Carnival of the Godless #36

Welcome to the 36th Carnival of the Godless. I'm your carnival host, Daniel M.

I am utterly and unapologetically uncreative. Therefore, I will list all of the posts by "title, author, category," for those of you who want to go straight to them, and provide a synopsis and Daniel's analysis below for those of you who actually care what I think about them. Lest you think any COTG a failure without some sort of theme, pretend we're in "The Godless Situation Room" and I (not Wolf) am rattling off headlines, then going behind the story...These headlines appear in the inverse order I received them in, latest first:

1. Break on through to the other side, Salto sobrius, Delusion
   
2. Amy Sullivan: Democrats Should Abandon Secularism, Atheists Should Shut Up?, Austin Cline, Politics/Culture
3. The Big Guy Checks the Numbers, Mark A. Rayner, Comedy
4. The Atheist Materialist Scientist, Atheist Ethicist, Crisis
5. The Standard Problem of Evil Reformulated: Part 1, 2, Francois Tremblay, Philosophy
6. The Charlotte "Representatives of The Men Who Contribute Nothing", Andy Clarkson, Virtue
7. Critical Review of William Lane Craig's Reasonable Faith, Chris Hallquist, Philosophy
8. Where the Hell Are They?, Frank the Financially Savvy Atheist, Famous Black Atheists
9. Moral Responsibility vs. Christianity: Part 1, 2, 3, Francois Tremblay, Ethics
   

Now, for a quick breakdown, here are the author's description, then my own analysis, below:

1. Post: Break on through to the other side
   Salto sobrius' description -- Psychotic Stockholm teen tries to kill his pal because he believes that he's living in the Truman Show. He thinks God will step in and stop him if he tries to do something really bad.
   Daniel's analysis -- Whereas the Christian church responded to the "heresy" of Gnosticism with the Gospel of John, attempting to stamp out the idea that Jesus was only spirit by presenting a story where, in this new and improved Resurrection account, people were allowed to touch Jesus and Jesus even ate something...a young Swede, caught in the ultra-Idealism that the entire universe is an illusion, that the world is his stage and God is behind the scenes paying attention to this young man's every move, the man decides to do a little experimenting and see if he can disrupt God's script and cause God to come down off the Divine Director's Chair to step in and stop a horrific act of evil -- murder. Unfortunately for this young man, and for all of us, God doesn't seem too interested in reducing the amount of evil in the world, since God passed away a few years back.


2. Post: Amy Sullivan: Democrats Should Abandon Secularism, Atheists Should Shut Up? Austin Cline's description -- Should nonbelievers, skeptics, and atheists simply sit down and shut up lest the poor, sensitive Christians feel offended that anyone would dare challenge or criticize their beliefs? No... That's a demand for Christian Supremacy: for Christianity to be a privileged ideology which maintains social, cultural, and political power in part because it is kept immune from criticism or challenge. So long as people are prevented from talking about how the emperor has no clothes, the emperor retains power and authority over the sheep who meekly submit. The truth is that we need people who are willing to speak out of turn, willing to be impolite, and willing to rudely challenge those in power.
   Daniel's analysis -- His synopsis sums it up pretty well, and I would just add that in light of the recent MO "Christian State" gaffe, an unabashedly Evangelical President who opens cabinet meetings in prayer and declaims the platitude "God Bless America" every chance he gets, unrelenting attacks on science and unprecedented attempts to redefine the nature of science, a South Dakota ban on abortion, etc., the next time I hear anything about political pandering to "persecuted" religious folks I really may vom in the projectile fashion.


3. Post: The Big Guy Checks the Numbers
   Mark A. Rayner's description -- comedy
   Daniel's analysis -- A humorous, but insightful, look at the evolving popularity of gods. Thor receives bad news from "a PR flack" that his belief ratings have dropped to unprecedented lows, tempered by the good news that the "head-banging heavy metal market" supports the god with 6% belief ratings.


4. Post: The Atheist Materialist Scientist
   Atheist Ethicist's description -- Last Monday, I came home from work to find my wife with dried blood all over the inside of her mouth, too sick to recognize me. The "Atheist Ethicist" blog entry that I wrote for that night discussed my reliance on the findings of those "atheist materialist scientists" in seeing to it that she gets well, rather than on prayer.
   Daniel's analysis -- A powerful post, as it shows the absurd fallacy of the logic "no atheists in foxholes" or "you'll cry out to God in a time of dire need". Here is a man whose wife was at death's door, and he points us, step-by-step to each point where he relied upon the effort of fellow human beings, and not an invisible Healer, and because of it, his wife is doing fine now. His ending: "These are issues of life and death -- real lives, and real death, and the quality of the lives that we can live." My favorite post of the carnival.


5. Post: The Standard Problem of Evil Reformulated
   Francois Tremblay's description -- none
   Daniel's analysis -- Unquestionably one of the most powerful arguments against the existence of God (defined as omnipotent and omnibenevolent) is the Argument from Evil. Francois does a good job (in part 2) of analyzing the propositions and premises. Prof. Witmer at UF, who specializes in the Philosophy of Religion, recently analyzed deduction (3) (in part 2) to say that a Theist must say it is logically impossible for God to reduce the amount of evil or suffering that is present without also reducing the amount of good that is present. Otherwise, a powerful and good God would act to reduce the suffering and evil in the world. This, of course, reduces God to less-than-good and/or less-than-omnipotent, and takes Leibniz's le meilleur des mondes possibles through a Lisbon earthquake, after which no reasonable person can keep a straight face and claim some valid theodicy.
   


6. Post: The Charlotte "Representatives of The Men Who Contribute Nothing"
   Andy Clarkson's description -- These virtues won't get you into heaven. And they won't save the world (actually they will, but not in the altruistic way most people think).
   Daniel's analysis -- Andy analyzes charity as a virtue from an Objectivist POV. Not specifically godless in content, but considering the logical consequences of unadulterated charity, and the philosophical underpinnings of rewarding irresponsible values in others, is certainly worth a moment of reflection. In this sense, is charity always a good thing?


7. Post: Critical Review of William Lane Craig's Reasonable Faith
   Chris Hallquist's description -- Actually the index for a series of posts critiquing the book Reasonable Faith by leading Christian apologist William Lane Craig. It covers a range of subjects, but the highlight may be the look at how Craig's refusal to rationally evaluate Christianity makes his apologetic a sham, along with the question of why he takes such a position.
   Daniel's analysis -- A 9-part review of Craig's new book, by chapter. I commend Chris on this undertaking, as it certainly represents a lot of hard work and thought. I think that Chris did a really good job demolishing Craig's defense of miracles in Chapter 4, part 1; Craig's attempt to demonstrate that Jesus did self-assess as the Savior and Messiah is equally worthy of debunking (chapter 7). The number of assumptions that go into Craig's defense, and his absolute disregard of liberal scholarship of the gospels, makes this a laughable defense and a waste of paper. Craig is essentially trotting out the tired canard of the "Lord, Liar, or Lunatic?" argument in his "Salvaging the Trilemma", which always fails without the premise that the gospels are entirely accurate histories.


8. Post: Where the Hell Are They?
   Frank the F.S.A.'s description-- In this post I posit the question: "Where the hell are they?". Who are "they"? You'll have to read it to find out. [they = famous black atheists]
   Daniel's analysis -- Frank certainly had my number. When asked, I felt almost ashamed at not being able to name a single famous black atheist. Frank's point is well-taken: the black community (and everyone else, Native Americans, etc.) needs more prominent freethinkers and atheists. One of the commenters on the post left a handy link to a list of "Famous Black Freethinkers" (it needs more entries). I was surprised to see W.E.B. DuBois' name on the list, and kicked myself for not thinking of him earlier.


9. Post: Moral Responsibility vs. Christianity
   Francois Tremblay's description -- none
   Daniel's analysis -- Francois' first post deals with his argument that we have acquired natural virtues, and that religion disrupts our natural virtues, and instill in us moral irresponsibility. His second post examines two of these disruptions -- religious enforced autonomy and belief in an afterlife, and analyzes their effect upon natural virtue. In his third post, he shows that if God does exist, and is sovereign, then suffering is itself decreed and we ought not attempt to alleviate it, lest we violate God's will (think Job here). He goes on to analyze "original sin" in the third post, arguing that the idea nullifies the concept of responsibility and supports an "escapist" mentality from moral responsibility -- believers want to avoid consequences for their actions, and impute them to someone else. He doesn't stop at the major monotheisms, though, as he also attributes the New Age mentality of "karma" and the concept of an "inter-subjective creation" to moral irresponsibility, since this position states that mind is utterly subjective, and removes agency.
   

I hope you enjoyed this COTG. I enjoyed hosting it. The next godless gathering will be held at Neural Gourmet on April 2. If you're still hungry for thoughts on [the nonexistence of] God, check out two funny ones that didn't deserve top spots in the carnival -- an article proving universe creation is a collaborative act, and an article on Jesus and genetics in Wednesday's Slate. Thanks for reading!


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[shamelessplug] If you enjoy general godlessness and live in the Gainesville area (or know someone who does), I head up the one and only student org. at UF dedicated to atheism and freethinking -- Gator Freethought. Also, if you enjoy reading informed opinions, or reading formal arguments, debunking the evidence and logic of Christianity, check out Debunking Christianity, a sort of symposium for ex-ministers including such big names as Farrell Till, Dan Barker, John Loftus (site founder, ex-apologist, and former seminary student of W.L. Craig), Ed Babinski, and more (they were even fooled into letting yours truly in)! [/shamelessplug]
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