Suzanne wrote:. . .You guys kill me, I make an observation, and a small joke in a forum about libraries, and the flood gates burst open. I feel like there are hawks circling the forums, waiting for something to attack. I feel like road kill all of a sudden. . . .

Please don't feel bad, Suzanne. In the spirit of Jesus, I have been offering myself as a lightning rod for the venomous thunderbolts of BookTalk atheists. I think they need to get it out of their systems, and once they do and surmount their doctrines, they will return to being the very nice people they are at heart.

Tom

http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/
42 Fallacies

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/ ... logic.html
-- an atheist's site on fallacies

http://www.unc.edu/depts/wcweb/handouts/fallacies.html

As long as you're doing some research Tom. I'm reading all of these as well, if you feel like discussing them let me know.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_bias

Framing in the above link might be a useful study for you. Thought it's only somewhat applicable.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance

The above is good to understand how someone intelligent would come to strange and contrary conclusions. I believe you suffer from this, but I'm not sure how much. Dead people have heartbeats.

http://secularoutpost.infidels.org/2009 ... rt-ii.html

Blogs are fun.

Interbane wrote:As long as you're doing some research Tom. I'm reading all of these as well. . .

Thanks for the links, Interbane.

Ok Interbane, I give, your daddy is bigger than my daddy.

Not everything's a competition Suzanne. What interests me most is how intelligent people can have such strongly opposing views. I'm at a chapter in "On Being Certain" right now about how neural networks, even if incorrect, become stronger over time. We should all take a stance we don't agree with from time to time, if only to break the ruts created by long held beliefs. There is no such thing as having an 'open mind' if you don't practice disbelieving in your current beliefs from time to time. It's painful, and requires one to swallow some pride.

Quite a few childhood memories come back when I do this, including an interesting one where each and every snowflake is an angel, and they were swirling around me outside the house I grew up in. It was dark and the wind was blustery and cold, but the snowflakes were large and well formed. If I concentrated hard enough, perhaps I could convince them to grab a hold of me and carry me up into the night air.

Hello everyone, I’m a new member. I thought I would dive in on the interesting question of libraries or liberty. In my opinion, it would have to be: libraries first, liberty second. Without an informed populace, liberty can be a sham. It is much easier to manipulate those who are lacking in information, and the resultant ability to make good, informed decisions on important life issues. I believe we are guilty of this in Western countries, even though we exist today in a virtual sea of information. For example, the Bush administration was elected, and re-elected, with expert application of spin, but little application of reason. And I am sure we could all come up with a long list of similar events in a short time. Here in my own corner of the world (British Columbia), we recently had an election in which spin, and a less than informed electorate, achieved similar results: a good outcome for a minority with influence, a not so good one for the majority.

etudiant wrote:Hello everyone, I’m a new member.

Welcome to BookTalk, etudiant. I'm not certain that public libraries contribute much to an informed populace. My impression is that once out of school, most people never go to a library, so the public in general is being taxed to support the few of us who do. Also, wordprocessors have flooded the market with low quality books. If I had to choose between the Internet and a public library, I'd go for the Internet.

Tom

Suzanne
So, Frank, show me. Where is your legitimate evidence that God does not exist?

There is none.

There is no credible evidence that God does exist.

You are exactly right on both counts, and if you review my many posts you will find that I have never denied the possibility of some kind of god, I simply do not think its existence likely in the light of no evidence.

I do not believe in things like unicorns, fairies, hobbits, dragons and goblins for the same reason, my standards are equal across the board.

I notice that the religious wave their standards for their religious beliefs, even though the supporting evidence is exactly the same as it is for the aforementioned mythical/fictional creatures that they (for the most part) do not believe in either.

Of course, (and this is the real point) I have NOT debated the existence of god with TH, I have challenged his claim that there is an empirical spiritual existence… and I have challenged his claim that atheism leads people to behave badly and to Nazism/totalitarian regimes.

Neither of those claims is supported by any convincing evidence… in fact both are easily shown to be false.

TH holds on to his views despite the massive amount of credible counter evidence…

But I have never had a discussion about the existence of god with TH… so I do not know where your critique is aimed.

Suzanne
If a critical thinker relies on evidence, and the subject of debate is subjective, and carries no evidence, you can not apply critical thinking to the debate. It becomes a debate over opinions. Opinions are never wrong, you may disagree, but without that magic evidence, you can never say opinions are incorrect. No matter how forceful you say it, you have an opinion, and nothing else.

I will continue with the god question despite the fact that it is not what has been the subject of disagreement in the past…

To me the debate is not weather god exists or not… as you say it is not possible to address this critically/rationally without evidence... unless claims are made on the behalf of the god that are testable... like “prayers are granted by said god...” claims like these are testable and all have failed to date.

In my opinion the debate is why the religious believe these ridiculous claims without evidence when they normally require evidence for other beliefs of such importance.

If a man showed up at your front door (even a well dressed, respectable looking man) claiming that Zeus was going to destroy your house with a thunder bolt, I seriously doubt that you would evacuate your home, pets and property without some kind of convincing evidence. The effort is extraneous considering the infinitesimal chance he is correct with no supporting material.

Most people would likely politely dismiss this person thinking him a nut job and go back to what ever they were doing… and rightly so.

The same holds true of god and his threats on your soul… why is it ok to dismiss Zeus and not the claims made on behalf of Christ/God?

This is a double standard that most religious people are victim to and critical thinkers see this.

The religious most often times do not.

Of course when we ask for evidence from them to confirm their claims they say that we are “militant” and “unfair”.

Look back through the posts… no atheists here have made any claims that they cannot back up… for the most part we are asking for clarification of terms and evidence to support obviously false claims made by others and providing evidence that support our positions.

I do not recall any atheist on this site ever making definite claims about gods not existing… except defined gods.

If you want to defend TH that is fine, but remember he views atheists as prone to Nazism and bigotry and it shows in his posts.

You may ignore it if you wish, but I will defend my integrity and way of thinking as acceptable.

If you find me to be rude in the process so be it, but I am only mirroring the respect (or lack there of) that I have been shown so far.

Later

I personally love my library, and the entire library system. This may be because I live in a heavily populated area with many libraries which gives me access to an interlibrary loan system and free services. I agree with Thomas Hood that most people do not use their libraries, but also agree with others who brought up the point that without liberty, libraries would either be so contrived as to be useless, or nonexistent. So, in that interest, I say that liberty is more important than having a library. As long as people read and gather books, there will always be a way to borrow a book from others.

Regarding the religious discussion, I think that people who get really riled up about things are afraid that their positions will be discredited in the eyes of others and that they will be made a fool. I agree with Frank and Interbane when they indicate that they have not decried the existence of God, they are simply using a process called critical thinking (in all of its definitions) to go through the miasma of opinions that exist out there and come up with one that makes the most sense for them. Why someone would want to blast that process and dictate what we should all believe lest we be labelled as heathens is beyond me...smacks of elitist and arrogant thinking...as well as afraid thinking...because darn it, these guys make a lot of sense.

http://www.accd.edu/sac/history/keller/ACCDitg/SSCT.htm

Interbane wrote:

Not everything's a competition Suzanne.

You are in the olympic division, I am only a rec player

What I have noticed is simularities. It's how these simularities are communicated where conflicts arise. If critical thinking is truly the topic, adding information from any credible source would enhance the conversation. My criticism was directed to the dismissal of new information, from a credible source, and the insinuation that the requested information was somehow tainted. Quoting someone very close to you, "Maybe your words will appear different if you let them sit awile".

Interbane wrote:

Quite a few childhood memories come back when I do this, including an interesting one where each and every snowflake is an angel, and they were swirling around me outside the house I grew up in. It was dark and the wind was blustery and cold, but the snowflakes were large and well formed. If I concentrated hard enough, perhaps I could convince them to grab a hold of me and carry me up into the night air.

When I was little, I believed we all lived under a big rock. I like your memory better.