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Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
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I'm still waiting for answers to my questions and the links to "writing for academia" .....but that would entail more lies and evasions I guess..poor bastard. I wonder does breezy hire himself out as a corkscrew or a pretzel after hours? .
If the bible was an effective narrative I would still be practicing my religion.
If guns were effective at killing, there should never be any survivors of shootings, correct?
Holy crap ʝօɦn 6IX ɮʀɛɛʐy, here you are insisting that we all stay on topic, and objecting to any diversions. Yet when you are faced with a very simple statement with "bible" and "effective" and it flies in the face of your presentation, you quickly attempt to change the subject.
Do you even recognize or comprehend your blatant dishonesty?
One thing in my journey of spiritual searching was to sit down and read the bible. I hoped it would reinforce my theism. But instead it drove me away from religion.
Well, duh, staying on topic is something I expect adults to be capable of doing.
That being said, asking questions or finding places where statements don't apply, is a great methods of probing further into the conversation.
Here you made a claim about effectiveness, and my comment about guns should have made you elaborate on that further. Which you currently did, though not as much as I would have liked.
You view effectiveness in terms of personal conversions, great.
Bullshit, you were just attempting to divert any discussion away from what I intimated, that the bible is not effective.
In my example, a theist who was seeking reinforcement for his beliefs read the bible, and it was a massive step back from the intended direction. You may discuss theoretical possibilities and academic considerations, but I live in the real world where results matter. And for anything, that is the acid test, whether it actually works, not if it may look pretty in theory.
If the bible is not effective in conversions, then it is not even worthy of being toilet paper. And I am not the only person who had the same experience and failure by the bible.
You live inside the scripts and schemas your brain has created to understand the world. You're more than welcome to live inside that life in happiness. If you're only interested in results then wait for those of us that are looking for them to find them.
Here's a little secret from those of us that investigate the reality you claim to live it: results depend on the interaction among variables. The flashing lights and loud sirens of a fire alarms are effective methods of informing people of danger. But if you change the human variable, to a blind and deaf it no longer works.
Your experience is great. But unless you have something better than anecdotal evidence, and step into the world of pretty theories and experimental results, there's not much I can conclude from it.
What the fuck are you on about? Most of what you said should be reflected back to yourself!
“Here's a little secret from those of us that investigate the reality you claim to live it”
Hahahaha! YOU claimed to investigate REALITY?! With your big fairy in the sky and a man who walks on water, turning water into wine? THAT is reality? Oh please, tell me more about this strange, new interpretation of reality?
Oh chicken, my chicken; you have much to learn, welcome to the forum.
I have much to learn, as we all do, but I sure as hell (haha) don’t plan to learn from you. I’d like to make the matter clear that you are in no position to welcome me to the forum you yourself are a guest at. This is the home of Atheists, not apologists.
Haha I love it; still welcome.
The shooter has to be effective, not the gun.
Just as the writer has to be effective, not the book.
If the bible is effective why are most people not Christians? if its message is effectively communicated why don't most people agree about what it says?
If an omniscient omnipotent deity designed a gun whose sole purpose was to enable humans to kill, then yes I'd expect no one to survive shootings from it. Though it's a piss poor analogy of course.
For some reason, this reminded me of this quote:
@ Breezy
And THAT is your answer on the effectiveness of the Bible's narrative.
rmfr
That's not a bad point at all. Except that you'll need to compare the number of people it converted through violence, with the number of people it killed once converted. A lot of its violence was directed at other Christians.
I don't live anywhere near Europe, and yet, an hour away from my house there's a place called the bay of slaughter. Where a bunch of hugenots were... well.. slaughtered.
Oh, is the mark of how good a narrative format is its effectiveness at killing? You've still not said what you criteria is for effectiveness.
" You've still not said what you criteria is for effectiveness."
It gives him a broader scope to sneer at and dismiss other people's posts.
Breezy: "If guns were effective at killing, there should never be any survivors of shootings, correct?
"
What is it I have been saying about Religious Absolutists being megalomaniacal psychotic sociopaths?
rmfr
Herodotus in his Histories (intended as a historical narrative) says that when the Persians tried to conquer the Greek states, they were stopped at Delphi by the gods Zeus and Apollo.
Ignoring the psychology behind it. Have you thought of this format at a bad thing, or a good thing for religion? In other words, if the Gods are real, is this a smart move or a bad move?
It's a brilliant move, clearly. Otherwise, nobody would know about Herodotus or that story to this day.
Very few people worship the Greek gods (apart from maybe Dionysus). So how would Herodotus' account be a good thing for ancient Greek religion, how would it be a smart move for those gods? So again, which criteria are you using to judge effectiveness?
I'm not using any criteria, that's up to you to decide. If the Herodotus story was intended to convert people, then it wasn't effective. If it was intended to record the history of the event across time, then it was.
If you are not using any criteria on which to judge your argument, then it can be safely be concluded that the argument is false.
I've barely even made an argument yet, I've asked a question and explored the few meaningful answers I've received.
The moment I present my argument, rest assured all the cards will be stacked in my favor. And as always happens, you'll get a list of references beneath to defend my point. When I said ignore the psychology of it, I'm essentially saying pretend I'm not right, what do you think about this topic..
Breezy: "I've barely even made an argument yet, I've asked a question and explored the few meaningful answers I've received./cite>"
BWA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA.
***tries to reply, sees post***
BWA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA.
O gosh, someone call 911. I think I hurt something...
***laughter continues unabated***
rmfr
Your OP made a claim that you have not substantiated, thus resulting in much wasted time. You then expect others to provide a meaningful answer on your terms, without explaining what those terms are.
What claim was that? The only possible claim I see there is that it is written as a narrative, as opposed to a textbook?
Yes, that was the claim I was particularly referring to. Although what you said about your motives was also a claim.
I think that if I need to show that the bible is written as a story and not a textbook to someone, then they can't really have much to contribute. Its like asking someone if they think abortion is wrong, and they respond with "what is abortion" and "what is wrong?"
At that point just disregard the question.
As you know full well, I don't dispute that it has stories in it. I dispute that it was written as a narrative, rather than a collection of books written by numerous different authors with different motives, many of which are not even narratives.
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