You Win Salvation and a Toaster Oven!

[dv8nation.livejournal.com]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/turkey/5729452/Turkish-gameshow-attempts-to-convert-atheists.html

A gameshow in Turkey has religious leaders competing to convert atheists to their faith.

The producers behind the programme hope it will promote religious beliefs and educate the country's majority Muslim population about other faiths.

"The project aims to turn disbelievers on to God," Ahmet Ozdemir, the station's deputy director, told the Hürriyet Daily News and Economic Review.


I've seen a lot of messed up game shows. And I say this as a guy who lived in Japan. But this really takes the cake. How do they expect anyone to take a game show conversion seriously?

Comments

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

I'll take the "People are idiots" option for $1200, Alex.

[stef-tm.livejournal.com]

love this comment.

[htpcl.livejournal.com]

DQ.

[rasilio.livejournal.com]

?????????????????????


WTF


Why would any Atheist want to go on this show? What's in it for them? They only win if they actually convert, which has a heavy assumption that they actually WANT to believe in a god.

Also, do the Atheists get a chance to "convert" the clergy?

Finally, even assuming that the Atheist DID want to convert it is highly unlikely that any of these clergy will be able to present any argument or evidence that the Atheist has not already reviewed and rejected because if they are an Atheist and they actually wished to believe in a god but found themselves unable to do so then they would have already engaged in a long search for it

[montanaisaleg.livejournal.com]

Why would any Atheist want to go on this show? What's in it for them?
A pilgrimage to Mecca, Jerusalem, or Tibet! Given the choices, I'd probably convert to Buddhism. Tibet would be pretty awesome to visit.

[anosognosia.livejournal.com]

"it is highly unlikely that any of these clergy will be able to present any argument or evidence that the Atheist has not already reviewed and rejected because if they are an Atheist and they actually wished to believe in a god but found themselves unable to do so then they would have already engaged in a long search for it"

This hasn't been my experience, to say the least. Indeed, it's rare to find anyone who can so much as accurately state what any of the classical arguments for God are. People's pretensions to knowledge about this topic are somewhat strange. I imagine it's a natural extension of religious fideism adapted to an atheist context.

[rasilio.livejournal.com]

Well first off since outright athiests only make up somewhere around 2% of the population that makes us pretty rare. Still you are correct the majority of us have not ever encountered or considered the classical arguments for the existence of a god, however the average atheist would have absolutely no more interest in going on a "game show" such as this than the clergy present would have in going on one in which atheists tried to convince them that their god was imaginary. No the only ones who would show up are that very small subset of Atheists who are actually troubled by their inability to believe and desperately wish that they could change their belief. With these you're talking one in a thousand out of one in fifty only around one in every 20,000 people and they all have a LOT of interest in studying arguments in favor of the existence of a god.

In otherwords, the odds that a random person would be familiar with any formal arguments either for or against god, extremely small, odds that your average Atheist would, decent but still below 50%, odds that someone interested in going on this game show with enough of an open mind that there is any chance of converting them will be aware of them, 100%.

[anosognosia.livejournal.com]

"odds that your average Atheist would, decent"

Right, this is what I'm saying seems not to be true.

This being an aside to the game show thing which sounds quite silly.

[chipuni.livejournal.com]

I saw these articles two years ago.

Am I the only not-major-religionist(*) who would eagerly join the show in order to travel to Mecca, Jerusalem, or Tibet?

From the article:

Converts will then be monitored to ensure their religious transformation is genuine and not simply contrived to gain a free holiday. "They can't see this trip as a getaway, but as a religious experience," Mr Ozdemir said.

Darn. No, I'm not.

(*) I'm a 'Jeffersonian theist': God created the universe, but doesn't otherwise interfere.

[anosognosia.livejournal.com]

Deist?

[chipuni.livejournal.com]

Crap. You're right.

Deist. NOT Theist.

Thank you.

[ddstory.livejournal.com]

Could you expand on your opinion a bit? One line wasn't enough to understand your point.

[dv8nation.livejournal.com]

If the idea is to bring people to God a silly contest with a free vacation as prize makes a mockery of what in normal circumstances would be a profound life choice. And the holy men taking part in this are little more than shills rather that anyone a person should turn to for spiritual assistance.

[ddstory.livejournal.com]

OK so what prevented you from adding that to the OP?

[dv8nation.livejournal.com]

Because I had to log off right after I posted that.

[htpcl.livejournal.com]

She has a point. It shouldn't be too much of a pain to put some thought as opposed to copy-pasting some article and saying "This is messed up. Discuss.".

[anadinboy.livejournal.com]

"The present letter is a very long one, simply because I had no leisure to make it shorter".
Blaise Pascal.

[ddstory.livejournal.com]

I think you're confusing this forum for a newsreel. The idea is that most of your post is supposed to be your creation, not a copy-pasted article from somewhere. There's ontd_political for that.

[dv8nation.livejournal.com]

I think I've posted enough and well enough to show that I know the rules. Sue me for once rushing something. I'm human and make mistakes.

[ddstory.livejournal.com]

I know.

[ghostwes.livejournal.com]

I'm a lifelong atheist myself, but I can't help but find this idea very amusing.

Despite the stated intentions of the producers I suspect they'll end up converting a lot more people to atheism than vice versa. Plus, the added bonus of increasing religious tolerance (this is after all a dialogue between different religions, just in the form of a game).

I hope copies of this show will make their way here with English subtitles. Should be good for a laugh.

[tridus.livejournal.com]

How do they expect anyone to take a game show conversion seriously?

The same way people take anything on any "reality" show ever made seriously. People are idiots.

[montanaisaleg.livejournal.com]

If any of the religious folks on the show convert to atheism instead, where does the trip they win take them? I should create an atheist holy city somewhere really great that they could go to. Probably somewhere tropical, since game shows like sending people to places like that. But it wouldn't just be a trip they'd win. It would be a pilgrimage. They'd have to not really worry much about god or religion for the whole trip. Otherwise, they could do whatever they want.

[anadinboy.livejournal.com]

the library

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

There's something in this. The atheist pilgrimage should be to lie on a beach in a tropical paradise for a week.

[the-rukh.livejournal.com]

They are giving religion the respect it deserves?

[reality-hammer.livejournal.com]

Here in the US we just take game show marriages seriously. :P

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

How many #1's has the "Idol" franchise created thus far?

[rasilio.livejournal.com]

Looks like 17 Billboard Hot 100 top 10 hits ...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Idol_alumni_single_sales

However only 1 #1 hit on that chart, however some of those songs hit #1 on other charts, for example Carrie Underwood has at least 9 songs that made #1 on some Country Chart or another, Daughtry has at least 3 which made it to #1 on at least 1 Chart, Jennifer Hudson has at least 1 #1 on the R&B/Rap Charts and so on.

You can throw in 16 American Music Awards, 42 Billboard Music Awards, 8 Grammy Awards, and 1 Academy Award

Most of them of course belong to Carrie Underwood and Kelly Clarkson. **

Not really sure what this has to do with much of anything though.


** = and no, I'm not actually a fan of American Idol, I've seen exactly half of one episode and don't intend to watch any more of it, honestly if I'm gonna watch "reality tv" I'd rather watch Deadliest Catch, however I am a fan of some of the artists who got their start on the show and I have fairly leet google fu.

[mikeyxw.livejournal.com]

Yeah, conversion by the sword would be much more compelling and make for better TV.

[htpcl.livejournal.com]

Bring in the lions!