JimC wrote:Seth wrote:
Again with the Wayback Machine fallacy. Oy! Give it a rest. We're discussing contemporary behaviors driven by contemporary religious beliefs. Your lame attempts at drawing a moral equivalency between the misdeeds of Christians a thousand years in the past and the misdeeds of Muslims yesterday is as intellectually dishonest as it gets and gives you the appearance of being an apologist for Muslim terrorism because you use the implicit "Christians did it so Muslims get to do it too" bullshit argument.
In fact, it is a vital counter to your assertion that there is a major difference in religious nature between Islam and Christianity, which you are advocating as the sole reason why contemporary Islam is much more involved with violence than contemporary christianity (a fact that most would agree with)
Where did I say "sole reason?"
If that were the case, then this intrinsic difference would have meant that the differing levels of violence were the same all through history.
Logic fail. Neither religion is completely static and, as we all know, there are many different sects within each one. Lutherans, Baptists, Evangelicals, Sunni, Shia, etc.
To refute that, it is both easy and necessary to demonstrate that christian violence and brutality was historically very prevalent.
Er, there is no such thing as "Christian violence" because Christ didn't preach violence, he preached peace and love. Islam, on the other hand, expressly preaches and commands followers to commit violence against infidels. The fact that some people claiming to be Christians engaged in horrific acts of violence and oppression does not prove that Christianity is morally equivalent to Islam. It's not, which anyone who knows anything factual about Christianity knows. Where does that leave your argument pray tell?
There are probably many reasons why this has shrunk dramatically over the years, and possibly a degree of internal reform of christianity towards a gentler version was part of it, but it is clear to anyone with a decent knowledge of history that the progressive shrinking of the worldly power of the church post-enlightenment was a vital component. I'm not ruling out that some of the current disparity in the extent of violence are due to intrinsic religious differences, but that is not the whole picture by any means.
The "whole picture" is that there is no moral equivalence between Christianity and Islam. Never has been, never will be.
The other way you stick your head in the sand over christian traditions is to proclaim that the old testament has nothing to do with christianity, and therefore its particularly vicious sections can be safely ignored in this debate. This is a nonsense, as shown by the fact that pastors, priests and preachers of every major christian denomination still regularly use readings from the old testament in religious services. Wisely, they usually avoid the bits where delight is taken in bears eating small children who have ignored prophets...
It's quite simple, Christianity is what Christ taught and nothing else. Any mechanisms of power and control or resort to Old Testament Judaic laws that have been grafted on to some sect's practices
are not Christianity. They are things grafted on to Christianity by individuals or groups in order to achieve some purpose or goal
unrelated to the message of Christ.
And no, it's not a "No True Scotsman" fallacy because there is no reinterpretation of the evidence to make it unfalsifiable. The simple fact is that if you don't behave as Christ said to behave, you are not a Christian. You may be something else containing parts of Christianity, but Christianity is a very specific set of beliefs and practices that do not include directives or permission to perpetrate violence on anyone.
‘No True Scotsman’ Fallacy
Explanation
The no true scotsman fallacy is a way of reinterpreting evidence in order to prevent the refutation of one’s position. Proposed counter-examples to a theory are dismissed as irrelevant solely because they are counter-examples, but purportedly because they are not what the theory is about.
Example
The No True Scotsman fallacy involves discounting evidence that would refute a proposition, concluding that it hasn’t been falsified when in fact it has.
If Angus, a Glaswegian, who puts sugar on his porridge, is proposed as a counter-example to the claim “No Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge”, the ‘No true Scotsman’ fallacy would run as follows:
(1) Angus puts sugar on his porridge.
(2) No (true) Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge.
Therefore:
(3) Angus is not a (true) Scotsman.
Therefore:
(4) Angus is not a counter-example to the claim that no Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge.
This fallacy is a form of circular argument, with an existing belief being assumed to be true in order to dismiss any apparent counter-examples to it. The existing belief thus becomes unfalsifiable.
Real-World Examples
An argument similar to this is often arises when people attempt to define religious groups. In some Christian groups, for example, there is an idea that faith is permanent, that once one becomes a Christian one cannot fall away. Apparent counter-examples to this idea, people who appear to have faith but subsequently lose it, are written off using the ‘No True Scotsman’ fallacy: they didn’t really have faith, they weren’t true Christians. The claim that faith cannot be lost is thus preserved from refutation. Given such an approach, this claim is unfalsifiable, there is no possible refutation of it.
The problem with this analysis is that it poses certain presuppositions that do not apply to the present issue. Angus is either a Scotsman or he is not a Scotsman. In the example it is set as a premise that Angus IS a Scotsman and the argument is made that putting or not putting sugar on one's porridge is determinative of membership in the class "Scotsman." But if Angus is NOT in fact a Scotsman, then making the claim that no true Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge is not a fallacy at all. The circularity of the argument is set up by the premises used, which depend on a factual claim (Angus is a Glaswegian, and therefore a Scotsman) and an unproven asssertion (no true Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge) combined with another premise that attempts (fallaciously) to support the claim of "no true Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge."
The distinction between the No True Scotsman logical fallacy and a "no true Christian" claim such as I have made is that the premises are completely different and therefore not comparable.
No True Scotsman:
P1 Angus is a Scotsman
P2 No Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge
C1 Angus is not a "true" Scotsman
No True Christian:
P1 Jesus directs his followers (Christians) not to use violence against others.
P2 Using violence against others disqualifies one from being a Christian.
C1 Those who claim to be Christians who use violence against others are not Christians.
There is no error in logic here. To be a Christian you have to behave as Christ commanded, and that does NOT include using violence against others in Jesus' name. Doing so means you're not a Christian, you're just someone who claims to be a Christian but who is not actually a member of the private club because you violated the terms of membership. It doesn't matter how vigorously you try to excuse your violation of Christ's directives, you can't be a Christian if you don't live a Christlike life.
Whether a person who loses faith in Christianity is a "true Christian" or not is entirely irrelevant. One is either a Scotsman or not, and one remains a Scotsman (by implication) by virtue of one's birth/residence. But one can be a Christian and then not be a Christian, and then become a Christian again, and then stop being a Christian. Being a Christian is solely determined by one's behavior and compliance with Christ's directives, and whether one who has fallen away from Christianity and become "not-Christian" and wishes to rejoin the club follows the rules for readmittance set forth by Christ. If the rules are followed and one's sins forgiven and one then undertakes a Christ-like life, then one again becomes a Christian.
But those who claim to be Christians and perpetrate evil and harm to others, even if they purport to do so in the name of Christ,
are not Christians. They are merely poseurs and frauds using Christianity as a cover for their evil acts,
and neither Christianity as a whole nor Christians as individuals have any liability or culpability for the wrongful, un-Christ-like actions of Christian poseurs.
Pretty simple logic there...even for those with at least a fractional wit.
"Seth is Grandmaster Zen Troll who trains his victims to troll themselves every time they think of him" Robert_S
"All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke
"Those who support denying anyone the right to keep and bear arms for personal defense are fully complicit in every crime that might have been prevented had the victim been effectively armed." Seth
© 2013/2014/2015/2016 Seth, all rights reserved. No reuse, republication, duplication, or derivative work is authorized.
Talk about Jebus vs Mohammed the basis for the two cults and the universal reaction is to find the shit in the OT ignoring that the violence in the OT was NOT taught or acted upon by the Christ character but the violence in Islam is all contemporary to one central character .Most of the rape, torture, child- abuse, theft ,lying, breaking of treaties and genocide in Islam are direct orders from Mohammed( or his own much glorified actions) and carried out by his personal companions who ,according to Islam are "The Best of Men." 
