From: mayne@ds3.scri.fsu.edu (Bill Mayne)
Subject: Re: Ancient Books
Organization: Supercomputer Computations Research Institute
Lines: 25

In article <Apr.13.00.09.02.1993.28445@athos.rutgers.edu> miner@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu writes:
>[Any former atheists converted by argument?}
>This is an excellent question and I'll be anxious to see if there are
>any such cases.  I doubt it.  In the medieval period (esp. 10th-cent.
>when Aquinas flourished) argument was a useful tool because everyone
>"knew the rules."  Today, when you can't count on people knowing even
>the basics of logic or seeing through rhetoric, a good argument is
>often indistinguishable from a poor one.

The last sentence is ironic, since so many readers of
soc.religion.christian seem to not be embarrassed by apologists such as
Josh McDowell and C.S. Lewis. The above also expresses a rather odd sense
of history. What makes you think the masses in Aquinas' day, who were
mostly illiterate, knew any more about rhetoric and logic than most people
today? If writings from the period seem elevated consider that only the
cream of the crop, so to speak, could read and write. If everyone in
the medieval period "knew the rules" it was a matter of uncritically
accepting what they were told.

Bill Mayne

[This may be unfair to Lewis.  The most prominent fallacy attributed
to him is the "liar, lunatic, and lord".  As quoted by many
Christians, this is a logical fallacy.  In its original context, it
was not.  --clh]
