51. Do you have to read up on leprechology before disbelieving in them?

Comment #72528 by Paul Creber on September 21, 2007 at 12:58 pm

Revcort (542)...there IS Scriptural backing for the Bible CLAIMING to be the word of God- at least 2 come to mind immediately.

2 Timothy 3:16-17 16 All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; 17 so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work.

2 Peter 1:20-21 20 But know this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation, 21 for no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God.

Forgive me Rev, I may be going bananas here, but when Paul allegedly wrote those words to Timothy and Peter allegedly wrote those words to the faithful, they were both surely referring to the Old Testament.
I don't see how they could have been talking about the New Testament canon, when it hadn't then even been assembled.
On a wider point, suppose I write: "Mark my words. These are holy words." (holy shit, I just did!). Does this then mean that my words are self-referentially holy? If so, aren't we in danger of disappearing up our own biblical passage?

52. The Fleas Are Multiplying!

Comment #70685 by Paul Creber on September 16, 2007 at 3:42 pm

J: Now, I'm not in a position to speak confidently about the books pictured on this thread, as I haven't read them.

Actually, Jonathan, you have read one of them - David Robertson's. His Letters to Dawkins on the Free Church website constitute in its entirety his book The Dawkins Letters. You may recall that in your various replies to Robertson, on the Free Church site, you successfully unpicked all of his arguments, one by one. So not only have you read a flea, you have swatted one. Just thought I'd keep you up to scratch.

53. Cartoons from Evolution: a journal of nature 1927-1938

Comment #67297 by Paul Creber on September 3, 2007 at 3:04 am

Is that the Bishop of Carlisle in the cartoon?

54. Christopher Hitchens and Bill Donohue on Mother Teresa

Comment #66453 by Paul Creber on August 30, 2007 at 3:01 am

"An Englishman has to be quiet when an Irishman talks"

Which of course explains why Englishmen everywhere have been obliged to take a lifelong vow of silence.

55. Another Flea is Born

Comment #62500 by Paul Creber on August 10, 2007 at 1:54 am

Who's the guy between Darwin and Marx?

I can see the resemblance to Brian Sewell, but actually I think it's meant to be Bertrand Russell.

56. The Out Campaign

Comment #62054 by Paul Creber on August 8, 2007 at 3:13 am

J I like your post there, by the way. You adjusted it slightly, no? 'I suppose it would be futile...'.

Yes. I do have this recurrent problem of engaging the keyboard before putting my brain into gear, and I thought it was a bit more sensitive to put it that way. Nevertheless, I am sure there will be those who take offence.
Have you heard Hitchens's definition of "taking offence", by the way: "Whingeing, just whingeing."

57. The Out Campaign

Comment #62038 by Paul Creber on August 8, 2007 at 1:58 am

Wee Flea, 131: Dear Richard Dawkins…J is a credit to you and to this website.

J, 669: Paul Creber…Nice observations! Snappy and forceful.

Gosh! I danced with a man who danced with a girl who danced with the Prince of Wales. In case you haven't gathered, I'll accept any glory whatever, even if it is reflected through the cracked and distorted mirror of David Robertson.
Jonathan, why hasn't your latest tome appeared on the Free Church site? Has Robertson taken it to Bulgaria with him so he can prepare his reply before anyone else has a chance to read it?

58. The Out Campaign

Comment #61935 by Paul Creber on August 7, 2007 at 1:24 pm

J – Your post 625 once again provides a wealth of insight. Par for the course, as I am sure most others here will agree. The fact that the Bible has been seen by different believers at different times in a different manner is one that is inexplicably lost on many Christians. Take the creation account in Genesis, for example. Liberal evangelicals such as Robertson are quick to trumpet: "No thinking Christian today reads this story as literally true." But what they tellingly overlook is that until a mere few hundred years ago just about every thinking Christian read it as literally true. In other words for a period of time amounting to at least 80 per cent of the history of Christendom it was universally and unquestioningly accepted by believers that Yahweh did indeed create the entire cosmos in six days, there was indeed a snake who spoke fluent Hebrew and womankind was indeed created by a very deft and very supernatural orthopaedic surgeon. And that's just Genesis 1-3. Let's not go anywhere near the Noachim flood, the sun halting in the sky or the parting of the Red Sea.
As I see it, there are two formidable challenges in all this for 21st century Christians of a more liberal persuasion.
First they need to face the fact that fundamental tenets of their faith have been forced into retreat by science. Why else would they part company with their forefathers on something as rudimentary as the age of the universe and the nature of life?
Second they must acknowledge that their more fundamentalist brethren have, for all their intellectual contortions, at least stayed faithful to a plain and straightforward reading of scripture. It is the liberals, not the fundamentalists, who are the true renegades from biblical Christianity.
From the atheist perspective, why should we attack the renegades when there are true believers out there?

59. Richard Dawkins and Alister McGrath

Comment #61606 by Paul Creber on August 6, 2007 at 1:39 am

Dr Benway

In the setting of such unbelievable vastness, does it not seem strange to imagine that the universe was designed with us in mind, for our pleasure and betterment? When you put the story of humanity in its particular time and place, does it not seem like the teeniest of tiniest farts a dog can make?

Thank you Dr Benway. You almost exactly echo my post 1585. And you put it better than I did.

60. They let anybody onto the faculty at Oxford nowadays

Comment #60863 by Paul Creber on August 3, 2007 at 2:55 am

#60810 by AdrianB

Everything that I read or hear from this man always includes the phrase "I used to be an atheist....."
Does he really think this gives him some sort of moral high ground. It seems rather childish to keep on repeating this.
Does anybody else think he is just plain lying though?

For an excellent summary of McGrath's muddled, contradictory recollection of his own biography, take a look at NMcC's comment here: http://richarddawkins.net/article,1212,Richard-Dawkins-and-Alister-McGrath,Root-of-All-Evil-Uncut-Interviews

61. Richard Dawkins and Alister McGrath

Comment #57893 by Paul Creber on July 22, 2007 at 3:28 am

Dianelos Georgoudis

Discussing is not really about winning you know; it's about learning.

Quite right, so listen up and learn. I've been following this thread since May, 1954, and have so far kept my big mouth shut. But enough is enough. Dianelos, you have much to learn from many of the posters here, but perhaps most of all from Dr Benway, whose intellect is surpassed only by his wit.
Dr Benway asks you about cats, but he might just as easily have asked about titmice or turnips, lizards or lice, flamingos or flagella. All have the same claim to a place in the awesome continuum of life as ourselves. You appear to be asking us to believe that your perception of the almighty permitted these and a billion other species to inhabit the earth and meet their frequent and savage doom over three billion years solely so that consciousness might finally blossom and God's image be replicated in a species which has walked the planet for mere milliseconds of the evolutionary day.
Further, you appear to be asking us to give credence to the hypothesis that all this happened on a minute speck of matter in a nondescript galaxy in a universe whose longevity measures 50,000 times our own.
Exactly which planet are you on, Dianelos?

This is where the rest of us live
(http://www.zo.utexas.edu/faculty/antisense/DownloadfilesToL.html).

62. Richard Dawkins and Alister McGrath

Comment #55596 by Paul Creber on July 11, 2007 at 4:14 pm

This tight fitting steel band lies snug to the ground all the way around the planet. Now it needs to be lengthened by a metre to raise it a little above the ground. How far will the band be raised? Most people think a few microns or so given the tens of thousands of kilometres of the band's length.

When you get the answer, after a little deliberation, at least the mental model of it will stay with you forever.

...and? If you can't give us the answer, at least give us a link.

63. Floods are judgment on society, say bishops

Comment #53543 by Paul Creber on July 2, 2007 at 1:42 am

53491 by joshuaslocum:

Two things are astonishing:

A. The paper considered this "news," and to the extent of devoting so many column-inches to it.

B. That they didn't try to, or couldn't find, one public figure willing to call bullshit on these clergy and point out how outrageous and offensive their remarks were.

A. The number of replies flying thick and fast on this thread is testament to the fact that this is indeed news.
B.There are some news stories where it is superfluous to invite comment from "the other side". A quirky tale about a man with hobgoblins at the bottom of his garden would be one example. The bishops' preposterous pronouncements would be another. Both stand pilloried by their own absurdity.

On another point, the Telegraph has acquired a reputation of opening up with both barrels at the church when the newspaper has precious little to back up its claims. In the wake of the Asian tsunami, the Sunday Telegraph ran a splash story quoting the Archbishop of Canterbury as saying that the disaster had led him to question his belief in God. In fact, the archbish had said no such thing.
But in the current story (no pun intended) it certainly appears that Graham Dow and the other bishops have been quoted accurately.

64. Floods are judgment on society, say bishops

Comment #53467 by Paul Creber on July 1, 2007 at 3:03 pm

The Bishop of Carlisle, eh? If memory serves me Carlisle was flooded to a depth of several feet a couple of years back when the River Eden burst its banks. One of the bishop's churches, St Aiden's, was among the buildings worst hit. Is that an umbrella he's holding in the picture?

65. God Hates the World

Comment #53226 by Paul Creber on June 30, 2007 at 7:26 am

One further observation. I'm sure everyone noticed that "raised consciousness" has been repeatedly - and I suspect deliberately - misunderstood by Robertson. But, Jonathan, did you spot Di's wonderful example of the beginning of a potential new game of Chinese whispers, when she not only picked up on Robertson's misrepresentation but took it into new territory by referring to Dawkins's "raised conscience". Priceless.

66. God Hates the World

Comment #53223 by Paul Creber on June 30, 2007 at 7:17 am

J: Di scares me. But she seems to be an embodiment of the point I've been trying to get across to David - that religions screw up people's priorities and allow them to lose track of piffling little things like life and death.

(Best be nice, though - from her last post, it seems that she silently haunts these pages, in search of things to misinterpret and object to.)

I'd forgotten she was keeping an eye on us...anyway, as I was saying, that Di on the Free Church of Scotland website is by far the ablest and most erudite theist I have come across. Face it Jonathan, she tore your case to shreds with her relentless reason and formidable intellect...

67. God Hates the World

Comment #53098 by Paul Creber on June 29, 2007 at 10:26 am

Thanks Billy, but there's not much point in posting it here because it relates to a comment from a believer on that site.

Thanks, Jonathan. How dare you delay my terse, concise mastery of English with your verbose meanderings. Seriously, I enjoyed your put-down of the very strange Di. What is life indeed. I came away with the distinct feeling that it's high time she got one.

68. God Hates the World

Comment #53095 by Paul Creber on June 29, 2007 at 10:01 am

Hi Jonathan (J)

Have you had any luck posting on the Free Church forum lately? I submitted something last Sunday which still hasn't appeared.
Regards
Paul

69. Egypt mufti says female circumcision forbidden

Comment #52267 by Paul Creber on June 26, 2007 at 3:36 pm

The issue is very simple. Surgery should be employed only to heal people.

70. God Hates the World

Comment #52028 by Paul Creber on June 26, 2007 at 1:13 am

Isn't it time we extended David Robertson (Wee Flea) the courtesy of using his real name again on this site? At least newcomers would then be aware of the true source of all this wisdom. What do you think, Josh?

71. Richard Dawkins and Alister McGrath

Comment #50002 by Paul Creber on June 14, 2007 at 1:51 pm

J wrote (623): But 'most important to know about reality' is in direct conflict with 'most important to show to be true about reality' – which is what you appear to be doing. The latter is selective argumentation to support a prior assumption. The former is a serious attempt to discover whether something is actually true, and an honest acceptance of the results of that enquiry. These are dangerous things to confuse, but things that theists do confuse as a matter of course.

Absolutely on the button, J....except that, unless I'm mistaken, you have mixed up your "former" and "latter".
Regardless of that, this is yet another great post by your good self. By the way, you may be interested to know that I followed your exchange with David Robertson on the Free Church website with fascination. I even submitted a post there, congratulating you on your verve, tenacity and restraint, but for reasons best known to the Free Church moderators they didn't publish it. Never mind, rest assured that your time-consuming efforts here and elsewhere really are appreciated.

72. Debate between Richard Dawkins and Robert Winston

Comment #49144 by Paul Creber on June 10, 2007 at 3:41 pm

Those of you who have been debating David Robertson here may well want to visit the Free Church of Scotland forum site to read comments posted by 'J' (Jonathan, from Manchester).
His posts are so incisive, eloquent, thorough and witty as to bear mention in the same breath as Dawkins, Harris, Dennett and Hitchens. What's more, he exposes the fallacious arguments of Robertson with a verve and tenacity that brought tears to my eyes. Go to:
http://www.fcosonline.org/index.php?topic=5.msg32;topicseen#msg32
Highly recommended.

73. Debate between Richard Dawkins and Robert Winston

Comment #45887 by Paul Creber on May 29, 2007 at 1:44 pm

David Robertson (Wee Flea) wrote: The first response to my post and the second (which I was responding to) was implying that I was being dishonest and trying some secretive self promotion.

David: My response to your post was merely pointing out that Wee Flea and David Robertson were one and the same. Further, since Wee Flea was actively commending Mr Robertson's book, it seemed to me that some might consider you had been at least a tad naughty. Please don't compound that naughtiness by throwing yet another of your tiresome tantrums. Then try being a grown-up. You may get to like it.

74. Debate between Richard Dawkins and Robert Winston

Comment #45631 by Paul Creber on May 28, 2007 at 3:33 pm

Infrequent visitors to this site should be aware that "Wee Flea" (above) is none other than David Robertson, which means that he is using a pseudonym here to promote his own book. Some might consider this questionable ethics on the part of a minister of the church - or indeed anybody.

75. Sam Harris in conversation with Oliver McTernan

Comment #38969 by Paul Creber on May 9, 2007 at 4:41 pm

My abiding impression of this debate is that one speaker, Sam Harris, spoke consistently in plain English. Oliver McTernan, on the other hand, occasionally spoke in English, but far more often tried to put his points across in Serbo Croat and Albanian. Even more frequently, particularly when cornered, he resorted to the age-old tradition of theism by speaking jibberish, a language in which he is plainly fluent.

76. Flea Circus!

Comment #33226 by Paul Creber on April 19, 2007 at 4:07 pm

I don't understand all this business about apostrophes, which has raised David Robertson to new levels of apoplexy, even by his own high standards. The cover of his book on this site appears to be the same as the one on his own site. It even has the same incomprehensible pink unicorn. Have I missed something? And is the pink unicorn biblical?

77. Is this another Sokal Hoax?

Comment #28982 by Paul Creber on April 1, 2007 at 2:36 am

This site operates on Pacific Time, eight hours behind GMT. I strongly suspect that when this was posted, perhaps from the UK, the GMT clock had passed midnight, and it was no longer March 31.

78. 'God Is Not a Moderate'

Comment #26984 by Paul Creber on March 22, 2007 at 5:49 pm

I'd like you to focus, however, on a few competing doctrines in terms of their plausibility:


(1) There is no God.

(2) There is a God, but all of our religions have distorted Her reality. Jesus was just an ordinary prophet who happened to become the center of a myth-making cult. God loves everyone and has never been concerned about what a person believes. After death, all people, Christians and non-Christians, simply merge with the Deity in a loving embrace.

(3) Christianity is the one true religion, and Catholics have the truest version of it.

I'm sure I'm not the first to have noticed that Harris, having offered Sullivan the opportunity to reflect on the unreliability of human intuition, proceeds with brilliant symmetry and eloquence to echo the Monty Hall problem in his threefold choice of theistic belief – two goats or a Lexus. And am I allowing my imagination to stray too far if I say that I also detect a subtle echo of Pascal's wager in this telling observation?
Others have discerned that Sullivan is disarmingly honest. I'm not so sure. As far as I can see, in the face of Harris's relentless and watertight onslaught, Sullivan can endorse his honesty only by giving up the ghost, figuratively and literally.

79. Faith

Comment #24253 by Paul Creber on March 5, 2007 at 2:59 pm

David Robertson wrote: Paul - not sure I understand your post. I don't think the quote was out of context nor dishonest. Darwin made it and he declared himself to be agnostic. What's the problem?

David,
The problem is your apparent inability to see the obvious. If you select part of a quotation that represents pretty well the exact opposite meaning of the complete quotation, you are misleading your readers. When found out in this situation, the honest course of action is to hold up your hands and say: "Sorry, I goofed." The dishonest course of action is to attempt to rationalise your deception. You chose the second course of action. It's as simple as that.

80. Faith

Comment #23933 by Paul Creber on March 3, 2007 at 3:46 pm

Riley wrote: As disingenuous as Robertson has proven himself to be, he's right to point out that there are an awful lot of posts on this site that amount to little more than personal attacks and blunt "that's stupid" types of empty criticisms. I don't understand why people feel so compelled to fill-up so much space in these threads pilling-on with redundantly abusive comments. It appears that there's a lot of semi-repressed anger spilling out.

I wish it weren't so.

I too wish it weren't so. But I have to confess that I am one of those who has experienced considerable anger towards Robertson. This anger stems not from the weakness or inconsistency of his arguments but from the very disengenuousness which you mention above. Robertson displays an intellectual dishonesty that would be reprehensible from anyone; in the mouth of someone who espouses - and teaches - what he regards as a superior morality, it is nothing less than an appalling hypocrisy.
Let me give you one example: In one of his letters to Dawkins and later on the discussions on this site he quoted Darwin thus:

"...the extreme difficulty, or rather the impossibility, of conceiving this immense and wonderful universe, including man with his capacity for looking far backwards and far into futurity, as the result of blind chance or necessity. When thus reflecting I feel compelled to look to a First Cause having an intelligent mind in some degree analogous to that of man; and I deserve to be called a Theist."

This was an accurate quote, but crucially, hopelessly incomplete. In fact, Darwin continued:

"This conclusion was strong in my mind about the time, as far as I can remember, when I wrote the 'Origin of Species;' and it is since that time that it has very gradually, with many fluctuations, become weaker. But then arises the doubt - can the mind of man, which has, as I fully believe, been developed from a mind as low as that possessed by the lowest animals, be trusted when it draws such grand conclusions? May not these be the result of the connection between cause and effect which strikes us as a necessary one, but probably depends merely on inherited experience?
"I cannot pretend to throw the least light on such abstruse problems. The mystery of the beginning of all things is insoluble by us; and I for one must be content to remain an Agnostic."

When I castigated Robertson for this blatant cherry-picking, I expected at the very least an admission that he had made an honest mistake, the result of too-hurried research perhaps.
What I received instead was this:

"As regards Darwin's quote. It was not out of context. And citing it was not claiming anything that was not already dealt with in context. If you read the whole article you will realize that I have already attacked those who claim a death bed conversion for Darwin. I was certainly not claiming that he was a Christian, nor even a theist. The additional quote you give indicates clearly that he was agnostic – unlike most on this board who claim to be atheist – knowing there is no God. Do you not think it a bit ironic and dishonest that you claim Darwin as one of your own?"

In the end I resisted the temptation to respond with a blunt instrument, and instead decided to allow his hypocrisy merely to speak for itself. But it was a close-run thing, and I can readily understand why others on this site have found that old red mist a little too overpowering.

81. Faith

Comment #23289 by Paul Creber on February 27, 2007 at 3:10 pm

David Robertson (aka St Petes) should be positively encouraged to post on this site. With the exception of Dawkins, Harris and Dennett, his comments represent perhaps the most persuasive case for freethought and scepticism that I have so far encountered. If you doubt this, take a look at his risible meanderings on the long-running thread:
http://richarddawkins.net/article,300,Dawkins-Delusion-3rd-article-Same-Stupid-Title,David-Robertson
Or visit the Free Church website and watch as Robertson's threadbare arguments are effortlessly unpicked, piece by piece, by the merciless but ever-so-polite "Alex".

82. Mr. Deity

Comment #18365 by Paul Creber on January 20, 2007 at 5:20 am

Logicel:..."supporters of religious superstitions like them, laugh at them, and think they are really funny and are not offended by them."

You're right, and this is a phenomenon I have always found odd. Many of my Christian friends have the capacity to laugh at even their most cherished core beliefs. It is almost as though at some level they are perfectly well aware of their absurdity. Has anyone researched this?

83. Evangelical Scientists Refute Gravity With New 'Intelligent Falling' Theory

Comment #18361 by Paul Creber on January 20, 2007 at 4:09 am

Jack Rawlinson: Question for admin: where is the troll thread? I just had a quick scan on the forum and couldn't see it there.

It's at the top of this thread and at the top of every thread for which there are troll posts. Took me a while to spot it, too.

84. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #16775 by Paul Creber on January 8, 2007 at 4:15 pm

DR, quoting Darwin: "..the extreme difficulty, or rather the impossibility, of conceiving this immense and wonderful universe, including man with his capacity for looking far backwards and far into futurity, as the result of blind chance or necessity. When thus reflecting I feel compelled to look to a First Cause having an intelligent mind in some degree analogous to that of man; and I deserve to be called a Theist."

How Darwin's quote continues: "This conclusion was strong in my mind about the time, as far as I can remember, when I wrote the 'Origin of Species;' and it is since that time that it has very gradually, with many fluctuations, become weaker. But then arises the doubt - can the mind of man, which has, as I fully believe, been developed from a mind as low as that possessed by the lowest animals, be trusted when it draws such grand conclusions? May not these be the result of the connection between cause and effect which strikes us as a necessary one, but probably depends merely on inherited experience?
"I cannot pretend to throw the least light on such abstruse problems. The mystery of the beginning of all things is insoluble by us; and I for one must be content to remain an Agnostic."

Shame on you, David Robertson. Not only have you once again appealed to authority, but you have cherry-picked just the first part of Darwin's quote, and failed to record his later reasoning, which led to his agnosticism. On this occasion I shall be charitable and assume that you mischieviously seized on a sound-bite which appeared to support your case, and then irresponsibly rushed into print with it. At best this makes you a lazy thinker, and at worst a disingenuous or even downright deceitful debater (my ad hominem is wholeheartedly intended). Your transgression is compounded by the fact that you have repeatedly reprimanded atheists and freethinkers on this site for supposedly cherry-picking biblical material "out of context". Are such double standards the norm among ministers of the church? I certainly hope not.

My recollection of Stephen Hawking's reference to God is that he was presenting one of several alternatives on the significance of the big-bang. I seem to recall that in the same chapter he later hypothesizes that a more likely explanation is a simple chain of happenstance, but I may be wrong. Meanwhile, please do some diligent homework before you hit that keyboard.

85. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #16587 by Paul Creber on January 7, 2007 at 1:46 pm

Apologies: In Post 839 I incorrectly quoted Stephen Hawking as saying: "From that definition we see that the WAP (weak anthropic principle) does not require the assumption of a supernatural agent being responsible for the creation of the universe and of life"

What Hawking in fact said was: "The weak anthropic principle states that in a universe that is large or infinite in space and/or in time, the conditions necessary for the development of intelligent life will be met only in certain regions that are limited in space and time. The intelligent beings in these regions should therefore not be surprised if they observe that their locality in the universe satisfies the conditions that are necessary for their existence."
Although this amounts to very nearly the same thing, I felt it was important to put things straight. The error arose from my mistaking a commentary on Hawking for Hawking himself.

86. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #16222 by Paul Creber on January 5, 2007 at 4:02 pm

An excellent post, Fedler. It prompted me to marvel at David Robertson's claim that scepticism and rationality somehow embrace "wishful thinking".
The facts, of course, are this: He professes to believe that he will spend a lifetime of communion with the creator of the universe, followed by an eternity of bliss. We freethinkers, on the other hand, suppose that to the best of our knowledge, we shall spend a brief snapshot of time on this planet before returning to the oblivion that characterised our pre-birth. Wishful thinking? Someone around here is standing on his head and it's not you or me, Fedler.

87. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #16209 by Paul Creber on January 5, 2007 at 2:47 pm

POST 827: "It's the World Cup, 2222. Scotland are the hosts, and they face England in the final at Hampden. Tickets are like gold dust, but David Robertson manages to acquire one (this guy has influential connections). He takes his seat in the stand, and you'll never guess who is sitting next to him. It's quite incredible, uncanny really, but the seat is occupied by none other than Jacques Dubois, from Rennes, North Western France. Yes, out of 70,000 people in Hampden, David Robertson finds himself sitting next to none other than Jacques Dubois, a complete stranger. The odds against this happening are amazingly long. Indeed, Kenny Dalglish has estimated that if David Robertson had been sitting just ONE SEAT to his right, he would not have been sitting next to Jacques. And if Jacques had been sitting just ONE SEAT to his left, he would not have been sitting next to David. And if neither of them had got hold of a ticket, or if neither of them was a football fan or if neither of them had been born, they wouldn't be sitting there at all. Whatever the result of today's big match, we shall never cease to ponder the astounding, wonderful, amazing and incredible phenomenon of Hampden 2222 – North Stand, Row 12, Seats C and D.
David, please tell us what, if anything, is wrong with the reasoning in the paragraph above."

DR: Certainly – it is the presuppositions in the analogy which make it fall down at every level.

PC: What presuppositions? By whom? The only presupposition I am aware of is yours, and it runs something like this: "I suppose there is an intelligent creator of the universe and conclude that because of his existence, the universe is fine-tuned. Moreover, from the fact that the universe is fine-tuned, I conclude that there is an intelligent creator".

DR: Firstly there are 69999 other people in the stadium who can be observed and proved (that cannot be said about billions of other universes)

PC: Who said anything about billions of other universes? My analogy relates only to the probability of this ONE universe being fine tuned for the sustenance of life.


DR: Secondly there is a stadium and such a thing as the world cup.

PC: There is a universe and such a thing as planet earth.

DR: Thirdly being next to Jacques is not a necessary condition for my existence.

PC: Who said it was? My point was merely that without any a priori prediction that you would be sitting next to Jacques, its probability was precisely the same as the arbitrary chance of you sitting next to any of the remaining 69,999. It was no big deal. Similarly, without any a priori prediction at the time of the Big Bang of the arrival on the scene 10 billion years later of a remote and insignificant speck of dust capable of producing life, its probability was precisely the same as the arbitrary chance of a number of alternative outcomes. It was no big deal.

DR: Fourthly the probability of me sitting next to Jacques is still far lower than the probability of there being the fine tuning necessary for the Universe in the first place.

PC: Which means you accept that the probability of a fine-tuned universe is certainly far higher than one in 70,000 – short odds when we consider the immensity and complexity of the whole shooting match. Why didn't you concede as much in the first place? It appears we are in broad agreement after all.
…unless, of course, you meant to write "higher" instead of "lower". I suspect that this is the case, and it may be that you're trying to play chess with too many people at once, David.
By the way, you say you find it "a little disturbing" that I should regard the fine-tuned universe as a fallacy. If by "disturbing" you mean that I am disrupting your presuppositions, I am glad to be of service. If, on the other hand, you use the word "disturbing" in the patronising sense that others know better than I do, please allow me to draw your attention to what Stephen Hawking has to say on the subject:

"From that definition we see that the WAP (weak anthropic principle) does not require the assumption of a supernatural agent being responsible for the creation of the universe and of life" (A Brief History of Time).

I quote Hawking not because I place any credence in arguments from authority, but because you clearly – and misguidedly – do. Try to argue your own case on its merits, David. Otherwise we may be left with the impression that, stripped of all those surrogate lifebelts, you will sink like a stone.

On the subject of fine tuning, I should make one further point. Even if we concede for the sake of argument that you have a case, we still find ourselves a million light years from the Christian God. Your argument leaves the door wide open for Wotan, Mars, Jupiter, Thor, Allah or a veritable committee of deities to claim fatherhood of the cosmos. More plausibly, it makes a case for the sort of deism that for all practical purposes differs little from atheism – a god who winds up the clock and sets the alarm, then walks away to play no further part in the proceedings.

You have repeatedly made the point that much of the evidence you are offering for your position is of a supernatural variety, and you have frequently castigated us for, as you see it, a predisposition to disregard such testimony. On the matter of "fine-tuning", however, we occupy a very different battlefield; here we are debating nothing more ethereal than matter and energy. Many will regard it as significant that in this arena of shared presumption, you have failed to make the slightest headway towards building a case for Christianity.

88. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #15735 by Paul Creber on January 2, 2007 at 11:27 am

Billy wrote: "Oh that's easy, Scotland reach the world cup final? :-)"

Easy mistake to make, Billy, but I was of course referring to the World Cup in tossing the caber.

89. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #15213 by Paul Creber on December 29, 2006 at 2:43 pm

Hello David,
I am surprised that you still fail to understand the significance of our arguments against a "fine-tuned" universe. Torbjörn has explained it mathematically, and referred you to several websites which amplify its relevance. For my part, I have provided two analogies which mirror its fallacy.
Nevertheless, I shall try again. Imagine this scenario:
"It's the World Cup, 2222. Scotland are the hosts, and they face England in the final at Hampden. Tickets are like gold dust, but David Robertson manages to acquire one (this guy has influential connections). He takes his seat in the stand, and you'll never guess who is sitting next to him. It's quite incredible, uncanny really, but the seat is occupied by none other than Jacques Dubois, from Rennes, North Western France. Yes, out of 70,000 people in Hampden, David Robertson finds himself sitting next to none other than Jacques Dubois, a complete stranger. The odds against this happening are amazingly long. Indeed, Kenny Dalglish has estimated that if David Robertson had been sitting just ONE SEAT to his right, he would not have been sitting next to Jacques. And if Jacques had been sitting just ONE SEAT to his left, he would not have been sitting next to David. And if neither of them had got hold of a ticket, or if neither of them was a football fan or if neither of them had been born, they wouldn't be sitting there at all. Whatever the result of today's big match, we shall never cease to ponder the astounding, wonderful, amazing and incredible phenomenon of Hampden 2222 – North Stand, Row 12, Seats C and D.…"

David, please tell us what, if anything, is wrong with the reasoning in the paragraph above.

90. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #14469 by Paul Creber on December 22, 2006 at 3:04 pm

Torbjörn Larsson wrote (807): "That is it, it is a variant of the Texas sharpshooter fallacy! ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_sharpshooter_fallacy ) I completely forgot about this fallacy, probably because it was only recently I learned about the connection. It is an obvious mistake in probability, so obvious that it is apparently put as a logical fallacy too."

Thanks for echoing my thoughts, Torbjörn. It is indeed an obvious logical fallacy, though apparently not obvious to our friend David. However, as we both know, what is apparent is not always the reality.

91. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #14318 by Paul Creber on December 22, 2006 at 2:40 am

PC: "Your argument about the so-called fine tuning of the universe to support life is a bullet you have fired into a barn wall. Having fired the bullet, you then stroll over to the barn and paint a target in such a way that the bulls-eye falls precisely over the bullet hole.
Now do you get it?"

DR: "Nope."

David,
Would you be interested in making the effort to understand the above analogy?

92. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #14243 by Paul Creber on December 21, 2006 at 3:55 pm

Hello David
I think the point made by Torbjörn Larsson (Post 782) in his probability theory paragraphs, which to be candid were a tad too cerebral for me too, can be rephrased as follows (please correct me if I am wrong, Torbjörn):
"A blindfolded golfer stands on a tee and announces his intention to score a hole in one. He succeeds and the crowd bursts into loud applause. Why? Because he announced his intention before striking the ball. Had he not announced his intention, and merely swung blindly at the ball, who would applaud when the ball landed on a particular blade of grass?
"At the Big Bang, no-one announced their intention to create human life on a planet with all the significance of a Saharan grain of sand. On the evidence before us, "fine tuning" is a preposterous description. Happenstance is a good one."
You may recognise the above from my post No 719. However, you may not, because at the time you appeared to overlook it. I say this because your only response to it was to repeat your original assertion about the wonder of it all, and then quote from the Bible. Perhaps, however, you simply didn't understand the simile, so here's a metaphor instead:
Your argument about the so-called fine tuning of the universe to support life is a bullet you have fired into a barn wall. Having fired the bullet, you then stroll over to the barn and paint a target in such a way that the bulls-eye falls precisely over the bullet hole.
Now do you get it?
Please don't respond by suggesting that I apparently know better than Fred Hoyle et alia. If you follow either the simile or the metaphor and disagree, please explain in your own words why I am wrong.

93. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #13119 by Paul Creber on December 15, 2006 at 4:04 pm

David Robertson (DR) wrote: 'Who made God?' is a question I would expect from a six year old. Likewise "Who made God then?' is the accusation I would expect from a sixteen year old. I am genuinely surprised to find the world's most famous atheist (now that Anthony Flew has defected) and an Oxford Professor to boot, using it as THE intellectual foundation for his atheism.

My response(PC): Many, of course, would take Dawkins's credentials as an Oxford professor as a good reason to give him credence. You choose to do the opposite. Neither position has the slightest relevance. What is at stake is the validity of his claim that complicated intelligence requires cumulative evolutionary steps. And is it valid? Yes, it is. Faced with the evidence before us, there is no other reasonable conclusion. Your statements about God "not being made", existing "outside of time and space" and "creating time, matter and space" are mere assertions. Worse, they are a spectacularly circular argument which takes as its starting point that which it seeks to prove.



DR: Let us assume for the moment that evolution is true, why would that disprove God? Let us assume that the Intelligent Design movement (and to be fair it should be pointed out that this is a particular political/philosophical/scientific movement primarily in the US) is wrong – why would that disprove God? It would disprove one argument that some theists use but there are many other arguments and there are many Christians who do not accept the ID science and who continue to be believers in the God of the Bible. You mention with particular praise Kenneth Miller, of Brown University and author of Finding Darwin's God. He strongly disagrees with Behe and with the whole ID movement. By your logic he should then be an atheist. But he is not. He is a Theist. I am sure you would not call him stupid but you do accuse other theists who are also 'good' scientists of 'compartmentalising'. To my mind this is patronising and the equivalent of accusing them of a fundamental dishonesty. To you they have the evidence to prove there is no God (who designed the designer?) but they do not have the moral courage or the mental capacity to embrace the logical conclusions. Except of course these conclusions are not logical. As McGrath puts it "There is a substantial logical gap between Darwinism and atheism, which Dawkins seems to prefer to bridge by rhetoric rather than evidence" (Dawkins God – p87).


PC: I'm assuming that all the words above boil down to this: "Evolution must have had a kick-start, and I believe, along with others, that was God".
Feel free. I don't. So what?



DR: Stephen Hawking points out that if the rate of expansion one second after the Big Bang had been smaller by even one part in ten thousand million million, the universe would have recollapsed before it ever reached its present state. If it had been greater by one part in a million then the stars and planets would not have been able to form. Is that not spine chillingly incredible? Constants like the speed of light, the force of gravity and electromagnetism all need to work precisely together for there to be life. Apparently there are fifteen such constants. Wonderful and incredible.

PC: A blindfolded golfer stands on a tee and announces his intention to score a hole in one. He succeeds, and the crowd bursts into loud applause. Why? Because he announced his intention before striking the ball. Had he not announced his intention, and had merely swung blindly at the ball, who would applaud when the ball landed on a particular blade of grass? At the Big Bang, no-one announced their intention to create human life on a planet with all the significance of a Saharan grain of sand. On the evidence before us, "fine tuning" is a preposterous description. Happenstance is a good one.

DR: If you hold to position two – which you must as a rational atheist then you are left with this vast improbability of the fine tuning of the Universe. And it is an improbability that cannot be explained by evolution because there is nothing to evolve. The question is how did we get the conditions for evolution? I guess you could argue that we were very very very lucky – to the point of one in ten thousand million million. That takes an enormous amount of faith

PC: Okay, the numbers game. There are an estimated billion billion planets in the known universe. I suppose you could say our number was up. Faith is the last thing it takes.
I'll get back to you on you concluding paragraphs when I retrieve my copy of The God Delusion from a friend who is threatening to pass it on to someone else.

94. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #13115 by Paul Creber on December 15, 2006 at 3:45 pm

Out of interest, David, have you drawn the attention of your congregation to this debate? I've not seen any comments from them. I daresay you could do with some allies.

95. In case you didn't know I'm a fool, here's an article to prove it.

Comment #12838 by Paul Creber on December 14, 2006 at 1:57 am

An apparently endless parade of theists have claimed in response to Dawkins that atheism has been directly responsible down the centuries for the slaughter and suffering of millions of people.
They base this argument upon the false but convenient assumption that atheism is a belief system, complete with its own moral code. For the umpteenth time, it is not. Atheism is merely the absence of a belief in a god or gods. Those who espouse atheism have no shared moral code. They are as likely to be saints as they are sinners. However, there is an elephant in this room that theists always overlook. It is this: Those of us atheists who care about the human condition and its moral future have given birth to a new philosophy, which we have called Humanism. I strongly suggest that theists start comparing apples with apples instead of with oranges by re-wording their question. Instead of attacking the straw man of atheism for its woes, they should be challenging us to justify the massive loss of life over the years at the hands of Humanism. Funnily enough, that is not a challenge I have come across very often.

96. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #12561 by Paul Creber on December 12, 2006 at 3:21 pm

Like Ewan D, I too have had enough, but for slightly different reasons; I need to start my Mid-winter Solstice shopping. I agree with you, Ewan, that David has been infuriatingly slippery throughout this long exchange, but perhaps unlike you, I take some consolation from that. It is this: There will almost certainly be those on the sidelines in this discussion who possess intelligent and discerning grey matter. I have little doubt they will have no problem in separating "lazy and unedifying" point-scoring from taut and cogent argument.

97. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #11966 by Paul Creber on December 8, 2006 at 3:57 pm

David, as I read more of your posts, I proceed from puzzlement, to bewilderment, to bafflement, to outright astonishment.
You refer to shades of grey. Is this the sort of thing you had in mind?

In Post 576, you commented: "If the evidence for evolution is as strong as you say it is (and I am inclined to believe that you are correct)…"
In Post 587 you state: "The reason I cannot comment on evolution is that I am ignorant about it."

In Post 580 you wrote: "Of these three positions I think the evidence appears to be overwhelmingly against the first."
In Post 587 you write: "I am actually open to all three possibilities."

In Post 555 you stated: "I have never argued that everything can be explained by 'God did it'.
In your article dated November 15 you wrote: "…as I listened to the sound of the plain singing of the psalms of the Bible, and heard the waves of the sea splashing against the walls of the church, it struck me what a fool I had been. Of course God existed. Nothing else made sense. You cannot explain beauty or evil, creation or humanity, time nor space, without God."

Finally, in Post 437 you commented: "Faith does not entitle me to argue that black is white…"
Please allow me to observe that you have apparently chosen to seize that entitlement with conspicuous enthusiasm.

98. God's Inbox

Comment #11841 by Paul Creber on December 7, 2006 at 4:01 pm

Eve@eden.hard-drive-crash.com: OK, OK, so you warned me about Apple

99. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #11772 by Paul Creber on December 7, 2006 at 7:59 am

David Robertson wrote:

"a) YEC - would say that the earth is 10,000 years old, that Adam and Eve were specially created as fully grown adults.
b) OEC - would say that the earth is millions of years old and that Adam and Eve were specially created as adults.
c) TE - would say that the earth is millions of years old and that Adam and Eve evolved over a period of time and that they became fully human when God 'brethed' his Spirit into them.
"Of these three positions I think the evidence appears to be overwhelmingly against the first. I would incline towards the second but am open to persuasion and see a lot of merit in the third."

Interesting that having accepted the testimony of the Bible as evidence for the virgin birth, you reject its testimony over creation. Your first option (Young Earth Creationism) represents by far the simplest and most obvious interpretation of what Genesis has to say about our origins. You reject this on the grounds of "overwhelming evidence" against it; in other words, you give higher credence to science than you do to a simple, straightforward reading of what the Bible has to say.
You go on to say that you favour option two (Old Earth Creationism), which as far as I can see entails bizarre and convoluted reasoning. You appear to be favouring a theory which says God created the planet, and then allowed natural selection to take its course over millions – indeed billions – of years, producing a vast array of plant and animal life. Then you seem to be saying that one fine day God stepped outside that process to create just two fully-grown specimens of the species Homo sapiens. Okay, David, if you want to believe that, go ahead, but please don't expect a positive response from more level-headed representatives of the species or for that matter from those in the Christian camp who at least have the courage to believe what Genesis actually says..
Your third option (Theistic Evolution), on which you say you are open to persuasion, also clearly lies a million light years from a straightforward reading of Genesis. Beyond that, however, I am at a loss to comment because your understanding of the evolutionary process is, shall we say, muddled, to say the least. May I suggest that you read some good books on the subject? Dr Richard Dawkins has written several excellent volumes aimed at laymen just like you.

100. Dawkins Delusion (3rd article, Same Stupid Title)

Comment #11660 by Paul Creber on December 6, 2006 at 11:36 am

I wrote: "My almighty problem is this: Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection, for which there is overwhelming evidence, leads me to suppose that humankind came into existence in an entirely different manner - as a descendant of other species, in fact.
Do you follow the testimony of the Bible in this regard also?"

David Robertson responded: "Paul – that's a good question. If the evidence for evolution is as strong as you say it is (and I am inclined to believe that you are correct) then I would have to ask if the Bible really does teach that the world was created 10,000 years ago. I actually think the Bible says nothing about the age of the earth – and it would seem to me that theistic evolution would fit well with Genesis 1 and 2."

I thought it was a good question, too. So why didn't you answer it? The question I asked had nothing to do with the age of the Earth. The question was this: "[The] same Biblical testimony, on which we have just placed such store, also tells me that the entire universe was created in six days, and that the first two men and women on this planet were created as fully grown adults… Do you follow the testimony of the Bible in this regard also?"

Please allow me to repeat the question in another way: Is the Bible correct when it tells us the first human beings on this planet were created as fully grown adults?