thoughtful ideas on life's big questions
I am grateful to a reader Mustahsin Mir, who asked me some questions about an argument in the book Atheist Universe: The Thinking Person’s Answer to Christian Fundamentalism by David Mills. I haven’t read the book, but the argument can be followed in Amazon’s Look Inside, with Mustahsin’s questions relating to the section on page […]
Most people agree that we cannot answer the question, is there a God? with a clear proof, either way. So most arguments for or against the existence of God start with observable features of our world, and try to show that these are compatible with the belief we ourselves hold, but incompatible with the opposite […]
I have several times blogged on how christians and atheists relate to each other on the internet, because I think courtesy is better than rudeness, and attitudes on both sides can be improved. So I was interested in christian author Benjamin Corey’s thoughts on this.
This page in brief The internet is an amazing source of information – we can find out almost anything we want to know with a quick visit to Google. But trust is involved – we have to trust websites to speak honestly about things they actually know. But what happens when that trust is misplaced? […]
Internet discussions between believers and non-believers often get into the matter of evidence. Is there any evidence for God? Trouble is, we cannot always agree on what type and amount of evidence for God is enough to believe. And of course we all have our own viewpoints to defend. But perhaps looking at evidence a […]
We live in a physical world and most things we know are through our senses. Certainly we relate to each other through all the senses. So if God’s really there, why can’t we know him through our senses too? If God loves us, why wouldn’t he make himself more obvious, so we can all receive […]
Definitions of words can be boring stuff, but sometimes they are important. Sometimes people get quite excited, perhaps even angry, over them. The words atheist and agnostic have been examples of this in recent years.
It is good, every now and again, to reflect on what we believe and why, and to review if there is any reason to change our minds. I think it is good, too, for a blog author to remind their readers of what the blog is all about. So here’s my summary – what I […]
Alfred, Lord Tennyson, in his poem Maud wrote: Ah yet, we cannot be kind to each other here for an hour; We whisper, and hint, and chuckle, and grin at a brother’s shame; However we brave it out, we men are a little breed. Most of us, upon reading that, would probably smile ruefully and […]
I was reading my favourite atheist blog recently when I saw a commenter make an argument against the resurrection that went something like this: There are natural explanations of the resurrection (e.g. “It is possible that grave robbers stole the body of Jesus [and] …. that the alleged post-death appearances of Jesus were simply vivid […]