Forersnag
"A REAL atheist would not waste their time like Dawkins or yourself arguing the case against god, or proseletising atheism as a new religion, but would simply ignore christianity for example & be lawn mowing or shopping on sunday morning when christians are in church because christianity is not hurting anybody.
Almost ALL professional atheists are in fact promoting atheism/left wing politics as a new religion, 'god is dead, all hail the dear leader, communazi international socialist party, revolution, dictatorship of the proletariat, etc'."

I should say right off the bat that I am not Marxist. In fact, I am anti-Marx.
That said, I don't see why Christianity should not be up for debate. It has underpinned moral, epistemological, and ontological debates for almost two centuries. I particularly take issue with its belief in free will, the belief that we intuitively can know right from wrong, that there is life after death, and that we all get judged on judgment day. These are all interesting and important philosophical issues that ought to be debated and questioned, rather than blindly accepted.

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=12760#220775

Aristocrat, who said i blindly accept judgement day, life after death, or free will? Or that all christians do?

There are many differences over doctrine &/or scriptural interpretation among different churches.

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=12760#220758

anti-green, i agree with most of your comment, but main stream christianity has not been doing any of that in Australia since before federation.

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=12760#220768

Bugsy, your blogging anonymously with a nick name, i regularly openly, honestly, talk about my voting intentions. Why can't you? it is hardly a "rude" question & NOT irrelevant if you are "slavishly" following dogma/doctrine from a political rather than religious "party line".

That is my point i have never in any forum encountered an alleged atheist ranting about the evils of christian dogma without slavishly quoting their own version of party line dogma.

i repeat it is not good enough to simply deny, deny, deny. your last comment 20 words, mine 350.

Me 'ranting' about the evils of Christian dogma?
Hardly.

This post: 18 words
your posts: regularly 350 words
Who's ranting?

Aristocrat,

I'm a fan of Nietzsche's and don't presume to correct him, or even fully understand him, though I've trawled through most of his works and taken down numerous memorable quotes--and long before I enrolled at any university--but I find his perspectivism dogmatic, albeit persuasive. I've argued many times on OLO that there is no absolute truth in human terms, to me that's the merest banality; if there is any ultimate truth then it's no business of mine.
I don't know of any philosophers who would identify as Cartesian, and it might interest you to know that Hegel is these days more and more interpreted as naturalist.
The psychology is interesting and being a fan of Freud's and Lacan's I can certainly sympathise with the ingenious traps we set for ourselves, yet the fact remains that humans are capable of feats of interpretive and intuitive understanding--including being able to "process" empirical data.

I appreciate your appreciation of the issues, but then you say: <These intuitions could have developed over time for evolutionary reasons: survival, utility, preservation.
They seem mystical because their origins are an absolute mystery to us. I would suspend judgment on what these intuitions are before putting in the plug of "it must be god">
And so would I! You're not quoting me I trust? I'm a self-declared agnostic and unlike Dawkins, or theists, I'm more interested in the here and now--which is why I've asked some questions of liberal rationalism above (unanswered of course).
The other stuff's a hobby of mine and the fact remains that you can't substantiate materialism by ruling out other possibilities.
Herein I am a sceptic rather than a dogmatist. I believe wholeheartedly in ignorance!
You say: "I don't see why Christianity should not be up for debate".
I don't see why functionalism and liberal rationalism shouldn't be?

As others have said: nice style, content not so much. Just a few points within the word limit:

Dawkins has written a few books on biology? Michael Kirby wrote a few judgments too. Friedrich Hayek did a bit of on economics. The point: Lane Craig has written a lot, but to put him on the same level as Dawkins in terms of intellectual contribution to his topic is to grossly fail to understand who Dawkins is.

There are different views on whether Dawkins should debate people like Lane Craig. Dawkins has explained why, properly, lots of times; picking on a throwaway line is sloppy. The person who convinced Dawkins not to undertake these sorts of debates was Stephen J Gould - who was quit sympathetic to religion.

There is also a view that debates of these kinds are pointless and are unable to convince either side.

I've never, when asking Christians where Dawkins is wrong, had a concrete (except on the authorship of Hebrews). Authors like Keith Ward seem not actually to have read the book. Anyway: no, "I hope we get an answer" is not the key argument. I suggest a reread. The key argument is that there is no good answer to many basic questions, and absence of an answer doesn't allow us to say "god did it". Dawkins then hopes that we may have the answers one day through science. This argument is not original to Dawkins nor does he claim it to be. Notably there was Bertrand Russell. Wrote a bit on philosophy, did Bertrand. Actually, one of the greatest philosophers of all time. What's that about intellectually unsatisfying? I was a Christian, by the way, when I studied Russell at philosophy school and I had the same view about him then, even though my copy of "why I am not a Christian" is covered in my disagreeing comments.

Research, Madeleine, and understanding your topic. It's what makes the difference between being able to make a contribution to an important topic, and merely being able to impress those who don't understand the issues.

Squeers
"The psychology is interesting and being a fan of Freud's and Lacan's I can certainly sympathise with the ingenious traps we set for ourselves, yet the fact remains that humans are capable of feats of interpretive and intuitive understanding--including being able to "process" empirical data."

Interesting point. I believe Kant dealt with this problem when he tackled the empiricists. If my memory serves me correctly, he argued that the mind proccesses the empirical on an unconscious level even before we become aware of it. The empirical is derived from the mental representation the mind gives the empirical object in question. However, Kant is not a reductive materialist because he also talks about "sensuous concepts" and "pure concepts" which are not derived from the material. Kant seems more related to Descartes and Plato with the latter two explanations.

I am inclined to agree with Kant's explanation of "empirical objects." That we perceive an object and the mind then forms a concept on what the object is.

Also, taking another angle on this point, intuition and feats of interpretation could merely be by-products of something deeply psychological/physiological. Nietzsche called it "the will to power." Meaning, the soul/self strives for power and as a by-product of this primary drive concepts are formed in order for power to manifest itself. This means that there are no static objects 'out there,' but rather concepts are formulated as a symptom of the soul's drive for power. The formulated concepts may have no relevance to the referred objects, but rather be merely a symptom of the drive in man to instatiate his will on the world.
If we insert god into the argument here he becomes a pantheism.

"And so would I! You're not quoting me I trust? I'm a self-declared agnostic"

Don't worry, I wasn't quoting you. I was just having a go at the theists who like to claim "it is god" as soon as something becomes unfathomable.