For all atheists and agnostics?

Question

Please encourage any christians you know to watch this video so that they can open their minds and stop believing in fairy tales:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=zDHJ4ztnldQ

What is you opinion?
(I think it's one of the best rebuttals to christianity that I've ever seen)

Answer 1

You'll quickly find that Christians don't base their faith on inductive reasoning... That's why they call it faith.

Only a handful of Christians actually believe religion is logical, scientific, etc. And those people are seldom ready to be intellectually honest, so you'll go nowhere.

Answer 2

I think it makes an excellent case but I suspect it fails by bashing people over the head with the same explanation worded in exactly the same way over and over again - it's not incorrect but it lacks eloquence. Unfortunately by assuming that a rational person will evaluate their own point of view dispassionately the video comes across in a confrontational and almost insultingly strong manner. Selling an idea (even if it is correct) requires that you make an appeal to people on a emotional level. The video is likely to convince people like us who have no vested interest in false rationalizations, but it will not convince those for whom accepting the idea that god is imaginary will mean having to confront family peers and social pressure without any compelling emotional payoff. The best arguments are the ones about justifications for the observable social inequity and human tragedy. The necessary missing component from this video might be simply to give the believers an opportunity to explain or answer each of the questions - without drawing conclusions for them, and then to provide an emotional content item that extends the question - by Socratic irony - until it becomes self-evident that these responses (which could be quotes from real believers) cannot adequately answer the question raised. In my opinion the presentation format should be softened to be more sympathetic, in order to make the view feel less threatened. The remarks at the end about delusional perspectives are far too "hard sell" in tone and are only likely to work if the audience is already in agreement from the start. Otherwise they simply come across as insulting the "intelligent" audience and even the term intelligent itself seems to have been intended as sarcastic and facile.

Anyway that's my opinion/critique whatever you want to call it. For what it's worth I do not think they are delusional, Deep down they probably know the truth but I do think they are emotionally biased toward wishful thinking. They want god to exist despite their own critical evaluation, and they choose to believe despite their rationality because there is an emotional payoff for doing so. That is not delusion - it is just vested self-interest. Atheism and agnosticism will not be any more likely to be effective trying to counteract selfish human nature with arguments that question the believers' sanity than the cold war communist arguments about the corrupt and deceitful capitalists.

Answer 3

I wouldn't say that it is the best rebuttal that I'VE ever seen. I thought that his arguments were quite amatuer and I was pained with patience waiting for him to answer when I had the answer formulated out instantly upon the questioning. I found it unfair to presume that you needed to be an intelligent professional to understand the questions when I couldn't answered all of them when I was still in highschool. Sorry, but I thought that it was another recant to just ridicule Christians and their faith. I am not Atheist, nor Christian, nor any faith many people might know... so perhaps I am an exception... either way... I was bored by the movie clip.

Answer 4

Yes I agree with the video and I have been asking Christians those questions for years. One criticism: I didn't like how the video indicated that college educated people were smarter and more rational than the non college educated.

Answer 5

I think the tone was patronizing and that it was planned to be that way. Also, take no offense if you aren’t educated nomad, I think that too was a way to show how an education does not equate to one with common sense. Slick, but like some have said, there is no popping their religious bubble. You can’t make people hear the words and questions they fear most.

Answer 6

Sorry, but it won't work! The majority of Christians won't sit through the first few frames of that clip, let alone the whole thing to the end! They'll shut their minds to it, because they don't want to listen. Sad, but that's the way it is. They'd rather go on condemning everyone else, and insisting if you're not one of them, you're going to end up in hell for eternity. You can't tell them anything -you have to let THEM tell YOU what you believe.

Answer 7

For bible huggers, they can't be touched. How can you really argue with "faith"....we can't touch that, and its kind of sad, but hey, i don't hate all bible huggers, just a few. Even my brother is a ned flanders wannabe and i can't even talk to that guy anymore. All day i hear about the miracle of god and blah blah blah, its like they get effing brainwashed by the bible.

Answer 8

I agree with The Dude whole heartedly. Religious mindset disregards all portals to reason.

Answer 9

It offers another point of view. What does it matter? Why does it matter on what others view as truth.

Each persons faith is a personal truth. Eadh persons lack of faith/ belief is a personal truth. Why does it matter what others choose to believe or choose not to believe in?

Answer 10

Good video. They will make huge rationalizations that make no sense. There is no educating the ignorant.