Religion is predominately a positive for humanity

Final rebuttal [Con"s Round 4] 1) "My first point is a declaration of a viable argument, that religion has run its course" -You can state this even though c.54% of the planet believe in the same Abrahamic monotheistic God, with a further c.30% following other religions? http://en.wikipedia.org... So I"m not sure how viable your argument is here, on the basis of the actual facts. "Your points on my absolutism are not related to this debate" -on the contrary, it exposes your stance. I genuinely have come here for dialogue, whereas you apparently have only come here to demonstrate your own "rightness" and my comparative "wrongness". It is precisely this level of closed-minded intolerance you decry religion for, yet that is effectively what you are doing yourself. 2) "This example was intriguing because it shows the dichotomy that exists between an Atheist and a Theist." -I entirely agree; don't see how I miss the point, this is basically what I was trying to point out too. The only difference is you think you're right and your mum is wrong! I think you're not really listening to what I am actually saying. "Her logic is faith based. If I have a brain tumor, I know I [sic] what I have because I can go get a CAT scan and can clearly see the tumor." -except that you have no way to quantify that you definitely are here on Earth in the first place, so anything you think you can "prove" hinges on the assumption that your own brain is trustworthy in how it is interpreting this universe for you - see solipsism, brain in a vat etc. "Proof" and "evidence" are actually an illusion, because they rely on your own senses being trustworthy in the first place - which is impossible to demonstrate. "Faith, therefore, is suspension of logic." -Not necessarily - sensible faith is the most likely rationalisation of the available data, in the absence of concrete proof. Faith to the suspension of logic would be like me just waking up one day and deciding to believe that my sofa was a deity. That is not the type of faith I have. I have faith in the historic Christ, who made certain claims and whose life is recorded by eye-witnesses - the gospels being as valid historic record as the works of Herodotus, Tacitus and Suetonius (with the notable exception that the time lapse between the actual events and the recording of the events is predominantly much closer in the case of the gospels). Of course, you too take it "on faith" that your senses are reliable, that you really are here on earth, and everything which you believe you can scientifically "prove" really exists. But perhaps you think it is logically sound to have one "free" unprovable assumption, and then demand empirical proof from there on in (all of which hinges on that unprovable assumption)? "Your points on terrorism strengthen my own viewpoints." -nope, because you still haven"t demonstrated that wars etc are necessarily "bad". You suggest that God wiping out entire cities and peoples makes him a "wicked God" (the ultimate oxymoron, because if God exists, he is necessarily the very yardstick of "goodness" by definition - so if from your perspective he appears "wicked", logically that ought to tell you something about your own perspective). But your logic doesn"t hold anyway, because if God created us then he has absolute authority and right to do with us as he chooses. Not a great parallel - but if you exterminate a load of termites that are ruining your wooden floor, does that make you wicked? And you didn"t even create the termites! Your gripe with God is a bit like a two-year-old getting cross at its parents for not letting them investigate the pretty looking flames of a fireplace by touch! Just because you don"t understand the reasons behind God"s rules and actions doesn"t mean that there isn"t a higher righteousness which you can"t understand because of your limited faculties (this isn"t to say you are stupid, it is merely to say that relative to God you are infinitely more ignorant than a two-year-old compared to its parents). "I"m thankful to be in a place where secularism is celebrated and science and reason are allowed to challenge dogmatic beliefs, not in a place where such ideas are encouraged to ferment." -I would tend to agree with you on this point, except that secularism isn"t the ideological panacea you claim it to be. The very reason I quoted you those comments from atheismuk.com, was not in some desperate attempt to draw some half-baked parallel to your argument to make you look bad (it is very telling that you chose to interpret it that way though). It was to demonstrate that by removing religion, you don"t remove the intolerance nor the ideological fanaticism. There is no doubt in my mind that secularism could be hijacked in precisely the same manner as religion has been historically, in order to oppress and stamp out followers of faiths. Atheists can be just as intolerant of other worldviews, which has the potential to be just as dangerous. The seeds of intolerance are sown with such comments as those atheists were posting on their little cliquey forum. Then if left unchecked this can grow into a behemoth of oppression very quickly. It is when you start to close down dialogue and begin to think that your worldview is superior by saying things like "religion has run its course" in order to subordinate other people"s beliefs to those of your own that you are in dodgy territory. The fact that you don"t seem to recognise the potential danger to be equivalent, is a little worrying to say the least. It is my belief that you are incorrectly assigning this issue (predominantly, if not solely) to religion, where in point of fact the problem lies with humanity who hold an absolutist adherence to ANY ideology to the exclusion of other worldviews. I believe you are in danger of holding such a position yourself - but you seem to genuinely believe that science and secularism are somehow immune to such threats. Why don"t you take a look at what the Japanese did in the name of science in WW2: http://en.wikipedia.org... Or what the secular, ANTI-RELIGIOUS communists did in the name of socialism throughout the last Century: http://en.wikipedia.org... Where is your "scapegoat" of religion to blame in these instances? 3) "The Bible is a deeply contradictory book, as I pointed out." -Give me an example of something which you claim to definitely be contradictory in the Bible, and I will give you a reason why it isn"t. [Will have to be on the comments board, as we"re out of rounds!] "This sense of the New Testament/Old Testament god is relatively new in the Christian doctrine. It"s apologetic and isn"t very genuine." -This isn"t what I was arguing. God is the same; it is the Testament that has changed. This is precisely why they are called the Old Testament and the New Testament. The New Testament (or "Agreement") replaces the Old Agreement - that"s the entire point! (Are you sure you listened properly when you went to Bible college?) "As for the Crusades, well they are more supported by Jesus" words than by anybody else"s." " "I"m sad to read that you can"t see that religious texts are a primary source of such fanaticism." -no, you see that is my entire point. Pope Urban II twisted Christ"s words to suit his own agenda. "He who loves his father and mother more than me"" and "he who leaves all to follow me"" are very different to saying (in fact, they are frankly nothing to do with) "push far back the race of infidels". If he had quoted Christ"s Sermon on the Mount, particularly Matthew 5:38-44, it is quite clear there is no justification for what he was proposing. Again, it is the VEHICLE - not the SOURCE. My logical position reiterated one final time: God exists - religion is necessarily positive for humanity. No God - everything is just relative and completely meaningless/pointless anyway. [Including this debate and this upcoming vote!]