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Donating = Loving
Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
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Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
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@Sapporo Re: "Someone might have had a vision of Jesus being sodomized by the Pope, but it doesn't make it so."
Hey, I had a vision of Jesus physically abusing his steak, disciplining his pet primate, and strangling his poultry. Wonder what that means?
How awful! Spanking monkeys and choking chicken is detestable! Someone call PETA! Not sure about beating his meat though. Maybe he needed it to be softer?
Sapporo,
"Someone might have had a vision of Jesus being sodomized by the Pope"
Suppose the writers had made sodomy a part of the ritual of becoming a Christian. Do you think it would have ever caught on?
You tried this shit before and this is just as worthless. A bunch of propaganda YouTube videos do not in any way prove shit! Try again junior!
The Interlocutor " it would be irrational if you consider a witnesses mind to be generally sound (their faculties/senses are considered to be functioning normally), but make special exception for their senses/faculties which had the experience of God/Jesus"
So if someone of sound mind claimed they had seen a mermaid then we'd have to take their word for it? I don't think you have a very good grasp of how unreliable human testimony can be, or the superior role of objective evidence in validating claims. There is a reason people who get ill go the doctor, and generally don't that doctor if they recommend prayer.
"The Interlocutor" an atheist interlocutor--who I had been conversing with for a while--who stated: "you did not show why I personally should rationally believe in Christianity/Jesus/God."
"His response assumes that he had never experienced the Holy Spirit"
---------------------------------------------
>>This an oddly incongruous claim next to your claim that we should give people's experiences the benefit of the doubt if they're of sound mind. Why is his claim to be doubted but yours not?
The Interlocutor "When it comes to witness testimony, it is rational to believe a witnesses testimony (and irrational to reject it) if:
1. The witness is considered to be telling the truth (of how they experienced the events in question).
2. The witness is considered to be of sound mind (their faculties/senses are considered to be functioning normally)."
Unless they deny having experienced your superstitious beliefs you mean? The limitations of eye witness testimony is being understood more and more, and has been shown to be wholly unreliable when uncorroborated with objective evidence.
Your witness stand is incredibly biased. Why don't we call upon witnesses who were members of the clergy and cloth and are now Atheists?
There's an increasing number of pastors and reverends who are falling out of faith and I think their testimony is a thousand times more powerful like this guy:
http://clergyproject.org/michal-pleban/
@ The Interlocuter
"... they may suddenly find themselves having a desire/zeal not to sin anymore (but rather to live righteously), they may notice themselves loving people more, they may notice themselves feeling peaceful, they may notice themselves suddenly having a desire to read the Bible, they may notice themselves suddenly having a strong love for other Christians,..."
they may notice themselves picketing pro-choice clinics or servicemen's funerals, they may notice themselves shooting doctors, or truck bombing buildings in Oklahoma.
"When it comes to witness testimony, it is rational to believe a witnesses testimony (and irrational to reject it) if:
1. The witness is considered to be telling the truth (of how they experienced the events in question).
2. The witness is considered to be of sound mind (their faculties/senses are considered to be functioning normally)."
1. Individuals experiencing psychosis are also telling the truth about the reality they experience. It's very real to them, but it would be irrational for us to accept it as reality.
2. And we are able to judge they were of sound mind and functioning normally at the time how exactly? Do we just take their word for it? That would be irrational. These witness testimonies always appear AFTER the event, except for the ones neuroscientists induce in lab subjects.
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