WARNING:  Don't watch this video unless you have an IQ of about 
140...you're guaranteed to lose 30-40 points just by watching this video 
(or so the friend of mine who posted this claims)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kF3L359yKjs

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Jim Henderson wrote:
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kF3L359yKjs

If nothing else, it's an example of
1) Not understanding that bananas are far from how they were created, and
2) Not understanding how and why fruit evolves.


But you want to hear something really weird? You know who was the first 
person to be diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's Disease?  It was Lou Gehrig! How 
freaky is that??

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Insanity is a small city on the western
   border of the State of Mind.

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Darren New wrote:
> Jim Henderson wrote:
>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kF3L359yKjs
> 
> If nothing else, it's an example of
> 1) Not understanding that bananas are far from how they were created, and
> 2) Not understanding how and why fruit evolves.
> 
> 
> But you want to hear something really weird? You know who was the first 
> person to be diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's Disease?  It was Lou Gehrig! 
> How freaky is that??
> 

Its not the only issue Mr. Comfort has. He is a grade A kook, and just 
"loves" to get things dead wrong. One of his latest idiocies is an 
"edited" version of Darwin's Origin of Species, which includes his own 
personal "introduction". PZ Myers, biologist, unapologetic atheist and, 
at times, writer of far more rants about the sort of stupid this man 
does than science articles, stated this:

"It's like a book with multiple personality disorder -- two parts that 
absolutely hate each other; an intro that is the inane product of one of 
the most stupid minds of our century, and a science text that is the 
product of one of the greatest minds of the author's century." PZ Myers, 
biologist and associate professor at the University of Minnesota, Morris

He is currently looking for someone to write a forward to his mangled 
book. lol He also, for no reason I can imagine, actually "has" that 
quote on his website, on the page where he babbles about finding someone 
to write his forward for him.

Another nice example of the man's logic (or rather total lack of any):

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/03/elephantine_errors_from_ray_co.php

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   If Schrödingers_cat is alive or version > 98 {
     if version = "Vista" {
       call slow_by_half();
       call DRM_everything();
     }
     call functional_code();
   }
   else
     call crash_windows();
}

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Patrick Elliott wrote:
> Its not the only issue Mr. Comfort has. He is a grade A kook,

Well, sure.

Actually, the first one in this I just stumbled across expresses what I was 
saying quite nicely: 
http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/09/26/five-atheist-logic-tests-and-how-to-pass-them-a-skeptical-response-to-how-to-make-an-atheist-backslide/

I also liked the argument that God must like gay sex, with a set of similar 
arguments to the banana argument that I don't think need to be repeated here.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Insanity is a small city on the western
   border of the State of Mind.

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Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
>
http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/09/26/five-atheist-logic-tests-and-how-to-pass-them-a-skeptical-response-to-how-to-make-an-atheist-backslide/

  Some atheists do this same thing in reverse: They try to smartly debunk
christianity and the bible, and do so by abusing similar principles, ie.
distorting what christianity and the bible say, making false presumptions
and outright straw men, and then basing questions on those invalid premises,
and so on.

  I especially like the video called "10 questions that every intelligent
Christian must answer". It's completely full of fallacious argumentation,
but cleverly laid out by the authors so that most fellow atheists will be
mistaken into a false feeling that the video is actually proving some valid
points. Even atheists succumb to confirmation bias: They are more likely to
believe false statements when those statements confirm their own beliefs.
In this regard many of them are not much better than religious people.

  (Btw, that was not a statement about whether I believe God as taught by
Christianity exists or not or whether the bible is the truth or not. It was
a purely objective observation about the subject.)

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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On 4-7-2009 9:47, Warp wrote:
> Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
>>
http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/09/26/five-atheist-logic-tests-and-how-to-pass-them-a-skeptical-response-to-how-to-make-an-atheist-backslide/
> 
>   Some atheists do this same thing in reverse: They try to smartly debunk
> christianity and the bible, and do so by abusing similar principles, ie.
> distorting what christianity and the bible say, making false presumptions
> and outright straw men, and then basing questions on those invalid premises,
> and so on.
> 
>   I especially like the video called "10 questions that every intelligent
> Christian must answer". 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDHJ4ztnldQ

> It's completely full of fallacious argumentation,

Why don't you point them out? I think it is horrible, very American, and 
assuming a type of religion that is not very common among European 
intellectuals, but that does not make the arguments false. In fact there 
is not much argumentation in this video, that is mostly left to the 
audience. Or is that what you are objection to? Anyway, I think that the 
banana proof and the elephants are in a whole different ball park.

> but cleverly laid out by the authors so that most fellow atheists will be
> mistaken into a false feeling that the video is actually proving some valid
> points. Even atheists succumb to confirmation bias: They are more likely to
> believe false statements when those statements confirm their own beliefs.
> In this regard many of them are not much better than religious people.

A couple of remark inspired by the video: The first few 'question' 
center around prayer. If you don't believe in prayer this will make no 
sense. I don't know how common it is for Americans to believe that 
prayer really helps, among the Christians that I know, it is AFAIK 
uncommon. (Though there was recently a book that claimed that you could 
get everything that you wanted if you visualized it every day and that 
was also popular here. Forgot the name.) Aside, some people say that 
praying to God to get (material) things is a sin against the second 
commandment, they might have a point.
Then follow a few things about selective usage of verses. Again if you 
don't claim that everything in the bible is the Truth that won't make 
any sense. It may come as a shock (at least it shocked me when I first 
noted it in real life) but there are people who seriously believe that. 
The remarks in this video are directed against those people. The bible 
is internally inconsistent, inconsistent with laws and constitutions of 
every western country, and inconsistent with science (though the 
examples may not be the most convincing). I think that if someone claims 
that every word in the bible is True, it is a reasonable to ask how that 
person handles all the inconsistencies. I also know that by definition 
no answer will ever satisfy the person asking.
Interesting thing is also that the examples are mainly from the 
old-testament and thus would be equally valid for jews and muslims. Yet 
the title only mentions Christians. Yet another example that the maker 
of this video is not able to abstract from his own cultural environment 
and attacking the world at large assuming everybody thinks like he 
assumes his neighbours think. All in all I think it is very shallow and 
hardly convincing. I don't think I would have listened to more than 30 
seconds of it if you would not have recommended it.

>   (Btw, that was not a statement about whether I believe God as taught by
> Christianity exists or not or whether the bible is the truth or not. It was
> a purely objective observation about the subject.)

sure

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On Fri, 03 Jul 2009 18:47:08 -0700, Darren New wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kF3L359yKjs
> 
> If nothing else, it's an example of
> 1) Not understanding that bananas are far from how they were created,
> and 2) Not understanding how and why fruit evolves.

Very true....

> But you want to hear something really weird? You know who was the first
> person to be diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's Disease?  It was Lou Gehrig!
> How freaky is that??

LOL

Jim

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Warp wrote:
> distorting what christianity and the bible say,

To be fair, you probably see a different bunch of christians than the 
outspoken atheists do. Here we have regular problems with christians passing 
discriminatory laws and such, based on the belief that you are evil if not 
christian and the belief that the bible is 100% true and correct.

When they start teaching the Earth is 6000 years old, and fire biology 
teachers that mention evolution, and murder doctors that do what they think 
the bible says they shouldn't, in *your* country, let me know what the straw 
man is.

Oh, and let me know when the Pope thinks atheists are human, again.

>   I especially like the video called "10 questions that every intelligent
> Christian must answer". It's completely full of fallacious argumentation,

It's only fallacious if you don't assume a literal reading of the bible and 
so on. I mean, we have a really big number of people here who really think 
the universe is only 6000 years old.

Honestly, I think most of these arguments are pointless, since the entire 
idea behind religion is to be irrational if not illogical. Making arguments 
like this isn't going to change the mind of atheists *or* the faithful. All 
the arguments are old and tired, and if you[1] already believe you know 
God's will enough to enforce your views on others, yet God's will is too 
ineffable to understand, then pointing out fallacies in your logic isn't 
going to help.

[1] Generic "you" here, not "You, Warp". :-)

> Even atheists succumb to confirmation bias: They are more likely to
> believe false statements when those statements confirm their own beliefs.

Well, of course. That's why people invented science.

> In this regard many of them are not much better than religious people.

Atheists are better than the faithful in this sense because atheists *know* 
they have confirmation bias.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Insanity is a small city on the western
   border of the State of Mind.

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Jim Henderson wrote:
> WARNING:  Don't watch this video unless you have an IQ of about 
> 140...you're guaranteed to lose 30-40 points just by watching this video 
> (or so the friend of mine who posted this claims)
> 
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kF3L359yKjs
> 
I was sure it was satire until I read teh rest of this thread

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On Sat, 04 Jul 2009 15:36:01 -0400, Jim Charter wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
>> WARNING:  Don't watch this video unless you have an IQ of about
>> 140...you're guaranteed to lose 30-40 points just by watching this
>> video (or so the friend of mine who posted this claims)
>> 
>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kF3L359yKjs
>> 
> I was sure it was satire until I read teh rest of this thread

My first thought was that it had to be some form of humour, but yeah, it 
does seem like the guy is serious...

Jim

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