Godless Ranting

A blog to post rants about Christianity and religion in general.

Quoting the Bible.

Posted by Phillipa "Seedlet" Robinson comments (1)

Please please PLEASE stop quoting the bile in order to prove your argument. I know you have little else, but like a random twitterer stated, using the Bible as proof of God is like using Harry Potter as proof of Wizards.

Atheists or members of other religions *do* *Not* believe that the bile is a real genuine holy book, so why would quoting from it convince us of anything?

I think a major problem leading to things like this is the assumption by Christians and some other religious folk that Atheists actually do believe in God, but are just rejecting him. This is *not* the case! Like with God, believing in something does not make it true.

I need to read some Harry Potter (even though I think the writing is garbage, sorry guys), so I can quote it back at Christians every time they try to use the bible to tell me I should believe. Just bewilder the heck out of them.


On an unrelated note, I read a lot of Christians asking how former theists could have believed before, but not believe now. Did you used to believe in Santa? The Easter Bunny? The Tooth fairy? Many (American) children believed in one or all of these at some point, but as they grow up they come to realize that these ideas are silly and stop believing them. It is almost exactly the same with atheists. As children or naive adults they were taught things that in reality are rather absurd or silly, and as they matured and became educated, these concepts no longer made sense to keep to heart and were discarded. That's all.

So, the eternal question, are science and religion compatible. No.


Science does something that religion cannot allow by questioning every belief and possibly changing that belief if the evidence warrants it. Science is never sure about anything, there is no 100% in science. Science changes. Religion does none of these things.

Can a person be a scientist and religious? Of course. But does that mean that the person is being consistent? No. The two concepts of science and religion are the antithesis of each other. In the everyday world this duality can exist in one person because, lets face it, its just easier to compartmentalize disparate thoughts like this. Perhaps a scientist likes the feeling of belonging at church or doesn't want to 'rock the boat' in the family, but when it comes right down to it, either you think that things require evidence to be believed or they don't. Can you do science while being religious, well yes, there's long lines of theistic scientists that get trotted out every time this is brought up, but are they really consistent in their insistence of evidence in one area of their lives but not others? I don't think so. Why would you require evidence for gravity and not for God?

Because life is easier that way.

Simply complex.

Posted by FierceFirefight comments (0)

Why is it so hard to talk to people with theistic tendencies? As someone who has tried to debate a number of topics it always tends to boil down to one thing, simplicity. People are comfortable with seeing the world in simple terms. Every animal alive has to abstract the environment and make best guesses about everything in life. 'Is it better to attack this prey right now or find something easier' 'Is that noise something dangerous?' 'Should we head out to new hunting grounds even though we've only had a few bad weeks of hunting'. All of these are perfectly valid questions that tend to be answered quickly, with gut instinct, based on our previous experiences and ingrained common sense about the world.


Science flies in the face of this approach to life. Science is methodological, sometimes slow, and always has caveats. It is not in our nature to adapt to this mode of thinking without effort. Basically, its not easy. Even the simplest form of straightforward facts can be fraught with subtle complexity. For instance :
'Water becomes ice at 32deg F.' Well, water isn't really becoming anything fundamentally different, crystallization is a physical process that doesn't change its chemical makeup. This assumes that you consider 'becoming' as a fundamental chemical change. Crystallization takes time as well, so just because water has reached 32F doesn't mean its all instantly ice. Pressure, impurities, and other factors can influence the crystallization. Water can be super-cooled under th right circumstances, dropping below 32f without ever freezing. You can add salt to water to lower its freezing point. In short, 'Water becomes ice at 32F' is really 'Pure water, at 1 atmosphere of pressure, analogous to the normal habitual conditions of humans on Earth, given sufficient time, will crystallize into the form of non-spin Ice'. And even that could be specified further taking into account the different water ions and temperature scales, ect, ect.

Now, as scientists, we know that these caveats exist and we communicate in terms of the most common assumptions and if we know those assumptions need to be modified a good communicator will let the reader/listener know. Say you are talking about super-cooled water you might open the sentence with 'Under the arctic ice (denoting an exceptional location) water can reach -5F.' Does this mean that the statement 'Water becomes Ice at 32F' is wrong? Not really. Under most circumstances that's a correct statement, its just that its more complex than that.

And this is where the road block is hit with theists, especially with subjects that threaten their world view. Sure, a fundamentalist christian is probably ok with science explaining how to create electricity but start speaking about human origins and you can bet you are in for a fight. The most common attacks are to attack/quote mine individuals like Dawkins that are seen as the paragons of the 'Evolutionist' movement. Usually they take small quotes, that say something simple, and use them as evidence of evolution failing to address some fundamental question such as how complex structures have evolved. A statement like 'Its strange that the eye could have evolved at all' is taken to mean that there's no explanation for that event. Or statements about the proposed evolutionary path of humans being different as new finds are made. Both of these show the lack of critical thinking and the reliance on simplism, that a statement must stand on its own at face value instead of taken in context for the larger over all argument. It IS strange that the eye evolved when you first think about it, but as you research more you begin to see how it happened and then its no longer strange, just amazing.

Likewise, as new fossils are discovered it changes the path that scientists believe took humans from proto-monkeys to ...well monkeys still but more advanced ones we consider human. The shape of the path changes but the fact that there is a path at all is never really doubted. Changing the form of water does not make it any less water. But a theist will shout 'SEE science said water was liquid above 32F and now they say it isn't, how can you believe them?' Its simple, its because things are not as simple as you think they are. One statement is not a comprehensive list of all possibilities, it is usually just the most common outcome. Finding corner cases where special conditions apply does not invalidate the general case.

Sometimes its just not that simple.

Prayer

Posted by Phillipa "Seedlet" Robinson comments (0)

Just a little rant on prayer, and how it makes no sense whatsoever. Ok, it can make a little sense if you are just doing it to praise God. As in, "Dear God, you rock! Thanks for everything, Love, Bob."

But does asking for anyhting make any sense? No. At least not if you believe your god is all knowing and has a plan, which most Christians seem to. He'd pretty much have to to be god. I suppose if you don't think your God is all knowing, sure. Or if he has no real plan, go ahead. But one or the other or both? Why would you EVER pray?

If God is all knowing, he already knows just what you want the moment you want it. If you'd like to get a raise to better care for your family (or buy a car or whatever), God knows. Right now. Before you've prayed. He knows how much you want it, he knows what you'd do for it, what you'd do if you got it, everything. I guess you could argue that maybe God is waiting for you to get down on your knees and actually ask for it, but he'd already know you were going to do it before you do it. Why bother?

Also, if your God has a plan, and everything is special to it, who are you to ask for something that doesn't go into the plan? If your husband is in a coma and about to die, why pray for him not to die? The only effect you could have on your husband is to get him all the care possible on EARTH, within your realm of influence. Praying for it is asking God to change his plan through supernatural means. Do you know better than God? And if he wasn't meant to die, he's going to live whether you prayed for it or not, so there's no point in that either.

I know it says to pray in the bible, to ask for things, Mountains will be Moved and all, but what I am saying is that it's just another huge contradiction displayed for all to read and believe. If God is all knowing, he knows what you want. If he has a plan, then who are you to mess with it? He was/is going to whatever he wants anyway, so there is no need or reason for prayer.

About this blog

We are atheists. Every day we are faced with news and information about religion and it's effects on the world. We are faced with our own thoughts and philosophies on the topic of theism and everything related. This is a place to talk about and share our thoughts, frustrations, rants, jokes and observations about God, Gods, ghosts, spooks, spirits, the Bible, the Koran, the Torah, and any number of other bits and pieces of supernatural superstition we can think of. This is Godless Ranting.

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