That atheists didn't bother to become universal theologians first.

magilum
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That atheists didn't bother to become universal theologians first.

I've heard it argued by the religious that authors like Richard Dawkins are speaking from ignorance; that only a theologian could make the informed decision to deny religious propositions (of course the same could be said of most believers of any one religion). If it were a field other than religion, I would agree -- to call theology a field is being charitable. To chastise an atheist for not knowing enough about religion to refute it implies that there is something to know. That there is, in the details, an evidence more potent than the trifling semantics relied upon by the most prominent advocates of religion. Something better than a deity that hides in the ambiguities of words, in the gaps of our knowledge, in drooling awe, in ignorance, or in a specious "necessity." 

I've listened to debates between atheists and the likes of William Lane Craig, John Lennox; arguments from Lee Strobel, Denys Turner, etc. Charity will only let me assume that these are the absolute bottom-feeders of apologetics, for not one of them was able to produce a description of their deity that wouldn't be synonymous with "nothing." It's as though they'd taken the leavings of Occam's Razor, and gone at the world with those scraps and some tape. The transcendental argument (TAG), the ontological argument, the argument from degrees: old, refuted, laughable stuff. An incongruously proud argument for what Nietzsche would have derisively called a ghost, and a spinner of cob webs. 

Surely, we are remiss, because the basis for "informed" belief could not be as stupid as it seems. So out with it. What is the great evidence?


theotherguy
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Yes, I have a problem with

Yes, I have a problem with this too.

Whenever I argue against a certain religious gurus points, my parents are always like, "Don't you know? He's a major in theology. He's taken five years of apologetics. Don't pretend you know more than he does. Let him answer the religious questions and you just listen."

 Not only is it an appeal to authority, its an appeal to false athourity. Theology and apologetics are joke fields. They teach nothing but useless dogma, and are based on nothing but thought games. So taking four years in apologetics is equivalent to taking four years in jibberish and nonsense.


Raki
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theotherguy wrote: Yes, I

theotherguy wrote:

Yes, I have a problem with this too.

Whenever I argue against a certain religious gurus points, my parents are always like, "Don't you know? He's a major in theology. He's taken five years of apologetics. Don't pretend you know more than he does. Let him answer the religious questions and you just listen."

 Not only is it an appeal to authority, its an appeal to false athourity. Theology and apologetics are joke fields. They teach nothing but useless dogma, and are based on nothing but thought games. So taking four years in apologetics is equivalent to taking four years in jibberish and nonsense.

 Don't Question Authority,part of Brainwashing 101.

Nero(in response to a Youth pastor) wrote:

You are afraid and should be thus.  We look to eradicate your god from everything but history books.  We bring rationality and clear thought to those who choose lives of ignorance.  We are the blazing, incandescent brand that will leave an "A" so livid, so scarlet on your mind that you will not go an hour without reflecting on reality.


Strafio
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The best bit is when you

The best bit is when you then point out someone who used to be a Christian but now strong repudiates Christian doctrine. You point out that they were clearly familiar with Christianity and that they rebuke it most passionately at all.

That's when you find out that these converts clearly weren't a real Christian... lol! Eye-wink