Reddit reviews The Devil's Delusion: Atheism and its Scientific Pretensions

There's a book called The Devil's Delusion: Atheism and its Scientific Pretensions written by an agnostic Jew. It's not an apologetic work though, just trying to give people of faith some space.

>Name me fucking one.

I said I would, and I am:
Why God Won't Go Away: Is the New Atheism Running on Empty?

Why There Almost Certainly Is a God: Doubting Dawkins

Atheist Delusions: The Christian Revolution and Its Fashionable Enemies

Nonsense of a High Order:: The Confused World of Modern Atheism

The Devil's Delusion: Atheism and its Scientific Pretensions

Against Atheism: Why Dawkins, Hitchens, and Harris Are Fundamentally Wrong

The Atheist Delusion


Furthermore though, Christian rehtoric is often explicitly anti-atheist in its messaging without having to be specifically about that. They attiribute morality to themselves and imply that atheists are necessarily immoral or that their values are the only true way to think. If you want proof of this, you need look no further than how much prejudice there still is against atheists in the U.S. statistically.

This is what I found on my Dad's desk


He quickly hid it, like a teenage boy ditching a porno mag, but I knew it was because of me...


I just wish he would also look at it objectively, not just from a Christian echo chamber novel.

These are all good books, but they are philosophical. Here are a few historically-based works that might help set the context of the debate. TGD is interesting, but Dawkins is bad both at philosophy and history.

The Myth of Religious Violence - William Cavanaugh

I've seen this book criticized a few times on Reddit by users who haven't read it. You'll hear the claim that religion is the most violent force in the world, which Cavanaugh shows is a really slippery statement to hold.

Warning: it is empirical (historically speaking) to a fault. You may want to put it down because of all the examples he gives. Also, if you haven't read an academic as opposed to popular history book before, be aware that professional historians operate very differently when trying to uncover a narrative.

The Devil's Delusion: Atheism and Its Scientific Pretensions - David Berlinski
Mystery of Mysteries: Is Evolution a Social Construct - Michael Ruse

Scientists are human and, therefore, fallible. Some are very fallible, as both these books show. Understand that men like Dawkins, Hawking, and Gould have their own agendas.

Berlinski's book is great--he's a really talented writer--but insulting to atheists, though I would say no more insulting than TGD is to the religious. Ruse's work is more balanced but definitely critical of certain 20th century scientists. He really takes Karl Popper to task. Both these authors are irreligious, by the by.

"The Presbyterian Rebellion" - Richard Gardiner

The British nickname for the American Revolution was the "Presbyterian Rebellion." It is misleading to say that America's founders were aiming for a total secular society, and many who were involved in the revolution saw it as a war for freedom to practice their own religion, as this dissertation points out.

This is reddit, so this post will suffer one of two deaths: either it will be picked to pieces or ignored. I don't know which is worse.

No, they are very specifically anti-Christian. I used to think about it that way as well, until I studied the common theme among all of them. Every religion demotes Jesus, specifically, in clever and sinister ways, as if another was purposely attempting to bring people away from the core of the saving Gospel of Christ found in Ephesians 2:8-10, Romans 3:23, Romans 6:23, and John 14:6. This cannot be by accident, but you will only become aware of this if you truly understand the Gospel of Christ - which a large, large majority of peope do not understand. I would actually assume by probability and what you have said thus far, that you do not understand it either.

Just because a group of scientists claim something is true, does not automatically make it so by an appeal to authority. Look at the science yourself. Here's a great place to start to understand some core concepts that fundamentally break down that evolutionists hold to with absolute faith and complete uncertainty: https://www.amazon.com/Devils-Delusion-Atheism-Scientific-Pretensions/dp/0465019374/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1523138554&sr=8-1&keywords=devils+delusion

Thanks again for your reply! I'm glad we've been able to talk about this sincerely for so long.

You seem to have misunderstood me again, and the attrition will soon cause me to quit. I can't keep repeating myself, I don't have the time: I am not appealing to God as an explanation of that which can otherwise be explained. I do not make unfounded assumptions. Since explanations are what we are after, there could be such a thing as "naturalism-of-the-gaps". Here's one of the defeaters for naturalism if you're interested.

> I'm only making this argument because you seem to think other peoples' conclusion has any weight.

Not what I said.

> spontaneous generation

that was a dead end. Doesn't mean the only alternative is God, of course. For all we know transpermia could be possible. I think Flew's rationale was that because it is impossible here, and in light of just how impossible it could be for life to arise from inanimate matter, it seems there's no way it could have happened elsewhere. It seemed to him a more complicated assumption than God's existence.

> I don't know how you can claim this world is so good to humanity that it MUST have been created for us. That's not to say that all the horrible things out there somehow undo the good things but I don't see how all these good things you see undo the bad.

I didn't say that either.

> Additionally, I have my own hypothesis that loving and appreciating nature has lead to discovery, mental health, and invention and therefore is an evolutionary advantage.

The notion that a designer deigned it lead to science because we presumed the universe is intelligible and that science could even be done.

> Us humans are slaves to our emotions but some of us like you and me are lucky enough to be capable of focusing on the good, but it's important to admit that not everyone feels this way.

Be there a realm of good, varying apprehension of that realm does none to the existence of that realm anymore than carrying apprehension of the natural world decides whether it is there or not.

> If you've ever known someone with chronic depression you'd agree that some people just can't focus on the good.

I have chronic depression, I know plenty. I'm glad there is such a thing as evil and sadness and pain, for if they did not exist then good would be meaningless. If life were pure prosperity, what would prosperity even be? All the pain in my life has made the good sweeter, the darkness made the light brighter.

> In this sense alone, being a positive and appreciative person can be beneficial for the survival of both individuals and our society collectively.

As I said, I'm aware there is this thing called science. However, regarding the argument, I don't care what else we learn about the natural world. Evolution by natural selection? Awesome! I'm so glad and amazed that there exists something that could lead to this.

> If you want to bring up the opinion philosophers and the masses of humanity as proof of anything I will have to bring up scientists.

Which ones, Sir Isaac Newton or the Nobel prize winner from two sessions ago--both Christian? Does a scientist speaking outside of his field of expertise provide meaningful ethos? If it does I don't think it helps your side. Einstein and Michiow Kaku are pantheists--far more than you have considered. So the most accomplished scientists can believe in the supernatural.

Now I was giving Christian philosophers as my example because, unlike scientists, they invest their skills and research into issues such as the validity of Christian belief. Meanwhile, scientists may be intelligent but are preoccupied with and trained for studies that are irrelevant to the validity of Christianity. Outside of being a scientist, scientists are normal people. i.e. Harvard--of all places-- has a majority of academic who in the very least believe in a "higher power".

> Scientists are, by a vast majority, atheist.

Most believe in something supernatural, but it's not always a god. I explained how the misconception of what evidence would imply God's existence, in tandem with the emergence of the classical atheists, has caused secularization at large in academia today. Let's not forget that for the expression of this "higher power" the Christian God was the outlet for most. We wouldn't have colleges today, had the Christians not founded them.

Since you are an agnostic atheist I think you'll find this book, written by a likeminded author, enlightening.

I don't remember appealing to God with a cosmological argument but that seems to be your assumption. I think you misunderstand. I empathize with Einstein and Dr. Kaku (one of the leading advocates of string theory today) on this point: it did not have to be this way, there are an infinite number of ways existence could have been--for it to be this seems it has been chosen. I just disagree with them that because God cannot be found within this creation he is not personal.

> and assert some veritable wizard in the sky as the answer. I don't mean that as an insult, it's just an apt parallel to what you're positing as a reasonable conclusion, whether you admit it or not.

He is not "in the sky", He created the heavens and the earth--all of it. People believe in God for very different reasons than they do a wizard, unicorn, or whatever because He is an explanation for natural phenomena--in some cases the best explanation, whether we like it or not. Anyway, here's an essay you might like. And another

I replied to my previous reply, in case you didn't notice.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Devils-Delusion-Scientific-Pretensions/dp/0465019374/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1371528897&sr=8-1&keywords=the+devil%27s+delusion

There's a lot of that going around