psychology

Is sin real – Are we really just a few heartbeats away from depravity and wickedness?

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A common foundational idea of religious belief is the classic sales pitch – “here is a hideous problem within human nature, but I have a product that will fix it for you”, but if the problem itself is fictitious, then the proposed “solution” is attempting to fix a problem you do not have. It really is often … Read more

Why is there so much hostility towards atheists from the religious?

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I once tried a little experiment in a FB group. Upon diving in and starting to swim amongst the religious believers I deployed slightly different words. The result? – interactions were quite different. It was perhaps akin to this. “Do you collect stamps?” Instead of being specific and explaining, “No, I’m not a stamp collector”, … Read more

The Moral Decay of Conservative Christianity

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Valerie Tarico, a psychologist and writer in Seattle, Washington, has a nice Conservative Christian takedown over at RawStory entitled “Conservative Christians point fingers at atheists to cover growing corruption in church“. On the surface the claims made by many belief leaders sound both credible to those that believe and are also very much on script, … Read more

Claim: A Muslim destroys the New Atheism with clear simple logic

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There is a YouTube clip that is a great example of fatally flawed “thinking”, and the claim presented is that they have clear simple logic that supposedly destroys new atheism. Side note … it is curious that they use the term “New Atheism”, so should we conclude that their argument does not hold true for “old” atheism? … Read more

How do you work out what is fact and what is fiction?

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Learning how to work out what is fact and what is fiction is all part of growing up, and so a 4 year old who believes Santa Claus is real is cute. If however a grown adult was seriously asserting that Santa Claus was quite real then we would be quite rightly concerned because clearly something has … Read more

A few words from a not so Logical Christian

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Over at “Lake Country Now” a chap called Al Neuhauser has written an article entitled “The Logical Christian”. Ah, now that sounds interesting, so I took a peek. Oh, and before we get into it, if you are anticipating intellectually challenging and well-reasoned arguments from Al then I better warn you that you will be disappointed. OK, … Read more