"Open your heart and seek him sincerely" vs "false conversion"
So apologies if this is something people have asked before or if it's off topic, but I caught the debate between Matt Dillahunty and Ray Comfort from June recently and there's something that's been bugging me about Ray's responses to Matt. I've seen them talking on the Athiest Experience before, and I'm wondering if maybe this is something I've just missed it being discussed or something
Whenever asked for evidence of God, Ray seems to respond "If you open your heart, ask Him to reveal Himself to you, and seek Him sincerely, you will find Him", implying sincerely trying to believe and a willingness to follow God is all it takes to receive a revelation. At the same time though, when Matt points out he once believed he experienced this but now he's convinced he was mistaken, Ray justifies that as being a false conversion and says this is a common problem
Has Ray ever explained how to avoid a false conversion? He doesn't seem to reject Matt's claims to have sincerely sought God and followed him faithfully, but that seems to be all he says is necessary to find God, and once you find him you'd never leave the faith. If false conversion are possible though, how is someone supposed to avoid that if they can follow his advice and still experience one? It seems like, far from being a "simple" process, it's just a massive roll of the dice whether you have a real or false conversion, and even if you *do* believe you never really know if it's a false conversion
Hope someone has an answer to this one, it's been bugging me for a while now and I just can't see how the two can be compatible
Posted Sep 2, 2020, 6:57 PM UTC
you can't know what other people experience so its a silly thing to claim you do
this is a convienent argument - basically, his argument is we know it wasn't a false conversion if the person never deconverts, i.e. remains a believer.
Its a really bad faith argument because not only are you saying you just know better than I do, but you're also accusing me of being a liar about my own experiences.
He didn't really argue that he knew what Matt had experienced, he just seemed to accept Matt's experience as described, including his retrospective view that they weren't real, just with the explanation "You're right that they weren't real, that's because it was a false conversion. That's not what I've experienced"
It just seems odd that he wouldn't raise that as something to keep an eye out for when trying to convert people, or telling people how they can find God anyway. Matt's said he thinks Ray is sincere too, which is why I found it kind of baffling. By over-simplifying what's needed to experience God, he's potentially damning souls who'll never find the *true* faith because they were mislead by a false conversion without knowing it was possible
Well its almost a no true scotsman fallacy. "No conversions are true conversions except for the ones I think are." That sort of thing. The pejorative part is that if Matt believes he was truly a christian, saying "no, you werent, because you deconverted and no true christians deconvert" is challenging the internal experience of someone else.
I think its safe to say whether or not Ray is sincere in believing that's somehow a convincing argument - he isnt potentially damning souls because I dont think you can damn a soul, or whatever that is. Sincere christian beliefs can be baffling, though, no argumemt from me. I dont know that Ray understands how much of a bad faith argument it is to claim false conversion, but his understanding or lack thereof it doesnt make the argument any better, at the end of the day.
What I meant was that, in his belief system, he's potentially allowing souls to be damned. If Matt *still* believed he was truly a Christian (in the sense of having a relationship with Jesus, which I think is their usual standard), then Matt's already acknowledged he wasn't by their standard, so it's not really pejorative against him because he already acknowledged his internal experience was false
As far as the no-true-scotsman fallacy, it's more like he's saying "some of you are Scotsmen, some aren't, but there's no way to tell the difference. Might as well pretend all of you are Scotsmen until you come forward and say you aren't, even if not being a Scotsman gets you tortured regardless of whether you were aware you weren't one". It's just... weird
I agree. It is strange.
Im with you on your first response - but I would say all conversions are in fact "false conversions" by that metric. I just dont like the overall tone of explaining to someone what their experience was when you arent them. But we dont have to argue that point really.
The whole concept of a false conversion an improvable thing prior to deconversion, and pretty strange to sincerely hold contradictory beliefs based on unknowable information. If one thinks some beliefs are false and some are true when they both assert the same thing, its a paradox in that one (Ray) would argue the statement "I believe there is a God" can both be true and false depending on how it turns out in the future. Its shrodingers belief. Lol.
Sincerity can be paired with gap beliefs in that its more convienent for many christians to believe they are the only true christians and have an easy answer to things they dont know. Its also begging the question to say the way to prove if a conversion is "real" or "not real" is by whether or not the person is a christian at that moment.
Edit - may not be begging the question strictly... but it is circular.