The āuseā of ādebateā is rooted in the rule of thumb that there are, in any given forum on average, 100x more people who are lurkers than participants. Certainly never less than 10x. And these people are often looking for a way out of the thicket of theism. I believe it helps them (also would have helped me back in the day) to see that there are sound reasons to not uncritically accept religious ideation, and what those reasons are.
I doubt that anyone here engages in those kinds of conversations because they are under the illusion they are going to Change Minds.
Although I have seen on rare occasions, people actually change their minds. On another forum was a woman who was a rootin-tootin fundamentalist out to save the world and over many years became a rootin-tootin atheist out to save the world and finally, just a skeptic and realist once she let go of her need to Save the World.
No one is going to save the world, we are just going to use what influence we have to imperfectly change a few minds and hopefully have a net positive impact (or at least be able to rationalize that we have). Real positive change is a fragile long game.
To my understanding, Theists mainly come onto here in the attempts to convert Atheists. They donāt join to give up their Christianity. Itās all about getting us to drink the Kool-Aid. And they donāt care about evidence. To them, their holy book is evidence and no can tell them any different.
I donāt believe that.
There are a lot of folks who read the posts here who never participate in the discussion. Why do you āspose theyāre reading this stuff?
I suspect some portion of the lurkers (as well as some portion of the theist posters) come here because they are having doubts about their theism. These discussions are fodder for thought. Could it be that they are searching for information to use as a tool to determine if their belief holds water?
In my book, thatās a win.
Again thereās a rule of thumb that there are MANY MANY more lurkers than participants. Lurkers are completely different dynamic. This is known as the 90-9-1 rule. 90% are ālurkersā who donāt post but just read, 9% are occasional contributors, and 1% produces the vast majority of actual content.
Remember that lurkers donāt even need to be registered members to access the debate area. Itās possible that the moderators couldnāt even tell us an exact number of unique persons reading through the site for that reason. But as CyberLN rightly points out, they can read through all the point/counterpoint at their leisure and really consider it.
I would insert: Theist leaves, either voluntarily or otherwise, but undeterred Atheists continue the debate by quoting and refuting the departed Theist.
This is true, and though the debates themselves are not formal, with an argument being adjudged to have won at the end, we can all still learn from them, theists and atheists alike. Just because I find an argument uncompelling or poorly reasoned, doesnāt mean I didnāt learn something from that argument.
And on occasion, some atheists have posted here, whose arguments have ranged from poor, to bat shit crazy. They were called on their hubristic claims, and then left as well.
In the end people will believe what they want to, or they may critically examine all claims, and believe only what they deem sufficiently evidenced, but that is also a choice of course.