Post tagged with religion

  • Should you marry your theology to the latest science?

    September 30th, 201112:49 PM ET
    By Randal Rauser
    I've been slowly reading through Michael Shermer's How We Believe in my spare time. It is a pleasant enough read, but has many noticeable weaknesses. Perhaps the biggest weakness is that Shermer is an advocate of the separation or two worlds model of theology and science (what Stephen Jay Gould called the "NOMA" or non-overlapping magisteria approa...

  • How should we interpret the religious skepticism of elite scientists?

    September 19th, 201105:43 PM ET
    By Randal Rauser
    There have been many surveys of the religious belief (or lack thereof) of scientists. While certain factors vary, the overall pattern is strikingly consistent: scientists on the whole are less likely to be religious than the general population. And elite scientists (e.g. members of the NAS or Royal Society; nobel laureates, etc.) are less likely to...

  • The End of Christianity? A Skeptical Review (Part 12)

    September 13th, 201101:20 PM ET
    By Randal Rauser
    I was not very kind to David Eller's first contribution to The End of Christianity. I shall continue my curmudgeonly ways as I review his second contribution, an essay titled "Is Religion Compatible with Science?" I shall begin my complaints with the topic. Why "religion"? Why not focus on Christianity and argue for the incompatibility of Christia...

  • Religion briefly defined

    June 15th, 201102:03 PM ET
    By Randal Rauser
    A few weeks ago I blogged on the myth of religious violence. In the article I complained about those who define religion in an arbitrary fashion so as to marginalize a certain segment of the population. But how then does one define religion? I wasn't really interested in offering a clear definition at the time. Rather, I was more interested in iden...

  • Do Atheists discriminate?

    May 25th, 201112:25 PM ET
    By Randal Rauser
    Of course. More exactly, some do and some don't. Just like some Christians discriminate and some don't. (I chronicle both types of discrimination in You're not as Crazy as I Think.) The real question for the present moment is this: how do atheists commonly discriminate? In the last couple weeks I've been focusing on some key examples of discrimi...

  • Why there is nothing wrong with being certain in your beliefs

    May 16th, 201110:45 PM ET
    By Randal Rauser
    These days one often encounters the idea that being certain about a belief — i.e. having unshakeable conviction in its truth — is somehow worriesome, dangerous, or otherwise threatening. This is how Richard Dawkins puts it: "religion causes wars by generating certainty."(Cited in Avalos, Fighting Words, 177). Second, in Does the Bible justify...

  • Carl Sagan's old time religion

    September 30th, 201002:42 PM ET
    By Randal Rauser
    I would like to say some more about Sagan’s Pale blue dot fallacy but before doing so let’s say something about Sagan’s (ir)religiosity. It is often assumed that Sagan was an atheist. (Here I am assuming the standard definition of atheist as one who believes there is no God where “God” is defined broadly as the being as defined by the wes...

  • Everybody's gotta god

    September 23rd, 201007:55 PM ET
    By Randal Rauser
    A new/old visitor to the Tentative Apologist, whatifitstrue, asks: "When does a belief system (including , perhaps atheism) become a religion...?" So what is religion? Perhaps belief in God, an authoritative revealed text, and a set of sacred rituals? In Bob’s garage is a cherry 70’ Chevelle 454. On the shelf beside the car is a well worn cop...

  • Does the distribution of religious belief suggest a natural source?

    August 27th, 201004:49 PM ET
    By Randal Rauser
    Friends, Romans, Countrypersons, You will realize by looking at the calendar that September is almost upon us. For people like myself who make our nickel in the classroom, this means a crunch time getting ready for a new semester. But even so, you will still see me struggling mightily to keep the storefront at the Tentative Apologist Department St...

  • Why the Outsider Test had better go big or go home

    June 19th, 201009:58 AM ET
    By Randal Rauser
    I have been arguing that John Loftus's outsider test for faith (the claim that people who adhere to a religion are obliged to take a critical test in which they view their faith as an outsider, and if they do they will *see* that it is false) has some pretty serious weaknesses. Here is a recap as well as a note on why John's continued attempt ...
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About this blog
An exploration of faith, knowledge, reason and doubt (with the occasional trite pop culture reference thrown in for good measure).