Thousands of gods

Over the past ten thousand years there have been tens of thousands of religions and thousands of gods. Which one is the right one? To believers in each one they all appear unique. To an anthropologist from Mars they all look the same... . This clever book gives you the intellectual firepower you need when engaging believers, pointing out, for example, that they are religious skeptics, too—of all those other faiths. Some of us go one faith further in our skepticism. You will, too, after reading this testament to the power of reason.

–Michael Shermer

This is Shermer’s blurb for the “new” book by John Loftus. It’s also a good illustration of how infidels are self-deceived by their intellectual pride.

From his own perspective, the “power of reason” is simply the brain of an ape. A 3-lb lump of meat that evolved by trial-and-error.

Moreover, it’s demonstrably false that believers generally think their religion or their god is unique. To begin with, religions are traditionally polytheistic, so there’s nothing unique about being a god in a polytheistic faith. You have plenty of competition in a crowded field for that distinction.

Moreover, traditional religions are often syncretistic. Hinduism is syncretistic. Roman religion is syncretistic. Their gods are not unique. You can substitute one nations gods for another in the pantheon. Roman gods for Greek gods, or vice versa. Interchangeable gods. A war god. A sex goddess. Ishtar. Aphrodite. Venus. Mars. Ares.

Furthermore, atheists typically propound an evolutionary theory of religion, according to which religion was originally animistic. The gods were simply personifications of natural forces, like sun gods, fire gods, and storm gods. Well, aren’t all sun gods, fire gods, and storm gods cut from the same cloth?

Finally, atheists also distinguish between anthropomorphic conceptions of God, like Zeus or Thor–and philosophical conceptions of God, like Thomism or perfect being theology. So they wouldn’t all look the same to a Martian anthropologist.