Claims of Personal Revelation and Divine Hiddenness

I have what seems to be quite a novel idea that I would like to present here...

Months ago, I authored a post dealing with what is often called the problem of divine hiddenness or, more generally, why -- if the Christian god exists -- the Christian god remains hidden. Theists typically, at least from my experience, use personal revelation as reasons to believe in God (or otherwise justify their previously held belief in God) and thus -- as it seems and should be guaranteed to follow if we accept their claims for sake of argument -- increase the probability of God existing. Surprisingly though, as I will argue, if it is the case that theistic belief is conditional on a god not revealing himself, it seems to be the case that both claims of personal revelation undermine the reasoning of theists who maintain that God must remain hidden due to certain considerations and that claims of personal revelation (if accepted for sake of argument) actually seem to lead to a conclusion that the Christian god doesn't exist.

Before getting into the thick of things, as this should often be the case, it should be helpful for me to define terms in order to eliminate confusion.


Personal revelation is a phrase used to describe some sort of intervention from God in which a person believes that they are either communicating with God or receiving some sort of message or good reason to warrant belief in God. Revelations can come in many forms from something as simple (and silly, some theists would even attest) as seeing Jesus in a photograph to being 'called' by God to enter into priesthood or something similar. The Catholic Church, for instance, is filled with a history of people -- some of them saints and some of them simply laypeople -- who claimed to have personal revelations and even have claimed to encounter God or other figures in groups of people as opposed to a solitary encounter.

Divine hiddenness is a phrase used surrounding the concern of why, if the Christian god exists, the Christian god remains hidden or otherwise doesn't unequivocally reveal himself to everyone so that they believe. Some versions of what turns out to be a problem (or even an argument against the existence of God) include an argument for why God would want and should want to reveal himself to everyone. Theists often maintain, from my experience, that God has sufficient reasons to remain hidden and, on some accounts, his hiddenness is required to preserve free will, 'genuine belief,' and even faith.

The problem, then, when understanding both divine hiddenness (and the associated reasons that God ought to remain hidden or otherwise a warranted Christian belief being contingent on God remaining hidden) and personal revelation should be clear. A theist can not justifiably maintain that God both must remain hidden (or remains hidden and has reasons to do so) and that God reveals himself to people; a contradiction seems to be apparent here. A further problem is found, then, when people maintain that God has revealed himself to people. If God must or does remain hidden, instances of revelation -- if true (or accepted for sake of argument) -- seem to lower the probability of the Christian god existing.

Suppose Bob maintains that the Christian god exists, has sufficient reason to remain hidden, and has revealed himself to Bob. What are we to make of this? In order to avoid a contradiction and remain coherent, Bob must reject one of his ideas, but which one of these ideas should he reject? Suppose Bob -- prior to having experienced a personal revelation -- has a litany of reasons which he considers adequate enough to warrant belief in the Christian god including but not limited to arguments from design and cosmological arguments. Bob, then, doesn't find reason -- when considering these arguments and arguments from detractors -- to reject belief in the Christian god, but has to face the question of why God remains hidden and doesn't unequivocally reveal himself to everyone. Suppose Bob maintains that God doesn't reveal himself because God wants to preserve free will (and Bob believes that an utter revelation would infringe upon free will and not lead to genuine belief) and values belief based on a considerable degree of faith. Bob, then, after his personal revelation experience, seems to have to reconsider some of his beliefs.

Bob, as should be apparent, can then either reject the idea of Christian belief being contingent on God remaining hidden or reject the idea that he has a personal revelation from God. An interesting third option, though, remains. Bob can reject belief that the Christian god exists! For Bob, after some examination, his personal revelation seems to be quite undeniable while some of the arguments for God that he had previously considered seemed to point not specifically to the Christian god, but rather to a creator god or being. Some options Bob might consider are as follows: perhaps some other god exists who is masquerading as the Christian god, the revelation was ambiguous, and Bob misinterpreted something. Bob, of course, can also reject the idea that the Christian god has sufficient reason to remain hidden or that he experienced a personal revelation, but he's not about to do that.

Hopefully this hypothetical example gives a good introduction and a better understanding of the following problem which I will formalize:

(1) If the Christian god exists, people can not profess genuine personal revelations from the Christian god.
(2) People profess genuine personal revelations from the Christian god.
(3) The Christian god does not exist.

In order for this deductive argument to be valid, its premises must lead to the conclusion and this is the case, so challenges to it must be attacks on its soundness (the truth-value of the premises). The argument, though, can only work -- as premise one implies -- if God's hiddenness is contingent on Christian belief; theists who believe that God doesn't remain hidden are not faced with a problem. Remember, many theists will argue that God has sufficient reasons to remain hidden including but not limited to considerations of free will, faith, and genuine belief.

Some may also object thinking -- when reflecting on premise one -- that the professed genuine personal revelations aren't genuine; people are lying, mistaken, drawing inappropriate conclusions, or a combination of these. This consideration, though, doesn't seem to matter considering that many theists -- including leaders in the Catholic Church and people writing Church history -- profess that personal revelations are genuine; the mere fact that people are professing personal revelations, not whether they are true or not -- is the issue. One of the problems, though, as I mentioned earlier in this post and this argument alludes to, is that God can't both remain hidden and reveal himself to people. If a theist professes to have experienced a genuine personal revelation and maintains that God remains hidden, we must assume that something else is 'going on' such as a non-Christian god revelation if the personal revelation itself is not doubted.

What, then, should people draw from this reasoning I proposed if I happen to be on-target? It seems quite obvious, as people might have already considered, that God can't both remain hidden and reveal himself to people, but the less obvious item I argued for is that claims of personal revelation -- when coupled with the belief that if the Christian god exists, he must remain hidden and/or that personal revelation claims can't be genuine -- actually make a solid case against (not for) the existence of the Christian god.

Recorded Video - Debate: Does the Christian god exist? Rev. Marcelle Dotson vs. Justin Vacula

I debated Rev. Marcelle Dotson of Field of Grace United Methodist Church in Wilkes-Barre on the topic of "Does the Christian god exist?" on December 19, 2011.

The debate was recorded live from "Jason International Studios" in Mountain Top, PA.

The debate is now available as a recorded version for your viewing pleasure. A audio-only podcast will also be available in the near future.



Feel free to comment below, send me e-mail, etc. I'd love to hear from you.

Rev. Dotson's e-mail is mdotson@susumc.org


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Justin Vacula -- co-organizer, spokesperson, and board member of the NEPA Freethought Society -- graduated from King's College with degrees in Philosophy and Psychology, a distinguished award in Philosophy, and a minor in Professional Writing. He regularly publishes articles for Examiner.com as the 'Scranton Atheism Examiner,' writes for American Atheists' "No God Blog," and publishes posts about “atheism, theism, philosophy, and much more” on his blog at www.justinvacula.com. The NEPA Freethought Society's website can be found at www.nepafreethought.org.

Rev. Marcelle Dotson, pastor of Field of Grace Community of Faith United Methodist Church holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology from Smith College, a Master's of Divinity degree in Theology from Drew University, and a Master of Business Administration from Simmons School of Management. She served as an associate pastor in Manchester and had served the United Methodist Church in Maine. She came to Wilkes-Barre in 2009 to start Field of Grace. United Methodist Church. The website for her church can be found at www.fieldofgraceumc.org.

Atheism, Dating, and an Evangelical Christian who tried to convert me

For the past two years as an atheist, I have realized that dating was quite a difficult affair, but even before being an atheist, I noted that it's quite difficult to have meaningful relationships with those who don't value learning, knowledge, and intellectual pursuits. Since I have become an atheist, I have learned so much and am quite a different person than I was when I was a theist. Now, for example, I listen to a large number of science podcasts, know logical fallacies like the back of my hand and notice them everywhere, question so many claims that I would have been content with in the past or otherwise would not have noticed, etc.

Unfortunately, many in my cohort (and not all, of course) in the local 'dating scene' are very much different than me and it's tough because I refuse to compromise and believe that I need a similar intellectual connection with a significant other in order to have a relationship. I don't think it is possible for me to have a relationship with a religious person who was very, very, very much different from me who may perhaps deny evolution, believe in a young universe, endorse a global flood, believe that atheists can't be moral, and believe that I am going to Hell among other things.

Contrary to what many might think, I am quite open and more than happy to date a religious individual as long as the person accepts who I am and is okay with the fact that I am one of the most (if not the most) prominent/active atheists in Northeastern Pennsylvania. Closed-minded fundamentalists, though, are simply not permissible.

It is an obvious fact of life that all sorts of people, even if they share very similar worldviews, will disagree on some issues. Many of my close friends, for example, share wildly different positions from mine ranging from endorsing libertarianism and supporting Ron Paul to believing that all abortions are murder or otherwise being almost completely opposed to abortion. I also have many theistic friends, of course. It is also the case that many theists comment on and view my news feed on Facebook. Blah, blah, blah. We can be friends and disagree about issues and said disagreement need not be construed as disrespect.

Anyway, I'm active on a certain dating site. I am not hiding anything on my profile about me being an atheist. I mention, among other things:

I'm a very scientifically-minded and logical person who is skeptical of all things paranormal and supernatural. I'm somewhat of a public figure in Luzerne County and some parts of Pennsylvania mainly because of my writing and my public stand for separation of church and state in December of 2009. I am the co-organizer of a local non-profit group of atheists, skeptics, humanists, etc called the NEPA Freethought Society. We are a social, educational, activist, and philosophical group that provides a community for non-theists and is a community watchdog group for church/state violations.

(my Examiner.com page, various interviews/podcasts I participated in, the book I was featured in, my Facebook page, etc)
Religious people are OK, but fundamentalists aren't. Atheists, agnostics, and Buddhists are preferred. You must be OK with the fact that I am a prominent and public atheist. I challenge and criticize religion on a daily basis. It's also literally my job. :)

In my over 900 survey questions I answered on the website, I publicly answer various questions relating to religion, science, etc that should easily identify me as a skeptic and atheist. There are clearly no secrets here.

Despite this, someone [I'm not going to say who], a few says ago, sent me a message with her cell phone number asking me to call so we can, the same day of the message, go for coffee or a local festival and said "Call me you seem AWESOME!" I was busy soon after I noticed this message because I was playing D&D with friends for my weekly game. I told her that I couldn't talk and was busy, but she called and sent multiple texts while I was gaming.

After the session, I spoke with her on the phone for a very extended period of time and talked about my general personality, announced that I was an atheist, talked about my local activism, my writing, etc. She told me that she was an open-minded person, likes that I question, said that she likes that I am a writer, thinks I am intelligent, and various other associated comments. She said she really wants to meet me (and sent me her phone number to do so), is really interested in me, is physically attracted, etc.

The only line mentioning anything relating to religion or any gods on her profile was "Christianity and not too serious about it," so I thought that there would be no problems. Hours after contacting, I authored a blog post regarding vegetarianism in which a lengthy part of the discussion is quite critical of arguments for God. I mention the Euthyphro Dilemma and call divine command theory failure among other things. She said she enjoyed the post and also viewed some of my other writing. Great.

Soon after, out of nowhere, she said she "believes what she believes" and believes in God and prays. I told her that I am okay with that as long as she is okay that I am an active atheist and as long as she was not a close-minded fundamentalist. She said that religion was not a big deal for her and she "doesn't live by the Bible." Ok, great.

After about six days of frequent communication via text messages, phone calls, picture sending, Facebook messages, Facebook chatting, etc the real 'fun' began when she send the following text messages to me (cleaned up for punctuation, grammar, and capitalization):

So I do not want to hurt your feelings, but I need to be honest. It is not going to work between you and I. I really am not very into you. I am a super-Christian and it is just making me furious talking to you. [...] I really hope you find the Lord one day. Take care and God bless you.

I had not thought you were this bad. I thought maybe I could help you. You are not going to Heaven. It is really sad. I feel so bad for you. Justin, I will continue to pray for you. I thought maybe I could spread the word to you. I guess not.

I responded asking what she means when she says I am "bad" and why I need "help" and noted that she's really not concerned about me [or my soul?] like she says she is because she really made no effort to try to convert me [and she did not unless trying to be in a relationship with me under false pretenses is an attempt at conversion] and said "Then I suppose you are not concerned even though you say you feel sorry for me." I also asked her why she would bother to do this, among other things.

After this, she sent me a text message saying that should word report me for "harassment by communications."

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I have joked for quite a while that there is a 'theistic conspiracy' in which theists are trying to find me via dating sites and convert me, but this is obviously no longer a joke...because it happened. What sort of rational person honestly thinks that this is morally permissible behavior (to lie about wanting to be in a relationship with someone in order to secretly convert) and better yet, who thinks that this attempt would actually work?

I could never imagine myself concealing my identity or otherwise listing "atheism, but not serious about it" on my page, removing all references of my activism, blog, etc and messaging theists on dating sites who I actually was not interested in in order to convert them. That never even crossed my mind before this post because it is so profoundly ridiculous. This girl, though, thought that making no mention of her religion or beliefs in her profile besides "Christianity, but not serious about it" and then later revealing she was a "super Christian" who wanted to convert me was permissible (I presume) and a good plan.

This plan, though, has obviously utterly failed and this girl revealed that she was either really dumb, naive, or both. The breadth of my work, simply including my writing or a Google search, should reveal that I'm not 'lukewarm' or otherwise easily persuaded to change my positions regarding religion and gods. I'm not hiding anything! Of course, as my page's banner says, I'm willing to change any and all of my beliefs given good reasons, but this girl did not even try to change my beliefs (unless she thought that posing as a person who was really interested in me would make me change?).

If people want to convince me that I am wrong and their religious beliefs are correct and substantiated, posing as a Christian who isn't serious about Christianity is not the way to go...and it's actually a really terrible plan that won't work. I'm open (and love) to have the discussions, but this girl offered no real reasons to persuade me although her Bible, in 1 Peter 3:15 tells her to do so if asked.

One of the really funny and perhaps ironic things concerning this situation is that I really thought about publishing this post and whether or not it would be permissible to do so because most, if not all, of this communication I had with this woman was private and I did not want readers of my page trying to somehow find this person and harass her (even if she totally deserves it, as some would think and have said). Two wrongs, though, don't make a right. I don't want people reinforcing her ridiculous beliefs that she may have about atheists and it would be quite unfair and unethical for me to direct a 'personal army' against her. Of course, though, I am the one concerned about ethics, not her. I was also thinking of not even posting this, but as long as I didn't 'out her' or give [many] specifics, I find nothing wrong with this. This post can be very educational, entertaining, and show the folly of at least one theist.

Theists out there: just don't ever do this. It is a waste of your time, a waste of my time, and it seems to be utterly crazy. I am more than willing to date a theist as long as said theist isn't a fundamentalist and close-minded. I'm not going to take the attitude of "I can't date a theist" because of this experience. I'm not, of course, painting all theists with the same brush here. Might, though, it be the case that this is an example of harmful religion? I'll let you decide this. As always, feel free to comment but please, please, please don't engage in vigilantism of any sorts if you know who this woman is. Thanks!

...and for the record, I think this is even more odd than a semi-professional (?) wrestler challenging me to a wrestling match in order for me to find and pray to the god I don't believe in.

Conversation with a Born Again Christian and Science Denial

Today, I had an unexpected and interesting conversation with an energy consultant at a flea market type venue. After some discussion in which I intended to be skeptical of his claims, he announced that he was a born again Christian after I told him that I work for Examiner.com as the Scranton Atheism Examiner.

He asked me if I believe that "everything came from nothing" and I called out the obvious false dichotomy that is typically posited with this assertion. I told him that natural processes can account for the universe after he asked me, "Well, who created the universe then" and "how did the universe get here, who put it here." He started to talk about the "complexity"of the human eye and I talked to him about how the eye doesn't seem to be designed at all. I called out his argument from ignorance soon after be asked me if I watched the Expelled movie with Ben Stein (lol) regarding intelligent design. Even if it were the case that we couldn't explain how the eye was formed, this doesn't entail that we can rationally posit God as an answer (the typical God of the gaps argument).

He then told me that I have "faith" in science and that it takes more faith to be an atheist than to believe in God. I addressed this points rather quickly be saying that neither of us are evolutionary biologists and I simply defer to the experts on matters best left to experts. It's not faith to accept the conclusions of people who are properly trained to evaluate and interpret the data. One of the best features of the scientific method is peer review, the process by which scientists review others' findings. Once a paper would go through a peer review process, we have good reason to accept this data as the best fitting explanation...and especially after a meta-analysis and consensus amongst scientists. Still, the man insisted that this was "faith" and I simply repeated and reinforced my points.

I asked him if he took medicine and if he called taking medicine and vaccines a faith-based position. He said that he believes in the efficacy of medicine. I asked him why...and never really got an answer. One of the major logical fallacies going on with the man was special pleading; he accepts some conclusions from scientists, but dismisses others even though the evidence yields a conclusion in the same manner. Why defer to the experts on matters of medicine and vaccines and then not accept what experts have to say on the matter of evolution?

The idea of "it takes more faith to be an atheist" is nonsense because atheism isn't a faith position, it's simply the lack of belief in any gods. I don't have faith when I don't believe something exists; I come to a conclusion based on the most reasonable an unbiased survey of the evidence. All of the arguments from believers, I have reasoned, are insufficient to establish any good reason to believe in any gods.

He then got into the topic of global warming...a topic which I really have not studied much, but am justified in deferring to scientific consensus on (still not faith). He mentioned that all of the funding for scientists who believe in global warming is from the government and special interest groups who have a vested interest in legislating policy that accords with belief in global warming. This assertion is very dubious to begin with and misses the point of the scientific process; no matter who funds something, the conclusion that the data yields will shine through. While there may be conflicts of interest and "creaming the data," a process of peer review, independent researchers who are publishing peer-reviewed material, and the data itself will yield a conclusion. The beauty of critical thinking skills, I have discovered, is that once you can argue one topic really well and understand logical fallacies, you note huge problems in arguments about topics that you aren't well-informed about...and this was the case here with global warming.

Saying "oh, this is funded, so I can't accept it" is profoundly ad-hoc and is more special pleading. When this man sees data he presumably doesn't like, he doesn't question the data, but rather gives an "excuse" to save his hypothesis of global warming isn't happening. Surely, he accepts data that is funded by the government and special interest groups for other matters, right? Why, then, deny global warming and not everything else that is funded?

Another argument he tried was that there are two sides to the debate and experts can often disagree. In the case of global warming, there is no real debate because there is scientific consensus. There may, of course, be disagreements regarding the rate of global warming, the impact of global warming, and what policies we should put in place (notice, this is politics, not science, but perhaps is scientifically-informed politics), but this does not entail that global warming is not happening. Two sides to a debate doesn't automatically make a position valid, either.

Just because certain politicial groups may support 'global warming legislation' or 'push' the fact that global warming is happening or if it is the case (and it is) that some people are 'making money off global warming' does not entail that there is some sort of conspiracy or flawed scientific methodology. This is a causal fallacy; just because one thing happens does not entail that it is linked to the other...and it's also a non-sequitur (so what if people are making money? This doesn't entail that global warming is not happening). What's happening here is very similar to what '9-11 Truthers' are doing when they say things like "Oh, look! People sold stocks before 9-11, so they must have known about it and were in on a conspiracy." Just because people profit off of something, whether intentionally or not, does not entail a conspiracy.

When I asked him why he believes what he believes in the matter of God's existence, he actually pulled Pascal's Wager by saying "Well, if you're wrong, you're going to Hell and if I'm wrong, I lose nothing." I quickly demolished this horrid argument and he moved on to say that he "feels" that belief in God is justified. (More about my evaluation of Pascal's Wager is here.)

I asked him why feeling something is true makes it so and I was given a very long anecdotal story previously that he appealed to. His son was in a coma and had very low chances of living. Eventually, he recovered after doctors told the parents to 'pull the plug.' Therefore, he believes in God and thinks that this was a wake-up call. Anecdotal stories are really problematic (I can't really know the details or if it even happened), but for the sake of argument, let's assume that it is true.

There are many problems. First, the doctors saved the person, not God. If you take the doctors out of the equation, there would be no surviving. Second, what kind of all-powerful and all-knowing god would put someone through a coma to send a 'wake-up call?' Surely, since he is all-powerful and all-knowing, according to believers, he could have revealed himself in some other manner with ease. Third, even if 'something happened' that was not the work of the doctors or a naturalistic recovery, why assume that it is the Christian god or even any god? It's the old argument from ignorance again: I don't know, therefore God. Extraordinary situations are simply not indicative of miracles!

It doesn't take faith to be an atheist and we don't need to take claims on faith. We can, after a reasonable appraisal of the evidence, come to justified conclusions without taking a 'leap of faith.' While we may be wrong about some things, this doesn't mean that we had a faith-based position or that our reasoning process was wrong to begin with. Tomorrow, for example, we can discover that this world was really an illusion and 'we' were brains in a vat. Should we be blameworthy for believing that the world was not an illusion? No. Was believing that the world was real a faith-based claim? No.

The only real candidate for faith in my life is induction (the belief that the future will resemble the past). Induction, though, as I explain in my capstone philosophy paper, which also talks about why I don't have faith in many claims, is necessary for being a functioning human being and, although there are problems with question-begging, is a forced option that everyone must live by (or else they'd probably end up dead, disfigured, or in a mental institution). This is much different than the faith of a religious believer.

Are Extraordinary Situations Indicative of Miracles?

I often hear the following stories during conversations with theists, "Well, this one event in my life was so improbable and extraordinary that there's no way it could have happened without some sort of divine intervention!"

Last night during a meetup with the Wilkes-Barre Interfaith Community, one of these stories were told and it went like this:

I was driving down a long road with some friends and family and was lost. I had no clue where I was and I was running out of gas. There wasn't a gas station anywhere and I was getting very worried. Someone in the car, a minister, prayed that we would find gas very soon and we decided to stop at the next house that had a light on. We pulled up and an old couple actually had a gas pump and gave us gas! Now I'm a math guy... and the chances of that are so extraordinary!

A first problem we have with anecdotal stories like this is that we really can't verify them - the story is limited to the individual or other individuals who were present. They could also all be fooled, stretching the details, etc. With a story like this, I don't think that there is some sort of lie going on and the person seemed credible. It's certainly not impossible to pull up to a house and gas, but I might be more suspicious if they said that a UFO landed and transferred some sort of space gas...

A second problem with stories like this is that people often count the "hits" and ignore the
"misses." We tend to notice when our prayers seemed to produce some sort of effect, but we don't really notice (or typically tell stories about) the failures. For instance, I'm sure you've heard people thinking "I was thinking of a friend and my phone rang! I knew it was him calling at it was!" How many times have you thought of a friend and received no phone call? How many times was it someone else? If we ran some sort of experiment where we drove down long random roads and happened to pray and stop at a first house with a light we saw, how many times would we get gas from people? The chances are very slim...but that time you were successful.

A third problem is that stories like this often are based on a false premise leading to a supposed conclusion. Perhaps the prayer had nothing to do with getting the gas. Just because you prayed does not mean that this was why you got the gas. What if you rubbed your head three times before you took a test? Would you credit the head rubbing with success? We're doing the same thing with the prayer here... In other words, correlation does not imply causation.

The largest and fourth problem with stories like this is that they are huge arguments from incredulity/ignorance. The idea that we have no explanation for why something happened does not mean that we can or should attribute a supernatural cause. I often hear comments like, "The universe is so amazing and we don't understand it...God must have made it!" Well, no...religion actually has a pretty bad track record at answering questions without current answers from the idea of the sun in the sky moving with a chariot, to Zeus striking people with lightning, and famine caused by lack of worship to a deity. If we don't know, we should simply say that we don't know and look for an answer instead of drawing a hasty conclusion.

A fifth problem related to the first is that the burden of proof is on the person making the claim. Some theists may try to say something like "Well, disprove it then! Explain how it happened! If you can't explain it it must be because God did it!" This response is ridiculous and it's so ridiculous that I've covered it in a previous blog post. Imagine that I told you that I can fly and manipulate street lights with my eyes. You would not accept me saying "Prove that I can't do it," so don't think that the theist is justified in trying this tactic when God is involved.

The above story may not seem to be very extraordinary, but I'll pose a different one for another example.

My sister was very sick for weeks. We developed a debilitating cancer and the doctors said she would only live for one more month. My family was praying for her and the cancer remitted! God must have intervened and saved her! There's no other explanation!

In a case like this, we can apply the four major problems above and look at the situation with a skeptical eye...but what about the doctors, what about the fact that cancer does remit?

This isn't about poking fun at people or being a dick, of course...but we really should think about situations like this. Millions of people have these stories like this to tell and attribute their god or supernatural beliefs to the answer to the mysteries...

For more coverage on prayer, please read my "Perils of Prayer" post and for more coverage on miracle claims, please read my post on that subject.

Formation and Reinforcement of Religious Belief + My Backstory

Many of our beliefs are products of our peers, parents, culture, and education. Generally, we'd like to think that many of our important beliefs are justified with good support and evidence, but that's probably not the case. Advertising is muddled with "sales" and statistics often mislead us. Experienced marketers with a solid background in advertising know exactly what they are doing. News commentators tell us about how terrible the political party they don't belong to us. Sports networks tout about how great certain teams are and how certain teams have the greatest fans in the world...but so does every other team. We often might not think twice (or even once) until someone, if ever, points out errors in our thinking. Figures who have some sort of authority or perceived authority make claims that we often accept just because.

Imagine if I were to teach you a card game, you'd probably accept what I have to say regarding the rules of the game and probably have all reasons to do so. You don't know how to play the game and you think I do...but I could have just presented you incorrect information and you would not have known it. If you find inconsistencies in my presentation of the information or it appears that I'm making up rules as I go along, you might question, but you'll accept everything else.

Imagine that you hear a speech regarding research on autism from a professor at a university. When you return home are you going to check the information presented and see if it is widely accepted by scientists? Are you going to look for the studies that were referenced? If you know much about the topic and care about the topic, you might, but if you don't really know much and don't care, you probably won't. If a conversation with friends on autism happens in the future, you'll probably present this information and say "an expert told me this" ... and you might even communicate incorrect information do to a faulty memory, confusion of ideas, and your own possible related ideas that really have nothing to do with the topic at hand. Children playing the "telephone game" can demonstrate this quite easily. (Tell someone a story and over time the original story can change quite easily and quite drastically.)

Watch this Short Change Scam...the shopkeeper here has no idea that she got scammed and probably would not realize she was scammed until the end of her shift when she counts her drawer.

It's very easy to be confused when you are multitasking and dealing with numbers.

We often don't take the time (and really can't) to verify every claim we hear. It's impossible to demand tremendous evidence for all claims we hear, so we simply accept information as being credible. Combine claims with environmental distractions, you thinking about what is going to happen later in the day, cognitive errors...

Let's make it more difficult and consider children. Children listen to their parents because they believe that their parents are very smart, right about most things, and for evolutionary reasons. Children look up to their parents and other role-models...they listen to teachers, are told that people in uniforms (especially policemen) are trustworthy, and generally accept most of what they hear unless it contradicts earlier learned information. Children readily believe in Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, and the boogeyman. Sure, over time these beliefs fade because children realize that these are fairy tales and other children or adults "spoil" them. Many other beliefs that adults continue to believe in and reinforce such as the ideas that minority groups are inferior, homosexuals are "wrong and disordered," homeless people are homeless because they are failures at life, Mother Theresa is a paragon for charity and goodness, priests and clergy are exemplary moral individuals who know more about morality and ethics than laypeople, etc.

Children will believe in most beliefs that adults constantly reinforce and present as fact. When the general population also reinforces these ideas and presents ideas as fact, the reinforcement is strengthened. As you might have guessed, a particularly reinforced and shielded belief in America is Christianity. Churches in small town Pennsylvania are often "on every street corner next to bars" as the common joke and reality suggests. There's no shortage of churches and adults professing their faith. There's no shortage of schoolchildren believing in the Christian god. There is no shortage of children attending religious classes such as CCD, summer camps, etc. At a very early age, children are told that Jesus died for their sins, that Hell is real (and Christians think that teaching Hell is justified), and that when they die they'll see all of their family in Heaven. Yup, children around the age of five are learning about death, are guilt-ridden, and placed in a state of fear for what they do because a loving god who is watching them can send them to burn for eternity...but that's a post for another day.

I can recall learning about the idea of reconciliation and sin at a very early age and having to go to confession. I was told that I had to pray away my wrongdoings, talk with a priest about my sins, and felt really bad about not attending church, not listening to my parents, etc. I worried about my great grandmother after she died and I went to her funeral and cried because there was a chance she wasn't going to Heaven. I honestly thought that I had to pray to her because she was in purgatory. When I sinned I felt really bad...especially after getting out of confession.

I had no choice in this matter. My parents never said anything like "Well, here is what we believe and here is the reason for believing it. What do you think?" or "You can choose whether you believe in it or not." Even today my mother says, "You can't not believe in God, you're raised Roman Catholic." When I ask why she believes (which often doesn't happen because she gets very angry), I get appeals to tradition, emotive arguments, arguments from ignorance/complexity, and stupid arguments like Pascal's Wager or "you have to believe in something." With her, there is no rational discussion about God because she is convinced for "personal reasons."

"Arguments" from ignorant believers (not all of them are, of course because many wouldn't say these really stupid things) consist of similar patterns and these people never even met each other!

• I have a right to my own beliefs!
• Don't tell me what to believe!
• It's better to believe in something than nothing!
• Who are you to question God!
• How could the universe have arisen from nothing without God?
• If you believe in God and you're wrong you've lost nothing, but if you don't believe in God and you're wrong, it's all suffering.
• The eye/universe/this giraffe is too complex to exist without God!
• I have faith! I don't need evidence, reason, and argument!
• I believe because it's right for me!
• Everything happens for a [hidden/mystical] reason! OMG!!1one (my most hated assertion)

As mentioned in other posts, no one really challenged my ideas about religion until around my second year in college. I went on in my life as a "true believer" and used programmed responses (where did I get them from anyway, church and CCD, of course.) like "that's why it's faith." I enjoyed going to church, singing the music, seeing all of the art, narrarating and reading the readings, etc. Church is a place where you really do feel good and feel part of a team (despite all the mixed messages about God's love...but yet he may torture you and others for all eternity). Christianity tells you about how bad you are...and offers you ways to deal with the bad (although the bad often is an idea of bad exclusive to Christianity). Sure, not all forms of Christianity or individual Christians accept everything the church or the Bible says, but the general idea of sin is widely accepted - we're inherently "fallen" and the way to deal with it is to accept Jesus, repent, and feel sorry for our wrongdoings after "getting right with God." The real problem here is that humans do make mistakes and we don't always do the right thing, so we get a constant loop looking with this:

Christianity tells us that certain actions and thoughts are wrong

We do something wrong

We feel guilty

We're told that doing "x" will make it better

We repent and confess our sins

We do something wrong

We feel more guilty

We repent.....

Couple this with the existence of Hell, the idea that God is always watching us, and the idea that only the righteous and true believers go to Heaven and you're quite easily "hooked." Again, not all believers think of sin and exemplify this loop, but many do. Some children are told that it's wrong to question about God ("The blasphemy of the Spirit today, which is the same as the unpardonable sin, is the state of continued unbelief. There is no pardon for a person who dies in unbelief.") and that people who don't believe in him are immoral devil-worshipers who worship science. What's even worse is that the non-believers are not visible and vocal so the myths can perpetuate. Only if more atheists were out and active... Children might say "Hey, daddy, Uncle Jim told me he doesn't believe in any gods and talked to me about it. I asked him some questions and you know, non-believers aren't bad like Pastor Tim said they were." The myths of atheists being bad people even continues with adults...I recently heard this from someone in a classroom. Unfortunately, I didn't have the time to respond, "I know you're an atheist and everything, BUT you're pretty nice and respectful." Why the but......???!?

Beliefs about the nature of the universe and the supernatural should not be justified because of emotion or personal experiences. They should be justified because of good reason, argument, and evidence...not fear, comfort, and appeals to tradition.

It is often the case with Christianity that children are labeled as religious because they can properly make a choice about the ideas and fully read their religious texts. Imagine calling children republicans or democrats...but we often call children religious. What is this madness? Can you ever possibly think of a child ever saying, "You know what? I think that the government should stay out of our lives as much as possible, everyone should own whatever guns they want, and the rich should not be taxed at a high rate." Never... but we will hear children saying they love Jesus and Jesus loves them. There's clearly something wrong with this picture.

It's odd that religious belief often doesn't start with "Here's the idea and here is the reason that it is true" but rather infantile belief followed by later "justifications" and excuses. We're doing things in the reverse order here. Read the Bible, think about the ideas, and then make a decision...we shouldn't make a decision before the reasons for the decision. Children could easily be presented with the ideas of Scientology, Jainism, Islam, Christianity, or Pastafarianism and wholly believe it. As Richard Dawkins says and I'll slightly modify, religious belief is often an accident of birth: you're born into a family with religious parents and you believe what they do because you're told that it's true. Later in life you might investigate, but chances are that you won't or will just accept your version of the truth modifying what others believe and maybe some of your beliefs. Fundamentalists might turn into moderates and moderates might just be content with "what I believe is what I believe and I believe it." Fundamentalists might turn to non-belief and non-believers might turn out to be fundamentalists...although I do doubt many who say that they used to be atheists but then present "arguments" like Pascal's Wager :)

Even amongst theists, I hardly, if ever, get "real reasons" for belief. I generally get nonsense as bulleted above and a good conversation hardly ever happens. It shouldn't be hard to say something like, "This is what I believe and why I believe it" without falling victim to logical fallacies. Even if I don't agree with your worldview or ideas, you should be able to present arguments and reasons. Laziness, ignorance, and simply not thinking about issues deeply can be to blame...this can apply to all issues and all people. Can many theists often list the arguments from atheists and give responses that are coherent? I think not. I'm not trying to make theists look unintelligent or stupid, but many people do give the "group" a bad name quite often (and I'm sure atheists can do the same because atheism doesn't always entail awesome clarity of thought).

So, are we now to be disillusioned and give up all our beliefs, never trust people, and not accept new information? No, the proper course is to really think about what matters, go out and investigate, ask proper questions, make up your own mind, and have good reasons for your important beliefs. When I first wanted to think about the possibility of Christian claims being false and I was still a theist, I thought "It's pretty important whether or not God exists. I should really seek some answers" and now I'm here from a "true believer" who was told that cursing was a "strike" for me against God to a person who freely says fuck on any given opportunity. What a change... I've learned so, so much from the past year or so and still have much more to learn and explore.

Whatever your decisions are, understand that important ideas should be based on good reason that you can dictate, understand, and present to detractors and, as always, you might be entitled to your own beliefs, but you aren't entitled to your own facts.