Representing our clan at a local Highland Games this weekend. 
As we’re shutting the tent down for the day, a fella from a couple of tents down passes by and asked if I’m going to kirk (church) in the morning. I calmly said, “No.” He then said it would be good for my soul, to which I replied, “Oh, I don’t have one of those.”
The look on his face is still making me chuckle.
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I have the following exchange to offer.
“I’ll visit your house of mythology, if you accept in return, to listen to a two hour lecture on invertebrate zoology from me”.
Those who accept rapidly regret it.
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I think Ray Charles had a lot of soul.
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He sure did.
One of my pet peeves with theists is how they will often use words with multiple definitions and then conflate them to muddy the waters. Given the way they conflate the different meanings of “faith” with their special religious meaning for example, it wouldn’t surprise me to hear one of them say that we acknowledge the existence of “the soul” because we admit that Ray Charles “has soul”!
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I agree with your points, and theists do twist the meanings and definitions of words to “prove” a point.
One of my favorite examples was mentioned by Isaac Asimov in his writings.
Here goes:
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We can imagine a perfect being, which we may choose to call God.
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Nonexistence is a flaw in perfection.
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Therefore, saying “God does not exist” is a self-contradictory statement.
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So this means that God must exist.
Twisting the definition of the word ‘perfect’ proves God?
I don’t think so, yet countless people have been burned at the stake over this.
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Which clan are you? I’m Clan Gordon.
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ROFL, I’m stealing that. You got him good! 
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Hi! I don’t have a soul to begin with.
Interesting forum…something for all of you atheist here to consider. For those who claim to believe in God, the way of salvation through His Son Jesus Christ, and believe the Bible is the Word of God…“IF” they truly believe this in their heart for however many years…What IF THEY DIE and were wrong about it all along…What did they actually lose ? ANSWER: NOTHING…but on the other hand, what “IF” those of you who truly do not believe in God or His way of salvation through His Son Jesus Christ, and when you die…WHAT IF you folks find out then that you were wrong about it all along ? What did YOU LOSE ? ANSWER : EVERYTHING…for all of eternity…God did not send you to HELL…You sent yourselves !
Ah, Pascal’s Wager. If it has a name, it’s been discussed. Allow me to give you a shortened version of the rebuttal.
You can’t pretend to believe in an all knowing god. He’ll know you’re faking it.
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That’s not much of a rebuttal !
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Well, I don’t understand how it is wrong.
I’m not convinced there are any gods. That’s not a choice I made. I’m not convinced because I have not been presented with convincing evidence. Isn’t it the job of your god to do that? If your god isn’t providing all people with enough convincing evidence, then that’s a failure on her part, not mine.
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Type in “evidence for God” on Google , etc. very convincing to say the least.
Very convincing to you, perhaps. Why do you assume it would be so for everyone? Are you the gold standard for what information people should find convincing?
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Your god uses Google to provision evidence for herself?
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I generally don’t use the Google search engine. Does it matter which one I use?
But…which god or gods do you mean? Any of the Abrahamic gods? Or, if they are not the same, do you mean the Jewish Yahweh, the christian god commonly known as just God, or the muslim Allah? Or do you mean any or all gods from the Greek pantheon, like Zeus, Poseidon, Athena, etc? Or perhaps the Roman pantheon is more correct? Or perhaps the Norse gods, like Odin and Thor? From the Inca gods, I could choose from e.g. Viracocha the creator god, Pachamama the earth mother, Inti the sun god, Mama Killa the goddess of the moon, Appu Llapu the god of storms, and Yakumama the monstrous goddess of water, or just all of them (can you help me pick?). Perhaps we even have to go as far back as the Sumerian pantheon – because older is better – and consider Inanna and Anu? Or maybe we should go even further back to upper paleolithic shamanism and contact animals from the spirit world? In fact, we have evidence for the latter from cave paintings (see The Mind in the Cave by David Lewis-Williams). AND it is considered to be the origin for all later religious forms. Yeah, I think I’ll go for the paleolithic spirit world. It precedes all of the others, so it must surely be closer in time to the original “source” and therefore more correct. And we don’t want to err when choosing the religion. Right?
Which evidence do you find the most convincing?
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It’s not much of a proposition.
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I suggest that you use the search function regarding Pascal’s Wager and bring yourself up to date on all the many discussions on that old chestnut on this site and other over the years. You’ll find, as with basically anything else you might bring up, that “us atheists” have already considered it rather extensively, and in aggregate and sometimes as individuals, often know more about it than many of the random believers coming here to parrot talking points that they find compelling (usually because they haven’t deeply considered it themselves; it’s just a source of confirmation bias).
Pascal was a relatively smart guy but that didn’t make him wise or consistent in his thinking (he also was no evangelical Christian, so if that’s what you are you might ask yourself why you are fascinated with the ideas of a 17th century Catholic, and a Janesenist at that).
His wager assumed there’s only one deity (and one version of that deity via one religion) when there are several major current world religions, plus past religions, and thousands of denominations even within Christianity currently, many accusing others of things ranging from insufficient piety to outright heresy. He wrongly assumed that outward acquiescence to this religion would be sufficient to satisfy the deity even if, for the sake of argument, he had the correct one.
I think those who find the wager compelling simply aren’t clear thinkers, sorry. You have to squint at the problem in a certain way and ignore certain realities for it to hold together at all.
I wonder: Did Blaise know he had a flaw in the argument? If he did, did he think others wouldn’t notice? I know I have published some things that had questionable provenance and thought that if anyone notices, I’ll confess my sins and ask forgiveness - maybe do a better job of research, that sort of thing.
But what if he didn’t know his argument had a flaw? What was going on in his brain that he couldn’t see it?
That stuff only convinces the people who already believe in magic.
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