In this election season, many of us get into heated political conversations. Or maybe it’s about public policy (such as climate change). Or science education (evolution). Or religion (end times). One frustrating recent example is atheist Bob Price explaining how he’s an enthusiastic Trump supporter.
You might ignore your better instincts and jump into such an argument, but you’ll probably get nowhere. The thing that gives me the most enduring frustration is not being able to say “I told you so” once the evidence is in. That is, when things play out just like you said they would—whether ten days have passed or ten years—you never even get the minimal satisfaction of hearing your antagonist admit that they were wrong. They conform to the new data without that unpleasant I-was-wrong phase.
The point is not to show how smart you are or your superiority (though that might please the ego) but for the antagonist to learn something to create a small hope that they will be less likely to make this kind of mistake again.
Let me add two hopefully obvious clarifications: (1) sometimes the antagonist does indeed admit their error (it’s just that this is rare) and (2) this goes both ways, and it might be us eating the humble pie and learning the lesson.
Commit to a public declaration
So how can we improve our chances of eventual satisfaction? Let’s say that the topic is rabbit overpopulation, and your antagonist is in favor of the upcoming ballot initiative to release radioactive super-weasels to control the rabbit problem.
You list the problems with this approach but your friend disagrees. Then the initiative passes, the weasels are released, and the environmental catastrophe (and untouched rabbit population) plays out like you predicted. When you confront your friend with this, he agrees that it was a disastrous project but denies specifics of both his prior position and your prediction.
The answer is for you to write a shared Public Declaration. This is a short statement summarizing the facts that clearly states what one of you think will or won’t happen and the time frame. It should be unambiguous so that an objective third party could determine who was right. (Of course, you could both be partly right. Or partly wrong.)
Let’s go back to the rabbit overpopulation problem and imagine that it ended with your writing this:

Sigmund Freud and I disagree on the best approach to the rabbit overpopulation problem. Sigmund advocates the radioactive weasels proposal in Initiative 7 on the November, 2016 ballot. I think it will be a terrible idea.
Prediction: I predict that the weasels will (1) have little impact on the rabbit population and (2) have the side effect of endangering the populations of other animals like birds. This is the position of the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), which has come out against Initiative 7.
Test: Check with the NRDC one year after the proposal has been implemented to see if things turned out how I predicted.
(signed) Friedrich Nietzsche

Here’s what’s good about this statement.

• It’s specific about the claim: you referred to Initiative 7 on the November ballot, and you predict that if implemented, “the weasels will (1) have little impact on the rabbit population and (2) have the side effect of endangering the populations of other animals like birds.” There’s no need to also summarize your opponent’s position because he simply thinks that you’re wrong.
• It’s clear on the time frame: judgment day is “one year after the proposal has been implemented.”
• It defines an objective test: use the NRDC’s analysis after the proposal has had time to work. This could be a weakness of this public declaration if the NRDC is seen as biased. Another option might be to predict an editorial confirming your position. It works as long as your opponent agrees on the test. It’s tempting to imagine that “everyone” on this future date will just know who was right, but the lack of a clear test would weaken such a statement.
• It’s a shared statement. This project works best when you work on it and sign it together.
• Recording your position for posterity is satisfying, which is better than just walking away frustrated and angry.

Be as specific as possible. Things that are clear and obvious in your mind now could be forgotten by the time the prediction must be evaluated. (Contrast this with the vague and unspecific claims made by biblical prophecies.) Imagine the future judgment day and give yourself a clear and unambiguous statement to work with.
By writing the statement together, each party should be proud, rather than reluctant, to sign it and commit to it.
How can someone forget so important a position?
While you’re arguing with someone, the argument and your position are very, very clear in your mind. (Well, you think things are clear. Simply writing down the issue may reveal a misunderstanding that could advance the discussion.)
While the declaration could prevent your antagonist from lying about their former position once it’s been proven wrong, I think simple forgetfulness is the bigger issue. The Challenger memory experiment makes clear the difference between vivid and accurate memories—just because you have a clear memory of a past incident doesn’t mean that memory is correct. (I write more about this experiment here.)
Implementation
The idea could play out in different ways. This could be as casual as notes on the back of a napkin or cardboard coaster, though something this informal might get lost. It could wind up on a Facebook post (use a consistent phrase, like “public declaration,” so that you can search for it on judgment day). Or maybe there’s a single site, PublicDeclarations.com, that could give a simple template for those who want to boldly plant their flag.
This could work for several kinds of claims.

• If-then claims such as, “If same-sex marriage is legalized in the U.S., then X will happen” or “If Hillary is elected, then X will happen.”
• An even simpler claim is, “X will happen,” such as the predictions about the end of the world by John Hagee, Hal Lindsey, and Harold Camping. Another example: “Biologists will realize that evolution doesn’t explain life.”

Since arguments usually distill down to a simple “Yes, it will” vs. “No, it won’t” dichotomy, public declarations could have wide applicability.
What do you think?

We survive by virtue of people extending themselves,
welcoming the young, showing sympathy for the suffering,
taking pleasure in each other’s good fortune.
We are here for a brief time.
We would like our stay to mean something.
Do the right thing.
Travel light.
Be sweet.
– Garrison Keillor

Image credit: Jonathan Baker-Bates, flickr, CC

On a recent vacation in London, I visited Speaker’s Corner in Hyde Park. I expected to see men lined up with a sign advertising their position and maybe standing on a step stool, speaking to a stationary audience or just to passersby. I imagined the speaker delivering a monologue or sermon, interrupted occasionally by a comment or question (which he’d answer) or a heckling remark (which he’d talk over). I expected discussions of current political or social topics or Christianity.
That’s not what I saw. There were about two hundred people, all men, all speaking Arabic, and presumably all debating facets of Islam. Conversations were often spirited, but all seemed polite. I saw no police, and I understand they only come in response to complaints. (Keep in mind, though, that this is just what I saw on Sunday evening a week ago, and your mileage may vary.)
After walking around a bit, it looked like I wouldn’t find any debate to engage me, but that turned out to be premature.

This photo shows the same northeast corner of Hyde Park as the map view above. (People gather to speak on the wide walkway in the park, not in the middle of the trees as the image suggests.)
I did find some interesting atheists who seemed, like me, to be more interested in the rare Christian discussion. One of the atheist regulars videoed me engaged with regular participant Adnan Rashid, a Muslim. (I don’t see the video as especially informative, but I include it for completeness.)
As an aside, Adnan made several claims: thirty percent of Africans taken to the U.S. as slaves were Muslim (source: Servants of Allah by Sylviane Diouf), and Islam is the fastest growing religion in the U.S. I haven’t fact checked either claim.
He made another claim that evening that doesn’t hold up. He said that this kind of open public debate was something that would be typical in cities in any Muslim country, though that’s not what the International Humanists and Ethical Union’s “Freedom of Thought Report 2015” says. It lists twelve countries for which blasphemy or apostasy are punishable by death, including Adnan’s own birthplace of Pakistan.
But the specifics of my conversation aren’t the point. Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin, George Orwell, Marcus Garvey, and others reportedly have spoken at Speaker’s Corner. Though I only had a couple of hours to chat, it was a thrill to be there.

Everyone has the right to believe anything they want.
And everyone else has the right to find it fucking ridiculous.
— Ricky Gervais

Credit for images: Google Maps

I participated in a formal debate (20-minute opening statements, followed by rebuttals, close, and Q&A with the audience) a couple of weeks ago. The topic was “Is it Reasonable to Believe in God?” and I summarized the details here. The organizers have now supplied the video, which I include below. I think there were more than 100 people in the audience (mostly Christians, I’m sure).
Everyone treated me with respect, and I had a great time. Watch the video and tell me what you thought (the quality of the video looks to me to be excellent).
Opposing arguments
My opponent was Rob van de Weghe, and he opened with four arguments.

1. Cosmological Argument. The universe began to exist; therefore, there must be a creator. A sub-argument was that entropy is increasing, so things must be winding down from a creation event.
2. Fine Tuning Argument. The universe is delicately tuned for life.
3. Design Argument. Life is complex, which points to a designer. A sub-argument was: where did life come from? God answers this question nicely.
4. Moral Argument. Each of us is wired with a standard of moral values—where did this standard come from except from God?

My thorough responses will be found in blog posts (search and ye shall find), or you can watch the video below to see my very abbreviated response.
Debate strategy and my opening arguments
It’s important to think out one’s goals. In a public debate like this, a technical win isn’t much of a goal in my opinion. If there were judges critiquing the arguments, I would be careful to respond thoroughly to every argument, defend any attacks on my own arguments, and make clear how I thought I was doing (“I notice that my opponent has said very little about my third argument, so I must conclude that he is conceding that point …”) to help the judges see how thoroughly I was winning.
But of course there was no formal judging. Instead, my Christian opponent provided a Christian audience for me to lecture to, and my primary goal was to give them some ideas they hadn’t considered. If they heard a few simple, memorable puzzles to which they had no snappy answers, that might get them thinking. This means that standard arguments (such as, “Why do bad things happen to good people?”) were out, since those in the audience would likely have heard rationalizations already. And I had to do all this while coming across as polite, thoughtful, and intelligent.
Here are my opening arguments (I’ve written about each one in the blog):

1. Historians Reject the Bible Story
2. Mormonism Beats Christianity
3. Because There’s a Map of World Religions
4. Christianity Relies on Indoctrination
5. The Natural Explanation Resolves the Puzzles Confronting Christians
6. All the Other Religions Are Nonsense
7. Jesus Is Just One More Dying and Rising God
8. Christianity Is Unfalsifiable
9. God Has No Impact on Reality

My debate goal was primarily to overwhelm my opponent with the quantity of arguments as well as mix up the list to add a few that I hadn’t used in prior debates so that simply watching previous debate videos wouldn’t give all my secrets. I read Rob’s book beforehand, and I assumed he’d done some preparation on me as well.
Rebuttals
Problem 1 would be being blindsided by a good argument that I’d never heard of before. Problem 2 would be getting an argument that I was familiar with and had even blogged about but for which I couldn’t remember the best points.
I’d almost welcome a bit of Problem 1, just to make life interesting and to give me something substantial to blog about later, but this didn’t happen. To avoid Problem 2, I went into the debate with printed summaries of about forty issues, distilled down from my blog posts, anticipating what might come up. Rob’s arguments were on any apologist’s top-ten list, so I was able to pull out a summary sheet for each one and circle the points that I wanted to make in my rebuttal. This made my life much easier, and it is quite satisfying to be able to say something like, “Rob quoted cosmologist Alexander Vilenkin, but let me point out something else that Vilenkin said, and I quote …”
I’d like to thank the atheist friends who made the long trip to see the proceedings!
Feedback is welcome. Let me know what you think I need to work on—presentation, arguments, attitude, whatever.

To conceal a want of real ideas,
many make for themselves an imposing apparatus of long compound words,
intricate flourishes and phrases … new and unheard-of expressions,
all of which together furnish an extremely difficult jargon that sounds very learned.
Yet with all this they say—just nothing.
— Arthur Schopenhauer

Image credit: Steve Maw, flickr, CC

I will be participating in a public debate on the question “Is it reasonable to believe in God?” this Saturday (March 19, 2016) at 6:30 pm near Port Townsend, Washington. I’ll be debating local a Christian apologist, and I will obviously be arguing for the negative side of the question.
Opponent
Rob van de Weghe has a similar background to my own. He has a Masters degree in electrical engineering and computer science (1982) from a university in the Netherlands. His investigation of Christianity began after his retirement in 1999, and it led to his book Prepared to Answer: A Guide to Christian Evidence (DeWard, 2010). There’s more background at the event’s Facebook page.
I finished reading Rob’s book a couple of months ago in preparation for this debate. I liked the style—it’s well written with lots of footnotes—though the arguments were neither new nor convincing. Perhaps I’ll sift through for interesting arguments to showcase and critique in future posts. Unfortunately, while responding to the arguments in writing should be straightforward, responding on my feet with a time limit is more difficult.
Though I won’t give my opening presentation here, of course, the arguments that I’ll be using are all ones that I’ve written about in this blog. I will plan on Rob having read them.
Debate format
The debate format will be the typical 20-minute opening statement, 10-minute rebuttal, and 5-minute close. Rob will speak first. Following that will be audience Q&A, with a 2-minute answer from the person addressed, followed by a 1-minute rebuttal from the other debater.
Rob has requested that we focus on being informative rather than competitive. That’s a little hard to do in a debate, but I’ll do my best to match his demeanor.
Location and time
Date and time: Saturday, March 19, 2016 from 6:30 – 9:00 pm
Location: Chimacum High School Auditorium, 91 W Valley Road, Chimacum, WA 98325 (map)
 
This is a free event, and if you can make it, I’d love to see you there. If you’re a regular here at the Cross Examined blog, be sure to say hello. It will be recorded, and I’ll make a link available as soon as possible.
(And happy pi day! Using American calendar notation, today is 3/14/16, which is π rounded to five significant digits.)

If placing holy words next to people turned them from sinners to saints,
the mere presence of Gideon Bibles in motel nightstands
would have terminated adultery by now.
— Barry Lynn, God and Government
(referring to the value of placing the 10 Commandments in public view)

Image credit: Leo Reynolds, flickr, CC

In the aftermath of 9/11, I worked with a group of concerned citizens in Seattle to create Pangea, a nonprofit that supports nonreligious community-building projects in East Africa, Central America, and Southeast Asia. In little more than a decade, it has awarded over a million dollars in grants. I’ve found an interesting parallel between the culture clash we had in trying to do good in the developing world and that between Christianity and reality.

When trying to improve living conditions in the developing world, one quickly hears cautionary tales about how well-intentioned efforts don’t turn out well. Here’s one: a few years ago, a high-tech executive who had been raised in Zimbabwe wanted to go back to help a community there. As a worthwhile project, he picked a busy dirt road that needed much improvement, but things were not as simple as they seemed. Simply giving money to the local department of transportation wasn’t enough. Palms had to be greased. After trying every avenue, there seemed to be no way to avoid paying extra for the bureaucrats to permit the work to happen.

Corruption was a problem for this executive but money was not, so instead of working through the system, he simply paid to have a road grader do the work. The work crew showed up on the assigned day, but so did one of the bureaucrats who had been bypassed, backed by armed soldiers. The road work never happened.

Pangea and culture clashes

With Pangea, we had similar clashes between our approach and the local approach. In some societies, a person who is better off is culturally obliged to help friends and family who have less, and sometimes the local accountants helped out the less fortunate with Pangea money. Helping the less fortunate was the goal of the project, of course, but bleeding off money threatened its success.

This wasn’t like the Zimbabwe problem—I don’t remember anyone taking money simply to make themselves richer—but the bigger issue was that as a 501(c)3, Pangea had an obligation to the IRS to see that the money was distributed as promised.

It’s important to understand local customs, and the last thing we wanted to be was the rich, know-it-all Westerners who would come in and remake the local environment to the correct, Western way. Indeed, the opposite was true, and we learned a lot. The projects were always initiated and run by local people. But the constraints on the money were nonnegotiable. We had made a promise to the IRS—a reasonable constraint in return for tax-free donations, which we were happy to enforce. Sorry—on money issues, these Western constraints must win out. If you’re a local organization that doesn’t like that constraint, that’s fine, but don’t apply for a grant from us.

Application to Christianity

This example made me think of two parallels with Christianity. First, when you’re a church that benefits from tax-free donations, you’ve made an agreement with the IRS. Stick to it. Remember “Let your ‘Yes’ be yes, and your ‘No,’ no” (James 5:12)?

Pulpit Freedom Sunday is one ridiculous example of civil disobedience where Christian preachers demand yet more concessions. They are delighted by tax-free money, but they don’t like the prohibition against electioneering that comes with it. If accepting a deal with the IRS is a pact with the devil, then don’t enter into the pact.

The second parallel is with local NGOs thinking that they can do things their own way, ignoring the contract they made with Pangea. Similarly, Christians sometimes want to come to conclusions their own special way, rather than using science, history, evidence, reason, and so on.

Reason is the way we find things. Understanding things by imagining communication from the Holy Spirit might be a venerable way to learn things in your religion, but don’t imagine that it works in the real world. You can imagine your own source of knowing, but reality trumps that.

Related posts:
“What do Churches Have to Hide?”
“Are Churches More Like Charities or Country Clubs?”

Cool: “I can’t do that because of my religion.”
Not cool: “You can’t do that because of my religion.”
— seen on the internet

Image credit: Bob Seidensticker

The public Christmas tree lighting in Seattle is the day after Thanksgiving. I attended years ago and was surprised to see a number of people carrying big signs with Christian messages. One said: “Thanksgiving means thanking God he hasn’t killed you yet.”

Ah, what a loving deity. That’s the religion I want to join!

I got into the street sign morass myself a few years ago. I’d seen Christian sign carriers on street corners in Seattle, and I thought it’d be interesting to make an atheist rebuttal. I didn’t want to get into a shouting match, and I didn’t want to be there solo without them as a counterbalance. But it would be nice to have a polite atheist out there occasionally to give another viewpoint.

I found some great quotes and made a simple banner. With some artistic help from the very talented Kyle Hepworth, the artist who did the covers of my last two books, it looked pretty good:

I made this into a large vinyl sign with a frame. As I sketched out my plans to some atheist friends, I was surprised that some weren’t on board with the project. They thought it was too hostile, too in-your-face. With that thought in mind, I was concerned as I set up for my first day of being in public, but that worry vanished when I saw the sign that the Christians brought that day.

It had flames at the bottom with the text, “Repent or Else.”

In the battle for being offensive, it’s no contest. I throw in the towel.

Continue with Part 2.

The invisible and the nonexistent 
look a lot alike.
— Julia Sweeney

(This is an update of a post that originally appeared 11/25/12.)