Miles T

But no refutations? I draw a distinction between rebuttals, which may address individual arguments in a proposition (such as dismissing bad analogies) and refutations, which attempt to make the actual proposition untenable.



You’re right. Indeed, Christians are persecuted even to this very day. However, that doesn’t refute my conclusion that Christianity teaches to persecute. Millions—very possibly even billions—have been persecuted in the name of Christianity. If Christianity had its own way, over half of humanity would be relegated to live in subordination.

One would hope so. I’m not familiar enough with the Bible to be able to recall any delusion from God. There’s certainly bad ‘teachings’ from God, though.

Given the evidence in favour of Christianity’s veracity, I beg to differ. However, if you can show to me with reasonable certainty that a ‘Christian God’ (whatever that is) exists, then I’ll acknowledge that there is no delusion in thinking it exists. Note that I also draw a distinction between ‘believing’ something to be true and ‘thinking’ it’s true. I use the former to refer to irrational, faith-based assertions and the latter to refer to sufficiently-reasonable assertions. Thus, in my usage, it is delusional to believe in anything.

We know exist because not only are they defined in terms of psychological phenomena that at least billions of creatures have experienced and experience, but also because of recent developments in neuroscience.

So by your usage, it seems that Jesus would have to exist and be correct (which seem to be two requirements, as opposed to three) to be ‘real’. Thus, for your assertion of his reality (is that correct usage?) to be reasonable, you must be reasonably certain that Jesus exists. As it is, the best evidence seems to suggest that, at the most, Jesus was a real person, but not necessarily one as described in the Bible. As you are presumably referring to the Biblical Jesus (with miracles and whatnot), you now need to put forth that revolutionary evidence that demonstrates Biblical Jesus’ existence before I’ll accept that Jesus is real.

This doesn’t sit well with me because not only is it factually incorrect (the sheep did listen to them, and many of ‘them’ were honest people seeking to do good), but perhaps more importantly, it also suggests that only God is fit to shepherd humanity. Christianity belittles humanity by comparing humans to sheep in order to suggest that they need direction by some ‘superior being’ and that they are foolish, oblivious, unknowing and more besides. Perhaps worst of all, Christianity states that humanity is unfit to choose its own direction. As someone who holds grand dreams for humanity’s future, and who constantly strives to Illuminate, Christianity relegates my highest and greatest dreams—and indeed my very being—to futility.

We’re invited to throw aside the insatiable desire to know and understand and self-determination to submit to ‘God’ because an inconsistent, often unsubstantiated and highly suspect book tell us to. We’re invited to forgo these things—things fundamental to the human condition—in exchange for fake promises and unthinking subservience.
God and Jesus apparently love us so much yet allow pain and suffering and wrongdoings to continue for millennia amongst the former’s highest creations. God loves us so much that ‘he’ will send us to Hell for embracing the human condition. God is so caring and fair that ‘he’ will send us to Hell for an infinite period for a finite misdemeanour.

That is to say, the teeming millions and billions of Christians will harass, pressure coerce and outright force Christianity upon the whole of worthless humanity.

‘I lay down my life so you can continue to be worthless sheep! It’s such a chore for an omnipotent being like myself!’

In my book, delusion is very much not ‘fine’. When it is permissible, unbidden intellectual mediocrity ensues. Claiming something as truth while knowing there is not reasonable evidence is no better than destructive lying. If everyone were to simply live in the utmost delusion…well, I’m sure you can see why that would be absurd. Permitting delusion permits the decay of human progress.

This is all fluff until you substantiate it. The Bible is an inconsistent, contrafactual, dubious book. Its assertions, on their own, don’t count as substantiation. It’s a poor source of evidence for the existence of ‘the Christian God’. Merely referring to the Bible as ‘proof’ amounts to:

Premise: The Bible states that God exists.
Conclusion: Therefore God exists.

Which is not sound; it is not a valid logical argument.

As it is, the chance of a God even remotely similar to the God you claim exists is infinitesimal. But despite the presumable non-existence of the God you propose, the principles that you claim ‘your’ God issued are still followed to, amongst other things, persecute and hinder human progress (such as in the scientific field).