So, another theist showed up on the channel and offered to debate, except over  the course of a couple of responses, I backed him into a corner and, at least at the moment, it appears that he’s fled.

That’s not exactly a surprise, is it? Therefore, let’s look at exactly what he did wrong and why, I figure, he knew that he couldn’t actually achieve his goals.

First off, you can  go to this video to see the entire exchange, I’m going to focus on a syllogism that he tossed out, simply because it’s where he failed the worst.

P1.) Objective morality entails that God exists

P2.) Person A believes in objective morality

C: Person A must also believe in God

At  first glance, that might look somewhat reasonable, although it really isn’t. The first premise is nonsensical from the get-go. There’s no reason whatsoever to think that objective morality exists at all and even if it did, that doesn’t mean God done it. That’s presuppositional bullshit. If there was objective morality, and again, we don’t have any rational support for it, that doesn’t have anything demonstrably to do with God. It could be Krishna that was responsible. It could be the flying spaghetti monster. Toward the end of the discussion, I suggested that it could be invisible, intangible, universe-creating pixies. He thought I said pixels for some reason. I even went back and made sure I hadn’t made a typo, but no, he just misread it. That’s fair. People make mistakes. No problem.

The problem here is that he’s just ASSERTING things that he cannot support with evidence. It is no different to claim “God done it” than  to claim “Santa Claus done it”. Just because you really like the idea, that doesn’t make the idea true.

That was the one thing that he seemed incapable of understanding. Just because you believe it, that doesn’t get you to truth. Objective morality existing doesn’t entail any  gods. That doesn’t even get into the fact that if gods came up with it, it  can’t, by definition, be objective, it would be subjective by its very nature. Objective means beyond any intelligent mind. These words mean things for a reason.

So I kept asking “why God?” Why not Odin? Why not Zeus? Why not those pixies? That’s pixies, not pixels. That was about the time that he just headed for the hills. He could be back, I don’t know, but at the moment, he’s just gone.

This is where pretty much all theists fail. They can’t see beyond their own faith-based wishful thinking. They can’t think outside of their little theological box. They like the idea so it has to be true.

Except that’s not how it works.

Once you get beyond your theological echo chamber, people are not obligated to take your empty claims seriously. You might really like the idea of God but I don’t. I only care what you can demonstrate, not what you can claim. I figure that’s where he realized that he was out of his element and ran away (if he did, I’m trying to be fair). These people get whacked right between the eyes by people who won’t accept their preconceptions and they don’t know what else to say.

Unfortunately, they can’t just say “you’re right, my position is untenable, let me rethink it.” It’s not like they’re responsible, rational people after all. I think we’ve all given up expecting that.

So, another one down, at least potentially. Who is next?