40 Arabic Words

40 Arabic Words

FacePlant of the Day - Debunking Christianity: The Major Reason Why I Am a Skeptic

John Loftus has posted some thought about his interaction with David Marshall and the difference about which they view the world

 David Marshall continually says I must read up on world religions and the history of religions. But why? It's because he thinks it will help me to believe. So David, I'll grant that you have read more world literature than I have and that you have the benefit of world travel. But I think the brain is such that if I had your experiences and read only the works you have, I would agree with you and think like you. Our brains are like that. So in order to think like you I must be more like you (which also includes IQ, gender, race, sexuality, place and time of birth, and so forth--do you know that sociologists can identify different ideas held by people born in America during the 20's vs the 30's vs the 40's vs the 50's and so on?). BUT I AM NOT YOU! Nor can I ever be. The same thing goes in reverse for you. If you had my experiences and read only the works I have, you would agree with me and think like me. That is probably the major reason why I am a skeptic, because of this propensity of ours to believe and defend a host of ideas just because we were exposed to them, which is as obvious of an empirical fact as we can get. It's overwhelming that our respective cultures influence us, since that's what we're talking about. Just take four babies and raise one in China the other in Saudi Arabia the third in Kentucky and the fourth in Russia and you will see clearly how cultures influence us all. And it’s never more pronounced than when it comes to religion. Knowing this I must reject faith based reasoning of any kind. Knowing this I am skeptical of ideas that do not have sufficient evidence for them. Knowing this I try as best as I possibly can to only accept science based reasoning. Science is the only hope out of this epistemological morass. How can you possibly counter this? How can any believer counter this? Believers can only do so out of ignorance, pure ignorance, willful ignorance, a head-in-the-sand type of fear based ignorance.

Loftus admits the following:

So David, I'll grant that you have read more world literature than I have and that you have the benefit of world travel.

But he also asserts:

Believers can only do so out of ignorance, pure ignorance, willful ignorance, a head-in-the-sand type of fear based ignorance.

Rather inconsistent.  Loftus admits that in reference to Marshall, he is ignorant about a lot of things that Marshall is knowledgeable about. Given that Marshall is a Believer, it would mean that many, if not all, of Loftus' assumptions and premises are flawed, leading to his flawed conclusion.

Debunking Christianity: The Major Reason Why I Am a Skeptic

Answering Muslims: More Hypocrisy/Sharia Compliance from the New York Times

David Wood asks and answers a really great question in a recent post: Why is it okay for the New York Times to publish the following ad:

But not okay to publish this one:

David writes:

 Not surprisingly, the New York Times refused to publish the ad (at the moment, anyway), claiming that “the fallout from running this ad now could put U.S. troops and/or civilians in the [Afghan] region in danger.”

In other words, the New York Times will run an ad against Catholicism because Catholics won't go on a killing spree. But the Times won't run an ad critical of Islam because Muslims will go on a killing spree.

Answering Muslims: More Hypocrisy/Sharia Compliance from the New York Times