The sun ≠ the son

Sometime believers try to cook up comparisons that attempt to make the reasoning of non-believers
look ridiculous. But more often than not, it's the believer that looks all the more ridiculous for the efforts. Just the other day, I learned of another of these attempts that comes straight from a book by the well know Christian apologist, Ray Comfort. Lets take a look at his attempt that keep laughably true to his usual form.

In Ray's comparison, he actually tries to form a comparison that claims that not believing in God is just as silly as not believing in the sun. No, I'm not kidding even though it all sounds like a bad joke. So let's review his craziness one point at a time...

A group known as “a/sunists” produced a manifesto explaining why they believe that the sun doesn’t exist:

Firstly. An entire desert tribe of men, women, and children was once killed by the sun. Therefore the sun doesn’t exist.

Wait, what?.... I can only assume that Ray is equating the evil deeds that the God of the Bible perpetrates in said book to the 'desert tribe killed by the son'. What Ray doesn't seem to understand is that an atheists doesn't disbelieve in God because of his many evil deeds in the Bible. If we thought he actually did those things, we would believe and not be atheists. These 'events' are reference when a believer tries to claim that the Bible and it's God are morally perfect.  So referencing that the God character in the Bible committed horrible atrocities is not a reply in regards to his existance, but one to the moral question.

Second. Intelligent scientists have searched the night sky for the sun, and found no evidence for its existence.

 Careful Ray, your judgements are showing. You like to assume that believers don't want to believe, or are looking in all the wrong places. You forget that most of us were believers at one point. So we have walked the road of faith, and found it to lead nowhere.  We have not filtered our search to the 'darkness' and nowhere else. We look everywhere for evidence for and against the theological question. The lack of findings in favor of God isn't due to lack of trying, but rather a lack of evidence.

Third. They also entered a pitch-black room and studied a book about the sun. Again, they found no empirical evidence.

 Again, you assume that atheists and scientists are being willingly disingenuous. You would have us believe that the whole of science and every atheist is purposely rigging the game so that they won't find evidence of God. This simply isn't the case. We find there is no empirical evidence for God, because there is no empirical evidence for God. If there was, I'd be a believer. But to date, such evidence does not exist. The big difference is that while we do not have evidence for God, we do have solid evidence and proof of the sun's existence... even in the night sky(The sun's reflection off the moon).

Fourth. Beliefs were confirmed by interviewing members of the Braille Institute.

A group known as “a/sunists” produced a manifesto explaining why they believe that the sun doesn’t exist: - See more at: http://preliatorcausa.blogspot.com/2012/12/11-ray-comfort-presents-another-hilariously-bad-analogy-for-god-3978.html#sthash.uyZn85m2.dpuf

A group known as “a/sunists” produced a manifesto explaining why they believe that the sun doesn’t exist:
Firstly. An entire desert tribe of men, women, and children was once killed by the sun. Therefore the sun doesn’t exist.
- See more at: http://preliatorcausa.blogspot.com/2012/12/11-ray-comfort-presents-another-hilariously-bad-analogy-for-god-3978.html#sthash.uyZn85m2.dpuf

Again, accusing us of being the blind leading the blind. Actually, the ironic truth is that Ray is actually the one wearing blinders and ignorant of the truth.

Lastly. The millions who testified that they have seen a brilliant ball of fire in the sky are unscientific dimwitted liars. The a/sunists continue to hold their meetings in a dark room and tell each other that it is intelligent to believe that the sun doesn’t exist.

I am not for a second calling all believers 'unscientific dimwitted liars'. Sure, many believers doubt and deny science. There are some that aren't to bright (atheists as well). But are they liars? Maybe the priests that no longer believe are liars. But the vast majority of believers aren't. To be liars, they would have to know that what they believe isn't true. However, they sincerely believe their beliefs to be true. So no, they aren't liars, but they are misguided and deceived.

And yes, millions testify to believe in God and to have felt his power and light. But so have the believers of every other religion that is and ever has been. So claims themselves don't really get us anywhere. So to find out which claims are true, we look at the evidence. For the sun, there is overwhelming evidence, yet there is no such evidence for God. We can see the sun, but we can not see God. We can use and measure the power of the sun, yet we can not measure or even detect the supposed power of God. So the problem isn't ignoring evidence but there not being any to find.

Lastly, we do not hold meetings for the sole purpose of patting ourselves on the back. If anything,
that's what church is for every Sunday. Believers are often not open to being wrong, but us atheists are open to all the new information that may come our way. We are open to being wrong, but all the evidence in the world points toward there not being a God. No self congratulatory meetings, just honest openness. Any person could easily prove to anyone that the sun exists, if they had any doubts. There's just that much undeniable evidence. But there is no such evidence for God.

So as you can see the comparison to disbelief in God and disbelief in the sun is a laughably terrible one. Not believing in God is in no way as absurd as someone not believing in the sun. In fact, his entire claim shows that he is either fully ignorant of what atheism is, or is just being purposely deceptive. Whichever the case, he's fully wrong.

One final thought though... 'asunist' isn't even the correct term. Is this the awkward moment that we have to tell Ray that the sun has a name just like other stars. The name of our local star is Sol. You may recognize the 'sol' from words like solar energy, solar radiation, etc. So asolarist would have been a more accurate term. Just another example of Ray Comfort getting it all wrong again.

-Brain Hulk

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