David Heddle #fundie

David Heddle #fundie scienceblogs.com

I did not write, anywhere, that you cannot make a rational case for Christianity--of course you can. Many have done so with great skill. So I do not think people like Strobel or McDowell are foolish--not in the least. What I actually wrote, to paraphrase, is that no atheist will be persuaded by their rational arguments. Apart from being reborn, he will reject any such argument, and attribute that rejection, incorrectly, to his own intellect.

If, say you, are reborn, then you will begin to see the rationality of Christianity. Perhaps a book such as Stobel's will be the means by which the gospel taks hold of you--but without being reborn, you'll always consider it foolishness.

And there is no contradiction--moral inability to choose God in our natural, fallen state is not an excuse--we are commanded to choose God The unhappy fact that, apart from God's first choosing us, we cannot is our dilemma, not our excuse.

13 comments

old comment by Mister Spak

"I did not write, anywhere, that you cannot make a rational case for Christianity--of course you can. Many
have done so with great skill." Somehow this writing never makes it onto the internet. What I actually wrote, to paraphrase, is that no atheist will be persuaded by their rational arguments. How would you know this, if you have never produced one? " he will reject any such argument, and attribute that rejection, incorrectly, to his own intellect." No I will attrribute the rejection to your lack of basic sense. "If, say you, are reborn, then you will begin to see the rationality of Christianity." If you can somehow turn me back into a baby, the yes I will believe any rediculous thing you tell me.

old comment by Papabear

"I did not write, anywhere, that you cannot make a rational case for Christianity--of course you can."
No, one cannot. The trinity is down-right irrational. God having his own son, who is himself his father, killed to atone to the father, whom he is, for the sins of the father's special creations, created in the very image of the father, is patently irrational. Creation of the universe in 6 days is irrational. And, on and on and on... "Many have done so with great skill." Many have claimed that they have, but none has actually done it. "So I do not think people like Strobel or McDowell are foolish--not in the least." I do. I think they are both delusional and/or lying sacks of shit. "What I actually wrote, to paraphrase, is that no atheist will be persuaded by their rational arguments." No reasonable person will be persuaded by those attempts at cogent pro-Christian agruments. Have you even read Stobel and McDowell's books? "Apart from being reborn, he will reject any such argument, and attribute that rejection, incorrectly, to his own intellect." So, until I "drink the Kool-Aid" and buy into your delusion, I won't believe... your delusion. My intellect has always done well by me. Christianity has never done well by me. I'm going with my intellect. Too bad about you, though. "If, say you, are reborn, then you will begin to see the rationality of Christianity." See above. "Perhaps a book such as Stobel's will be the means by which the gospel taks hold of you--but without being reborn, you'll always consider it foolishness." According to you, it seems the main effect of being reborn is to lose one's ability and desire to think critically. I'll pass, thank you. "And there is no contradiction--moral inability to choose God in our natural, fallen state is not an excuse--we are commanded to choose God" I don't have an inability to choose. Choosing was easy. God is a fiction, therefore, I choose my intellect. "The unhappy fact that, apart from God's first choosing us, we cannot is our dilemma, not our excuse." So, you admit that your situation with your "God" is unhappy. That my be a sign of progress... or not.

old comment by David D.G.

Tigerdreams, he gets even worse later on in that thread:
"SLC, Come now, where did I claim "the bible nowhere violates physical laws?" (By which, I gather you mean, that I have claimed that nowehere in scripture is there described a violation of physical laws.) If I did, show me and I'll retract. What I have claimed: "the bible is compatible with science." A miracle, by definition, violates physical laws. So it would be crass heresy for me to state that the bible never describes violations of physical laws. I still think you are trying to trick me!" In other words, he now claims that miracles are compatible with science! As Noah said to God: "Riiiiiight." And then there's this bit, which recaps the part that is the original post here: "Jason, Yes of course I understand your exasperation; its all too familiar from my own life. God has given us free will, but the problem is we are slaves to our desires. We will choose exactly what we want most at any given moment, and our predicament is that fallen man does not want God--which is why, unless he is changed, he will not choose him. It is indeed the most horrible of situations: moral responsibility coupled with moral inability. The moral incapability being that our free will never chooses what we don't want, and sadly our desires have been horribly corrupted. And which is exactly why we need a savior. It is quite clear we cannot save ourselves. The good news, of course, is that if you recognize this predicament, if you recognize the need for a savior--well then, you have been born again, and the inexorable has already begun. Jesus came not for the well, but the sick." Jason (Rosenhouse, the guy whose blog this is) does a wonderful job of pointing out the constant contradictions in David Heddle's arguments in this thread, too (e.g., stating that we have both moral responsibility and moral incapability, which are, morally speaking, mutually exclusive). But I'm sure Heddle will scarcely even notice, and will produce more weasel words shortly to convince himself he's won the battle. ~David D.G.

old comment by Maronan

I did not write, anywhere, that you cannot make a rational case for Christianity--of course you can.

Yes, it is theoretically possible to make a rational case for Christianity. Obviously, it may be a bit tricky to explain how we're responsible for the actions of "ancestors" who never existed, or how 1 = 3, but you can always give it a shot. Since I can't prove the existence or nature of anything outside of my own consciousness, I must admit that the truth of Christianity is possible, just extremely unlikely. If you can shoulder the humoungous burden of proof, I'll believe you but don't expect a half-assed excuse or weak pseudo-explanation to convince me.

Many have done so with great skill.

A great many people think they've done so, and have convinced themselves that they've done so. Nobody actually has. Or, at minimum, nobody has proven Christianity and told anyone about it.

So I do not think people like Strobel or McDowell are foolish--not in the least.

I can't call Strobel or McDowell foolish, since I haven't read their works. If I did read their attempts to prove Christianity, I suspect that I might find them foolish but maybe I'll be surprised. Would you care to publish them online? Actually, they already did make their works freely available, right? They certainly weren't in it for the money, right?

What I actually wrote, to paraphrase, is that no atheist will be persuaded by their rational arguments.

I get it. You have no evidence, so you claim that you've already proven your point and your opponents just won't accept it. An ad hominen - "you're all just irrational" - is not a substitute for evidence, just so you know. Actually, this assertion is not an ad hominem. If all atheists were irrational, they would reject his evidence; it's relevant to the issue at hand, so it's not an ad hominem. Of course, your assertion that "all atheists are irrational" is a rather weighty one, and we all know the rules regarding extraordinary claims and the amount of evidence required to substantiate them.

Apart from being reborn, he will reject any such argument...

Apart from being "reborn?" Excuse me for a second. [Acme Translator is starting up.]

Machine translations are imperfect. Single-tired-person translations may be equally flawed. Fundiebabble-to-English translator now engaged. Translation: You will never understand or know the evidence for Christianity unless you become a Christian. You must believe in God for no reason, without evidence, but I promise that you will find evidence for Christianity if you are already a Christian.

Oh. I see.

...and attribute that rejection, incorrectly, to his own intellect.

If I'm not an atheist because of my intellect, then why am I an atheist?

If, say you, are reborn, then you will begin to see the rationality of Christianity.

"If you agree that we're right, you'll start to think we're right." I actually agree here, to some extent. People who constantly say something feel inclined to believe it themselves. If you do a very boring task, then tell many other people that the task was actually exciting, you will start to believe you enjoyed the task. (Festinger and Carlsmith, 1959) Of course, most people wouldn't constantly say they were Christian when they weren't, making it a moot point. Hopefully, I don't need to remind you that believing in Christianity doesn't make it right.

Perhaps a book such as Stobel's will be the means by which the gospel taks hold of you...

I doubt that there are any rational atheists who are convinced by Strobel. I'm guessing that Strobel's books are just more crappy apologetics preached to the choir somewhat effective at preventing Christians from deconverting, but worthless for convincing rational people to become Christian. Of course, if Strobel really isn't just in it for the money, and actually has published his work online, then give me the url and I'll find out for myself!

...but without being reborn, you'll always consider it foolishness.

"I can preach it, but only the choir will believe me!" Look, insisting that atheists just won't listen to the evidence may help reduce your own cognitive dissonance, but it's not an argument, and it won't convince us. Look, here's an argument for you to consider: If atheists really won't be persuaded, and will always consider pro-Christian books to be "foolishness," then we obviously won't convert, so shut up and leave us alone! The fact that you keep preaching to us implies that you really do believe that we'll listen to evidence or that you are having problems with the evidence, and don't want to consider it for fear of being proven wrong.

And there is no contradiction--moral inability to choose God in our natural, fallen state is not an excuse--we are commanded to choose God

Hmmm, we're morally unable to "choose" (believe in?) God, but we have to? We must "choose" God, and the fact that we can't is no excuse? No, wait, we're morally unable to "choose" God, but we are commanded to do so, whether it's moral or not? I agree. There's no contradiction here. There's no coherent point, and it really doesn't make any sense, but there's no contradiction.

The unhappy fact that, apart from God's first choosing us, we cannot is our dilemma, not our excuse.

The gibberish is choking my Acme Translator! There are too many definitions for the word "choose" here! What exactly does "choose" mean? Believe in? Ally with? Obey orders from? Attribute some form of value or importance to? Some time ago, I was given many tests in school, where answers had to be written out. If I didn't know an answer, I would write something illegible, hoping the teacher would "see" the correct answer in a Rorschach-like way or give me the benefit of the doubt. In all likelihood, the teacher simply marked them wrong if they were impossible to understand. Your statements work the same way. I will not assume them to be correct because they don't make sense.

David Heddle #fundie scienceblogs.com

13 comments

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