Does this explain the impasse between Christians and no-Christians?

[TruthSeeker0]

4 hours ago, Myrkhoos said:

Well, when talking about religion in general one does exactly that, generalises. It is by default that you include that fact when saying general statements. Not all people fit neatly in any category. That is a given  And not all religious people think in black and white for example. I personally know many who do not.

        The fact that people have genuine concern, while that may or not be true, does not mean they do not have black and white thinking. Many people who join cults join for some version of we are going to save the world stuff. That does mean their ideology or actions are sound while acting from that point of view. 

         And there many examples of the PC/ identity politics gone too far. Advocate magazibe called Peter Thiel not gay for supporting the republican party. Evergreen students became violent towards their teachers and Bret Weinstein, hardly a racist, had to resign. Comics refuse to play college campuses. Even Jerry Seinfeld, one of the most clean comics in terms of language.

           Lenin may have had genuine concern. The nine eleven bombers may have had genuine concern. Genuine concern is not a guarantee of rational  behaviour. Not in the least. 

       And come on, seriously, extreme identity politics are the champions of simplifying generalisations. And seriously my grandfather suffered physical and psychological abuse and the hands of those fighting for the liberation of the working class opressed by rich capitalists. Go figure , my granfather was a lowly peasant, as millions in the Eastern bloc. So yeah maybe you are not living in the aftermath of what genuine concern for the opressed can lead to but I am, along with my whole nation. So I am really not all impressed with " compassionate inclusivity discourse" by itself. 

       And black people, by the way, were opressed and are oppresed by other black people way before the colonization in the late medieval era. Aztecs were sacrificing their neighbours in human sacrifice long before the conquistadors. And more women probably died at childbirth than killed by their husbands. That narrative of the white man oppressor is nothing less than ignorant of history and psychology, or some kind of traumatic projection. Humans torment other humans, that is the ugly truth. No race or sex or other has the upper hand, there are only differences in degrees and historical times of hegemony. What Europeans had, was , in my mind, a lot to do with germs and guns. As in diseases they gave to colonised people, and better updates in war technology, strategy and general statecraft. But they were also the progenitors of human rights. Yes the same white educated men. Without white educated men there would be no civil rights movement at all in the last hundreds of years.  No democracy. Go to the middle east and see what it is without those " white " inventions. 

       There are rationally inclined people on the left, there are rationally inclined people on the right, on religions, in sciences, and wackos in all. 

       I recommend Douglas Murray Madness of Crowds on the subject. 

That was a lot. Let's stay on topic in the thread. 

[Edgarcito]

19 hours ago, WarriorPoet said:

There has been some great discussion in this thread, but there is something that I think has been lurking just under the surface the entire time and it relates to the above quoted paragraphs specifically.  I haven't been very active for the last few years here, but I would like to share something that I have noticed happening in the Lion's Den, both during the time that I was more active and over the last few years when I was mostly lurking here.

 

This impasse that you talk about frequently seems to have a really simple cause.  Warning:  I am about to generalize, which is something that I usually try to avoid, but I think is warranted in this case.  There is one thing that religious people seem to have a very hard time doing that skeptics usually don't and that is saying three simple words:  "I don't know".

 

Christians, and occasionally believers of other varieties, come here to discuss their faith all the time.  We like to ask them questions to get them to explain their beliefs, problems that we perceive with those beliefs, and whether they can offer any good evidence to convince us to share their beliefs.  Occasionally, those questions get very uncomfortable, for reasons that most or all of us can understand, since there was a good chance that we found ourselves in a similar position when we were believers.  There don't seem to be good answers, and for a good answer not to be readily available feels like a failure on the part of the believer, one who should be " always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence;" (1 Peter 3:15).  What happens is the believer in question finds themselves in a position of not being able to give an answer that sounds satisfying even to them, so they evade, attack a strawman, or they engage in blatant logical fallacies even as they (occasionally) accuse us of the same behavior.

 

The simple fact is, saying "I don't know" is often the only intellectually honest answer and I have seen  that answer avoided at all costs by believers.  They seem to think that saying that is a far larger defeat, the conceding of far more ground in a debate than it really is.  This is were we get in impasse, if more believers were willing to admit ignorance on questions that they genuinely don't have answers to, it would lead to far more meaningful discussions when we would then be able to move on to other matters.

Not good enough for most here.....the Christian says, "we don't see clearly" per the Bible.  The standard response here is that's not good enough...mockingly: "God works in mysterious ways" or God of the gaps.  Then if the Christian poses something.....it's: "your making shit up now" or "we don't believe anyhow"... 

 

Then ultimately if you have them stumped....it's: "Well, why did God?" 

 

How the hell does a Christian know "Why did God?"......

[Joshpantera]

17 hours ago, Edgarcito said:

Not good enough for most here.....the Christian says, "we don't see clearly" per the Bible.  The standard response here is that's not good enough...mockingly: "God works in mysterious ways" or God of the gaps.  Then if the Christian poses something.....it's: "your making shit up now" or "we don't believe anyhow"... 

 

Then ultimately if you have them stumped....it's: "Well, why did God?" 

 

How the hell does a Christian know "Why did God?"......

 

First of all, the questions that you're being asked are aimed at trying to get you to think about something further, consider something deeper than you have been. Is that understandable enough? You've questioned a lot of things, but you sort of stop the questioning at some point and just accept these claims at face value. 

 

For instance, we're coming from a place of mind where we once thought like you guys are thinking. We weren't thinking critically. We weren't questioning enough. We were just taking too much at face value. And then we identified these problems, eventually, and moved past them into newer ways of thinking, basically. So when people are asking you questions it's aimed at trying to get you to think further. And to possibly see if you can do that or if you are unable to do that. 

 

For example, we used to leave the "why did god such and such?" questions alone like you guys are doing. Until we actually locked horns with the hard questions and started seeing the hard answers come into view, something that you guys have yet to accomplish. 

 

That's the line of questioning where we've asked you to reconcile the contradictions between the "omni" claims about god. The contradictions are there. They are black and white obvious. The question is to have you try and account for the contradictions, not for us, for YOU. It's not to anyone else's benefit aside from your own. You're the one who's up until now turned a blind eye to these obvious contradictions, and lacked the critical thinking applications that can identify inconsistency within a given belief system. Which red flag the belief system as less than, "true." Internally inconsistent belief's turn into a breaching dam - you the little Dutch Boy trying to plug the holes with his fingers, but unable to plug them all. 

 

Let's talk about you having "them stumped."

 

Can you provide an example of you having someone stumped so I can see what you're talking about? What could you have possibly stumped anyone here with? 

[TheRedneckProfessor]

11 hours ago, Edgarcito said:

Then ultimately if you have them stumped....it's: "Well, why did God?" 

Yes, you certainly had me stumped when I started with the "Why did god..." bullshit.

 

 

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