Why Anti-Atheist Arguments Are Illogical

I followed a link that led me here. Based on the title ("Why Atheism is Illogical"), I thought whoever wrote it must really have something good as an argument. Imagine my disappointment upon discovering it was just a very short version of Pascal's Discredited Wager.

But Pascal was writing in Christian, and specifically Catholic, terms. Our amateur apologist broadens the wager to include all theists, ignoring the fact that Christianity threatens Hindus with hell as much as it does atheists.

In Christianity, they [atheists] would be sent to hell. In Hinduism, they would be reincarnated into a lower status.

However, if a theist is correct in their beliefs, they are rewarded for their faith and go to heaven/reincarnate in a better status/etc.

So, finding Christianity abhorrent, let's say I go with Hinduism. I end up in the Christian hell if I converted to the wrong religion. Same with Islam. If I convert to Christianity and the Muslim faith is the correct one, I risk going to the Islamic hell. We can continue to add various religions and sects of various religions until we have possibly thousands to choose from. This is where the wager actually favors the atheist position (Pascal's Wager is not an argument for God's existence as much as it is an argument for the desirability of belief).

In the original wager, there is only one God, the God of the Catholic Church. The assumption is that those outside the Church will suffer eternal torment after death. The further assumption is that the believer loses nothing if he/she is wrong. All three assumptions are faulty.

The true God may be one of the many thousands that people have believed in throughout humanity's history, not just the God of one Church, however much it proclaims its universalism. Furthermore, the real God, if there is one, may offer universal salvation and immortality in paradise to everyone, including atheists. It could be that this real God loves atheists even more than believers, perhaps to the point of sending arrogant fundamentalists of all faiths to hell, and rewarding atheists for their commitment to reason. And the assumption that believers lose nothing if they are wrong is also false. Time, money, innocent earthly pleasures that they deny themselves believing that they are "sin", etc. are just the tip of the iceberg.

Since the wager is not about God's existence, but about the value of belief itself, it becomes apparent that with hundreds of religious options to choose from, the chance of you choosing the right one and being rewarded with life after death is small. Coupled with the costs of following a particular religion (praying five times a day, taking a costly trip to Mecca, giving up all alcoholic beverages) and the prior probability of theism, atheism is then the better choice.

I found the following at Advocatus Atheist:

As expected, we’ve all heard the Christian schema of why we ought to believe. In their attempts to convinces us, they often fall back on fallacious arguments, often saying something along the lines that evolution is false therefore the Bible is true, or because the Bible is true evolution is false. Other times we have heard the claim because the Bible is true, and God created it all, evolution is true, and therefore proof of God’s existence. Or how about, you can’t be moral without religion; ever heard that one? Or if you don’t believe in Jesus and ask him for forgiveness you’ll go to hell. God is all loving (never mind the contradiction). Or the rapture is definitely coming. Or that God hears your prayers. Or that you go to paradise in heaven after you die. Or because you can’t prove human consciousness then that’s evidence for God. Or because the universe exists something must have created it, therefore proof that God must exist. All of these claims are unfounded, therefore when Christians wish to support their devotional beliefs they turn to the slippery slopes of fallacy packed professions and mind-boggling truth claims, hoping you won’t notice their sufficient lack of evidence whatsoever.

99.9% of Christian Apologetics Rely on Fallacies

And for some real life examples of bad arguments, I present antiatheism.info.

Here's a great one (under the title Atheist Accuses Christians Of Not Having Evidence Of Jesus Christ’s Divinity):

The evidence for His divinity can be found in the Bible. How come all of the books in Bible fail to contradict one another once when they were written over a span of several thousand years by many different authors? How come they all manage to predict the coming of the Messiah.

You’ll obviously try to explain this all away by saying it isn’t scientific but either way I just don’t think you want to know the truth.

I rest my case!

Theist Elitism

If there's one thing that really pisses me off about theists, it's how elitist they are. They see themselves as more noble, more mature, and more virtuous than the rest of the population, simply because they've chosen to believe in a sky pixie without any hint of evidence.

Theists came to believe in their particular religion for no other reason than the fact that they were indoctrinated in it from birth. There may be a few exceptions, but that's why they're called "exceptions."

In other words, theists take it as a given that they're more "moral" because they're religious, but their position is based on nothing. Your average theist becomes a stuttering, flustered wreck when asked to back up his beliefs instead of merely proclaiming his superiority.

Choosing to believe in a supernatural creator without any evidence or intellectual reasoning does not make you morally superior; it makes you a tool. Just thought I'd make that clear. ;)

The Frustrated Spammer- I'm Lovin' It!

A certain psychotic spammer (who shall remain nameless, as he LOVES the attention) who leaves inane spam unrelated to anything he's "commenting" on (he is too stupid, obviously, to actually engage in discussion-as many thoughtful and intelligent Christians do at atheist blogs- with those he disagrees with, so instead he posts pathetic and childish cut and paste work) is getting frustrated at being unable to post his moldy baloney here. All I can say is, I'm lovin' it!

I am thoroughly enjoying his anger. Frankly, it makes my day. But as he is a loser without a life (he must spend every free moment posting spam, or searching for places to post it) we here at Skeptical Eye are also performing a service to him by providing him with hours of time-killing activity to fill his otherwise pointless existence. It's a win-win situation!

After all, if he is so dumb that he wants to waste his time with his obsession, we the sane, theists (yes, you can be mistaken and sane) and atheists alike, should let him. So keep up the good work, you Dumb Moron. It amuses me.


I also laugh at his ignorance. He thinks deleting spam and/or moderating comments equals "censorship". In one of his recent (rejected-I'm lovin' it!) "comments" he wrote "funny... you think by censoring the TRUTH it goes away....". No, what I think is funny, is that the Dumbass Miscreant thinks there is any truth in anything he says. It's a laugh out loud riot, in fact! What I think is even funnier is that he equates deletion of his nonsensical BS with censorship. And I know he doesn't just mean censorship in some loose vernacular sense. No, he actually is so delusional that he believes he has a right to take a shit on someone else's property. I know this is what he thinks, because here is what he wrote at another blog:

did you ever hear of the 1st amendment? or will you censor me like
everyone you disagree with...

HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAW!

The first amendment has nothing to do with protecting a private website or blog from ugly graffiti, or exercising editorial control over what gets published. Fools are free to publish whatever they want on their own goddamned site, nowhere else unless given permission, either explicitly or implicitly. You have a right to take a dump on your own kitchen counter but not come into MY house and do your filthy disgusting business on my counter top. You can spray paint your own wall all you want, but you can't do the same to mine unless I allow you to. Only when the State forbids your opinions from being published anywhere at all is it censorship. Get the difference, you Deluded Monomaniac?

What our crazy imbecile is also too stupid to realize is that we at Skeptical Eye are doing the Lord's work. We oppose the State which is nothing but a substitute god for many, including, unfortunately, many "atheists" who have replaced a supernatural god with the god of government. By exposing the State for the false idol it is, we give support and room to other less real, but also less menacing, gods.

To the non-insane who read this, you may notice comment moderation is turned on at times. This is to prevent lunatic spammers from posting. We would only ask that you help make the insane spammers even more insanely mad by posting your comments, which, if they aren't spam, we promise to publish, even when you disagree with us strongly.

Thank you, and have a great day!

The most moronic theist story I've ever heard

Some girl posted this on my Facebook wall. I think it's the most laughably ridiculous (not to mention torturously long) piece of theist propaganda I've ever seen.

CLS: How the most religious states fare

The always-entertaining libertarian blogger on the evidence.

And goody, I live in one of the ten least religious states!

Is secularism harming society?

Just the opposite, of course.

From Dostoyevsky to right-wing commentator Ann Coulter we are warned of the perils of godlessness. "If there is no God," Dostoyevsky wrote, "everything is permitted." Coulter routinely attributes our nation's most intractable troubles to the moral vacuum of atheism.

But a growing body of research in what one sociologist describes as the "emerging field of secularity" is challenging long-held assumptions about the relationship of religion and effective governance.

In a paper posted recently on the online journal Evolutionary Psychology, independent researcher Gregory S. Paul reports a strong correlation within First World democracies between socioeconomic well-being and secularity. In short, prosperity is highest in societies where religion is practiced least.

Read the rest here.

The Anti-Dawkins Delusion

I'm currently about halfway through Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion. If it took me a while to get to it, it's because I suspected I would already be familiar with most of his arguments. And indeed I am. Yet it's nice to have all of them neatly summarized in one book.

The responses from Dawkins' critics (such as the laughably ineffective Dinesh D'Souza) posted online are truly amazing, even for the religious crowd. Almost none of them give any indication whatsoever that the critic actually read the book. The critics simply trot out the same old batch of arguments, apparently unaware that Dawkins has already addressed each and every one of them in exhausting detail. The negative reviews are written *by* people who have never read the book *for* people who have never read the book.

If you think Dawkins' answers are flawed, then fine. But at least acknowledge that Dawkins has addressed them in the book. Instead of responding to Dawkins' rebuttals to their arguments, theists merely repeat the exact same arguments. I'm not sure that I've come across a single intellectually honest review...at least not yet.

If theists were honest, they would simply say: "We're deeply uncomfortable with the book and its conclusions, therefore we hate it." Just skip any pretense of countering the arguments and cut to the chase, guys. It would be a refreshing change for once.

Another idiot prays to Jeebus while his daughter dies

He's being charged with homicide. Not that it'll bring his daughter back.

Hells yeah

I just bought my tickets to Mayhem Fest to see Slayer -- one of my favorite bands of all time. I'll be arriving early and staying there all day (12+ bands are playing, I believe). I'll also be bringing $200 to spend on T-shirts, beer, and junk food.

And if I run into wacky religious protestors like this schmuck or this wacko, I'll take a pic with my digital camera so we can all point and laugh. Some people just have no sense of fun.

Charlie Reese's most insane quote ever

I surprised some people once by saying that I would rather live in a neighborhood of Islamic fundamentalists than in a neighborhood of atheists and agnostics. That's true. You can count on the morality that Islam teaches; there is no morality for atheists and agnostics, except what they arbitrarily choose.

-"Religion essential"

Charlie does realize that the Islamic fundamentalists would immediately execute him for being an "infidel," right?

Conservapedia's hilarious entry on atheism

Here.

In a nutshell, we are: mass murdering Communists, charity-hating grumps, promiscuous, suicidal, mentally ill, immoral party animals (ok, maybe they're right about that last one).

And did you know that the "evolutionary position" is "losing public support?"

Funny stuff.

Is it safe to denigrate Muhammad yet?

Remember back when idiot Muslims rioted all over the place and killed people over a few (hilarious) cartoons mocking their stupid beliefs? Every media milquetoast was horrified of offending them. Even Comedy Central wouldn't touch it with a 20-foot pole (they censored South Park).

I, too, was offended by the anti-Islam cartoons. I was offended because they weren't sufficiently disrespectful to the laughingstock that is Islam.


These masterpieces are from a contest held at Right-Thinking a few years back. So what ever happened to the "denigrate Mohammed" movement? It's as if people just forgot about it, which is a shame, because there's a lot of comedic opportunity here.

Having a good laugh at Pascal's Wager

The evening prayer

It's happened to the best of us. You're sitting at the dinner table at Thanksgiving or something, and all of a sudden (you'd never have guessed it!) some douchebag suggest that thanks be given to the "lord" for the "bountiful harvest he has bestowed upon us."

I can't freaking stand it when this happens. If I object then I'll inevitably draw attention to myself, which I don't want to do. On the other hand, I hate participating in the idiocy of closing my hands and talking to myself. It's no different than giving "thanks" to Zeus, or to the stupid Wicca gods, or to the Mithras (the religion that was stolen from to invent Christianity).

Most of the time I'll just look down in shame, without closing my eyes or hands, and think about how silly the whole spectacle is. It's just flat-out bizarre, is it not? We're grown adults praying to dumbass folklore characters that a bunch of dickweed storytellers just pulled straight out of their asses a couple thousand (sometimes hundred) years ago.

But we're the strange and unreasonable ones! Crazy, man.

Here's a few things we can do when theists demand we stop eating for their inane "prayers:"

1) Sigh heavily and roll your eyes through every word of the prayer. Stare at your watch even if the prayer is extremely short. Yawn loudly. Do a "bullshit" cough in the middle of it. (Back in high school, my brother and I did this kind of stuff all the time. It was very entertaining.)

2) Quietly begin eating during the ridiculous "prayer." If there's any food on other people's plates that you want, now is the time to load up. Replace the food with the stuff you don't want.

3) Participate in the prayer, but secretly acknowledge, deep down, that the prayer is really going to George Carlin.

4) Take a "bathroom break" before the prayer, in hopes that they'll be done blathering by the time you get back. Unfortunately, sometimes the numbnuts will actually wait for you, then stare at you when you return. This can be a big pickle. It can be solved by saying that you already prayed on the can.

5) De-convert your family (fat chance!) and never go through the ordeal again. It's the best, but the most unlikely solution.

Socialism and Religion: the similarities that can't be denied

It is a great irony that socialists hate religion, considering that socialism has all the defining characteristics of a religion. Let's have some fun examining the obvious similarities.

1) Socialism and religion are both completely unproven dogmas that have zero actual evidence to back them up. In fact, there is plenty of evidence against both.

Therefore, belief in religion or socialism can only come from completely blind, irrational faith. The faith that theists and socialists have in their doctrines is very strong, bordering on hysterical. Why is it so strong? Because the idea that they may be devoting their lives to a stupid pipe dream (cough) is too much for them to handle. They don't want anyone blowing on the house of cards that is their belief structure.

2) Socialism and religion both promise that we can eventually reach a state of "heaven." And in the process, they've both brought us hell on Earth. Socialists and theists have yet to apologize for all the atrocities their belief systems have generated. If you point to the Soviet Union, socialists will answer that it wasn't "real" socialism. If you point to hideous rights violations in Middle Eastern countries, you'll be told that "real" Islam is a "peaceful" religion, despite all the evidence to the contrary.

3) Socialism and religion both maintain that everything would be chaos without central planning running the show. But in reality, neither the economy nor the universe could ever be "planned." Both are just the result of a ton of spontaneous shit happening. This lack of control horrifies both socialists and theists.

4) Socialists and theists both believe that those of us who simply laugh at their dumb beliefs are evil and working against all that is good and right. We are trapped in the hands of Satan, or in the pay of the "capitalist class" (defined as anyone who works for a living).

5) Socialism and religion both fulfill a similar psychological need: the need to believe in a "higher power," or the "common good." Neither exist, but they are both comforting to believe in. Comforting lies are always far more pleasant than the truth.

What Is Theism?

Educating Dan The Educator

An atheist responds to a typically uniformed (or lying) theist:

As an atheist all my adult life, I can tell you exactly what atheism is: It is the lack of belief in any sort of theism. It is simply the response to theism of saying, "I don't believe it." It's the rejection of the belief in any god or gods. That's all it is. It's knowing one doesn't have to be locked into a god-belief, and opting out (or never getting sucked into it to begin with). It's being free from the addictive superstitions of religion, seeing that religion and morality are two entirely separate things. There is absolutely no call for an atheist to "explain" themselves — the burden of proof is entirely upon one who presents something as true; i. e. the theist. Theists make the most outrageous claims, without any proof that stands up to close examination. Atheists don't believe them.

The Mr. Valenti she is responding to made the following idiotic statements (my comments follow each of Sky-Daddy loving Dan's paragraphs):

The author fails to offer compelling evidence that the "no God" argument is worthy of being taken seriously. This has always been atheism's great polemic weakness. Having to argue the existence of an alleged non-existence, it must deny God by referring to God. The poor atheist must accept this on faith and hope others will do the same.

I had to read the above twice to really believe someone could write something so shockingly devoid of reason and logic. Keep in mind this arrogant jackass is "A writer, broadcaster, and educator" and " the author of 12 books" (see here).

Let's educate "educator" Dan Valenti. First, no evidence is needed not to believe in something for which no evidence has been provided. What evidence can Mr. Valenti produce to show why his non-belief in Islam is justified (I'm assuming he is not a Muslim)? If he does not believe that the Koran is God's word and Muhammad is his prophet then Mr. Valenti is just going to have to deny Allah by referring to Allah. Poor non-Muslim Dan Valenti must accept this nonexistence of Allah on faith and hope others will do the same.

Is it fair to use such an argument against Mr. Valenti for his failure to see the truth of Islam? Of course not, yet he uses the same argument against atheists, who do not assert anything when it comes to gods, but simply ask theists to provide the evidence that justifies believing in invisible supernatural beings. I'm confident Dan "The Educator" Valenti would expect Muslims to provide real evidence that their beliefs are true before he adopts their religion as his own.

May I ask just what it is Dan Valenti thinks atheists have "faith" in? Does Mr. Valenti think it takes faith not to believe in fairies, bigfoot, leprecauns and other numerous magical beings that some claim exist? If I told Dan the Educator that an invisible magic elephant occupies my living room, would he need "faith" NOT to believe it? Yet such inane, illogical reasoning is typical of the god-believer. No wonder atheists think religous belief is nonsense, when even "educated" theists can't defend it without resorting to logical fallicies.

More of Dan "The 'Educator'" Valenti's self-refuting words:

It's easy to show how atheism unravels as an exercise in logic. On the basis of his own lack of experience, and discounting the overwhelming evidence of historical human experience, the atheist deductively concludes there is no God then advances that faulty major premise as an article of faith, one that dooms subsequent reasoning. However valid, the argument cannot be true.

Since Mr. Valenti has no experience of being a Muslim, I guess he is discounting the overwhelming evidence of the historical Muslim experience, deductively concluding that Allah does not exist. He must also believe that the Sun orbits the earth, as the overwhelming evidence of human experience proved that it did for centuries. And please, what "article of faith" is he referring to? Does he hold it as an article of faith that Zeus and Thor do not exist?


The nonsense continues:

Truth, however, is the atheist's first victim. Instead of the wondrous presence of the universe and everything in it, which by moral certainty we know exists, the nonbeliever presents life as an empty, uncaused desert populated by a human species that...is prone to savagery.

Assertions but no evidence, the lazy theist's stock in trade, is the best that this "educator" can come up with. The truth has always been the victim of mysticism and superstition. The way of religion, with its elevation of faith over observation and reason, and its consequently magical view of the universe, only leads to false beliefs. But mystical Dan states that truth is the victim of atheism, in the same way, I suppose, as nonbelief in astrology makes truth a victim. He further states the obvious and makes the daring claim that the universe exists and is a wondrous place, as indeed it is, but I've never known an atheist to deny this. The facts are quite contrary to Danny Boy's (he has the philosophy of a child, so I think boy is an apt description, of his mind if not his body) moronic view, for it is the theist who ultimately must deny the universe and existence its rightful place of primacy and substitute it and give its glory to an invisible, imagined super-being that the boys and girls call "god." Theism in all its forms denigrates this world and this life and instead worships the unknowable. It says that there is another, better world to come, and leads people to become disillusioned with the wonders of reality and instead long for those imaginary streets of gold that exist nowhere but in the fevered dreams of the Dan Valenti's of the world. Mr. Valenti projects his own hatred of the real world onto the atheist, making the nonbeliever into the one who sees life as empty, when nothing like that follows from rejection of god-belief. It is Danny Boy who thinks this life and universe would be empty without his sky-daddy, and so accuses the atheist of holding to such a view. But of course it is the theist who distorts the truth of the wonders and fulfillment of a real life in a real world, and who can't see how anyone else can see it differently without also playing the theistic game of sky-daddy (tyrant) make-believe.

More from Mr. B.S.:

Of course atheism is growing, but not because adherents find the message captivating. Rather, they embrace your position because it avoids the duty of finding out firsthand about God, a lifetime effort that finds no place in an Instant Age where attention spans die on the keyboards of high tech. In the era of surfing the net on a computer while text messaging on a phone while listening to an iPod while watching TV, the capacity for sustained awareness and focus spirituality presumes has little chance.

I would like to ask Sky-Daddy Dan (that has a nice ring to it, but maybe I should say Sky-Daddy freak Dan) how he gained this "firsthand" knowledge of "God". It doesn't take a lifetime to know that the Sun and moon exist, or for you to confirm that another person exists. I can even, without confirming directly through years of investigation and experiment, come to near certainty of the reality of most any fact in at most a matter of weeks by reviewing what experts in a particular field have discovered. That Danny Boy Valenti states it takes a lifetime of sustained awareness of his invisible magical world to discover its "truth" only confirms the imaginary and nonexistent nature of it.


The Sky-Daddy Freak continues with his unrelenting torrent of dog crap:

There's no such thing as honest atheism. Those who openly declare God doesn't exist stand indicted by their own pointing fingers...they unreasonably and illogically embrace an irrational assertion they have no way of proving.

How many times, oh Danny Boy, do atheists have to explain to you something you should have firmly grasped at least by the time you graduated from high school? Its called the BURDEN OF PROOF, and it falls to the one making the assertion, i.e., the one claiming something (such as that an invisible all-powerful Sky-Daddy exists). There is no obligation to "prove" that something doesn't exist unless that something has already been proven to exist. Please "prove" that my invisible magic elephant doesn't exist. Can't do it? Then by your own words you are "irrational". But then, astute observers have always known that theists are usually hypocrites and never consistently follow their strange and incoherent reasoning.


Educator Dan must have been trained at the Goebbels school of propaganda (if you tell a lie often enough it becomes "the truth", especially when you accuse your opponent of doing exactly what you're doing) in order to produce this next sentence:

Atheists, as it turns out, believe things much more fantastic and absurd than those they mock.

And what things, dear Danny Boy, do atheists mock? Dying and rising god-men? The efficacy of petitionary prayer (no study has ever confirmed that prayer is anything more than talking to oneself, and in fact the studies that have been done show it has no effect at all)? That flying planes into buildings will earn you an immediate place in heaven and the services of 72 virgins? Yes, only a Sky-Daddy freak could believe it is more absurd to deny such things than to embrace them. Thank you, Educator Dan, for enlightening us all.