There’s probably no Dawkins…
…now stop worrying and enjoy Oct 25th at the Sheldonian Theatre.
So read the signs on buses in the Oxford area at the moment, lamenting the sudden failure of courage from New Atheism’s leading apologist.
It seems that while Richard Dawkins is happy to have the occasional televised cup of tea with an English archbishop who is too polite to respond to his bombast, he is not quite so bold when it comes to debating religion with any serious Christian apologists. After lengthy prevarication, Dawkins has retreated securely into his shell and refused to debate William Lane Craig at the Sheldonian.
As the proposed debate was in his hometown, I don’t think travel costs were the issue. It’s really hard to see this as anything other than cowardice on Dawkins’ part.
Read more on the story here in The Guardian.
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Craig is not worth debating because he offers us nothing except the same broken reasoning, misrepresentations, and intentional misunderstandings over and over again to the cheers of his supporters and calls it a debate. He has failed to be taken to task by his supporters for his utter failure to address these fatal shortcomings in his oft repeated arguments but instead pretends to be a christian champion. Fine. As gnu atheists, we expect no less duplicity from such an apologist. His mind is closed… shut down for the duration. That’s typical. But how christians can be so supportive of someone who uses exactly the same line of reasoning to support biblical genocide as Himmler did to support the jewish genocide should be a bit of a clue that maybe – just maybe – christians need to review their moral allegiances.
Dawkins is happy to create a ridiculous charicature of Christianity and take cheap pot shots at it in books. He’s happy to offend, insult and ridicule the 90% of the world who are religious. He’s happy to say that anyone who calls themself a Christian is stupid and deluded, but he isn’t willing to debate William Lane Craig.
Why not? If he thinks Craig’s reasoning is flawed and indefensible, that’s fine, but why isn’t he willing to say it face to face? Craig is not some random dude from the internet who wants to waste Dawkins’ time. He’s a leading Christian apologist: ie., someone who explains the rational basis for the Christian faith. (Note: not an evangelist; that’s quite a different role).
If Dawkins is willing to abuse a strawman version of the Christian faith from behind the cover of a book publisher but not willing to do it face to face with a serious Christian apologist, I call that cowardice.
(And seriously, bringing Nazi Germany into the discussion already? That’s pretty a pretty powerful admission that there’s no substance to your argument).
I am making a very legitimate comparison: that the divine command theory that Craig uses to justify the (hypothetical) slaughter of the Canaanites while telling us we should feel sorry for the soldiers who undertake this mass killing is no different in logic than Himmler’s speech to his SS troops in Poland.
That comparative FACT is intended to shock you into reevaluating your knee-jerk loyalty to such an immoral apologist and perhaps even begin to appreciate why Dawkins will not do Craig the honour of standing on the same stage with him.
No, really, you’re not making a legitimate comparison.
Is Craig sending troops into another country? Was the proposed debate intended to focus on genocide? Because those would be, you know, comparative FACTs to legitimise throwing in a Nazi reference.
A debate on the existence of God between a leading Christian apologist and a leading atheist apologist has nothing to do with ancient Jewish history as recorded in the Bible. According to Dawkins, God doesn’t even exist, so the passage in Deuteronomy is clearly rubbish and not worth wasting time on.
Staying on topic is pretty much fundamental to any rational discourse. As a professor at a prestigious university, I would have hoped that Dawkins understood that. His “response” is no response at all. It’s a pathetic – and cowardly – diversionary tactic.
By the way, Craig’s reasoning is flawed and indefensible, and this has been adequately pointed out time and again. But to no avail; the man just keeps on spewing the same defeated arguments and proclaims victory in spite of detailed explanations by Harris, Krauss, and many, many others why his arguments are built on factually incorrect foundations. But none of this matters to Craig because people who support him as a ‘leading’ apologist assume the man knows what he’s talking about. He doesn’t. In fact. In reality.
But none of this matters to Craig’s supporters because no apologist and their camp followers respect what’s true in fact; they all respect what is believed to be true and that’s that. There simply is no room for debate with such closed minds and Craig has proven this by failing to adequately answer to these sound charges. The man is a broken record.
Dawkins, quit being such a scaredy cat!!
If he shows up he’ll have a chance to challenge what he believes. it’s hard to kick against the bricks.. maybe he’s grown weary of railing against the truth.