By John W. Loftus ~ P lato's cave allegory is a good one applied to the issues that separate believers and non-believers. I know I'm in a culturally derived cave. So I can reflect on that which I have been led to accept since I realize I'm in it, and this makes all the difference in the world. My conclusion is that I can only trust science to tell me what I should accept. Doing so allows me to think outside the cave, to question the reality I was raised to believe. Believers raised in their respective religious cultures are in the cave and in denial. They have accepted and now defend what they were raised to believe using a double standard, one for their own faith and a different one for the faiths they reject. But the problem is faith. Believers all defend the merits of faith even though faith has no method. Sometime ago in the past in that cave during a dispute between prisoners, one of them said, "Let's test the idea," and the test solved the issue in ...

John W. Loftus earned M.A. and M.Div. degrees in theology and philosophy from Lincoln Christian Seminary under the guidance of Dr. James D. Strauss. He then attended Trinity Evangelical Divinity School , where he studied under Dr. William Lane Craig and received a Th.M. degree in philosophy of religion. Before leaving the church, he had ministries in Michigan, Illinois, and Indiana, and taught at several Christian colleges. Today he still teaches as an adjunct instructor in philosophy at Kellogg Community College and has an online blog devoted to " debunking Christianity ." His book is Why I Became an Atheist: A Former Preacher Rejects Christianity . Dinesh D'Souza (born April 25, 1961) is an author and public speaker who once served as the Robert and Karen Rishwain Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University . D'Souza is the author of numerous New York Times best selling books and a conservative writer and speaker. D'Souza is a Roma...