The Liability of a Pattern-Seeking Brain

Here is a fun and quick experiment to highlight one of the key traits that humans possess, far above and beyond other thinking animals; a trait that is both a powerful advantage, and a crippling liability.

Look at this:
The Dog chased the Red Ball.

It is difficult to explain how incredible is it, what you just did. You read that sentence, and you understood it. In probably less than half a second, you decoded 28 characters, you decoded the special order they were placed in, understood the meaning, and pulled up accurate and useful images of a Dog, and a Red Ball. Within a shadow of a fraction of a second you had established a relationship between the Dog and the Ball based on your understanding of the word “chasing”, and in fact, without even thinking of it, you probably placed that dog and ball in a setting and context which is, probably, accurate and useful and in line with the mental setting I had, based on no information I gave you, but pure inference from past experience.

It may not seem like it, at first, but that is a truly astounding amount of information processing cascading along innumerable paths of inter-related memories and models all in the blink of an eye and all without any active effort or conscious thought on your part. Even this basic act, understanding a simple sentence and matching it up to useful mental models, is the kind of thing that even the most advanced AI programs and fastest processors to date can only superficially imitate in carefully controlled contexts. Even the best brightest of other thinking animals are amateurs by comparison when recognizing patterns and matching them up to complex and contextual assumptions.

We are also incredibly good at modifying those models on the fly. You have a generic image of a Dog, and a Ball, and probably some vague park-esque setting in mind based on the sentence I gave you, but If I say the dog is a Pomeranian and he is chasing a ball too big for him, then you immediately and without effort change the mental image of the Dog to something probably radically different than what you had in mind a moment ago, and scale the ball up to an assumed sized relative to the size you know a Pomeranian to be. Again, this is an incredible feat of information processing, done without effort. This gift for pattern recognition and model building goes beyond being effortless. It is, in fact, mandatory. You can’t avoid doing it even if you wanted to. Bear in mind, at the top of the page, I did not say “Read this”, I said, “Look at this”, but you read it anyway.

Try again, try to just look at the letters and not read them, try and just see loops and squiggles and dots. Try to bend all of your will towards seeing a word as a shape without drawing any meaning out of it.

Look at this:
“The Boy walks down the Stairs.”

Unless you have a truly unique (and by unique I mean broken) brain, you cannot help but have read that sentence, no matter how hard you tried. You cannot choose to only see lines on a page, even if you want to. Further more, you cannot avoid pulling up a mental model of the scene based on generic assumptions. You cannot stop your mind from immediately generating an image of a generic boy, on generic stairs, established that he is moving along them in an assumed direction (as in left to right, information your brain filled in to complete mental model of stairs, even though my sentence gave no indication of the direction in which the stairs slope). If I alter the image, and tell you the boy is wearing a blue shirt, no possible force of will can keep you from understanding that word and altering your model.

This compulsory nature of our pattern-based intuition is what can make this normally vital and useful mental tool go awry, and become a damaging burden under certain conditions. It hinders us in understanding things outside of the normal scope of our inference, and critically biases our world view in a thousand unconscious ways.

We cannot not see patterns. Anyone who has stared at a random background long enough will know that faces and shapes will eventually begin to emerge. Mankind had always seen shapes of earthly things in the stars, even though we all know that the Universe is not arranged with Fish, Lions, or Greek Heroes in mind. We have always been prone to superstition, thinking that a certain pair of sneakers worn to several winning games may be lucky or that a person who narrowly avoided an accident may be favored by fortune, even though we know that these circumstances are simply coincidence. This kind of tendency feeds directly into supernatural beliefs. When we encounter something that is far outside of our normal scope of inference, or see something that our brain can’t generate a sensible model for, then we force the next-closest thing to fit.

Only a few days ago I was driving near an airport at night, and one of the planes above me, taking off, appeared as a weirdly hovering triangle of light. Of course I know that I was near an airport, and the effect was caused by the plane being in a steep climb, it’s vertical rather than horizontal movement creating the appearance of hovering. With only the nose and wing tip lights as points of reference the size and distance of the object was difficult to gauge, adding to the illusion. Even though I knew I was seeing a normal event from an abnormal angle, I was struck by how UFO like it seemed, and couldn’t help imagine an alien craft filling the space between the lights. Another excellent example of pattern-recognition run amok is a park near my home said to be haunted by the Bride under the Bridge, a ghost apparition that only appears at midnight when the moon is full. I have gone to see the bride myself, and she really is quite striking. A unique combination of water discoloration on the concrete under the bridge, coupled with the shadows cast by a full moon during the midnight hour, create a remarkably convincing image of an ethereal woman in a wedding dress floating below the bridge, where an obsessed ex-boyfriend slew her on her wedding night. Again, this is nothing more than a normal thing seen from an abnormal angle, but this tendency to see forms and patterns where they may be none spawns countless stories of Ghost and Ghouls and Aliens and Spirits.

Our tendency to operate on generic unconscious models also serves to reinforce and exacerbate many of our biases. As much as I may be a liberal who is strongly in favor of racial equality, when I picture a boy walking down stairs, he is a white boy. As much I support the equality for women, and try not to be Anglo-centric, when I read the words “Wealthy CEO” I picture a man in decidedly Western business attire. Obviously as soon as someone tells me the CEO is a Sikh or a woman, I can quickly and easily alter the image based on that new information, but that initial generic assumption is neigh-impossible to uproot.

So why does this matter? Unfortunately, there is plenty of evidence to indicate that these inherent biases have very real impacts on our society. Even minor sources of discrimination, so small that nobody realizes they are consciously acting on them, can have real and significant effects when viewed on a scale large enough for all of those small acts to add up. For example, a study was conducted in 2001 and 2002 by the NBER Research Fellows in which they sent out nearly 5000 resumes to different employers across a wide range of professions and geographic locations, with the variable being whether or not the name of the applicant “sounded black” or “sounded white”. It was discovered that the resumes with black-sounding names got called back 50% less often than those with white-sounding names. Similarly late last year, Yolonda Spivey, who thought of herself as a well qualified professional, became frustrated that her online job search had yielded no responses or offers despite 10 years experience in her field and hundreds of jobs applied for. She re-posted her identical resume, under the exceptionally Caucasian name Bianca White, and received numerous job offers within 48 hours.

I do not believe that the 5000 employers in the NBER study, or the hundreds of employers in Yolonda’s experiment, were being deliberately or consciously racist. We can be all but certain that at least a few of those employers have since read these same studies and shaken their head in disappointment, without even realizing they were one of the employers involved. This is the kind of impact that our subconscious biases, which we ingrain in our default generic images of people, can have when blown up to the large scale.

It is not all a curse though. There is a way to keep the benefits of this pattern-seeking brain while mitigating the damages. The key is awareness. We may not ever be able to keep our unconscious brain from feeding us false assumptions, but we understand how the process works, and remain mindful of our own nature, can willfully choose not to act on those assumptions and inferences when not appropriate. We may not be able to consciously avoid being racist, or sexist, or Anglo-Centric in our most basic world-models, but we can be mindful of that influence and try to willfully counteract it, especially in important matters.

Feel free to respect and value your unconscious mind, and the amazing things it does, but above all else understand it. You cannot control, it, but you can understand it, and if you understand it, you can use it to its full extent where it’s most useful, and keep it in check where it’s most dangerous. In this way it becomes a power you control, rather than a power controlling you.

Accepting Christ as your Personal Savior: WTF Are They Talking About?

I spent a little time today reviewing a religious tract that someone had left in the break room at work. It was your typical fare, the same thing almost everyone in this country has probably heard a hundred times, but something struck me this time. “If you believe that Jesus Christ died on the Cross for your Sins, and that by his blood you are forgiven,” the pamphlet explained, “and receive Him as your personal savior, then you can reign with him in heaven for eternity.”

I can recall having heard this basic call to salvation since my most distant memories appearing out of the fog of early youth, but just now, just today, I stopped and asked myself, “What in the world does that even mean?” I feel a bit foolish now, having heard the plea (or some variation on it) so many times, but having never considered the actual language of the request. It is border-line nonsensical.

For one, the Christian call to salvation requires that you willfully choose to believe something. Isn’t this impossible? I am being asked to believe that Jesus is the son of a God (or a God incarnate depending on your theology) and that he was executed as a substitutive sacrifice for my future transgressions. Now what if I don’t believe that? What if I don’t believe that for the exact same reasons that I don’t believe any of the other similar religious martyr stories sprinkled liberally across antiquity? I cannot simply, by force of will, choose to believe something I don’t. Nobody can do this. Let’s say that I asked you to believe in Leprechauns. Can you simply choose to believe in Leprechauns on the spot? No, of course not. You must be convinced. Belief is a process, not a choice. So first and foremost, the Christian call to faith asks me to make a choice I cannot possibly make. I suppose I could fake it, just pretend I believe and go through the motions, but any God worth his salt could see through that I’d wager.

So then, if we agree that you cannot simply choose to change your belief, but must be convinced, then we arrive at the point where most Atheists have the biggest problem with religious claims….there is not enough evidence to convince us, and if we can’t be convinced, we can’t change our belief, anymore than a religious person could choose to believe in Leprechauns without convincing evidence.

The next part of the call is equally nonsensical; that my sins are forgiven by the death of Jesus. Preachers say, “By the blood of Christ our sins are washed clean” as if that statement makes all of the sense in the world. But does it? Let’s assume the statement is a metaphor, and the preachers isn’t literally saying that sin is some form of particularly pernicious stain and Christ-Blood is the only solvent strong enough to remove it. Let’s assume they mean something more like, “Sin is a form of crime against God, and that crime must be atoned for in order to enter heaven, and the death of Jesus retro-actively and pro-actively serves the sentence for all of these crimes.” Even if we put it like this, it still doesn’t make sense. Let’s say that I commit adultery, after a date to the All-You-Can-Eat Buffet, so we’re looking at two of the seven deadly sins in one night. Maybe that is a crime against a spouse or my own health, but how is that a crime against God? Even if it were a crime against God, how is death and torture a proper punishment for such menial sins? Even if death and torture were appropriate punishments for these crimes, how does torturing and killing someone else 2000 years ago make amends for my actions today? How does any of this make sense? What special property of the death of Jesus makes my binge at the Golden Corral no longer count? What is it about human sacrifice that makes the consequences of Adultery evaporate? I certainly can’t tell my arteries that being a pig is fine, and to not worry about a heart attack because Jesus died for my Gluttony. I don’t think telling a heartbroken spouse not to worry about your infidelity because Jesus died for it would actually make anything better. Apparently this is a special unique kind of forgiveness that doesn’t apply to anything in the real world, but only to God’s opinion of you on judgment day.

But even if some explanation can be provided for why all of the above works the way it does, then we are still left wondering why in the world God would make a list of things he doesn’t want his children to do, then creates them with a tendency to do all of those things, then puts himself in human form to be sacrificed to forgive those children for transgressions against his own rules, which he set down knowing they would be broken in advance. None of it makes even the slightest bit of sense. You know what would have been much easier to sacrifice, if God really wanted us forgiven of sin? The list of sins. Yup, if God had just said, “Eh, this list of sins is probably a bit too strict, you know what, screw the list.” That would have been a real sacrifice and display of understanding on God’s part, and would have been far more direct than the weird mechanics of how death atones for sin.

Lastly, and perhaps most weirdly, is that requirement that you “receive Jesus as your personal savoir”. For one, it seems strange to be that forgiveness of sin via the death of Christ doesn’t count unless you admit/believe that it does. It seems to be that if someone came along and paid off my student loan debt, that the debt would still be paid whether I knew it, admitted it, or wanted to believe it. It seems that if someone came along and healed me of some horrible condition, I would in fact be healed, whether I wanted to admit and understand it or not. As far as I can tell, Atonement through the death of Christ is the only thing that is absolute and binding, that doesn’t count unless you personally choose to believe that it does.

Furthermore, even when putting on my Christian hat, I cannot figure out what the verb “Receive” means in this context. What exactly is it that I am being asked to do? I can think of a thousand examples of receiving something, from a ball, to an exam, to a degrees, to a title, and none of them seem to match up to what Receive means in the context of an alter call. So what do I do? I get down on my knees, close my eyes, announce that I am ready, and then what? Will I be spoken to? Do I have to listen extra super-duper hard? Do I have to wait for some kind of special feeling or sign? I am often told that I must open-up my heart to Jesus, I assume that this is also a metaphor, and not meant literally, so then what does this literally mean? Do I pay close attention to my emotional state as well as my ears? Again, this requirement seems strait forward on the surface, but when you go to actually do it, you realize it makes no sense.

For review, the call to faith typically goes as such, “If you believe that Jesus Christ died on the Cross for your Sins, that by his blood you are forgiven, and receive Him as your personal savior, then you can reign with him in heaven for eternity.” And so, here is my theory behind what the Christian call to faith is really asking of you.

If you deliberately cultivate and foster wishful thinking, supernatural ideas, and credulity, eventually you will get past your inherent good sense and skepticism be able to make yourself believe things there really isn’t a good reason to believe. If you get to that point then the fact that Jesus’ blood can wash away sins will make a lot more sense, and you wont feel the need to nit pick it or think of it mechanically. Once you can accept all of that, you need to whip yourself up into an emotionally susceptible state, and if you do this while thinking about Jesus and sin and love and Hell and sacrifice, then you might have a cathartic experience, which you can then attribute to the Holy Spirit, and because by this point you have long abandoned your previous skeptical and cynical ways, you wont bother to question the fact that what you experienced was probably just the culmination of a long process of emotional manipulation, and then you can live the rest of your life with a sense of smug moral certitude and without constantly fretting over the terrifying permanence of death

I am afraid I must decline this offer and withdraw with my integrity intact.

Contra Apologia: The Fine Tuned Fantasy

The Universe appears to be fixed, or so some Theologians say. Everything, from the PH Balance of our Oceans, to the length of our day, to the fundamental forces that underpin the physics of our Cosmos, it all seems to be crafted just as it must be to allow humans to live and prosper. It seems that the odds of such fine tuning having arisen through the chance course of naturalistic means is so miniscule, so infinitesimal, that it cannot be believed to have happened. Given these observations, the Theist will conclude that a Divine Architect of supreme power must have designed this Universe with human life in mind.

This is the Fine Tuning Argument, which stands as one of the most popular and commonly advanced modern Apologetic positions. This Argument is so popular and so often used because of how well it appeals to intuition, and how difficult it can be to address in front of an audience. Christopher Hitchens, when questioned about which Theistic Argument he found most persuasive, presented the Fine Tuning Argument as being the most difficult to deal with (although “most difficult” on a scale of arguments that are all deemed unconvincing may not be saying much).

The Fine Tuning Argument, at least in the form it is usually presented, is fairly modern, being less than a century old. It is only in our most recent epoch of Cosmology and Physics that we have gained an appreciation for how narrow the band of life permitting circumstances is, and how unlikely it may be for such a band to have existed at all. However, in many ways the Fine Tuning Argument is really a reformatted and greatly focused version of the Teleological Argument, also known as the Argument from Design, which is an old Apologetic standby. The Argument from Design seeks to point to order in the Natural World which seems both unlikely to have arisen by chance, and displays properties which we commonly associate with deliberate design. This approach, claiming that the design we see in Nature is more than just metaphor, is applied to the order and structure of our Universe to portray the Cosmos as being a machine of sorts, designed to generate a world for us.

The Fine Tuning Argument bears the features of the Argument from Design that fathered it. Each of the major refutations applying to the Teleological Argument also apply to the Fine Tuning Argument. I wish only to discuss the refutations that apply more uniquely to the Fine Tuning Argument, but will refer you to the article Arguments from Design: The All Natural Watch Maker for further information on the Teleological Arguments in general.

I do understand the intuitive appeal of the argument, and I find myself from time to time marveled and perplexed by the mechanics that allow molecules in motion to act in manner that seems willful, and in the case of the brains of conscious animals, can in fact give rise to will. It is mind boggling to consider that everything that has ever happened, is happening right now, and will every happen is entirely dependent the positive and negative charges of different atoms and molecules that Gravity has clumped together.

However, as I have discussed before, intuitive answers to complex questions often prove incomplete or false, and it is no different with this discussion. The Fine Tuning Argument fails on three levels. It is often used as a debate tactic in a very dishonest way, it serves as an example of extraordinarily twisted reasoning, and it serves as a cynical and disingenuous tool of conversion in almost every case.

The Fine Tuning Argument stands up so well in debate for a number of reasons, none of them commendable. The Argument can hardly be presented without reference to the cutting edge of chemistry, physics, and cosmology, often venturing deep into territory beyond the understanding, let alone refutation, of anyone other than a specialist. It is easy for an Apologist to ramble off a list of such facts, one after another, regardless of how well they actually understand the technical aspects of their points they are making. They will lead their audience along by their intuition towards a conclusion: The existence of an often oddly specific God. The problem is that the Apologist likely has no more of a grasp on the actual mechanics of the Astrophysics they cite than the audience does. They surreptitiously slide out of Science and into Theist Philosophy to claim evidence they don’t understand supports the conclusion they held in the first place. The problem is that, due to the incredibly technical nature of the points being made, the Atheist is often not qualified to refute the position, and even if they were, it takes far longer to erase bad science and replace it with a proper explanation that it does to advance a cavalcade of half-facts and misplaced theories.

The first secret to dispelling the Fine Tuning Argument is to understand that the part of the Argument citing numerous factoids and revelations of Science serve as a red herring. It is an attempt to dazzle the audience with science and establish unearned credibility towards an unrelated point. They rely on the audience having little to no understanding of the facts presented, and their opponent lacking the time or the expertise to properly refute them. Even failing those assumptions, at least their intuitive chain of reasoning is more superficially appealing than the dry and technical nature of the likely response. It’s not truth. It’s a stage performance. It’s drama.
Perhaps the most glaring problem with the Fine Tuning Argument, even if we grant the rather dubious conclusions of the Apologists, is that the entire Argument is hinged on one of the most twisted redefinitions I have ever encountered. When the Apologist says the Universe is Fine tuned for Life, they employ the phrase “Fine Tuned for” in an utterly foreign and mysterious way that is almost impossible to decode.

The Universe is vast, larger than we can fathom. Think of how small you feel in those rare and fleeting moments, standing on a lone pinnacle at night beneath the dome of the stars, when your get a whisper of the vast space between yourself and the Belt of Orion. Think of that mixture of fear and excitement that leaps into your chest and then scampers out again as soon as you try to grab hold of it, because your mind simply cannot grasp something so immense. Our Cosmos many billion times over larger still that what we can conceptualize even in these tiny visceral snapshots. There are a Billion Galaxies, and a Billion Billion Stars, each with an untold number of Planets, each Planet with and untold number of Moons. That space is massive, empty, cold, and dead. Only on the tiniest of planets, under the rarest of circumstances, in the most fleeting of times, can life arise. Of the life that arises on that planet, 99.8% of it goes extinct in the blink of an eye. Of the remaining .2%, a tiny fragment happens to be Human. Those Humans live on a world with vast portions of its climate being deadly. In those small climatically hospitable windows these humans still encounter plague and natural disasters which regularly wipe them out droves without even noticing.

By what conceivable definition of “Fine Tuned for” can anyone posit that this Universe is Fine Tuned for Human life? The overwhelming bulk of our Universe is instantly fatal to Humans if exposed to it. The overwhelming bulk of our own Earth is instantly fatal to Humans if exposed to it. The remaining tiny pockets that are not instantly fatal are still fairly fatal on a regular basis. It is only by an astounding twisting of reason that “Fine Tuned for” can mean “almost completely antithetical to”.

Now there are those Apologists that will claim this is a misrepresentation of the Fine Tuning Argument. The Argument, they will say, is that the Universe had to have been incredibly fine tuned into order for even that massive cold emptiness of space/time to exist, which then had to be further fine tuned to even allow for that minuscule environment and time for Humans to live. The idea is that existence itself, the vast whirling cosmos, and the bulk of the earth are essentially the fumes of the machine that generates a Human inhabitable environment. This seems to me to imply a rather inept and wasteful God. This position also places some rather arbitrary limits on the abilities of God, or else to simply appeal to the mysterious ways in which God works, in which case why bother why with the Science at all?

The second secret to dispelling the Fine Tuning Argument is to realize that when the Apologist says “Fine Tuning”, they are not speaking English. There is absolutely no other context in the language in which the phrase Fine Tuning could be used to describe a system so wasteful to implement and so bad as achieving its goal.

The thing that is most hollow and cynical about the Fine Tuning Argument is how disingenuous it is. One would think that the purpose of presenting a case such as this is to share with the unconvinced the kinds of things that you found convincing in your own intellectual journey. It is understood in most academic debates or honest and open discussions, that you are presenting your beliefs and your positions in good faith, and not merely advertising. Apologists so rarely do this. I have never encountered an Apologist for whom the Fine Tuning Argument holds even one iota of sway over their personal beliefs.

The Fine Tuning Argument appeals to the current state of Scientific understanding, but so what? Apologists appealed to the current state of understanding before it was where it is now. When the Universe was past-eternal, Apologists found a way to make that apparent fact support God. Once the Universe became past finite, the Arguments changed to match. When the Universe was perhaps a place that could easily support life, that fact was highlighted to show God’s design. Once Science revealed that life is incredibly unlikely, that fact became a centerpiece of God’s design. It doesn’t matter what Science says, the Apologist will always find a way to make it lead to God. What is more is that you will hardly find an Apologist who will deny this when forced to answer earnestly. Try to pry a Theist for a response to the following question: “So are you saying that if we had been born 80 years earlier, having this debate in a time when Science did not support the conclusions you are drawing, that you would be standing here saying Science refutes God?” The Apologist will likely attempt to avoid the question, but if pinned down and forced to answer, they will likely conceded that no, they would have found a way to make the science of the day support the same conclusions.

The Argument is presented cynically, as a means to appeal to the scientifically minded. This is how the Apologist transforms from a knowledgeable expert, to a salesman. They stop extolling the virtues of the Religion that are convincing and meaningful to them, and start telling you what they think will convince you to buy the product.

The third and final secret I have (although there are surely more to be discussed another day) to dispelling the Fine Tuning Argument is to consider whether or not the line of reasoning the Apologist is presenting would have any impact on the faith of the Apologist even if it were completely overturned and proved to be absolutely false. If the Apologist is feeding you an argument that has no sway over their own intellect, then it is more than a little disrespectful for them to think it will sway yours.

The Fine Tuning Argument will likely continue to be a common tool in debate. It is a hell of a tactic. It is intuitively appealing, cumbersome to refute in conversation, and relies heavily on the authority of an expertise that nobody in the debate is likely to be able to undermine. Hopefully good information will spread to the point that audiences are wise, and Apologists will learn that they cannot get away with presenting manipulative Arguments, twisting language beyond all recognizably definition, obfuscating their own beliefs.

Lastly, I want to highlight the curious way in which an Apologist cuckolds Science, and uses it to incubate and foster their own beliefs. If an Apologist is willing to rely on an incredibly detailed, step-by-step, mechanical processes to get them to, say, the finely tuned value for the Electro-Magnetic Force, and then abandoned all of that rigorous specificity and jump head long into “therefore God”, then they are being dishonest. If the Theist earnestly respects that meticulous process, then they will continue to demand the use of that process in defining the Hows, Whens, and Whys of God’s involvement. If they champion the rigorous standards of Science, then abandoned those standards as soon as it gets them to their jump-off point, then the facts were presented cynically and had little to do with their beliefs in the first place. In which case, why did they bother at all?

Because it’s what they think you want to hear.

For the Glory of God: How Good turns Wicked

“In a world without Evil, a world without sin, there would be two attributes of God that would go unglorified. Those two attributes would be God’s wrath and justice poured out on those who do Evil, and God’s mercy on those who have done Evil.”
-Pastor Doug Wilson

It has been approximately a decade since my personal deconversion and fall from Protestant Southern Freewill Baptist grace. In that time, through the various selective and purging pressures of debate, research, reflection, and writing, my views have morphed, shifted, and matured in a number of ways. One of the more subtle, but perhaps the most important, shifts that my Atheism has undergone is the realization that what truly stokes my ire, threatens my values, and leads to evil in this world, is not necessarily Religion. The true villain, the mastermind of whom Religion is only a tool, is Absolute Authority. It is not the teachings and text of this or that superstition, faith, or doctrinal system that offends my sensibilities or shackles minds, but rather our capacity (in fact our eagerness) to grant Absolute Authority to these systems, whatever the details of them may be.

I recently re-listened to the debate, “Does the Triune God Live?” between Pastor Doug Wilson and former evangelical Dan Barker. It has been a few years since I heard the debate, and upon this listen, something new caught my attention, for all of the wrong reasons. Dan Barker was confronting the Pastor with the Problem of Evil, and the Pastor’s response was possibly the most dehumanizing and abject thing I’ve heard an Apologist dare to say in public debate. I suppose I must give Mr. Wilson credit for having the courage of his beliefs. The Pastor’s response is quoted above.

The Problem of Evil is one of the longest standing and most difficult questions for the Apologist. It is so problematic because of how powerfully the facts of our world contradict the stated properties of God. The discrepancy between the two calls out for resolution. Of course the Problem of Evil is easy to escape if you simply allow for a God that is not perfectly Benevolent. If you allow for a God that is mischievous, or mean, or petty, or even just indifferent, then the Problem of Evil evaporates. However the true genius of the Problem of Evil is not just that it highlights an inconsistency in the concept of God, but any attempt to answer the problem without compromising Omni-benevolence, shines a spotlight directly on the slavish devotion of the religious to absolute definitions and unalterable authority. They will squirm and twist and dodge and conflate and redefine and justify to the point that it becomes embarrassing to watch, rather than allow for the possibility of a less than Omni-Benevolent creator. The Problem of Evil dangles a shinny glinting bit of common sense directly in front of the Apologists face, and then forces them into all manner of contortions in order to refuse looking at it.

However, Pastor Wilson answers the question in a way that is Theologically consistent, sound, complete, and yet entirely discomforting and unsatisfying. Evil, claims the Pastor, is a means to an end, utterly under the dominion of the Creator, and serves a purpose that God willfully ordains. In fact, under the Wilson’s view of morality, “Good” is definitionaly identical to, “The Will of God”. As there is nothing that can possibly occur that is in contradiction to the Will of God, under the Pastor’s view there really is no such thing as Evil, and anything that would appear Evil to us is simply a byproduct of our incomplete understanding of God’s plan.
Those familiar with the Euthyphro Dilemma may have a little more insight into the issue at hand here. Rather than explaining those positions again, I direct you to the Article Euthyphro Everlasting, which can be found on this Blog.

I am not explaining the views of Doug Wilson to this degree because I have any particular interest in the individual beliefs of one Pastor, but rather because I think the Wilson has managed to take a belief that is widely and passionately held by many Christians, and forge it into specific and comprehensible language. I believe the manner in which Wilson addresses morality and the Problem of Evil in this debate is one of the most honest and bare representations of the Christian view of Morality, and it is chilling.

This view of morality tastes of ash to me. Some people claim to find a measure of security and solace in the idea that morality has no depth beyond the dictates of an Authority, and that the only application of studying Morality is in uncovering the true intent behind the less specific passages attributed to that Authority. I simply cannot grasp how this kind of shallow search for right and wrong could be anything other than belittling and unsatisfying. However, beyond my personal distaste, holding to this kind of morality is dangerous, as it directly degrades the value of human well being.

I find it difficult to muster the language to describe how deeply disturbed I am by the idea Wilson expressed in the quote above. God is perfectly capable of creating a world without Evil. God is perfectly capable of creating a world both free of Evil and compatible with Free Will. However, according to the Pastor, such possible worlds would allow God to only show off some of his perfect attributes, not all of them. It is important, cosmically important, that we human beings do terrible things to ourselves and to each other so that God may have a guilty party to demonstrate his Wrath on, and desperate souls to impress with his Mercy. God purposefully created a race of creatures prone to misbehavior, so that he could punish them and then forgive them. God displays such an utter devotion to his vanity that he values it above the peace and well being of an entire race and the eternal fate of their souls.

If there is a better definition of Megalomania and Sadism, I have never heard it.

What is truly disturbing is not that a fictional character may be crafted who displays such vile traits, but that Pastor Wilson, and millions like him, are content to view such a character, not only with admiration, but with abject worship. They are willing to set aside the common moral faculties that would allow them to see the utterly immoral wickedness of these qualities if they were applied to any other character imaginable. There is nothing I can imagine that is more servile, more dehumanizing, and more devaluing of our collective existence, than the idea that we and our world primarily exist to serve the vanity of the Boss on High. Yet people accept this otherwise disgusting state of affairs with glee and comfort as long as it is handed down from a position with enough Authority. This is how Goodness turns Wicked. This is how the word “Moral” becomes meaningless.

If there were nothing else, no other detrimental aspect of Religion at all, I would be compelled to fight it and its proponents due to this position alone. This is harmful, this is acidic, and this is cancerous. How can this view, that humans are nothing more than a means to an end, with the means being suffering and the ends being the Glorification of God, not be deleterious to the way we view and treat ourselves and each other? How could this belief, held so strongly by so many, not be corrosive to our relationships and our shared dignity? How could there possibly be no destructive side-effects to telling children, early and often, that this is absolutely true, and not to accept the truth of it is to court the worst fate imaginable?

Of course there are real, tactile, and dramatic consequences for planting the seeds of dehumanizing credulity in people. Perhaps the most celebrated Holy figure of this century, Mother Theresa, believed that pain and suffering were gifts of God, and that those blessed, yes blessed, with suffering were in the best position to know the glory of God. The common expression, “Kill them all, and let God sort out which are His.” was first spoken by the 13th Century Abbott Arnaud Amalric , and put into practice during the Crusades. The explicitly Christian Lord’s Liberation Army under control of Joseph Kony seeks to implement strict Biblical law on the nation of Uganda, and employs an army of Child-Soldiers, indoctrinated to view killing as simply a means to bring about God’s plan.

I would never go so far as to say the views Pastor Wilson promotes would ever lead directly and inexorably to such extreme ends. However, there is no doubt that the philosophy Wilson expressed in his response to the Problem of Evil is not only compatible with these extreme examples, but is more than a little complicit in the belief structure that justifies such things. It is not mystery how a passionate and deeply ingrained regard for human life as a means to an end might contribute to the idea that illness and hunger is to be celebrated while murder for the Glory of God is not only acceptable, but expected.

Compliments are due to those Christians in this world who divorce themselves from such hateful aspects of the belief. Kudos all around. But the inescapable and uncomfortable truth is that it is the dehumanizing Theology of Pastor Wilson, Mother Theresa’s fetishizing of illness, and the Religious Warrior philosophy of Joseph Kony, that serve as the more accurate and true implementations of what the Good Book teaches.

Convenient Christianity: Apologetic Gymnastics

Last night, while enjoying my evening run, I listened to the most recent debate performance by Apologetic icon William Lane Craig. His presentation was the typical canned arguments we’ve come to expect of him, but it was his response to a rebuttal by his opponent that got me thinking. The opponent (whom I can’t recall since all Craig debates tend to blur together, and of course I don’t care to go look it up) pointed out that Craig’s discomfort with the concept of infinity, and insistence that nothing can be uncaused, would discredit his own idea of an infinite and uncaused God. Of course Craig replied that his God is not subject to that criticism because of Craig’s customized definition of God, specifically crafted to make him immune to that very objection. This is essentially a more sophisticated version of the school yard “imagination game” that we all played as children.

“I attack you with my Fireball of Infinite Regress.” Says Craig.
“Well played!” Beams the opponent, “But I have a Fireball of Infinite Regress as well. Got you!”
“Nuh Uh!” Protests Dr. Craig, “I have the special Wizard Armor that shields me from that!”

If Dr. Craig is allowed utter control over even the most nuanced definition of the invisible, transcendent, and (most importantly) unavailable Deity he wishes to prove, then the debate is no longer over the existence of said Deity, it is over the limits of Dr. Craig’s imagination and lingual flexibility, which is a far less interesting and infinitely less important discussion to have.

If I have faith in anything, I have faith in the ability of the Religious to explain, rationalize, reinterpret, deconstruct, and redefine to whatever extent they require to make an old book jive with their personal philosophy. Years of participating in and observing discussions with the religious have shown me that the only reliable and consistent definition of God is that he will be whatever the believer wants him to be. If an Apologist needs God to have specific mechanics and properties for an argument, God will oblige. If the Apologist then requires God to retreat behind the shield of the unknowable and transcendent to avoid a rebuttal, then God does so without question. A Politician can always rely on God to be rigid and unchanging on some social issues, while being fairly progressive and modern in regards to others. We can count on God to always hate the same things we hate, love the same things we love, and be silent or vague when convenient.

It is no secret that there are 30,000 or more official variations of Christianity. We are not talking about total variations through history, but rather current, active, and practicing variations. I find it difficult to respect the authority, authenticity, or integrity of such a fragmented and fractured proposition. Imagine that there were 30,000 different versions of Physics, ranging in difference from only minor squabbles over the weight of E in energy and mass equations, all the way up to major disagreements over whether or not Energy exists, with some sects arguing that Gravity is only an illusion.

Certainly if Physics were determined by doctrinal interpretations of an old book, with no ability to actively study, test, or update the information, then Physics may very have ended up looking like Religion. Fortunately for us all, Physics is the study of something real, and imminent, and available. We can test, study, and test again, refining our knowledge, collaborating, and all the while eliminating inconsistencies and outliers while converging on more accurate definitions. This is not the case with Religion. With Religion there is nothing to test, nothing to check, and the only source of information is, by fiat, not subject to significant update or revision. This is why further discussion and analysis of Religion, rather than eliminating inconsistencies and converging on more specific definitions, leads only to further fragmenting, splitting, and a loss of definition.

This process of un-refining and losing definition has lead to versions of God and Christianity that are so incredible vague and nebulous that they become useless. There are people who do not adhere to any contents of the Old Testament, or generally of the New, and who only loosely respect select teachings of Jesus, and yet call themselves Christian. There are people who choose to call the Naturalistic Universe as Science would describe it, free of any ultimate consciousness or purpose, God, and who believe Jesus was nothing more than a mortal spiritual leader, and still they refer to themselves as Christian. You are free to use whatever language you wish to describe yourself and your beliefs, but the purpose of a definition is to define one thing from another. There comes a point at which a definition is stripped of that ability to distinguish and becomes practically worthless.

It is difficult to express how little I care about the personal and custom-tailored Gods that Apologists will parade across a stage, forged out selective reinterpretation of the Good Book. Given enough reinterpretation and explanation you can make any text mean anything you like. Anyone who has taken a Literature class should know this. If you grant me enough uses of “Yeah but” and “What you have to understand is”, then I will explain to you how Harry Potter is an allegorical retelling of the French Revolution.

So I have become rather disillusioned with the God of the Apologists. It is painfully obvious to me, as these men deliver their opening statements, that the God they are presenting is not an eternal, loving, and utterly supreme God, worthy of my respect and prostration, but rather the most useful and effective God they could devise for the audience and the purpose at hand. The Apologetic Gods often bear little resemblance to the personal Gods that the same Apologists worship in their private lives, and deviate greatly from the God worshipped daily by the people these Apologists are meant to represent.

Bertrand Russell had his challenge, that a Theist disprove the existence of a Tea Pot orbiting Jupiter. Christopher Hitchens had his challenge, that anyone present a Good or True or Right belief that a Theist may hold that in inaccessible to a Non-Theist. I would like to present my challenge today. The challenge is simple: Explain to me why God always seems to agree with the personal tastes and preferences of a given believer. Explain to me why we never encounter the Priest who says “I personal have no problem with Homosexuality, and in fact I feel Gays should have equal rights, but unfortunately God says otherwise and I must obey.” Explain to me why we never encounter the Pro-Lifer who says, “I think Abortion is a disgusting practice, and wish I could do away with it, but the Bible has nothing to say on the matter so God and I part ways on this one.” Why is it that, regardless of what the Bible does or does not say, God always affirms the preferences and prejudices of his adherents?

Why Your Beliefs are My Business

Anyone in the business of combating superstition will eventually be asked, “Why can’t you have your beliefs and let other people have theirs? Live and let live I say!”. There is almost no position a person could hold that I respect less than this one, at least when it comes to issues of any importance.

Let me be clear, there are certain disputes for which, “Live and let live” is a viable resolution. Any number of issues of taste or benign preference can be resolved with this mantra, and I have no problem using it in that context. However, if the preference or belief in dispute has real-world consequences, then I find “Live and Let live” to be an unsatisfactory concession, and the greater the severity of those real-world consequences, the less likely I am to let this resolution fly. The phrase is basically a bargain. “I will allow you to go on as you were before, and you will allow me to do the same, and we will stop trying to alter each other’s position.” This bargain seems fair at first blush, but is all too often a sour deal.

The phrase “live and let live” implies that beliefs are private, benign, and personal things that are nobody else’s concern or business, something you don’t need to bother with. Indeed some beliefs are of this private, sequestered, and harmless nature, but many are not, and it is these beliefs that are most often debated. There is a truth about beliefs, a truth that “Live and let live” attempts to ignore: Your beliefs do matter.

Your beliefs, especially those you hold most dear, affect and effect your actions, your day to day life, and what kinds of beliefs you are likely to adopt and support in the future. To put it simply, the more hateful, foolish, divisive, and superstitious things you believe, the more hateful, foolish, divisive, and superstitious things you are likely to do or support. Since no man is an island, and we live in an ever shrinking and increasingly interconnected world, your beliefs, and the actions they prompt, directly impact me and things I care about, and therefore become by business.

The level of harm caused by belief, and how much those beliefs directly impact fellow citizens, exist, like most things, along an aggravatingly fuzzy grayscale. At the extreme then there are, of course, dramatic examples. The moment your religiously stoked anti-American beliefs contribute to a bombing, your beliefs stop being private and become public business. The moment your paranoid government-hating beliefs lead to a clock-tower shooting, they stop being private and become public business. A little further down the scale, with less direct culpability, you find the man who runs a fiercely racists paramilitary conspiracy publication. Perhaps this man has never shot up a Military base himself, but his literature, his teachings, his methods, and his supplies may have directly inspired, consoled, and informed a man who did. While this whack-job bears no direct guilt, obviously his beliefs are not simply a personal and private matter, they are directly and undoubtedly my business, and yours as well. What about the infamous Westboro Baptists? These hellions cause untold emotional and social distress by acting on their beliefs. They have committed no crime, but only a fool would say their beliefs, and the actions those beliefs inform, are none of my business. Few people would disagree with my position so far. Perhaps we can argue over which of the aforementioned people deserve legal reprisal, but even those not prone to argumentation or debate could hardly criticize those who did wish to argue and debate with these kinds of people over their beliefs. The simple doctrine of “live and let live” would sound hollow and unsatisfying against beliefs that cry out so loudly for examination and criticism.

Here is where it gets fuzzy. Here is where the general head nodding and agreement most people would have with the above examples will start to waver. What about the vast numbers of people who don’t perform particularly egregious acts themselves, but privately hold to various religious and superstitious views? Are their beliefs my business? The answer is, you may have guessed, of course.

Would I be wrong if I said that the Christian beliefs held by a vast majority of American’s for many generations have caused untold harm and misery to Homosexuals? Would I be wrong in saying that those beliefs have cost many pregnant women dearly at the hand of anti-abortion efforts both legal and otherwise? Would I be wrong if I said that in the not-too-distant past the ubiquitous spread of these beliefs resulted in entire lifetimes of belittling and sometimes dehumanizing oppression of women, interracial couples, and various ethnic minorities? Of course this is just in the United States. If we expand the scope to Europe, or Africa, then the widely held religious beliefs of the common people have contributed, in no small way, to unimaginable amounts of harm.

The thing is that, quite often, you can easily identify a harmful religiously based belief, but cannot point to any one religious practitioner and say, “You! Your beliefs are responsible for widespread harm!” The particular person you are pointing to may have never acted on those beliefs directly, or may not even, when asked about their particular theology, identify with the belief in question, or they may have a different interpretation. However, having an entire nation of people casually, indirectly, and passively supporting these beliefs immensely amplifies the efforts of those do cause direct harm. No State Senator would be able to pass a bill outlawing Gay Marriage if he didn’t have a large population of civilians who agree with him enough to elect both himself and enough other senators for a Majority Vote. Anti-Abortion and Homophobic positions are mainstream, and not on the fringe where they belong, precisely because so many people identify themselves as holding the same general set of values under which these causes most often fall. If I attack the beliefs of the homophobe, or the New Age medicine Guru, or of the Evangelical, or of the Conservative, it is because their beliefs, no matter how little they act on them personally, feed upwards in a giant pyramid scheme of power and influence does, as a point of fact, end up impacting me and those I care about.

This is why I cannot accept, “Live and let live”, because the bargain is a bad one. If I attack the beliefs of a Pro-Lifer, and they refuse to budge on their position, then “live and let live” actually means “You leave me alone and I will continue causing harm.”. This is not a compromise. This is not a resolution. This is a concession on my side and a victory on theirs.

There was a time when Racism and Sexism were not the toxic fringe beliefs they are now. There was a time when these were mainstream views held by a majority of Americans. It was only by relentlessly debating, talking, writing, speaking, and arguing that general social changes came about. Racism did not die out because some of some single great debate victory of a champion of racial equality over a member of the KKK. There was not one fell sweep of a social scythe that culled the racists. The battle was won by slowly and inexorably changing the mind of individuals, and thereby marginalizing the champions of the cause and sapping them of their power.

This is why it is important to keep talking, keep debating, and keep challenging even those beliefs that only passively or indirectly support harmful positions, because it is the only way to win, and History has shown us that it works.

Selectively Traditional: The Myth of Christian Values

“Central to America’s rise to global leadership is our Judeo-Christian tradition…”

-Mitt Romney during 2012 Presidential Campaign

Being born and raised in a rural and somewhat isolated region of the Mid-West I am intimately familiar with Traditional Christian Values. I have experienced first-hand the way this sometimes specific and often amorphous set of standards lays over small communities like a fog, ever present and so easily violated. Christian Values, or rather transgressions against them, are used to stoke fear and righteous indignation in the population, and never more so than during election season. As I listen to these constant appeals to tradition, I am forced to ask, in the face of what I know of the world and of our history, exactly what tradition is being appealed to? I consider myself more than passingly familiar with the contents of the Bible, and much of what is so passionately endorsed by fundamentalist pundits resembles a Pleasantville styled alternate history more than it does the content of the Good Book.

First I want to set aside a possible confusion. Traditional Christian Values are not synonymous with Traditional American Values, as much as the Evangelical crowd would like to claim otherwise. Demonstrating this difference in depth is a point for another time, but we can all agree that the United States is a nation with a strong history of encouraging immigration, and with one of the most diverse populations of any nation in the world. As such it should be absurd on its face to claim that the values of any one particular religious system represent the values of such a distinct and granular landscape of peoples and customs.

We should always be cautious of the word “traditional”, and be mindful of the ways in which it is being used. The word can easily shift from being informative, to regulatory, often with little sign of the shift having occurred. If you were to visit a museum you may encounter a demonstration of a Traditional Native American war dance. In this context the word “traditional” is informative, letting you know that there is a measure of historical authenticity to the demonstration. That integrity is valued to those with an earnest interest in such things, and is worth highlighting. However, if a preacher stands before City Council, opposing an ordinance regarding public accommodations for Transgendered peoples (an actual recent debate in the City Council of my Hometown), and claims that such allowances will degrade Traditional Morals, then his use of the word “traditional” takes on a different meaning than it did in the museum. In this context the word is regulatory, compelling you to adhere to a given standard by merit of it being a historically held position

The problem with the word “traditional”, and the reason it is so powerful in the hands of spokesmen, is that those four syllables serve to smuggle in an entire argument and a world of assumption. What traditional means, in the regulatory context is: “Because this value has been held by previous generations, and because we have respect for previous generations, and because this value served those previous generations well, we too should uphold this value.” Of course it may or may not be the case that the value served the previous generation well, that we hold any particular respect for that generation, or even that the previous generation held the value in question at all. None of this can be so easily granted, but by even allowing the phrase “traditional value” to go unquestioned, we have already ceded that entire debate. We should always be mindful of the baggage the word carries, and be prepared to question the unspoken assumptions that try to sneak in.

So then what about those who wish to refer to tradition in a proper and informative, rather than regulatory, way? A Politician may cite Traditional Christian Values, not as a mandate for a course of action, but to act as a contrast to highlight the problems they see with the current or proposed system, or to use as a model for a past system that they believe worked better. Tradition in this context would need to refer to a historically persistent standard or practice that exists fairly universally within the demographic being referenced, in the case of this discussion, Christianity. It would be productive, with that standard in mind, to look at some of the values the Evangelicals purport to champion, and see whether or not the values being promoted meet the test of being “traditional”.

I am always taken aback when I hear the religious cite traditional, biblical, family values as a standard worth upholding. I am shocked both by how misleading and how ill-informed the statement is. When a Conservative references traditional family values, the image they intend to conjure is one of a father and mother raising their well behaved children in a modest home appropriate for their station. Often accompanying this image of the family is the idea that a Father is necessary to provide disciple and ensure that the children are instilled with a healthy respect for authority. This picture of the traditional family explicitly excludes the idea of a Homosexual or Polygamous Union. As with so many of the most cherished values of the Christian Right, this standard is derived more from the traditions of Mayberry than the traditions of Israel.

A traditional biblical family rarely consisted of only a father and a mother. A proper biblical Patriarch was entitled more or less to the sexual promiscuity of his choosing, being permitted multiple wives and concubines with no discernible condemnation of the practice. Abraham, one of the most revered Biblical figures, was renowned for being a virile lover to his multiple mistresses even late into his years. The wisest man in the Bible, Solomon, maintained an army of sex slaves with an untold number of progeny resulting. Meanwhile, among the common folk, it is well documented that young virgin wives were to be traded and bargained for as property, and that a man could claim a bride of his choosing by raping the desired woman and then paying her father for the cost of her virginity.

The Biblical image of marriage and courtship is not one we find particularly appealing, but what does the Good Book say about how to raise the resulting children? The Bible is quite explicit that unruly Children are to be physically disciplined up to the point of stoning. The phrase most commonly associated with an abusive and authoritarian home, “Spare the rod, spoil the child” is, after all, a Biblical Proverb. The Biblical relationship between Fathers and Daughters is fairly bleak since, as mentioned above, the Bible is insistent that daughters be considered as property of their fathers. What does the Bible have to say about the relationship between Fathers and Sons? The most well known Biblical Father/Son relationships are those of Abraham and Isaac, and of course God and Jesus. In the former in the Father attempted to sacrifice the Son to God to appease God, and in the later God did sacrificed his Son to appease himself. All said the parent/child relationships present in the Bible are extreme, violent, possessive, and authoritarian. Is this is not the kind of traditional Judeo-Christian value former candidate Romney was referring to?

I believe there is an open and shut case to be made that when the Christian Right cites traditional family values, the tradition they reference is most certainly not the biblical one. While the Bible does admonish homosexuality, it is stands firmly in support of polygamy. While the Bible does endorse the corporal discipline of children, it is not bashful about that disciple include ritual execution. As well as condoning the murder of disobedient children, the Bible treats children as chattel to be bartered, sold, or sacrificed as necessary. Beyond the basic core principle of Patriarchy, virtually none of the Neo-Con family values match up to the kinds of arrangement held up by the Bible as worthy of respect and admiration.

Not only do the values pushed by Conservatives not necessarily match up to the values present in the Bible; these supposedly sacred values are incredibly transient over time. We cannot forget that women were once denied the right to vote and encouraged to stay in the home under the auspices of Christian Tradition. It is well known that Biblical Values were paraded before courts to keep interracial marriage illegal. The fact that these values have now fallen out of vogue, and new causes have since risen to Conservative prominence, reveals the entire Christian Values mantra to be the temporal, fickle, political device that it is.

It has long been said, amongst the non-believers, that whatever God you worship is nothing more than the ultimate idealized projection of yourself. This is why it never fails that God happens to share all of the same values as his followers, even when his followers do not share the same values. God truly is personal, in the sense that every person has their own God. This is why you never encounter the Liberal Christian who says “I really have nothing against Gays, and if I had my way it would be live and let live, but unfortunately God says otherwise, I’m sorry.” This is why you never encounter the Pro-Lifer who will claim, “I despise Abortion, I think it’s a horrible practice, but the Bible has absolutely nothing to say on the matter, so I guess I’ll just have to deal with it.” This is why God will always, through some twisting or obfuscation of the text, happen to agree with whatever is believed by the practitioner. I think it we can say with some certainly that the oft-cited Christian Tradition fails the test of being Traditional at all. These values are not historically persistent, and do not exist in with any consistency within the population that claims to believe the same thing. If “traditional” doesn’t mean historically persistent and fairly demographically ubiquitous, then I find the word hollow and meaningless.

So then, when the Evangelical claims to champion traditional Christian Family Values, what on earth are they talking about if their values are neither particularly traditional nor particularly Christian? The answer is as plain and cynical and vulgar as you could possibly hope for. Traditional Christian Values are definitionaly equivalent to whatever values the Religious Right happen to hold at the time, regardless of what the Bible actually has to say on the matter. Tradition is a means to an end.

It is difficult for me to take a person seriously who claims to be defending Christian Tradition, when in fact what they are defending is 1950’s American Conservative Tradition and calling it Christian. I find it difficult to respect a person who claims to be upholding Biblical values, when most of their values aren’t endorsed by the Bible, are flatly contradicted Bible, or are painstakingly cherry-picked from the Bible. Unfortunately, thanks to the Republican bedding of the Religious Right, these people have a strong and well established foot in the political door, and I am forced to take them seriously whether they deserve it or not.

It is well known in Politics that having God on your side is an incredibly potent endorsement. The majority of our citizens equate Christianity with moral aptitude, and will vote a Religious line that often happens to coincide with a particular party line. As God rarely makes stump speeches or introduces candidates, it is much easier to simply say that God in on your side, even if the positions you push have little to nothing to do with God. Perhaps the best we can do for now is to underline and highlight this dishonest behavior, beseech our religious friends and family to see this tactic for the manipulative device it is, and hope for a day when religion and politics will not be quite so intimately intertwined.