Buddha Punk Robot Monks wrote:A more nuanced reading would notice that the thesis indicts philosophy of religion in general, arguing that the New Atheists share these philosophical misconceptions with philosophers of religion:Indeed, these confused assumptions are constitutive of one of the dominant approaches to the study of religion in contemporary philosophy. It is my claim that both the New Atheists and their counterparts in philosophy of religion fail to recognize, respect, and do justice to the variety and complexity of religious phenomena. Through a close investigation of the conceptual confusions of the New Atheists and their relationship to contemporary philosophy of religion, I hope to clear a few persistent conceptual tangles and point to a more intellectually rigorous approach to understanding religion. 3
How vague. Who are these "counterparts in philosophy"? Moreover, why does this apply to the atheists in this thread? I'm fairly sure Richard Dawkins doesn't post in NSG, so why is this relevant?
Buddha Punk Robot Monks wrote:Indeed I did. Conclusion:The New Atheists have certainly had an impact on public discussions of religious belief iN the United States and Great Britian. But once their claims about the nature of religious belief are examined more closely, one sees that their veracity sheds more heat than light on the question of the nature of religious belief. For all their rhetoric and animus, they actually provide little in the way of substantive criticism of the nature of religious belief.
And the conclusion is wrong.
Buddha Punk Robot Monks wrote:How? He argues for the selectivity in Dawkins interpretation of religious discourse and also that he fundamentally misunderstands religion and sees it as an interpretive alternative to science, which it is not.
Does Richard Dawkins post on this forum?
No?
Then it's a useless source.
Buddha Punk Robot Monks wrote:No because if you fail to understand the nuances of how religious people think about God, and/or don't represent such a God accurately, including all points of philosophical and theological data, then you cannot reasonably make an argument for such a God's malevolence.
Way to completely ignore my post. We aren't arguing about what theists believe. We understand what theists believe about God, and that's precisely why we are arguing against that belief. I'm not sure why this is so difficult for you to understand.
Buddha Punk Robot Monks wrote:It's classical example of coming to an argument with an agenda and seeing what your want and only using those specific data points which support your argument. If more research was done into Christian philosophy and theology you will see that Christianity has already answered this question years ago and, indeed, continues to do so (especially with the historical-critical method). And yet none of this research has been represented in this thread.
Except, no. We came into this thread making the claim that God is malevolent. We seek to support our claim. That is indeed an agenda. But you however, refuse to attack our argument. You refuse to address anything we've stated, and have instead dismissed every single point brought up while screaming, "NEW ATHEISTS SUCK! NEW ATHEISTS SUCK!" You've been the only one so far committing intellectual dishonesty by pretending that because we happen to live in the modern era, and are Atheists, that we are all followers of Dawkins.
I honestly lol'd about the "Christianity answered this question years ago." And we've already refuted that answer years ago. Who gives a shit? We're on a debate forum. You debate. You don't fling shit at the other side screaming they're stupid and calling them thinly veiled insults in the form of, "NEW ATHEISTS!"
Buddha Punk Robot Monks wrote:You are free to make bad arguments based on caricatures of a God that does not exist. This, however, is not good reasoning.
Stop. Just stop with this straw man.
Buddha Punk Robot Monks wrote:So by not bothering to understand the cultural, political and historical context behind such Texts of Terrors your interpretation does indeed become quite literalist.
And you've still not backed this up. At all.
Buddha Punk Robot Monks wrote:And representing God in a way nobody believes in is not a misrepresentation of theism?
Nope. If people believe that Darth Vader is a malevolent being, does that suddenly mean that it's impossible to argue from an objective, independent standpoint that he isn't?
Here's the problem: You are asking us to assume that you are correct. You are asking us to assume that your interpretation of God is correct, and thus argue off of that. That isn't how you debate, and it's intellectually dishonest to pretend that you're doing anything resembling debating.
Buddha Punk Robot Monks wrote:I used the links to support my arguments, if you noticed. And people here are arguing that God is malevolent.
Yes. You're claiming that we're claiming that YOUR interpretation of God is malevolent. We are not doing this.
Buddha Punk Robot Monks wrote:I am saying that such a view is based on bad reasoning. Reason would dictate that one takes in all the available relevant data before making a conclusion. But the only thing I see here are vacuous arguments recycled from the pages of Dawkins or Hitchens that have already been shown to be unsophisticated.
In order to claim the view is based on bad reasoning, you should actually understand the view, which you obviously do not. Read through this thread, then come back.
