Did He Think We Wouldn’t Catch Him?

From the same mold of minds that said writing out 10²⁶² “would [require] fill[ing] up the entire known universe with paper,” we get another piece of crazy mathematical manipulation.

Chuck Colson wrote a piece for The Christian Post in which he said this:

Even atheist Richard Dawkins admits that there is a one-in-seven chance that God might exist. He simply chooses to take, as he sees it, the six-in-seven chances that God does not exist. That’s a bad bet.

Really? That’s what Dawkins said?

No, of course not.

Not that Colson would provide a citation for that claim, but the good bet is that it is a distortion of something Dawkins wrote.

In The God Delusion, Dawkins categorized the “belief continuum” into seven parts, ranging from someone who says he is 100% sure that God exists (1) to someone who is 100% sure that God does not exist (7).

Dawkins said he was at a 6, leaning toward 7.

Colson makes the jump to say that Dawkins, who put the “100% certainty of God’s existence” option on the belief spectrum, is saying there is a 1 in 7 shot that God exists.

Wow.

That takes balls.

Siamang wonders what the odds are of Colson making a correction.

I’m not holding my breath…

(via Scientia Natura and the eBay Atheist)

[tags]atheist, atheism, Jesus, Christian, math, religion, lies, liar[/tags]

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Kate

Seems like someone was reading their Bible during middle school math…
t3knomanser

That’s a sadly common misinterpretation of porbability theory. I think it arises from the most common examples- dice, coins, etc. Things where the each item in the set of results has equal weight. A die has six options, and that means a one in six chance of a specific number coming up. It’s an easy (and wrong) jump in logic to expand that to any situation where there’s a finite set of options.
Kate

Yeah like winning the lottery – I either win, or don’t. Sweet, 50% chance I’ll win!!!
Mriana

IMO, what Dawkins said is akin to my saying, “IF there is a god, it’s part of nature, much like the wind.” Science has yet to find it IF that is true. He is denouncing the traditional concept of the invisible old man in the sky, but not denying the possibility that there is something about nature we haven’t explained yet. His thoughts leave room for what science may discover.
Spanish Inquisitor

Who listens to Colson anyway? He became irrelevant in 1973, when he said “Grab ’em by the balls and their hearts and minds will follow.” Of course, he worked for Nixon at the time.

Now all he can do is shill religion.

Ptui.
John Waterman

And being a “6, leaning toward 7” is exactly the right position for a scientist. Never certain. Ready and hopeful that the evidence will show us something new.
HappyNat

He simply chooses to take, as he sees it, the six-in-seven chances that God does not exist. That’s a bad bet.

Him misrepresenting Dawkins is bad, but not understanding that a 6 in 7 cahnce is better than a 1 in 7 chance might be even worse. This makes the gambler in my heart cry.
Mikayla

What!! No, what Dawkins said that there is a 1-7 scale from abolutely certain theism to abolutely certain atheism. A person who is at 1 on the scale is abolutely certain god exists. Someone at 7 on the scale is abolutely certain god doen’t exist. Someone at 4 thinks it is equally likely that god may or may not exist. Someone at 6, such as Dawkins, admits the very slightest possiblity a god could exists, but that is about the same possiblity that fairies exist.

This is all in The God Delusion, and it would do Chuck Colson some good to read it.
stogoe

The odds of Colson correcting himself is roughly equal to the chances of Mickey Kaus coming out on national TV as a goat-blower.

And Colson is still big in the West.
Polly

Colson is on the radio – KKLA – every weekday (in LA) for a 5-minute spoken blurb about various subjects. Sometimes, he talks about causes I can agree with in general: the poor or the forgotten, modern day slavery, etc. I don’t know anything about him outside of that except that he was in jail and has a prison “ministry” which may or may not INCREASE recidivism.

In general, xian “leaders” and apologists are liars. Everything they say is deceptive advertising for their religion. I’m talking about the nationally known ones, not the pastors in the churches just struggling to get by. The poor ones are usually honest, maybe a couple of the well-off ones, too, maybe.
Karen

Colson is quite a hero in the evangelical Christian community. He’s very much admired for his work with inmates in prison, though I’ve never seen any good stats on how effective that program truly is.