This blog has had as one focus showing why belief in god makes no sense. In the interests of fairness, here is a video clip of twenty intellectuals (academics and theologians) explaining their beliefs. The contortions some of them get into are quite hilarious.
Via Jerry Coyne, who provides some commentary on each person’s arguments.
I can’t bring myself to risk brain damage by watching the videos, but Coyne’s capsule summaries are things of beauty.
God does not exist. Miracles don’t occur. Anyone who believes in God is stupid and irrational. They are deluded. OK. You have said this again and again. How long are you going to stay on this subject? Don’t you think that at some point you should move on. You seem to get a kick from ridiculing the believer and the belief. Isn’t this a complete waste of time?
No. There are still plenty of people out there who either 1) think the same privately but don’t realize how far from alone they are, or 2) have never stopped to question their childhood indoctrination but may do so if confronted with the reasons why it seems silly to people who have actually thought about it. As long as such people are around, the emperor’s nakedness needs to be pointed out at every opportunity. And those of us who don’t need convincing can still learn new arguments that may be of use in talking to such people.
Plus, you know, nobody is forcing you to read this blog.
I also don’t believe in god, but I also think that people that has faith in god deserves respect. Most of critics must be directed to priests and the Pope who are the liers and robbers in this history.
It isn’t a waste of time, because all people has the choice to discuss about they want all the time…
Manik,
Steve is right.
It is true that atheists have won the basic argument. But religious apologists keep shifting slightly, trying to find new niches for god, and those have to be countered. As Steve says, one learns new things all the time, even if the fundamental message remains the same.
Also, as long as religion remains a powerful force in society we need to keep hammering away at it, to counter its pernicious effects. Otherwise, the only voices that will be heard in the public sphere will be religious ones.
Notice that I do not argue much against astrology, which is as absurd as religion. That is because astrology is now seen as basically a joke (at least in the US) and any person who claimed to base his or her life on the position of the stars would be seen as a flake. But say that you take your guidance from god and people treat that as a perfectly reasonable thing to say.
When religion’s influence descends to that of astrology, I can hang up my keyboard or move on to other things.
What Mano said. If “respecting” believers means respecting their beliefs by never challenging them the same way we would a political or other philosophical belief, then atheists have been doing that politely for a very long time until recently. And what has that gotten us? We are still vilified by many, many of us don’t know they aren’t alone and thus live in secrecy, and people like Michelle Bachmann are serious candidates for president. We have gay teens killing themselves Gay people in passionless marriages that later end in divorce (two of my friends’ grew up in families like this) and public school students with inadequate education about the fundamental theory of biology- evolution. People deny climate change (or see it as a good thing- end times) and politicians say God promised to never flood us again. People are trying to deny not only abortion, but birth control to prevent them!I personally get riled up about this because I care if my beliefs are true or not out of intellectual integrity and because I think a society can only do what’s best for itself if it is basing important decisons on accurate information. Rick Perry’s solution to the very serious drought problem? Talk about climate change, fire prevention or promote conservation of water? No, he lobbied hate groups to raise money for people to sit around and do a rain dance for rain. Basically they might as well have lined up to throw a penny in a wishing well (filled with precious water). Rick Perry may not even believe his own crap. He’s like a pied piper manipulating people who are sadly able to be manipulated due to their beliefs. Politicians couldn’t get away with their crazy shit if our society valued and embraced questioning, critical thinking, and independent thought. Religious dogma and valuing faith over evidence only serves to prevent this.
Just to add on. Greta Christina makes my point for me much better. She says are there angry atheists? Hell yeah, and we should be!