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John W. Loftus earned M.A. and MDiv degrees in theology and philosophy and a ThM degree in philosophy of religious. The author of Why I Became an Atheist: A Former Preacher Rejects Christianity and The Outsider Test for Faith: How to Know Which Religion Is True, Loftus is also the editor of The afficher plus Christian Delusion: Why Faith Fails; The End of Christianity; and Christianity Is Not Great: How Faith Fails. afficher moins

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It all gets a bit tedious after a while – the hectoring tone, the argument-by-assertion, the repetition, the special pleading and question-begging, the myopia. And quickly. Despite the book's massive flaws, the central contention – that it's a profitable endeavor to subject our culturally inherited beliefs and biases to critical scrutiny, availing ourselves of the tools of science and reason – is certainly true, and not particularly controversial. The OTF itself can be salvaged from the wreckage of the book if you broaden it to include all manner of beliefs, rather than only explicitly religious ones, and extricate the author's unsubstantiated foregone conclusions which permeate the text. But really, what's the point? In a culture as modern, pluralistic, and secular as our own, this amounts to preaching to the choir. Even if the sermon did happen echo beyond the pulpit, reaching the apostate faithful out on the street corners and miraculously leading to some of their conversions, they still won't have become outsiders. They'll have done the only thing that's possible: traded one insider vantage for another.

^^ This is the conclusing paragraph of my review of this book. The full thing is available here: http://nateduffy.blogspot.com/2013/05/the-elusive-outsider-vantage.html
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Duffyevsky | Aug 19, 2022 |
An interesting book that tends toward high density, abstract arguments. Norman Geisler, author of A General Introduction to the Bible and The Baker Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics says it "is a thoughtful and intellectually challenging work, presenting arguments that every honest theist and Christian should face." "Thoughtful and intellectually challenging" are simultaneously this book's strengths and the things that make it sometimes rather dull.

When reading this book, one should not forget that this is an explanation of why the author rejected Christianity. The book contains philosophical arguments, but they are the ones that convinced the author that Christianity is false. It is not meant to be an exhaustive catalog. The arguments generally focus on Christianity. Some of them may generalize to other religions, but arguing the implausibility of other religions was not the author's main goal.

In my opinion, the most interesting part of the book is the "Outsider Test For Faith". In general, what is convincing to an insider is not necessarily convincing to an outsider. Many arguments that seem flawless from the insider are laughable from the outside. This is true for any division of the world into "inside" and "outside".

The outsider test for faith asks you to "[t]est your beliefs as if you were an outsider to your faith." How would an outsider's view be different from an insider's view? First, it would take into account that there are many religions in the world, all of them faithfully believed. Does the sincere belief of those believers convince you that the religion they follow is true? If not, than the mere existence of your own faith cannot be expected to make a convincing argument. In an similar vein, an outsider viewpoint would take into account that for the vast majority of believers, the religion they follow is determined by their cultural, temporal, and geographic context.

Another feature of the outsider's viewpoint is that purely internal evidence is not convincing. For example, if one claims, without other arguments, that the Bible is true because it is authenticated by the Holy Spirit and that the feeling that you call the Holy Spirit is true and trustworthy because the Bible says it is, your claim will not pass the outsider test. Similarly, if you say that one should give their life over to Jesus because he is the son of God who died for our sins (according to the Bible), your claim also does not pass the outsider test. In both of these cases, the statement has nothing to stand on if one does not already accept the premises that would make them an insider.

The outsider test may sound like a harsh stance to take, but it is the stance you take toward every religion where you are an outsider. If you follow a certain faith, you are just applying the same standards to your own beliefs that you are applying to the beliefs of others.

Of course, no one can truly take on an outsider's perspective. Human beings are almost not capable of fully abandoning their own beliefs. Even so, the exercise can still lead to insights. And even if you are not willing to try the outsider's test for faith, acknowledging the difference between an insider's perspective and an outsider's perspective can, hopefully, help you understand why something that is so convincing to you is completely unconvincing to someone else.
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eri_kars | 7 autres critiques | Jul 10, 2022 |
This book is the book that never ends. You think you're getting close, and you look, and you swear you have 30 more pages to read than when you started. Why? I'm guessing turgid prose, comma errors, all sorts of missing words or extra words, and, well, shallow thinking coupled with talking about his shallow thinking. In short, this book would not convince anyone who was not already convinced, and he wrote it for believers, not atheists. I wanted to read it because I heard so much about the outsider test of faith and how important a tool it is. Really? Nope. It's not even a tool. It is just the author making himself important by giving a big important name to something so basic I knew it in 5th grade. The arguments are okay in places, but not as strong as many other works that are better written and better edited. In short, a disappointing work that I spent nearly a month of my life on, and I wish I had the month back. I cannot recommend this book for believers (though be comforted; your belief is safe here) or non-believers (many of whom will give this five stars because they favor the pompous pontificating and shallow thinking of this work because the position agrees with their own. That is not enough. The author agrees with my position, too; I am a Christian turned atheist, and I don't find this book convincing at all. I found it mostly boring, with occasional interesting bits, especially where he quotes other people.… (plus d'informations)
½
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Devil_llama | 7 autres critiques | Jun 5, 2020 |
Another prime example of atheistic irrationalism, and a rather mundane and mediocre one at that. Most amusing is the so-called "outsider's test for truth", which of course can be equally applied against atheism. As an academic myself, I really don't have time to devote to refuting drivel that fails to arise to the level of many of my students' term papers. I'll simply refer to a full review and refutation entitled "The Infidel Delusion". If you think there is anything left after the demolition job carried out in the latter work, well then I would suggest you retake Philosophy and Logic 101. Here's the link. https://calvindude.org/ebooks/stevehays/Infidel-Delusion.pdf… (plus d'informations)
1 voter
Signalé
ambrs57 | 1 autre critique | May 17, 2016 |

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Œuvres
15
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