AfF #7: Argument from Scripture

(Click here for Arguments for Fred #6)

God exists because it says so in the Bible. How do we know the Bible is true? It says so in the Bible. But that's circular reasoning! How do we know it's circular reasoning? Because the laws of logic say so. How do we know the laws of logic are true? Because the laws of logic say so. But that's circular reasoning!

Does the above place the Bible on a par with the laws of logic? No, because the "God exists because it says so in the Bible" argument is invoking the laws of logic, while the initial accusation of circular reasoning does not invoke the veracity of the Bible. The two arguments are not equivalent, because one is internally consistent (the laws of logic say that circular reasoning isn't proof of anything) while the other (the veracity of the Bible) must rely on something external to itself (the laws of logic):

"It's okay to use circular reasoning to prove the truth of the Bible, because reasoning itself is circular when it says circular reasoning doesn't prove anything."

Clearly a tu quoque argument par excellence.*
_____
*Why use only one language when you can use three?

Why do people laugh at creationists?

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=AC3481305829426D



This is a selfish blog-post on my part. I simply wanted this series of Thunderf00t's videos in a convenient, easily accessible place.

New podcast: Skepticule

I hearby announce the launch of my new podcast, Skepticule, which will be a series of irregular episodes no more than 20 minutes long, addressing areas similar to those addressed here at Evil Burnee, but in audio form.

The podcast has been submitted to iTunes and I hope it will be listed soon. Meanwhile you can subscribe manually in iTunes or any other podcatcher using the following feed address:

http://www.skepticule.co.uk/feeds/posts/default?alt=rss

The Skepticule podcast blog-page is a little rudimentary at present, but I hope to tidy it up soon, along with adding a flash player to allow streaming of the latest episode. Meanwhile the "zeroth" episode is available for direct download from the site, or by using the link below:

http://media.libsyn.com/media/revup/Skepticule-000-20090906.mp3

Burnee links for Sunday

Tony Blair: Without God's Truth at its centre, no community can fulfil its potential - Commentators, Opinion - The Independent
This is all faith and fuzzy feeling - isn't it all terrible, if only we could have more God, everything would be fine and dandy. Sorry Tony, this is more than usually muddle-headed. Anyone (the pope included) who claims that atheists are to blame for global warming is simply not thinking straight.

NSS supports Penn & Teller’s right to attack the Vatican on TV | National Secular Society
Penn & Teller's half-hour show on the Vatican is indeed hard-hitting, but someone needed to do it. The Catholic League, in the person of Bill Donohue, is veritably frothing at the mouth over it. But he doesn't speak for all Catholics, let alone the Vatican itself, from whom we have yet (2009-09-01) to hear on this subject.

Secular kids' camp in Collin County aims to provide questions, not answers | News for Dallas, Texas | Dallas Morning News | Religion | The Dallas Morning News
Now that we have one (or more) of these camps in the UK, there's a chance that we might soon overtake the US in the number of them, given the relative un/godliness of the two nations.

"There must be a reason" : Respectful Insolence
Insightful blog-post on why some people cling to certain beliefs despite ample evidence that those beliefs are incorrect - based on a recent research paper.

Greta Christina's Blog: Decisions Are Made By Those Who Show Up: Why Calling Congress Isn't A Waste Of Time
How to be a political activist . . . or, stop grumbling and attempt to make a difference. Sound advice, in two consecutive posts.

BHA objects to accreditation of creationist qualifications
Creationists claim that the existence of the Loch Ness monster disproves evolution. Wait, did I miss something? Did Nessie give a press conference?

Italy ok's abortion pill despite church opposition | International | Reuters
Notice how when opposition to the RU-486 pill on religious grounds fails, the Vatican (or its unofficial spokesperson) switches to saying it's not safe. This is is the same as when the pope claimed that condoms contribute to HIV deaths in Africa. If the original argument doesn't sway people, invent something else that might. Unfortunately (for the Vatican) the reasoning behind the fake argument is just as transparent as the dogma-based argument.

Students must learn about other religions: judge - nationalpost.com
An upright judge, a learned judge!

My Admittedly Acerbic Observation... - JREF
The Amazing One adds his (considerable) voice to the godless condemnation of Pope Benny's latest.

Catholic League: For Religious and Civil Rights
One of the blurbs on Bill Donohue's new book, Secular Sabotage: How Liberals Are Destroying Religion and Culture in America:

• “Wake up, America! The secular minority has cut the brake cables on America’s In-God-We-Trust-Mobile™! Not even all 43 of our Christian presidents can save us now.” – Stephen Colbert, host of “The Colbert Report”

(Via @mightymur on Twitter: RT @mattstaggs: Apparently Catholic League pres Bill Donohue doesn't know Colbert is a satirist.)

Daylight Atheism > Original Virtue
A discussion of "original sin". Fascinating stuff, but I question its purpose.

AfF #6: Fine-tuning Argument

(Click here for Arguments for Fred #5)

The fine-tuning argument is actually part of the teleological argument.

The way the universe is arranged, from the micro to the macro, is just so. It turns out that everything is just right for intelligent life on Earth. This is so amazingly improbable it must have been done on purpose.

Actually no. Look at the size of the universe (in particular, look at the Hubble Ultra Deep Field image). Compared to the size of the universe, life on Earth is an invisible dot on an invisible dot on an invisible dot on an invisible dot. What kind of intelligent creator would make something so mind-bogglingly vast, just so that an infinitesimal part of it could develop intelligent life, while the rest of creation remains – to an almost universal degree – dispassionately deadly? Only an incompetently wasteful one.

The reason why the universe appears fine-tuned to us is that we are a product of it. If the universe were "tuned" differently, we would be different (probably utterly and incomprehensibly different).

Some people invoke the idea of the multiverse – a possibly infinite number of universes, all slightly different, existing in parallel, and unable to communicate with each other in any way. This hypothesis may be useful as a thought-experiment, but it's unfalsifiable, so of little practical utility. The idea is that there are so many of these parallel universes that all combinations of the values of physical constants will exist, somewhere, however improbable. We just happen to be living in one that contains at least one planet suitable for the evolution of intelligent life.

Here's Douglas Adams on what has become known as the Anthropic Principle:

"...imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, 'This is an interesting world I find myself in - an interesting hole I find myself in - fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!' This is such a powerful idea that as the sun rises in the sky and the air heats up and as, gradually, the puddle gets smaller and smaller, it's still frantically hanging on to the notion that everything's going to be alright, because this world was meant to have him in it, was built to have him in it; so the moment he disappears catches him rather by surprise."

(From Biota)

UPDATE 2009-09-10: Click here for AfF #7

When "The Bible tells us..." is legitimate

I have to admit that when a Christian evangelist begins a sentence with "The Bible tells us..." I tend to tune out, because inevitably the Bible is being quoted as a source of incontrovertible truth, and personally I've seen no compelling evidence for this belief.

Writers like to quote other writers. Someone once complained that they really didn't see what was so great about Shakespeare, because all he had done was take a stack of famous quotations and string them together. We quote other people when when we think they have a unique way of saying something, or when the quote seems particularly apt. So why reinvent the wheel?

The Bible is full of quotations - by which I mean it is oft quoted, but not necessarily as inerrant truth. One of my favourite put-downs comes from two different places in the Bible:

"And [Judas] went and hanged himself." (Matt 27:5)
"Go, and do thou likewise." (Luke 10:37)

This is All Dawkins's Fault! - Jason Rosenhouse, Evolutionblog

The ridiculous fracas over the mention of "evolution" on the shirts of a school marching band has been all over the blogs, but Jason Rosenhouse has, I think, the most ironic take on it:

http://scienceblogs.com/evolutionblog/2009/08/this_is_all_dawkinss_fault.php

My friends, there are certain times in your life when you are simply forced by events to reevaluate everything you believe and hold dear. For me, now is such a time. I have argued at length that the aggressive tone of the anti-religion books by Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens does not hurt the cause of promoting good science education. That position is no longer tenable, in light of events coming out of Sedalia, Missouri:

The shirts, which were designed to promote the band's fall program, are light gray and feature an image of a monkey progressing through stages and eventually emerging as a man. Each figure holds a brass instrument. Several instruments decorate the background and the words “Smith-Cotton High School Tiger Pride Marching Band” and “Brass Evolutions 2009” are emblazoned above and below the image.

...continue reading

What surprised me about this affair is the assumption by certain people that the mention of "evolution" is somehow a religious issue.