Sunday, April 17, 2011

Why the “I Just Believe in One Less God than You” Argument Does not Work | Parchment and Pen

In another gem of a tweet from Brian Auten I found the following link to an article by
“I contend we are both atheists, I just believe in one less god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.” —Stephen F Roberts

Funny thing is I've heard this same argument multiple times from atheists who comment on John Lofus' blog Debunking Christianity. I've posted links to the answer for this objection in several posts on this blog from several people. I like this particular treatment also.

Why the “I Just Believe in One Less God than You” Argument Does not Work | Parchment and Pen
Enhanced by Zemanta

12 comments:

  1. Ah, the good old "christianity is most like christianity" fallacy.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Can you show how Norse or Greco-Roman "theology" is like Christianity? Didn't think so.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Why would you expect it to be? And in fact, that's the whole point of Patton's fallacy.

    ReplyDelete
  4. The point is if they are not the same then you can't claim that its sensible to reject Christianity on the same grounds as rejecting Norse or Greco-Roman "theologies"

    ReplyDelete
  5. Ultimately, they have enough in common to write them off in common.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I asked you to prove that. And you called "Fallacy" - given all you seem to have is circular reasoning.

    ReplyDelete
  7. I need to prove that christianity, greek, roman and anglo-saxon mythology make supernatural claims? Really?

    ReplyDelete
  8. No, you need prove that you have sufficient reasons to reject those claims on the same basis.

    ReplyDelete
  9. I reject them on an equal basis because they all make supernatural claims and I reject the existence of the supernatural. Theological differences are irrelevant when you can't provide empirical evidence for the required primary presupposition.

    ReplyDelete
  10. You can reject the supernatuaral all you want but can you prove that presupposition really makes sense because science cannot prove or disprove the supernatural or miracles?

    ReplyDelete
  11. It absolutely makes sense given the lack of empirical evidence for the supernatural. Not holding the epistemology that this presupposition entails sends one (or should if they are intellectually honest) down infinite rabbit holes.

    But we've been over that. You personally one epistemology for things you want to be true and another for things you don't. So I honestly don't expect you to understand this late in the game.

    ReplyDelete
  12. should be "... you personally have one epistemology..."

    ReplyDelete