Quote:
Originally Posted by dereds
In the context of your post above I'd use wrong, it makes clear your position but it doesn't add the weighting a term such as ridiculous does. The thing with wrong is that you can say someone is wrong without them being ridiculous, that implies that their beliefs are worthy of derision and I'd generally avoid such claims.
You can say that 'someone is wrong without them being ridiculous', you can 'generally, avoid such claims, but you can also say that some beliefs are ridiculous. You have at least one yourself, you consider flat Earth theory to be ridiculous. I'd like you to try to defend that because I think it at least help you to understand why I consider theistic belief to be ridiculous (for lack at this point of a better word than ridiculous or just plain 'wrong') without necessarily feeling a need to ridicule believers.
Ridicule is not how to win a debate, no matter how ridiculous I might find a position to be. Plus, I can't actually demonstrate that it's ridiculous.
(You think creationism is ridiculous? I thought you believed in the christian god and therefore also believed in the creation?)
Quote:
Originally Posted by dereds
It's an assertion I'm making based on my own experience, I'd argue it fairly strongly though because of what I consider a worldview to contain and that the belief, or absence of such, in god is only a part of it. I'd also hold that there are such divergent beliefs in God that universal claims that they are ridiculous are essentially meaningless
I try to stay away from my own experiences, they're rarely going to be convincing. I don't even trust them myself since I know how easily fooled we are and how little I can trust my own perceptions.
If you total the Muslim world, for whom a belief in god is a big part of their world view, fundamentalist Christian Americans, Catholics, Hindus and Sikhs in India, Christians in South American countries, I believe we're rapidly approaching a total that would make your 'most people' claim seem at best that it might be a 'small majority' for whom their religious beliefs aren't a big part of their lives.
If you reduce religious beliefs to 'there are immortal, all powerful and all knowing gods', I think that I can say that I find that ridiculous and it's meaningful. I'm taking the one thing all religions have in common and starting there with my skepticism. Frankly, it only gets more ridiculous when I start to examine individual religion's claims.