Professor Richard Dawkins told the launch ceremony that the existence of God was as likely as the tooth fairy
Posted on 01/06/2009 10:20:23 AM PST by Stoat
Professor Richard Dawkins told the launch ceremony that the existence of God was as likely as the tooth fairy
The campaign was conceived by Ariane Sherine, a comedy writer who dreamed of just one bus going around London with an atheist slogan after she saw a similar advertisement for Christianity on the back of a bus.
(Excerpt) Read more at timesonline.co.uk ...
What a foolish, careless statement. If you have a problem understanding suffering, which is a part of life, you need to read C.S. Lewis.
Yes, and we know that not everyone who follows Christ exhibits a philosophy of love. So quit blaming Nazism on every philosopher or scientist you don't agree with, whether its Nietzsche, Darwin, or Spinoza.
Nietzsche is no more responsible for the Nazis than Christ is for Davis Koresh.
Let me guess; Mere Christianity.
Yawn.
At least the Narnia Chronicles are interesting. Lewis proves that Christian apologetics make much better fiction than philosophy.
Interesting, but overrated. The Lord of the Rings by his friend and contemporary J. R. R. Tolkien is far more sophisticated.
You are so far off base in your understanding it is pathetic, and I haven't the time to correct your mis-education.
But guess what. None of it justifies your hatred.
Stop throwing tantrums against God and Christians and the church. It's sad, really.
Only a fool can look at himself, others, and around this world, listen, feel, think, and not acknowledge something greater than himself is behind it all and that he is more than a blob of cells.
And actually you’re wrong - it wasn’t “Mere Christianity.” But your intellectual curiosity is clearly so thin I won’t waste anymore of my time.
In fact C.S. Lewis was a die hard atheist until J.R.R. Tolkien converted him during a train trip together. Amazing but true.
Lewis is proof that there is hope for the hard of heart!
“Nietzsche is no more responsible for the Nazis than...”
Nietzsche can easily be called a prophet of Nazism (not to mention a raving, mad creature). His philosophy more than laid the groundwork for Hitler’s Aryanism.
He was a homosexual in love with a horse - hardly a balanced personality.
You are so far off base in your understanding it is pathetic, and I haven't the time to correct your mis-education.
Yawn.
This is your retort?
I've had two tenured philosophy professors in a pub arguing over whether Spinoza was a deist or a pantheist, and all you've got is "I'm so well-studied that I can even make a point".
Seriously, that's pathetic.
The only tantrum here is your juvenile post.
The belief in something greater than oneself is not exclusive to your religious worldview, and is found in just about every culture throughout history.
A belief in a celestial dictator is not a prerequisite.
And actually you’re wrong - it wasn’t “Mere Christianity.” But your intellectual curiosity is clearly so thin I won’t waste anymore of my time.
Oh, nice. Another example of "I'm so well read that I can't tell you what influenced my thinking."
You're like a third grader arguing over who knows more about Star Wars.
But you don't see that because you can't see beyond your bigotry. Your bigotry against Jesus and Christians and the Judeo-Christian foundations of Western civilization contorts everything you think and say.
The “yawn” is more accurately directed at your hackneyed criticisms of Judeo-Christian history. You think they are new and shocking and so well argued. But they are not. They have been uttered a thousand times before by people far more learned and logical than you.
And they have been proved false a thousand times.
But none of that will matter until you get over being a Christophobe, until you can overcome your bigotry.
I'll just say this, as much as you plug your fingers in your ears and scream “LA LA LA” and throw yourself on the ground kicking and screaming, God still loves you. He is watching you, not with the hatred that contorts you, but with love and the wish that you would turn yourself from the darkness of whatever has happened to cause you such undeserved hatred to the light of His love.
I pray that God bless you with the strength to turn away from your hatred.
Apparently not, and you don't seem to have any tact in discussing religion with someone who has a different point of view.
What exactly have I said that has been "proven" false? If I'm so wrong about the people that I mentioned, why don't you show me instead of throwing imaginary insults followed up by the proverbial "I'm praying for you, o tortured soul."
Do you think I haven't heard this type of silliness before? If you want to have a discussion without insults and with real points, I'll be glad to. But if you call me a bigot again just because I don't share your religious persuasion, I'll go find a more intelligent conversation elsewhere.
Rather, perhaps it is because your negative attitude projects that you have little interest in pursuing any knowledge I offer. “The Problem of Pain” is the book, if you really care.
God is not a celestial dictator. He allows free will. He allows you to even freely reject him as you have.
If God didn’t exist then there would be nothing greater than man. The idea that without God there would be something greater than man would just be self-deceiving sentimentality.
But the fact that you are here today proves God’s existence and His love.
“Atheist bus adverts claiming ‘There’s probably no God’ are reported to watchdog
By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 8:18 AM on 09th January 2009
An atheist advertising campaign claiming ‘there’s probably no God’ has been reported to the regulator.
Hundreds of buses are due to carry the slogan in a four-week £140,000 campaign, backed by the British Humanist Association.
But Christian Voice has complained the ads break the Advertising Standards Authority’s codes on substantiation and truthfulness...”
Seems a bit dangerous, since the pro-religious bus postings would probably fail on the same grounds.
I do care, and have read The Problem of Pain.
Sorry I didn't respond earlier, got mixed up in another discussion. But if you'd like to discuss further, I'd say that there are things that god could have done without.
I can accept disease, death, and murder. But I have a hard time with things like child rape and the murder of children. I think that if god could intervene and stop child rape, he wouldn't be giving away his existence. It's not like anyone would turn around and say, "Wow, its weird that no one has sex with little children, must be god intervening." I doubt that anyone would dream of the concept if it was absent from our society.
That's a stretch. But think of a world where no one raped little girls. I don't think it would be strange at all, and I don't think its a fantasy, since I think it is somewhat achievable.
“But think of a world where no one raped little girls”
Heaven. With billions on this planet and the corruption of heart in every person, no matter how small, I’d say it’s a noble goal that is impossible until the end of time. The root is that man is stained at birth with original sin. It’s the same reason why people steal even though they know it’s wrong. Why does our heart tell us it’s wrong? Not because of science, technology, philosophy, or nature, but because of God.
We got rid of human sacrifice. I think the other evils will slowly continue to disappear, regardless of whether the world becomes more religious or not.
I disagree that philosophy can't help sort out morality, since the works of the great ancient and modern philosophers are much more moral and ethical than all of the Old Testament, and arguably some of the New Testament.
How do you sort out the morality of what Joshua did to Jericho? What is moral about what god did to the children of Egypt during Exodus.
I'll take Epicurus and John Stuart Mill over the Bible any day.
“We got rid of human sacrifice.”
Did we? I’m sure it happens somewhere. In fact in some form or another it happens nearly everywhere. Perhaps like that Wal-Mart employee sacrificed at the altar of radical consumerism.
“I think the other evils will slowly continue to disappear, regardless of whether the world becomes more religious or not.”
Abortion, euthanasia, and growing problem of drugs. Murder continues unabated throughout the world. Not to mention, lower on the scale, adultery.
I also never said philosphy can’t help us understand things including morality. I did say philosophy is not the origin of the conscience and the law written in everyone’s heart.
Men in the Old and New Testaments, just like ancient philosophers and just like us, were imperfect beings. That someone appears in Scripture does not make them infallible or a saint or even necessarily a role model. Events that occur in the Bible for different reasons. It may be a lesson or a historical note, or perhaps something more hidden. So neither are every event documented in the Bible supposed to contain an ideal or be considered the perfect way.
“What is moral about what God did to the children of Egypt during Exodus.”
Why would you assume that God would treat the enemies of those who love Him or even their enemies’ children equal to His own children? Was it not Egypt who enslaved Israel? Did Egypt not surely murder Jewish children?
God’s ways are not our ways. God’s thoughts and plans are far, far above our thoughts and plans. Have you ever seen a movie where you see something that makes you angry and later realize that it ultimately turned out essential for a greater good and want to slap yourself for it. It’s something like that except 10,000 times more inscrutable to our minds.
“I’ll take Epicurus and John Stuart Mill over the Bible any day.”
That’s a somewhat silly thing to say. I’d say an honest atheist would admit there is certainly much worldly wisdom in the Bible. Even putting aside that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, he was also simply the most remarkable and influential man in history (or at least one of - I don’t care if you are Buddhist, atheist, whatever). Ask the Dalai Lama - who is in metaphysical belief an atheist - what he thinks of Jesus. Time was divided in the name of the Man (yes before the Moslems tried to copy him).
By the way I’m not a Biblical literalist.
Read Blaise Pascal. Strict atheism is a bad bet. I personally think it’s silly to be anything beyond agnostic. To be at least open to the possibility of God is a good thing that may (in fact will) at some point allow Him to really enter your life in a shocking and wonderful way. [I could here share the conversion story of a friend...a former die hard atheist.] (God has little use for intellectual scheming and armchair naysaying.) Dawkins’ statement above that God is just as likely as the tooth fairly is A-1 whistling past the graveyard and you know it.
One more thing: there is a certain unhelpful stubborness in your refusal to capitalize the name of God. From your viewpoint, do you by any chance decapitalize names in a fictional novel when you discuss them? Try. It makes the conversation just a little more open on multiple levels.
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