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"When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours." - Stephen F Roberts

...The Fallacy of the Fool was posted to usenet sometime in the distant past (1997 or so). It is a succinct rebuttal of a common theist claim from Psalms 14:1.

MINI-FAQ: Psalms 14:1

"The fool has said in his heart, 'There is no God.' They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that does good." (Psalms 14:1)

ad hominem fallacy: An argument is discounted based on attacking the character of the person making the argument. ("He is wrong when he says there is no God, because he is a fool.")

strawman fallacy: Arguing against a position by creating a different, weaker, or irrelevant position and refuting that position instead of the original. ("There is no God" misrepresents "There isn't sufficient evidence that God exists.")

circular reasoning: The truth of the conclusion is assumed in order to justify the premises. ("The fool says there is no God, because anyone who says there is no God is a fool.")

begging the question: The argument creates a secondary proposition that is related to the primary proposition, which requires a similar argument that is missing. (The existence of God is assumed, while addressing propositions of whether God exists.)

fallacy of inconsistency: The argument is inconsistent with other arguments within the same context.
In the Christian context, Jesus commands against the invective in Psalms 14:1, warning that "whoever says 'You fool!' shall be liable to the hell of fire" in Matthew 5:22.

special pleading: The inappropriate attribution of emotive functions to objects that do not have that capability. (Hearts are not capable of "knowing" or of feeling emotions.)

redundancy: Psalm 53 is identical to Psalm 14.

questionable premise: It is obviously not the case that all atheists do nothing but bad deeds. This premise is invalidated by a single example of an atheist doing a single charitable act.


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