I'm not saying that makes it excusable. I'm just saying I'm not sure you can tag it on religion. Capitalism waving a crucifix is still just capitalism.

no it's not an accusation, emails would have been sent if so

it's more like we'll never get a break from having the one crusader guy coming to spew out the same boring talking points about how secularism is bunk and jeebus is best

and to be clear, I do mean it's of the Sbyvl-type posting quality, not our regulars like semck who (a) don't even post like this in the first place and (b) make reasonable assertions and back them up well instead of this sweeping-assertion-hit-and-run

All right, hecks. You go on thinking that organized religion isn't the root of condescension around the world.

Found some:

http://yacawa.org/2010/07/17/atheist-satire/

It seems to be clear that anti-atheist satire doesn't work.

@President Eden - I have no idea what you are referring to.

@hecks - "The fact is that humanism is based solely on one's inferences based on observation; that is, based solely on logic. While this provides room for divergence of conclusion, I find it far more rational to accept one's own observation than to begin with the assumption of the infallibility of a single ancient source."

If humanism is based solely on logic and rationality, then it would seem that there would be absolutely no room for a divergence of conclusions. If there is a divergence of conclusions, which of course there is, then it seems that logic and rationality are just red herrings. Humanism isn't based on logic and rationality, it makes use of them to work from an arbitrary starting point to whatever its reasonable conclusion is. The starting point of humanism is arbitrary depending on which humanist you talk to, and so, again, there is simply no reasonable epistemological grounding for humanism. Again, this is not to say that humanism is irrational, but to say that its rational arguments proceed from something groundless.

Humanists may say the same thing about Christianity, but then at least there is no room for humanists to say that Christianity is inferior. All they can say is that Christianity's epistemological starting point is just as arbitrary as humanism's, in which case we are reduced to a discussion about taste and aesthetics.

This isn't exactly anti-atheist, and it's not by a religious person, but it's close enough and it's fun, so I'm going to post it (for entertainment, not forensic purposes).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-M-vnmejwXo

South Park did a great atheist satire, where the future had groups like the Militant Atheist League fighting the League of Militant Atheists etc.

hey come on now, Ramsul is presenting clear reasons for his beliefs that can be argued against, and he is responding calmly and directly to the criticisms. That's a lot better than sbyvl does.

Without reading all the diatribe, it's not used for the same reason LYING would not be used intentionally to make a case for Christianity.

SATIRE: the use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues.

Satire is generally not seen as a "positive" dialogue. You may be correct in that satire can not be used in support of religious beliefs because the methods are generally antithetical to the desired outcome of a conversation.

"Hey...I want to introduce you to my God...He is all about love and honesty and all thing Good. Here...let me lambast you and ridicule you with a little sly humor in order to introduce you to my God..." It just doesn't work...not because I *can't* ridicule you with satire, but because it would be defeating the purpose.

Trust me...I could make a satirical cartoon / joke about you firmly putting your foot down and spending eternity burning in torment in the depths of hell...but at least you didn't sway from your atheist principles! You died certain of your belief, blah blah blah.

This would be a humorous cartoon (in a strange, sad way...) to Christians but you wouldn't get the joke, and it sure as hell wouldn't convince you to explore Christianity.

@Heck Bravo -- right on --- you get it perfectly. "However we unbelievers feel about religious people, they're rarely as condescending to us as we are to them"

Christians talk to non-believers about their God **because** they love them and don't want anyone to die and suffer eternally. It is actually the worst kind of hatred for a Christian to NOT talk to you about God..because that would mean they are content to let you die and suffer, even though they believe they have the key to freedom and eternal joy.

@BO "All right, hecks. You go on thinking that organized religion isn't the root of condescension around the world. "

Seriosuly, Bo, you are so blind sometimes. whatever evil you claim is tied to *religion* can also be found in spades in the non-religious. Evil behavior is a trait of being HUMAN...not of being religious.

I'm sad to say I just +1'd krellin

Evil behavior is not a trait of being human at all. It is a trait of humans within civilizations and societies. It is not at all a trait of being human. We survived just as everything else in the world did for millions of years.

People that make the bullshit claim of "human nature" amaze me. It's just obscene. It is not human nature at all.

Now please be your usual self and call me a hypocrite. Every one of us is a hypocrite. If you think that "evil" and the seven fucking bullshit sins are human nature, you're a hypocrite too.

@Ramsul,
"If humanism is based solely on logic and rationality, then it would seem that there would be absolutely no room for a divergence of conclusions."
You presume that applying good logic always leads to identical conclusions. Application of logic always depends on interpretation, even given identical source material. Otherwise, there would never be disagreements among theologians.

"The starting point of humanism is arbitrary depending on which humanist you talk to, and so, again, there is simply no reasonable epistemological grounding for humanism."
Arbitrary? No. Subjective? Yes. Again, the fact that there's no *uniform* starting point does not mean it can't be *reasonable*. One reasons from ones observations. Given our different experiences in life, my observations and thus my conclusions will obviously differ from yours.

"Humanists may say the same thing about Christianity, but then at least there is no room for humanists to say that Christianity is inferior. "
Here we can agree. I'd never argue that Christianity is inferior. Rather, I'd say that it's incompatible with my observations, and thus doesn't work for me. It may confirm and be confirmed by your observations, and make perfect sense to you. I have no problem treating our belief systems as equal.

You, evidently, do have a problem with treating them as equal.

I try to be careful to make it clear that my take is subjective, phrasing it as, "*I find it far more rational* to accept one's own observation than to begin with the assumption of the infallibility of a single ancient source." You, however, presented your views as objectively better than mine, saying, "Secular humanism *has less of a rational basis* than Christian belief." It's only that to which I object. If you prefer to amend your statement to say that you find Christianity's basis more rational, I'm perfectly happy to agree to that.

lol I love when you silly people sadly +1 me...because it happens *so often*. You really need to get over it, because, you know, obnoxious and all that, I'm very *often* right on the money... :P

@Krellin,
It's because you're a man of extremes. You're always either extremely right or unbelievably wrong.

"Evil behavior is not a trait of being human at all. It is a trait of humans within civilizations and societies. It is not at all a trait of being human. We survived just as everything else in the world did for millions of years."

Moron...sigh....you are simply ridiculous. Yes, humans never stole, were never greedy, never killed each other for resources (hunting grounds, for example), until civilization.

You are truly ridiculous Bo.

Fuck...even the animal kingdom is *brutal* ammoral/immoral towards one another. Ever watch a cat boot the runt from the litter and let it die? Or watch animals gorge themselves on food so that others can't share in the spoils of a kill?

To suggest "evil" behavior (which is a strictly human concept anyway...) is not a part of being human is *stupid*.

@hecks - "You presume that applying good logic always leads to identical conclusions. Application of logic always depends on interpretation, even given identical source material. Otherwise, there would never be disagreements among theologians."
- Good logic will always lead to identical conclusions if the starting point is the same. My whole point, which you seem to agree with, was simply that humanism has no foundational epistemological starting point. Or, rather, it has many subjective starting points. Either way, there is no *rational grounding* for humanism. You note that humanists reason from their observations. That can't be right, because people generally observe the same things. Rather, humanists reason from their *interpretation* of their observations, but my point is that there can be no epistemological grounding for picking a particular interpretation. At the very least, Christianity gives a rational account of why the Scriptures are an epistemological framework from which to reason to conclusions about the cosmos.

You pointed out that there is disagreement among theologians, and this is undoubtedly true. And there is even disagreement on major points, but there is serious agreement on the fundamental points. This is what the Nicene and Apostles' Creed represent. They provide Christianity with a coherent rational framework from which to reason about the world. No such things exists for humanists because there is NO point of any fundamental agreement except that reason should guide us. As you pointed out, though, reason is only a methodology, not an end in itself. There is, again, no rational starting point for humanists and thus, I think I can reasonably claim that secular humanism has no real rational basis.

No, humans weren't greedy. They didn't steal because they didn't have possessions. They competed just as everything else in nature does for territory - who wants to walk another 500 miles if you don't have to? Humans, like everything else in nature, took what they needed to survive comfortably and left the rest to be. That's how nature has survived on this planet. If everything were greedy like we have been since the beginning of civilization, nothing would be left - a path we are clearly carving out anyway in the somewhat distant future if we keep it up.

Brutality is not immorality. To use a well known example, a lion will hunt the gazelle at the back of the pack. The one at the back of the pack is the slowest, or maybe it's injured, or even mutated. It'll chase the gazelle down, eat it till it isn't hungry anymore, and the scavengers will handle the rest. Crows get their food, the lion gets its food, the ground gets its food over time, the plants are fertilized, and the gazelles will graze alongside the lion because the gazelles know the lion isn't hungry anymore.

You should know as well as anyone, krellin, that TV shows on Discovery Channel don't give you anything more than a shithead's sniff at what actually goes on in the wild.

@Rasmul,
I think we need a definition of terms. You keep saying that, because I don't share some immutable foundational truth with another secular humanist, my beliefs can't be rational. I don't see how you're getting from point A to point B. It sounds more like what you're saying is that there's no *absolute* grounding for secular humanism. And that's a fair statement. But I need you to explain how you're getting from no shared absolute basis for belief to no rational basis for faith.

"That can't be right, because people generally observe the same things."
WHAT??? WHAT??? Think hard about that statement, would you? Do you really think that the things I observe living a relatively wealthy existence in semi-rural Northeast United States share anything in common with someone observing the world around them in Syria right now, or in the Amazon basin, or in sub-Saharan Africa? The assertion that people generally observe the same thing is facially absurd.

If you want more detail on how people generally observe drastically different things, just google, "reliability of eyewitness testimony".

@hecks - "You keep saying that, because I don't share some immutable foundational truth with another secular humanist, my beliefs can't be rational."

I am not saying this. In fact, after this conversation, I'm quite positive that your beliefs *are* rational. They are rational in the sense that they all cohere together to form a system which makes logical sense and can plausibly account for the things that need accounting for in our universe. And I think, based on other things that you have said, that you would agree that my beliefs are also rational in that way; that they cohere to form a plausible explanatory system.

The relevant difference, I think, is not the rationality of our systems but the rationality of our starting points. That is, if I grant your starting point then your system, because it is rational, is right. I take that if you were to grant my starting point that the Scriptures are authoritative in all they teach, then you would think that my system, being rational, is right. The issue is how we epistemologically justify our starting point and, from what I understand, the only way that you can justify yours is by nothing that your observations of the world are unique to you and no one else, and thus that the rational system you construct from those observations is right, but only for you. This is what I take you to be saying. If I am wrong, please correct me.

My point, when I said that people generally observe the same things, is that every individual human being has a problem, regardless of where they live, how wealthy they are, etc. The problem is their own existence. For human beings, our existence is a problem to us, something we must solve, something that needs explaining. Each person observes their existence and wonders at us and feels a need to explain it. In that very general sense, our observations are the same. I grant you that many other things are quite different, but this particular problem is proper to all humans.

So, this one observation, that we exist, is the same for all of us. And, as I said, reason and logic are really just methodologies to help us get to where we have to go. If logic and reason were able to guide us, then, based on our shared observation of our existence, we would all come to the same conclusion about it. But we do not. Which means that people *interpret* their existence differently, and that this interpretation is *logically prior* to the application of reason and logic to the problem. Whatever this interpretation is, it does not seem to have the status of a rational basis for establishing belief in a conclusion, because it is just an assumption, probably a culturally socialized assumption, but still an assumption.

Christianity, it seems, gives good reasons for the assumptions it makes about our interpretation of our existence. At the very least, it gives reasons. Humanists don't seem to give reasons for their particular starting points when it comes to the problem of human existence. They assume them, and then use logic and rationality as red herrings to give the appearance that their systems are unassailable. Given the starting point, they are, but my point is that there is no reason to assume that any particular humanist's starting point is better than any other.

If that's what your claiming, then, what is your epistemological justification for the truth of the scriptures? I'm familiar with Augustine's epistemological proof for the existence of a god, but, having been raised Christian, the only justifications offered for the veracity of the scripture were wholly self-referential (ie, the bible is true because of this passage in the bible that says so). I'd be curious to hear what deeper evidence you might provide.

@BO "No, humans weren't greedy. They didn't steal because they didn't have possessions. They competed just as everything else in nature does for territory - who wants to walk another 500 miles if you don't have to? " Serisuoly, where do you come up with this shit.

How about some source material, other than "my atheist teacher told me so"

What you are saying is *unsupported* by *anything*.

"Brutality is not immorality. To use a well known example, a lion will hunt the gazelle at the back of the pack. The one at the back of the pack is the slowest, or maybe it's injured, or even mutated. It'll chase the gazelle down, eat it till it isn't hungry anymore, and the scavengers will handle the rest. "

Ask teh fucking gazelle that just suffered a *brutally* violent death if he thought preying on the weak was immoral or not...

All that being said, *dogs* are greedy, and will break the rules *that they understand* to get something. Do you own a dog? Or a cat? Ever watch an animal shrink and cower and slink away after they have stolen food from the table? The dog is well fed, knows it should not take from the table, but does so out of greed, not need...and then expresses *guilt* in it's behavior.

I can't tell you how many times my stupid dog *would* have gotten away with something if not for their guilty behavior.

So...let's see...natural animal world can break rules and behave badly and suffer penalty (also *very* evident in primates, where punishment is highly prevalent)....but you are *stupid* enough o suggest that pre-civilized man committed no sin?

Again...Bo, I like you...you try...but you are seriously a delusional idiot at times. I just don't know where you get half the illogical bullshit you spew.

@Ramsul...you claim secular humanis is irrational because it has no foudning doctrine, etc....

That is *stupid*.

christianity has no founding documents...or at least it didn't until well after Christ was dead and risen. All of Judiasm/Christianity (same religion, essentially...Christianity is the continuation of Judiasm) is based upon a bunch of random writings by different people accross thousands of years that, at some point in time, a bunch of priveldged religious leaders cobbled together and called a book...leaving out some writings for unknown reasons...and then keeping it pretty much to themselves until Luther came along...

Yeah...there's a great foundation for belief there....

Contrast that (the wispy writing of old dead people) to secular humanism...which is based upon life itself and the idea that people should be nice to one another for the betterment of all....I don't need mystical writings to have a foundation of belief that says be nice to each other, do I?

No worries, krellin. If observing *everything else* that isn't human in nature isn't a good enough source for you, I'll just be quiet. Really, if that's the best you can give me, it's not worth debating.