask exactly how the existence of God provides us with objective morality. We must wonder whether God is a tyrant enforcing the moral rules he made up or whether he is himself subject to some eternal moral law. Though the discussion certainly does not end here, at this point we begin to see that the theist's position is no less problematic than the atheist's and may even be worse. In the end, we may conclude that the existence of morality does not at all serve as evidence for theism; in fact, morality may be more of enemy for theism than an ally.

Religious Experience

Having once been a Christian, the argument from Religious Experience is one with which I am intimately familiar. It was, after all, the only argument I had left after a certain point on my path to atheism. Although the belief that one has experienced God or heard his voice may be very strong for a believer, when considered objectively, religious experience can only prove that something happened inside the mind of the believer. Even theists are quick to discredit the religious experiences of people of other religions; any objective observer can quickly see that alternative explanations exist for the religious experiences of all believers regardless of the brand of religion in question. Furthermore, neurological evidence that demonstrates the same areas of the brain are involved in the religious experiences of all various religionists strongly suggests that religious experience is entirely rooted in the brain. That the existence of the supernatural is responsible for any religious experience is an unnecessary hypothesis because sufficient natural explanations do exist. Thus the ubiquity and uniformity of religious experience is a testament to the uniformity of human physiology and not the existence of God. Therefore, the argument from Religious Experience is no evidence for theism.

Although other arguments for theism exist, we may assume that since the above arguments are commonly considered the strongest forms of theistic arguments, and because these all fail, all weaker arguments for theism also fail. But we cannot stop here. If it were simply the case that no evidence succeeded in shifting the weight of evidence towards theism, it may also be true that no evidence exists that shifts the balance away from it. However, as we will now see, there are many atheistic arguments that collectively provide powerful evidence that atheism is true and that theism therefore irrational.

Atheistic Arguments
The Evidential Argument from Evil

It has long been recognized that the Epicurean formulation of the problem of evil does not succeed in demostrating that theism is logically impossible. Since it is logically possible that God could have a reason for allowing evil to exist that is morally justificatory, it may be true that the existence of evil is compatible with theism. On the other hand, the Evidential Argument from Evil (EAE) seeks not to show that theism is logically impossible given the existence of evil, but rather that theism is rendered highly improbable by the existence of evil. The EAE has taken on many different forms that have not been sufficiently answered by theists. Richard Carrier contributed to this brand of atheistic argument skillfully in Sense and Goodness Without God. In addition to Carrier's discussion there, others have produced insightful contributions to the EAE including William Rowe, Theodore Drange, Nicolas Everitt, Paul Draper, Michael Martin, Quentin Smith and Richard Gale. Also, Jeffrey Jay Lowder has presented arguments that powerfully demonstrate our world is not at all the kind of world we would expect if theism were true. Specifically, the biological role of pain and pleasure, the flourishing and languishing of sentient beings, the occurence of tragedies, and God's silence in the face of tragedies strongly imply that atheism, not theism, is true.

The Physical Dependence of Minds on the Brain

Another argument that powerfully demonstrates the improbability of theism is that if minds require physical brains, then the implication is that disembodied minds do not exist. Because all of the evidence available to us strongly suggests that minds do require physical brains, and since God is supposed to be or possess a disembodied mind, it is unlikely that God exists.

The Argument from Religious Confusion

The religious landscape is invariably muddied by competing and contradictory opinions about the nature of God. Since we would expect that any theistic God would want his nature and expectations clearly revealed to his beloved creation, the lack of such clarity in the religious landscape is evidence against theism.

The Evidence for Evolution

Although theism is logically compatible with evolution, the occurence of evolution seems to speak against the truth of theism. Because evolution does not proceed with any kind of guidance or goal in mind, and because beneficial mutations are caused by the same mechanisms as harmful ones, the emergence of humans is exposed by evolution to not be the result of any kind of divine plan. Furthermore, evolution by natural selection drove another nail into the coffin of theism by demonstrating that complex order and design can arise naturally.

The Arguments from Nonbelief, the Reasonableness of Nonbelief, and Divine Hiddenness.

Quite simply, there is no apparent reason that God could have for not providing clear knowledge of himself to those he desires to believe in him. Furthermore, there seems to be no morally justificatory reason that God could have for concealing his existence. Moreover, the existence of widespread nonbelief in the theistic God is evidence against theism; the lack of clear knowledge of God is evidence against the existence of a God who could provide such knowledge; and, since we would expect nonbelief in God to be unreasonable if theism were true given the nature of the theistic God, the reasonableness of nonbelief is evidence against theism.

Atheistic Cosmological Arguments

Although we examined theistic cosmological arguments above, we may now observe some ways in which arguments from the universe may be fired back against theism. As both Carrier and Everitt have argued, the scale of the universe speaks against the truth of theism. Given only the hypothesis that God exists and what the universe looks like from this planet without the aid of technology, ancient cultures produced visions of the cosmos that differ dramatically from what science has revealed. If God created the universe for the purpose of placing humans in it, then it would make sense for the universe to be on a human scale. However, the universe is not on a human scale. Instead, we find a universe that displays no concern for us at all and in which we occupy only a tiny part. There is no obvious reason that the God of theism could have had for creating such an unimaginably huge universe, thus it seems more probable that theism is false--that God didn't create it at all. Furthermore, if arguments like those of Victor Stenger and Quentin Smith are correct, then the universe not only has no need for supernatural explanations, it precludes them.

The Problem of Coherence

The task of producing a meaningful and consistent definition of the theistic God is difficult enough in the eyes of many philosophers that the concept is often considered vacuous. Determining what is even meant by the various attributes commonly given to God is complicated (for example, what it means to be all-loving or all-knowing is not entirely clear) and the problems created by attempting to reconcile these attributes with each other are vast. Carrier has presented an argument along these lines by demonstrating the difficulty attached to the doctrine of omnipresence. Since omnipresence cannot mean that God exists in every spatial location (as we can clearly see by looking in front of us), then it follows that God must have no spatial location. However, if God has no spatial location then God exists nowhere; if God exists nowhere, then God does not exist. Problems arise in the same way with the doctrine of immateriality. Since it is claimed that God is not composed of matter, then it follows that God is made of nothing. However, if God is made of nothing then he is nothing, i.e., he does not exist. The theist may reply that God's existence is some other type than spatial and material, but because we have no idea what such existence would be, we begin to see why the concept of God is often considered vacuous.

The Argument from the Edibility of Living Organisms

All of the above arguments have been presented before in greater detail by others. However, the final argument for atheism I wish to present is an argument that I have constructed: the Argument from the Edibility of Living Organisms. The argument can be summarized like this: The construction of living organisms out of edible material, and the necessity of the consumption of living or once living organisms for the overwhelming majority of species is much more likely if atheism were true, and is not at all what we would expect if theism were true. An essential component of my argument is not that living organisms are eaten, but that they are simply edible. It is logically possible that God created all living organisms to be edible, but an omnipotent God surely could have created life otherwise. In contrast, we know of no other way that life could arise naturally.

Furthermore, I can think of no morally justificatory reason that a God could have for creating humans, plants, and other animals with the ability to be consumed and the need to consume. Instead, if theism were true, we would not initially expect us to possess the need for food at all. We have no evidence that disembodied beings like angels and demons, if they exist, require sustenance; and God certainly cannot require sustenance. So, since the existence of bodies that require sustenance creates competition for limited resources, and since it is possible, on theism, that a life can exist that does not require sustenance, we would expect that a morally perfect God would not make our bodies in a way that requires sustenance or, perhaps, that God would provide the necessary sustenance in unlimited amounts from non-living sources. For example, we might expect to be able to receive our nutrition through the sunlight or, as Breatharians imagine, through the simple act of breathing.

To summarize, it seems likely that God would have avoided creating organisms that require the consumption of other organisms to live. It is also unknown why God would have created humans--if we are to be the jewel of creation--with the ability to be eaten and digested like the rest of the animal world. On theism there is simply no reason why life would be characterized by such a necessary struggle for survival in which living organisms must feed on other living or once living organisms. However, such a system is precisely what one might expect if atheism were true. Indeed, it does not seem that nature could produce life any other way; since competition for limited resources is one of the necessary components of natural selection, and since living organisms not only require these resources but also constitute these resources (i.e., food), the edibility of living organisms has invariably shaped the creation of life in its present form. Thus, the edibility of living organisms is not suprising given atheism, yet it is not at all what we would expect if theism were true. Thus it appears that the edibility of living organisms is some evidence for atheism and against theism.

Conclusion

Given the relative brevity of this essay, the arguments presented both for and against theism have undoubtedly been oversimplified; the strength and weaknesses of the above arguments is found in the details--details unfortunately not found here. Luckily my purpose was not to convince anyone of the truth of atheism and the irrationality of theism. Instead, my purpose was to explain what has lead me to conclude that theism is irrational. In this task, I believe I have succeeded; we have seen several reasons why I believe theism not only has no evidence in its favor, but that the evidence points clearly towards atheism. In conclusion, it may benefit us to note that any faith-based belief cannot be held rationally; because faith provides us with no method for distinction between true and false propositions, it is clearly epistemologically invalid, thus an appeal to faith cannot salvage anything lost here. In the final analysis, theism is irrational. For anyone concerned with responding to "irrational emergencies," belief in God should put us on the highest alert. Until humanity is satisifed with taking a fully natural view of ourselves and our place in the universe, humanity will be inevitably plagued by the God delusion and the tangible consequences of irrational belief. For this reason, it is in the best interest of humanity to abandon theism and it is our moral obligation to facilitate this change.