Theism VS Atheism 1on1 Debate COMMENTS

[braxhunt]

I would just like to make a point about Bart Ehrman since my personal friend Mike Licona has debated him. If you read the book you cited he builds his case on 4 or 5 supposed "mistakes, or alterations" to the bibilical text. However, 1) Bibles almost universally put the passages in question in brackets and note on the page that these were not in the very early manuscripts. 2) None of the passages he cite make the slightest difference theologically or doctrinally speaking. He makes it sound as though this is some well kept secret that the church doesn't want you to know about, but as I said almost every Bible I have, and I have a bunch, make it well known.

Also, evangelicals absolutely do not universally believe the same view of interpretation. In fact I just read 4 scholarly works by conservative evangelicals on the bibliology and none of them were as you characterized. BTW, you did not directly claim that the evangelicals believe universally in the same view of innerancy, I'm setting the record strait.

[i_am_i]

I appreciate your willingness to talk about it, but it (evolution) just has zero relevance to the question of God.

Braxhunt, I agree with you that evolution has no relevance to the question of God. I get impatient when it's brought up in that context.
What, then, does have relevance to the question of God, in your opinion?

[iNow]

Just to be pedantic, evolutions DOES have relevance to the question, as it can help explain the commonality of belief in deities and the ways neurocortical mechanisms have been hijacked by religion.

[LoneMateria]

I would just like to make a point about Bart Ehrman since my personal friend Mike Licona has debated him. If you read the book you cited he builds his case on 4 or 5 supposed "mistakes, or alterations" to the bibilical text. However, 1) Bibles almost universally put the passages in question in brackets and note on the page that these were not in the very early manuscripts. 2) None of the passages he cite make the slightest difference theologically or doctrinally speaking. He makes it sound as though this is some well kept secret that the church doesn't want you to know about, but as I said almost every Bible I have, and I have a bunch, make it well known.

I've read the book and he uses more then 4 or 5.  The book has 7 chapters where he cites multiple examples in each chapter though a few he refers back to in different chapters to reinforce points.  Which bibles?  I don't see them in the King James I have or the New International Version (Not really a "new" book It says copyright 1984).  That 2nd one is wrong some of the references he makes changes the character of Jesus like in Mark 1:41 when he heals the leper, Jesus heals the man then gets angry at him.  In Mark 3:5 Jesus again gets angry at a person he heals.  But not only that 2 of the 4 Gospels (I can't remember which ones off the top of my head) had endings added to them.  Early Christians used to change texts to fight those who criticized their beliefs.  Texts were changed based on popular belief and sometimes on hatred of competing religions.  There were wide variations of the bible, and we have surviving texts of people openly criticizing early Christian beliefs and people responding not by denying the accusations but trying to spin their alterations of the texts as a good thing.

I'm going off on a tangent so i'm going to stop.  Basically since Ehrman was a biblical scholar his book was aimed at saying even if the original message was divinely inspired or written by God that the alterations that early Christians made of the bible (and even when it was picked up by monks and professional scribes) whether on accident or otherwise has been so distorted that we no longer know the original message.  I think he makes a good case and it was a good book.  But he isn't aimed at discrediting any one particular thing in the bible so included in his book are works by "heretics" like Marcion and some writings by people that openly criticized Christianity, and defended it.  If you haven't read it, its a good read whether you agree with his conclusion or not.  

Also, evangelicals absolutely do not universally believe the same view of interpretation. In fact I just read 4 scholarly works by conservative evangelicals on the bibliology and none of them were as you characterized. BTW, you did not directly claim that the evangelicals believe universally in the same view of innerancy, I'm setting the record strait.

My apologies i'm under a misconception.  I think I meant to paint Evangelical Christians with the same brush which is a poor mistake on my part.  Is there a special ... denomination or classification you give people who do believe in the absolute inerrancy of the bible?

Now I can't help but notice you didn't answer my previous questions.  I'd like to discuss why evolution doesn't have any bearing on if a god exists or not.  Apparently i'm in disagreement with several people.  Perhaps some discussion will get me to change my view or vice versa ^_^

[Recusant]

...evolution DOES have relevance to the question, as it can help explain the commonality of belief in deities...

Indeed.  There is in fact a recent study which seems to provide some evidence related to this very subject. I started this thread several months ago referring to the article linked above.   Interestingly, from what I read in the piece in The Independent, one of the lead scientists in the study (at least the mouthpiece for it here) is a theist.  In fact he seems to give indication in his quotes that he thinks the results can be read as favorable to the theist position.

 

"When we have incomplete knowledge of the world around us, it offers us the opportunities to believe in God. When we don't have a scientific explanation for something, we tend to rely on supernatural explanations," said Professor Grafman, who believes in God. "Maybe obeying supernatural forces that we had no knowledge of made it easier for religious forms of belief to emerge."

I have my doubts that Grafman is justified in taking the results the way he does.  I think it's actually a very interesting example of a theist scientist doing a fair job of taking evidence that on it's face seems contradictory to his position and turning it into proof for his belief.

[iNow]

Right on.  Thanks for sharing that.


Here's some more on the topic of our evolved tendency to believe in deities, and how religion tends to hijack our neocortical mechanisms.

[youtube:17vuoxpc]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iMmvu9eMrg[/youtube:17vuoxpc]

If you understand the psychology of [why we crave] the Big Mac meal, you understand the psychology of religion. We evolved adaptations for things that were crucial and rare... the sugars of ripe fruit... fat of lean game meat... for salt... those were crucial adaptations in our past. And now the modern world creates a novel form of it that comes from those adaptations, but hijacks them with super-normal stimuli... not ripe fruit, but a coca-cola... not lean game meat, but fat hamburger and french fries soaked in meat juice... and it creates these super-normal stimuli, but they're based on ancient adaptations.

Let me take you on a bit of a tour of a few of these cognitive mechanisms.

The first is Decoupled Cognition... <more at the video>

A few additional quotes from the above video:

Children know more than they learn... We come into the world with these systems already in place. It is natural, from very early on, to think of "disembodied minds." Now, you can flip it around and you can understand why this is crucial. If I required a body [to be physically present] to think about [someone elses] mind, that's a real liability... It's burdensome... I need to be able to think about somebody, and think about what's going on inside of them, and what their intentions or goals might be... without them present.

Another thing about children is that they are causal determinists... What does this mean? Well... any mind that is oriented toward seeing intentions... and desires and goals... is gonna "over-read" purpose. If you ask a child, "What are birds for?" [that child will respond with something like,] "To sing." [If you ask a child] "What are rivers for?" [that child will respond with comments such as,] "for boats to float on." [If you ask a child,] "What are rocks for?" [that child will respond with something like,] "for animals to scratch themselves."

We over-read causality... we WAY over-read causality and purpose.

He argues how our complex social interactions with unseen others (think visualization and mental rehearsal) are just one step away from communicating with a dead ancestor and one step further to communicating to a god or gods. He also illuminates our susceptibility to optical and other illusions, and how these same "gap filling" tendencies in the brain lend a giant opening for supernatural figures. It's called intuitive reasoning, and it underlines the essence of religious ideas.



Additionally:

http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/exchange/node/1581

Boyer does not make an attempt to take an atheist stance and explain away God as a figment of our imaginations, but rather to explain why we believe what we believe and why some beliefs are so persistent.
<...>
The other problem with this account of the origin of religionâ€"where religion is used as an explanation for natural eventsâ€"is that religious concepts tend to make things more mysterious and complicated than other types of explanations.
<...>
Boyer discusses specific properties of the human mind, for example, how we produce our inferences, and how they affect our inference systems and our templates to generate different kinds of information about religion. He also discusses which concepts are most likely to be adapted and which ones are not.
<...>
I think one of the most important concepts that Boyer covered was that diversity can rise out of simplicity. Here we have very simple templates about the way the world works, and we have inference systems that help us piece together new bits of information and create new information. Using these inference systems, we are able to build up a more complex body of knowledge about the supernatural, thus creating very complicated religious concepts from very simple beginnings. Just as different varieties of atoms can arise from a few changes in electrons and just as complex macromolecules and organisms can be built from different arrangements, so too can complex ideas and supernatural agents be built from humble templates.

I also found Boyers’ explanations of the way the human brain works very revealing.

There's a lot more meat on this bone, but it may warrant its own thread.  Enjoy.