How To Convert Christians to Atheism...

[SlartyBartfast]

I wonder if anyone here has successfully converted a religious person away from their religion?

I have to laugh when I hear of a supposedly well-educated person who is also Christian. Well-educated and Christian are oxymorons. The only people who believe in the bible have been brainwashed or are missing the facts they need to draw more reasonable conclusions on how the world works. I feel that if these people had been better educated they would not hold such absurd beliefs.

Why do we need to educate them? I hold that a belief in invisible people with magical powers, as so many religions proclaim, is harmful--at least it is in adults. One who believes such zany things is capable of believing other zany things, which may not be quite so harmless. For all of our sakes, these people need to learn how to think, how to know truth when they see it, and how to be an adult--all things they probably should have learnt in school but didn't.

I don't feel as if I am being unfair and discriminatory, or some sort of anti-religious fascist if you like, by proclaiming a need to cure these people's minds. I think it would be best for their own good, and the good of humanity as a whole, if we could all start thinking along more rational lines. Surely we all want to have the most correct knowledge we can get?

But how do you get past the blindness of your average Christian or Moslem, past their refusal to listen to anything they do not already believe? And I'm positive they feel the same way about us, the atheists and evolutionists who are positive they know the answer to everything.

I see our point of view, for example, agnostic and evolutionary, as being more reasonable:

All beliefs require a leap of faith; we have faith that our brains are working correctly and that the universe still works as it always has. This leap of faith is the only one needed to accept that there is no Christian God or Allah. We place faith in the evidence we see before us, and using that evidence form theories concerning the world.

But religion makes a further leap of faith when it comes to belief:

The religious individual accepts that their brain is working correctly and is rational enough to make sensible decisions, and then accepts on top of that the existence of magic, of invisible spirits, an entire world for which there is no physical evidence other than a book that even religious people admit has been tampered with repeatedly; a book that must, rationally, be accepted as myths and stories as in other ancient and now extinct religions. In short, the religious person believes that a book written by men was actually written by a supernatural being?

So how do we cure them of this madness? We could start marching them out and lining them up against the wall and shooting them, which might make the world a better place; but that would only encourage their lunacy. They want to die in the name of Christ and Allah, because it gives their lives meaning (which just goes to show how we create our own meaning in life.) It would be nice to think that if we simply ignored this superstitious nonsense it would go away; but meanwhile these loonies are constantly trying to win brownie points with their so-called loving God (who is very cruel btw) by corrupting other poorly educated and susceptible individuals into their cult.

A fellow just can't reason with them. They claim their arguments are reasonable, but any reasonable person can see they aren't. What are we going to do with them? And we must do something before they gain a position of power and destroy us all. They would quite happily bring down armageddon on top of us all, because then they will get to go to their imaginary heaven. They need to learn the errors of their ways. They must be stopped, before they do something crazy like banning Monty Python.

[Rex Germanius]

In order for this argument to work, reasoning must be proven valid.

If it isn't, this is a moot point.

[SlartyBartfast]

What else can we do but have faith in reason? If not that, then nothing.

[Rex Germanius]

What else can we do but have faith in reason? If not that, then nothing.

Have faith in another system?

[Doge Domenico]

The whole "Conversion" thing implies atheism is a belief, rather than the lack of. Which makes it a religion which makes it fail.

[Rex Germanius]

.

You'll have to forgive me, but I don't catch your drift.

[Vanoi]

These kind of threads kind of give atheists a abd name. These threads are the reason some religious people think atheists are s.

[(s)AINT]

Converting to atheism makes it seem like Atheism is just another religion - which it is not.

So this whole thing is a big whooping fallacy.

If anything - just show them a couple youtube videos of hitchens, harris or dawkins. LOL. Or give them a book.

[Rex Germanius]

All thinking is inherently a belief. Which makes your point a 'fail'.

Edit: Sorry about that, this was directed towards the post above yours.

Furthermore, even if reason is assumed true, atheism is still a belief, as there is no proof towards the existence or non-existence or a supreme being(s). What is not a belief is Agnosticism, which is totally different.

[Doge Domenico]

All thinking is inherently a belief. Which makes your point a 'fail'.

Edit: Sorry about that, this was directed towards the post above yours.

Furthermore, even if reason is assumed true, atheism is still a belief, as there is no proof towards the existence or non-existence or a supreme being(s). What is not a belief is Agnosticism, which is totally different.

A person cant be converted to thinking. I think thats what you meant. I could be wrong.

Athiesm is the rejection of the belief of any supernatural thing. If thats what you were talking about. All I see is a bunch of sophistry.

[Rex Germanius]

Elaborate on your first point(im tired)

Athiesm is the rejection of the belief of any supernatural thing. If thats what you were talking about.

If you're tired, this is probably not the time to read this. However, here goes:

Assume A is logic.

According to logic, no system that is not proven valid is true. Therefore we must prove the validity of logic, or henceforth, A.

A, however, cannot be validated by A, as this is a tautology, which is not proof. Essentially, that's tantamount to claiming a religion is true because it claims it's true.

Therefore, we must assume that logic works. However, that is not allowed either. In fact, that is termed a paradox.

But step back and consider for a moment that reason, which is logic, was used in thinking this through. That is yet another violation of the rules which lead to another paradox. Yet, in order to make this conclusion, logic was used. Another paradox. I coined the phrase 'Propagating Paradoxes Problem', or 'PPP' for short, to describe this. I find this quite catchy, as I'm always fond of alliteration. Quote it at will.

However, there is a road out of this debacle: invent another system that validates logic. There is a problem, with this, though; it is that, according to logic, which should reign supreme, this system itself must be proven valid. That yields another system to be proven. Eventually, there are an infinite number of systems. This, I called the 'Infinite Systems Quandary'.
(I was tempted to quote another of my posts which explained this, but I was somewhat inebriated at the time, so I wasn't as clear.)

Thus, I concluded that A does not reign supreme, and can be proven valid with the invention of a system which serves such a purpose. But this has other implications. One of which is that that is nothing that stops anyone from inventing a system that proves logic invalid. Therefore, anyone can believe what they want, they just won't hold the reasonable highground of proof, and therefore, truth. Basically, all forms of thinking is based on assumptions, or as they are otherwise known, beliefs.

In essence, I am the demarcator of logic; reason does not limit me.

[Doge Domenico]

If you're tired, this is probably not the time to read this. However, here goes:

Assume A is logic.

According to logic, no system that is not proven valid is true. Therefore we must prove the validity of logic, or henceforth, A.

A, however, cannot be validated by A, as this is a tautology, which is not proof. Essentially, that's tantamount to claiming a religion is true because it claims it's true.

Therefore, we must assume that logic works. However, that is not allowed either. In fact, that is termed a paradox.

But step back and consider for a moment that reason, which is logic, was used in thinking this through. That is yet another violation of the rules which lead to another paradox. Yet, in order to make this conclusion, logic was used. Another paradox. I coined the phrase 'Propagating Paradoxes Problem', or 'PPP' for short, to describe this. I find this quite catchy, as I'm always fond of alliteration. Quote it at will.

However, there is a road out of this debacle: invent another system that validates logic. There is a problem, with this, though; it is that, according to logic, which should reign supreme, this system itself must be proven valid. That yields another system to be proven. Eventually, there are an infinite number of systems. This, I called the 'Infinite Systems Quandary'.
(I was tempted to quote another of my posts which explained this, but I was somewhat inebriated at the time, so I wasn't as clear.)

Thus, I concluded that A does not reign supreme, and can be proven valid with the invention of a system which serves such a purpose. But this has other implications. One of which is that that is nothing that stops anyone from inventing a system that proves logic invalid. Therefore, anyone can believe what they want, they just won't hold the reasonable highground of proof, and therefore, truth. Basically, all forms of thinking is based on assumptions, or as they are otherwise known, beliefs.

In essence, I am the demarcator of logic; reason does not limit me.

. TBH I had to read through that a few times, and say it to myself before I got it. So this is a response to the fallacy arguement presented, or religion its self?

[Exarch]

force christians to practice what they preach from the bible;

that'll convert christians to atheism real fast; if it converts them to another faith, that doesn't worry me so long as it aint a judeo-christian-islamic religion.

[leeho730]

Why break their heart? What's the difference between believing in God and believing in fairness or justice (the two that do not exist in physical sense)?
As long as Christians obey the law, show empathy towards other people, do not cause any harm to other beings and do not force their belief to other people, why not let them believe?

Moreover, atheism itself is invalid, depending your point of view. If an atheist wishes to argue that the entity called Jehova or Allah do not exist in physical reality, I agree.
But if you deny the existence of God in absolute sense, I have to disagree. It is because you need to define God before arguing about its existence. Thus I'm not atheist; I'm simply ignostic.

Moreover, who knows? Maybe if the science advances enough we may be able to find god-like beings in distant planets or dimension: immortal, very highly intelligent beings of tremendous physical and mental power and capable of bending physical reality to suit their needs, like Greek gods.

A true scientist does not believe; he simply observes and predicts.
By degrading them, you start to sound a lot like those "ignorant" Christians that you hate.

[Cooraan]

LOL. That's seems to be the only reasonable response I could come up with.

Maybe it's because I'm religious aren't educated enough to understand.

Seriously though. What a stupid thread.

[Sphere]

The simplest and most direct argument against belief in any specific religion is simply to ask what evidence all the other religions are lacking in comparison.

Why, for example, is the Book of Revelations which was written at an unknown time by an unknown author and was disapproved of by several early bishops, considered to be divinely inspired in the Western and Eastern Orthodox Churches, but the Book of Mormon whose history and authorship is very well know and documented, whose miraculous golden tablets were witnessed by several people (as attested to in signed documents) considered false? What exactly makes the Book of Revelations more credible than the Book of Mormon? What is so clearly different in an angel telling Joseph Smith about the golden tablets, than an angel telling Mary she is carrying the Son of God?

And for another example, I will steal from Sam Harris; the Indian Guru Sathya Sai Baba is credited with all the miracles of Jesus (creating food from nothing, levitation, healing etc.), miracles attested to by thousands of living eyewitnesses. He apparently was impressive enough to create a religion of at least 10 million people. Why is it that the miracles of Jesus, which we only know about from secondary sources written decades after his death in the pre-scientific first century Roman Empire, are more believable than those of Sai Baba? What exactly is Sai Baba missing?

This is the way to attack belief in specific religions, as such a believer can always provide a long list of evidence for why their religion is true, but they are at a loss to explain why they don't believe in other religions using that same level of evidence.

[Doge Domenico]

The simplest and most direct argument against belief in any specific religion is simply to ask what evidence all the other religions are lacking in comparison.

Why, for example, is the Book of Revelations which was written at an unknown time by an unknown author and was disapproved of by several early bishops, considered to be divinely inspired in the Western and Eastern Orthodox Churches, but the Book of Mormon whose history and authorship is very well know and documented, whose miraculous golden tablets were witnessed by several people (as attested to in signed documents) considered false? What exactly makes the Book of Revelations more credible than the Book of Mormom? What is so clearly different an angel telling Joseph Smith about the golden tablets, and an angel telling Mary she is carrying the Son of God?

Or for another example I will steal from Sam Harris, the Indian Guru Sathya Sai Baba. He is credited with all the miracles of Jesus (creating food from nothing, levitation, healing etc.), miracles attested to by thousands of living eyewitnesses. He apparently was impressive enough to create a religion of at least 10 million people. Why is it that the miracles of Jesus, which we only know about from secondary sources written decades after his death in the pre-scientific first century Roman Empire, are more believable than those of Sai Baba? What exactly is Sai Baba missing?

This is the way to attack belief in specific religions, as such a believer can always provide a long list of evidence for why their religion is true, but they are at a loss to explain why they don't believe in other religions using that same level of evidence.

Mormons are christians. All sects of christianity debate against the other in certain points. A common belief holds them together. Jesus never said, "I am the only one who can do these things" In fact he said we could all do these things, and greater if we believed. And what is his religion called if you dont mind telling me?

[Rex Germanius]

The simplest and most direct argument against belief in any specific religion is simply to ask what evidence all the other religions are lacking in comparison.

Why, for example, is the Book of Revelations which was written at an unknown time by an unknown author and was disapproved of by several early bishops, considered to be divinely inspired in the Western and Eastern Orthodox Churches, but the Book of Mormon whose history and authorship is very well know and documented, whose miraculous golden tablets were witnessed by several people (as attested to in signed documents) considered false? What exactly makes the Book of Revelations more credible than the Book of Mormon? What is so clearly different in an angel telling Joseph Smith about the golden tablets, than an angel telling Mary she is carrying the Son of God?

And for an another example, I will steal from Sam Harris; the Indian Guru Sathya Sai Baba is credited with all the miracles of Jesus (creating food from nothing, levitation, healing etc.), miracles attested to by thousands of living eyewitnesses. He apparently was impressive enough to create a religion of at least 10 million people. Why is it that the miracles of Jesus, which we only know about from secondary sources written decades after his death in the pre-scientific first century Roman Empire, are more believable than those of Sai Baba? What exactly is Sai Baba missing?

This is the way to attack belief in specific religions, as such a believer can always provide a long list of evidence for why their religion is true, but they are at a loss to explain why they don't believe in other religions using that same level of evidence.

Religious belief exists outside the realm of logical validity, therefore you can't attack it in such a manner.

[Banana Jelly]

I dont know, but I think this forum was around 40% of the reason why I had agnostic ideas.

But I still believe in god/islam.

[Sphere]

Mormons are christians. All sects of christianity debate against the other in certain points. A common belief holds them together. Jesus never said, "I am the only one who can do these things" In fact he said we could all do these things, and greater if we believed. And what is his religion called if you dont mind telling me?

So you consider the book of Mormon to be the word of God, on par with the Gospels.