The God of the Deist-Theist Gap. (A Quick Thought)

If you are a relatively new atheist like myself who grew up in a Christian home all your life, you may have the same addiction I have of watching god debates on YouTube. William Lane Craig vs. Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins vs. John Lennox. Christopher Hitchens vs. Dinesh D'souza. Atheist vs. Theist. Have you noticed a trend in all of these debates? It's always a debate on the existence of God. The new atheists say there is no extraordinary evidence to prove the extraordinary claim of a god while the theists say that the cosmos is too ordered and sophisticated to not have been created by a deity.

However, what you can rarely find on YouTube is a debate between an atheist and theist that deals with specifics of the particular religion these theists adhere to. Why is it you can never find a debate online where the theist is specifically trying to prove Catholicism, or Islam, or Mormonism as the "correct" theism? The best a theist can do is argue for deism with divine command theory or the cosmological argument. These C.S. Lewis-style weak philosophical tricks have faulty premises and are riddled with confirmation bias from the start. What you won't see is a theist trying to prove Jesus was God's only Son and that he died on a cross and rose from the dead, and walked on water, and other miracles claimed in the Bible. Their "proof" ultimately stems from "the Bible said it is so" thus it is so. The ever popular - "God Said It. I Believe It. That Settles It." Of course this is a faulty way of building a theory of anything. This is not proof. Even historical proof. Assuming we all do not believe in Zeus, or unicorns, or Atlantis but these things were written down in ancient texts too. Why the special treatment for the ancient texts that make up the Bible? Why you ask? Because they say they are true and special and divinely inspired. Circular reasoning always gives you the answer you desire from the start. There couldn't be anything more unscientific than this way of thinking.

Another thing you don't see as often online are debates between various religions. It's not as often you see a Muslim debating an Evangelical or a Scientologist debating a Mormon. Why is that exactly? As an atheists how comical would this be? I would enjoy watching a debate where one sides magic underwear and golden tablets trumps the other sides e-meter and galactic alien overlord. I'm still awaiting Scientology Vs. Mormonism: The Musical, Matt Stone and Trey Parker! That would be the funniest musical of all time. The second funniest would be the Book of Mormon of course.

Logic, science, and reason has knocked religion down to its knees. It's exposed it for what it is: man-made. It's conjured up. It is still used for controlling populations. It's been said that "Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful." Theists can debate atheists on the grounds of deism but not theism and certainly not a specific brand of theism: Christianity, Mormonism, Catholicism, Scientology, Islam, Judaism, etc. Once we get into the specifics we see the supernatural nonsense and the wild tales said to be true. We are exposed to what makes otherwise intelligent people believe the most outlandish things like walking on water, talking donkeys, living inside a fish, and mounds of scientific claims such as a man of god stopping the sun (?), a worldwide flood, god creating light before creating the stars and other Biblical claims that fly in direct opposition to what we know to be scientifically true.

Some may say I'm picking on the "most extreme" fundamentalists of each type of religion. The religious faithful all don't reeeally believe everything literally, but just focus in on the moral teachings of the Bible (please don't get me started on morality. There are more appalling immoral examples in the Bible said to be moral than there are scientifically inaccuracies claiming to be actual events.) I get this attitude a lot when I debate Evangelicals who want to have it both ways. They have somehow created this dualistic nature in their mind where they can be a Bible literalist but then laugh it off and point to William Lane Craig "intelligent-sounding" philosophical deist arguments. Maybe some of you other atheists out there know what I'm talking about. Some theists may say I am singling out only the holy book literalists. While this is true, it is deceptive to allude to this notion that this is a fringe minority of the religious followers on this planet. A gallup poll shows that one-third of all Americans think that the Bible is literally true:

http://www.gallup.com/poll/27682/onethird-americans-believe-bible-literally-true.aspx

We all know on which side the followers of Islam, Mormonism, and Scientology would fall on this poll. So there you have it - it's clearly not the fringe. We have all seen the polls where nearly half of all Americans do not accept evolution as a valid scientific theory, but in the same breath have said they think Intelligent Design is a sound biological theory.

And here's another thought:

How often do you see these theists living by the standards laid out in their holy books? In some minds believers may think - "just do you're best and God will sort it out in the end when I die". The most important thing is that one believe in a god in the first place. A person MUST be a theist at least. This is where most of the arguments trend with these debates from theists. It's just deism. Nothing more. Once of course, you press them on these rules and regulations laid out as laws in the Bible that must be followed you will get a litany of excuses ranging from well, that's the Old Testament so those laws don't count. *Well at least some of those laws don't count. 10 commandments still do, and let's cherry pick some others. Often you will get the educated "holy book expert" theologian that will snobbishly laugh quietly at your attempt (as an atheist) to make sense of the Bible on your own. We, as mere ignorant atheists in 2013, can't dream of understanding the complex web of incoherent ramblings from ancient bronze age desert dwellers. This requires another "spiritual expert": A theologian who has a doctorate in studying these ancient texts. Sometimes I consider getting a PhD in theology as an atheist just so I can shut these pompous pricks up. I would still consider it nonsense. I would treat the Bible as someone like Daniel Dennett does - A natural Phenomenon. That's it. Natural. A natural pieced together book in this natural world in which we live written by human beings naturally.

In conclusion I think I speak for most atheists obsessed with YouTube debates on god when I say I really want to see a debate with a Christian or Muslim or Scientologist or Mormon where we don't just debate if God exists, but we move from deism down to your specific religion. We can even start with the premise that there "is a god". We atheists can grant you that. Now prove to us that your specific version of God and what he wants of us is the correct version. Go! Any takers? (or are the only people that read this blog agnostic or atheists?)