Monthly Archives: January 2014

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The fool has said in his heart there is no god.

Disclaimer: This post may be long.

The Psalmist in Psalm 14:1 writes

The evil one has said in his heart, “There is no God”. They are corrupted and they are defiled in their schemes and there is none who does good.

There is a brief commentary on this verse. The commentator writes in part

“The fool.” The Atheist is the fool pre-eminently, and a fool universally. He would not deny God if he were not a fool by nature, and having denied God it is no marvel that he becomes a fool in practice. Sin is always folly, and as it is the height of sin to attack the very existence of the Most High, so is it also the greatest imaginable folly. To say there is no God is to belie the plainest evidence, which is obstinacy; to oppose the common consent of mankind, which is stupidity; to stifle consciousness, which is madness. If the sinner could by his atheism destroy the God whom he hates there were some sense, although much wickedness, in his infidelity; but as denying the existence of fire does not prevent its burning a man who is in it, so doubting the existence of God will not stop the Judge of all the earth from destroying the rebel who breaks his laws; nay, this atheism is a crime which much provokes heaven, and will bring down terrible vengeance on the fool who indulges it.

Read that again and read it well. To call an atheist a fool pre-eminently and universally is to make a joke of mans intelligence. To praise belief in a mythical being because a story is told about him in an antiquated text is to display the greatest folly and ignorance. I can confidently say that most if not all believers in gods do so because they have been told. They couldn’t have arrived at such a god as described in scripture through induction or a priori. And further, most men live through their lives without reflection. To call atheists names such as the ones in the above passage is to elevate folly to a high pedestal and to give faith a distinction it doesn’t deserve. That said, this passage is not our concern. There is a theist, a scholar and a Katlik who we feel deserves a response.

She writes about atheists

Their state of mind arises either from pride, or from corruption of heart, or from a misguided education, or from all three.

which ignores the demand the atheist has made of the theist to provide evidence for their god, whatever, god is. It is arrogant to say the atheist has arrived to atheism because of corruption of the heart! How stupid would a person be to say something like this?

Theists claim that we call them stupid. She writes

I have lost count of the number of times that I have been told in a condescending and somewhat pitying manner that people who believe in God are psychologically and intellectually weak and that faith is nothing but a crutch that gives mental defectives something to cling to. 

This is a statement I don’t want to apologize for. I only want to make a qualification. I know there are brilliant theists. I have met them. But tell me how many theists have considered disparately and thoughtfully why they believe in the god they do? All those who seem to have thought about their beliefs like the apologist WLC present a god that my grandmother wouldn’t recognize in a thousand years. There is obviously a disconnect between the god of the street believer and the apologist.

I have written elsewhere on this blog that the existence of anything we see around us isn’t evidence for any god. To write

It is true that in this life, God is hidden from our direct knowledge but we can learn a lot about Him from carefully observing the things that He has made. 

is to make an extravagant claim. It is not possible to come from the existence of a stone to god. It requires a leap of several magnitude where at some point you drop your ability to reason. It is not possible any other way.

This is

So in other words, we know God both by the natural light of reason

a plain lie but not surprising since from the very beginning of Paulinity, its teachers have always found lying useful.

Our reason does not tell us

there is one true God, our Creator and Lord, Who is the beginning and the end of all things.

Maybe yours does. Mine doesn’t.

Faith tells us

that we must worship Him and do His will as it is written by Him in our hearts.

for he will damn you if you don’t believe and supplicate before him. Reason on the other hand tells us that this are the demands of megalomaniac, a dictator and an egotist. A being that is vain and unworthy of worship! That is if we must worship anything.

On the contrary

The whole visible world with its wise arrangement and intricate systems of life, as well as the voice of conscience, provides clear evidence to every thinking person of the existence of an almighty God

cannot be attested to by reason. There is nothing about a tree that provides evidence for a god nor an earthquake.

To ask

How can anyone reasonably think that the world made itself or that life is just an accidental happenstance resulting from a big bang? 

Assumes too much. It betrays the thought, acquired after several years of Katlik indoctrination that the world is in need of a creator. There is a difference between an always existing world and a world that made itself. And please, read about the big bang.

To claim

the simplest logic tells me that order does not come from disorder

is again to betray once ignorance. Order and disorder are not inherent in things. It is our idea of the world. Even in a very chaotic set, if one observed quite closely, some order would emerge.

No one I know of has made the claim we get life by adding some chemicals to a coffee table. There is no reason to assert that some magician, only of immense power originated life. Nature acts in its own ways and unguided and has the building blocks from which life originated. It is natural to assume that nature acting on its own ways resulted in life and that in nature, the occurrence of life is not a wonder as we make it to be just because we don’t know how it comes to be. Why does the believer ignore the complexity of a stone. Are they able to tell us how stones came to be? Or is goddit going to be the standard reply?

The Hindu believes his sacred writings are the words of a god, the Muslim believes Mo[ please be unto him] received his from god and the Pauline claims hers is from god. Which god, if I may and which of these represents the message of the one true god? And while at it, please share with us the criteria for making this judgement.

It is suspect and highly so, that none of the people claimed to have been approached by god are men of any learning or standing in the community unless you consider a murder- Moses[ allowing for the sake of argument that he was a real fellow], Abraham- a pimp, Isaac- shepherd and the anonymous fishermen who claimed to have been with Jesus among others. No skeptic, no man of books, no Socrates, no Seneca, no Cicero, no Marcus, no Zeno! How sad! How ridiculous. Please don’t misunderstand me, but all religious stories seem to me to have been told at fireplaces to entertain children and only later believed by adults. I don’t see how sane people can believe that a god who could create the universe and all that is in it would have need to come down from gods’ residence to have his feet washed and partake of bbq!

It is only the credulous who would shamelessly write

Since God does not speak directly to each one of us, we have to take the word of those to whom He did speak of what He told them

and believe they have said something worthy of merit. It is disappointing to say the least. What reason have to take another man’s word as coming from a deity. Joseph Smith has made the same claim and pastors make the same claim daily on pulpits, are they to be believed? If yes, how is it that their pronouncements haven’t found their way into scripture? Think, just once! It will not kill you.

The only honest statement in this diatribe is

In other words, we take God’s revelations on faith.

and whether it is clothed in big words such as

If we hold firmly and without doubting what someone tells us on God’s authority, we have divine faith, for in that case we really believe God Himself.

It is still faith and it can’t count as evidence. Buddha told his monks

Believe nothing, O monks, just because you have been told it, or it is commonly believed, or because it is traditional or because you yourselves have imagined it. Do not believe what your teacher tells you merely out of respect for the teacher. But whatsoever, after due examination and analysis, you find to be conducive to the good, the benefit, the welfare of all beings – that doctrine believe and cling to and take as your guide

and elsewhere he says

Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense

Before you start saying am appealing to authority of Buddha, tell me where does it agree with your common sense that a snake can walk and talk or a fish that can carry a man for three days or zombies rising out of graves or a god that kills a man for refusing to ejaculate in his sister in-law then we can have a word about argument from authority.

She tells us to know whether they are messengers of god, we must

We need to ask him to present his credentials.

and which are these

Miracles and prophesies are the only infallible credentials which God gives his spokesmen.

and on these standard, the magicians of Pharaoh must be messengers of god. But while still on it, why would a god need miracles? We have also seen that whatever is claimed to be prophesy is written after the fact. In essence we have no way of telling the messenger of an imaginary being.

If one of the miracles is to raise a person from the dead, the question that we must ask, is what is the point? Is the person raised from the dead made immortal or do they have to die a second time? If they must die a second time, then it must be a cruel person who would disturb maggots during their dinner time to bring such a person to life. And definitely not a god worthy of belief and worship.

We don’t want to waste time here talking about zombie Jesus. There is already a post we did yesterday and several links one could make use of to see the impossibility of Jesus story.

Anyone to who does not find the trinity a travesty to our reason has lost the right to be called reasonable. There is no discussion to be had. The case has been closed and only admittance to an asylum is pending. I will process the papers myself! for free.

In conclusion, I think this lady hasn’t spent time with atheists. Had she done so, she would acknowledge that on the question of religious belief, the average atheist is far more knowledgeable than the most pious believer.

And I think this Psalm should be edited to read

The fool has said in his heart and loudly there is a god. 

That my friends is the end.

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The case for Jesus H. Christ

I think the Jesus whose story is told in the bible didn’t exist. I don’t know whether the character was built on a real person[s]. If I was asked to make a case for Socrates, the base facts to begin with would have been the parents, when and where they lived and if possible a few of  his contemporaries. We would name Crito, Xenophon, as his contemporaries, a birth place would be named, and so many other facts.

In an attempt to make a case for the existence of Jesus, apologists have resorted to make assertions about the resurrection that they think if are agreed on, would compel even the skeptic to change his mind on the historicity. This assertions come from WLC he of the DCT and the KCA.

Before you read the assertions, here is a piece that you should begin with. It sheds some light on the problem we will try to answer below.

The assertions are called facts and are as listed below.

  • FACT #1: After his crucifixion, Jesus was buried in a tomb by Joseph of Arimathea. 
  • FACT #2: On the Sunday following the crucifixion, Jesus’ tomb was found empty by a group of his women followers.
  • FACT #3: On multiple occasions and under various circumstances, different individuals and groups of people experienced appearances of Jesus alive from the dead.
  • FACT #4: The original disciples believed that Jesus was risen from the dead despite their having every predisposition to the contrary.

Tell me, friends, who tells the life of a person they know based only on their deaths and the events that happened thereafter. These four above are not facts, they are assertions. The christian asserts that Jesus was buried and resurrected. It is not a fact. I wouldn’t even want to discuss whether he died on the cross or not and whether there is a tomb or not for this would lend credence to a legend. The issue that must first be settled is who were his parents, when and where was he born and who were his contemporaries if any.

On assertion number three, there is none, repeat none, skeptic who Jesus appeared to. Neither did this apparition appear to Pilate, to the Pharisees, to the gentiles. The people who claim to have seen him can all be said to be those who already believed such an event would occur. Besides, Paul whose writings as quoted as being aware of 500 witnesses didn’t see Jesus, if he existed. It can actually be said, whoever Paul is, he is the creator of this Jesus narrative.

Point 4, is confirmation bias. There is no proof of this. There is no record left by any of the supposed disciples telling us what happened. What we have are anonymous gospel accounts that tell the story.

The apologist tells us on point 3

The appearance traditions in the gospels provide multiple, independent attestation of these appearances. This is one of the most important marks of historicity. The appearance to Peter is independently attested by Luke, and the appearance to the Twelve by Luke and John. We also have independent witness to Galilean appearances in Mark, Matthew, and John, as well as to the women in Matthew and John.

This ignores the scholarship on the NT that shows that Mark was the first to be written and Mathew & Luke borrowed from it. It is no rocket science that they will have a similar story with a few additions like the different genealogy stories in Mathew and Luke. John’s gospel is written later in the day, it is only a credulous person who will take it as evidence on the matter.

Anyone who has spent a considerable amount of time reading on the Jesus story knows that the Josephus text mentioning Zombie Jesus is most likely a forgery.

The statement

There is no reason to think that the early church would generate fictitious stories concerning the unbelief of Jesus’ family had they been faithful followers all along

is in need of demonstration. Eusebius? seems to have no qualms lying for Jesus. To claim they wouldn’t lie is to put them on a high pedestal without the slightest justification. There is no reason to believe they couldn’t lie. We have no reason to believe those who claim to have seen the golden plates Joseph Smith translated to the book of Mormons as saying the truth.

In conclusion, we find this comment

So I guess the problem here is that I’ve made a minimal facts case and cited historians across the ideological spectrum for the four facts – including people like Gerd Ludemann and Bart Ehrman! You’ve responded with your opinion, and cited no scholars to either refute the four facts, or to propose an alternative naturalistic explanation to the subset of minimal facts

ably demonstrates the thin case on which the assertions for Jesus lie so that it has been reduced to minimal facts assertions that are themselves in need of demonstration. And why ignore the historicists who argue this fellow Jesus as portrayed in the bible did not exist? If my faith and life in the nether world depended on it, the case I would be making wouldn’t be based on minimal assertions. I would make a proper case.

And lastly, please, please Jesus apologists, read beyond William Craig and Strobel. Start by reading Celsus’ arguments against the Christians. I promise it will not kill you to read something different, maybe just enlighten you.

William LC case for the resurrection of Jesus

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Answering atheism: Not really

It seems every theist is trying to answer atheists and each of them think they have the one argument that is going to make atheists convert to their chosen brand of belief. Well, maybe atheists are doing the same thing as am doing here now. Believers, and especially Paulines and Katliks have heard enough time to make their arguments. Am not saying atheists haven’t heard the same opportunity, well, there was a time not so long ago when heresy was punishable by death or something close and still is if you live in a country where they follow Mohammed[please be onto him] then the punishment for apostasy is death.

And since yours truly is feeling lazy, take twenty minutes of your time and listen to this trope. Someone tell me, how many WLCs exist or are there clones?

Am hoping this fellow will tell us what god is before they can tell us why a god is a necessary being.

The argument that god is a necessary being tells us nothing about what god is or its nature. Further as Hume rightly points out in dialogues of natural religion

The words necessary existence, have no meaning; or, which is the same thing, none that is consistent.

The PSR that this fellow quotes does not help his case. The first rule can be stated as

everything must have a reason or cause.

and to come from here to my god is uncaused is first to be involved in special pleading and also to contradict the PSR which the person started with as his argument. We say, you can’t have your cake and eat it.

Since we have discussed Divine Command Theory, we will not talk about morality in this post. We however will say that theists need to really start reading sophisticated atheist arguments before they can comment on it… no we don’t mean that at all.

Now go and waste your time listening and you can use the comments section to express your anger at my making you listen to such trope 😀

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Things that annoy me.

An atheist did write a post[I can’t vouch for the blog. I haven’t seen the original version or where it is claimed to have come. In the meantime I will consider it a case of Paulines lying for Paul] about his view of what his views of atheism is and how we shouldn’t sugarcoat stuff.  We will write about his post someday when we get the time to do so, but as of now, there is a portion of the apologist trope I need to deal with.

He/she writes

I see a lot of atheists these days thinking that they can help themselves to a robust notion of consciousness, to real libertarian free will, to objective moral values and duties, to objective human rights, and to objective meaning in life, without giving credit to theism.

Which is loaded with lies, innuendo and misinformation. As I have oft repeated, atheism answers only one question. It is kinda annoying if one has to be told time and again that beyond the existence of gods, all other topics, they will have different views. I have friends who think we have free will to some extent, not the libertarian type, and those like me whose view is that we are biological automatons.

I don’t know what adding the word objective to morals or human rights does to the rights or morals in question. The apologist, in parroting WLC, claims there must exist objective moral values without telling us which these are and also demonstrating that these values and duties couldn’t have been developed by man and are objective to the extent that they apply to most societies given that we share a common humanity with small cultural differences? Why must a god be responsible for our duties and obligations to one another?

I don’t know atheists who claim an objective meaning in life. I have asked why must life have meaning to be lived. Why is the theist not satisfied with living and wants transcendence to have a meaningful life. If life has to have any meaning, an individual has to find those things that make it so. It is meaningless and absurd for all of us. To the theist, his life has meaning in god, to the non believer, whatever his fancy. We are all however, at the same place with regard to meaning in life and that it is meaningless. It is therefore a display of ignorance and arrogance to claim that for atheist who asserts that her life is meaningful can only do so through theism!

I have been advised not to call theists stupid, but this utterence cannot be thought of in a different light other than sheer stupidity and arrogance. Why for all that is reasonable should a person write

 I think it’s particularly important not to let atheists utter a word of moral judgment on any topic, since they cannot ground an objective standard that allows them to make statements of morality.

Morals have no meaning to an individual living alone in an isolated planet doing whatever gods do. Atheists, being human can utter and do utter words of moral judgement. And why shouldn’t they? What do belief in gods got to do with our morals. Am tired of apologists repeating this trope. I would want to ask, as Socrates did ask millenia ago

Is something loved because it is pious or is it pious because it is loved?

And while the theist is making claims about objective moral values, I want him to give a list of such examples and to demonstrate how these differ from those that man have developed since they began to live as social animals.

It is therefore stupid to continue to write

Further, I think that they should have every immorality ever committed presented to them, and then they should be told “your worldview does not allow you to condemn this as wrong”.

There is nothing in atheism that warrants me to transgress against my neighbour. Atheism is not a worldview. It is a conclusion on a question that has existed in the community consciousness for a long time. In fact, I must add here that among the Romans, the Epicureans and Stoics had in their numbers many atheists and these group represent some of the most excellent men who have lived on the planet. On the contrary, the Spanish Inquisition was led by religious men, the Aztecs were driven extinct by religious groups, in which case it can be said there is nothing about religion that guarantees that a person will be humane and moral, whatever moral is.

And she should explain to us why

They can’t praise anything as right, either.

Unless of course he denies our humanity.

And am waiting for the day I will be shown the truth of the statement below.

but if the opportunity arises to point out how they are borrowing from theism in order to attack it, we should do that in addition to presenting good scientific and historical evidence.

It is easy to repeat trope one has heard WLC or other apologist say, it requires independent thought to see that they are full of BS. You don’t just go repeating stuff because you have heard it said. It doesn’t hurt anyone to do some thinking for self. In fact, in the words of William H. Clifford,

it is wrong always and everywhere to believe anything on insufficient evidence.

I need to add a small thing to this already long post. She writes in one of the comments

If was Christians who hid Jews during the Holocaust, and Christians who took in abandoned infants in Roman times, and Christians who are leading the fight for the unborn today.

While ignoring it was the same Paulines killing the Jews during the holocaust. And well, Paulinity is new on the landscape and when it took form, Rome collapsed. I don’t like to engage in the abortion debate, but I must inform this apologist that they have little concern for the living. Their main campaign is about birth and after that they will wait for you to be ready to join the army to go and die in a cause that you nor your grandmother before you can make head and tails of.

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There are no Christians

Only Paulines and Katlicks!

Nietzsche wrote in the Antichrist

I shall go back a bit, and tell you the authentic history of Christianity- The very word Christianity is a misunderstanding- at bottom there was only one Christian and he died on the cross.

[…]It is an error amounting to nonsensicality to see in ‘faith’, and particularly in faith in salvation through Christ, the distinguishing mark of the Christian: only the Christian way of life, the life lived by him who died on the cross is Christian..

[..] The Christian- he who for two thousand years has passed as a christian- is simply a psychological self delusion. Closely examined, it appears that, despite all his faith, he has only been ruled by his instincts- and what instincts!

Look at that and the claim by most evangelical Christians that they have been freed from the law and now they have entered a new covenant with god regardless of evidence to the contrary.

They ignore the teachings of Jesus on the law and go by Paul. I don’t think they can have them both ways. Either Jesus founded their delusion or Paul. If it is Jesus, then until heaven and earth passes not a dot of the law will change and if it be Paul, then Jesus is irrelevant in their belief.

What do you think? Have I misrepresented Christians here?