Comments on: TIA Tuesday: An even deeper hole

By: Galloway

Galloway — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 23:49:41 +0000

VD: ” Accepting the idea that we are not only gods of the machine, but also the machine of God, gives us the wherewithal to face the prospect of death with enthusiastic anticipation instead of courage, resignation, or terror. ”

Right, Vox, no need for courage or anything else – just latch on to a benevolent sky god and custom-tune his attributes to obviate the need to answer for the many 2000 year-old logical inconsistencies inherent in his demeanor. And the part about facing death with ‘enthusiastic anticipation’ : it’s almost like these people are hoping for some cataclysmic event that paves the way to armageddon. Very troubling.

By: InTheImageOfDNA

InTheImageOfDNA — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 04:51:17 +0000

The fact that theology differs so much from person to person even among the same religion is just more evidence that its referents are imaginary.

By: John Morales

John Morales — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 01:00:37 +0000

Dominic,

He [VD] shows Christians how to beat atheists in rational arguments pertainting to the question of whether or not there is a God by demonstrating the superiority of his open theism arguments and how they defeat the atheist arguments (which are usually directed against the Omnipotent God, not the Open Theist God).

I truly, literally Laughed Out Loud to that one. Heh.

(my bold in the quote)

By: pboyfloyd

pboyfloyd — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 22:30:13 +0000

You have to admit that he’s probably doing a bang-up job of convincing the already convinced.

Plus all this other not-quite consistent stuff is EXACTLY the same style as the original ‘scriptures’. A teasingly surreal confusion technique with the ‘statement-of-fact’ type conclusion snapping the client/subject out of their confusion with a virtual ‘command’.

A style that ‘tricks the subconscious’ or fucks with your ‘mind reality model’ with the notion that ‘it’s complex, don’t you see?’, but(snap), ‘I’ve simplified it for you!’

Vox is a good persuader, people are paying him money(?) to be persuaded by him.

By: Dominic Saltarelli

Dominic Saltarelli — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 22:08:29 +0000

Well, Vox has admitted on his own blog that most Christians would view him as a sort of ‘ur-Atheist’ if they understood his theology. My feeling is that his frequent and vocal attacks against atheism are largely an evangelical tool to convert more people over to open theism rather than an attempt to defend faith at large.

He shows Christians how to beat atheists in rational arguments pertainting to the question of whether or not there is a God by demonstrating the superiority of his open theism arguments and how they defeat the atheist arguments (which are usually directed against the Omnipotent God, not the Open Theist God).

The unspoken part being, of course, he’s basically asking all the Chrisitians who believe in an omnipotent God to stop believing and actually admit the atheists are right, that the omnipotent God doesn’t exist, and then replace thier old God with a smaller, easier to understand, more human, new one. That way, all the old theodicy arguments which are usually the most persuasive are no longer valid.

It’s an effective tactic in a way. Prove someone wrong by first admitting they are actually right.