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The Turning of an Atheist (Antony Flew)
New York Times Magazine ^
| 4 November 2007
| MARK OPPENHEIMER
Posted on 11/03/2007 5:58:54 PM PDT by shrinkermd
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"...Flew was a precocious 27 when he delivered the paper at a meeting of the Socratic Club, the Oxford salon presided over by C. S. Lewis. Reprinted in dozens of anthologies, Theology and Falsification has become a heroic tract for committed atheists. In a masterfully terse thousand words, Flew argues that God is too vague a concept to be meaningful. For if Gods greatness entails being invisible, intangible and inscrutable, then he cant be disproved but nor can he be proved. Such powerful but simply stated arguments made Flew popular on the campus speaking circuit; videos from debates in the 1970s show a lanky man, his black hair professorially unkempt, vivisecting religious belief with an English public-school accent perfect for the seduction of American ears. Before the current crop of atheist crusader-authors Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Christopher Hitchens there was Antony Flew.
To: shrinkermd
“Although Flew still rejects Christianity, saying only that he now believes in an intelligence that explains both its own existence and that of the world,...”
2
posted on
11/03/2007 6:03:35 PM PDT
by
M. Dodge Thomas
(Opinion based on research by an eyewear firm, which surveyed 100 members of a speed dating club.)
To: M. Dodge Thomas
Another one just Flew out of the cuckoo’s nest!
3
posted on
11/03/2007 6:07:34 PM PDT
by
sodpoodle
(If you can't handle the truth ......................................................try satire)
To: shrinkermd
He’s 81. I have always said people believe in God the closer and closer they get to having to meet Him.
To: M. Dodge Thomas
He’s gettin’ pretty old. If he continues to reject The Lord Jesus Christ...and unless something miraculous happens...yuk
5
posted on
11/03/2007 6:08:47 PM PDT
by
shield
(A wise man's heart is at his RIGHT hand;but a fool's heart at his LEFT. Ecc 10:2)
To: shrinkermd
An atheist finds a sort of truth, then denies the power therein?
A start, does Flew move the ball forward past acceptance?
6
posted on
11/03/2007 6:09:30 PM PDT
by
padre35
(Conservative in Exile/ No more miller brewing products, pass it on/Isaiah 3.3)
To: shrinkermd
I’ll bet that it *killed* the Slimes to print this piece.
7
posted on
11/03/2007 6:12:25 PM PDT
by
Gay State Conservative
(Wanna see how bad it can get? Elect Hillary and find out.)
To: shrinkermd
“...wondrous feats that credulous people attribute to God.” and “Haldane chimes in to argue ...”. What arrogant reporting- but then it *is* the NYT, whose reporters imbue ultimate truths upon joining the august institution. Credulous readers then adopt their beliefs, and chime in during political discourse.
8
posted on
11/03/2007 6:16:12 PM PDT
by
paolop
To: M. Dodge Thomas
I dismiss this as a deathbed CYA coming from an insufferable old humanist fart who is now counting down his date with a dirt nap on a stopwatch........
9
posted on
11/03/2007 6:21:01 PM PDT
by
Viking2002
(Fred in '08. Deal with it.)
To: shrinkermd
I really wish God would start acting like He did in the Old Testament and just give a real kick to the Muslims and atheist marxist liberals.
To: camerakid400
He is the same. His ways are not our ways.
11
posted on
11/03/2007 6:26:35 PM PDT
by
BipolarBob
(Yes I backed over the vampire, but I swear I didn't see it in my rear view mirror.)
To: shrinkermd
"Antony Flew has concluded that some sort of intelligence or first cause must have created the universe." Then what makes miracles special? They are an intervention against nature after all. It would be as if God admitted making some kind of mistake in the universe He made.
Or is it a matter of degrees? Everything is one grand miracle, but miracles are especially.... miraculous.
Flew is a Deist, by my estimation. But only God can judge.
To: shrinkermd
Dinesh D'Sousa of late has come to the conclusion that the way to confront the anti-theists and atheists who have begun to evangelize their anti-theism is through reason rather than simply scripture.
Antony Flew arrived at his diesm, if it is indeed that, through reason, or so he tells us.
Perhaps Dinesh is on to something.
13
posted on
11/03/2007 6:34:28 PM PDT
by
jwalsh07
To: camerakid400
Then things must be the way He wants them.
14
posted on
11/03/2007 6:55:09 PM PDT
by
stuartcr
(Everything happens as God wants it to.....otherwise, things would be different.)
To: Viking2002
Really? So when is the cutoff for belief?
15
posted on
11/03/2007 6:58:10 PM PDT
by
Melas
(Offending stupid people since 1963)
To: camerakid400
That kind of change happens when the Messiah sets up the Kingdom of God on this earth, for His 1,000 year reign. That doesn’t happen to be too far away, perhaps a few weeks, months or a few years. We’re real close now...
To: Southerngl
Me too and you are going to be dead a lot longer than you are going to be alive.
17
posted on
11/03/2007 6:59:26 PM PDT
by
freekitty
((May the eagles long fly our beautiful and free American sky.))
To: shrinkermd
What caused the Big Bang, if not G-d? How can a universe appear out of a pin point of condensed matter? Further, the universe followed by ready made natural laws that enabled that boundless chaos to self organize into galaxies, solar systems, planets, life, and ultimately intelligence. If that is not evidence of G-d, I don’t know what is.
18
posted on
11/03/2007 7:12:39 PM PDT
by
rbg81
(DRAIN THE SWAMP!!)
To: shrinkermd
The Angles are rejoicing another saved soul, glory to God in the Highest.
19
posted on
11/03/2007 7:14:29 PM PDT
by
boomop1
(there you go again)
To: jwalsh07
Am reading Dinesh’s book, “What’s So Great About Christianity” and was going to order Flew’s book next.
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