1. You misread me. I said, clearly, that some people may believe in a certain metaphorical thing, while others may take that same thing and believe it literally. I’m simply pointing the reality of literal belief vs metaphorical belief. You never know which side a person may take. Some people understand, correctly, that “Adam & Eve” is a story; others think this couple really existed. They did not. / I’ll look at your piece later.
2. Yes, the Universe simply is. Now, if we could only get theists to stop speculating on it.
3. What do you mean when you say (to merge your words; I’m not misreading you) “distance doesn’t actually exist”? Given the size of the Universe, if our planet disappeared tomorrow, the Universe wouldn’t even know it’s missing. / Planets and stars and all the rest of it are real things that exist in a still-expanding universe that is billions of years old, and many of these things exist many million miles apart from each other. See my entry again on Laniakea.
4. You’re missing my point about “blessing.” When a priest gesticulates in a certain manner in front of a vial of water while speaking certain Latin words, the only thing happening is that molecules in the air may or may not bounce off the vial. Nothing “mystical” is going on. Water is water. / To your other point, why would “diverse abilities and personalities and mental capacities” make someone a “super human”? You haven’t defined “super human,” and so I don’t know what you mean. There are pianists who can play all thirty-two sonatas by Beethoven from memory, but that doesn’t make them super human. There’s a guy in Japan who can hold a plank for five hours (I can only hold one for a few minutes), but that doesn’t make him a super human.
5. I don’t assume I have all the answers. I’m only saying that theists have no answers. / A person who doesn’t believe in God can still be a spiritual person. See André Comte-Sponville’s The Little Book of Atheist Spirituality.
6. You assert some extra-ordinary things here but provide no extra-ordinary evidence to support what you say. Therefore, I can dismiss this.
7. There’s no problem of perspective. If something is said to be objective, then it applies to all. God is not exception. There is no such thing an objective morality. / “Chief Abortionist”? I never said any such thing. All I said was, by implication, that because miscarriage occurs in huge numbers daily across the globe that God, if God is the ultimate source and explanation for what goes on in a woman’s body, is the biggest abortionist around. That’s all.
8. There is nothing false about carbon dating. If there were, you or someone else who says the same thing would have collected the Nobel Prize for it already. / Every instance of man’s intellect has failed? Gee, I know that things aren’t looking good in Sudan and Yemen right now, but things seem to be working out pretty well in Scandinavia. Failure doesn’t exist everywhere. / “Look beyond human minds”? Whose minds do you have in mind?
9. How am I victim of the world when, by accidentally cutting a finger, I’m only being reminded that my body is vulnerable and susceptible to injury? / Meditation is fine. Thing is, Sam Harris meditates all the time and he’s as atheist as you can get. You might want to read his book, Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion. From the dust-flap: “For the millions of Americans who want spirituality without religion, Waking Up is a guide to meditation as a rational practice informed by neuroscience and psychology.”
10. We gain wisdom when we speak honestly about the nature of the world and the universe. It’s the comforting lies of theists that constitute self-made prisons.
And let the record show, your honor, that my ten questions still remain unanswered (not just by you, by the way).
