This is one of the many quotes by religious infiltrators to our philosophy site. — god must be atheist

How dare you. What little faith ye have. Thinking- nay- daring, insulting others by pretending, in the most condescending manner- that logic can somehow be defeated- and not just us but.. oh god.. "our children" with what you even admit is "futile" and "outrageous" blether. Good Lord, what side are you even on man?

The moderators will not ban this, and I don't think they should, but it should be classed to its own lounge, they can call it, The God Lounge. I do know Dfpolis to be an exceedingly skilled polemicist for his position, he would certainty not fit into any evangelical category, at least not his arguments from what I've seen. I'm quite sure he's a Christian, but he can handle himself on this front. Nevertheless, the above statement is quite indefensible. What I would say to the moderators is please stop defending people who say this kind of stuff. Let me tell you what I mean, don't protect them when we call them out in the same public forum in which they try to preach. The fact that they are offended that someone challenged their fantastic claims is just too damn bad, don't come to their aid or get all emotional about it. They're the ones that had the audacity to assert this stuff in a public philosophy forum. What do they expect? Please do not give their religion an a priory status of respect, if they want respect for their premises, then just like everyone else here, they need to be held to the same philosophical standard, they need to earn it. The moderators here should agree that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. The man or woman who calls this stuff out is not doing anything wrong, quite the contrary, they are doing what so many others were not allowed to do. It is the right of philosophy to assault the positive. And if one cannot do this then one cannot practice philosophy. This is a philosophy forum not a religious forum.

I still think they should be banned when they present in a mass invasion force. They have an agenda, I presume, which is to christianize the world. They go head-butt about it, and they don't listen to reason. Amen3017 is a prime example, among many. You can't convince them of anything. Reason rolls off them like water off duck's back.

To be honest religious dogma would only be like 15% of all the random bs people say here (I say some things that I cringe at a week later too) so I don't think it's even worth the effort and headaches of deciding what counts as illogical dogma and what doesn't.

Types of posters who are not welcome here:

Evangelists: Those who must convince everyone that their religion, ideology, political persuasion, or philosophical theory is the only one worth having.

Racists, homophobes, sexists, Nazi sympathisers, etc.: We don't consider your views worthy of debate, and you'll be banned for espousing them.

Advertisers, spammers: Instant deletion of post followed by ban.

Trolls: You know who you are. You won't last long

Sockpuppets

If they are evangelists and are genuinely trying to push their ideology as the only one worth, by the rules they should at least be getting warnings of their behavior.

@god must be atheist Have you asked what steps the moderators take and what their criteria is for dealing with these infractions? Have you flagged the alleged offending comments?

How hard have you tried to convince these alleged offenders of the errors in reasoning they are making?

Unfortunately due to the language used in the rules, if they are pushing their ideas while not saying anything about other peoples ideas then they aren't technically trying to convince that their ideology is the only one worth having, they are just very strongly pushing theirs. In order to make the full claim, that their ideology alone is best and that all others are useless. There would probably need to be evidence that says they have not only strongly pushed their claim, but baselessly attacked others claims and judged them for those claims. Without even being willing to listen to the substance of those claims if they aren't similar enough to their claims.

Hypothetical; I am a christian, you are a muslim.
I tell you about my beliefs, I tell you that you are wrong to have your beliefs and that you will burn in hell. I even make a false claim about a muslim practice that you know, no Muslim would ever do. I refuse to allow you to even object and reject that claim and I refuse to listen to anything you have to say about your own faith as I claim I already know what I need to know about it to even bother listening to yours.

As a Muslim, you make your claims strongly, you believe they are the only ones worth having. However, you also listen to other peoples claims and give them their time to speak. Allowing them the opportunity to convince you and giving some time to listening instead of talking.

Only one of these persons would be breaking the rules. Both might believe that their views are the only ones worth having. However only one is behaving like they truly believe that. This one is the real rule breaker.

Not saying I agree or disagree with you. I'm just asking if the people you are concerned are like the Christian or Muslim in our scenario?

They have an agenda, I presume, which is to christianize the world. They go head-butt about it, and they don't listen to reason. — god must be atheist

Only mosquitoes and idiots don't go away when you ignore them. When any bible puncher is ignored they eventually figure out that they are wasting their time and go away. If you get upset by them I think it says more about you and your agenda than theirs.

Peace and love bro, sit down and drink a beer. :victory:

If you get upset by them I think it says more about you and your agenda than theirs. — Sir2u

Is this equally true of Nazis?

Is this equally true of Nazis? — JerseyFlight

I have no idea about his political views, but he does seem to be a bit of a fanatic about the topic.

Are you not going to tell me that I mis-understood the question?

That doesn't answer my question. You said his criticism of religion is a negative mark against him. I would like to know, does this also apply to people who are critical of Nazis? What about the Peoples Temple? What about Aum Shinrikyo? What about Heaven's Gate? What about Branch Davidians? What about the Order of the Solar Temple?

There is no proof, as of yet, that god doesn't exist.

That doesn't answer my question. — JerseyFlight

Of course it did not answer your question, it was not supposed to.

Seriously, is there any way to compare a bunch of hyped up bible blathers to the nazis?
Anyone with a half way working brain would have a right to get upset with the nazis, but a bunch of psalms readers!!!

If he is so scared of them then he must be very insecure about his own will to resist them. Maybe he is a closet christian and is projecting his disgust with himself at them, who knows.

But to deliberately try to have freedom of speech banned because he is scared that everyone on this forum will convert to christians and all of our children will also succumb to the dire consequences of it is just pathetic.

And why do you capitalize the letter N in nazi if you do not have respect for them.

There is no proof, as of yet, that god doesn't exist. — TheMadFool

Which g/G is that? :roll:

Which g/G is that? :roll: — 180 Proof

Any one of them will do, they are all the same.

The name of the site is "The Philosophy Forum." In the forum's section are various philosophy-of sub-forums. The question goes to what the "philosophy" in the names means. Does it mean anything? I hold it does. To my way of thinking, a subject-matter-X forum, and a philosophy of subject-matter-X forum are two different forums with two different subject matters. Broadly, generally, mostly, we-all manage. Perhaps there's less philosophy then there might be, and more subject matter than strictly speaking there should be, but in my experience the philosophy has and takes its place, and most recognize and respond to it, and occasionally we get good stuff! But if ever in the philosophy of religion section, then please someone point it out to me.

Religion is a serious topic, and a philosophy of religion equally a serious topic. But we have a long-term core of posters to the philosophy of religion forum who don't discuss, don't constructively argue, and certainly don't arise to any level of philosophy. They're non-responsive to questions, evasive. or simply ignore ordinary courtesy in discussion.

The only thing that I can think of is, after reasonable efforts at discussion have failed, to just call them out until they improve or get tired of it and go away. It seems any site-wide restriction probably won't work, but at the same time, when I read outrageousness in a philosophy-of forum, I find it hard to let it pass. Had that topic - religion/philosophy-of - it's own separate title, I would understand to stay out of it, but the "philosophy" I understand as my invitation to participate, and with an expectation of the discussion meeting at least, mostly if not always, reasonable minimum standards of responsiveness.

Seriously, is there any way to compare a bunch of hyped up bible blathers to the nazis? — Sir2u

Inquisitions.

There is no proof, as of yet, that god doesn't exist. — TheMadFool

There is no proof, as of yet, that you do not owe me USD1,000. Please pay up!

Any one of them will do, [g/G's] are all the same. — Sir2u

Not according to any believers, theologians or religious traditions I'm aware of.

Which g/G is that? :roll:
— 180 Proof

Any one of them will do, they are all the same. — Sir2u

No they aren't. In fact very few conceptions of god are the same.

Inquisitions — JerseyFlight

Holy fucking hell, run for your lives everyone. The inquisitors have come to TPF.

Did you not read what I said?

Let me explain again. I get upset with people that go out and kill other people because they don't like their color, gang, religion, sexual preference, the books you read, or any other stupid reason you can think of. I think anyone would as well.

But what does that have to with the people that come here to talk about how great their god is? Do you seriously think that they will be able to convert anyone here? Jeez, that is sad.

Not according to any believers, theologians or religious traditions I'm aware of. — 180 Proof

No they aren't. In fact very few conceptions of god are the same. — MSC

I am not a believer, so I just use a generic, everyday definition of the word god

god=Any supernatural being worshipped as controlling some part of the world or some aspect of life or who is the personification of a force.

And I really don't care too much how they define their personal one.
Bullshit is still bullshit even if it is wrapped up as a fact.

I'm as anti-religious as they come and I think threads like this one are just as low-quality and (for lack of a better word) disruptive as the shallow little-reasoning religious threads are.

I generally think the best solution to that kind of problem is to ignore it (on the users' part; the mods have recourse to deleting on account of low quality or evangelism).

In which case I shouldn't even be making this post, but I am anyway.

You charged the original poster with, "If you get upset by them I think it says more about you and your agenda than theirs."

To test the accuracy of this statement I asked you several questions, none of which you answered. What you fail to see is that your bias (and that's what it is) is bent uncritically in favor of religion. If this was not the case then why not say this position is equally true of Nazis? It's because your cultural stance on Nazis is entirely negative, while you live too far apart from (cannot comprehend) the historical atrocities of religion.

Maybe we can drive the point home more. Suppose some fanatics from Isis wanted to come on here and start talking about Allah, would you still claim, "If you get upset by them I think it says more about you and your agenda than theirs." ?

I don't think so. Why? Because you live in a time when you can see the dogmatic violence of Isis, understanding the dangers of religion requires more than your immediate impression. Suppose someone from Isis came on here long before they starting pillaging and mass murdering, what an ignorant fool you would look like right now.

I am not a believer [ ... ]

god=Any supernatural being worshipped as controlling some part of the world or some aspect of life or who is the personification of a force. — Sir2u

Kind of circular then: there is no proof of the existence of an unbeliever's g/G - well, of course, but vacuous. I think was saying something more (yet unspecified) than this.

I'm as anti-religious as they come and I think threads like this one are just as low-quality and (for lack of a better word) disruptive as the shallow little-reasoning religious threads are.

I generally think the best solution to that kind of problem is to ignore it (on the users' part; the mods have recourse to deleting on account of low quality or evangelism).

In which case I shouldn't even be making this post, but I am anyway. — Pfhorrest

Now that is strange, when I told the guy to just ignore them some jumped all over me about it. But you are right, I would not be here if it were to for someone else trying to pick holes in what I said.

I'm as anti-religious as they come and I think threads like this one are just as low-quality and (for lack of a better word) disruptive as the shallow little-reasoning religious threads are. — Pfhorrest

Excuse me. Lots of people read these threads, some of them very likely, impressionable young people, are you claiming that a person is doing something wrong by criticizing religious error? You are here calling it "shallow," "little-reasoning," and comparing it to the irrationality of religion. Based on what, how did you arrive at this conclusion?

I generally think the best solution to that kind of problem is to ignore it — Pfhorrest

For the most part I agree, but this is not finalized. Sometimes this can be cowardice, being afraid to offend people, at other times it can be an evasion of responsibility. Notice: you confess that it's error, and then say, "well, just let it be," and further, you say, "I will not stand up to those who speak error, but I will stand up to those who speak out against error." This strikes me as backward conformity.

Which g/G is that? :roll: — 180 Proof

All g/G.

Lots of people read these threads, some of them very likely, impressionable young people, are you claiming that a person is doing something wrong by criticizing religious error? You — JerseyFlight

I'm not saying that anyone is doing anything wrong by criticizing religious errors. I'm saying that, for the most part, it's not worth the effort of engaging; they won't be convinced to change their minds, so you'll just be wasting your own precious time arguing against a brick wall.

If some people do want to spend the time to give a quick rebuttal for the sake of onlookers, then that is valuable, for the onlookers' sake, sure.

You are here calling it "shallow," "little-reasoning," and comparing it to the irrationality of religion. — JerseyFlight

I'm calling the religious threads that this thread complains about "shallow" and "little-reason", not this thread itself.

But I'm saying that threads like this complaining about the existence of shallow unreasoning religious people are little better. The mods will eventually delete low-quality or evangelical threads -- if they don't have any high-quality responses yet. (It takes them time, because they're not here watching the forum like a hawk 24/7; they're people with lives). So giving a quality rebuttal to them makes it less likely that they will be deleted. And posting threads like this complaining about them... just creates more filler that isn't quality philosophical discussion on the forum.

Why not make it a general request to remove posters who do not engage in philosophical argument and discussion but preach. This may be more common amongst religious posters, but it seems to me form of participating rather than content of positions should be the focus. Anyone who regularly confuses stating their positions with philosophical discussion, assertion with argument, appeal to authority with reasoning
regardless of the position, assertion and authority is considered to be violating the rules of the forum.
Which I assume they are already

Why not message the moderators directly about this? This is unnecessarily dramatic. Talk to moderators if you wish to give feedback on moderation. Talk to the rest of us if you want to discuss philosophy.