Skip to main content

Atheist bus complaint rejected


More news on Stephen Green's silly complaint to the Advertising Standards Agency about the atheist bus adverts which say "There's probably no God". Green said:

"Advertisements are not allowed to mislead consumers. This means that advertisers must hold evidence to prove the claims they make about their products or services before an ad appears."

The above complaint resulted in this verdict:

"The ASA council concluded that the ad was an expression of the advertiser's opinion and that the claims in it were not capable of objective substantiation. Although the ASA acknowledges that the content of the ad would be at odds with the beliefs of many, it concluded that it was unlikely to mislead or to cause serious or widespread offence."

I disagree with this verdict because I believe the claim on the buses is capable of objective substantiation. Indeed, it's substantiated.

Source here.
Labels:

Comments

Anonymous said…
Well to borrow a phrase "If it isn't hurting it isn't working."

Ought to strengthen the phrasing for the next ad perhaps.

Actually I gather Prof. Dawkins was after a new slogan. In the spirit of science it would be best to conduct some experiments first to determine which phrase is the most effective.
January 23, 2009 at 6:20 PM
Steven Carr said…
I see it didn't take long for Christians to respond with abuse, calling non-believers 'fools'
February 5, 2009 at 7:41 PM
Anonymous said…
"Advertisements are not allowed to mislead consumers. This means that advertisers must hold evidence to prove the claims they make about their products or services before an ad appears."

And yet Christians are allowed to advertise their religion on large posters in public place, with no evidence whatsoever that it's the truth?

Why is it one law for Christians and another for us Atheists?
March 8, 2009 at 9:48 PM
Achilles24 said…
I'm curious why it is says "Now stop worrying and enjoy your life", implying almost that because you may believe in God you are constantly worrying and depriving yourself of enjoyment. What utter nonsense.

Personally I'd feel much more relaxed and comfortable knowing that God did exist.
September 6, 2009 at 10:14 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Evil God Challenge and the "classical" theist's response

On another blog, FideCogitActio, some theists of a "classical" stripe (that's to say, like Brian Davies, Edward Feser) are criticisng the Evil God Challenge (or I suppose, trying to show how it can be met, or sidestepped). The main post includes this: In book I, chapter 39 , Aquinas argues that “there cannot be evil in God” (in Deo non potest esse malum). Atheists like Law must face the fact that, if the words are to retain any sense, “God” simply cannot be “evil”. As my comments in the thread at Feser’s blog aimed to show, despite how much he mocks “the privation theory of evil,” Law himself cannot escape its logic: his entire argument requires that the world ought to appear less evil if it is to be taken as evidence of a good God. Even though he spurns the idea that evil is a privation of good, his account of an evil world is parasitic on a good ideal; this is no surprise, though, since all evil is parasitic on good ( SCG I, 11 ). Based on the conclusions of se...
446 comments
Read more

EVIDENCE, MIRACLES AND THE EXISTENCE OF JESUS

(Published in Faith and Philosophy 2011. Volume 28, Issue 2, April 2011. Stephen Law. Pages 129-151) EVIDENCE, MIRACLES AND THE EXISTENCE OF JESUS Stephen Law Abstract The vast majority of Biblical historians believe there is evidence sufficient to place Jesus’ existence beyond reasonable doubt. Many believe the New Testament documents alone suffice firmly to establish Jesus as an actual, historical figure. I question these views. In particular, I argue (i) that the three most popular criteria by which various non-miraculous New Testament claims made about Jesus are supposedly corroborated are not sufficient, either singly or jointly, to place his existence beyond reasonable doubt, and (ii) that a prima facie plausible principle concerning how evidence should be assessed – a principle I call the contamination principle – entails that, given the large proportion of uncorroborated miracle claims made about Jesus in the New Testament documents, we should, in the absence of indepen...
159 comments
Read more

Plantinga's Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism refuted

Here's my central criticism of Plantinga's Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism (EAAN). It's novel and was published in Analysis last year. Here's the gist. Plantinga argues that if naturalism and evolution are true, then semantic epiphenomenalism is very probably true - that's to say, the content of our beliefs does not causally impinge on our behaviour. And if semantic properties such as having such-and-such content or being true cannot causally impinge on behaviour, then they cannot be selected for by unguided evolution. Plantinga's argument requires, crucially, that there be no conceptual links between belief content and behaviour of a sort that it's actually very plausible to suppose exist (note that to suppose there are such conceptual links is not necessarily to suppose that content can be exhaustively captured in terms of behaviour or functional role, etc. in the way logical behaviourists or functionalists suppose). It turns o...
151 comments
Read more