Religious children do not exist.

This is odd; in the post you’re referring to (the top of this page), I made no claim of any kind related to an essential truth of the biblical Christian faith.

At no point, in any of my posts in any of this thread have I made any claims or statements regarding what are “the essential truths of the Bible” other than my very last post where you asked, only had a small fraction of the post dedicated to it, and misrepresented nothing.

Do you know how to have logical, rational discussion? Or are you just used to using this type of ridiculous, dishonest non-argument strategy you’re using here? It’s getting obtuse.

We’ve gone two and a half pages now, and you have not once tried to defend anything you’ve said. It’s ridiculous - are you simply incapable? Or unwilling?

  

But to let’s go back and answer that obtuse question for a second time.

There are innumerable denominations of Christianity, in 2000 years no one has really been able to settle the argument of what the central “truths” of Christianity, really are other than God exists, and Jesus was the son of God and came to atone for the worlds sin.

Other than that, central truths differ from sect to sect. 

Westborough baptist church generally ignore Jesus, and focus more on one individual portion of deutoronic and Paulian edicts; evangelicals beleive the Bible is literal whereas Catholics believe it is simply inspired by God; you have the trinitarians and non trinitarians;  you have those who believe Jesus overrode the old covenant and those that dont; or that believe  that the Ten Commandments are still valid (though always seem pretty cool with the 2nd and 4th) even how you get into heaven is debated, with a belief alone vs belief and good deeds.

Now, I’m sure you can probably list a few of your core beliefs, which may change significance or context depending on what point you wanted to prove at the time; and I’m sure that they will neither be novel or outside the grand spectrum of Christian beliefs. I don’t know what you will chose from that pantheon; but I am intricately familiar with everything in that pantheon.

The issue is, faith is inherently why you keep believing it, it’s the process of self reassurance that keeps you believing it.

Like I said, what belief you have faith in, is largely irrelevant to the topic of what faith actually is.

Of course, I’m sure you won’t actually acknowledge this, so I’ll preemptively call you out for dropping everything I said to ask another question.

What you’re doing here, is selecting your words in order to talk around the issue.

Trust, confidence, belief;  are not the right words to focus on.

The right word to focus on is “justified”

It is absolutely fine and dandy to have justified trust, justified confidence and justified belief in something. It should be encouraged, and what I encourage.

But that’s not what faith actually is. Focusing only on the former leaves a gaping and obvious whole in your argument where the latter should be.

Let’s look at it this way:

A given level of Belief, confidence, or trust in a thing, concept or opinion is either justified or it’s not.

If there is no evidence, or very shaky evidence; believing it to a level of confidence more than is warranted - is irrational.

Of course faith is just “trust” or “confidence”, but not justified trust or confidence.

This whole premise of unjustified trust is central to religion, it’s described in Hebrews - the evidence of things not seen.

Indeed, consider for a moment why God doesn’t simply come out of the clouds reveal himself objectively and without doubt to all of humanity today? 

The answer invariably given is that being convinced of God based on direct provable evidence - such as him revealing himself  - goes against the need to have faith in God - that he wants you to believe without knowing for sure.

When that sort of justified belief in God is deemed antithetical to faith: it clearly indicates that faith Is itself simply an unjustified belief, unjustified trust, unjustified confidence.

On top of this, faith is used as both a noun and in the context of an act. Faith is used to describe unjustified belief as a noun; and the process of maintaining that unjustified belief: such as “you need to have Faith”, or “keep the faith.”

Fauxlaw is talking about a process of generating “faith”, of that confidence - it is this process that is a manifestation of denial:

Take one of the best tropes: “god has a plan”

This is normally used in the context of a person who things they’re good, undergoing hardship, and maybe finding it hard to reconcile that hardship with belief in God; or are simply in pain.

This trope is effectively trying to suppress or ignore the negative actions without specific justification. This seems remarkably similar to abuse victims convincing them self’s that their abuser loves them, and must have some other driver of their behaviour.

I’ll also point out that knowledge is not knowing anything. Knowledge ; being in possession of information or facts that indicate the way reality is - is inherently demonstrable.

If you can’t show it, you don’t know it: if you can’t compare your statement to reality, you can’t tell whether it matches reality.

Finally, and here’s the inherent problem with faith.

Should we have faith in Charles Manson, David Koresh, the WBC,  the leader of heavens gate? The people’s temple? Should we have faith in winning the lottery? Nigerian princes?

Should you have the same trust and conviction in the existence of Allah or Zeus as you do in God?

I know the answer, but to get to that answer rationally requires you to show those faiths are unjustified. There’s process of doing that without invalidating all faiths.

This is what I said previously, but you have decided to keep the issue going. If a logical, rational discussion involves the insulting and degrading of those you disagree with, then no I am not involved in a lot of those. At least, not from my end.

The essential beliefs that make up the biblical Christian faith are pretty well settled. Just because some people disagree with the essential beliefs doesn't mean there isn't a clear answer. It typically means that the dissenters don't consider the Bible their authority. Many - if not most - denominations, sects, and cults that refer to themselves as "Christian" do not adhere to the Bible as their sole authority (i.e. Catholics, Mormons, Pentecostals, most mainline evangelicals, etc). The other reason is typically that they haven't followed basic rules of interpretation. If the Bible says, "Thou shalt not commit adultery," and someone comes along and says that adultery is morally acceptable in the Bible, it should be easy to see who is wrong.

As another example, there is no such thing as a non-Trinitarian Christian because you cannot properly interpret the text of the Bible without coming to that conclusion. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are all referred to as God, yet they are also all referred to as distinct persons within the Godhead. You have to consult an authority outside the Bible to contradict the clear reading of the whole text of the Bible.

Now if you're expecting me to debate you on abiogenesis, evolution, a global flood, the authenticity and historicity of the Bible, naturalism, population bottlenecks, the authority of the Bible in Christianity, secondary Christian doctrines, and textual interpretation in addition to what faith is all in a single thread, call me what you will but it's just not going to happen.

No it's not. But you seem content on forcing false ideas about what faith is on me that I don't adhere to. I don't have faith in a belief. But if you're interested in accurately representing my position instead of going on long diatribes about religion, would you like to know what the essential truths of the biblical Christian faith are? I will even provide references to back them up.

If not, it's always interesting to see what insults the tolerant and loving progressive atheists can come up with.

Calling you intellectually dishonest for a pattern of objectively dishonest behaviour I have outlined at every stage of our exchange, and you continue to do so - is completely accurate.

I’ve summarize this jumping around, non defence of your position repeatedly, and you’re still doing it.

For example: at one point you adamantly professed you’re position was evidence based, given what was mentioned in the bible; then you incredulously belittled the idea that life could come from non life:

But when I point out your evidence is shoddy; you ignore it, and when I go through and specifically explain why life coming from non life is perfectly Justified, you then start complaining that it’s unfair for you to argue against a rebuttal for the thing you just said.

However it seems completely fair to talk about the entire sum of dogmatic beliefs, even though as I explained and you haven’t addressed - it’s not really relevant to anything I’m saying.

Right now, I’m calling you out for trying to systematically avoid any conversation on the matter, false equivalency, and flat out dishonesty - because that’s what you’re actually doing. It’s definitive, I’ve detailed why and how I know that.

It’s not possible to have an honest conversation with someone who repeatedly changes the subject, and refuses to defend anything they’ve said before.

If you find pointing out your pattern of behaviour is degrading or insulting- perhaps you should review your behaviour.

I asked if you wanted an explanation about what the biblical Christian faith is, and you continue your anti-religion diatribe without even bothering to answer the question, let alone hear what I have to say. You wanted to continue the conversation after I offered you victory. So to continue, would you like me to explain the essential truths of the biblical Christian faith so you can accurately represents my position?

You just dropped everything again! This is hilarious. I mean come on lol.

Are you unable or unwilling to justify what you’re saying in the face of rebuttal?




I’ve characterized faith multiple time’s here, to multiple people; and provided a justification for why my characterization is accurate.

Multiple theists here have largely agreed with me insofar that it is a form of trust, confidence of conviction in a position; you even implied this is the case yourself using trust in planes as an analogy. I even used what the Bible talks about as faith to underline my point. Our difference is that I am showing that effectively an unjustified belief.


Are you disagreeing with everyone here, and the Bible, that faith is broadly described as the trust one has that what you believe is true?

If not, then what you specifically believe is irrelevant as faith is related to your belief in any specific dogma, but what that dogma is. Is not relevant; if so - then by all means explain exactly why everyone’s interpretation - including your own 20 posts ago -  of what faith is, is so fundamentally wrong. 


Frankly, what’s happened is that you started off solely contesting the amount of reasonableness and justification of faith; then after failing to defend that position, and every other position - you’ve then told me my definition is wrong, but aren’t even hiring at specifically why or how; and accusing me of misrepresenting something, but not explaining how and why.


Given all that, given the false equivalence - and the dishonest questions I’ve shown you’ve already asked; and your fixation with me having to “agree”, to something where you could just explain why I’m wrong leads me to believe that me agreeing is somehow more important than what you’re going to say; and I’ve told you I don’t bite on gotcha questions.

If you can show me explicitly why I’m wrong ; paying careful consideration to the constant and repeated justifications I gave already, feel free to do so; but given that what I’m saying is based inherently on something that’s pretty consistent with everyone else’s description (save from my conclusions on whether it’s valid), I doubt this is going to happen.


This is neither specifically anti-religion or a tirade; it’s simply an anti-dishonesty; your behaviour, questions and responses here are inherently intellectually dishonest, as explained by your response to evolution an abiogenesis - is the reason that many religions that are forced to object to those examples are themselves cannot be defended honestly.

Lastly, if you want to concede the conversation; go ahead. If you want to lay up a couched face saving out for yourself; whilst still trying to bash my position or my statements - I’ll pass.

Well I'm glad I've given you a good laugh. I sometimes am known for my sense of humor.

That wasn't so hard, was it? But since you are so eager for me to explain, I suppose I will take the time to do so...

At no point in any of that theocrababble did you explain how or why anything I said was false. In fact:

You just conceded that my definition is actually broadly accurate.

In fact, in that reply: the only difference you point out is that as part of your faith, there is also belief >>in<< your deity of choice.

But they’re exactly the same thing.

Belief in a person, is belief that something is true - belief that they exist, that they will act in a given way, that they have your best interests; that something will happen. Without that, the sentence and sentiment is nonsensical and incoherent.

Simply omitting the thing that is believed is yet another example of your intellectual dishonesty.

So after all that, we are indeed taking about the same thing; and the specifics of what you actually said are, as I suggested simply meaningless.

But as I said , and the whole point of this:

You have no objective reason or justification nor any evidence to believe that anything you just said is actually true to any degree you are simply telling everyone it is; and have conviction that it is - and that unjustified conviction, together with the pretence of validity in the face of lack of evidence is precisely why faith can be considered a form of denial.

Defending this faith requires you to be dishonest. We can see it in the way you are acting, you are forced to ignore every argument, you are forced to drop what you’re saying and move on; you’re forced to ask gotcha questions, draw false equivalences

So now, with this ridiculous gotcha question, we’re right back at the beginning of the first reply you ignored.

I have absolutely no believe that you will continue with any more intellectual honesty than you have started; but I will start counting up the points you’re ignoring.

At no point have I stated that my intention was to debate certain miraculous events in the Bible. I did not even mention that I intended to debate abiogenesis or evolution. I did state there were certain assumptions that must be made in terms of "proving" them since they have not been observed, but that is different than debating whether they happened. I think you have been assuming motivations that I do not have. I am not expecting to use empirical evidence to convince you that a non-physical being exists.

So it is not dishonest of me to ignore your attempts to debate supernatural events like the flood just because you brought them up. Even if I did engage with that topic and somehow convince you that a global flood happened, where would that leave us? Nowhere. Except that you would then be an atheist who believes that there was a global flood.

But what has naturalism really brought us? You may boast of the claims of technological advancement, and indeed there has been. Though I would hardly attribute them to naturalism so much as individuals who understood the physical world. But that has also made us all the more efficient at killing each other. We have created both nuclear power plants and nuclear bombs.

We have just seen the world brought to a halt in reaction to a tiny virus. And even if we somehow manage to control it with vaccines, think of all the time and money spent trying to cure cancer and other more deadly diseases that kill people. But even if we cured all disease, your naturalism will never stop crime, war, or death because you can't solve the problem of wicked human hearts. Put simply, your naturalism can at best provide a bit of comfort and delay your inevitable death.

You also keep talking about a justified claim. But all that means is a claim that you are convinced by. And what is the need to "justify" my claims in such a way that they seem satisfactory to a meaningless clump of stardust? If something is true, then it is so regardless of what the chemical reactions in our brains feel about it, right? But if you would like full disclosure so there is no confusion or assumption needed, I will tell you my motivation.

Contrary to your naturalistic worldview, you are not a meaningless clump of stardust or a cosmic accident. The amazing complexities of even individual cells show that you were intentionally designed and created. You are also not a beast who is subject to instinct, but a moral agent with an understanding of what is good and evil. But that would mean that you have gone to great lengths to convince yourself that there is no God, that you are the result of a cosmic accident, and that everything is meaningless. And you have done this because you love your sin. Because if you get rid of God then there is no morality, there is no Judge, and everything is permissible.

So you are at least partially right in that I am simply proclaiming what is true. And if your conscience is not absolutely hardened, you know that what I am saying is true - that "everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed" (John 3:20).

So from the beginning, I have had no intention of debating science or the empirical evidence of a non-physical being in this thread. I have indeed asked questions, but my motive from the beginning has been to proclaim what is true. So you can either continue in your hatred of God, storing up wrath for the day of judgment, or you can repent of your sin and believe in the Lord Jesus, whose blood can justify sinners before a holy and righteous God. That is the only justification that matters.

1.) Entering into a conversation (on a debate forum) and making claims that you have no intent of defending - and only admitting it after being called out multiple times - whilst also asking questions to make others defend theirs - is intrinsically dishonest.

Ridiculing aspects of science, or various theories; then declaring that you will not defend that ridicule or consider a defence of them - is also intellectually dishonest.

2.) naturalism - You are conflating validity with impact. Indeed, your conflating a lot of things.

The premise of my argument is that naturalism, science and technology relies upon the premise of objective evidence, and provable claims being the best way of determining truth.

We can validate this, from how this process has allowed us to exploit how the world works in a way that faith has not.

We can harness the atom, not because men have “understood the physical world”, but because first newton derived laws of physics that were proven based on objective measurable evidence; Einstein overwrote this with relativity based upon objective measurable evidence, and atomic behaviour was derived based on objective measurable evidence; and all of this was done under the pretence that there is a naturalistic, determinable mechanism by which things we see happen.

From that application of objective evidence, we can derive how the world works; and we can have confidence that it is true, as we are able to exploit it. If E != mc^2, is our explanations were not true - then there is no reason to expect nuclear reactors to work.

The point is, that people are asserting that faith, somehow, derives how the world works too - and yet provides no objective means of exploiting anything.

A few individuals who tested hypotheses that a given illness conveys immunity to another; then provided an objective measurable proof of it subsequently lead to the complete or near complete eradication of multiple diseases that have killed billions of people.

How many diseases has prayer eradicated? If Jon snow had prayed instead of removing a pump handle, how many people would have ended up dying from cholera? 

That’s the difference here: assuming the way the world works is physical only allows us to explain the world and solve problems - assuming the supernatural exists - has not solved anything (and indeed has stood in the way)

Moralistic fallacy aside, vaccination, modern medicine, the haber process, and others have each individually saved more lives than all wars combined.

Saying that, it’s a red herring; whether you like the outcome or not, it’s impossible to deny that the application of naturalism has lead to more objectively true understanding of our reality in 300 years than faith has done in the last 10,000.

3.) Justified trust.

If you believe something is true, is it really true, or just your brain tricking you into believing is is true? 

Justified trust is trust which everyone can confirm for themselves is true to the degree the trust is held; we don’t have to rely on someone asserting it is true, or solely on our faulty brains to convince us - as you are doing.

The reality is, that religious beliefs are not objectively justifiable - if they were, there’d be a single universal religion that almost everyone would believe - and the very concept of faith would not exist.


Faith - the conviction of trust you have, is not justifiable, not because I simply disagree - but because of all inherently boils down to things you have to simply believe as true without being able to objectively show them in a way that anyone can confirm.


Take all your assertions, you can’t objectively show that we’re more than simply clumps of matter, you can’t show that the level of complexity necessities a designer - leave alone a god. That conclusion is not arrived at independently or objectively - but is inherently influenced by the belief in God you’re using it to justify.


I don’t believe without reason that we’re just clumps of matter - I trust based on the objective facts that treating ourselves as clumps of matter has led to the advent of modern medicine; and the distinct absence of evidence to the contrary - and all attempts to verify whether we are something more generally fail - though obviously this could change with new evidence.

The irony here, which is not lost on me, is that I am arguing that faith is a form of denial - belief in the absence of facts - and then maintained by ignoring contrary arguments and facts. 

The way you defend your faith, is by just asserting you have the truth over and over again, with no independent facts - and then systematically ignoring all contrary arguments and facts.

The irony here is beautiful - in that the way you are defending your faith here is doing EXACTLY what I specified faith is in my argument.

4.) Drops

Drop 1: I explained this in the previous post, explaining the specifics of your behaviour that made it dishonest; you failed to address this.

Drop 2. In your previous posts, you accused me of misdefining faith, then came up with your own definition, I pointed out that you definition and my definition are the same thing - meaning that I was never misdefining it.

To say the "application of naturalism" is somehow the cause of all scientific knowledge and understanding of the physical world is actually a conflation. One does not need to adhere to naturalism in order to understand the physical world or the laws that govern it. Theists (who, by definition, reject naturalism) do not need to reject that the physical world exists and is governed by laws, and they have contributed much to the scientific field.

You still boast about the achievements of science. However, modern medicine has never prevented the death of a single person. That is a factually true statement. A person may be spared death from a particular cause at a particular point in time, which is what I assume you meant by a saved life. But that in no way disputes what I said, that your naturalism can at best provide a bit of comfort and delay your inevitable death.

Again, this is a clear indication of where you are conflating an understanding of how the physical world works, with assuming the way the world works is physical only (i.e. naturalism). Now you have accused me of failing to address the disputes you have raised. But you have also failed to address the many moral aspects of what I have said. And it is this moral aspect where one of the main differences between naturalism and theism (particularly Christianity) lies.

The Bible is often called the "Canon" because it is the revelation from God that acts as the standard by which we measure all things, including what is good and evil. As a naturalist, the only standard you can provide is personal preference. You cannot say Hitler was evil because you have no objective basis to do so. You cannot even objectively determine what evil is outside of disagreement with your personal preference. So all you can consistently say is that you don't personally like Hitler's morally neutral actions.

Science can only take us so far. It is a methodology that can increase our understanding and knowledge about how the physical world works. But it cannot tell us what to do with that knowledge. The only ethic you can derive from the physical world alone is "might makes right," and this is where naturalism fails. You cannot give an objective answer as to why it is acceptable to crush a mosquito but not a human. You cannot give an objective answer as to why it is acceptable to eat oranges but not babies. The term "human" is just a categorization for a clump of cells that is organized in a different way than other clumps of cells. And all these cells are just random patterns in a mass of meaningless, purposeless matter and energy that we call the universe. That is naturalism.

Modern science, and the understanding of the modern world through science is built upon the premise that there are natural causes for observed phenomena. Modern science, and scientific process works because it excludes supernatural events as part of possible explanations.

Science only works because it inherent precludes magic and the supernatural. And precluding the supernatural and positing only naturalistic explanations is how we determine truth.

Your assertion to the country is just that.

Theists can practice science - but they too work as if magic and the supernatural are not factors in effecting the things they study: Methodological naturalism.

All modern science, and understanding of the world that has come from it, has been predicated on the inherent assumption that the supernatural does not effect things: naturalism.

Newton invoked the supernatural surrounding orbital motion and made no further discoveries - Laplace assumed naturalism, and explained planetary Orbital motion.

Your assertions aside, the modern world is built on naturalism. Understanding the world and determining how it works to the point it can be explained and exploited has been done presuming that faith, the supernatural, magic, etc is not necessary. 

That’s the point. Science and explaining the world removes faith and belief from the specifics of how the world works - when that happens, human invention surges forward.

Your comment on death is absurd and incoherent. When someone “saves your life” any rational human being presumes this means preventing death at a given time - rather than preventing their death in general.

Given your reasoning, war and science hasn’t killed anyone either - because everyone was going to die anyway.

This bizarre, ludicrous argument barely needs a rebuttal. It’s just clutching at straws.



You then go on to make an argument from morality.

This is not related to the nature of faith that we were talking in any way. It’s a red herring argument.

It’s also empty assertion. In the Bible, God commits genocide of humanity, kills everyone in Sodam and Gomorrah, commands genocide against the Amelkites, and even killed lots wife for “looking back” - and that’s just in the first few books!

The Ten Commandments, a list of moral edicts includes such gems as “don’t say God damnit when you stub your toe”, “even thinking something for a split second and not ever acting on it ever” is immoral, as is working on Saturday, and having any images of God. Slavery is supported, seafood is bad, no tattoos, long hair for men is bad, etc.


Christians are simply really good at asserting how you need God to understand morality, good and bad, when the Bible is an utter sh*tshow of mad lunacy and kids being mauled by bears for mocking elijahs baldness; the Bible is an unhinged, immoral mess; that cannot possibly be used as a rational basis for anything.

Indeed, it requires no objective morality, no Bible and no deity to recognize, “I am a human, and I don’t like it if someone is a d*ck to me, so maybe I shouldn’t be a d*ck to other people.” My morality in this respect is just as subjective as yours; with your moral compass, I would hope, being firmly untangled from the Bible, and from its God; with your compass driving your interpretation of scripture rather than the other way round. 

The reality here is not religion, Christianity or faith provides any true moral guidance - theists are just really, really good at loudly asserting it does.

I mean, you are in no better position to determine what is moral or not than I, you have no real ability to determine whether anything really matters outside of our own feelings than I, you can’t tell whether we are clumps of matter or more. 

You’ve just gotten really good at pretending you can.

Drop 3: completely dropped the argument that you are dishonest.

Drop 4: you completely dropped the argument about justified trust.

Drop 5: you completely dropped that you’re argument is doing exactly what I stated faith is.

Drop 6: you completely dropped that you have no ability to show we are more than simple clumps of matter: you simply affirm the assertions

Drop 7: completely dropped the fact that faith has cured no diseases, and solved no problem.

Science had nothing to do with religion. 

My comment on death was not to dispute the use of the phrase "save a life." I was putting the issue in perspective to show that for all the achievements of modern medicine, we have never prevented the eventual death of a single individual. Everyone will die from some cause. Even if you want to leave the door open for some improbable future discovery, the consistent data that we have attests to the fact that nothing can prevent death. So you have not said anything that disputes my statement that your naturalism can at best provide a bit of comfort and delay your inevitable death.

Supernatural: of or relating to an order of existence beyond the visible observable universe

Science precludes the supernatural simply because it is a methodology for observing the natural world and nothing more. Science cannot prove or disprove an order of existence beyond the observable universe. You cannot observe the unobservable, and to assert you can is unscientific.

It is impossible to confirm or deny whether a human has a soul via the scientific method. A soul is a non-physical entity so science has no way to test or observe whether a soul exists. At best, you can say that you have no empirical evidence for the existence of a soul.

Since you determine truth via the scientific method, it is understandable why you would say that the supernatural does not exist. But it is in response to this method of deriving truth where the moral argument is shown not to be a red herring. If truth is derived via the scientific method, and morality cannot be derived via the scientific method, then you have no basis to make any moral claim.

It is not surprising that you did not really dispute what I said about morality being subjective preference. And your rebuttal basically consisted of trying to claim the Bible is just as lacking in terms of a moral foundation as naturalism. But the way that you did it is worth noting.

The only argument that you gave was to say that because God has done so many evil things, the Bible should not be used as a valid objective standard. But that assumes there is an objective standard outside the Bible that can be used as the basis for such a statement. You have not disputed that you cannot objectively determine what evil is. Yet, your entire rebuttal was founded upon the premise that what God did was evil. However, the only thing you can consistently say is that you don't personally like what God has done, but it was not evil.

And if that wasn't enough, you then appealed to the essence of the golden rule - a teaching found all the way back in Leviticus - as a generally valid moral compass. So you know that you should treat people with dignity and respect, but you have no basis to say why. This subjective application of "morality" allows you to seek justice when someone wrongs you, while rejecting any consistent standard for yourself. As I said before, your rejection of God allows you to justify your own evil, while hypocritically judging the "evil" of others.

Here is a practical example of why theistic morality, as opposed to amoral naturalism, is relevant to one's methodology. We'll continue using our prime example of Nazi Germany. Prisoners at the Dachau concentration camp were subjected to freezing experiments in order to find an effective way to treat hypothermia, particularly for the benefit of those in the German Air Force. Can you prove that this was objectively wrong in a way that is consistent with naturalism?

My undisputed assertion is that you can't. You can only express personal disagreement. And this is why theists don't engage in "methodological naturalism" as you put it. Choosing a test subject for such an experiment is part of one's scientific methodology. A naturalist should have no trouble justifying Nazi freezing experiments, especially when considering the perceived benefit. Consistently holding to a biblical ethic could never allow one to justify such an experiment on the basis of understanding that humans have inherent value which comes from being made in the image of God. And one must reject naturalism to do this.

faith is for those who do not understand science. 

I guess I don't see the problem.   

Every child is born into something.  And they will need to be taught something.  If they are not born into a religious family it will be a non-religious one.  And that non-religious family will assume that child is non-religious.  

Why should it be ok to call that child non-religious anymore than it would be to call it religious or Marxist to use your comparison? I am sure children born into Communist China are all communists until they are allowed to think for themselves.  And certainly China would consider that the children belonged to the state not to the family anyway.  

I think you are coming at this from an individualistic Western value POV.  

In any event, what is it that determines someone's religion or politics for that matter? Is it one's own individual ability to think it? Is it the family you were born into, or the country, or even religion of the country?   

Are there different levels to how one considers their religion or political allegiance? Can one be part religious and part non-religious? Can one be part Marxist and part Capitalist? America is a mixed economy? The political parties who are moderate are a mixture of various policies from both ends of the spectrum. Religious people have plenty of overlap in their beliefs - but more than that - they can be more fundamental or more liberal depending on a whole range of things. Some atheists are more militant than most religious people I have met.  Many religious people love all other religions without fail. Many atheists consider themselves spiritual.   

Just my thoughts. 

Complete lie

Your, - not talking about religion -  plan fell at the first fence.

Ok, so what is your new "intelligent" plan to end all religion?  And how many bibles so far  have to put to the flames?#8  &         #14

Who do you mean by "we"? 

Believe what you want, but I know I trust scientific evidence over desperate woes of hope everyday of the week. 

They are also subject to materialistic and atheist indoctrination.

Indoctrination and therefore materialism is what it is to be human.

The internal acquisition, storage and utilisation of data.

Though it is reasonable say that theism begets atheism....It's not really chicken and egg stuff.