Here’s a phony dilemma from John Loftus:
“If I tried to figure it out and I wasn’t supposed to try, then maybe educated people don’t have a chance to be saved. If, however, I’m just not smart enough to figure it out, then only intelligent people who study it out have a chance to be saved. Maybe the only people who have a chance to be saved are those who aren’t educated or who aren’t very intelligent? But who gave us our mental equipment in the first place? Didn’t God create us? Does this mean that when we’re born some of us are condemned from the start because of our mental equipment leading us to believe, or not? And if God gave it to us, and if only unintelligent people can be saved, then it’s set in stone the day we’re born what the possibilities for each one of us are.”
This is a really obvious straw man argument. Both believers and unbelievers range along an I.Q. continuum from utter simpletons to men of genius. You can find equally dumb and equally bright guys on both sides of the ledger.
The problem is not with one’s mental equipment, but with one’s moral predisposition.
For example, an evil genius will use his brilliant mind to devise evil schemes.
Not to mention that saying things like this is insulting to poor John. It's also the insults of Christians which drove him away from the faith.
ReplyDeleteHe was a victim. A victim of a God he says doesn't exist, and a victim of hate-mongering philo-fascists like me, er, uh, you, Hays.