Might I ask how he frames his argument on this point?Quote:
Originally Posted by Trystan
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Might I ask how he frames his argument on this point?Quote:
Originally Posted by Trystan
He calls God a 'celestial dictator'. He watches us at every move, he can even listen to our thoughts; constantly scrutinizing us. Hitchens uses North Korea as an analogy - but, he says that at least you can die in North Korea and escape that tyranny.Quote:
Originally Posted by Redzeppelin
God is something we imagine based on our mental frames. But God, if he is the one to set everything in order is far from our understanding.
Different religions frame their own pictures of God.
A projection is not God.
The name is not God.
Your imagination can not delimit God.
Your prayer has nothing to do with God. And just because you pray God does not take your side and God does not thwart them just because they do not pray.
I hope Mr. Hitchens can do better than this. God's existence is not confined to our 4 dimensions - that He is omniscient and omnipresent does not in-and-of-itself = "tyrant." Where does Hitchens get the idea that God is "constantly scrutinizing" us? The North Korean analogy is silly - North Korea is a repressive government - God gives us complete freedom of will.Quote:
Originally Posted by Trystan
As I've said before, why would a tyrant or "celestial dictator" suffer Hitchens and his criticism to continue existing? North Korea's tyrant would not suffer the likes of Hitchens and his criticism very long.
Certainly Hitchens can do better. I'll assume you've oversimplified his argument, because this is hardly compelling.
main reason is in agreement with posters here...Hitchens thinking too derivative. The man should give up try to convert sinners, write poetry instead-"Celestial Dictator"-now thats lovely phrase.
God is great as a father figure. But at times he fails, and succumb to fakes and nothing else.
I have read Hitchins' book. I found it amusing, and a bit informative. He is of course preaching to the converted (or should I say the unconverted?) There is really nothing new to say in the arena of atheism; it is after all a negation (and I don't mean that in a derogatory sense at all), the most powerful argument in favor of atheism being the absolute lack of any physical evidence of God's existence. The other atheist arguments are the historical retreat of belief in the supernatural as rationalism and science have advanced, and the linking of modern religion to various mythologies that are nowadays recognized as absurd. All three arguments have been around for a very long time.
Still, there is value in a systematic restatement of these ideas every now and then. God is Not Great is not going to make an unbeliever of a true believer, but it offers hope to the serious doubter, to those who don't really care to believe but who were perhaps raised to be religious and know nothing of rational disbelief. Religion is everywhere, and is almost universally praised as good or at the very least harmless. As the book itself points out, it is only recently in the history of civilization that such freethinking has become permissible; religious faith has long been compelled under threat of the harshest possible of punishments.
Sure, Hitchins' book is partisan. He makes no bones about it, and I see nothing wrong with it.