Can Christians Really Argue Well? -- The Drunks Bar

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Date Posted: 14:01:00 07/27/01 Fri
Author: OPB
Subject: Can Christians Really Argue Well?

http://www.berith.com/English/BR0011.html

I ran across this while searching for an etext edition of PRINCIPIA MATHEMATICA. It's a philosophical essay by one Rev. Ralph A. Smith that takes on Bertrand Russell. After a stunningly weak argument against atheism (it boils down to the tired old "the atheist must assume the Christian worldview in order to argue for atheism"), the good reverooned concludes with an ad hominem against Russell _and_ threats of hellfire:

"...Rousseau, Marx, and Sartre, to name only a few, fit the pattern seen in Bertrand Russell -- a pattern of lying, immorality, and both philosophical and personal self-contradiction."

"Russell himself has fallen into the blind cave of eternal night. He is no longer an atheist. Hell and judgment, the fear of which motivated Russell to deny God and to seek to escape from the truth that he knew only too well, are no longer mere religious ideas which he can deny."

Goddamn, but can't Christians argue without resorting to trash like this? It's fairly obvious why they do so: their arguments don't shore up their conclusions well enough, so they feel the need to layer on the emotionalism and call down the spirit revival-style. If you're setting out to attack an argument, stay with the argument. I wonder if Reverooned Smith would get a kick out of a Hindu writing a philosophical attack on Alvin Plantinga and winding up by calling the man spawn of Kali and lecturing about how he'll be reborn as a nit on a 1st-grader's head?

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Replies:

No. But you can. And it's very enjoyable. (NT) -- Kathy, 14:36:21 07/27/01 Fri
- Thanks, but -- OPB, 23:54:33 07/27/01 Fri
  - I dunno. Maybe. -- Kathy, 07:04:47 07/28/01 Sat
Well, Non-Christians can argue -- Reverend E. Dwayne Looper, 15:03:40 07/27/01 Fri
- E. Dwayne! -- Rufus A., 23:56:50 07/27/01 Fri
- Satans peeps -- Moleculo, 01:51:00 07/28/01 Sat
  - Re: Satans peeps -- SM78, 10:29:27 07/28/01 Sat
    - "Sinner Man" -- OPB, 13:02:26 07/28/01 Sat
      - Re: "Sinner Man" -- Steve Hogan, 18:22:26 07/28/01 Sat
        Re: "Sinner Man" -- SM78, 20:44:21 07/28/01 Sat
Hey, you think it's easy defending phony made-up sh*t? -- SteveH, 16:42:42 07/27/01 Fri
- You got a point -- OPB, 00:55:56 07/28/01 Sat
Primer for xians -- Queer, 17:52:18 07/27/01 Fri
- Wow, that stuff looks too much like the Baalm's Ass site, Queer :) -- NKLS Cody, 11:00:18 07/28/01 Sat
 - Sorry... that's Balaam's Ass. I should've searched out the name -- NKLS Cody, 17:01:47 07/28/01 Sat