Well, to be more precise: stupid believers, and atheists responding to stupid believers. The stupid atheists are the ones who think refuting a strictly literal reading is sufficient to refute all of Chrisitanity (similar to the stupid Christians who think refuting vulgar materialism is enough to refute atheism).
Hmm. I would say that atheists are united in determining that NO accounts of supernatural events in Scripture relate to factual events. So, that would seem to make atheists less literal than theists, wouldn't it?
Also, what sort of similar agreement do theists have pertaining to the reading of Scripture?
If I read in a high school paper that "the Tigers annihilated the Trojans, 12 to 3"
-- the stupid of the literalists say that the game happened and that there were literal tigers on the field, and that there was literal carnage,
-- the typical literalist say there really was a game, but none died, and there were no literal tigers,
-- the non-literalist agree the game happened but suspect the score was not exactly as reported,
-- your atheist might say there was no game, and no teams, but the author intended to say there were real tigers, and of course this shows how absrd and false the paper is.
Can you cite an example of an atheist doing what you say an atheist might do with regard to Scripture? I'm not following your criticism there.
Also, can you answer the gist of my previous question -- which parts of Scripture do theists agree are not to be understood literally? I mentioned where all atheists are in agreement that Bible is not to be taken literally, and I was curious (per the post) which parts all Christians do not take literally.
The atheist is surely right to start with a conservative reading of scripture at least. If one argues that you don't have to be literal with scripture, one is introducing judgment into it's assessment. That is not uncontroversial, theologically speaking (see the drama surrounding Mike Licona for confirmation of that). So I am not sure that an atheist is "stupid" or "wrong" to read scripture literally, since it appears to be an uncontroversial position within Christian thought.
BTW, one might be able to make an argument that, since a literal reading of scripture is 'false' the probability that Christianity is false is increased. Not totally sure if this would work, but it seems a reasonable possibility to me.
@Parbouj: I don't think that Atheism is the direct antithesis to Christianity. Atheism is antithetical to theism. Humanism or materialism are antithetical to Christianity and so if a theist refutes materialism, she doesn't by extension refute atheism. Same goes the other way: if a sceptic refutes Christianity, they haven't necessarily refuted theism. Just a thought.
Most atheists are much better than this, but a typical claim of over-literalness by an atheist is that the Bible says there are unicorns because of a particular translation's handling of a particular Hebrew term.
William, If unicorn is mistranslated, what supernatural events described in the Bible are not mistranslations and are to be taken literally by atheists? Or, as I asked earlier, which parts of Scripture do theists agree are not to be understood literally?
Dumb question, Tony. You know in advance that you'll never get "all Christians" to agree on what parts of Scripture should be taken literally. Since the Protestant Revolt (a.k.a., the Reformation), the Church speaks with a divided voice.
(This situation will not, however, last forever. The time will come when historians will look back on our current circumstances of there being many different denominations as a passing phase in the history of Christianity, as we today look on the Arian controversies of the early centuries A.D. as an ultimately temporary blip, despite the fact said controversies lasted for generations.)
But your question becomes even more nonsensical when you ask for complete agreement between "all theists". To get such agreement, you'd have to have every singleChirstian, Moslem, Jew, Hindu, Zoroastrian, and Daoist (etc.) to agree on which passages in the Old Testament are allegory? Not gonna happen!
You may perhaps, for the time being, legitimately ask which parts of Scripture Catholics (for instance) interpret in a non-literal manner, but as evidenced by the friendly debate in an earlier thread between Ben Yakov and myself about the historicity of Adam, even there you will not find 100% agreement.
Dumb question, Tony. You know in advance that you'll never get "all Christians" to agree on what parts of Scripture should be taken literally.
You will get a considerable number of them to agree on a considerable amount of the Bible, though.
As for atheists, heh. Atheists (among others) have trouble agreeing on who qualifies as an atheist, on what qualifies as natural or supernatural, etc. Ask them if it's appropriate to make a pass at a woman in an elevator if you want to see real fireworks. ;)
Of course, Christians are simply going to deny that , eg, when Paul says 'the last Adam became a life-giving spirit' , he meant that Jesus became a spirit.
And they simply deny that when Paul says 'Flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God' he meant that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God.
The Bible doesn't mean what it says, is something that is very useful for believers to say, and they can then scoff at people who think the Bible means what it says.
"I see Bob cannot produce any meaningful comment."
But why should I, Steven, when you're saying it all? Please do go on; every word you type is confirming everything written in the article cited on this thread!
Just look at the title of this discussion ("Who are the most literal readers of Scripture? Atheists, of course!"), and tell me how you are not proving to the world (or at least to the readers of Dangerous Idea) the truth of that statement.
I already said that atheists read the Bible more literally than believers.
Just as people who think the Holocaust happened read 'ausrotten' more literally than Holocaust deniers.
I think this is probably because atheists read the Bible by themselves, while most believers have the Bible read to them, when it is given a protective cocoon of spin so that they are not able to see the context.
So Richard Dawkins can read the Bible and correctly see it describes a sadistic malevolent egomaniacal bully of a god who kills on a whim, while believers are told it is all about fluffy bunnies.
Lazy Christians and opportunist atheists love to employ the old "it means what it says, says what it means hermeneutic." I've been saying this for a very LONG time. It's no wonder skeptics have managed to locate so many "contradictions." Try that with Shakespeare, son!
No, it is people like NT Wright who are forced to claim that the Bible should not be taken literally when it says Jesus flew into space, just like David Irving claims it should not be taken literally when Nazis said the Jews were to be 'ausrotten'.
Without a protective layer of spin to shield believers from what the Bible says, they would be forced to deal with the actual words on the page - words like 'the last Adam became a life-giving spirit'.
Crude: "You will get a considerable number of them to agree on a considerable amount of the Bible, though."
Perhaps. But as I said earlier, you get uniform agreement from atheists on a considerable amount of the Bible, and that agreeement is in all those sections which are most definitely not to be taken literally (as in corresponding to factual events). And try not to forget that the OP is about who reads the Bible most literally.
Crude: "As for atheists, heh. Atheists (among others) have trouble agreeing on who qualifies as an atheist, on what qualifies as natural or supernatural, etc. Ask them if it's appropriate to make a pass at a woman in an elevator if you want to see real fireworks."
>Without a protective layer of spin to shield believers from what the Bible says, they would be forced to deal with the actual words on the page -
I see no reason to believe Stephen Hawkings is a Theist just because he said if we learned the secrets of physics we would "know the mind of God".
If you take him literally he is a Theist but he didn't mean it literally. He meant it as a metaphor for knowing the ultimate mystery.
He also said it will sell him more books if he put that line in there.
Not every author is literalist. Same with the Bible.
>Without a protective layer of spin to shield believers from what the Bible says, they would be forced to deal with the actual words on the page -
You are assuming without proof the Bible is meant to be perspicuous. You are assuming the Reformation Doctrine of the Perspicuity of Scripture.
Why should Catholics like Bob & myself buy that?
In fact it shows why New Atheist Fundamentalism is for the mentally inferior with it's one size fits all polemical mentality.
As an intelligent Atheist on Luke blog once quipped about the futility of this approach the Atheist has to become an apologist for a competing religious tradition and argue for it.
You have to do twice the work. Become an apologist for Protestantism & then polemic that Protestantism.
Ben, you are right on that one. It's amusing how Steven, an atheist, is lecturing me on what I, as a Christian, am supposed to be believing. It's frustrating to him that we actual Christians aren't fitting into his strawman mold.
Scratch a Rah-Rah Catholic, and find a proto-atheist (especially if he's "liberal" and moresoe if he's already full-blown socialist).
"Scratch an Atheist find a fundamentalist."
Scratch a Rah-Rah Catholic, and find an dhimmi-to-secularism who refuses to grasp that all *serious* Christians are "fundies" in the eyes of the secularists.
>Scratch a Rah-Rah Catholic, and find a proto-atheist (especially if he's "liberal" and moresoe if he's already full-blown socialist).
Actually I love the Tea Party. I can't get enough of FOXNEWS. I can't watch MSLSD(aka MSNBC) news for more than 20 second without bursting into flames.
Just so you know.
>Scratch a Rah-Rah Catholic, and find an dhimmi-to-secularism who refuses to grasp that all *serious* Christians are "fundies" in the eyes of the secularists.
Yes Richard Dawkins calls Francis Collins a "creationist".
Why are you complaining about this to me when I already complain about it?
BTW I noticed you and J have locked horns on the other thread.
Now that is a train wreck I would pay to see. But I get it here for free. Awesome!
Ben, you and I put the catholic in the Catholic Church. You like Fox News; I like MSNBC (especially Hardball!). You like the Tea Party, whereas OWS is starting to impress me. I have no idea who your favorite Catholic political thinkers are, but mine are Dorothy Day, Daniel Berrigan, and Gustavo Gutierrez (and I'm quite sure that none of them would be on your list!)
Crude said "Atheists (among others) have trouble agreeing on who qualifies as an atheist"
Among atheists, this is really not the case. There are no major schisms among self-proclaimed atheists, with regard to what they mean by their atheism (sometimes people will bicker about weak vs strong atheism, which is a bit of a tempest in a teapot: neither believes a god exists).
Where I am, in the midwest, Christians are always saying other putative Christians are not really Christians. The Catholics are more kind, they say the Fundies are bad christians, not nonchristians.
At any rate, nothing rides on this. Who cares what group has more infighting, I care what group is right. Which position has the evidence and reason on their side?
Yes, Bob, that seems a better way to express what I encounter with the Catholics. If I were to become Christian, I'd lean Catholic likely at this point. Don't trust the dirty masses to interpret that jungle of a text authoritatively any more than I trust the maniacs in a direct democracy to make laws in our country. :) I'm like republican form of government, and lean toward the same in my (simulated) religious belief.
>Among atheists, this is really not the case. There are no major schisms among self-proclaimed atheists,
And Richard Dawkins and his fellow Cult of the Gnu folks calling Atheists who want to treat Theism with respect "appeasers" has escaped your notice?
Plus I do remember BDK often saying he doesn't merely lack "God belief" he doesn't believe gods exist. Or something to that effect. So is he really an Atheist considering he seemingly rejects "Lack of god-belief" as the sole one true definition of Atheism?
OTOH sure Atheists technically have no schisms since there is no parallel to the Catholic Church in Atheism. There is simply no founding non-belief institution to spread the good news of non-belief.
>At any rate, nothing rides on this. Who cares what group has more infighting, I care what group is right. Which position has the evidence and reason on their side?
BY: I meant definitional fights about what it means to be an atheist. Of course there is plenty of fighting among atheists about how we should treat religious texts etc.
But you are right, and I mentioned strong v weak atheism (sounds like this Knight was talking about the same). There is some bickering there, you are right, but it is not very central. It comes down to arguing about whether someone who has never heard of any gods, and doesn't believe that said gods exist, should be called an atheist.
That's not a fight just for the atheist to have among ourselves, but an interesting question I am no more qualified to answer than you or Victor or Crude.
Since I am a non-naturalist atheist, I tend to fight atheists a lot who (nowadays) tend to fetishize neuroscience but know little about logic or mathematics, and have no sympathy for Platonism.
Ilion/Troy shows again he is not just ignorant, but depleted of logical capacities. Atheism does not imply naturalism (metaphysical naturalism, or physicalism), while the converse implication does flow.
If you need help understanding conditionals, a logical form which we have seen consistently trips you up, try out Wikipedia
Hope that helps. Maybe it will improve your programming skills too. Any other time you need a special ramp built to help you follow my reasoning, I'll be glad to build it. I usually don't make my writing so as to be mentally-handicapped accessible, but for you I'll make an exception.
35 comments:
Well, to be more precise: stupid believers, and atheists responding to stupid believers. The stupid atheists are the ones who think refuting a strictly literal reading is sufficient to refute all of Chrisitanity (similar to the stupid Christians who think refuting vulgar materialism is enough to refute atheism).
Hmm. I would say that atheists are united in determining that NO accounts of supernatural events in Scripture relate to factual events. So, that would seem to make atheists less literal than theists, wouldn't it?
Also, what sort of similar agreement do theists have pertaining to the reading of Scripture?
Scratch an Atheist find a fundamentalist.
Tony,
If I read in a high school paper that "the Tigers annihilated the Trojans, 12 to 3"
-- the stupid of the literalists say that the game happened and that there were literal tigers on the field, and that there was literal carnage,
-- the typical literalist say there really was a game, but none died, and there were no literal tigers,
-- the non-literalist agree the game happened but suspect the score was not exactly as reported,
-- your atheist might say there was no game, and no teams, but the author intended to say there were real tigers, and of course this shows how absrd and false the paper is.
And so forth.
William,
Can you cite an example of an atheist doing what you say an atheist might do with regard to Scripture? I'm not following your criticism there.
Also, can you answer the gist of my previous question -- which parts of Scripture do theists agree are not to be understood literally? I mentioned where all atheists are in agreement that Bible is not to be taken literally, and I was curious (per the post) which parts all Christians do not take literally.
The atheist is surely right to start with a conservative reading of scripture at least. If one argues that you don't have to be literal with scripture, one is introducing judgment into it's assessment. That is not uncontroversial, theologically speaking (see the drama surrounding Mike Licona for confirmation of that). So I am not sure that an atheist is "stupid" or "wrong" to read scripture literally, since it appears to be an uncontroversial position within Christian thought.
BTW, one might be able to make an argument that, since a literal reading of scripture is 'false' the probability that Christianity is false is increased. Not totally sure if this would work, but it seems a reasonable possibility to me.
@Parbouj: I don't think that Atheism is the direct antithesis to Christianity. Atheism is antithetical to theism. Humanism or materialism are antithetical to Christianity and so if a theist refutes materialism, she doesn't by extension refute atheism. Same goes the other way: if a sceptic refutes Christianity, they haven't necessarily refuted theism. Just a thought.
Most atheists are much better than this, but a typical claim of over-literalness by an atheist is that the Bible says there are unicorns because of a particular translation's handling of a particular Hebrew term.
here.
William, If unicorn is mistranslated, what supernatural events described in the Bible are not mistranslations and are to be taken literally by atheists? Or, as I asked earlier, which parts of Scripture do theists agree are not to be understood literally?
Dumb question, Tony. You know in advance that you'll never get "all Christians" to agree on what parts of Scripture should be taken literally. Since the Protestant Revolt (a.k.a., the Reformation), the Church speaks with a divided voice.
(This situation will not, however, last forever. The time will come when historians will look back on our current circumstances of there being many different denominations as a passing phase in the history of Christianity, as we today look on the Arian controversies of the early centuries A.D. as an ultimately temporary blip, despite the fact said controversies lasted for generations.)
But your question becomes even more nonsensical when you ask for complete agreement between "all theists". To get such agreement, you'd have to have every singleChirstian, Moslem, Jew, Hindu, Zoroastrian, and Daoist (etc.) to agree on which passages in the Old Testament are allegory? Not gonna happen!
You may perhaps, for the time being, legitimately ask which parts of Scripture Catholics (for instance) interpret in a non-literal manner, but as evidenced by the friendly debate in an earlier thread between Ben Yakov and myself about the historicity of Adam, even there you will not find 100% agreement.
Dumb question, Tony. You know in advance that you'll never get "all Christians" to agree on what parts of Scripture should be taken literally.
You will get a considerable number of them to agree on a considerable amount of the Bible, though.
As for atheists, heh. Atheists (among others) have trouble agreeing on who qualifies as an atheist, on what qualifies as natural or supernatural, etc. Ask them if it's appropriate to make a pass at a woman in an elevator if you want to see real fireworks. ;)
Of course.
Believers have to maintain that the Bible does not mean what it says.
As they cannot sell the Bible, if they admit that what the Bible says is what the Bible means.
It is a bit like the way David Irving claims 'ausrotten' was metaphorical.
While the rest of the world reads it literally as meaning that the Jews were to be annihilated.
... and along comes Steven Carr, to prove Aslan's point perfectly! (I love it when a plan comes together.)
I see Bob cannot produce any meaningful comment.
Of course, Christians are simply going to deny that , eg, when Paul says 'the last Adam became a life-giving spirit' , he meant that Jesus became a spirit.
And they simply deny that when Paul says 'Flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God' he meant that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God.
The Bible doesn't mean what it says, is something that is very useful for believers to say, and they can then scoff at people who think the Bible means what it says.
"I see Bob cannot produce any meaningful comment."
But why should I, Steven, when you're saying it all? Please do go on; every word you type is confirming everything written in the article cited on this thread!
Just look at the title of this discussion ("Who are the most literal readers of Scripture? Atheists, of course!"), and tell me how you are not proving to the world (or at least to the readers of Dangerous Idea) the truth of that statement.
This is too funny for words.
I already said that atheists read the Bible more literally than believers.
Just as people who think the Holocaust happened read 'ausrotten' more literally than Holocaust deniers.
I think this is probably because atheists read the Bible by themselves, while most believers have the Bible read to them, when it is given a protective cocoon of spin so that they are not able to see the context.
So Richard Dawkins can read the Bible and correctly see it describes a sadistic malevolent egomaniacal bully of a god who kills on a whim, while believers are told it is all about fluffy bunnies.
Well then, Steven, at long last we agree about something - that neither fundamentalists nor atheists know how to read the Bible!
Lazy Christians and opportunist atheists love to employ the old "it means what it says, says what it means hermeneutic." I've been saying this for a very LONG time. It's no wonder skeptics have managed to locate so many "contradictions." Try that with Shakespeare, son!
The Flannagan's noticed a similar thing:
http://www.mandm.org.nz/2010/11/bovine-faeces-and-the-sexual-proclivities-of-rocks-why-were-all-selective-literalists.html
http://www.mandm.org.nz/2011/05/madeleine-on-unbelievable.html
No, it is people like NT Wright who are forced to claim that the Bible should not be taken literally when it says Jesus flew into space, just like David Irving claims it should not be taken literally when Nazis said the Jews were to be 'ausrotten'.
Without a protective layer of spin to shield believers from what the Bible says, they would be forced to deal with the actual words on the page - words like 'the last Adam became a life-giving spirit'.
Steven,
What you call "spin", we call the potestas docendi, or Teaching Authority, of the Church.
You really need to ask yourself a couple of questions, like these:
Q: Who is best qualified to say what a particular piece of writing actually means?
A: The writer is best qualified.
Q: Who wrote the Bible?
A: The Church.
Q: In that case, who has the last word on how Scripture should be interpreted?
A: The Faithful, who make up the Church.
Q: Not Atheists? Perhaps Richard Dawkins?
A: (after stifling scarcely controllable laughter) No.
Crude: "You will get a considerable number of them to agree on a considerable amount of the Bible, though."
Perhaps. But as I said earlier, you get uniform agreement from atheists on a considerable amount of the Bible, and that agreeement is in all those sections which are most definitely not to be taken literally (as in corresponding to factual events). And try not to forget that the OP is about who reads the Bible most literally.
Crude: "As for atheists, heh. Atheists (among others) have trouble agreeing on who qualifies as an atheist, on what qualifies as natural or supernatural, etc. Ask them if it's appropriate to make a pass at a woman in an elevator if you want to see real fireworks."
Yawn.
>I already said that atheists read the Bible more literally than believers.
Thank you Steve for being honest enough to confirm what I have always said.
It's actually quite refreshing.
If we could get to realize Protestants aren't the only readers and interpreters of Scripture you would be the perfect Atheist.
>Without a protective layer of spin to shield believers from what the Bible says, they would be forced to deal with the actual words on the page -
I see no reason to believe Stephen Hawkings is a Theist just because he said if we learned the secrets of physics we would "know the mind of God".
If you take him literally he is a Theist but he didn't mean it literally. He meant it as a metaphor for knowing the ultimate mystery.
He also said it will sell him more books if he put that line in there.
Not every author is literalist. Same with the Bible.
>Without a protective layer of spin to shield believers from what the Bible says, they would be forced to deal with the actual words on the page -
You are assuming without proof the Bible is meant to be perspicuous. You are assuming the Reformation Doctrine of the Perspicuity of Scripture.
Why should Catholics like Bob & myself buy that?
In fact it shows why New Atheist Fundamentalism is for the mentally inferior with it's one size fits all polemical mentality.
As an intelligent Atheist on Luke blog once quipped about the futility of this approach the Atheist has to become an apologist for a competing religious tradition and argue for it.
You have to do twice the work. Become an apologist for Protestantism & then polemic that Protestantism.
That's kind of lame.
Ben, you are right on that one. It's amusing how Steven, an atheist, is lecturing me on what I, as a Christian, am supposed to be believing. It's frustrating to him that we actual Christians aren't fitting into his strawman mold.
"Scratch an Atheist find a fundamentalist."
Scratch a Rah-Rah Catholic, and find a proto-atheist (especially if he's "liberal" and moresoe if he's already full-blown socialist).
"Scratch an Atheist find a fundamentalist."
Scratch a Rah-Rah Catholic, and find an dhimmi-to-secularism who refuses to grasp that all *serious* Christians are "fundies" in the eyes of the secularists.
@Ilion
>Scratch a Rah-Rah Catholic, and find a proto-atheist (especially if he's "liberal" and moresoe if he's already full-blown socialist).
Actually I love the Tea Party. I can't get enough of FOXNEWS. I can't watch MSLSD(aka MSNBC) news for more than 20 second without bursting into flames.
Just so you know.
>Scratch a Rah-Rah Catholic, and find an dhimmi-to-secularism who refuses to grasp that all *serious* Christians are "fundies" in the eyes of the secularists.
Yes Richard Dawkins calls Francis Collins a "creationist".
Why are you complaining about this to me when I already complain about it?
BTW I noticed you and J have locked horns on the other thread.
Now that is a train wreck I would pay to see. But I get it here for free. Awesome!
Ben, you and I put the catholic in the Catholic Church. You like Fox News; I like MSNBC (especially Hardball!). You like the Tea Party, whereas OWS is starting to impress me. I have no idea who your favorite Catholic political thinkers are, but mine are Dorothy Day, Daniel Berrigan, and Gustavo Gutierrez (and I'm quite sure that none of them would be on your list!)
When I argue religion I have little use for politics. From a Catholic perspective politics are a matter of the individual's prudent judgement.
There is no religious compulsion to be for or against raising taxes and such.
The problem with Gnu's is they see religion & philosophy as politics by other means.
Which makes them tedious.
"Ben, you and I put the catholic in the Catholic Church."
I'll say! 'Illogical' all the way to 'anti-logical' and 'irrational' is a very catholic spectrum.
Crude said
"Atheists (among others) have trouble agreeing on who qualifies as an atheist"
Among atheists, this is really not the case. There are no major schisms among self-proclaimed atheists, with regard to what they mean by their atheism (sometimes people will bicker about weak vs strong atheism, which is a bit of a tempest in a teapot: neither believes a god exists).
Where I am, in the midwest, Christians are always saying other putative Christians are not really Christians. The Catholics are more kind, they say the Fundies are bad christians, not nonchristians.
At any rate, nothing rides on this. Who cares what group has more infighting, I care what group is right. Which position has the evidence and reason on their side?
Parbouj,
Not "bad" Christians - just misinformed ones. Some of the best Christians I know are fundamentalists.
Yes, Bob, that seems a better way to express what I encounter with the Catholics. If I were to become Christian, I'd lean Catholic likely at this point. Don't trust the dirty masses to interpret that jungle of a text authoritatively any more than I trust the maniacs in a direct democracy to make laws in our country. :) I'm like republican form of government, and lean toward the same in my (simulated) religious belief.
>Among atheists, this is really not the case. There are no major schisms among self-proclaimed atheists,
And Richard Dawkins and his fellow Cult of the Gnu folks calling Atheists who want to treat Theism with respect "appeasers" has escaped your notice?
Plus I do remember BDK often saying he doesn't merely lack "God belief" he doesn't believe gods exist. Or something to that effect.
So is he really an Atheist considering he seemingly rejects "Lack of god-belief" as the sole one true definition of Atheism?
OTOH sure Atheists technically have no schisms since there is no parallel to the Catholic Church in Atheism. There is simply no founding non-belief institution to spread the good news of non-belief.
>At any rate, nothing rides on this. Who cares what group has more infighting, I care what group is right. Which position has the evidence and reason on their side?
Add philosophy to that & I can't argue with that.
Cheers.
BY: I meant definitional fights about what it means to be an atheist. Of course there is plenty of fighting among atheists about how we should treat religious texts etc.
But you are right, and I mentioned strong v weak atheism (sounds like this Knight was talking about the same). There is some bickering there, you are right, but it is not very central. It comes down to arguing about whether someone who has never heard of any gods, and doesn't believe that said gods exist, should be called an atheist.
That's not a fight just for the atheist to have among ourselves, but an interesting question I am no more qualified to answer than you or Victor or Crude.
Since I am a non-naturalist atheist, I tend to fight atheists a lot who (nowadays) tend to fetishize neuroscience but know little about logic or mathematics, and have no sympathy for Platonism.
"Since I am a non-naturalist atheist, ..."
"Contradiction in terms"? What's that?
Ilion/Troy shows again he is not just ignorant, but depleted of logical capacities. Atheism does not imply naturalism (metaphysical naturalism, or physicalism), while the converse implication does flow.
If you need help understanding conditionals, a logical form which we have seen consistently trips you up, try out Wikipedia
Hope that helps. Maybe it will improve your programming skills too. Any other time you need a special ramp built to help you follow my reasoning, I'll be glad to build it. I usually don't make my writing so as to be mentally-handicapped accessible, but for you I'll make an exception.
Happy Thanksgiving Troy {g}
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