When Christians confuse an explanation with an argument

Posted on April 18, 2023 by Bob Seidensticker

Years ago, I came upon a fascinating psychological experiment. Like the best of these, it was very simple.

It’s called the Copy Machine study. In 1977, when giant copy machines were shared office equipment, psychologist Ellen Langer had her research assistants try to cut into the line of people waiting to make copies. They tried three ways. The first approach was to say, “Excuse me, I have five pages. May I use the Xerox machine?” It was polite but minimal, and it worked 60 percent of the time.

Next, they added a reason: “Excuse me, I have five pages. May I use the Xerox machine, because I’m in a rush?” This worked 94 percent of the time.

But the final approach was a surprise. They asked, “Excuse me, I have five pages. May I use the Xerox machine, because I have to make copies?” It worked 93 percent of the time. It had the form of the second one, with the “because” clause, but there’s no real reason here.

Langer concluded that the form of the request was the trick, and having a “because” clause is important. It satisfies the subconscious need for a reason, regardless of whether there’s a good reason in there or not.

We find something like this empty “because” clause in many Christian arguments.

Explanation vs. argument

There’s a difference between (1) explaining how you see things or how your worldview fits together and (2) making an argument with evidence to convince me to adopt your worldview. Said another way, the two options are explaining how you see it (explanation) vs. how I should see it (argument). Apologists sometimes focus on (1) and forget that the words coming out of their mouths are backed by zero evidence.

The Strange Notions blog has an example of a Christian explanation.

[Atheist objection:] God is supposed to be all good. But he both permits evil to exist and even causes it through punishments. So God must not be all good.

[Catholic reply:] God is so good and so perfect that he permits evil to exist, and brings greater good out of it.

This reply is Catholic dogma. It’s how Catholics are supposed to think about the problem, and, as an atheist, it may be helpful for me to understand. But use it as an argument, and questions surge forward. How do we know God is good? Why should we think that all the evil in the world is there for a greater good? Why is this the best a perfect God can do? How do we even know he exists? And so on.

As “Here is how I see things,” it does the job. As an explanation that resolves reasonable questions, it fails.

“God did it” is the premiere example of an explanation rather than an argument. It explains part of someone’s worldview, but it’s no convincing argument.

The best explanations are prefaced with something like, “Okay, here’s how it makes sense to me.” For example, “Here’s how it makes sense to me: there is evil in the world, but God permits it and uses it to create a greater good” or “Here’s how it makes sense to me: God did it.” The Christian is making clear that this isn’t intended as a convincing argument.

An explanation has its place, and it may help you understand how something makes sense in a Christian’s mind. But it can be dismissed without consideration if it’s given instead of an argument.

Example 2: Trinity

Another example is the Trinity. The Athanasian Creed explains the incompatible properties that the Trinity must have. That creed is an explanation, not an argument. Imagine trying to explain to a Muslim, who shares the same god of the Old Testament, that the Trinity is not polytheism.

Example 3: consciousness

Apologist Sean McDowell insists that human consciousness must be explained.

Any honest atheist or naturalist would say at least minimally they don’t know the mechanism of how consciousness or mind can emerge from matter. But this actually isn’t a problem for a Christian or a theistic worldview, because God, who is a mind, exists before matter. We’re made body and soul, mind and matter. So it makes sense, if God is spirit, that we would be beings with spirit (@21:45).

God is a mind. God existed before matter. Humans are body and soul. I need to make copies.

Explanations are not arguments.

Example 4: providing evidence

At the “There’s no hate like Atheist love” Facebook page is a meme that reads, “Science is the study of God’s Creation. Therefore, if it doesn’t acknowledge His handiwork in all things it’s not science—it’s pseudoscience.”

In the comments beneath was this (abbreviated) exchange between Carl, who created the meme, and Alec:

Alec: Nice claim. Where is the evidence?

Carl: This is an axiom of science.

Alec: You claim there is a god and it is the work of said god. So, where is the evidence?

Carl: Everywhere

In an open exchange, in response to Alec’s request for evidence, Carl would’ve said, “Hold on—let me be clear. I’m not claiming to make an argument. I’m just explaining how it fits together in my mind. I’m making no demands on you.” In other words, he’d clarify that he was giving an explanation only, not an argument. And, of course, if Carl didn’t feel this way but was presenting the meme as an argument, then it can be dismissed without consideration.

Example 5: illusionist

This example comes from Barry Goldberg’s Common Sense Atheism blog.

Suppose you see a stage magic show with some friends. Everyone loves it. Afterwards, you mention your favorite trick and say that it seemed completely impossible.

One of your friends says that he is something of an amateur illusionist himself and can explain the trick. Everyone leans in.

He says, “The magician used real magic. He cast a spell.”

Is this satisfactory? Of course not—again, it’s an explanation where an argument is expected. To be an argument, it would need to resolve the questions it provokes. Is all stage magic real magic? How did the illusionist get magical powers? How does spell casting work from the standpoint of physics? And so on.

It’s like “God did it”—a claim that generates more questions than it resolves. How did God do it? What laws of physics (both known and unknown) were used or violated?

Another example is the Shroud of Turin, the claimed burial cloth that holds a faint image of Jesus as he was supernaturally zapped back to life. “God did it,” of course, but the same questions are unanswered.

Conclusion

We see Christianity’s explanation-over-argument problem everywhere. Jesus needed to die for humanity’s sins. Why? How does this make sense to someone outside your worldview?

Only with faith can you please God. Why?

Every human is tainted by Adam’s sin. Why?

Next time you read a Christian apologetic, be careful to separate it into explanation and argument. Discard any explanation pretending to be an argument and see if any substance remains.

“God did it” isn’t an argument. It’s just an explanation. You might as well say, “I need to make copies.”

(I apologize for the lack of articles last week! I was vacationing in sunny Puerto Vallarta, Mexico and, in the last-minute rush, didn’t have time to fill the queue. I’m now back where I belong, in windy, rainy Seattle, dreaming of summer.)

[Many Christians believe in] a God greater than which
none can be conceived
but also in a gospel greater than which
it’s totally easy to conceive.
— Josh Watson on Twitter

The atheist worldview beats the Christian worldview

Posted on November 21, 2022 by Bob Seidensticker

Christian apologists, perhaps knowing that they won’t do well in the arena of argument and evidence, try instead to beat the atheist worldview by arguing that theirs is more pleasing or happier.

In several recent posts, I’ve responded to the claim that Christian hope is a strong plus for Christianity. It’s not. It incorrectly imagines that consoling is enough, it encourages Christians to not see reality clearly, it encourages complacency and magical thinking, it provokes anxiety when promises and reality don’t mesh, it makes God a jerk, and it infantilizes Christians.

Let’s now look at the big picture of each worldview. Compare Christianity and atheism, and atheism wins.

Positives of Christianity (and the negatives)

Let’s start with Christianity’s positive traits. The church can create community for its members, and it can catalyze their good works and charitable giving. As such, it is an important social institution.

While this natural part of the church is a positive, the supernatural side doesn’t hold up as well. Let’s look at some examples. For one, heaven is a nice idea, but it comes as a package deal with hell.

And you’re told that God is eager for a relationship, but he won’t even meet you halfway when his very existence isn’t obvious.

Laying your problems at the feet of Jesus might be comforting, but they’re usually still there when you go back to check. Why are prayers answered at a rate no better than chance?

One of Christianity’s strongest selling points, we’re told, is that salvation doesn’t require works but is a gift. All you need is faith. But with so many interpretations of correct belief within Christianity, how do you know the Jesus you have faith in is the right one? You may be headed for hell if you guess wrong.

What is God’s goal when he allows bad things to happen to people—tsunamis that kill hundreds of thousands or childhood cancers, for example? As an omnipotent being, he could achieve any goal without causing suffering.

Christians might deal with issues like these by compartmentalizing, by not asking questions, or by denying their doubt. But not being able to honestly raise their concerns, let alone resolve them, creates mental stress. That’s not a healthy relationship.

Facing reality (and the positives of atheism)

When challenged with some of these concerns, a common Christian response is to argue that the atheist worldview is bleak and empty—as if “that worldview is depressing” is any argument against it being correct. But let’s consider that worldview, a world without God. This would be a world where praying for something doesn’t increase its likelihood; where faith is necessary to mask the fact that God’s existence is not apparent; where no loving deity walks beside you in adversity; where natural disasters kill people indiscriminately; where far too many children live short and painful lives because of malnutrition, abuse, injury, or birth defects; and where there is only wishful thinking behind the ideas of heaven and hell.

Look around because that’s the world you’re living in. But this isn’t anarchy. It’s a world where people live and love and grow, and where every day ordinary people do heroic and noble things for the benefit of strangers. Where warm spring days and rosy sunsets aren’t made by God but are explained by science, and where earthquakes happen for no good reason and people strive to leave the world a better place than they found it. God isn’t necessary to explain any of this. Said another way, there is no functional difference between a world with a hidden god and one with no god.

It’s not that the atheist worldview finds no value in life. In fact, the opposite is true: the Christian worldview is the one that devalues life. Of what value is tomorrow to the Christian when they imagine they’ll have a trillion tomorrows? What value are a few short years here on earth when they have eternity in heaven?

There are consequences. If the atheist is right, the Christian will have missed seeing their life for what it truly is—not a test to see if they correctly dance to the tune of Bronze Age traditions; not a shell of a life, with real life waiting for you in the hereafter; not drudgery to be endured or penance paid while you bide your time for your reward; but rather the one chance you have at reality. We can argue whether heaven exists, but one thing we do know is that we have one life here on earth: a too-short life, no matter how long you live, that you can spend wisely or foolishly. Where you can walk in a meadow full of flowers, and laugh and learn, and do good things and feel good for having done them. Where you can play with children, and teach someone, and love.

I won’t be able to visit new places after I die; I won’t be able to learn another language, or comfort a friend, or apologize, or forgive, or simply stop and smell the roses. If it’s important to me, I’d better do it in the one life I know I have. Life is sweeter when that’s all you’ve got. Sure, there’s a downside to having a finite number of days on this earth. It’s a downside, but that makes life on earth precious, and that’s why it’s an upside.

Atheism is far from being a depressing worldview—just ask any ex-Christian atheist. They’ll tell you how empowered and free they feel now that they can honestly ask questions and follow evidence where it leads.

Actress Mae West said, “You can only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.” Similarly, atheists seek only the truth, and the truth is enough.

Human beings never behave so badly
as when they believe they are protecting God.
— Barbara Brown Taylor

God’s life is hell

Posted on September 16, 2021 by Bob Seidensticker

I first heard this story about thirty years ago.

One day, a man wakes up on a couch in a field. The setting is new and strange, but he feels at peace. He has a vague memory of some sort of accident. Is this the afterlife?

A man with the formal demeanor of a butler comes over and asks if he’d like anything.

“Maybe some food?”

The butler indicates a table just behind the couch full of exotic snacks.

He asks for something to drink and gets all that he could want. He asks for other people and finds himself in a party.

Days pass—or so it seems, because there are no obvious indications of time, and sleep is no longer necessary—and the man finds every pleasure he could want. Food and drink, art and music, theater and sports, community and solitude. The mood is always upbeat and cheerful.

Finally, he realizes that his brain is idle and needs something to chew on, so asks his butler for a problem to solve. Just a little obstacle to make life interesting.

“I’m sorry,” the butler says, “but problems are the one thing from your old life that we don’t have here.”

“Oh, that’s fine,” the man says. “It was just a whim.”

Life rolls on as his moods demand, with formal dinners and casual picnics, sparkling literary conversation and bawdy drinking games. But the absence of problems wears on him. He asks repeatedly and is told, always politely, that problems don’t exist.

Finally, after what seems like years or even decades have passed, the man snaps. “I can’t take it anymore! Life is too easy here, and humans need problems! If I can’t have any here, I’ll go to the other place. Send me to hell!”

The butler, who had always shown an expressionless face, smiles slightly for the first time. “And just where do you think you are?”

(This is the rough plot for the 1960 Twilight Zone episode, “A Nice Place to Visit”; h/t commenter Ben Yandell.)

Limitations to omniscience

That’s a taste of God’s life. We see problems as bad things because most of us have too many, but what if you have none? That’s the problem for the guy in the story and for God. God could never be perplexed by anything, and there’s nothing to exercise creativity on. There’s no pleasure in solving a problem, no thrill of an Aha! insight.

Not only does God have no problems, he doesn’t even have surprises. No matter what it is, he saw it coming. No matter what it is, the correct response is not only obvious but foreseen billions of years earlier. Not only can’t God wrestle with a problem, he can’t think a new thought or plan or regret or be surprised or get a joke or make a decision. Omniscience can be a bitch, and God’s ways are a heckuva lot more unlike our ways that you may have thought.

But God’s calendar is packed, right? He’s granting prayers, weighing the consequences of people’s actions, satisfy his agenda by performing undetectable miracles, tweaking evolution so it goes in the right direction, and so on. Think of Jim Carrey standing in for God in Bruce Almighty.

Nope. God’s omniscience has consequences, and the God Christians have invented is as personable as a machine. He knows every request and every human problem, now and in the future. Knowing the future, God could list his every action like this: “At time T₁, do action A₁; at T₂, do A₂,” and so on. God is nothing more than that. Not only could he mindlessly carry out these actions, but God could be replaced by a universal wish-granting machine. He’s an automaton.

We can imagine a conversation with God, but he couldn’t see it like we do. A conversation for him would be like stating lines in a play, all of which he’s memorized.

It’s true that God in the Old Testament has original conversations, gets surprised (example: he regretted making humanity before the flood), gets angry (such as his response to the golden calf), and so on, all of which makes sense only if he’s not omniscient. But how is this possible? God would’ve seen it all coming for 13.7 billion years. God’s properties in the Bible are contradictory.

Timelessness

Christians have changed the properties of their unchanging God.

What did God do all day before he created the universe? If he created the universe, that admits that things weren’t perfect beforehand—if they were, changing things would make them less perfect. And if things were perfect after creating the universe, why wait so long for creating it? (And who would say that this mess of a world is perfect?)

Fourth-century church father Augustine told of someone who was asked what God was doing before he created the universe. The answer: “He was preparing hell for those prying into such deep subjects.”

But pry we must. A popular Christian answer is to say that the Big Bang theory has a beginning for the universe (more precisely, this theory says that there’s a point in time before which science can’t take us yet). Therefore, God lived timelessly before he created the universe.

No, a timelessness God doesn’t solve anything. How could God create the universe if he’s outside time? How could anyone create anything if you’re outside of time?! Creation is a process that can only operate within time. That’s also true for the decision to create. A timeless god is a frozen, unchanging, and inert god. He makes no decisions, sees nothing, decides nothing, initiates nothing, and loves nothing. Once frozen in time, he doesn’t have time by which to take the action to unfreeze himself.

Christians have created a God who’s inert (when outside of time) and a soul-less robot whose hands are tied by his own omniscience (when time is proceeding). Christians should rethink the properties they invent for God.

Can you imagine anything more absurd
than an infinite intelligence in infinite nothing
wasting an eternity?
— Robert Ingersoll

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(This is an update of a post that originally appeared 4/3/17.)

Image from Ted Van Pelt (license CC BY 2.0)

Criticizing the Logic of the Atonement

Posted on January 11, 2021 by Bob Seidensticker

The Christian atonement is the reconciliation of humans to God through the death of Jesus. While it’s pitched as an incredible gift from a loving god, it doesn’t make sense when you stop to think about it.

The role of today’s Christian apologist is played by Greg Koukl, who responded to a skeptic’s question on the Unbelievable? podcast (audio here @30:10).

And our skeptic questioner is Frances. She had three concerns. Each is an illustration of how our sense of justice works, and each is a tenet that the atonement rejects. (I’ll try to clearly identify input from both Frances and Greg Koukl, and anything else is my own reaction.)

If we’ve done something worthy of punishment, then we should get that punishment. Anything else is unjust.
Whenever someone takes a punishment that should’ve been applied to someone else (like Jesus taking our punishment), that’s a miscarriage of justice.
If you give one guilty person a break, you must give the same break to everyone in the same situation, otherwise that’s an injustice as well.

(And there are more issues. For example, why must we be reconciled in the first place? If we’re flawed, that’s because our Maker made us so. And why make a big deal about the sacrifice when Jesus popped back to life a couple of days later? I talk about that more here. But the answers to the three answers are such a train wreck that we’ll limit this discussion to just them.)

Worldviews: let the tap dancing commence!

Koukl responded by saying that we must first identify the worldview from which a statement is made. Sometimes people critique Worldview 1 from the standpoint of their worldview, Worldview 2. An atheist doesn’t accept miracles and so may scoff at a Christian talking about miracles. “It’s absurd from within their story because their story doesn’t allow for that kind of thing,” but within the Christian story, miracles are quite normal.

He wants to pigeonhole Frances’s comments as coming from an atheist worldview, but they’re not. Her observations about justice come from a Western worldview and perhaps even a worldwide worldview. They are pretty much universally held within the modern world.

Koukl imagines a symmetry that’s not there. He’s saying in effect, “We each have a worldview—I have my Christian worldview, and you have your atheist worldview, so let’s admit up front that we’re both biased.” Here again he’s wrong because there is a default position. We have a common idea of justice, and Frances is speaking from that standpoint rather than an atheist standpoint. Koukl is welcome to have a different point of view, but we will always see it in terms of its differences from the default.

He wants to respond to Frances from within the Christian worldview, but is that available to anyone? Can I answer from within a Scientology worldview and expect that to be respected? Or Raelian? Or Pastafarian? Can I say that polygamy is okay from a Mormon standpoint? Can I say that ritual murder is okay as Kali worship? Or is Christianity privileged for some reason—and if so, why?

Koukl says that God is the primary one offended by any sin or crime. “Even if I sinned against Frances, I am sinning first and foremost against Frances’s maker.” So if God is indeed the primary offended party and he’s satisfied with Jesus as a substitute (and the substitute is satisfied, and the guilty party is satisfied), then where’s the problem?

The problem, of course, is that this isn’t justice. Instead, it’s mythology and legend that over time became codified into religious dogma. Koukl starts with an assumption of God and then weaves a story showing how it all makes sense from within a Christian worldview. It may make sense to him, but that’s not the point. We start, not with an assumption of the supernatural (the Hypothetical God fallacy), but with the idea of justice held pretty much universally in the West and compare the Christian version against that. It doesn’t compare well.

He says, “I don’t see the conflict within the context of the Christian worldview. Certainly I can see from a perspective of justice outside of the Christian worldview that there could be a conflict.” Exactly! Critiquing his position from outside the Christian worldview reveals a conflict. That’s all Frances has been saying. More importantly, this external, more universal view is the default. Koukl can’t dismiss it by saying that he simply has a different worldview.

(Oddly, Koukl’s position sounds like the postmodern “We each have our own truths” attitude that conservatives claim to hate. Maybe they only hate it until it’s convenient.)

Mercy and debt and punishment, oh my!

Koukl addressed the unfairness issue: “Mercy is an overflow of goodness that is not required of God.” God can grant mercy . . . or not. For example, Frances is within her rights to forgive one debt but not another. And if she is owed a debt but a third party wants to pay it, and everyone is happy with that, problem solved.

Yes, Frances can be arbitrary, but doesn’t God follow a higher standard? A judge certainly does. Fairness is the standard that society tries to achieve with our justice system. True, we don’t always meet that standard, because we are imperfect. A perfect, omnibenevolent being would be perfectly fair.

As for a third party paying a debt, that’s an option only for monetary payment, not for punishment for a crime. Frances suggested that we imagine someone unfairly imprisoned for a crime they didn’t commit. Once the error is discovered, no one says that the debt has been paid and there’s no need to find the actual perpetrator since someone has already served the time.

That’s what we see in the Innocence Project, which has used DNA evidence to overturn more than 300 criminal cases in the U.S., one quarter of which were for murder. Had justice nevertheless been satisfied in these cases because punishment was at least given to someone? Of course not—these were miscarriages of justice just like the Christian story of God’s righteous wrath being satisfied by the death of Jesus.

Koukl has a few more misfires on justice and morality, and that critique is concluded in part 2.

Justice is the only worship.
Love is the only priest.
Ignorance is the only slavery.
Happiness is the only good.
The time to be happy is now,
the place to be happy is here,
the way to be happy is to make others so.
— Robert Ingersoll

(This is an update of a post that originally appeared 8/3/16.)

Image from Justin Leonard (license CC BY 2.0)
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Stupid Christian Argument #41: Polls to Resolve Scientific Issues

Posted on January 4, 2021 by Bob Seidensticker

Polls of the population can be interesting and informative:

the percent of prison population that are atheists vs. Christian,
the fraction of Republicans vs. Democrats who are Christian,
the gender mix of Christians or atheists,
the biggest issues troubling voters,
the most/least religious parts of the country or world,
how many Americans think the end times have arrived (41 percent, by the way),

and so on.

But public opinion polls may not be a good foundation on which to build government policy. In particular, public opinion should not dilute the scientific facts used to guide policy. Of course, elected officials must answer to their constituents, but the opinions of non-scientist constituents still count for nothing on any question of science. Politicians make policy, and scientists give us science’s best approximation to the truths of nature. “We should do nothing because acknowledging climate change is scary” is a policy option (a cowardly option, but one nonetheless), but “Climate change is a hoax that can be ignored” isn’t.

Creationism in public schools is another area where science steps on toes. Americans are embarrassingly clueless (perhaps willfully so) about evolution. 42 percent accept strict Creationism (God created humanity in the last 10,000 years), and an additional 31 percent accept guided evolution (evolution was tweaked by God). (Acceptance of evolution rises with education, which highlights the nonscientific agenda behind Creationism, but that’s an aside.)

Answers in Genesis said about this wide public acceptance of Creationism, “Although the vast majority of Americans desire both creation and evolution taught in school, the evolutionary naturalism worldview dominates, revealing a major disparity between the population and the ruling élite.” No, the disparity is between a population that to a large extent accepts the agenda of conservative and religious leaders on one hand and science on the other. Nonscientists don’t get to invent science.

The Discovery Institute tried to give a veneer of scholarship to the debate with its “Teach the controversy” campaign. They ask: if we’re talking about science, why can’t we present claims of both sides and let the students decide?

I wonder if they’ve thought this through. How would such a science class be graded? Would pastors be brought in to grade the tests of students who don’t like evolution? Would an answer, “I have a powerful feeling that the answer is . . .” automatically be correct? What about “I’d like the answer to be . . .”? And how many “controversies” do we teach—does only the biblical idea of Creation get to come in, or are we throwing the door open to humanity’s hundreds of origin myths?

In 2011, Texas governor Rick Perry put it this way, “In Texas we teach both creationism and evolution in our public schools, because I figure you’re smart enough to figure out which one is right.”

Oh? And which one is right? How do you know? If you already know, why don’t we just teach that one instead of wasting class time teaching both? Or is “figure out which one is right” a personal thing so that any answer is correct?

“Teaching the controversy” isn’t what we do in science. We teach science in science class, not discarded theories like astrology, alchemy, or Creationism. And, of course, within biology, there is no controversy! This is a manufactured issue, and polls of citizens do not make science.

“Who is the right god?” is like asking,
“What is the last decimal digit of pi?”
There are ten possible answers and none of them are right.
— commenter Greg G.

(This is an update of a post that originally appeared 7/27/16.)

Image from Aaron Vowels (license CC BY 2.0)
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Stupid Christian Argument #40: Interpret Difficult Passages in Light of Clear Ones

Posted on January 2, 2021 by Bob Seidensticker

How can Christians maintain their belief when the Bible is full of contradictions and instances of God’s barbarity? Let’s look at their secret weapon.

(This list of stupid arguments begins here.)

This argument is an attempt to wriggle away from Bible verses that make God or Christianity look bad or that contradict each other. “Interpret difficult passages in the light of clear ones” is advice from Josh McDowell’s New Evidence that Demands a Verdict (page 48).

McDowell makes clear that difficult isn’t actually the issue—it’s contradictions that are the problem. They’re not difficult to understand, only to reconcile. For example, the epistle of James says that salvation is by works but Romans says that it’s by grace. The trick, McDowell tells us, is to find the interpretation that you like within the constellation of competing verses, bring that one forward, and either ignore the others or reinterpret them to be somehow subordinate to or supportive of your preferred interpretation. He doesn’t put it quite so bluntly, but that’s what he means.

The quest for the “clearer” passage has become a quest for the most pleasing (or least embarrassing) one.

The mere existence of what McDowell euphemistically calls “difficult” passages is a problem that few apologists admit to. How could verses conflict in a book inspired by a perfect god, even if some argument could be found to harmonize them? If conflicting verses exist, doesn’t that make the Bible look like nothing more than a manmade book? How could God give humanity a book that was at all unclear or ambiguous? What does it say that 45,000 Christian denominations have sprung up over varying interpretations of a single holy book?

And no, “I’ll just have to ask that of God when I see him in heaven” won’t do because the Bible must be self-contained. It has no purpose except to be clear and convincing to people here on earth.

See also:

When one person suffers from a delusion, it is called insanity.
When many people suffer from a delusion it is called religion.
— Robert M. Pirsig

(This is an update of a post that originally appeared 7/27/16.)

Image from Toa Heftiba (free-use license)
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