Originally Posted by Sobekeus
The problem with debating religion is you can't actually have a proper debate.
What would be interesting is a reverse debate. Make the atheist play God's Advocate and the Religiosity All Star play... Not God's Advocate.
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Tried that on a 'neutral' subject on another forum: Pantheon gods.
It lasted two pages before the religious realised we were using their own arguments against them (inability to disprove, sabattical gods, inconsistencies by the arbitrary attitudes, intrigue and differing characters of the Pantheon gods, forces of nature and general lack of knowledge of and interest in the subject). What was funny was that we actually could explain dinosaurs and huge fossiles better than they did by applying mythology: Hydra's, Nemean Lions, Griffons, titans, etc. could all be "shown" to live in that time period using Greek myth, whereas there's no references to such monsters in the bible.
While they could not rely on their usual method of biblical text quoting, since they had to critique. Hell, we could even state "our" religion pre-dated theirs, so it "must be more accurate" (age is after all often used that way) and there'd be little they could bring in against that that wouldn't disqualify their own arguments at the same time. Even science was on our side since we had all the big philosophers from the Classical Era.
So typically, this kind of setup won't work, the only ones interested are the agnostic and atheists (sometimes in a rather gloating and vengeful way to vent frustration of hitting brick walls of stubornness in other debates by returning the favour).
Personally I'd love to try it again, but I very much doubt you'll get enough "opposition" in the debate.
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