Christians Have No " Bullshit Detector "

[Thought2Much]

So on my trip to Baltimore, my wife told me that our nephew told her the following:

 

The mechanic our nephew goes to had a woman come into the shop to have her car looked at because she had driven it hundreds of miles, but the gas gauge had barely budged, and when she tried to fill the tank, it only took a little bit of gas. It turns out that this was some experimental car that accidentally got sent to the dealership, and was purchased by this woman.

 

This instantly set off my bullshit detector, and led me to ask questions, such as what it was that made the car work that way. My wife said that the mechanic had said something about "ions" or "vapors." I let her know that there have been urban legends for decades about this sort of thing, yet she maintains that our nephew's mechanic says he saw it himself (a claim which I doubt, by the way; I'd be willing to bet that the mechanic also heard it through a friend of a friend of a friend, but that detail got lost when my nephew retold the story to my wife).

 

A few minutes of using Google comes up with this little gem:

 

 

 

This all leads me to a question: Do Christians fall for Christianity because they have no bullshit detector, or do they just operate with their bullshit detector in "off" mode after being told to believe everything on faith, and facts be damned, for so long? Does the way that you have to disengage the brain in order to believe the Noah's ark story as history break it forever?

 

I can't tell you how many times I've had Christians try to tell me stories that are easily verifiable as urban legends, and tell me that I'm too skeptical, because they know that the story they're telling me right now is absolutely true, since the person who told it to them wouldn't lie. It's as if Christians lack even the most rudimentary critical thinking skills.

[silentknight]

I think there is some validity to this theory. My wife's mom is the most religious person in her family. There have been numerous times I've been at her house for dinner and she will say something matter of factly as true, and I'm like... "I don't think that's right". When I google it later on my phone for her, it often turns out I'm correct. It's generally not as silly as the car thing that's been around for like 20 years.

 

Oh yeah - my wife also told me that when she was a kid her mom took them all to "Hooters", because a coworker told her it was a family restaurant. She was aghast.

[raoul]

I think it goes back to that 'judge not lest ye be judged' thing. You know how it goes - don't criticize, don't question, don't et. al. because, after all, weez all brothers and sisters in de loyd so me have to forgive any and all bullshit just like weez all forgiven, yada yada doo wha dittley. LOL

 

But even when I was one of them I would still smell a rat at times so I guess my own bullshit detector was still working a little.

[florduh]

Do Christians fall for Christianity because they have no bullshit detector, or do they just operate with their bullshit detector in "off" mode after being told to believe everything on faith, and facts be damned, for so long?

I think we have both scenarios in play among the flock. The unfortunate ones who started with no detector and then were further damaged by religious faith are the ones selling Amway.

[LifeCycle]

For many, immortality is too good a thing not to believe in. Christianity is their mechanism to achieve it.

 

I know, I was there once myself.

[FeelHappy]

I've long noticed that christians are credulous, I think it has to go with a mind set of looking for miracles in everything. I used to get tons of forwarded email spam from my christian friends, but they finally quit sending me stuff because I'll always reply with an article from snopes.

 

When I was in church someone told a retarded Einstein urban legend where he outsmarts an instructor by showing that evil isn't incomparable with god therefore god exists, which quickly lead me to point out that Einstein was a spinozist and his "god" was actually the universe, so even if this retarded bs story was actually partially true Einstein certainly wasn't talking about the christian god....this didn't go over too well with my christian friends who pointed out that I should just appreciate the story for its moral relevance or something stupid like that.

 

This is the stupid story: http://www.snopes.com/religion/einstein.asp

[mcdaddy]

My wife just tried to reconvert me with some third hand account she heard at a catholic charasmatic conference of some non believer (who really liked jesus though) was in the hospitable with a rod in his leg, they prayed, it disappeared. I ask why is it im asked to trust people who give pedophiles promotions on matters like this.

 

That didnt go over so well.

[Thurisaz]

Let's also not forget that if someone has an authoritarian mindset, truth and facts don't matter to her; she will operate only on the basis of having an impressive führer telling her what to (dis-)believe. That, I guess, "helps" a lot with such crap.

[Stamps1962]

I had an xtian friend who was sending me emails with attachments about the 'Islamic threat". Nearly all the horrific tales were urban legends, some of them around for years. I began to send them back with attachments verifying they were false. His reaction was to get angry with me and cut off contact awhile. Today we avoid it, I think he and his friends at church still circulate these lunatic stories, ooh and aaah over them..

[LifeCycle]

My wife just tried to reconvert me with some third hand account she heard at a catholic charasmatic conference of some non believer (who really liked jesus though) was in the hospitable with a rod in his leg, they prayed, it disappeared. I ask why is it im asked to trust people who give pedophiles promotions on matters like this.

 

That didnt go over so well.

 

They prayed and the rod disappeared? Regarding your question to her... Maybe another question is why are you asked to trust other people? Why doesn't God work a miracle in your life so you don't have to rely on other people's word?

[VacuumFlux]

I had been told so many times that I was wrong that I quit trusting myself. I just believed whoever had the strongest emotional appeal, probably because the more passionate they were the more angry they'd get with me if I disagreed. It wasn't about truth, it was about trying to figure out which words would get me the least hurt.

[Sybaris]

Most of the or rather ALL of the urban legend emails I get are from christards.

 

Stands to reason that if you don't research the validity of the bible then you probably wouldn't put much effort behind researching anything else.

[buffettphan]

All the urban legend crap I get comes from christards too. At one stage, I started doing "reply all" with the Snopes link debunking the story. It didn't take long for someone to tell me that they never paid any attention to anything Snopes had to say because they are "too liberal and promote the liberal agenda".... Yeah, because getting the correct facts (i.e. truth) is liberal. Right. At the point, I just said fukkit and blocked most of the nutjobs email addresses.

[Chikirin]

Right, there is no BS detector because Christians are supposed to be "teachable." Naaman the Syrian had a bullshit detector "I'm not bathing in that nasty river!" and was villified for it.

[Tabitha]

Christians don't think with their heads, they think with their gut emotions - there's a reason they're called sheep. I used to think I lived in some kind of magic Jesus bubble, and I was way too trusting with everyone. When you are in the habit of not questioning things in the church, it becomes a habit outside the church, as well.

[Akheia]

Worse yet, you start trusting people who call themselves Christians when they've given no evidence at all that they are to be trusted. You just trust them because they claim to be part of your family. It's the culture--you get inculcated with this happy-happy-family thing and encouraged to just trust instead of using your head. Between that institutionalized gullibility and the Christian concept of forgiveness, predators must absolutely LOVE Christianity.

 

McD: asking for proof is a good start when someone claims a healing miracle. Also asking the necessary follow-up questions: What does such a healing mean in light of the abuses of the Catholic church, the widespread deaths from poverty and famine, and the lethality of various natural disasters? What kind of god heals an otherwise-privileged American who at least has a rod in his leg and a hospital to lay in, but ignores the starving and abused children of the rest of the world, who in many cases lack access to even the most basic needs--clean water, enough food, and health care? All I could say is "YAY GOD! Good for him! He's such a sweet little god, isn't he? Who's a good little god? Who is? YOU ARE! Now that you've done a simple healing, go help someone who really needs it. There's a good god!"

[Rek99]

I feel that they don't have a bullshit detector, but they're also highly emotional people. They are manipulated by music and/or very emotional stories that cause them to "give in" to believing in the Bible. Facts-be-damned, because that one time when the preacher was preaching I cried and felt something in my stomach, it means that it's all true.

 

My wife rationalizes it says "well if I'm wrong then nothing happens, if you're wrong you go to hell!". False, if you're wrong you spend you're entire life paying the preacher's salary and not doing certain things for no reason.

[pox]

"Faith" is the act of believing something regardless of evidence. Christianity teaches that such belief is a virtue, morally superior to skepticism. When one gets in the habit of faith, feeling morally validated for it, there's really no boundary confining it only to church.

[Will02]

It can get much worse than mere urban legends...if a christian gets caught up in conspiracy theory bullshit (the complete batshit insane stuff that even Fox Mulder would be ashamed to believe in) there is literally no help possible for them.

[ilovemybrain]

Hard to say...I think they must be, because they hold "faith" as being so important. Faith necessarily means gullibility, and so that mindset pervades the rest of their thinking. The ones who start to think "what if...just what IF...this isn't true?" are the ones who are likely to end up deconverting. I think I'm naturally a bit gullible but have had to train myself to keep the bullshit detector working.

[Thought2Much]

It can get much worse than mere urban legends...if a christian gets caught up in conspiracy theory bullshit (the complete batshit insane stuff that even Fox Mulder would be ashamed to believe in) there is literally no help possible for them.

 

Yeah, I've known more than a few of those. They're entirely too common in the Pentecostal movement. And you're right, there just isn't any helping them. I've also seen that if someone believes in one conspiracy theory (moon landing hoax), they are much more likely to believe in lots of other conspiracy theories (aliens and UFOs are actually demons, the UN has black helicopters patrolling the US, and so on).

[Thought2Much]

Christians don't think with their heads, they think with their gut emotions - there's a reason they're called sheep. I used to think I lived in some kind of magic Jesus bubble, and I was way too trusting with everyone. When you are in the habit of not questioning things in the church, it becomes a habit outside the church, as well.

 

I feel that they don't have a bullshit detector, but they're also highly emotional people. They are manipulated by music and/or very emotional stories that cause them to "give in" to believing in the Bible. Facts-be-damned, because that one time when the preacher was preaching I cried and felt something in my stomach, it means that it's all true.

 

Pretty much this. Yes.

 

Worse yet, you start trusting people who call themselves Christians when they've given no evidence at all that they are to be trusted. You just trust them because they claim to be part of your family. It's the culture--you get inculcated with this happy-happy-family thing and encouraged to just trust instead of using your head. Between that institutionalized gullibility and the Christian concept of forgiveness, predators must absolutely LOVE Christianity.

 

McD: asking for proof is a good start when someone claims a healing miracle. Also asking the necessary follow-up questions: What does such a healing mean in light of the abuses of the Catholic church, the widespread deaths from poverty and famine, and the lethality of various natural disasters? What kind of god heals an otherwise-privileged American who at least has a rod in his leg and a hospital to lay in, but ignores the starving and abused children of the rest of the world, who in many cases lack access to even the most basic needs--clean water, enough food, and health care? All I could say is "YAY GOD! Good for him! He's such a sweet little god, isn't he? Who's a good little god? Who is? YOU ARE! Now that you've done a simple healing, go help someone who really needs it. There's a good god!"

 

The part in bold cracked me up.

[Mountainman]

Those of us who have studied Biblical history at the college level know that many stories in the bible are parables -- fictional stories meant to convey a message but not historically true. We also know that there are many mistranslations in our current Bible compared to the most ancient texts. And many of these misinterpretations (whether of supposed fact or fiction) dramatically change the meaning.

[midniterider]

So on my trip to Baltimore, my wife told me that our nephew told her the following:

 

The mechanic our nephew goes to had a woman come into the shop to have her car looked at because she had driven it hundreds of miles, but the gas gauge had barely budged, and when she tried to fill the tank, it only took a little bit of gas. It turns out that this was some experimental car that accidentally got sent to the dealership, and was purchased by this woman.

 

This instantly set off my bullshit detector, and led me to ask questions, such as what it was that made the car work that way. My wife said that the mechanic had said something about "ions" or "vapors." I let her know that there have been urban legends for decades about this sort of thing, yet she maintains that our nephew's mechanic says he saw it himself (a claim which I doubt, by the way; I'd be willing to bet that the mechanic also heard it through a friend of a friend of a friend, but that detail got lost when my nephew retold the story to my wife).

 

A few minutes of using Google comes up with this little gem:

 

 

 

This all leads me to a question: Do Christians fall for Christianity because they have no bullshit detector, or do they just operate with their bullshit detector in "off" mode after being told to believe everything on faith, and facts be damned, for so long? Does the way that you have to disengage the brain in order to believe the Noah's ark story as history break it forever?

 

I can't tell you how many times I've had Christians try to tell me stories that are easily verifiable as urban legends, and tell me that I'm too skeptical, because they know that the story they're telling me right now is absolutely true, since the person who told it to them wouldn't lie. It's as if Christians lack even the most rudimentary critical thinking skills.

 

My mother in law used to send out to her email group (I was on it) shocking stories that I would then Snopes and send her the link debunking it.

[mcdaddy]

Worse yet, you start trusting people who call themselves Christians when they've given no evidence at all that they are to be trusted. You just trust them because they claim to be part of your family. It's the culture--you get inculcated with this happy-happy-family thing and encouraged to just trust instead of using your head. Between that institutionalized gullibility and the Christian concept of forgiveness, predators must absolutely LOVE Christianity.

 

McD: asking for proof is a good start when someone claims a healing miracle. Also asking the necessary follow-up questions: What does such a healing mean in light of the abuses of the Catholic church, the widespread deaths from poverty and famine, and the lethality of various natural disasters? What kind of god heals an otherwise-privileged American who at least has a rod in his leg and a hospital to lay in, but ignores the starving and abused children of the rest of the world, who in many cases lack access to even the most basic needs--clean water, enough food, and health care? All I could say is "YAY GOD! Good for him! He's such a sweet little god, isn't he? Who's a good little god? Who is? YOU ARE! Now that you've done a simple healing, go help someone who really needs it. There's a good god!"

 

LOL. Yeah, i said "it could be allah just showing mercy to christians. That doesnt necessarily mean its the christian god that healed him (assuming it happened, which I obviously doubt). I mean, IDK how much the official church had to do with that conference, but there were catholic priests there that give lectures, etc. The catholics have been parading out "miracles" for 1800 years to try and fool the faithful, have they not? I also said there are miracle healings in lots of other religions too. Nothing is unique to xianity. That just sent her into a mini passive aggresive rage where she acted like it was bonkers not to just take these holy men at their word. yikes.