I've never called in, although I have envied Dillahunty his gig, and have learned several things from him that I still use here on RF.
He was the first one I heard use the phrase justified belief, and to comment that he wants to believe only correct ideas. I held similar opinions implicitly, but hearing them in words made it possible for me to see that more clearly, making the ideas explicit in my head and available to use in discussion.
He also introduced the idea that Christian morality is flawed to me with the loophole trope. I shorten and reword it when I write something similar:
"Let's say somebody goes around and rapes and murders somebody, and after they're done, they get saved. What's the punishment for them? This is the problem with Christian religion. It establishes unrealistic and irrational and immoral criteria by which to live. And then it creates a loophole so that you don't ever have to be responsible for those actions. Christianity is not a moral system. It is an immoral system. Because it specifically says that there aren't necessarily consequences that you have to pay because of a loophole. And what is the loophole? It has nothing to do with how good you are or how morally you act. It has to do with whether you are willing to be a sycophant to an idea. And if you are, then there is an exception by which you no longer have to suffer a penalty for this. The idea that secular morality offers no guarantee that people will ever pay for their crimes and their atrocities is not an argument against secular morality because that is a tenet of Christianity. The idea that the Christian god is just is directly contradicted by the idea that the Christian god is merciful. Perfect justice and any mercy are necessary directly in contradiction, because mercy is a suspension of justice. Do not pretend that your religion is moral and just." - Matt Dillahunty
The following idea, which I first heard on that show, appeared in
an RF post I left this morning: "There's no good thing that a church or religion does that cannot be achieved by a purely secular means. And there is no positive benefit of churches and religions that necessarily demonstrates the truth of their supernatural claims." - Matt Dillahunty.
Here's another trope I first heard from Dillahunty. Later, I saw the famous Weinberg quote: "The fact that [the Catholic church] can do good is a testament to the fact that there are good people who will do good, but the organization is corrupt. It is poisoned to its core and it serves no essential good purpose, no true purpose, it is lie after lie, promoting harm to real people....the Catholic Church is not a force for good."- Matt Dillahunty.
Here's another linguistic turn of phrase that I have made my own: "Atheism is a single answer to the general question, "Do you believe in a God/god/gods?" For atheists, the answer is no. For theists the answer is yes. Apart from a position on the concept of God, there are no tenets, dogma, creed or code associated with atheism." - Matt Dillahunty
And another: "If there is a god, that god should know exactly what it would take to change my mind...and that god should be capable of doing whatever it would take. The fact that this hasn't happened can only mean one of two things: 1. No such god exists. 2. Whatever god exists doesn't care to convince me, at this time. In either case, it's not my problem and there's nothing I can do about it. Meanwhile, all of those believers who think that there is a god who does want me to know that he exists - are clearly, obviously, undeniably... wrong." ~Matt Dillahunty"
You can see that I've collected a lot from him for my files.
Regarding the video, I lasted ten minutes. Isn't that the way these discussions usually go? The hosts are clear thinking and articulate. Their comments are responsive and focused. The caller just stumbles. He can't make an argument. He can't answer a question asked to him even if asked to repeatedly. He appears to have no thesis. He refers to secular humanism, but there's no evidence in his words that he knows what that is. Yes, he's obviously not a native English speaker, but his vocabulary and grammar were fine. This isn't a linguistic issue. It's a cognitive one. It's a thinking problem. His thinking is disordered. Contrast his garbled content with the words of the hosts.
And that isn't a one-off thing. Isn't that what we see here on RF repeatedly - skilled critical thinkers in conversation with people with chaotic thinking like the one in the video? Many of the conversations here are just like that one.
That show is atheist school, just like RF. I consider the words of other critical thinkers the lecture part, and the parade of religious (and other) thought the lab, or field work. Dillahunty was a mentor for me 15-20 years ago, before I engaged in those types of discussions myself on the Internet, and I hope to pass along some of that kind of thought myself in this venue. It's always been my purpose to state explicitly for other skeptics to consider what I believe they agree implicitly with as I did Dillahunty, so that they can make better arguments using whatever appeals to and resonates with them as Dillahunty (and others - big Tracie Harris fan as well) did for me.
At this rate the irony will be all used up in the first page.
