NonStampCollector - Christianity Debate
0 (0 Likes / 0 Dislikes)
Christianity Debate by NonStampCollector
Ladies and Gentlemen,
thank you for joining us,
and welcome to tonight's debate,
on the proposition "Christian theology is true".
I'm Dr. Stamp, and I'm honored to have been asked
to be the moderator tonight.
With the lineup of speakers that we've got before us
it's sure to be a lively and enlightening evening,
and I'd first of all like to thank both
the Students' Theistic Alliance,
and the Center for Secular Inquiry for their assistance
in bringing tonight's debate together,
it's been a great joint effort and we appreciate
the amount of work that's gone in to organize everything.
Thank you.
Now before I introduce our distinguished speakers,
I'd just like to lay out a few ground rules for everybody
to make sure the debate runs smoothly and fairly.
Firstly I'd just ask everyone to please turn off your
telephones and pagers, for the benefit of those around you.
I'll ask all our speakers
to please stay within their allotted time,
as we've got a lot to get through.
Also, let's not have any impoliteness or name calling,
we'd like to keep the debate civil and polite,
and let's not say anything gratuitously offensive
to the beliefs or world view of the other side.
I'd also like to ask the audience to be polite and to
please not show any disrespect to any of our speakers,
no matter how strongly you may happen to disagree with them.
We'd like to say to our speakers tonight on both sides,
that we'd like you to not misrepresent the other side
and assert things about their world view that are simply not true.
For example, atheists, we'd prefer if you didn't criticize
the Christian side by claiming something like, say,
that they have a vendetta against the jews, or something like that,
and the Christians aren't allowed to assert, say,
the old line that people who don't believe in a single personal deity
automatically believe that everything came from nothing, or
one of those old lines that used to get thrown around.
I think we can agree that it's time to get past blatant
misrepresentations of the other side's viewpoint. Right?
We'd appreciate it neither side played the victim card
and claimed to be being persecuted in modern society,
especially if the side making that complaint
is the recipient of massive taxation concessions,
has astonishing access to high level politicians,
and is usually honored by being amongst
the first to be consulted by government or media
on any issue that has some kind of an ethical aspect to it.
Until your side loses that kind of privilege and status,
and the playing field becomes a little more level,
let's not have any claims of persecution, shall we?
Now, just before we hand over to our speakers,
science is bound to come up tonight, so again,
let's not waste time going over the same old
tired claims that have all been debunked,
especially let's agree from the outset that if scientists
don't know the answer to something
it doesn't automatically mean that the answer is therefore
that a magical god being is responsible for it,
that's just a false dichotomy and
we're all adults here,
let's not be asked to fall for something like that, shall we?
Oh yeah, and before we start,
we all know what the word "theory" means in science, don't we?
Yes? Yeah, OK.
Everyone graduated from high school, did we?
And speaking of the theory of evolution,
which I obviously am,
when discussing the strengths and weaknesses of evolution,
let's agree that you're not allowed to discuss cosmology.
Because.... ummm,...
how can I say this?
evolution and cosmology...
aren't really the same thing,
in case you didn't know that.
Hmmm, OK.
Also, you're not allowed to assert that human morality cannot
be explained by evolution, because
... well, it is.
That argument has been answered, with reference to the fact of
genes surviving within species rather than individuals,
and the obvious survival value of mutually cooperative groups,
I don't need to explain it all here just go and look it up
in a book if you're tempted to run that old line, OK?
Also, you can't argue for irreducible complexity
being proof of creationism.
Again, just in the interest of saving time tonight,
just go look it up for yourself if you're not quite sure why we'd
want to skip past this tired old long-ago-debunked argument.
Oh, yeah, and the claim that information
cannot be added to a genome.
Yeah, let's not hear that one tonight, because...
I mean, that's understood.
If you would just read up on frameshift mutations within
examples of gene duplication you'd understand how new
information can be added to a genome,
with a whole new and additional stretch of DNA with a brand
new protein-coding function suddenly being introduced.
I mean, how else do you think the enzyme nylonaze came about?
Ha, ha, haaeeh! Anyway, check it up for yourself.
Please don't claim that the universe is less than
10,000 years old, because...
You know, we've figured out that that's not true.
Yeah.
Another shocking waste of time tonight would be to use the
bible as a source for arguing that the biblical god is true.
It's a shame that I'd have to say this explicitly,
but that's a circular argument
and we're not here to waste each other's precious time, are we?
I mean in a nutshell,
even if there IS a god, the bible proves its existence
just as much as the Star Wars series proves the
existence of Darth Vader.
We'd also appreciate if neither side accused the other of having
a culture of closed-mindedness,
especially if the side you're leveling that criticism at
is in fact the very embodiment
of humanity's endeavor to establish truth,
to question everything, and to contribute to mankind
an explanation and understanding of reality
arrived at through constant unbiased,
open and transparent experimentation and discovery,
in which falsifiability and replicability
are highly valued and indeed relied upon,
which,...
now, when you think about it, is kind of ... Well,
the opposite of being closed minded, isn't it?
so let's not hear that one tonight, eh?
Uh and look while we're on that, can we agree to say that
an unbiased approach to truth that is constantly pushing
the boundaries of human knowledge is not
"changing its mind"
when it discovers or proclaims new information?
That's called progress, you know? it's a good thing.
Unless your side would prefer to live in a pre-scientific
age in which superstition ruled then perhaps you might refrain
from denigrating the progress of which you are the beneficiary.
Please remember that next time you go to the doctor for the
latest vaccination or remedy,
and please remember it tonight also.
OK, now in the interest of not having to cover the same ground
as has been covered over the past several decades,
I'd just ask the speakers to please not attack their
opponents with the claim that they are part of a religion,
if what they are actually part of is a rejection of religion.
You know, if rejection of religion is a religion,
then not playing football is a sport,
or not collecting stamps is a hobby.
An absence of belief, such as, ... I don't know, ...atheism,
is exactly the same absence of belief one could have in an
infinite number of things,
it needs no justification, it has no creeds,
no corollary obligations,
no dependence upon unproven propositions,
no faith, no organization, no rules or rituals, affirmations.
You know, it's just silly to say that atheism is a religion
because that wouldn't be true, would it?, and
it just kind of takes up time if we're always going over
things that just aren't true. OK?
Another rule along the same lines, can we please not
have anybody claim that the mass murderers of the 20th century,
Hitler, Mao, Stalin,
that their actions prove anything about a disbelief in god,
because that's been dealt with adequately before,
you know, it's been answered and put down every other time
it's been brought up, hasn't it?
There's not really a logical link between atheism and
genocidal atrocities any more than there's a link between
not accepting the claims of astrologers and genocide,
or even a link between those who don't accept the claims of
biologists and genocide.
To assert that there is such a link,
whilst ignoring the mass murderers' dogmatic
adherence to communism, or fascism,
or agricultural collectivism,
or nationalism, or militarism,
is obviously to take a very incomprehensive view of history
and like I said it's all been answered quite adequately
by many proponents of secularism and atheism
on more than enough occasions, hasn't it?
Oh, just one more thing,
Please don't claim at any time tonight that the founding
fathers of the United States were overtly Christian
or that the United States was founded upon Christian values
when in fact the truth is
quite the opposite
as one can easily see if one actually reads the words
that are written in the founding documents themselves.
I mean, I don't really need to explain that any more, do I?
We've all read the treaty with Tripoli from 1796, haven't we?
Yeah.
OK then, let's get into it.
Now we'd like to see a good debate with no sophistic
insinuations along the lines that without religion we would
have no moral compass, because...
it's not true, is it?
or that western civilization draws the fundamentals of its
morality from the bible or Christianity, because...
Err hmmm... we don't.
Let's please not have it said tonight
that the legal system of any civilized country is
based upon the biblical ten commandments.
That's simply not true,
I mean... we all know,
the first four commandments are out of place in the legal
system of any society other than a theocratic dictatorship,
we all either work on the Sabbath or know someone who
does without killing them or condemning them in any way
in fact we often pay them extra for doing so, don't we?
The fifth commandment rather depends upon how honorably ones
parents have behaved themselves,
the sixth, seventh, eighth and ninth are all good laws,
even thought the punishments prescribed in the bible for the
crimes they prohibit are simply barbaric and no civilized
society would stand for their being carried out,
and the tenth commandment prohibits the very central
mechanism and driving force of our capitalistic economic
systems and would leave us all socialist or something!
Let's not have any condescending aspersions cast that place
the moral standard of a book that condones slavery,
burning people alive, and stoning them to death above
what we as a society have risen to through centuries
of reasoned debate, discussion, practice and reflection.
And I would also ask those on my right to please,
if you're going to claim that the inspiration for good
actions came from the religion,
then it's only fair that you acknowledge that the
inspiration for heinous acts of hideous cruelty such as
slavery and the subjugation and murder of women
and members of other faith traditions have also been
inspired directly by your faith, and that license to carry out
hideous actions has been drawn directly from your scriptures,
giving a direct inspiration that a secular ideology or a
non-believing person could simply never ever justify.
Also, just one more thing,
please don't assert that any criticisms of Christianity
that refer to the old testament are invalid,
because that would rather
be having it both ways, wouldn't it?
especially if you're inclined to go back later and claim that
the benevolent being who sent his precious son as a sacrifice
for our benefit is in fact the murderous sadistic character
of whom we read in the old testament.
So, look, if he was so generous, merciful and graceful,
then to be fair you also need to acknowledge that your
opponents' observations of his violent, cruel, heartless
and obnoxious actions
are based in the same scriptural source as yours.
OK, so either accept the old testament as a representation
of the character of the
never-changing God the Father, or don't,
just choose one, OK?
let's not try to have it both ways tonight? Thanks.
OK, and with the ground rules established, so as to have
a debate full of fresh arguments and ideas rather
than the stale old fallacies debunked years ago,
I think we can begin.
But given that those on my right don't have any
arguments that are in any way satisfying to anyone
who is not blind to empty rhetoric, circular arguments,
ignorance, and outright lies and misrepresentations,
I declare the debate over before it begins.
At least until the theistic side can come up with
something that hasn't already been thoroughly debunked
at least a hundred times
in arguments so strong and watertight
that no theist wants to even try to address them
directly and would rather change the subject instead.
So, congratulations to our winners,
thanks for coming everybody,
and goodnight.
Video made by NonStampCollector and subtitled by HuanManwe