Saturday, December 8, 2012

John W. Loftus and The Ideologue Barometer

Randal Rauser relates a discussion he's had with John Loftus about their upcoming book, God or Godless . The most interesting thing was the test Rauser offered on how to tell how much of an ideologue you were:

 "Since everything needs a snappy name I’ll call it the Ideologue Barometer. Ask yourself this: if I were invited to discuss the three things that most bother me about my belief system, how quickly could I come up with a list and how long could I talk about them? The longer it would take you to compile the list and the shorter the ensuing speech, the more ideologically committed you are to your beliefs."

This reminds me a great deal of Mike Gene's Ten Signs of Intellectual Honesty.  So let me give myself the test:

 My theological belief system:

 1. If God exists, why isn't His existence as obvious as the physical world? 2. Why is there so much pain and suffering? 3. Why isn't there better historical evidence for Jesus and his resurrection? 4. How can God know the future and there still be free will? 5. Why are there so many morally questionable things in the Bible about God (Canaanite genocide, etc.)? 6. Why are there so many contradictory religions to my own?

 My beliefs about 9/11:

 1. If 9/11 was an inside job, why didn't the Democrats demand an independent investigation? 2. Why didn't Obama re-open the investigation when he took office? 3. Why weren't there more leaks? 4. Why wasn't there more converage in the mainstream media? 5. Why didn't Bush and Co. manufacture evidence for WMDs in Iraq? 6. Isn't the thought that people at the highest level of our government would be willing to murder thousands of their own citizens just a little too incredible?*

  Okay. That took less than five minutes. Does anyone out there care to make a list of problems with their own belief systems?

* I forgot one: 7. How could the inside job have been pulled off without being noticed by countless numbers of people?

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