Me: “I don’t believe anymore.”
“Why?”
Me: “Well, many reasons. Since you asked, one would be X.”
Followed by extremely long summary of why X is, in fact, incorrect, list of apologists who’ve covered this topic, suggestion of a few older Christians this person knows that I should schedule time with, etc.
I admit I haven’t read all the comments yet, I apologize if this has been covered, but I’m curious about this. Do you give specific evidential reasons? Have you tried giving a very broad general answer that is obviously non-assailable? Something like “I have more evidence for my physical father than for a heavenly one, and I feel that this should be the other way around if he exists and loves me as much as my physical father does.” The one absolute undeniable fact about God is that he does not show up in the real world to interact with people. If he did then none of this religion stuff would be necessary.
I’d be fairly surprised if that hasn’t been covered by most reasonably clever apologists. The argument I get by pattern-matching it against my internal model of a Christian apologist goes something like “physical evidence is in itself evidence of a creator, and why yes I haven’t bothered to think of a First Cause other than the Christian God”, which of course leads immediately to further questions, but I’m sure there are more sophisticated ones out there.
Really, the problem here isn’t lack of explanation; there’s a two-thousand-year-old history of Christian theological explanations for just about everything. The problem is that those explanations are unconvincing to outside observers, but seem very convincing to insiders thanks to motivated cognition; I’ve long since lost track of the number of times I’ve been told to read Thomas Aquinas.
I’d be fairly surprised if that hasn’t been covered by most reasonably clever apologists.
You bring up a fantastic point. Everything is covered by clever apologists. This is why I said HERE that believers don’t seem to be bothered by anything.
I brought up the infamous prayer study to a believer and she said that one “couldn’t put god in a test tube.” I asked if the study had turned out quite positive for prayer’s efficacy if she would have stood by it and, perhaps obviously, she said (emphatically), “No.” I highly doubt this, especially since people push Lourdes Miracles as worthy of investigation for the purposes of building belief. I don’t see much difference between the two except that in one, people were expectantly watching and in the other, they weren’t.
...there’s a two-thousand-year-old history of Christian theological explanations for just about everything.
Yeah, good point. Perhaps I should resolve to let the stream of rationality erode this rock over the next two-thousand years rather than worrying about the fact that I think people are wrong now.
In general, believers will always rationalize whatever they observe as what their religion predicts they should observe. They function on the assumption that it all adds up to normality, so the “sensible” interpretation is always the one that explains what they actually see. In the event that they can be swayed by evidence at all, it’s usually because they don’t know what reality says, and so they’re forced to draw upon the most reasonable interpretation of their religion without reference to the data. This way, when reality contradicts their interpretations, they know that the most obvious interpretation of their religion doesn’t explain reality.
Wow—missed this comment! I do tend to give various evidential reasons, but when discussing this topic at all (like Nornagest suggests), there’s always an out. PoE, why religious diversity happens to be so geographical, etc. There’s always an answer.
When I suggested to a theology professor (that a friend suggested I speak to) that I found it odd that if there was one true god, the world wouldn’t have figured it out by now, he responded in a completely unsurprised way and simply said that Jesus never foretold that Christianity would be a world-wide religion.
In fact, he said, the picture of the world is exactly how he would have expected. Yeah right. Anyway, there does tend to be a response to everything.
Re. god not showing up… he won’t override your free will, or he does but you need “eyes of faith” to see it, or it’s because your heart is hardened.
Perhaps this reply has helped me understand why the best mode of response is just not to engage. As long as there’s nothing that would change a believer’s mind… there’s nothing that would change a believer’s mind.
And if there is something that will… it probably won’t be from me, or at least not in direct conversation.
The ticket is probably to say something like you’ve said, but then simply “broken record” the rest of the conversation with, “My research has convinced me. I’m still open, but I believe my current stance to be rationally reached and based on a wide range of currently available evidence.”
I admit I haven’t read all the comments yet, I apologize if this has been covered, but I’m curious about this. Do you give specific evidential reasons? Have you tried giving a very broad general answer that is obviously non-assailable? Something like “I have more evidence for my physical father than for a heavenly one, and I feel that this should be the other way around if he exists and loves me as much as my physical father does.” The one absolute undeniable fact about God is that he does not show up in the real world to interact with people. If he did then none of this religion stuff would be necessary.
I’d be fairly surprised if that hasn’t been covered by most reasonably clever apologists. The argument I get by pattern-matching it against my internal model of a Christian apologist goes something like “physical evidence is in itself evidence of a creator, and why yes I haven’t bothered to think of a First Cause other than the Christian God”, which of course leads immediately to further questions, but I’m sure there are more sophisticated ones out there.
Really, the problem here isn’t lack of explanation; there’s a two-thousand-year-old history of Christian theological explanations for just about everything. The problem is that those explanations are unconvincing to outside observers, but seem very convincing to insiders thanks to motivated cognition; I’ve long since lost track of the number of times I’ve been told to read Thomas Aquinas.
You bring up a fantastic point. Everything is covered by clever apologists. This is why I said HERE that believers don’t seem to be bothered by anything.
I brought up the infamous prayer study to a believer and she said that one “couldn’t put god in a test tube.” I asked if the study had turned out quite positive for prayer’s efficacy if she would have stood by it and, perhaps obviously, she said (emphatically), “No.” I highly doubt this, especially since people push Lourdes Miracles as worthy of investigation for the purposes of building belief. I don’t see much difference between the two except that in one, people were expectantly watching and in the other, they weren’t.
Yeah, good point. Perhaps I should resolve to let the stream of rationality erode this rock over the next two-thousand years rather than worrying about the fact that I think people are wrong now.
In general, believers will always rationalize whatever they observe as what their religion predicts they should observe. They function on the assumption that it all adds up to normality, so the “sensible” interpretation is always the one that explains what they actually see. In the event that they can be swayed by evidence at all, it’s usually because they don’t know what reality says, and so they’re forced to draw upon the most reasonable interpretation of their religion without reference to the data. This way, when reality contradicts their interpretations, they know that the most obvious interpretation of their religion doesn’t explain reality.
Wow—missed this comment! I do tend to give various evidential reasons, but when discussing this topic at all (like Nornagest suggests), there’s always an out. PoE, why religious diversity happens to be so geographical, etc. There’s always an answer.
When I suggested to a theology professor (that a friend suggested I speak to) that I found it odd that if there was one true god, the world wouldn’t have figured it out by now, he responded in a completely unsurprised way and simply said that Jesus never foretold that Christianity would be a world-wide religion.
In fact, he said, the picture of the world is exactly how he would have expected. Yeah right. Anyway, there does tend to be a response to everything.
Re. god not showing up… he won’t override your free will, or he does but you need “eyes of faith” to see it, or it’s because your heart is hardened.
Perhaps this reply has helped me understand why the best mode of response is just not to engage. As long as there’s nothing that would change a believer’s mind… there’s nothing that would change a believer’s mind.
And if there is something that will… it probably won’t be from me, or at least not in direct conversation.
The ticket is probably to say something like you’ve said, but then simply “broken record” the rest of the conversation with, “My research has convinced me. I’m still open, but I believe my current stance to be rationally reached and based on a wide range of currently available evidence.”