I may be new around here but I've been around on the internet debating for a decade or more at least and a lot of the "arguments" if you want to use the term loosely haven't changed. I realize you can't expect people to come up with something new and original all the time but after so long there are just some things I get tired of having to effortlessly explain to people.
Top of the list? "Atheism = Communism.... and therefore atheism is responsible for the horrors of communism"
No, communism is responsible for the horrors of communism.
What usually brings this up is when you point out for a supposedly benevolent god with a supposedly peaceful religion there's an awful lot of murder and genocide in the holy book and an awful long history of murder and genocide on the part of the followers of the holy book.
And yes, I include all the Abrahamic religions in that which is why I didn't say "Koran" or "Bible".
Finding an ocean of blood from another source will not magically make your ocean of blood go away, particularly if you're being dishonest about it the source the other ocean.
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Most of them, as they tend to never be anchored by serious evidence.
You ought to make up canned answers to these annoying questions, so that you can just pop them in and go on to something more interesting.
Pretty much all of them, especially when they are centuries old arguments that get repackaged as a new proof of God. There is a reason why professional academic theologians and religious philosophers moved on from these arguments. Doesn't stop professional internet apologists reviving them to get some loot.
I had great hopes for TAG but it died out very quickly.
The New "argument" is triumphalism but it's not really an argument per se.
This one from "Someone". Yes, username is "Someone".
The answer has been fully explained to this individual, but he/she/it/they refuse to accept the answer. And the person is writing exactly like another user by the name of "John 6IX Breezy".
Very annoying he/she/it/they will only except the answer as typed above in the blockquote.
The only other answer he/she/it/they will except is:
But the real answer ain't that simple. Here is my short, sweet answer: When it comes to FACTS, reality experiences nothing, and our experiences count for nothing. Only cold, hard data.
rmfr
Every prime mover argument ever:
"Something exists, therefore my God made it."
Lots of theist arguments I am tired of seeing. But for me, the type that particularly annoy me are: the arguments that quote their version of the bible, or the quran or whatever else. I do not want to wade through yet another version of the bible and explain why it is all tripe, all bull sh... slog through ancient language styles that people think is very wise and flowery when it just translated and heavily edited crap that people spent their entire lives on to try to make the book more compelling.
Mine!: god works in "mysterious" ways. It is not even an argument in my opinion, but i find it so funny when the ones who do it think they are very, very, very wise and humble.
"Everything that begins to exist has a cause..."
Anything claimed to be a proof of the unobservable.
The Intelligent Design argument.
Probably the most lame argument I have ever heard.
rmfr
Any argument claiming atheism is a belief or a claim of any sort, but especially the truly idiotic idea that atheism is a "belief that a universe exists without any deities" from Someone.
Oh oh! Atheists are by definition immoral. That is always fun.
A delusional belief in a deity form a bronze age superstition that they can demonstrate no objective evidence for, makes their morals objectively true.
Presuppositionalism is the biggest crock of BS on the planet today. Everyone believes in god, His word is written on your heart. You can't be rational without god; only the Christian worldview can account for logic, morality, science, induction, consciousness itself, and the missing link.
I believe you eat cow shit and can not stop yourself. The urge is written on your brain. You can't be rational without it. ....
Here is one I heard from a family member at the last get-together we had and I later walked out on.
"Just because atheists say there is no God does not mean God does not exist."
I don't know what to call that one. But that is another very lame argument.
rmfr
It's called a straw man argument. When have you ever heard anyone claim otherwise?
The correct response is a patronising look as you point out as condescendingly as you can manage that just because people believe a god is real doesn't make it real.
You might ask them if they think unicorns are real, then ask if they realise their lack of belief doesn't mean that unicorns aren't real? Don't forget to be as patronising and condescending as you can.
So now we've stated two straw men positions what objective evidence can they demonstrate for their belief?
If they're not jumping up and down by then I'll be quite surprised.
And don't forget to mention that the unicorn is identified as a real creature in the bible. As well as dragons and sea monsters.
Good point, and bring us neatly to the truly absurd theological argument that an omniscient deity deals in puerile allegory.
My favorite is that there exists an unbroken unedited line of divinely inspired literature from before the birth of whichever prophet/manifested god they worship to the present day.
Bunkum.
Young Earth creationism. The fossil record, DNA, dendochronology, carbon dating, radioactive decay and magnetic imprinting in rocks, astronomy, geology, and physics are all wrong, and the scribblings of Bronze age ignoramuses are literally true.
However, I love the idea of coexisting with dinosaurs. It would have been great to have a dino-pet and drive a brontosaurus excavator in a quarry like Fred Flintstone.
I have long thought that the mere fact that religious arguments and their refutations haven't changed since the time of Thomas Aquinas is evidence that rationality is entirely ineffective against the bastion of religious dogmatism. No, only time can cure those wounds. Each successive generation is less religious than the last, not because of newer arguments or more rational people, but because of increasing animosity towards the institutions of their predecessors. People are just as stupid and credulous now as they always have been, it's just shifted from religion to other more interesting things like viral internet hoaxes or mass marketing schemes.
Ultimately, religious debate will never change because the religious won't either. The average dogmatic whacko will be impervious to logic because years of childhood indoctrination aren't logical agents. Logic is demonized, more often than not. How can you use logic to convince someone that thinks logic is bad, to think otherwise?
Religion is going down in popularity as of late because fewer and fewer kids are having it force fed to them. Enlightenment ideals have finally borne fruit by making school a secular institution, making way for a rush of secular kids. Now if only schools would teach science and logic properly, we could propel humanity forward how we need to.
Argument with theists is something I no longer do. In college, I once caused a classmate to lose his faith. He had difficulty coping with it. Belief in God is a great source of comfort to many Christians and Jews. I see no point in upsetting them. Muslims are another matter.
On the other hand, I joked with my fundamentalist preacher neighbor that in my next life I wanted to be an evangelist. He gently warned me there was no next life and gave me two books to prove Jesus and the Bible were true. Those books only served to strengthen my own godlessness, but I thanked him for them. We are still friends but avoid theological discussion.
When all theists stop proselytising and telling others how they should live, and stop indoctrinating children, and accept that their beliefs do not entitle them to anything in this life, then I'll happily stop talking about their whackadoo beliefs as well, as long as they don't bring them up.
@Sheldon: stop indoctrinating children
And stop hacking pieces off children, and stop abusing children, and stop obstructing vaccination and education.
In fact, hey preacher, leave those kids alone.
Indeed, and I plagiarised and paraphrased Roger Waters some time ago using that very line, great minds and all that...
@Mad Mac
I used to be in the boat of "just let them be" to do their own thing, and I will do my own thing. Let people wallow in their ignorance.
Problem is: they don't just "do their own thing" they create a self created high horse position and then take their ignorance and try to force it on others either through laws, or public shaming or otherwise. Now not every theist does this, and many do not directly engage in these activities, but they support the activities by being a part of the particular religion. If these people were really well meaning, they should quit their religions instead of supporting the ignorance that has a long history of, and to this day, ruins many, many lives, through ignorance, through social pressure, through political pressure, through wars.
Many theist take sides in Israel, atheist generally say the entire conflict is beyond stupid and should not occur at all, we are all humans and the significance of these "holy" sites beyond the study of human history, the sites are only manifestation of lies.
The way theists use arguments to not really argue but to preach. You k ow when they don't even hear a reply and they state the next piece of scripture at you.
Makes me feel used, i just wanted to be held.