There's an apparently new blog out: A Fool's Heart: Answering the Village Atheist. Other than his first post mourning Falwell, since May 16th the author, Joel McDurmon, has not offered a philosophical argument more sophisticated than a straw man: Atheism presumes materialism, atheism defines God as immaterial, therefore God does not exist. That's the best he can do, when he even bothers to argue at all; most of his site is just unsupported assertion and tendentious opinion.
I'd refute the guy but—to rip off Gertrude Stein—there's no there there.
Wednesday, July 04, 2007
11 comments:
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Joel has appeared briefly on a variety of message boards: Ann Coulter's board, Sam Harris' board, and the IIDB:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=206104
Despite our disagreements, he comes off as a nice guy and I do wish he would stick around longer.
Brian
The whole atheism == Soviet/Chinese totalitarianism == mass murder idea is pretty dumb.
ReplyDeleteThe best that can be said about the relationship between atheism and Soviet totalitarianism is that religion isn't necessary to be horribly evil. Which is not a bad point. But unless you could show that religion prevented totalitarian mass murder, you have to conclude that neither religious belief nor disbelief by itself entails anything politically.
Soviet Russia was not atheist in the manner most people making that tired argument suggest. Stalin was a trained Orthodox Christian priest (and bank robber!) and kept a puppet religious hierarchy in order to give himself some theoretical metaphysical cover. Maoist Communism was pretty much a Confucian wet dream -- of course it's going to seem atheist to Westerners who don't bother to actually know what they're talking about.
ReplyDeleteJeez. If they're going to make these kinds of arguments, I wish they'd freaking learn about their subjects first.
I, for one, am impressed at the attribution of the Stein quote.
ReplyDeleteSorry, couldn't resist.
:)
I did it just for you, Jimi.
ReplyDeleteIsn't "Jesus" rumored to have said something like, "Why do you complain of the plank in your neighbor's eye while ignoring the mote in your own?"
ReplyDeleteSeems to me the proper response to the alleged absence of religion under totalitarian governments (but I repeat myself) being responsible for mass murder is to demonstrate how much mass murder has occurred under "Christian" regimes.
And you can throw that chapter and verse at them at the same time. Sweet.
>I did it just for you, Jimi.
ReplyDeleteI $#!+ you not, that's the nicest thing anyone has said to me in days.
I love you man!
Jimi, I'm not sure to whom or which side you're addressing your comment.
ReplyDeleteAnd that would be the Book of Matthew, chapter 7, verse 3: "And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?" (King James Version)
And I thought it was so clear. I, being an atheist, am offering the biblical passage as evidence that Christians can be as hypocritical as anyone. More so, perhaps.
ReplyDelete"... which side."
Man, doesn't that just sum it up. Division rules the day.
Conflict has been a part of the human condition since we started leaving fossils.
ReplyDeleteAnd I've been laboring under the misimpression these last 15 years that Rodney King finally solved all our troubles.
ReplyDeleteI mean, really!