Atheism vs. Christian

[DogmaHunter]

DogmaHunter.

The only reason why evolutionism is still around is that children are brainwashed into it and those who belong to secular religions and liberal theology do not want to be accountable to their Creator.

If evolutionism were vaild, evolutionists could satisfactorily answer these 15 questions for evolutionists: http://creation.com/15-questions But they cannot.

But evolutionism days are numbered. Britain, the birthplace of Darwinism, is being overrun with Muslims and evangelical Christianity is growing as well. These two groups have higher birth rates than the irreligious.

The evolutionist Richard Dawkins is panicking because he knows that Muslims will not assimilate and teachers are catering to Muslim schoolchildren whose parents teach them Islamic creationism. And global creationism is quickly growing.

The British newspaper The Telegraph reported in an article entitled Richard Dawkins: Muslim parents 'import creationism' into schools:
“ Prof Dawkins, a well-known atheist, also blamed the Government for accommodating religious views and allowing creationism to be taught in schools.

"Most devout Muslims are creationists so when you go to schools, there are a large number of children of Islamic parents who trot out what they have been taught," Prof Dawkins said in a Sunday newspaper interview.

"Teachers are bending over backwards to respect home prejudices that children have been brought up with. The Government could do more, but it doesn't want to because it is fanatical about multiculturalism and the need to respect the different traditions from which these children come."[12]

Johns Hopkins University Press reported in 2014: "Over the past forty years, creationism has spread swiftly among European Catholics, Protestants, Jews, Hindus, and Muslims, even as anti-creationists sought to smother its flames."

On February 24, 2015, the Science Nordic website declared:
“ Creationism, the belief that a god -- not evolution -- shaped life on Earth, is ... spreading in the very stronghold of evolution, Europe. That’s the conclusion of five years of research that’s been put into new book on creationism. The book details how creationism is on the march throughout most of Europe.

"Creationism is most dominant in Eastern Europe and Turkey, but even some schools in the Netherlands are teaching creationism," says one of the book’s authors Hans Henrik Hjermitslev, University College South Denmark. "Politicians in some German federal states are advocating that schools use creationist books alongside those about evolutionary theory in their lessons. This kind of struggle is going on on a small scale in many places."...

"Over the last ten years we’ve seen the emergence of big-city creationism. London is a good example," says Kjærgaar.

Here, noticeably more young people have been signed up to various local and religious groups.

"And this doesn't just apply to young Muslims as many people might think. Christian groups are also recruiting young people...

Creationism has particularly been on the rise in step with the internet, which according to Peter Kjærgaard has made it much easier for people to become activists...[17]

On October 4, 2014, the Vancouver Sun reported that evolutionism is rejected by hundreds of millions of evangelical Christians and Muslims around the world.[2]

Specifically, the Vancouver Sun declared:
“ Creationism, a religious world view that adamantly rejects Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution, is on the rise among evangelical Protestants and most of the world’s Muslims.

It is not only the majority of residents in Muslim countries such as Pakistan, Indonesia and Turkey who strongly reject the teaching that humans and other species evolved over millions of years from less complex creatures. So do tens of millions of evangelical Christians in North America (as well as South America and Africa).

Overall, [Nidhal Guessoum, a Middle Eastern physics and astronomy professor] who teaches at the American University of Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates, estimates roughly 60 per cent of the world’s Muslims are creationists, including many living in the U.S. and Canada.

Even though poll results about evolution vary based on the questions asked, Salman Hameed reported in the journal Science that strong anti-evolution majorities exist in Turkey, Indonesia, Malaysia, Egypt and Pakistan. The latter is among Canada’s top six source countries for immigrants...

An Angus-Reid survey found 43 per cent of Americans accept the creationist teaching that the Earth is less than 10,000 years old, which means they reject the...view the universe began roughly 13 billion years ago.[3]

You are giving me many, many reasons to not take you seriously.

 

[cannotbechanged]

I think Jesus does the same. Speak the truth regardless of man's opinion's.

 

[The Cadet]

Atheists, using the definition of atheism that encyclopedias of philosophy use, what proof and evidence do you have that atheism is true?

None, because not a single self-described atheist here ascribes to that definition of atheism.

Atheism, as defined by the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, and other philosophy reference works, is the denial of the existence of God.

That definition is outdated. On this forum, you will not find a single atheist who defines their atheism in these terms. Almost every atheist here, and indeed almost every atheist who deals with the issue of belief in god, defines their atheism along the lines of "a lack of belief in god". Not denial, not the claim that god does not exist, simply a lack of belief. We aren't making a claim, we are simply rejecting yours.

Christianity has a lot of evidence supporting it. Atheism has none.

Atheism requires none. What evidence do you need to reject the claim that bigfoot exists? What evidence do you need to reject the claim that you murdered Jimmy Hoffa? None. The rejection of a claim requires no evidence. And given how broad the question of "is there a god" is, finding evidence against that claim is impossible - what would even qualify as evidence that there is no god? You've completely inverted the burden of proof.

If evolutionism were vaild, evolutionists could satisfactorily answer these 15 questions for evolutionists: http://creation.com/15-questions But they cannot.

Question 1 has no relation to the theory of evolution, it has to do with abiogenesis.
Question 2 has no relation to the theory of evolution, it has to do with abiogenesis.
Question 3 is easy to answer: you can produce any amount of information through gene duplication and point mutations. Unless they're using a definition of "information" which is not typical to information science, this question is trivially answered. And if they are using a different definition, they need to provide that definition.
Question 4 is nonsensical; natural selection does not, on its own, explain the diversity of life, and it is not taught as though it would.
Question 5 has been answered for quite a number of complex biological pathways, including such creationist darlings as the human eye, the bacterial flagellum, and more. If the explanation is missing for any particular pathway, it's because there's a large number of them, and only a limited amount of hours in the day of the average researcher

Should I keep going, or can we stop there? These 15 questions are a mix of non-sequiturs, demands for absurd evidence, and failures to keep up with the evidence. They have all been addressed in numerous places, which a simple google search could have shown you. Here's a basic example.

And there's nothing wrong with asking questions. That's how science progresses. But CMI isn't asking these questions looking for an answer. They're asking these question looking for a non-answer - arrogantly assuming that there is no possible answer, and that the questions will end up being stumpers. And that's just not a good way of going about making your case.

 

[PaulA135711]

The book On the Existence of Gods by Vox Day, Dominic Saltarelli is a debate/discourse between an theist and an atheist. A panel of judges picked a winner of the debate. My guess is that the theist one the debate. The book got 4.5 out of 5 stars at Goodreads and Amazon readers like it as well. See: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29601721-on-the-existence-of-gods#

I had heard both sides of the debate attempt to engage each others arguments. I regret to say that the atheist/agnostic side of the aisle at this forum is not pulling its weight in terms of discourse/debate.

The reason I say the theist probably won the Day vs. Saltarelli debate is that atheists have not been doing well in debate in recent times. And if memory serves, I think I also read a blog post about the debate and it said that Day won the debate.

For example, Christopher Hitchens debated William Lane Craig at Biola University in 2009 in a videotaped debate.[12] The atheist Luke Muehlhauser wrote concerning the debate: "The debate went exactly as I expected. Craig was flawless and unstoppable. Hitchens was rambling and incoherent, with the occasional rhetorical jab. Frankly, Craig spanked Hitchens like a foolish child."[13]

In October of 1997, atheist Jeffrey Jay Lowder, a founder of Internet Infidels, stated that he believed that in regards to atheism and debate that "the most impressive debater to date" was Douglas Jesseph.[3]

Yet, Douglas Jesseph claimed in a debate with William Lane Craig in 1996 that the origin of life had a detailed atheistic explanation(s).[4] In 1996, John Horgan wrote the following regarding what the highly respected origin of life researcher Stanley Miller believed to the case regarding naturalistic explanations of the origin of life: "Miller seemed unimpressed with any of the current proposals on the origin of life, referring to them as 'nonsense' or 'paper chemistry.'"[5] In addition, in 1996, John Horgan wrote the following in Scientific American: "The origin of life is a science writer's dream. It abounds with exotic scientists and exotic theories, which are never entirely abandoned or accepted, but merely go in and out of fashion."[6]

At the atheist blog Common Sense Atheism, the atheist Luke Muehlhauser said of the Craig vs. Jesseph debate: "A very typical debate in which Craig’s opponent is not prepared for Craig’s skill, speed, or organization, and things just get worse for Jesseph as things go along and he falls further and further behind."

I have heard atheist/agnostic whining and snark at this forum, but rarely something substantive. However, with that being said, I do appreciate the information I obtained at this forum about 17th century French atheism.

 

[The Cadet]

Vox Day

*brr*

This guy is a tool, and I have no interest in reading his book. Would you care to point out any particular argument you found particularly convincing?

 

[cannotbechanged]

To me, it is good to embrace all. Believe in God and Christianity.

 

[Oafman]

That would certainly support your previous comment:

As this dude seems to be editing the articles on the site as this thread moves forward.

If this theory is correct, this guy is my hero!

 

[The Cadet]

To me, it is good to embrace all. Believe in God and Christianity.

To me, it is good to embrace all. Believe in Xenu and Scientology.

 

[PaulA135711]

The Cadet,

I revised my post above.

In addition, I said that my guess is that Day won the debate and I gave my rationale on why I believe this was so.

I have not read the book except for a few pages via free samples of various pages of the book. But I plan on reading it as I found his book The Irrational Atheist to be interesting (I read a large portion of his book via a PDF free sample at: http://www.voxday.net/mart/TIA_free.pdf).

 

[cannotbechanged]

To me, it is good to embrace all. Believe in Xenu and Scientology.

That s a choice. I certainly don't want to fight one's belief's.

 

[Eudaimonist]

That s a choice. I certainly don't want to fight one's belief's.

Cool. My "all" includes only the natural universe.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[cannotbechanged]

Cool. My "all" includes only the natural universe.


eudaimonia,

Mark

What's wrong with that?

I enjoy God.

 

[cannotbechanged]

We are on a Christian site full of believer's. So what is your goal?

By the Grace of God, I will not stop believing in God. You will probably not stop believing your way. So what is the point in arguing?

 

[Eudaimonist]

We are on a Christian site full of believer's. So what is your goal?

By the Grace of God, I will not stop believing in God. You will probably not stop believing your way. So what is the point in arguing?

Are you addressing me?

This site has many non-believers as well, and some of them are interesting people. I'm not the only unbeliever here.

I discuss ideas mainly because I enjoy doing so and I see a benefit to myself in living the Socratic examined life. I think that it is good to have a dialog, even in the form of debate, with people who believe differently than myself for the sake of mutual understanding. It's a small world. People of differing beliefs should talk with each other instead of living in echo chambers.

I first came to ChristianForums to challenge stigmas that atheists have, especially in American culture. While it is extremely unlikely that I would deconvert anyone here, I can certainly change their views of atheists. That is not as high a priority for me now as it was then, but it is still a reason for me to be here.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[cannotbechanged]

Are you addressing me?

This site has many non-believers as well, and some of them are interesting people. I'm not the only unbeliever here.

I discuss ideas mainly because I enjoy doing so and I see a benefit to myself in living the Socratic examined life. I think that it is good to have a dialog, even in the form of debate, with people who believe differently than myself for the sake of mutual understanding. It's a small world. People of differing beliefs should talk with each other instead of living in echo chambers.

I first came to ChristianForums to challenge stigmas that atheists have, especially in American culture. While it is extremely unlikely that I would deconvert anyone here, I can certainly change their views of atheists. That is not as high a priority for me now as it was then, but it is still a reason for me to be here.


eudaimonia,

Mark

So surely you cannot be against me for having a belief in God.

 

[Eudaimonist]

So surely you cannot be against me for having a belief in God.

I'm not against you for having a belief in God. Did I say that I was?


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[cannotbechanged]

It is good to be for a believer in God I think.

 

[DogmaHunter]

The Cadet,

I revised my post above.

In addition, I said that my guess is that Day won the debate and I gave my rationale on why I believe this was so.

I have not read the book except for a few pages via free samples of various pages of the book. But I plan on reading it as I found his book The Irrational Atheist to be interesting (I read a large portion of his book via a PDF free sample at: http://www.voxday.net/mart/TIA_free.pdf).

I find it interesting that you seem to be carefully picking books of which you think in advance that they will support your a priori beliefs.

Having said that, "debate" is not a pathway to truth.
"Debates" are constructs in which the "best speaker" wins the debate.

 

[cannotbechanged]

It is written, Matthew 18:6

 

[cannotbechanged]

God's word is good.