Marian Paroo left a comment on my post "Thank You, Mother Teresa...." that perfectly illustrates how theists try to force their frames on an argument to the point of ignoring what is actually said in my post.
Marian wrote:
For someone who is an doesn't believe in God, you sure have spent a whole bunch of time and space on God (or the lack thereof). I wonder why. If you don't believe-you don't believe. Frankly, how can one who doesn't believe in God even begin to discuss God? How does one disprove the existence of something that doesn't exist? Do you see my confusion here?
Marian apparently didn't bother to read the post she commented on. The existence of God is only one assertion made by theists. I even said in that very post that you can't disprove a nebulous and undefined conception of God. I also said in that very post that it is the least important assertion. It's not about whether something like a God exists; it's about whether you can make any claims to knowledge about God. It's those claims, many and varied as they are, that cause all the problems.
The confusion that I see is all yours, Marian. You seem to think I've written something about God. I haven't. I've written about people who believe in God, in that case, Mother Teresa. Do you think that believers have no effect on the lives of others, like they don't fly airplanes into skyscrapers, or start wars in Iraq, or blow up abortion clinics, or mess up our lives in all sorts of ways? You're a perfect illustration of how theists try to force their frames on us to the point of ignoring what is actually said in my post.
The very question Marian asked, "Frankly, how can one who doesn't believe in God even begin to discuss God?" was answered in that very post. You talk about the claims made by people who do believe in God and you examine the effects of those beliefs.
As an example, if Mother Teresa, as Greta Christina claims, believed that suffering would bring people closer to Jesus, and said; "I think it is very beautiful for the poor to accept their lot, to share it with the passion of Christ. I think the world is being much helped by the suffering of the poor people." If she saw human suffering as a gift from Christ, something that would bring people closer to him, then those beliefs would effect how she acted. In this case having her hospitals and hospices offering grotesquely inadequate medical care, revoltingly unsanitary and even abusive conditions, and little or nothing in the way of pain relief, allowing the sick to suffer and the dying to die in terrible pain.
We can see and judge the effects of people's beliefs. That is what I'm writing about, not God, but the various affects of believing in various conceptions of God.
So, stop being an ignorant twit, Marian. Your frame doesn't work.
And that name, Marian Paroo, isn't that a fictional character from "The Music Man"? If fictional characters can leave comments on my blog that would seem to be evidence that we are indeed living in Nick Bostrom's simulated universe.
