Let Theists agree before they have the nerve to criticize atheists!

[Quiddity_Glomfuster]

[QUOTE=MrDibble]
No, I meant what does the whole sentence mean? “meta” is a meaningless suffix without a word to qualify, and “metalevel” isn’t any more meaningful. Like I said (and you’ve failed to answer), I haven’t switched the level I’m talking about, so you can’t accuse me of “pulling out” to anything.
[/quote]

Thanks for confirming that you aren’t following along.

No, because that analogy sucked. Use an actual logical argument, not a dumb analogy.

Yes, I get it. You’re not getting the point.

“All is One” is a gross mischaracterisation of the Buddhist belief of anātman.

“One is None” is closer - a dissolution of selfconciousness, not Union with the Great Link syncretic crap. Breaking the ties that bind us to the atman, not creating links to all of it.

Tell ya what; I’ll let these folks whose knowledge of Buddhism is vastly superior to mine (and, clearly, yours) discuss that point. Of course, there are probably almost as many interpretations of Buddhist teaching as there are of Christianity. Don’t know which one you’re working from or what the basis of your claims is other than your own understanding of the concepts.

Just make your own arguments and use your own terminology, don’t assume because mswas is arguing against me, he’s arguing with you. I don’t know if he’s one of your so-called “fans”, but he’s made it quite clear he’s only arguing by himself here.

All I said was that we had reached the same conclusion. No need to pretend I implied anything more.

No, it doesn’t. The word anātman doesn’t even appear there once. It’s about the actual Buddhist “physical” cosmology, not metaphysical. Actual Buddhist heavens, actual Buddhist demons, actual preta. Mythology, not meta-anything.

So now there’s ‘heavens’? Kinda metaphysical, that.

Where on that page is there any metaphysics? Do you even know what metaphysics means?

I use it in the sense of the collected terms that Roget’s includes in its definition of ‘metaphysical’ as ‘ideal’.

Allowing myself to be caused pain doesn’t fall under the “harm no-one” commandment.

More hair-splitting. Now shall we head off in search of the red herring ‘the true meaning of harm’?

Plus, you have yet to address the issue of unwilling sacrifice.

I did, indeed. Go back and read. We have modern examples of people choosing ‘harm’ in the name of faith; there is zero reason to think that the people of those times did not. Your saying so does not make it true. The second point is that humans to this day do harm in the name of religion; which only means that they haven’t paid attention to the actual tenets of their religion. I’m sure it was ever thus.

I thought “The Divine” was an abstract concept. It thinks, now?

You are the one that asked whether the Divine thought something or not. I answered no.

My claim is that a religion founded, rooted,based on causing harm can not be said to adhere to your Two Commandment model.

Oh really? Name one that’s not some obscure little sect of twelve people who have died out three centuries ago.

ConfuTaoBuddhism also isn’t some blip. It collectively has hundreds of millions of adherents, and does not subscribe to your concept of “The Divine” as a theistic monad.

Good, because that’s not ‘my concept’.

You tried to shoehorn every major religion into your syncretic Black Hole of a Divinity. I have shown that you are sadly mistaken in your conception of at least one of the world’s major religions, as well as sadly over-eager in painting with your Big-God-Two-Commandments brush. But you just won’t give it up, will you?

You are devoutly wedded to your unwillingness to see the pattern I’m talking about. Thing is the Dalai Lama has said pretty much what I did (no, I don’t have a cite; I didn’t happen to have a camcorder with me at the talks I attended). And, frankly, he’s got much more credibility than you. You claim to know the minds and hearts of the practitioners of the religions you speak for - good trick since they’re long dead.

The DL speaks to the leaders of the major faiths - the live ones, today, on this planet, now. On balance, he’s got the expertise.

Tell ya what, though - next time there’s a conference on the unity of faiths where religious leaders discuss the principles they share, you go tell them they’re wrong and why and drag out tales of Druid sacrifice. I’m sure your scholarship is much more impressive than that of those guys; doubtless they’ll leave chastened and understanding the Truth According to Dibble.

[cosmosdan]

[QUOTE=Voyager]
I never said that - you have seriously misquoted me. Whether or not Mohammed was illiterate, he was damn astute. Much more so than Jesus, as shown by him doing a lot better at the prophet game.
[/QUOTE]

This is interesting. Why do you say Mohammed was more astute? How is it that he did better at the prophet game?

[MrDibble]

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]
Thanks for confirming that you aren’t following along.

[/QUOTE]

No,* thank you* for confirming that you refuse to answer a simple direct question and would rather just attack me.

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

Yes, I get it. You’re not getting the point.

[/QUOTE]

Maybe because you’re not making one very well? If at all?

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

Tell ya what; I’ll let these folks whose knowledge of Buddhism is vastly superior to mine (and, clearly, yours) discuss that point.
[/QUOTE]

And is this Amazon link going to debate in this thread? No? Then read the book and bring the points in here, or give up. Don’t let someone else do your debating for you at one remove. Better yet, read the actual Buddhist canon, then get back to me.

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

Of course, there are probably almost as many interpretations of Buddhist teaching as there are of Christianity.
[/QUOTE]

Damn straight.

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

Don’t know which one you’re working from or what the basis of your claims is other than your own understanding of the concepts.

[/QUOTE]

2 years as a devotee, and the words of Buddha himself?
I notice you have failed to reply to my actual examples about Buddhist metaphysics, but are just attacking my credentials. Why is that?

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

All I said was that we had reached the same conclusion. No need to pretend I implied anything more.

[/QUOTE]

No, you were jumping from your terminology to his, probably because you thought it might be more succesful. Not working, is it?

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

So now there’s ‘heavens’? Kinda metaphysical, that.

[/QUOTE]

Again proving you have zero idea of what the word means. Those Buddhist heavens are conceived of as actual places. The metaphysics of Buddhism is beyond even that.

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

I use it in the sense of the collected terms that Roget’s includes in its definition of ‘metaphysical’ as ‘ideal’.

[/QUOTE]

To a Buddhist, heaven is not the ideal. This again just shows how sadly lacking in any appreciation of the nature of Buddhism you are. Buddhism is about release from everything. Heaven is a trap.

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

More hair-splitting. Now shall we head off in search of the red herring ‘the true meaning of harm’?

[/QUOTE]

I’d love you to find a definition of harm that excluded “getting my skin flayed off and my heart cut out”, please.

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

I did, indeed. Go back and read. We have modern examples of people choosing ‘harm’ in the name of faith; there is zero reason to think that the people of those times did not. Your saying so does not make it true.
[/QUOTE]

So you assert that children can be willing, informed participants in their own sacrifice? Those are some flaming hoops you’re jumping through.

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

The second point is that humans to this day do harm in the name of religion; which only means that they haven’t paid attention to the actual tenets of their religion. I’m sure it was ever thus.

[/QUOTE]

No, that should be “What QG claims are the tenets of their religion”. As we have seen, the two are not the same.

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

You are the one that asked whether the Divine thought something or not. I answered no.

[/QUOTE]

So the Divine doesn’t think? WHich is it?

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

Oh really? Name one that’s not some obscure little sect of twelve people who have died out three centuries ago.

[/QUOTE]

So “The Divine” changed in a significant way 300 years ago? And the MesoAmerican sacrifice religions were not obscure little sects. They were the only religious movement for their entire region, for centuries.

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

Good, because that’s not ‘my concept’.

[/QUOTE]

I’m sorry, how is the concept you are arguing for not your concept? Are you trying to pull a game with “your” like mswas?

Oh, wait, you have no idea what a theistic monad is, do you? Why didn’t you just say so? It means “God”, my dear. Or “The [singular] Divine” if you prefer.

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

You are devoutly wedded to your unwillingness to see the pattern I’m talking about.
[/QUOTE]

No, I’m devoutly wedded to the idea that you don’t really know much about what you are talking about. So far you haven’t proved me wrong.

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

Thing is the Dalai Lama has said pretty much what I did (no, I don’t have a cite; I didn’t happen to have a camcorder with me at the talks I attended).
[/QUOTE]

I’m sure the Dalai Lama has internet sources too. But it doesn’t matter for many reasons, amongst which are the fact that the Dalai Lama isn’t Buddha, he’s the leader of a Tibetan Buddhist sect, the fact that he has a clear agenda of creating universal peace and will say just about anything to achieve it, and the fact that I’m not debating the Dalai Lama.

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

And, frankly, he’s got much more credibility than you.
[/QUOTE]

Oh, my dear, don’t you know argumentum ad verecundiam is a logical fallacy? Or did the fact that the words were foreign mean you skipped over them the way you skipped over all those Buddhist terms I gave you?

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

You claim to know the minds and hearts of the practitioners of the religions you speak for - good trick since they’re long dead.

[/QUOTE]

Oh if only there was some means they could have preserved their own words for posterity - some sort of medium of communication in which they could have left their thoughts that I might know what they thought today.

Oh well, I guess I’m going to have to trust Quiddity and her best pal the Dalai Lama. What a pity Buddhism doesn’t have any scriptures and the Aztecs never carved stone.

Oh, wait, it does and they did. Well, then, that’s sorted.

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

The DL speaks to the leaders of the major faiths - the live ones, today, on this planet, now. On balance, he’s got the expertise.

[/QUOTE]

The Dalai Lama is a knowledgeable man, I’m sure, but he has an agenda of ecumenicism and a believer’s faith. No, I’ll trust the Tripitaka over a man any day, to find out what Buddha actually said (and even then, I don’t believe it’s all verbatim).

If I met the Dalai Lama on the road, I’d have to kill him*

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]

Tell ya what, though - next time there’s a conference on the unity of faiths where religious leaders discuss the principles they share, you go tell them they’re wrong and why and drag out tales of Druid sacrifice.
[/QUOTE]

I’d speak differently to those people, because they probably wouldn’t make the elementary mistakes of perception, citation and logic that you have.

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]
I’m sure your scholarship is much more impressive than that of those guys; doubtless they’ll leave chastened and understanding the Truth According to Dibble.
[/QUOTE]

My scholarship doesn’t have to be that good (and it isn’t) to run circles around you. Because I know what I’m talking about a very little, whereas you are trying to drag other people’s arguments, that you don’t even understand, in to support your points. When you misuse words like metaphysical, when you grossly misrepresent the Buddhist concept of anatman to serve your thesis, when you blithely skip over every example that doesn’t fit your closed worldview, all you do is trip and show everyone how weak your argument is.

If you had a strong case, you wouldn’t be trying to twist Buddhism to serve your ends. And you’d have an actual relevant quote from the Dalai Lama to back you up.

Instead, you attack my credentials rather than my facts (I attack both), you claim backup you can’t actually cite, and what cites you provide don’t say what you think they say at all. This shows how flimsy your concept of “Divine” actually is.

It also doesn’t show any mettā , but you don’t seem to care. That’s OK, I’m used to theists saying one thing and doing another.

*note - Buddhist joke, in no way a threat against the Dalai Lama.

[Apos]

[QUOTE=Der Trihs]
And why should I put religion in a special catagory ? Like most people, I flatly deny the existence of things more plausible than gods, like elves, goblins and thousand mpg carburetors; why should gods get more respect ?
[/quote]

They don’t: you’re overreaching in all these categories. And pointlessly so, since none of these overreaches are necessary to reject claims made FOR their existence.

Denying something exists requires less evidence than saying it does.

That depends on what you are denying. If you are denying arguments for, then yes. If you are denying actual existential possibilities, then this is no different than making a claim yourself, and so the burden of proof is on yourself.

It’s always the burden of the person claiming something exists to prove it;

Not quite right: it’s always the burden of the person claiming something to prove it: it doesn’t matter the polarity. Negative statements are just negations of positive statements.

[Apos]

[QUOTE=Quiddity Glomfuster]
You do understand what a meta-level analysis is, do you not?
[/QUOTE]

You know, merely the fact that you can use a term you came across somewhere and took a fancy to in does not make your usage of it sensible in context.

In this case, you started in with this “meta-analysis” dodge halfway into the discussion. But you never mentioned it in Post #62, which is what I responded to, nor #86 where you responded to me. In those, you very clearly stated claims about God and religion directly, as if correcting people that had false impressions of them period. No “meta-analysis” present.

Of course, I don’t think you actually understand what a meta-analysis is anyway, since the way you are using the term doesn’t make any sense. Even talking about “looking at things from the meta-level” doesn’t really make sense, when what you actually then do is more of a vague overview of all belief systems, noting some basic similarities, but ignoring all their specific and VERY strongly emphasized tenets. That’s not meta anything. It’s just a rhetorical dodge.

[Czarcasm]

[QUOTE=Apos]
Not quite right: it’s always the burden of the person claiming something to prove it: it doesn’t matter the polarity. Negative statements are just negations of positive statements.
[/QUOTE]

Again, I claim that objective evidence for God’s existence has yet to be presented.
Is the burdon of proof still on me?

[Mangetout]

[QUOTE=Apos]
Not quite right: it’s always the burden of the person claiming something to prove it: it doesn’t matter the polarity. Negative statements are just negations of positive statements.
[/QUOTE]
I’m pretty sure that’s incorrect. Sometimes It’s not immediately obvious who is making the positive assertion in an argument, but it’s only the positive assertion that can be proven (or not) - negatives (generally, with certain exceptions - for example where constraints are specified) cannot be proven.

[Apos]

In that case, no, provided that what you are implying is simply that it hasn’t been supplied to you in particular. JThunder is playing a little fast and loose by implying that you are necessarily somehow covertly implying that there is no proof out there at all, but the gist of that strategy is valid: to not incur the burden, you essentially need to keep your claims either in the realm of your own experience encountering arguments, or in characterizing those arguments themselves.

The reality is, of course, that JThunder almost certainly does not have any arguments to supply that haven’t been well refuted or shown insufficient a million times before, even for his “whole nother thread” and he knows it. But he’s got a point when he notes that, heck, for all we know there could be a good argument out there somewhere. So you don’t want to (and don’t need to) deny THAT. At that point, the ball still stays in his court: prove it or move it.

[Apos]

[QUOTE=Mangetout]
I’m pretty sure that’s incorrect. Sometimes It’s not immediately obvious who is making the positive assertion in an argument, but it’s only the positive assertion that can be proven (or not) - negatives (generally, with certain exceptions - for example where constraints are specified) cannot be proven.
[/QUOTE]

The difficulty of proving a claim is not the determinant on where the burden lies, only whether a claim is being made or not.

If I assert that a box does not contain a spoon, why should I have more leeway with my claim than you with your boxy-spoony claim?

While its true that it would be, in practice, next to impossible to rule out the existence of a being that could literally hide anywhere beyond all perception and detection as well as do anything, that’s precisely why it’s so silly to make grandiose claims of disproof that you cannot possibly ever back up.

Think about it: why is that ever even NECESSARY? What advantage do unsubstantiated and unsubstantiatable claims of non-existence get you over and above simple lack of belief? As far as I can see, nothing at all, EXCEPT an additional burden of proof on yourself.

If someone makes a claim, it’s their business to prove it. The whole POINT of the burden of the proof is that you should not feel obligated to have to take any position on the objective matter: if you do, I’d say that you’ve fallen into the trap. What you can do is take a very strong position on the argument being made for the claim. It is when you confuse the rejection of the argument with the rejection of the claim itself that you overreach.

[Mangetout]

The box and spoon example exists within specified constraints - the box. So either claim ‘the box contains a spoon’ and ‘the box does not contain a spoon’ is finite and demonstrable.

Claims without such obvious constraints (say, ‘leprechauns exist’ vs ‘leprechauns don’t exist’) are not similarly balanced - in these cases, the positive assertion would be provable (subject to evidence), but the negative cannot be proven - how can you be sure you looked everywhere?

[mswas]

[QUOTE=Voyager]
I didn’t think my logic was peculiarly atheistic, and I don’t see any cliches. Got an answer, or do you say it is invalid because you can’t respond.
[/quote]

Again, more atheist cliches. Logic is not peculiarly atheistic, applying it out of context isn’t either, but it’s certainly a common behavior. We aren’t talking about whether or not God is real, we are talking about whether or not there is a lot of agreement about certain properties of God.

I haven’t seen a bunch of core tenets yet. You’ve got your list to research. Most of the stuff you’ve posted has been refuted already. Something useful would be universal tenets that would not be expected based on all the holders being human. Dominion over the spark of life? I’m not sure what that means exactly. is that part of God being a creator? Does it mean God can kill people? People kill people, and since primitive religions saw the gods as more powerful people, of course they could kill people more effectively.

None of the stuff I’ve posted yet has been refuted. MrDibble got all uppity because I made a typo regarding Akhenaten, retracted my example of the druids due to inability to provide a cite, and he thinks that Uhura Mazda, Ahura Mazd, whatever transliteration of ancient Persian he thinks is the incorrect way to spell it in English is important. I’ve seen it spelled many different ways. He’s cherrypicking and ignoring most of my argument. Hardly counts as a refutation. It takes more than being arrogant and pompous to make a point.

God having control over the spark of life means that only God has the power to CREATE life from nothing. IE, the only being that can create rather than manipulate.

You got any common tenets that would be surprising? If, say, many religions agreed that the universe was very, very old before science confirmed this, that would be interesting. I believe Hinduism says this - maybe they got it righter than our culture does.

I am still focusing on the one that is being ignored in a pretty standard dogmatic fashion by ‘your side’. You notice how he got into lambasting my knowledge of pantheons, yet ignored completely what I said about how people relate socially to the pantheons. If you want, I can pare it down to just Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Bahai and Hinduism, religions that are actually practiced widely now. They all agree that there was a deity with the power of initial creation. Thus denoting wide agreement on the subject as they constitute about 60% of the populace.

Time to stop asserting and start giving evidence.

How about you take what I said point by point and tell me what you find wrong with it. MrDibble addressed a couple of my examples. One turned out to be a typo, another a disagreed spelling, and the third something that I admittedly cannot find a cite for. I hardly see how the level of discourse I am providing is of a lower brow than the OP citing talking heads on sensational news media as evidence of broad theistic disagreement. On another forum I participated in an interesting discussion about whether or not Allah and YHVH were the same deity, as YHVH had a covenant with humans, whereas Allah can change anything about reality at any moment. However, what all three of the main Abrahamic faiths agree upon is that God is the only one who has the power to create life from nothing.

Again, I remind you, we are not talking about whether or not this is true, but whether or not there is wide agreement. So do we want to address this subject or do we want to turn it in the same old ‘atheist trope echo chamber’ that is so common on this board?

Yeah, the ancient gods had hierachies just like humans. Odd, that. I certainly don’t expect you to believe in or justify the Greek religion. That’s the whole point. If there was agreement across religions, then you should want to and be able to do exactly that. Since there clearly isn’t, I don’t expect you to be able to.

Not just ancient religions. God kings who die and are resurrected weren’t invented by Christianity. Gods bonking women to create demigods was certainly not a Jewish concept - but was all over the culture in which Christianity flourished. You’d think there would be more similarities, considering this.

There are a lot of similarities. I personally do not subscribe to the notion of religious dominion, because to me that’s simply branding. Most of the notions applied in religion evolve as human thought evolves. I have a very interesting book that I haven’t finished about the influence of the Druids on early Christianity, and the influence of Pythagoreanism on the Druids at the time. There are a number of saints that were previously deities in the cultures that the Roman church attained hegemony over. The current strain of Christianity with it’s obsession with ‘good/evil’ has a very Manichean tinge. The synthetic property of religion is something that quite fascinates me. It seems to me that when a conflict over knowledge occurs the conflict of both sides is changed, synthesized with the new information, that whichever side remains dominant at the end of the conflict is irrevocably changed by it and the body of knowledge does not remain the same as it was before the conflict, despite the dilligent efforts of priests.

[Apos]

[QUOTE=Mangetout]
Claims without such obvious constraints (say, ‘leprechauns exist’ vs ‘leprechauns don’t exist’) are not similarly balanced - in these cases, the positive assertion would be provable (subject to evidence), but the negative cannot be proven - how can you be sure you looked everywhere?
[/QUOTE]

Lots of claims have different levels of difficulty in establishing them. I don’t see why that matters. What matters is that if you want someone to accept as true some statement about the world, then you are going to have to provide convincing reason to do so. Why else should they believe you, even if your claim is a so-called “negative” one?

As I said, it is PRECISELY the extreme difficultly in proving existential negatives for magical beings that should make you want to AVOID having to make grand claims about their non-existence. There is no utility to those claims over simply not believing IN them in the first place. So what’s the point?

Even if I’m 100% wrong, what’s the point? Why even give people the chance to argue that you have incurred a burden when there is absolutely no reason to even get into that in the first place?

[MrDibble]

[QUOTE=mswas]

None of the stuff I’ve posted yet has been refuted. MrDibble got all uppity because I made a typo regarding Akhenaten, retracted my example of the druids due to inability to provide a cite, and he thinks that Uhura Mazda, Ahura Mazd, whatever transliteration of ancient Persian he thinks is the incorrect way to spell it in English is important. I’ve seen it spelled many different ways. He’s cherrypicking and ignoring most of my argument. Hardly counts as a refutation. It takes more than being arrogant and pompous to make a point.

[/QUOTE]

Yet curiously, you haven’t chosen to reply directly to me about this, or to the other objections I raised.

You didn’t have all the facts, but you chose certain examples anyway. Debate doesn’t work like that. Using an example that you yourself aren’t sure of , as if it supports your case, is a form of plain out lying, in fact. You are a dishonest debater, and if no-one had noticed your (let’s be charitable) “mistakes”, you’d have just blithely gone on like nothing was out of place. Now, you’re miffed that I called you on it, so you’re attacking me rather than my objections.I love how you get to call me arrogant and pompous while I am forbidden a response, too.

Be glad I haven’t picked on your decidely wrong definition of henotheism yet, too. Slipping “Man-made” in, like that was part of the definition all along. Nice one! But next time, use Monolatrism, it’s more precise.

Also, for what is hopefully the last time, Akhenaten for Aten is a hell of a typo to make. Must be typing with mittens on. Call it what it is - a mistake, rather than weaseling out of it like you’re trying to do with “typo”.

And no, I didn’t ignore most of your argument. Pointing out that half your list was mistaken is the bloody refutation, since you said (my bolding):

One agreement that I have found amongst all the religions I have studied at all is that there is a single Creator or Generative Principle that has absolute dominion over the spark of life

You were the one being absolutist, just one example disproved your case.

Of course, now you’re scrabbling around in the gaps of what’s left. Typical.

[QUOTE=mswas]

God having control over the spark of life means that only God has the power to CREATE life from nothing. IE, the only being that can create rather than manipulate.

[/QUOTE]

Great. My wife and I made a life from nothing not three years ago. Does that make us together a God? Does that make me a demigod?

Or will you explain better what exactly the “spark of life” is that makes it different from plain old “life”?

[Mangetout]

Looking at if from the point of view of utility, like that, makes a lot more sense - but that doesn’t seem to be how you first presented it.

[Apos]

Well, because I’m arguing more than that (see the first paragraph of my last response). I just think that the utility issue makes it all moot regardless of whether you or I are correct.

And as per that last sentence, don’t you agree that if I’m just sitting around building sand castles, and someone runs up to me an insists that I sign a petition who’s chief principle is “leprechauns do not exist,” that this person has incurred some sort of burden of proof before I sign? If someone runs up at the same time with a petition for me to sign that says that they do, that person ALSO incurs a burden. But I don’t see how the burden of the second guy negates the burden of the first guy. I’m just sitting here building sand castles, happily getting along without EITHER belief in them, or the belief that none exist, period. Anyone that wants to move me to take a stand on either of those claims is going to have to provide some reason for me to do so.

[Mangetout]

I do see your point, however, it’s quite difficult in practice for people lacking a belief in X, and in the absence of evidence supporting the existence of X, not to find themselves eventually saying “X doesn’t frigging exist” - it’s just a quick and easy way to say “I don’t believe your claim that X exists, because you’ve not come anywhere near demonstrating that X exists by providing the necessary compelling evidence, so I’m going to carry on not accepting your claim that X exists”.

Also, as far as the other party is concerned - the one who does believe in X - it’s a more useful summary of the non-believer’s position. Otherwise, he’s likely to make the mistake of thinking more argument is necessary, rather than some evidence, and you find yourself on a treadmill powered by analogies, never quite able to get off.

[Hentor_the_Barbarian]

[QUOTE=mswas]
None of the stuff I’ve posted yet has been refuted. MrDibble got all uppity because I made a typo regarding Akhenaten, retracted my example of the druids due to inability to provide a cite, and he thinks that Uhura Mazda, Ahura Mazd, whatever transliteration of ancient Persian he thinks is the incorrect way to spell it in English is important. I’ve seen it spelled many different ways. He’s cherrypicking and ignoring most of my argument. Hardly counts as a refutation. It takes more than being arrogant and pompous to make a point.
[/quote]
It quite convincingly demonstrated that you are attempting to speak with authority on a subject that you appear not to have a strong command of. It is also telling that you are going on and on as if these are the only points of contention that he raised with you, rather than also responding to the host of other critical comments that he made. Ignoring most of his argument, that is.

[MrDibble]

Curiously, “Uhura Mazd” (what mswas posted) was a complete non-starter on Google. But yeah, I’m sure it’s just a variant spelling, mmm-mmm. I mean, I’ve seen everything from Hormuzd to Auramazdāh. Trust mswasflying fingers to come up with a new one. One that I’ve already acknowledged was an honest typo, but he keeps harping on about anyway.

Never mind the fact that I never said Ahura Mazda didn’t fit his thesis. He’s one of the few examples that did - and why not, he’s probably what the Jews and their follow-up religions ripped off for the whole monotheism gig, after all.

[Apos]

I dunno, I think monotheism is a sort of inevitable philosophical development in the game of whose god is cooler.

[MrDibble]

[QUOTE=Apos]
I dunno, I think monotheism is a sort of inevitable philosophical development in the game of whose god is cooler.
[/QUOTE]

…now take that chain of reasoning to its logical conclusion…and we arrive at a non-existent God

Who’s got the coolest God now, baby?