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AyameTan
New Member
Japan
36 Posts |
 Posted - 03/23/2011 : 21:29:55
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Comments and ratings greatly appreciated. :)
http://www.amazon.com/gp/cdp/member-reviews/A1K7X23UDT0R7V/ref=ya_26?ie=UTF8&sort_by=MostRecentReview
I repeat my points because WLC brings nothing new to his myriad debates.
Edit: I haven't read any of WLC's books, but I have listened to quite a few of his lectures, available on his website (free to download upon registration).
And I know all-too-well his projection when he accuses atheists of being "crashing bores" as one of his fellow fundies put it.
One response (in brackets) with my rebuttal:
Thank you for your reply, Tina. Apologies for my belated response.
(God made the universe and earth perfect and beautiful and completely without sin (evil). However, Adam and Eve (human beings) made their free-will choice to disobey God on the one thing He told them not to do. This catastrophic act of human disobedience caused the perfect earth that God created to fall into the imperfect earth that has suffered from every generation until now. Since the eternal God is perfect and holy, far more than any human being can understand ( including you), He cannot have sin (disobedience to His perfect law, the Ten Commandments) in His presence. He could have extinguished Adam and Eve for their disobedience and ended mankind before we began. But because God is love, He chose instead to curse Adam and Eve for their disobedience, along with the earth, with suffering to give them and all generations after them the chance to reconcile with God for eternity.)
Then why was Ted Bundy's free will more precious to your god than that of Bundy's victims?
It is also utterly, fractally immoral to punish me for what my ancestors did. It's ludicrous, and your god, if omniscient, set everyone up to fail from day 1.
(Since every human being is sinful (If you've told one lie in your whole life, you have committed a sin that cannot be allowed in God's perfect presence... For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. -- Romans 3:23), no human being can provide for his own salvation and reconciliation with God for eternity after our short human lives end. For this reason God the Son incarnated into the human timeline, and as Jesus Christ, He lived a sinless life, performed many miracles witnessed by thousands, died an unjust death on the cross as a substitution for the sins of every human being. When Jesus bodily resurrected from the dead, witnessed by over 500 different people over 40 days, He defeated death and sin and provided the only way for a sinful human being to reconcile with God. Jesus said... "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no one comes to the Father, but by me." - John 14:6)
You need to prove that the gospels are true (unlikely, since they self-contradict) before that argument will gain any traction with me.
((By the way, when Jesus overturned the tables and threw the moneylenders out of the Temple, He did not sin. This was righteous anger that they were using the Temple, God's House, as a den of thieves. Selling doves, etc. was not the problem. The problem was that they were selling the doves inside the Temple, which was disrespectful of God and against their law. The fact that the priests turned a blind eye and allowed it only shows how far they had fallen in love and obedience to God.))
So much for Jesus as the "Prince of Peace."
(Because God gave human beings free-will, each person can choose to accept God's one and only path to reconciliation for eternity, through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. With free-will each person can also reject God's offer of reconciliation, and thereby choose eternity without the presence of God. Since the only goodness on earth is from God... love, family, friendship, sunlight, food, water, satisfying work, beauty of earth, etc... it stands to reason that an eternity without ANY goodness from God will indeed be Hell.)
So there won't be free will in heaven? Then why not start and end with heaven? Why have this "soul-filtering machine" (as Matt Dillahunty would say) at all?
(God's goal in human suffering is reconciliation to Himself through Jesus Christ. If a person is suffering, they are knocked off their prideful pedestal, and they may look to God for help and answers, and hopefully reconciliation. Born-again Christians who are already reconciled to God through Jesus also suffer in this world, because our human nature is still fallen and this world is still fallen. But God does help us through the suffering, and He can use it to build character and faith. By going through the trial and coming out at the other end, the Christian can use the experience to help other suffering people through their own trials. Jesus said... "These things I have spoken to you, so that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world." -- John 16:33)
A temporary sacrifice is NOT a sacrifice. And we still suffer today. Why continue this mess? Justice delayed is justice denied, remember.
(You may wonder why God would give His creation human beings free-will knowing beforehand that people would choose to disobey. Without free-will a person's love would be forced and hollow. (Would you want a wife that was forced to love and obey you, but seething with resentment every day?!) If God wanted a race of emotionless robots forced to obey, He could have made them. Instead God made human beings with the free-will to choose to love Him and to choose to spend eternity with the love and goodness of God through faith in the finished work of Jesus Christ on our behalf.)
But "love" under threat of eternal torture is A-OK? That's ludicrous, end of story.
(For God so loved the world, that He gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. -- John 3:16)
So I only have to believe, not accept him as my saviour? Or are you referring to life eternal in hell? Why would eternal suffering be more moral or merciful than eternal extinguishment?
(And as it is appointed to men once to die, but after this the judgment. -- Hebrews 9:27)
The Babble only works on those who have accepted your demagoguery and dogma.
(The fool has said in his heart, There is no God. -- Psalm 53:1)
Arrogance. What a surprise. Out of arguments already?! Didn't Jesus tell you how to convert me to your faith!?
(Mr. Jen, while you are still breathing you have a chance to learn the truth about God and His one path to reconciliation. If you choose to reject God, then after death there are no second chances. You will face the wrath of a righteous God who does not wink at any sin, whether a "little white lie" or the heinous murders of Hitler.)
Afterlife blackmail. Wow. Enjoy your banquet with the Fuhrer! :P
(I hope you will consider this, and do some unbiased research on the Bible, especially the fulfilled prophecies in the Bible. Jesus did prove His claims beyond a reasonable doubt for those who search for the truth with an open heart. I hope for the sake of your eternal soul that you will at least read the entire Gospel of John.)
More stark arrogance. You come here with a preconceived conclusion; namely, that your religion is true.
[Moved to the Religion folder - Dave W.]
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"Tatti hitori no inochi wo sukuu mono wa zensekai wo sukuu." |
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On fire for Christ
SFN Regular
Norway
1273 Posts |
Posted - 04/09/2011 : 23:38:56 [Permalink]
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Countering Fundies Through Amazon
AKA "trolling" |
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Dr. Mabuse
Septic Fiend
Sweden
9687 Posts |
 Posted - 04/10/2011 : 07:39:22 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by On fire for Christ
Countering Fundies Through Amazon
AKA "trolling"
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Please elaborate...
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Dr. Mabuse - "When the going gets tough, the tough get Duct-tape..."
Dr. Mabuse whisper.mp3
"Equivocation is not just a job, for a creationist it's a way of life..." Dr. Mabuse
Support American Troops in Iraq:
Send them unarmed civilians for target practice..
Collateralmurder. |
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On fire for Christ
SFN Regular
Norway
1273 Posts |
Posted - 04/10/2011 : 08:53:39 [Permalink]
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| It was a pretty simple statement. Any lamb or small child could understand it. |
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sailingsoul
SFN Addict
2830 Posts |
Posted - 04/10/2011 : 14:09:18 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Dr. Mabuse
Originally posted by On fire for Christ
Countering Fundies Through Amazon
AKA "trolling"
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Please elaborate...
Originally posted by On fire for Christ
It was a pretty simple statement. Any lamb or small child could understand it.
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Your reply OFFC may be true or it may not. Dr. Mabuse was replying to your post. Can you elaborate on your post, please? SS
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There are only two types of religious people, the deceivers and the deceived. SS |
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Dr. Mabuse
Septic Fiend
Sweden
9687 Posts |
Posted - 04/10/2011 : 18:25:37 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by On fire for Christ
It was a pretty simple statement. Any lamb or small child could understand it.
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I understand that all five star reviews were written by Jesus-sycophants and that the book "End of Reason" is mostly excrement.
However, I'll add "End of Faith" and "Letter to a Christian Nation"(?) on my Amazon wish-list. If I ever manage to get through "The Science of Good and Evil" M. Shermer, I'll read them.
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Dr. Mabuse - "When the going gets tough, the tough get Duct-tape..."
Dr. Mabuse whisper.mp3
"Equivocation is not just a job, for a creationist it's a way of life..." Dr. Mabuse
Support American Troops in Iraq:
Send them unarmed civilians for target practice..
Collateralmurder. |
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alienist
Skeptic Friend
USA
210 Posts |
Posted - 04/10/2011 : 19:01:38 [Permalink]
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| I am neither a child or a lamb, so OFFC, you will have to explain your statement. |
The only normal people are the ones you don't know very well! - Joe Ancis |
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AyameTan
New Member
Japan
36 Posts |
Posted - 09/02/2012 : 05:13:30 [Permalink]
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I've written several new reviews recently.
Here's one on Has Christianity Failed You? by Ravi Zacharias (who loves to lie about Nazi belt buckles -
http://www.scribd.com/doc/7094194/ZACHARIAS-Ravi-JESUS-Among-Other-Gods
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/doug_krueger/copin.html
Nonsense and Callous Bile, August 15, 2012
During his introduction, Ravi regales us with a story about his family's Border Collie, GK, named after one of their favourite authors, GK Chesterton. Immediately I was struck by their callous attitude in forcing a member of their family to suffer the ravages of a natural death from cancer rather than put it quietly and peacefully to sleep. Sadly, Ravi takes a similar stance when he addresses the readers in the greater part of this book.
The author attempts to delineate "true" Christianity from the Christianity practiced in some churches today, and blames this for the reason people are leaving it in droves. He won't even entertain the idea that Christianity is false. The superficial saving grace in his book is his call to churches to be more supportive and understanding of those who have fallen away and "sinned" (a vacuous religious concept to begin with). He criticises the liberal media for condemning the Pope's stance unequivocally condemning contraception, asking if they would show compassion to someone who had used a condom and contracted HIV. In doing so, Ravi is denying the human impulse towards pleasure, one that he believes his god bestowed upon us, and is giving tacit support to a Puritanical worldview that has made the AIDS crisis worse. Condoms reduce the rate of HIV transmission, this is an undeniable fact. Why he would lend succour to a malicious prick who covered up and perpetuated child rape and indirect murder speaks volumes about the author. Perhaps he should write a new book on his own shortcomings and failures as an apologist and evangelical preacher.
Ravi claims that although his god is sovereign, he has also blessed us with free will. Anyone who has read Exodus should know that this is nonsense. A god who would violate Pharoah's free will to shunt himself up onto a pedestal and cause further gratuitous suffering is not only a deity brimming with malfeasance, but has no respect for free will. On a related note, Ravi complains that if one amputee was cured, this would be unfair to all other amputees, and we would demand more evidence and miracles. What, you mean like what allegedly occurred in the Old Testament? This flimsy excuse holds no water, especially since his god is supposedly all-powerful and could never get weary.
Ravi holds his personal experience (a supposed visit from Jesus while he was hospitalized after a suicide attempt). A cursory examination of NDEs, OBEs and similar experiences reveals that the only religious experiences humans experience is based on the religions that they were raised in. Why don't we see Muslims visited by Buddha or Krishna? I do not doubt Ravi's sincerity when he recounts this, but as he concedes, that doesn't prove the existence of his god. I would bet my life that Ravi would not place the same credence that he places in his own experience that he would place on the personal experiences of Muslims, Buddhists and Hindus. And besides, if his god is willing to reveal himself, it would be a simple matter to replicate such revelatory experiences for everyone on the planet. But we don't see this. It is very rare for adults who have been raised in religion to break free of the religion they were brought up in. Capital punishment for apostasy doesn't account for all of this, and the benefits of Christian missions and "charities" often do more harm than good. Myths and edicts about how to deal with "witches" have caused African villages to murder their children. The baggage that burdens Christianity and its teachings often end up doing more harm than good. And as for the bible, I found it quite telling that Zacharias does not mention whether or not he is a biblical literalist or whether some verses were not divinely inspired, in his view. And he doesn't even come close to explaining why we can trust the bible, since it was written by fallible humans, rehashed and manipulated depending on the era and translators. Perhaps simply thinks that the sheer quantity of obfuscation he spews forth will be enough to convince the reader.
He initially attempts to tackle arguments for the validity of theism over naturalism. He immediately falls flat at the starting gate by appealing to the sheer unlikeliness of life arising from random chance, and mentions monkeys randomly mashing keys until they produce the works of Shakespeare. According to him, the chances are too high for it to occur naturally during the alleged age of the universe. What he doesn't realise is that incredibly unlikely things occur every day - every person, every sperm and egg combination, is one in several hundred million. Add the chances of our parents meeting, and the thousands of human generations throughout our 200,000-year history, and the odds are far more unlikely than the "astronomical" odds Ravi mentions.
He also rails against secularism and "relativism", although situational ethics would be a better descriptor for what he is decrying here. Moral differences generally stem from the plurality of upbringings and the lack of complete information available or willing to be considered by parties in a given situation. When information is more detailed and situations and players considered more deeply, concurrence towards a single moral outcome is more likely, no matter who is considering the issue. That is why, for example, support for the right to die has risen considerably in Western countries over the past few decades, even in countries that have a majority of Christians, such as Australia.
In attempting to bolster his case for the truth of Christianity, he mentions William Lane Craig. This is a feeble attempt. Anyone who has seen Craig debate should know that intellectual rigour is not his strong suit. The opposite, in fact. Craig has mentioned several times that if the evidence should go against Christianity and the "internal witness of the holy spirit", the latter should take precedence against the former. Such an apologist, who decries the scientific method as being based on "the shifting sands of evidence and argument" himself uses arguments, and has therefore undermined at least half of his own case. There is no such thing as "reasonable faith", and few demonstrate this better than Craig himself. Baseless claims such as "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence" don't help him either. There's no evidence for Zeus, Thor or the Greek pantheon, and yet we don't see shills like Craig writing long-winded apologetics for them.
Ravi's chapter on prayer is the longest, and perhaps the worst. In this rambling, incoherent pile of flopped justifications, excuses and blame-shifting, Ravi redefines prayer, and what Jesus "really meant" when he said "knock, and the door shall be opened." Prayer isn't supposed to work "instantaneously or magically." Well, then why pray?! It would seem that Ravi doesn't seem to realise that he is making his god out to be a highly skilled huckster, by redefining his promises and covenants to suit himself.
In the final chapter, Ravi arrogantly assumes that anyone who has reached that point has understood that Christianity has not failed them, but people and/or institutions such as the church have. Well, all I have to say about this is that the actions of those who purport to act in god's name reflect either well or poorly on that deity, and any deity who would not clearly make his will and endorsements known to all is responsible for the impressions made by such believers (assuming, of course, that such a deity exists in the first place). Ravi attempts to gloss over the shortcomings of the CEO, using the employees as scapegoats. He rails against Islam and their mighty birth rate (implying that Christians must outbreed and out-brainwash them), and in a further act of incoherence and mental gymnastics, Ravi mentions the declining fish stocks worldwide. We cannot fix a perceived problem by making it worse. Woman's suffrage in the Muslim world is the only way to both stop the tide of Muslim takeover that he fears, and the scythe of overpopulation that will destroy us from within. |
"Tatti hitori no inochi wo sukuu mono wa zensekai wo sukuu." |
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the_ignored
SFN Addict
2562 Posts |
Posted - 09/02/2012 : 05:34:28 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by On fire for Christ
Countering Fundies Through Amazon
AKA "trolling"
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If it's done through the reviews and if Ayame sticks to the particular book that's under discussion in the review section then not really.
That's what the review section is for: For people to talk about the merits of the book. |
>From: enuffenuff@fastmail.fm
(excerpt follows):
> I'm looking to teach these two bastards a lesson they'll never forget.
> Personal visit by mates of mine. No violence, just a wee little chat.
>
> **** has also committed more crimes than you can count with his
> incitement of hatred against a religion. That law came in about 2007
> much to ****'s ignorance. That is fact and his writing will become well
> know as well as him becoming a publicly known icon of hatred.
>
> Good luck with that fuckwit. And Reynold, fucking run, and don't stop.
> Disappear would be best as it was you who dared to attack me on my
> illness knowing nothing of the cause. You disgust me and you are top of
> the list boy. Again, no violence. Just regular reminders of who's there
> and visits to see you are behaving. Nothing scary in reality. But I'd
> still disappear if I was you.
What brought that on? this. Original posting here.
Another example of this guy's lunacy here. |
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AyameTan
New Member
Japan
36 Posts |
Posted - 09/02/2012 : 05:41:54 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by the_ignored
Originally posted by On fire for Christ
Countering Fundies Through Amazon
AKA "trolling"
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If it's done through the reviews and if Ayame sticks to the particular book that's under discussion in the review section then not really.
That's what the review section is for: For people to talk about the merits of the book.
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In fact, the trolling and projection generally comes from the theistic side of the debate, as this discussion indicates:
http://www.amazon.com/review/R1WNHYSJGPA8DO/ref=cm_aya_cmt?ie=UTF8&ASIN=1581344872#wasThisHelpful |
"Tatti hitori no inochi wo sukuu mono wa zensekai wo sukuu." |
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On fire for Christ
SFN Regular
Norway
1273 Posts |
Posted - 09/02/2012 : 22:19:56 [Permalink]
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| That isn't trolling |
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AyameTan
New Member
Japan
36 Posts |
Posted - 09/02/2012 : 22:37:36 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by On fire for Christ
That isn't trolling
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Have you read the insults and vitriol that have spewed from the theists there, particularly M. Cat? Here's a particularly loving example:
| And your religion compares you to toe jam and excrement. Enjoy that now. LOL! |
| Hey everybody, Jen doesn't think attacking someone's religion is racist. Bigotry. Hahahahahahahahaha!!!! |
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"Tatti hitori no inochi wo sukuu mono wa zensekai wo sukuu." |
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On fire for Christ
SFN Regular
Norway
1273 Posts |
Posted - 09/02/2012 : 23:05:06 [Permalink]
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| yeah that was some good stuff |
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AyameTan
New Member
Japan
36 Posts |
Posted - 09/03/2012 : 00:53:14 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by On fire for Christ
yeah that was some good stuff
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I hope you're not trying to say that you feel M. Cat actually has a valid point somewhere up his/her rectum. |
"Tatti hitori no inochi wo sukuu mono wa zensekai wo sukuu." |
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On fire for Christ
SFN Regular
Norway
1273 Posts |
Posted - 09/03/2012 : 01:24:35 [Permalink]
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| I think if you dig hard enough, you can find it. |
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Countering Fundies Through Amazon
