Occasionally a theist makes an argument so amusingly stupid that it would be a shame not to share it with a larger audience. This is one of those occasions.
On another thread, we’ve been discussing the unloving way in which God — supposing that he exists at all — is treating the victims of Hurricane Harvey (and the soon-to-be victims of Hurricane Irma, unfortunately). In the course of that discussion, fifthmonarchyman — a Christian — made the following, er, memorable argument:
I form the light and create darkness, I bring prosperity and create disaster; I, the LORD, do all these things.
– Isaiah 45:7
keiths:
Yes, and creating disaster for his children is exactly what every loving father sets out to do. Right, Mung?
Nothing says “I love you” like drowning someone or wiping out their possessions.
At that point fifthmonarchyman got the bright idea that he could defend God by arguing that God is not our father. He wrote:
quote:
the Originator of the heavens and the earth! How could it be that He should have a child without there ever having been a mate for Him – since it is He who has created everything, and He alone knows everything? – Sura 6:101
and
and say: “All praise is due to God, who begets no offspring, and has no partner in His dominion, and has no weakness, and therefore no need of any aid” -and [thus] extol His limitless greatness. – Sura 17:111
end quote:
That’s right, folks. Fifthmonarchyman quoted the Quran to argue against the idea that God is our father — forgetting that the latter idea comes straight from Jesus. What are the first two words of the Lord’s Prayer? Our Father.
Seeing fifth — a Christian — use the Quran to argue (unwittingly) against Jesus is one of the stupidest moves I’ve seen in a long while. I therefore renominate fifth for the title of World’s Worst Apologist.
After posting his comment, fifth belatedly realized that he had just thrown Jesus under the bus. He tried to undo the damage:
Get it keiths ?
A loving father is not the default understanding of God. Not by a long shot.
To know him as Father you need to have met his Son. Once you have met his Son you are simply not dissuaded when bad things happen.
peace
It’s a bit too late to backpedal, fifth.
This is a good time to quote Augustine again, on the topic of Christians who make fools of themselves:
…we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn.
The inanity goes even deeper. I’ll elaborate in the comments.
Mung,
Bacteria have opsins. Does that count?
Allan, to Mung:
Mung sounds more like Joe Gallien every day.
colewd,
Not if there’s natural selection it won’t. Ay Caramba.
It’s also ironic that Mung accepts common descent, but rejects the very best evidence for it: the congruence of inferred nested hierarchies.
If people want to talk about complex features, fine, but I don’t see how that helps them at all. I mean, if eyes are regarded as a convergent feature (based on a very curious idea: that the word ‘eyes’ is an adequate character-state), how in hell does that invalidate the nested hierarchies of character states between, say, fruit flies and people? “We though there was a nested hierarchy, but they both have eyes, so we’re now completely stumped. Back to the drawing board” 😀
Anyway, screw eyes; we’ve done eyes. The question arose because Bill expressed the view that ‘the biochemistry’ says different on the matter of convergence. Which I take to mean molecular biology: specifically sequence comparisons. In those, there is virtually no convergence save that arising from ‘stochastic inevitability’.
Allan,
That’s going to go right over Bill’s head, unfortunately. We’ll probably have to show him a concrete example.
There’s another problem with Christianity’s laser-like focus on a person’s state of mind at the moment of death.
To see this, consider the argument fifthmonarchyman made earlier in the thread. He quoted Paul:
Fifth’s point was that we shouldn’t judge whether God is loving based on how he treats us in this lifetime, since an eternity of bliss awaits us. The suffering of this life is basically zero when compared to that eternity of bliss, according to the argument.
I’ve already pointed out the obvious — that an eternity of bliss doesn’t await all of us, according to Christianity. But beyond that, there is an obvious double standard here. We are told not to judge God based on the here and now, when God — according to most Christians — is doing exactly that to us.
And it’s even worse, because our eternal fate depends not on the lives we lived, but on our state of mind at the moment of death.
It’s a blatant double standard: Judge God by eternity, but judge humans based on a single instant.
So no convergence in proteins. Like for anti-freeze proteins? no convergence at all in RNA sequences, or DNA sequences, or amino acid sequences, it’s strictly a morphological phenomenon, which morphology is made up of … molecules?
Are you serious?
Going even further, the whole argument that finite earthly suffering doesn’t matter when compared to eternity is silly. I illustrated this in a comment to Alan, taken from an earlier thread:
J-Mac:
You really need to work on that ellipsis tic, J-Mac.
Do you actually believe that deadly hurricanes are the result of sin?
Allan Miller,
Until you have an eye there is nothing to select for. You have 300k of nucleotides drifting toward a meaningless group of sequences. Until you find a group of sequences that can provide reproductive advantage (sight) it is drift drift drift.
All evidence I have seen supports the hypothesis that life requires functional code upfront and working. All experimental evidence that I have seen contradicts your claim with the exception of the nylonese story which has recently blown up courtesy of Sal.
Do you have any evidence that will support that natural selection will prevent mutation of a sequence supporting a complex function from drifting away from function.
colewd,
This is just a version of the “what good is half an eye” PRATT.
Seriously, Bill, how can you possibly have missed everything that’s been written on this subject, from Darwin onward?
That’s a creation scenario. Poof, let there be an eye!
(“We’ll contrive the nucleotide sequences to get that done, won’t we, team?” says the Designer.)
keiths,
No, I have read Dawkin’s ” just so” stories in the blind watchmaker and other books such as half a wing is better then none. I am surprised a man as sophisticated as you would fall for this bullshit. We do lack a hair bit of evidence that a one winged bird would even survive in the wild. If you want to argue that half an eye or a single wing or part of a wing aids in reproductive advantage, knock yourself out.
I am also surprised that a true skeptic as yourself would not have looked into this more carefully.
We know it is under 120 years,
Are you saying there is an absolute moral code? Is that possible without a Deity?
No, it would be ” how about 45 seconds?”
If the only reason I existed is God’s will , that was nice of him.
The thing is, if you don’t believe in God then hurricanes are just the indifference of nature , suffering is pointless.
If you believe in God you still have the seeming indifference of nature with a possibility of occasional miracle but the suffering has a purpose. And having a good reason for suffering makes it more bearable and making suffering more bearable is a loving act.
And why there must be suffering? A believer trusts in God’s wisdom and plan.
OMG, do you have any clue of what evolution is about?
You’re not exactly getting more knowledgeable, possibly even less.
Glen Davidson
Poof! A light-sensitive spot. Poof! A lens. Poof! A retina. Poof! From here on, the evolutionary path is easy to see.
#GullibleAtheists
The general wisdom in everyday life is half a loaf is better than none.
How about two half wings?
Are you arguing that unless you have two eyes ,you might as well be blind?
No one is surprised that a true believer think that.
# Gullible atheistsandtheists
Once again you are assuming that rebels like you are “precious” in God’s sight?
The reason you do this is because of the little gospel you picked up when you were a child and later renounced publicly. God definitely does not say apostates like you are his “precious creatures”.
If you are what you claim to be he says you are “worthless and near to being cursed” because you are “crucifying once again the Son of God to their own harm and holding him up to contempt”
That just about the opposite of a “precious creature”.
If what you have said in the past here is true you are not any Christian’s brother—–you have officially relinquished any familial connection you might have had with us when you “trampled underfoot the Son of God, and profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and outraged the Spirit of grace” (Hebrews 10:29)
If you truly are what you claim to be the best way anyone can show you love is by warning you of the judgment that awaits you if you don’t repent and warning others not to make the same mistake you did.
These sorts of comments illustrate that this is mostly about emotion for you and you simply can’t think rationally about it.
You are unable to even begin to entertain the idea that those who have personally experienced God’s redemptive love have a better understanding of his character than his enemies.
You certainly would not have the same difficulty if the person we were taking about were not the God you despised and deserted as an adolescent.
peace
Then Jesus told them this parable: 4 “Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? 5 And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders 6 and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.’ 7 I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.
no that is not the point at all.
Paul was simply saying that Christian’s don’t consider the sufferings of today to be comparable what’s in store for us.
You as an apostate are sure to have another opinion. That is OK it’s a free country.
I would never presume tell you how to feel.
peace
Cannot conceive that it is not necessary to despise God to not believe your version exists?
newton,
You are assuming that the rebel is one of his sheep. You have no way of knowing that
quote:
but you do not believe because you are not among my sheep.My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.
end quote:
John 10:26-27
peace
You seem to presume to tell people what they feel.
Not at all.
Studies show that not all atheists are emotionally motivated.
Many here are though
peace
A sinner sounds like a person who rebels against God’s Will. What would you call it?
Seems to me you are making the point that there are contradictory bible verses
You accept psychology studies?
Of atheists? Sure!
Dogmatically blindfolded theists.
Thanks to mung for admitting, nay, even emphasizing, that, for him/her, it’s all about religion.
Quelle surprise!
Obsess much?
Consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.
colewd,
Guffaw. Ever heard of bilateral symmetry, Bill? Do you really think birds needed to evolve one wing first, and then the other?
Man oh man are you clueless about biology.
newton,
This is true but how much harder is it to build a half a loaf vs a whole loaf.
How about two half wings? Not sure but for argument lets test this. Maybe to build two functional half wings I need 70% or the genetic blueprints available. So with 70% of the material complete I get some reproductive advantage. This really does not make random change a feasible engine. 4^200000 still has an exceedingly large number ways of possible arrangements. How many can produce half wings during embryo development. Unless most the possible sequence arrangement produce symmetric half wings the unguided random walk will march to non function.
I would argue here that to get a single eye for advantage is beyond the capability of a random walk.
I am just surprised at the bullshit stories people believe that fail the sniff test when any detail is examined.
I should be humble because I once believed all this before the devil in the detail showed its ugly head 🙂
You have abundant reasons to be humble.
Yet, no matter how many mistakes you make, you’re neither humble nor teachable.
Glen Davidson
newton,
Some of your comments have me wondering. Do you believe in God? If so, do you believe he is both powerful and loving?
colewd,
Oh, the irony.
I have a bullshit story for you to examine. It’s the claim that God is both powerful and loving, and it’s the main topic of this thread.
Yes that’s how the scam works you fucking moron.
Ergo hoc, post propter hoc
Lay your healing hands over enough people, bus enough people to Lourdes, dose enough people with homeopathic remedies, get enough people to visit a psychic surgeon…..you’re all but guaranteed to get just enough ‘hits’ to convince the desperate and frightened that salvation lies this way.
You are the reason scumbags like Benny Hinn thrive.
Woodbine, to Sal:
I think the believers in this thread are competing to see who can be the most gullible.
keiths, to Alan:
newton:
No, we don’t. You’re assuming there is no suffering after death.
keiths:
newton:
No, of course not. Absolute morality is not a prerequisite for moral significance.
keiths:
newton:
And if the answer were “no”, would your response be “OK. No problem. I can tell how much you love me. Let the agony begin!”?
keiths:
newton:
I didn’t ask whether you thought it was “nice of him” to create you.
He created you, and now he’s going to torment you unspeakably for 100 billion years. Do you feel overwhelmed by the love he’s showing you? When you love someone, do you think to yourself, “I wish I could torment this person unspeakably for 100 billion years”?
newton:
While there’s certainly no cosmic point to suffering, the capacity to suffer still serves an evolutionary purpose. But either way, so what? Who decreed that suffering had to have a point?
Don’t make the mistake of thinking “I want all this suffering to have a point. Therefore it has a point.”
1) What purpose?
2) No, believing in God does not magically poof God into existence, complete with purpose-granting power.
Relieving suffering is even better. Perhaps that’s too loving for God’s taste.
newton:
A rational person would determine whether God is wise and benevolent before trusting in his plan.
And that’s why He sent us……Charlie Duke.
But surely if suffering has a purpose then our attempts to relieve suffering is immoral. All those people fleeing Florida really ought to turn around if they know what’s good for them.
colewd, to Allan:
Think, Bill. Can you really not work this out for yourself? Does someone have to guide you every frikkin’ step of the way?
Woodbine:
Yes. They’re rebelling against God’s will, and God hates rebels. Just ask fifth.
Woodbine,
Welcome back to TSZ, Woodbine. Just a reminder that Lizzie’s rules ask us to attack ideas rather than fellow members personally. “That’s fucking moronic because…” is fine. “You’re a fucking moron” isn’t.
Alan, to Woodbine:
As if Woodbine’s opinion of Sal couldn’t be inferred from the former, and as if there would be anything useful about guanoing either formulation.
keiths,
As I keep reminding you, if you want to change the rules, speak to the blog owner.
keiths:
fifth:
I’m talking about your point in quoting Paul, not Paul’s point.
You were responding to my question:
So yes, you were making the point I ascribed to you.
Can you be more specific. How do you submit an immaterial soul to torment. What is there to torture?
Just occurs to me that if that happened (in the sense that I knew that happened and could distinguish between reality and hallucination) then I suppose I’d go along with whatever she told me. Just the telling would be pretty impressive.