Construction of Islam

Pro Arguments A) Koran Unchanged i) Pro says that we should have a “special view” of unchanged books. Sure, maybe like “wow that's a long time” kind of special, but nothing supernatural. ii) For some reason, Pro willingly admits that no one can distort the original Koran, because then it wouldn't be the original! Duh. Any book is “uncorruptable” in the sense that the original version will always exist in some abstract sense. Again, nothing supernatural to see here. B) No contradictions in the Koran Pro says that the Koran is actually highly intricate. He offers no proof of this. As far as I can see, its pretty easy to write a book with no contradictions. Many of them exist. C) The Koran is irreproducible because of its style i) Pro says that the highest poets were amazed by the Koran. Yes, of course, in a theocracy all the poets employed by religious institutions will say that the religious book is super awesome. This is not an argument, it is an appeal to authority. Pro says that it is impossible for him to defend the style of the Koran because he has no space. Well, by my count, he had 1,500 characters left, and simply ran out of time. This is also very rich coming from Pro, since I gave him 16,000 characters in which to construct the Koran, while leaving myself only 8,000 for rebuttal space. Don't give him a free pass on this. Pro then wants you to count the sources I give to show you that the Koran has a terrible style. Well, from my perspective, you can't really argue this you just kind of have to see for yourself if the style is pleasing. Consider the following quote: 58:8 “Have you not seen those who are forbidden secret counsels, then they return to what they are forbidden, and they hold secret counsels for sin and revolt and disobedience to the Messenger, and when they come to you they greet you with a greeting with which Allah does not greet you, and they say in themselves: Why does not Allah punish us for what we say? Hell is enough for them; they shall enter it, and evil is the resort.” Now I know this is supposed to sound beautiful in arabic, but it sounds retarded in english. If I wrote that on an english paper I'd get an F because its a giant run on sentence. If the Koran were really holy I'd have been inspired by now. ii) Pro's basic argument is that the Koran is unique. But there are other unique books, so the Koran ain't nothin special. iii) Pro says I can't critisize the language of the Koran because I can't speak arabic, so let's grant Pro his best case scenario – that he can neither prove nor disprove to english-speaking audiences that the Koran is beautiful. This means that we have to throw out the argument because it can't be shown one way or the other. D) No one has ever produced a book that lasted as long as the Koran Pro says I don't win this point, but I'm pretty sure I do. Pro: “Then the challenge became to produce any book that could last as long as the Koran does, and that has not been passed either.” Con: “There's an older book [4].” Pro: “I said that whatever book you read, it has not lasted as long as the Qur'an in its original form.” But sheesh, the book is actually about 1,000 years older than the Koran. Whats more is that its the ORIGINAL VERSION! So yes, I'd say it HAS lasted as long as the Qur'an. This point is actually of minimal significance, but it should remove a lot of Pro's credibility. E) Mathematics of the Koran Pro writes: “The mathematics in the Qur'an are far from being scatter plots.” But his source in R1 IS actually a scatter plot. Just go look at it. Pro's next argument is that its hard to write mathematically and poetically. Maybe it could be, but lets look at the examples Pro gives. His scatter-plot example has to do with the number of verses/chapters. So you just stop writing or write a little more to get the number of verses you want! His sea+land=100 example is similar. Just make an extra sentence that says land. Super easy. Again, this is just basic addition. I'm not impressed by division either. Sorry. F) Pro drops this point. G) Other prophecies i) Pro drops this point. ii) Pro drops this point. iii) Pro says that clay exists in several forms and components. He has no source for this. I am totally confident that the bulk of clay is silicate, because as a petroleum engineer I have to study rocks. Here is the source saying with absolute certainty that clay is “a naturally occurring aluminium silicate composed primarily of fine-grained minerals .” [1]. Now Pro is right that clay can contain other minerals, like magnesium and stuff, which ARE found in the human body. That's fine. But if we're made from clay, ALL the minerals should be present, and aluminium silicate is not. Moreover, even though clay CAN contain a myriad of other components, remove them, and you still have clay. That's cus clay is aluminium silicate. Which we are not made of. Wow what a horrible error on the part of the Koran. iv) Pro drops this point. H-K) Pro drops all of these. There are a total of 10 sub points here. I guess they're not important. But wait actually they are! ********************************* **** VOTING ISSUES **** ********************************* 1) Failure to Compose Opposition to the Fallacy of Composition Pro has paid little attention to the fallacy of composition, probably because he has no answer. Just because some parts of a book are true does not make the entire thing true. So you shouldn't believe in the whole of the Koran even if you believe in its prophecies. For further information, and proof that the fallacy of composition is actually a valid fallacy, see here [2]. 2) False Prophecies, False Prophecies Everywhere... The Koran thinks mountains are Peg-like, but they aren't. Pro doesn't have a rebuttal for this anywhere. The Koran thinks we are made from clay, but clay is siliciclastic and we are not. Sure our bodies share magnesium with clay, but that's about it. So you have one false prophecy brought up by Pro, and one false prophecy I dug up. That should be enough to show that the Koran isn't perfect. 3) Drop It Like Its Not (even there) And finally, Pro has left all his debate rounds to the last minute. All he can do is say “see why the koran is so great at www.whythekoranisnotwrong.com”. He does not even try to address the bulk of my arguments. If Pro can't take his religion seriously, why should we? But as per the standards in round 1, Pro is not allowed to bring up any new arguments in the last round. Since Pro has never given a counter-argument to the mountain example, he can't give one now when I can't even respond. So from a technical standpoint, its an auto-win for me. Be an Atheist Kill your parents Dance hard techno -Sieben [1] http://en.wikipedia.org... [2] http://en.wikipedia.org...