God Is Imaginary - Proof 7

== "Proof" #7 - Understanding religious delusion ==
The first portion is mostly an example dealing with Santa Claus. Mormonism, and Islam. There is nothing there to respond to except to acknowledge where MB is coming from for the final portion.
For the most part, this argument is committing the same fallacies as two previous ones, just packaged a different way. He lists several beliefs Christians do not hold to, then says Christianity is just like them, then dismisses Christianity because HE thinks Christianity is just like them.
He also makes another appeal to the crowd, which as I've said before is not logical. Truth is not determined by democracy.
However, he does make some direct allegations against Christian beliefs directly. I will address each of those individually.
1. He attacks the veracity of miracles and says there is no 'proof' of them. He then links to a future 'proof'. Since he is more specific elsewhere and only makes the assertion here, I will be more detailed on miracles when he arrives there and simply make the counter assertion that not only are miracles verifiable, the account of witnesses of both disciples and enemies is undeniable in a logical sense.
2. He goes back to the prayer argument and makes the same ignorant assertions as in previous proofs. As I have already dealt with these and have no interest in rehashing.
3. He states this:
~~~~The book where Matthew, Mark, Luke and John make their attestations does exist, but, predictably, it is chock full of problems and contradictions - see this proof [link to Proof 5]. ~~~~
At best, he asserts the contradictions exist without showing one. Then he points back to Proof 5 which I’ve already dealt with. He has yet to actually allege a true contradiction. A contradiction is when a thing is true and not true at the same time and in the same place. E.g. I am physically alive right now and I am also physically dead right now. Those are mutually exclusive and cannot both be simultaneously true. I have yet to see evidence from his articles that he even understands what a contradiction is, not to mention being able to attempt to point one out in scripture.
~~~~Now, look at what is happening inside your mind at this moment. I am using solid, verifiable evidence to show you that the Christian story is imaginary.~~~~
Except he isn’t. He actually hasn’t presented any actual evidence whatsoever. An assertion on his part is not evidence. Appeals to the crowd is not evidence. Comparing one faith system to another that you reject in order to reject it is not evidence.
~~~~Four billion non-Christians would be happy to confirm for you that the Christian story is imaginary.~~~~
Argumentum ad populum.
~~~~However, if you are a practicing Christian, you can probably feel your "religious mind" overriding both your rational mind and your common sense as we speak. Why? Why were you able to use your common sense to so easily reject the Santa story, the Mormon story and the Muslim story, but when it comes to the Christian story, which is just as imaginary, you are not? Try, just for a moment, to look at Christianity with the same amount of healthy skepticism that you used when approaching the stories of Santa, Joseph Smith and Mohammed. Use your common sense to ask some very simple questions of yourself:~~~~
This is an assumption on his part and one that does not apply to me. My faith is not based on my feelings or my own personal desires. As a scientist, I’ve actually applied all the logical principles necessary and done my very best to show the Bible as logically fallible and therefore false. I found it to be an impossible task and therefore concluded it must be true. No human-only effort could achieve what the Bible does.
~~~~Is there any physical evidence that Jesus existed? - No. He left no trace. His body "ascended into heaven." He wrote nothing down. None of his "miracles" left any permanent evidence. There is, literally, nothing.~~~~
He sets artificial limits on “physical evidence” here that aren’t really logical limits. We might say the same thing of any of the Caesars of that time, or of Shakespeare, or even Charles Darwin. How do we know the bones in those graves at Westminster Abbey are Darwin’s? Its an absurd limitation MB places because if he allows indirect evidence that he would allow for these other men, then he would have to admit that Jesus was at least a historical figure. His enemies wrote about Jesus as if He existed. People that had no stake in His existence wrote about Jesus as if He existed. Of course His followers wrote detailed accounts about Him, accounts which His enemies could have easily disproved and destroyed the movement if the accounts were not true. Because they were, His enemies could not, and the movement flourished.
No, this is just another assertion that he slings out there and hopes his audience will accept without challenge.
~~~~Is there any reason to believe that Jesus actually performed these miracles, or that he rose from the dead, or that he ascended into heaven? - There is no more of a reason to believe this than there is to believe that Joseph Smith found the golden plates hidden in New York, or that Mohammed rode on a magical winged horse to heaven. Probably less of a reason, given that the record of Jesus' life is 2,000 years old, while that of Joseph Smith is less than 200 years old.~~~~
Again he compares Christianity to other religions, which does not make a contradiction or a valid argument against Christianity. Is there any reason to believe that Jesus performed these miracles or rose from the dead? It’s actually one of the most verified historical facts of that time period.
~~~~You mean to tell me that I am supposed to believe this story of Jesus, and there is no proof or evidence to go by beyond a few attestations in the New Testament of a Bible that is provably meaningless? - Yes, you are supposed to believe it. You are supposed to take it on "faith."~~~~
Again he makes an assertion that simply isn’t true. There is the testimony of Tacitus, Pliny, Josephus, and others. He’s throwing things out and hoping they stick, that his audience wants to believe him so badly they won’t challenge him. Any halfway decent apologist would eat this guy alive in a real debate.
~~~~No one (besides little kids) believes in Santa Claus. No one outside the Mormon church believes Joseph Smith's story. No one outside the Muslim faith believes the story of Mohammed and Gabriel and the winged horse. No one outside the Christian faith believes in Jesus' divinity, miracles, resurrection, etc.~~~~
No True Scotsman fallacy.
~~~~Therefore, the question I would ask you to consider right now is simple: Why is it that human beings can detect fairy tales with complete certainty when those fairy tales come from other faiths, but they cannot detect the fairy tales that underpin their own faith? Why do they believe their chosen fairy tale with unrelenting passion and reject the others as nonsense?~~~~
This begs the question, assuming that Christianity is false and then asks why people don’t believe it is false. This is not a logical argument against the existence of God.
~~~A simple experiment
If you are a Christian who believes in the power of prayer, here is a very simple experiment that will show you something very interesting about your faith.
Take a coin out of your pocket. Now pray sincerely to Ra:
Dear Ra, almighty sun god, I am going to flip this ordinary coin 50 times, and I am asking you to cause it to land heads-side-up all 50 times. In Ra's name I pray, Amen. Now flip the coin. Chances are that you won't get past the fifth or sixth flip and the coin will land tails.
What does this mean? Most people would look at this data and conclude that Ra is imaginary. We prayed to Ra, and Ra did nothing. We can prove that Ra is imaginary (at least in the sense of prayer-answering ability) by using statistical analysis. If we flip the coin thousands of times, praying to Ra each time, we will find that the coin lands heads or tails in exact correlation with the normal laws of probability. Ra has absolutely no effect on the coin no matter how much we pray. Even if we find a thousand of Ra's most faithful believers and ask them to do the praying/flipping, the results will be the same. Therefore, as rational people, we conclude that Ra is imaginary. We look at Ra in the same way that we look at Leprechauns, Mermaids, Santa and so on. We know that people who believe in Ra are delusional.~~~~
This is not a valid experiment by any logical standard. It’s just silly.
~~~~Now I want you to try the experiment again, but this time I want you to pray to Jesus Christ instead of Ra. Pray sincerely to Jesus like this:~~~~
I have already dealt with the concept of prayer in Proof 1 and those counter arguments still apply.
~~~~One rationalization that you may find yourself developing is particularly interesting. You may say to yourself: "Well, of course Jesus doesn't answer me when I pray about a coin toss, because it is too trivial." Where did this rationalization come from? If you read what Jesus says about prayer in the Bible (see this proof), Jesus does not ever say, "don't pray to me about coin tosses."~~~~
This is actually awful reasoning and gross misunderstanding of scripture. It does not understand the logic of specificity. Jesus gave us a number of limitations on prayer by specifying what we should pray for. The act of specifying (praying according to faith, praying according to the will of God, etc.) automatically eliminates anything not specified. This is sometimes ignorantly referred to as “the law of silence”.
MB sets up a false standard of what God should and should not answer, ignores what the Bible does say we should pray for and examples of what we should not (e.g. Matthew 5-6; Matthew 23:14; Matt. 26:39; Luke 18; Romans 8:26-27; Romans 10:1; Romans 15:30; 1 Cor. 14; 2 Cor. 5:20; Eph. 1:16; 6:18; Phil. 1:4, 9; 4:6; and so on.)
~~~~Jesus clearly says he will answer your prayers, and he puts no boundaries on what you may pray for. You invented this rationalization out of thin air.~~~~
Except I didn’t because He did put boundaries on prayer.
In Truth and Love.