A Social Justice Atheist Reviews a Movie

Social justice atheists almost always come across as incredibly self-righteous.  It becomes concerning when their level of self-righteousness leads them to rationalize/embrace/advocate violence against those who don’t perfectly share their beliefs.

Consider PZ Myers and his review of an old horror picture.  Myers writes:

But I still have Netflix! I started browsing, and perhaps it was my anti-Xian fuming that made it leap out at me, but The Wicker Man is available. No, not The Wicker Man, the 2006 abomination with Nicolas Cage, but the original 1973 movie with Edward Woodward. I remember seeing it when it first came out and enjoying it, but that was almost 50 years ago. It was memorable enough that I remember the plot. Spoilers ahead…but it is a 47 year old movie.

Here’s what I recall: an officious British police officer comes to a remote island to investigate a report of a missing girl. It quickly becomes obvious that all the inhabitants are lying, as their story keeps changing. The officer pursues every lead, getting closer and closer to the truth, until he discovers he has been led into a trap, and is put into a wicker man that is set afire as a sacrifice to the harvest.

Where it gets really weird is when Myers writes:

So it’s a horror movie, sort of. It’s rather like Midsommar; it also reminded me of Get Out, but with a distinct difference. In those movies, the antagonists were sinister and ominous, and the protagonist was sympathetic. In The Wicker Man, that’s reversed. The villagers are horny and happy, and constantly singing and dropping their clothes, while Officer Howie is an unpleasant, sexually repressed, fanatical prig. At the end of the movie, you end up feeling like he deserved a fiery, grisly death. Fun!

You don’t say?

Argument From Evil is Weak

The modern day atheist movement has only one argument to actually support atheism – The Argument From Evil.  Anytime an atheist tries to make the case that there is no God, chances are extremely high that some version of the Argument from Evil will be used.  Some time ago, Neil deGrasse Tyson put it this way:

OK, if that god is described as being all-powerful and all-knowing and all-good, I don’t see evidence for it anywhere in the world. So I remain unconvinced. If that god is all-powerful and all-good, I don’t see that when a tsunami kills a quarter-million or an earthquake kills a quarter-million people. I’d like to think of good as something in the interest of your health or longevity. That’s a pretty simple definition of something that is good for you. That’s not a controversial understanding of the word “good.” So if Earth in two separate events separated by just a couple of years can kill a half-million people, then if the god as you describe exists, that god is either not all-powerful or not all-good. And so therefore I am not convinced.

Essentially what Tyson is saying here is that God cannot co-exist with tsunamis and earthquakes.  That God’s existence is incompatible with tsunamis and earthquakes.  Okay, so let’s imagine God did exist.  According to the atheist’s Argument From Evil, this would mean there would be no tsunamis and earthquakes.  So let’s imagine God magically changes our reality such that there are no tsunamis and earthquakes.  Has the Argument From Evil been neutralized?  Has it been taken off the table?

Not so fast.  Sam Harris tells us “There is No God (And You Know It).”  In fact, it’s “obvious” to him.  What makes it obvious?

Consider: the city of New Orleans was recently destroyed by hurricane Katrina. At least a thousand people died, tens of thousands lost all their earthly possessions, and over a million have been displaced. It is safe to say that almost every person living in New Orleans at the moment Katrina struck believed in an omnipotent, omniscient, and compassionate God. But what was God doing while a hurricane laid waste to their city?

Hurricane Katrina?  How could I forget?  Look, I thought that was supposed to be President Bush’s fault, but we’ll say Harris has a point.  Let’s say that if God did indeed exist, He would have magically stopped hurricane Katrina because God is all-good.  So, suppose He did.  Are we good now?  Of course not, since Harris could have cited countless other hurricanes.  Well then, let’s say God magically changes our reality such that there are no tsunamis, earthquakes, or hurricanes.  Everything okay?  Please.

Dawkins, Religion, Atheism, and Viruses

A new low from Richard Dawkins:

The virus of religion does its bit to help spread the other pernicious virus that threatens us all:https://t.co/iXSpIXwLHqhttps://t.co/KhsZ24eYOWhttps://t.co/AjkXuJyz0S

— Richard Dawkins (@RichardDawkins) March 21, 2020

Is Dawkins oblivious to the fact that the tables are easily turned in the blame game?  For example, consider this…..

Exploited by the Medical Community

Here’s an interesting story:

A 23-year-old woman who is taking legal action against an NHS gender clinic says she should have been challenged more by medical staff over her decision to transition to a male as a teenager.

A judge gave the go-ahead for a full hearing of the case against the Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust.

Lawyers will argue children cannot give informed consent to treatment delaying puberty or helping them to transition.

The Tavistock said it always took a cautious approach to treatment.

[…]

Keira describes being a tomboy as a child. When asked how strongly she felt the need to change her gender identity, she replied that it gradually built up as she found out more about transitioning online.

Then as she went down the medical route, she said “one step led to another”.

She was referred to the Tavistock GIDS clinic at the age of 16. She said after three one-hour-long appointments she was prescribed puberty blockers, which delay the development of signs of puberty, like periods or facial hair.

She felt there wasn’t enough investigation or therapy before she reached that stage.

“I should have been challenged on the proposals or the claims that I was making for myself,” she said. “And I think that would have made a big difference as well. If I was just challenged on the things I was saying.”

Keira should be able to sue and recover damages from this medical company.

The Great 2020 Atty Mystery

Earlier, I noted that the Jesus Mythicist of 2020 award could turn out to be most entertaining.  Instead, It has become the most mysterious.  First, it’s pretty obvious that the award was designed for Carrier.  But then comes the mystery – he wasn’t even nominated for the award.  Four other obscure atheists with their own personal, fringe crackpot notions about what happen are instead nominated.

Now, is there any one out there believes Richard Carrier is not the type of person who would nominate himself?  Anyone?  I would have thought he sent his nomination in moments after the window opened.  And then, to make sure, he would get women from his harem to nominate him.  Perhaps he would get his two fans to nominate him also.  But not even a nomination?  

Why is that?

 

 

Excitement in the Air

The atheist community must be tingling with excitement as in less than a month, the long awaited Anti-Theist conference will begin!   Speakers, awards, banquets, and yet more awards.  And of course…..The Dawk.

Dawkins is getting an award too:

Richard Dawkins will be presented with the Lifetime of Service to Rationalism Award by Lawrence Krauss.

A bunch of relatively obscure atheists invent an award and get his pal to deliver it.  Given that Krauss has been shunned by a large part of the atheist/academic community, I suppose he has the free time.  And Dawkins?  He surely needs his ego stroked.  So let’s all act as if this is a big deal.

Anyway, I don’t see Dawkins listed as one of the speakers.  Imagine the poor schlub atheist who bought tickets because the Home page creates the impression Dawkins will be a speaker.

Oh, did you know “The Atty Awards aim to become the most prestigious International Anti-Theism Awards.”  I wonder what the non-prestigious International Anti-Theism Awards are.

 

Another Atheist Has Demands for God

Over at his blog, atheist activist Jerry Coyne explains his atheism:

Seriously, if God wanted us to accept Him, why can’t he just come down to Earth and do a few irrefutable miracles that can be witnessed, photographed, and so on?

And then adds:

But all it would take is ONE BIG MIRACLE, of the type I describe in Faith Versus Fact (p. 119)—a miracle that was taped and documented worldwide—to make me believe in a divine being—provisionally, of course, as it might be due to space aliens or some trick.  Why can’t we at least have that?

Let’s think this through.  Dr. Coyne says he would “accept God” if only He would do some “irrefutable miracles.”  Or, it could be “ONE BIG MIRACLE.”  Yet we must ask one simple question – WHY?  Why would Dr. Coyne “accept Him” because of a miracle?  Why would he believe because of a miracle?  What’s the connection?  How does a miracle purchase God belief?

Note, in both cases it has to be a miracle.  In other words, if it was an event that could be explained by natural law or chance, it would not count. Because then it would not be a miracle.

Of course, there is another term for miracle that is common used by atheists.  It’s called a gap.

How to Spot a Where’s Waldo Atheist

We’ve just seen that the way atheists commonly approach the existence of God is fundamentally flawed. For the atheist, determining whether God exists is just like playing a game of Where’s Waldo.  They demand evidence of Waldo!  Show me Waldo!  The atheist can only conceptualize God as “one more thing” in our empirical reality and thus determining whether God exists is simply a matter of using “science and evidence” to find this “one more thing.”  Yet if God does indeed exist, He would not amount to just one more thing in our reality.  He would be the Creator and Sustainer of all that exists.  He would be the reason everything exists, not one more thing that exists.  As such, the atheist’s “Where’s Waldo” approach is inherently misguided and cannot generate any meaningful conclusion.

And there is evidence that indicates most atheists do indeed employ this “Where’s Waldo” approach to the question of God’s existence.  How would you spot them?

The Atheist’s Where’s Waldo Approach

Over the years, I have shown the fatal flaws inherent in the atheists’ demand for evidence of God’s existence.  We have seen such demands completely ignore the subjective dimension of all evidence and mistakenly treat evidence as if it can objectively adjudicate disputes.   We have also seen that such demands invariably translate as a demand to see a miracle, yet such demands rely on God of the Gaps logic, a form of reasoning all atheists deny.  This problem alone renders the atheist’s demand for evidence as incoherent.

Let me see if I can illustrate yet another problem in this demand for such empirical evidence.  If you step back from the whole debate, you’ll notice that atheists treat the question of God’s existence as one big game of Where’s Waldo.

Can you find Waldo in the picture above?  You see lots of things in that picture – all kinds of different people doing different things in different states of dress.  You see people in the water and on the beach.  You also see animals, various inanimate objects, various boats in the water, etc.  Waldo is just one more thing among many things in the picture.

Now, almost every atheist I have encountered treats reality like that picture, only they can’t find Waldo.  They’ve looked and looked, and they can’t find him.  They’ve asked countless people to point out Waldo, and no can do it.  Thus, they conclude Waldo is not in that picture.  Those who think Waldo is in the picture are either delusional or they squint their eyes so hard that someone who kinda, sorta, looks like Waldo (but is not) is identified.

If you think of reality as the picture, and Waldo as God, this is the common atheist approach.  But in playing this game, the atheist is merely assuming God’s existence is like detecting Waldo.  For they are assuming that God is “just one more thing” (like Waldo) that is part of reality (the picture).   We can know this because atheists assume God, if He existed, would be detectable like other things – detected by our senses and our science.  We can further know this because atheists treat God as being perfectly analogous to unicorns, fairies, and Santa Claus, which, if any existed, would just be one more thing that is part of our reality.

But is God, if He existed, merely be one more thing that is part of our reality?

Dawkins Admits Nothing Can Persuade Him God Exists

We have seen that the central claim of modern day atheism – “There is no evidence for God” – is equivalent to saying “There are no Gaps.” That is, the evidence that the atheist demands is a Gap – something that cannot be explained by natural laws. Yet the same atheist will insist that the God of the Gaps approach is not a valid way of determining whether God exists. Heads I win, tails you lose.

Of course, don’t make the mistake of thinking that if only you could find a big enough Gap, the atheist would have to embrace that as evidence for God. After all, that’s not how it would work with Richard Dawkins, the most famous atheist alive. Dawkins made this clear some time ago in an interview with atheist Peter Boghossian. You can see the demonstration for yourself in the video below. It starts at 12:30 and goes to 15:30. I’ll post a transcript below the fold.