Why the Belief in the Existence of the Theist's God is a Delusion, Why Monotheistic Religions are Morally and Intellectually Bankrupt, and the Dangerous Liability of Religious Tolerance
There are many contradictions and inconsistencies that major organized religions have trouble coexisting with, facts that have become inconvenient to the religious apologists or otherwise uninformed adherents. Not surprisingly these things go unaddressed by the leaders of these religions, artfully omitted so that delusion can carry out its work beyond the light of scrutiny. There are many problems monotheistic faith based religions have yet to explain in order to ever be taken seriously, but a few of the key problems are outlined below:
1. Where does god come from? - The religious faithful are faced with the unavoidable problem of infinite regression.
If it’s reasoned there must be a creator agent, then by that same logic, the creator agent would need its own creator, and that creator its own, and so on and so forth. But for the sake of argument let's allow for a minute the untenable rationale this god always existed and move forward.
If it’s reasoned there must be a creator agent, then by that same logic, the creator agent would need its own creator, and that creator its own, and so on and so forth. But for the sake of argument let's allow for a minute the untenable rationale this god always existed and move forward.
2. If there is a theistic god, and he/she/it created all things, then it must have, even if indirectly, created suffering and evil, otherwise that god is not omniscient.
This contradicts claims that god is loving and impartial. As renowned secular polemicist and bestselling author Christopher Hitchens contends, “Why are we created sick, created diseased, and then comported to be good? There’s no rebellion, and if there was, why would he create us in such a form as to demand that we rebel?”
And why make us with biological impulses that would be stifled by oppressive theological doctrine? What’s that say about the motives of the monotheist’s god? Let’s take the Christian god in this example, a god indirectly responsible for creating a hell, a place of punishment (god is responsible otherwise god is not omniscient) telling people they’re damned to burn in hell if they don’t ceremoniously devote themselves and worship it.
This scenario is tantamount to a man telling a woman he will beat her if she doesn’t prepare his dinner, and then when she does, he says “I am rewarding you by not beating you for that dinner.” This is objectively true. So who would believe a creator of a universe would interest itself this way? And who would want any part of one that did?
This contradicts claims that god is loving and impartial. As renowned secular polemicist and bestselling author Christopher Hitchens contends, “Why are we created sick, created diseased, and then comported to be good? There’s no rebellion, and if there was, why would he create us in such a form as to demand that we rebel?”
And why make us with biological impulses that would be stifled by oppressive theological doctrine? What’s that say about the motives of the monotheist’s god? Let’s take the Christian god in this example, a god indirectly responsible for creating a hell, a place of punishment (god is responsible otherwise god is not omniscient) telling people they’re damned to burn in hell if they don’t ceremoniously devote themselves and worship it.
This scenario is tantamount to a man telling a woman he will beat her if she doesn’t prepare his dinner, and then when she does, he says “I am rewarding you by not beating you for that dinner.” This is objectively true. So who would believe a creator of a universe would interest itself this way? And who would want any part of one that did?
3. Would a god preference one group on the planet while excluding the rest?
For the sake of argument, let's say there was a god. Would it discriminate or favor its own creations based on the theological doctrine of man? Can the monotheist honestly, within the limit of their capacity to reason logically, conclude that an entity so seemingly omnipotent and otherworldly, could bias itself only to a certain group of people while ignoring the rest?
Does the breadth of their collective wisdom and intellect tell them, objectively, that if there was a god (as they were presumably indoctrinated into believing as a product of their upbringing, which would be a different belief altogether if they had been born in any number of countries) that said god would favor them and those who taught them of it? That holds up to careful consideration?
As philosopher Sam Harris reasons, it’s a very strange god, the one that would create the sort of situation we have today where people are born into their religions, that we are likely to find our religions by an accident of where we are born (e.g if someone is born in Pakistan they will more than likely be indoctrinated into, or choose to follow Islam, whereas if you’re born in Alabama, the odds are overwhelming that you’ll end up a Christian etc.) and according to these religions only one of them is right, and the other one leads to eternal damnation. This is a strangely provincial god that would let this happen.
For the sake of argument, let's say there was a god. Would it discriminate or favor its own creations based on the theological doctrine of man? Can the monotheist honestly, within the limit of their capacity to reason logically, conclude that an entity so seemingly omnipotent and otherworldly, could bias itself only to a certain group of people while ignoring the rest?
Does the breadth of their collective wisdom and intellect tell them, objectively, that if there was a god (as they were presumably indoctrinated into believing as a product of their upbringing, which would be a different belief altogether if they had been born in any number of countries) that said god would favor them and those who taught them of it? That holds up to careful consideration?
As philosopher Sam Harris reasons, it’s a very strange god, the one that would create the sort of situation we have today where people are born into their religions, that we are likely to find our religions by an accident of where we are born (e.g if someone is born in Pakistan they will more than likely be indoctrinated into, or choose to follow Islam, whereas if you’re born in Alabama, the odds are overwhelming that you’ll end up a Christian etc.) and according to these religions only one of them is right, and the other one leads to eternal damnation. This is a strangely provincial god that would let this happen.
4. God's supposed omnipotence conflicts with reality.
In the monotheist's world it's "god's plan" that an innocent girl scout wandering down the street gets cut down by a stray bullet, or that a baby gazelle is ravaged by a pride of lions with its mother watching helplessly, or that some boy with the disfiguring condition of Elephantiasis sits home on prom night in tears, or that hundreds of thousands of women are afflicted with a host of infertility diseases and can never bear children. In the monotheist's world that's all a part of the big cosmic plan. To believe this, they’d have found a way to square that with a god's agenda somehow.
As the famed Greek Philosopher Epicurus once reasoned so succinctly and eloquently: “Is god willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence came evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him god?" (Hume)
In the monotheist's world it's "god's plan" that an innocent girl scout wandering down the street gets cut down by a stray bullet, or that a baby gazelle is ravaged by a pride of lions with its mother watching helplessly, or that some boy with the disfiguring condition of Elephantiasis sits home on prom night in tears, or that hundreds of thousands of women are afflicted with a host of infertility diseases and can never bear children. In the monotheist's world that's all a part of the big cosmic plan. To believe this, they’d have found a way to square that with a god's agenda somehow.
As the famed Greek Philosopher Epicurus once reasoned so succinctly and eloquently: “Is god willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence came evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him god?" (Hume)
5. What happened to man for the first 100,000-200,000 years before there was organized religion?
Monotheists still have to account for the 100,000 years or so man was walking this planet before Yahweh, Christ, or Muhammad, before there was an organized monotheism, when life was significantly more cruel and savage, when average life expectancy was 25 years, most of it lost in birth, to infectious disease and turf wars. As prominent skeptic, and revered intellectual Christopher Hitchens muses “..and for the first 96,000 years of this experience, heaven watches with folded arms, us go through all of this, with indifference, without pity, and then around 4,000 years ago decides ‘Gee, it's time to intervene.’ And the best way of doing that would probably be around Bronze Age middle east, making appearances to stupefy illiterate peasants , which could then be passed on, the news would get to China around 1000 years after that” (Hitchens, Boteach debate) –as if the Chinese weren't as worthy as the Galileans or Canaanites. Hitchens’ hypothesis is particularly inconvenient for the monotheists.
It’s an air tight defense for secularism, and a crippling blow to the tenability of monotheism. Because this would mean if a god did exist, it never cared about intervening or availing itself/herself/himself in millions of lives for the span of a thousand centuries or more.
Monotheists still have to account for the 100,000 years or so man was walking this planet before Yahweh, Christ, or Muhammad, before there was an organized monotheism, when life was significantly more cruel and savage, when average life expectancy was 25 years, most of it lost in birth, to infectious disease and turf wars. As prominent skeptic, and revered intellectual Christopher Hitchens muses “..and for the first 96,000 years of this experience, heaven watches with folded arms, us go through all of this, with indifference, without pity, and then around 4,000 years ago decides ‘Gee, it's time to intervene.’ And the best way of doing that would probably be around Bronze Age middle east, making appearances to stupefy illiterate peasants , which could then be passed on, the news would get to China around 1000 years after that” (Hitchens, Boteach debate) –as if the Chinese weren't as worthy as the Galileans or Canaanites. Hitchens’ hypothesis is particularly inconvenient for the monotheists.
It’s an air tight defense for secularism, and a crippling blow to the tenability of monotheism. Because this would mean if a god did exist, it never cared about intervening or availing itself/herself/himself in millions of lives for the span of a thousand centuries or more.
6. The bible is derived from books and philosophies that came before it.
Monotheists often blindly accept the bible is true along with their indoctrination, forgetting the bible, after all, was authored during a time when virtually all of our books were steeped in superstition, or made reference to some mythical god of the Greeks or Egyptians. The bible's moral tenets and 10 commandments are derivative of ideas central to Confucianism and Platonism. Christopher Hitchens explains, “Christianity is a plagiarism of Hellenism,” and as Sam Harris points out, “The biblical Golden Rule is a great moral precept, but numerous teachers offered the same instruction centuries before Jesus (Zoroaster, Buddha, Confucius, Epictetus etc) and countless scripture discuss the importance of self-transcending love more articulately than the bible does, while being unblemished by the obscene celebrations of violence and barbarism we find [throughout the bible.]” (“Letter to a Christian Nation” pg. 11) Darwinian morality, and societal law had long since been mostly universally accepted.
The King James bible is a book that has gone through some 22,000 changes since it was first published in entirety (according to the Vatican), and Christians have slowly come around to cede findings like evolution, trying to shape it to fit their own beliefs after having denied it for so long. Now Christian moderates are trying to work around the biblical intolerance of homosexuals to adapt again to a modern world that increasingly conflicts with biblical theology, which begs the question, how true could the bible really be if it needed that much change? Can we really trust a book that needed that many revisions?
How can the monotheist accept that something that is supposed to have been authored by a divine artificer lack so much anyone would expect to come from a divine artificer? The bible as it is now is replete with contradictions and moral bankruptcy. Harris explains “Anyone who believes that the bible offers the best guidance we have on questions of morality has some very strange ideas about guidance or morality.” (“Letter to a Christian Nation” pg. 14) when describing the endless supply of barbaric quotes plaguing the Christian bible with passages such as Exodus 21: 7-11 where the bible makes it clear that every man is free to sell his daughter into sexual slavery, and this is just one of a litany of appalling biblical passages Harris reveals in his book “Letter to a Christian Nation.”
Take things like in Deuteronomy 22 encouraging that if a woman engaged to be married is raped in the city, she and the rapist should be stoned to death: "If a damsel that is a virgin be betrothed unto an husband, and a man find her in the city, and lie with her; Then ye shall bring them both out unto the gate of that city, and ye shall stone them with stones that they die; the damsel, because she cried not, being in the city; and the man, because he hath humbled his neighbor's wife." It doesn't take a theologian to see that things like this are inconsistent with our most outrageous concept of what a loving god would let slide through his editing room unchanged. What’s more is there is nothing in the bible to suggest it was authored by a creator of a universe.
As Harris explains,
"There’s not a single sentence in there that could not have been written by a denizen of first century. There’s nothing about DNA or electricity or computation or anything that, I mean, if anything like that were in there, then we would have a conundrum on our hands, but there’s nothing like that in there. And what is in there is not even a serviceable morality.Slavery isn’t even criticized” and “Let’s just grant the possibility there is this [celestial dictator] who is omniscient, who occasionally authors books, and he’s going to give us this book. He’s a loving, compassionate god, and he’s going to give us a guide to life. He’s got a scribe, the scribe is going to write it down etc. What is going to be in that book? I mean just think of how good a book would be if it were authored by an omniscient deity. There is not a single line in the bible or Qur'an that could not have been authored by a first century person. There is not one reference to anything. There are pages and pages about how to sacrifice animals, and keep slaves, and who to kill and why. There’s nothing about electricity, DNA, infectious disease, or the principles of infectious disease, there’s nothing particularly useful, and there’s a lot of Bronze Age barbarism in there, and superstition. This is not a candidate book. I can go into any Barnes and Noble, blindfolded, and pull a book of a shelf which is going to have more relevance, more wisdom for the 21st century than the bible or the Qur’an. It’s really not an exaggeration. Every one of our sciences has superseded and surpassed the “wisdom” of scripture, from cosmology, to psychology, to economics, we know more about ourselves than anyone writing the bible or Qur’an did, and that is a distinctly inconvenient fact for anyone wanting to believe that this book was dictated by a creator of the universe.” (Harris - Big Think)
Monotheists often blindly accept the bible is true along with their indoctrination, forgetting the bible, after all, was authored during a time when virtually all of our books were steeped in superstition, or made reference to some mythical god of the Greeks or Egyptians. The bible's moral tenets and 10 commandments are derivative of ideas central to Confucianism and Platonism. Christopher Hitchens explains, “Christianity is a plagiarism of Hellenism,” and as Sam Harris points out, “The biblical Golden Rule is a great moral precept, but numerous teachers offered the same instruction centuries before Jesus (Zoroaster, Buddha, Confucius, Epictetus etc) and countless scripture discuss the importance of self-transcending love more articulately than the bible does, while being unblemished by the obscene celebrations of violence and barbarism we find [throughout the bible.]” (“Letter to a Christian Nation” pg. 11) Darwinian morality, and societal law had long since been mostly universally accepted.
The King James bible is a book that has gone through some 22,000 changes since it was first published in entirety (according to the Vatican), and Christians have slowly come around to cede findings like evolution, trying to shape it to fit their own beliefs after having denied it for so long. Now Christian moderates are trying to work around the biblical intolerance of homosexuals to adapt again to a modern world that increasingly conflicts with biblical theology, which begs the question, how true could the bible really be if it needed that much change? Can we really trust a book that needed that many revisions?
How can the monotheist accept that something that is supposed to have been authored by a divine artificer lack so much anyone would expect to come from a divine artificer? The bible as it is now is replete with contradictions and moral bankruptcy. Harris explains “Anyone who believes that the bible offers the best guidance we have on questions of morality has some very strange ideas about guidance or morality.” (“Letter to a Christian Nation” pg. 14) when describing the endless supply of barbaric quotes plaguing the Christian bible with passages such as Exodus 21: 7-11 where the bible makes it clear that every man is free to sell his daughter into sexual slavery, and this is just one of a litany of appalling biblical passages Harris reveals in his book “Letter to a Christian Nation.”
Take things like in Deuteronomy 22 encouraging that if a woman engaged to be married is raped in the city, she and the rapist should be stoned to death: "If a damsel that is a virgin be betrothed unto an husband, and a man find her in the city, and lie with her; Then ye shall bring them both out unto the gate of that city, and ye shall stone them with stones that they die; the damsel, because she cried not, being in the city; and the man, because he hath humbled his neighbor's wife." It doesn't take a theologian to see that things like this are inconsistent with our most outrageous concept of what a loving god would let slide through his editing room unchanged. What’s more is there is nothing in the bible to suggest it was authored by a creator of a universe.
As Harris explains,
"There’s not a single sentence in there that could not have been written by a denizen of first century. There’s nothing about DNA or electricity or computation or anything that, I mean, if anything like that were in there, then we would have a conundrum on our hands, but there’s nothing like that in there. And what is in there is not even a serviceable morality.Slavery isn’t even criticized” and “Let’s just grant the possibility there is this [celestial dictator] who is omniscient, who occasionally authors books, and he’s going to give us this book. He’s a loving, compassionate god, and he’s going to give us a guide to life. He’s got a scribe, the scribe is going to write it down etc. What is going to be in that book? I mean just think of how good a book would be if it were authored by an omniscient deity. There is not a single line in the bible or Qur'an that could not have been authored by a first century person. There is not one reference to anything. There are pages and pages about how to sacrifice animals, and keep slaves, and who to kill and why. There’s nothing about electricity, DNA, infectious disease, or the principles of infectious disease, there’s nothing particularly useful, and there’s a lot of Bronze Age barbarism in there, and superstition. This is not a candidate book. I can go into any Barnes and Noble, blindfolded, and pull a book of a shelf which is going to have more relevance, more wisdom for the 21st century than the bible or the Qur’an. It’s really not an exaggeration. Every one of our sciences has superseded and surpassed the “wisdom” of scripture, from cosmology, to psychology, to economics, we know more about ourselves than anyone writing the bible or Qur’an did, and that is a distinctly inconvenient fact for anyone wanting to believe that this book was dictated by a creator of the universe.” (Harris - Big Think)
7. The faith claim falls flat.
It’s true that monotheism is based on faith, and so is the belief in Poseidon, werewolves, unicorns, Bigfoot, and flying dragons. Yet the monotheists wouldn’t hesitate to laugh at someone who could devoutly believe in one of those things. Why? Because they demand a measure of evidence before proceeding as if anything like that were true, and yet with their “god” monotheists fail to apply that same standard of rationale to their own beliefs. The Faith argument falls flat when the monotheist argues that the atheist cannot prove a negative, or disprove the existence of a god.
By this logic because I cannot disprove that a giant invisible elephant named "Harold" lives under the White House, it must exist. This is the point Bertrand Russell made with his Teapot theory. Perhaps the core atheistic argument if narrowed to one, would be that it isn’t particularly helpful to invoke a “god” where we don’t have answers yet. Going “native” isn’t the most productive avenue to take because you can’t explain something. It’s analogous to an assumption that it must be the work of ghosts when you don’t know how your mail got inside the house.
We now have answers to some of the deepest of life’s mysteries because Scientists dared to think beyond religious dogma, and Science hasn’t yet failed us in this regard. Famed Oxford professor of biology and prominent bestselling author Richard Dawkins asserts “Science actively seeks out gaps in our knowledge and seeks to fill them, while religion is satisfied with not understanding.” (Dawkins, Lennox debate)
It’s true that monotheism is based on faith, and so is the belief in Poseidon, werewolves, unicorns, Bigfoot, and flying dragons. Yet the monotheists wouldn’t hesitate to laugh at someone who could devoutly believe in one of those things. Why? Because they demand a measure of evidence before proceeding as if anything like that were true, and yet with their “god” monotheists fail to apply that same standard of rationale to their own beliefs. The Faith argument falls flat when the monotheist argues that the atheist cannot prove a negative, or disprove the existence of a god.
By this logic because I cannot disprove that a giant invisible elephant named "Harold" lives under the White House, it must exist. This is the point Bertrand Russell made with his Teapot theory. Perhaps the core atheistic argument if narrowed to one, would be that it isn’t particularly helpful to invoke a “god” where we don’t have answers yet. Going “native” isn’t the most productive avenue to take because you can’t explain something. It’s analogous to an assumption that it must be the work of ghosts when you don’t know how your mail got inside the house.
We now have answers to some of the deepest of life’s mysteries because Scientists dared to think beyond religious dogma, and Science hasn’t yet failed us in this regard. Famed Oxford professor of biology and prominent bestselling author Richard Dawkins asserts “Science actively seeks out gaps in our knowledge and seeks to fill them, while religion is satisfied with not understanding.” (Dawkins, Lennox debate)
8. God is an entity people have ascribed feelings of peace, tranquility, love, security to, accepted into their subconscious through indoctrination:
It’s important to note that someone needing a god to be true to give their life meaning doesn’t make the existence of one any more possible. Monotheistic religious belief is nothing more than the will of the indoctrinated to subconsciously ascribe feelings of love, tranquility, security, hope, empowerment, inner-peace etc to an entity they've been made to believe in. It's what French philosopher Jean Baudrillard called the simulacrum. It's imagined but interacted with, and even experienced as something that is real, In Harris’ words “belief is the engine for behavior.”
The same can be duplicated with an inanimate object someone is made to believe is magical. Powers, traits and characteristics can be attributed or ascribed to any item, and if the belief is strong enough, on an unconscious level, then the item is experienced as magical. That is what god is to the indoctrinated. This is illustrated perfectly when you see people flooding out of Tony Robbins and other motivational speaker’s conventions, their faces beaming with joy, streaming with tears, and a renewed sense of hope and purpose. Nothing was changed except their belief. Belief is the engine for behavior, mood, emotions, and feeling.
The truth is they didn't need a 'god' to feel those things. People don't need a god to feel tranquility, peace, happiness or security. They simply need the right education about how to better implement their own psychological tools to purge toxic thought patterns, and turn on more positive thinking and feeling whenever they like.
It’s important to note that someone needing a god to be true to give their life meaning doesn’t make the existence of one any more possible. Monotheistic religious belief is nothing more than the will of the indoctrinated to subconsciously ascribe feelings of love, tranquility, security, hope, empowerment, inner-peace etc to an entity they've been made to believe in. It's what French philosopher Jean Baudrillard called the simulacrum. It's imagined but interacted with, and even experienced as something that is real, In Harris’ words “belief is the engine for behavior.”
The same can be duplicated with an inanimate object someone is made to believe is magical. Powers, traits and characteristics can be attributed or ascribed to any item, and if the belief is strong enough, on an unconscious level, then the item is experienced as magical. That is what god is to the indoctrinated. This is illustrated perfectly when you see people flooding out of Tony Robbins and other motivational speaker’s conventions, their faces beaming with joy, streaming with tears, and a renewed sense of hope and purpose. Nothing was changed except their belief. Belief is the engine for behavior, mood, emotions, and feeling.
The truth is they didn't need a 'god' to feel those things. People don't need a god to feel tranquility, peace, happiness or security. They simply need the right education about how to better implement their own psychological tools to purge toxic thought patterns, and turn on more positive thinking and feeling whenever they like.
9. The popular question the more outspoken atheists get is “Why does this matter? Why not live and let live? Look all the good religion does.”
This is where the secularists point of contention lies, and it’s a strong one. As Harris and others assert, religion is the antithesis of "harmless." Take the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, for example. We’re facing the very real prospect of a nuclear showdown in the Middle East based on two opposing monotheistic beliefs that different gods promised each group a piece of contested real estate.
Anyone familiar with this conflict is aware of the unwavering path we are on toward this looming horror. Just how many untold millions of non-religious people would be killed or otherwise adversely affected when something like that happens is anyone’s guess, but at some point the question needs to be asked: why are we dignifying these claims based in mythology that have such profound tangible geopolitical consequences? It’s because of this taboo, this sphere of immunity that religion enjoys that this conflict is allowed to escalate.
Remember, this isn’t limited to those two groups. American protectionists, labeled “Zionist Christians” are right in the middle of this 3 way slugfest. All of us are at the mercy of these opposing ideologies, whether we’re religious or not. What could otherwise be a clean separation of land (an idea supported by most Jews in the US and many in Israel itself) is made impossible by these primitive beliefs that each religion’s god will come flying out of the clouds one day to prove the other group wrong. This palpable reality of a nuclear holocaust, and the blurring of the line between church and state in the US with regard to policy that affects us all, is why secularists are demanding some accountability.
Religion is far from harmless and the time for giving it a free ride needs to come to an end, and hard questions need to be asked about what life-changing policies we’re allowing to continue based on primitive beliefs supported by no evidence whatsoever. Harris concludes, “As we go into the 21st century, it’s not about accepting all manner of absurdity. It’s about reason and reasonableness.” (Idea city 05) “..there can be no doubt that religious faith remains a perpetual source of human conflict. Religion persuades otherwise intelligent men and women to not think, or to think badly about questions of civilizational importance.” (“The End of Faith” pg. 236-237).
This is where the secularists point of contention lies, and it’s a strong one. As Harris and others assert, religion is the antithesis of "harmless." Take the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, for example. We’re facing the very real prospect of a nuclear showdown in the Middle East based on two opposing monotheistic beliefs that different gods promised each group a piece of contested real estate.
Anyone familiar with this conflict is aware of the unwavering path we are on toward this looming horror. Just how many untold millions of non-religious people would be killed or otherwise adversely affected when something like that happens is anyone’s guess, but at some point the question needs to be asked: why are we dignifying these claims based in mythology that have such profound tangible geopolitical consequences? It’s because of this taboo, this sphere of immunity that religion enjoys that this conflict is allowed to escalate.
Remember, this isn’t limited to those two groups. American protectionists, labeled “Zionist Christians” are right in the middle of this 3 way slugfest. All of us are at the mercy of these opposing ideologies, whether we’re religious or not. What could otherwise be a clean separation of land (an idea supported by most Jews in the US and many in Israel itself) is made impossible by these primitive beliefs that each religion’s god will come flying out of the clouds one day to prove the other group wrong. This palpable reality of a nuclear holocaust, and the blurring of the line between church and state in the US with regard to policy that affects us all, is why secularists are demanding some accountability.
Religion is far from harmless and the time for giving it a free ride needs to come to an end, and hard questions need to be asked about what life-changing policies we’re allowing to continue based on primitive beliefs supported by no evidence whatsoever. Harris concludes, “As we go into the 21st century, it’s not about accepting all manner of absurdity. It’s about reason and reasonableness.” (Idea city 05) “..there can be no doubt that religious faith remains a perpetual source of human conflict. Religion persuades otherwise intelligent men and women to not think, or to think badly about questions of civilizational importance.” (“The End of Faith” pg. 236-237).
End
"I contend that we are all atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours." --Stephen Roberts
“I think the universe was spontaneously created from the big bang, according to the laws of Science. It has no beginning and no end. ” – Stephen Hawking
"You cannot be both sane and well educated and disbelieve in evolution. The evidence is so strong that any sane, educated person has got to believe in evolution." -- Richard Dawkins
"I don't try to imagine a God; it suffices to stand in awe of the structure of the world, insofar as it allows our inadequate senses to appreciate it." -- Albert Einstein
"You cannot be both sane and well educated and disbelieve in evolution. The evidence is so strong that any sane, educated person has got to believe in evolution." -- Richard Dawkins
"I don't try to imagine a God; it suffices to stand in awe of the structure of the world, insofar as it allows our inadequate senses to appreciate it." -- Albert Einstein
"Faith is the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, the lack of evidence" – Richard Dawkins
“The notion that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one.” — George Bernard Shaw
- B Soto
(DarwinsGauntlet)
Epicurus probably didn't say that, and if he did, he certainly wasn't the first. Its really just a skeptic quote in general, attributed to him. Not only that, but he was a deist.
ReplyDeleteMost of your arguments simply account for a Christian God, or some other specific God. You don't say too much about a deistic God.
Your argument in number 5 doesn't exactly make too much logic. I might be missing it, but you don't seem to give much proof. You could say that the role that a God played was more silent, guiding the evolution of humanity, edging the creature towards his future goal. As if the God was playing Spore, except with less penis monsters.
Number 6 barely even talks about God. You are just attacking the Bible. This obviously undermines Christianity, but hardly makes a dent in the argument against a God. Simply because 6-1=5 doesn't mean that all numbers, when one is taken away from them, equal five. You need to disprove the God, not the religion. Work with a variable instead of a solid number. If you try and disprove every religion, I can bring countless numbers up that you still have to disprove.
Number 7 is a bit weak. I can prove that there is no monster in Loch Ness pretty easily. Drain the lake, and it won't be there. Now lets try the same thing with the entire universe! Earth is easily searched. Cut down all the trees in Canada and the US, get some satellites, block off all cave entrances, and you can prove that Bigfoot doesn't exist. That doesn't work with a being that we don't know what it looks like, where it is, or even a ballpark size. God could be the size of an atom, or the size of 5 galaxies. I could also say that since Conservation of Mass-Energy, and we are made of matter, that a super-natural being that created the universe must exist. There is more proof for a God, as holey as it might be (lulz), than a pink elephant named Harold.
Overall, I would suggest that a bit more fact checking is in order, and that you need to be less specific against who you are arguing. Only 2 or 3 of those arguments could be of value in an argument with someone who isn't Christian.
Kyle, you might have noticed, I have no interest in disproving a 'deistic' god, as evidence by the title. These are arguments laid out against a theistic god; conspicuously a Christian god, though many arguments could apply to any of the Abrahamic gods belonging to Islam or Judaism.
ReplyDeleteEpicurus routinely, like most ancient Greeks, referred to "the gods." He espoused beliefs in classical Greek mythological gods, (ie: paganism). Epicurus in fact did write a variation of that and it is widely credited to him. (as seen here in the section of "Pleasure as absence of suffering" Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epicurus). The truth is, and this is why I cited notable philosopher David Hume at the end of the quote as you may have noticed, is that Hume shortened Epicurus's famous quote known as the Epicurean paradox. Epicurus's original generally says the same thing, and Hume shortened it in the 18th century.
While you're correct that Epicurus had a deistic view of his "gods," it's important to note that it wasn't a single god that he believed in. He, like any other deist worth their salt, understood that if there was a god, it certainly couldn't be concerned with us. Of course this isn't something I'm very concerned with in these reasons why a 'theistic' god can't exist.
I would agree with you that the examples of entities in #7 are weak, but Bertrand Russell's Teapot theory sill holds when we make the entity invisible, without form or substance, and totally weightless. I could just as easily say I have faith that an entity named Carl roams the depths of the ocean and this entity made a doctrine that says wearing red socks is a sin. You can't quantify something like that. Carl Sagan said it best when he expanded on Russell's teapot with his dragon here: http://www.godlessgeeks.com/LINKS/Dragon.htm
Be more specific about the "fact checking" you allude to. Everything here has been substantiated to the best of my knowledge. I'd be happy to cite anything you believe to be inaccurate, though I'm at pains to see where you imagined that happened.
It seems we're arguing cross purposes here. You're defending a deity, and I'm attacking a theistic god. Though, I would say the deity argument still has its own problems. I'm not sure why you would want me to be "less specific" about who I was arguing against. The title was intended to avoid misunderstandings like the one you seem to be having.
-DG (B.Soto)
Obviously, our definitions were confused about whether or not deists are theists, and that led to a confusion in beliefs
ReplyDeleteThe fact checking simply referred to Epicurus. Truth is, he didn't say that. From the same page you listed as your evidence, this is said about that quote:
"This argument was a type favoured
by the ancient Greek skeptics, and
may have been wrongly attributed
to Epicurus by Lactantius, who, from his
Christian perspective, regarded
Epicurus as an atheist."
Even if it was correctly attributed to him by Lactantius, his argument states that there is no God who is all-good and all-powerful. If you talking about an atheistic argument, as will be discussed later, he would have been a poor person to quote, unless you had misunderstood him and thought he was himself an Atheist. Quite obviously, I believed the second to be true, and wished to correct you in that matter.
And about the specifics, an argument against Theism is much stronger when you can raise problems against all types of theism (deism included) versus just specific monotheism. Mathematical theorems cannot simply be proven by using one expression without a variable. If 1-1=0, then all numbers, when subtracted from 1, must equal 0. That is obviously wrong, and is effectively what you are saying in 2 (this assumes a benevolent god; one could believe that a God created this world simply to enjoy others suffering), 3 (assumes a god rewards for worship; Cthulu kills and makes everyone suffer, and thus favors no one), 4 (again, assumes a benevolent god, or one that cares enough about some kid in the corner of the galaxy dying), 5 (assumes that a god knows and cares about the plight of humanity), and 6 (you only talk about the bible).
Looking back, however, i realize that you didn't mean theist, as in someone who believes that a god exists, but theist, as in someone who believes in a God. At its roots, i take theistic simply to mean belief in a god, as do Wikipedia, Wiktionary, and Merriam-Webster. A theistic God is a God of theists, people who believe in a God. Its not just monotheists or polytheists. It includes Deists, Pantheists, and Ietsitics.
You also say that I am defending a deistic God, which isn't entirely true. While i do bring up the fact that a deistic God isn't disproven by many of your arguments in my second paragraph, I don't mention it again. In fact, I refer to many Gods in my argument that interfere, such as at the end of my 3rd paragraph and vaguely at the end of my 4th.
Kyle, you seem confused about the distinction between theism and deism. I would invite you to revisit Merriam-Webster and reread the definition of theism. You'll note that the god in question is differentiated from the deism definition by the characterization of being "immanent."
ReplyDeleteThe classical deist believes a god may have started the evolutionary "snowball, or otherwise directly created the universe we know and then walked away. This deist god is one that doesn't intervene, is not concerned with the outcome of his/her/its creation, and is not immanent. He/she/it can not be experienced or interacted with. Conversely, the theistic god (the one I argue against the tenability of), is one that is, according to monotheists, immanent. This god can be experienced and interacted with. This god can be prayed to etc, and purportedly answer prayers etc.
With regard to Epicurean paradox or "Riddle of Epicurus" you can google either of these and see how widely attributed it is to Epicurus. Even the BBC, during one of their programs had an actor say the quote in question as if it had belonged to Epicurus: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEkJJidVjGU It would take some digging to find otherwise as virtually every search turns up the quote in question belonging to Epicurus, but you'll see here in under the section titled Epicurus http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Problem_of_evil That in fact Epicurus was responsible for the original logical argument of the problem of evil (with respect to an immanent god) here in this quote:
"Either God wants to abolish evil, and cannot; or he can, but does not want to. If he wants to, but cannot, he is impotent. If he can, but does not want to, he is wicked. If God can abolish evil, and God really wants to do it, why is there evil in the world?" — Epicurus, as quoted in 2000 Years of Disbelief
It was Hume that reformulated that, and as I mentioned before, simply made it more succinct. The argument is still the same. This problem points to the inefficacy of a monotheistic god (theism) that is immanent, the god that can intervene. As I'm arguing against theism, this is the service I needed from the quote. It stands.
"Benevolence" is not a word I used, though it can be argued that benevolence can be inferred from the major characteristics monotheists ascribe to their god. Nothing about the theist god is "assumed" by myself, rather the general traits accompanying the god the authors of the monotheist religions are peddling explicitly use those types of words throughout their doctrine. The Christian god for example is routinely referred to as one that is "just" and "merciful," one that loves "unconditionally." These claims suggest a god that is not only benevolent, but once concerned with presumably a consensus standard of fairness. All of these things of course contradict reality in its deepest terms.
I hope that clears up any misconceptions you might have had.
-DG (B.Soto)
This is a great post. More people should read it... it's something not enough people understand. Maybe you should try posting it on fireviews.com and get more people to read it that way
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading this. It is a fairly succinct dismemberment of the idea of "God".
ReplyDeleteYes Christianity is the biggest target here, as the author may not be as familiar with other holy books, but the arguments would apply equally to any conception of God, be he Jaweh, Shiva, or Allah.
I don't see a problem with people believing in a higher being. It's when people, through organised religion, use this belief, and create 'facts and truths' (and the bible) to try to control others way of thinking and think they are better than others beliefs that is the problem.
ReplyDeleteI think the focus needs to be on questioning and dismissing religious beliefs and interpretations(Including the bible) which then turn into rules and doctrines. Really the problem is PEOPLE not a god who may or may not exist!?...and it sorta feels that by devoting an entire article about this god you are actually giving him a bit of existence!
Tara, I believe we're in agreement on your first point. Indeed, problems arise when competing groups claim to know what a god is thinking, and further to follow and interpret man made doctrine mandating policy based on those unsupported beliefs.
ReplyDeleteThe second point is where we may differ. Monotheism's adherents account for over half of the world population. They are well funded, entrenched, and rapidly expanding. We get nothing by ignoring religion. Let's say we were to somehow mobilize the world's non-religious, and collectively agree to ignore religion; e.g. we stopped discussing it, writing about it, were apathetic about its manipulation of public policy, and in effect stopped caring altogether. Religion would still continue to thrive and worse. All of the secular checks that were once in place to ensure plurality and political correctness would be gone. You can imagine in this state how terrible things could grow with a newly invigorated, unrestricted theocracy. I agree with Sam Harris and others on this point that indifference isn't an option. Secular values don't spread themselves in a world covered by religion.
Our best efforts are spent challenging the status quo that religion gets a pass when other superstition is ridiculed. There is no difference between either in terms of evidence supporting their claims. It's our job to prevent this kind of tacitly accepted lunacy from doing more damage than it already has, using all legal means at our disposal.
-DG (B.Soto)
Good article: I can very strongly see the influence of the New Atheism authors.
ReplyDeleteNicely written. You condense a variety of arguments down into a readable manuscript. With the broad, and largely negative influence that religion has on public policy globally, irrational beliefs have moved beyond the status of a personal foible and are now a threat to humanity's future.
ReplyDelete