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From: rlr@pyuxn.UUCP (Rich Rosen)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: A Penney's Worth
Message-ID: <818@pyuxn.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 3-Jul-84 18:13:17 EDT
Article-I.D.: pyuxn.818
Posted: Tue Jul  3 18:13:17 1984
Date-Received: Wed, 4-Jul-84 03:54:30 EDT
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Organization: Bell Communications Research, Piscataway N.J.
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> I am not against
> skepticism per se; only a certain brand of it that occurrs here.
> A skeptic is an inquirer--ideally one who wants to learn and
> understand.  There is a certian character assocated with such
> a person.  He asks honest questions (the more specific the 
> better) and expresses honest doubts (e.g. he says "I don't 
> understand this." and not "you must be a fool to believe that").
> See the difference?  The former doesn't assume he knows better
> than those he questions. The latter is sure he does, he is a
> sophist.

(Perhaps the tone of many of the questions that have indeed been asked
[repeatedly, I might add] has become harsh precisely because religionists
assume they know better than the questioners... :-?)

So you want honest questions, eh?
Honest questions like "I don't understand why..."

Why you believe that a simple book (albeit interesting and well-written) is
assumed to have come from a deity, and why ALL events/ideas described in that
book are assumed to be absolutely correct, based either on "look, some
events *have* been proven to occur" or on pure faith.

Why you assume that 'rules' as written in that book are somehow divinely
inspired and the basis by which you should live your life, why others should
be required to live their lives by those rules (simply because your book says
so) in a society as you would/might like to have it.

Why all the phenomena you attribute to intervention from a deity (so-called
miracles either unverified objectively, like the resurrection, or changes in
your life resulting from increased self-esteem because you *believe* that you
are made worthy (solely?) because of favor from your deity) are not
attributable to "natural" physical processes.

Why you make assumptions about the universe (e.g., it MUST have a creator, that
creator MUST be benevolent to us and (of course) all-powerful, there must be
a sense of justice in the universe as determined by the creator, the creator
plans and controls things to give the (my) whole world a sense of order, there
MUST be an ultimate moral authority, it must be the creator, and without any
of these things everyone's (not just mine---everyone's) lives would be without
purpose), and why your beliefs seem to start at those assumptions and work
back to getting a picture of the universe as you seem to desire it, rather than
the so-called rationalist perspective on the nature of things in the universe
(which you indeed seem to uphold in your daily life every time you use an
electrical appliance or eat or breathe).

There.  Honest questions.  Please provide honest answers.  Circular reasoning,
blithering, etc. will be labelled as such, and such labelling should be
interpreted by you as Art Fleming saying "More specific information, please."
(...does anyone have this feeling of deja vu...)
-- 
It doesn't matter what you wear, just as long as you are there.
						Rich Rosen    pyuxn!rlr