Posted by:
Tal Bachman
(
)
Date: February 09, 2015 06:22PM
Four quick points.
First, it does not seem to be the case that atheists are less prone to believing in nonsense overall than theists. Cockamamie ideas - about politics, relationships, history, health, everything - seem to be about evenly spread throughout the human family, no matter how we divide that family up into categories. A belief in no god, or a thousand, provides no immunity to different forms of nonsense. This is not to defend theism. It is to (I think) only speak a bleak truth about our species.
Second, the question of whether evidence supports theism is often mixed up with the question of whether theism can be a social good. This is a mistake. It could be true that *every* form of theism is unsupported, or even contradicted by, evidence; but from this, it does *not* follow that every form of theism per se is without value, or bad.
The non sequitur that if theism is false, it must be bad for individuals or societies, presupposes synonymity between "true" and "good" (and "false" and "bad"). From an evolutionary or Darwinian perspective, this presupposition is without foundation.
Darwin even goes so far as to write (in "The Descent of Man") that it seems likely that belief in certain transcendental claims, themselves unsupported by any evidence, endowed certain human groups with superior survival ability.
Third, it is only an outrageous case of confirmation bias which could lead someone to attribute to theism crimes committed in the name of Catholicism, but to refuse to attribute to theism crimes committed in the name of communism. And the rationalizations for this outrageous example of confirmation bias, as I'll show in a forthcoming reply to Richard Packham, are literally as absurd as anything we could hear in the Mormon church next Sunday.
Lastly, pointing out the utter absurdity of some particular defense of atheism is not a roundabout defense of theism. If logic and facts actually do matter to those wishing to think of themselves as bona fide atheists and critical thinkers, they should welcome such critiques.
Just my two cents.
Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 02/09/2015 06:26PM by Tal Bachman.