I am not aware of any time that I “shifted the goalposts”; of course, I may have done so unintentionally and unknowingly. In that case, I hope you would have pointed it out. Did I miss it? This struck me as an unexpected criticism, particularly since I had complained several times about your (explicit) attempt to reformulate (shift) our first goalpost statement.

As for your claims that I lost interest at strategically convenient times, which you would seem to have people believe were due to the gathering strength of your arguments, my perspective is far different: that, after a substantial amount of time, the line of argument being pursued was not proving helpful. For instance, when you proposed two statements that you would defend, one related to morality and one related to the Bible, I thought that both of those statements (as stated) could be the basis of furthering our mutual understanding, though I was more interested in the second than the first. Part of the reason that I thought that discussing the first statement would be productive was that, as formulated, the statement your were defending was sufficiently strong. When the discussion got to the point where that statement needed to be substantially weakened, I did lose interest, not because of the strength of your argument, but because you had backed off from (my interpretation of) the original claim.

Our coverage of the second statement was limited to part of our last chat. Did I lose interest? Obviously, I said as much, but again (and as I detailed in my followup post) not because of the strength of your argument. It appears to me that despite our time attempting to develop some kind of common epistemology, we have some substantial disagreements there. The validation of beliefs that you appear to derive from Community is far stronger than I believe is defensible given the practices of the Community (especially where the Community in question was the early church).

Were there other occasions where you believe I lost interest? Certainly the conversation has taken turns at various points, but I do not see those as being caused by loss of interest by either of us, but rather by emerging understanding of what we needed to work out together. But, as I said, perhaps there was something that I am not remembering or never recognized. If so, please enlighten me.

You will, of course, believe what you will about my reasons for disbelief. I think you have badly mischaracterized them, but my say-so will not likely sway you on this point. Still, your statements here make me even less desirous of a continued or renewed discussion. Interpret that as you will.

Yes, you have repeatedly raised numerous objections to Chrsitianity; but then mysteriously lost interest when I attempted to rigorously critique your complaints and normalize them against mutually agreed-upon truths. That is why I feel your critique of Christianity is essentially “pre-paradigmatic” and (at its root) driven more by anger than a desire for truth.

I’d love to be proved wrong. If you’d like to provide a list of specific, carefully-constructed arguments demonstrating the core falsity of Christianity — that you believe are rigorously defensible, and that you’re willing to stick to without “shifting the goalposts”– I’d be happy to reopen our DiaBlogue and provide a detailed critique.

Love always,
– Ernie P.

This post is, in miniature, an illustration of the cross-purposes to which we have talked for quite some time. You wonder why I discard Christianity when it has some good characteristics. I am no longer a Christian because Christianity’s central and especially distinctive claims about reality are (as far as I can tell) most probably false. If Christianity still has good things to say, those good things must therefore be good independent of the truth of Christianity (or more specifically, those core parts of Christianity that I find very probably false). Additionally, the false beliefs contribute, directly and indirectly, to various sorts of harm. I also believe that the reality of some of that harm can only be seen after the false beliefs are exposed. For instance, trading benefit in this life for benefit in the after-life is a net benefit only if there is an after-life and the conditions of the trade actually hold; otherwise, it is a net harm. In this context, exposing the false foundation is an important (but not the only important) task.

As far as I can tell, you have ignored my arguments about the factual basis for Christianity except insofar as to attribute those arguments to hate and anger. To be sure, most of those arguments were presented outside the context of our diablogue. Still, you have provided neither refutation of those arguments nor good reason why the factual basis of Christianity is unimportant. Is it simply that you are willing to be satisfied by a helpful fiction (and never mind the harm)? If so, our lack of convergence is hardly surprising. But you have explicitly denied that point of view, claiming that evidence supports your beliefs. I believe I have consistently given reasons that I find those claims problematic.

You claim I am devoting my life to destroying Christianity. Isn’t that a bit melodramatic? Neither our dialog nor my infrequent blogging are my entire life, but only a small part, and “destroying” is a bit over the top. I am trying to explain some of the reasons that I find Christianity likely to be false. Less frequently, I try to explain reasons that I find (some forms of) Christianity harmful. That is hardly the picture of someone driven by irrational anger, a picture you seem to be painting here.