The following is taken from a post (link) by a fundie member of my forum:
Salt & Light wrote:Now I would like to introduce you to one of my favorite atheists, Antony Flew. For the past half-century Antony Flew has been the world's leading advocate of atheism. No one has so relentlessly espoused the atheist cause, and no one has been more anthologized and eulogized by the atheist community. Other twentieth-century philosophers, such as Martin Heidegger and Bertrand Russell, were unbelievers but they did not make atheism central to their philosophical work as did Flew. Flew's atheism long precedes that of latecomers like Dawkins, Harris and Hitchens.
[url=http://news.aol.com/newsbloggers/2007/11/15/the-atheist-who-came-in-from-the-cold/][color=darkblue]The Atheist Who Came In From the Cold[/color][/url] wrote:Now, in his early eighties, Flew has rejected atheism and said he believes that God exists. He does not espouse the Christian God, but calls himself a Deist. He says he has a lifelong commitment to following the evidence where it leads, and that new advances in the sciences have shown him that materialism and Darwinism simply cannot account for the world as it is and life as it is. Examining the fine-tuning of the universe and the mind-boggling complexity of the cell (a compexity that evolution presumes but cannot explain), Flew now believes that the design of the universe requires a designer. He gives his reasons in a new book There Is a God, which is co-authored with Roy Abraham Varghese.
I encourage everyone here to do a little research on the topics we have discussed here and on Antony Flew, then do a little soul searching to determine whether your beliefs are supported by fact or fiction.
Has anyone else come across this claim before? I think Mr. Flew's conversion to deism is really being taken out of proportion, and Mr. Flew's real extent of greatness is being hugely exaggerated for the purpose of showing "Ha, see!" for their cause.
In any case, I couldn't let the part about his supposed new book go, so I posted this great article by Richard Carrier who puts it much more eloquently than I ever could. I ended saying: "I think it's a poetic coincidence for it to be suggested that skeptics should thoroughly reflect on whether their beliefs are really supported by fact, using a story that wreaks of fabrication on the part of a pair of evangelical hacks."
If The Infinity Program were not a forum, it would be a pie-in-the-sky project. “Faith is both the prison and the open hand.”— Vienna Teng, "Augustine."
I've heard of every other name mentioned and was aware of their atheist leanings, I've never heard of this Antony Flew. Therefore he probably is not the world's leading proponent of atheism.
Flew "converted" to mild deism. Hardly a champion cause for Christians or any other religion.
Lì ci sono chiese, macerie, moschee e questure, lì frontiere, prezzi inaccessibile e freddure
Lì paludi, minacce, cecchini coi fucili, documenti, file notturne e clandestini
Qui incontri, lotte, passi sincronizzati, colori, capannelli non autorizzati,
Uccelli migratori, reti, informazioni, piazze di Tutti i like pazze di passioni...
...La tranquillità è importante ma la libertà è tutto!
Apologies, That NOS Guy. But since you left KAC, I thought I might as well pick on you.
Alternate universe Salt & Light wrote:Now I would like to introduce you to one of my favorite Christians, That NOS Guy. For the past half-century That NOS Guy has been the world's leading advocate of Christianity. No one has so relentlessly espoused the Christian cause, and no one has been more anthologized and eulogized by the Christian community. Other twentieth-century philosophers, such as Martin Heidegger and Bertrand Russell, were unbelievers but they did not make Christianity central to their philosophical work as did That NOS Guy. That NOS Guy's Christianity long precedes that of latecomers like Dawkins, Harris and Hitchens.
...
I encourage everyone here to do a little research on the topics we have discussed here and on That NOS Guy, then do a little soul searching to determine whether your beliefs are supported by fact or fiction.
I take quite an interest in atheism and theology. I read a book in late 1990s called 'Does God Exist?: A Believer and an Atheist Debate'. The putative atheist in the sub-title is Flew. I say "putative" because the impression I got at that time was that he was only an agnostic at best. For my own amusement I did a critique of the book, as I do with some books I read (some reviews/critiques of some other books I have posted on net).
Anyway, prior to reading that book I had never heard of him. So, no, he is not the world's leading atheist. He does have more notoriety in Britain.
Apparently the new book is not really written by him but by Varghese; he is apparently partially senile, and is being manipulated by fundies.
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Flew was a prominent philosopher he's now in his 80s with his mind failing and a shadow of his former self this article details how evangelical Christians have taken advantage of an increasingly senile old man who doesn't can't even remember conversations he supposedly quoted in the 'There is a God' a book he supposedly 'co-wrote' with Christian apologist Roy Varghese.
Pharyngula has a summary of the story if you don't want to wade through all 6 pages.
This whole sorry story is just yet another example of theists being inspired by their imaginary friends to behave despicably.
Flew wrote a short essay in (I think?) 1950 called "Theology and Falsification", which you can find amongst other places here. It is (or at least was) very well know, and a standard text for years. Flew, unfortunately, is senile these days, and is being shamelessly abused by unscrupulous people whose own moral standards direct against doing exactly that. It's all very sad.
"what huge and loathsome abnormality was the Sphinx originally carven to represent? Accursed is the sight, be it in dream or not, that revealed to me the supreme horror - the Unknown God of the Dead, which licks its colossal chops in the unsuspected abyss, fed hideous morsels by soulless absurdities that should not exist" - Harry Houdini "Under the Pyramids"
"The goal of science is to substitute facts for appearances and demonstrations for impressions" - John Ruskin, "Stones of Venice"
Surlethe wrote:Apologies, That NOS Guy. But since you left KAC, I thought I might as well pick on you.
Yeah, yeah right back at you
As for the topic, it's not like the man took up the cause of the New Life church and started preaching about science's distardly effort to lie to convince people to accept evolution. He adopts an extremely mild form of things trying to keep it in line with what's observable. It's hardly something Christians can celebrate. Unless of course you're of the "any faith is better then none" crowd.
