Speaking as someone who used to be a young Earth creationist, some of us are just born into it and are given lots of tools and incentives to maintain the faith despite, you know, all the evidence
Taking a class on the scientific method and reading a book on rationality was what got me to embrace doubt and decide that I only want to believe in something if it’s true
I never really understood why people argue with them.
Like, take this instance as an example. They’d just say that God intentionally created pre-aged Uranium.
To whatever your detailed scientific argument may be, their argument can always be “God did it that way”. You can win an argumenr against these people but you can never convice them that you did really just win the argument…
This is the whole point of “Last Thursdayism”. You claim that the world was created, as it is, last Thursday. All of history, including your own memories, were fabricated at the moment of creation - which was just last Thursday. Then you challenge them to try to prove you wrong.
It’s a great demonstration of why we long ago established the concept of the burden of proof
Last thursdayism: the universe was created last Thursday - everything is just precreated, memories and experience were planted there last Thursday. Nothing has been around for more than a week at this point.
It’s the same idea, pulled to an extreme which cannot be disproven, but also seems absurd enough for people to deny
When asked why God would do such a thing, the answer is usually “To test your faith”.
I was brought up Christian as a child, and went to church, but this answer is a prime example of what ultimately turned me away. Such behaviour didn’t fit the image of God in my mind. My version of God was pure, loving and trustworthy, and wouldn’t scatter “tests of faith” and other such trickery around my world.
“Testing your faith” sounds like tricking people into not believing. Which is exactly what they accuse their devil of doing. This god sounds like kind of an asshole.
Same here. Was raised by a purely Christian family, anti-abortion and anti-gay and all of that.
I may actually still be believing in their God if their answers didn’t always sound like made up fits-all generic loyalist bullshit.
Religion should be a way of better, more moral living based on principles, not a weapon to impose yourself on others and justify all oppression with “it’s God’s will”.
A lot of religious people live that way, with the philosophy/self morality being the point.
…A whole lot don’t, though.
I think it’s unfair they give good folks a bad name. But at the same time, there is way too much tolerance for that hate under the cover of “religion.”
A kid in my neighborhood when I was growing up would always say the Devil did it to turn you away from God, but never explained how the Devil has that sort of power in the first place.
People who believe in young earth creationism have completely rejected science already. They won’t be convinced by any scientific argument.
That’s not necessarily true. I managed to convert one who had doubts about the dinosaurs just by giving her information.
Some people were indoctrinated and aren’t hopeless.
Speaking as someone who used to be a young Earth creationist, some of us are just born into it and are given lots of tools and incentives to maintain the faith despite, you know, all the evidence
Taking a class on the scientific method and reading a book on rationality was what got me to embrace doubt and decide that I only want to believe in something if it’s true
Love of truth set me free
I never really understood why people argue with them.
Like, take this instance as an example. They’d just say that God intentionally created pre-aged Uranium.
To whatever your detailed scientific argument may be, their argument can always be “God did it that way”. You can win an argumenr against these people but you can never convice them that you did really just win the argument…
This is the whole point of “Last Thursdayism”. You claim that the world was created, as it is, last Thursday. All of history, including your own memories, were fabricated at the moment of creation - which was just last Thursday. Then you challenge them to try to prove you wrong.
It’s a great demonstration of why we long ago established the concept of the burden of proof
Last thursdayism: the universe was created last Thursday - everything is just precreated, memories and experience were planted there last Thursday. Nothing has been around for more than a week at this point.
It’s the same idea, pulled to an extreme which cannot be disproven, but also seems absurd enough for people to deny
When asked why God would do such a thing, the answer is usually “To test your faith”.
I was brought up Christian as a child, and went to church, but this answer is a prime example of what ultimately turned me away. Such behaviour didn’t fit the image of God in my mind. My version of God was pure, loving and trustworthy, and wouldn’t scatter “tests of faith” and other such trickery around my world.
My baseline argument these days is that god does not exist, or if he does exist, he is an evil asshole that gives children bone cancer.
“Testing your faith” sounds like tricking people into not believing. Which is exactly what they accuse their devil of doing. This god sounds like kind of an asshole.
Same here. Was raised by a purely Christian family, anti-abortion and anti-gay and all of that.
I may actually still be believing in their God if their answers didn’t always sound like made up fits-all generic loyalist bullshit.
Religion should be a way of better, more moral living based on principles, not a weapon to impose yourself on others and justify all oppression with “it’s God’s will”.
A lot of religious people live that way, with the philosophy/self morality being the point.
…A whole lot don’t, though.
I think it’s unfair they give good folks a bad name. But at the same time, there is way too much tolerance for that hate under the cover of “religion.”
A kid in my neighborhood when I was growing up would always say the Devil did it to turn you away from God, but never explained how the Devil has that sort of power in the first place.