WOTM: So Much To Apologize For

The problem is that theists conflate religious beliefs with ordinary beliefs. Ordinary beliefs are based upon evidence, like I believe the Sun will come up tomorrow. Why? It has a hell of a track record of doing so. Religious beliefs are beliefs not based upon evidence (their definition, not ours). If they want us to have an ordinary belief in their god, then we need evidence, lots of it. If they want us to adopt a religious belief, well, in that direction lies madness. If we are expected to believe things without evidence, then there is no limit to what we would believe, the evidence for this are the tens of thousands of religious denominations around the world. Why can't they agree? No evidence, so they are free to make shit up and boy, do they!

One of the things I hate about having early access to videos through Patreon, is that I get to watch them all right away, then I don’t get to be surprised when they show up in my feed. The second thing is not being able to share these awesome videos right away! Oh well. I guess I’ll just have to keep suffering with these privileges, along with the indulgences and lucky numbers.

If they succeed in convincing us with "evidence" and argument, how would that be different from the god showing up and introducing itself and violating our free will? If the god does not want followers that make an informed choice, then are excusigists working at cross purposes to the god?

How silly would it be to devise an argument for the existence of New York City? Wouldn’t you start with evidence? You could say, “I’ve been there.” You could point to the location on a map. You could turn on a radio and hear stations coming from NYC. You could see it by looking across the Hudson River. You could settle the question definitively by going there now. Why don’t we talk about the existence of God like we talk about the existence of New York City? We have evidence for NYC but arguments for God. A philosophical argument for the existence of New York City???

Ever walk into a Bible bookstore? There are thousands upon thousands of explanations of the Bible. At the top are the so-called systematic theologies, which are essentially the Bible re-written in the author’s own words. What you have to ask yourself is, why can’t God write a book that people can understand? Why do God’s own words spoken for the very purpose of explaining himself to people need to be explained by… people? The whole purpose of the so-called word-of-God was for God to explain himself to us common humans. But the book is so incomprehensible in so many places, and so contradictory, that thousands of books written by humans have been proffered to explain what the Infinite Being apparently cannot explain on his own.

Since there is no reliable, verifiable, concrete, empirical evidence for their belief, all they've got to defend it is… excusigism… apologism… mental masturbation. I remember when one of my daughters, years ago, asked for an example of how the Book of Mormon wasn't true. I reminded her that, according to the book, the Jaredites took their flocks and herds with them in those capsizing submarines. Now… according to scientific fact, how much feedstock, how much water, are needed to keep just ONE cow alive for ONE day? Yet they were bobbing around on the ocean for a YEAR…!?! Math doesn't lie. Impossible. Her answer: "Well, maybe god magically changed the cattle and sheep so that they didn't need to be fed." Mormonism starts them young, doesn't it?