Slashdot Mirror
"Anonymous" Takes Scientology Protest to the Streets
This past Sunday members of the group "Anonymous" that has been running an attack on the church of Scientology took their battle from the tubes of the internet to the pavement of real life, staging a protest outside the central Phoenix Church of Scientology. "The protesters said they gathered Sunday in lieu of the birthday of Lisa McPherson, a Scientologist once cared for by church staffers. Her 1995 death sparked media attention and a civil wrongful death suit against a branch of the Church of Scientology. A wrongful death suit by her family was a public-relations nightmare for the church for years until it was settled in 2004. The Church of Scientology declined to comment on the Phoenix protests. It did provide a news release calling members of Anonymous cyber-terrorists."
Scientology likes suing people for libel. Let's turn the tables on that. Maybe members of Anonymous should sue Scientology for libel for making accusations of terrorism.
I support the Center for Consumer Freedom
This was happening all over the world. According to wikinews (last time I checked), there were 9200 participants worldwide (although sadly, only 40 here in Nashville).
Earn a % of cash back from Newegg, Tiger Direct, Walmart.com, and more: http://www.mrrebates.com?refid=458505
> Something must be retained from death to birth
Never mind proof, what indication do you even have of this other than your gut feeling?
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
Anonymous, eh? Cowards.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
How do you take a balanced view of a religion that wont tell you it's beleifs before you've bought into it. Where did you get the information? How do you guarentee it's accurate.
Virginia is for lovers. EVE is for griefers.
Like the evil Lord Xenu and space ships that look like DC-9's?
No obvious fairy tales?
I'm sorry I didn't tag the link, but somewhere on Flickr, there are photos of the event.
These fools don't know who they are messing with, it's all fun and games until someone drops your ass into a volcano..... :)
It's only paranoia if your wrong...
From Wikipedia:
"The Galactic Confederacy's civilization was comparable to our own, with aliens "walking around in clothes which looked very remarkably like the clothes they wear this very minute" and using cars, trains and boats looking exactly the same as those "circa 1950, 1960" on Earth. Xenu was about to be deposed from power, so he devised a plot to eliminate the excess population from his dominions. With the assistance of "renegades", he defeated the populace and the "Loyal Officers", a force for good that was opposed to Xenu. Then, with the assistance of psychiatrists, he summoned billions[1] of his citizens together to paralyze them with injections of alcohol and glycol, under the pretense that they were being called for "income tax inspections". The kidnapped populace was loaded into spacecraft for transport to the site of extermination, the planet of Teegeeack (Earth). The spacecraft were identical to the Douglas DC-8 with the exception of having different engines."
The "origins" story of Scientology is total bunk that sounds like bad sci-fi written by a sleep-deprived crackhead. You can't even spin this as a parable like with Biblical accounts, etc. It's just plain trash that doesn't stand up to any scrutiny.
Alchemist: Be Thou For the People
that's a cool thing isn't it? or is it bad? Bad as in Xenu bad?
Mongrel News all the news that fits and froths
The video that they forced off of YouTube can, thanks to Gawker, be found here.
... I get a little frightened that people around me think like that. You may be able to argue that it's little different than Christianity or Islam but what I really fear are the people who are part of Sea Org or offshore from the states and may have given up their rights as a civilian & American to have some sort of special standing in this group.
... why are there so few publications attacking Scientology? There is definitely something scary about a very powerful organization and if they have people dumping money into them, I do not doubt they are capable of silencing anyone (unfortunately, even Slashdot).
As a non-scientologist, this is scary. Possibly the most scary part of it is the editing. I have no problem with people having convictions but when he talks about "fightin' the fight" and "people needing them" and "people depending on them"
Whatever the case, I will not ever affiliate myself with a Scientologist and after reading Have You Lived Before This Life, I will do everything in my power to convince those that I know and love to avoid Scientology.
The thing that concerns me about Scientology is that after reading some books by Hubbard about it, I have found very little criticism of it. A book & some articles with the most notable one being Time Magazine. It seems like such an easy target. It takes seconds to find books criticizing Catholics or Muslims
My work here is dung.
The linked article is pretty lame. Anybody got a link to better coverage of Phoenix?
There's an LJ Account from a participant in London that's a great read; sounds like something I would have been proud to participate in!
The Humblest Mollusk on the Net
When you strip all that away, the whole house of cards falls apart (which is a measure how interesting it all is, i.e. zero).
As wacky, maybe. Less wacky, no.
Without the supernatural? Travelling to earth on rocket powered airplanes and huge aliens blowing up volcanoes with thermonuclear weapons? Well, I do suppose its more science fiction than supernatural
Got Shadowrun? Awakened Worlds
No. The antagonism to psychiatry is clearly a a conflict of interest.
They want you to go to them and give them your money rather that you
giving it to a shrink. You can't really read ANY of Hubbard's stuff
and not realize this.
This includes his fiction as well as his pseudo-fiction.
Scientology: Come spend your money here! ---
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
...what the phrase "in lieu" *means*?
"...they gathered Sunday in lieu of the birthday of Lisa McPherson..."
Like the idea that Xenu, the giant space monster, trapped our real souls in a volcano? Plausible.
When you look at a religion, what's important is not how absurd the beliefs are (they all are otherwise it wouldn't be a religion). What matters is what the people (and especially high up in the hierarchy) do. And what the scientologists do is scary. Not that they have a monopoly on being scary, radical Islamists and especially the US radical Christians (that are no worse but have the power to do a lot more damage) scare the hell out of me as well.
Anon doesnt have an issue with the religious views of the church. They have an issue with the church itself which is why in one of there recent videos they talk about the "Free Zone" (People who follow the beliefs of the religion but are not affiliated with Scientology) which they have no issues with.
I am not a theist (atheist), but do think reincarnation is plausible. Something must be retained from death to birth, so that might as well be called a thetan.
Why do you suppose that "something must be retained from death to birth"? Other than energy being conserved, that is.
Much of the rest of Scientology seems like reasonable psychology as well--dualist, but without the supernatural
Dualism is supernatural.
Certainly no obvious fairy tales, like Christian, Jewish, or Islamic miracles.
Uh, what? Have you ever heard of Xenu?
I think the antagonism to psychiatry is the result of wanting to know what we don't yet--this aspect leads to unfortunate incidents such as this.
No, they just don't want the competition. It's bad for the bottom line.
If you strip away the secrecy and celebrity, there are some interesting ideas there.
Such as?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
The "origins" story of Scientology is total bunk that sounds like bad sci-fi written by a sleep-deprived crackhead. You can't even spin this as a parable like with Biblical accounts, etc. It's just plain trash that doesn't stand up to any scrutiny.
I don't have a problem with that. What I do have a problem with is a for-profit organisation masquerading as a religion, the secrecy, their aggressive legal tactics, their apparent refusal to ever apologise for any mistake they've made, and their underhand tactics to get and keep recruits.
I meant that it would follow from the plausible reasoning of reincarnation. Taken out of context, it seems like I'm asserting something that I am not.
"Much of the rest of Scientology seems like reasonable psychology" ... asking people to take a psychometric 'personality test' designed to lead them into buying into the idea and investing from tens of dollars for a book up to thousands of dollars for a course in the 'church' is far from what I would call reasonable.
... that wasn't an obvious a fairy tale? What do you think it was? A documentary?
As for that stuff about Xenu dropping neutron bombs into Earth's volcanoes from intergalactic DC-8s
http://twitter.com/onion2k
You would think, if they could accomplish intergalactic travel in DC-8's with different engines, they would have something better than 1950/60's era cars and trains.
Don't Vote for Norm Dicks! http://www.nodicks2008.com Another nutless dirtbag that voted for the FISA bill!
Scientologists can believe whatever they want. Attacking their beliefs is the same as attacking Mormons, Jews, Muslims, Budhists, what ever. There's no universal right or wrong in a post-modern world.
Before you all scream that scientology is different, remember that the ONLY difference is when the leader/crackpot was born. L Ron Hubbard, Joe Smith, etc.... Just cause they came along in the 50's doesn't mean their bullshit is any less "sacred" than Catholic Bullshit.
To be fair, no religion should get tax-exempt status.
THL phish sticks
It comes from the fact that LRH was a high functioning paranoid schizophrenic. His first wife tried to have him committed. Plus, psychology actually, you know, has scientific experiments backing up its efficacy. This obviates the need for LRH's psycho-babble snake-oil.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Interestingly, it's not the beliefs of Scientology that were being protested--if you read through some of the more recent Anonymous releases, you'll note that they emphasize that it's the organization that calls itself the Church of Scientology that's being protested, on account of its practices.
Anonymous has explicitly noted that the "Free Zone"--that is, the Scientologists outside the organization--are just fine and dandy.
O'course, the "Free Zone" doesn't charge for its teaching...
But I don't think the antagonism against psychiatry is what you think it is--I think it's more a control structure (given that the auditing, in essence, imparts a codependent relationship between the auditee and the auditor (and by extension, the CoS)). Also worth noting is that the founder, Mr. Hubbard, had a very distinct antipathy towards the profession, and which created certain aspects of Scientology specifically to counter standard psychiatric practice.
I would note that, while not a member per se of Anonymous, I do think that their efforts against Scientology are a good thing, and were carried out remarkably peacefully and with remarkably good organization.
(I've also heard there's more planned for 3/15--beware the Ides of March!)
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure dome decree
http://xkcd.com/154/
I genereally feel scientology is as useless as any other religion.
But about 15 years ago they swindled a woman I know out of $50,000. She had inherited it when her mother died (fairly young), and she was quickly taken advantage of in her distraught mental state.
That told me all I needed to know about them. They're as bad or worse than any TV preacher asking for money.
no matter how much balanced you want to be, it doesn't stop Scientology from abusing its members. Even IF what Scientology claimed was true, does that give them the right to ask for incredible amounts of money to spread its beliefs, and killing/suing whoever opposes them?
cyber-terrorism, because just being a plain old ordinary terrorist is just so boring these days
I don't know man. It sounds legit.
THL phish sticks
Man! Accepting even your first principle requires a large complex, and unsupported leap of faith.
Wait... Which religion are you talking about again?
"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge"
- Charles Darwin
of course.. L. Ron only said they look like 1950/60's era cars and trains. They were reality-retconned, because Xenu is a psychic alien who can see the future.
;)
sheesh.. is it really that hard to work out?
http://www.xkcd.com/354/
He said he was an atheist; he never indicated that he was guided by reason/logic/scientific method.
Remember kids,
Atheist does not imply scientist/logician
You're thinking small. Why miniaturize the laser, when we could instead enlarge the sharks? -John Searle
Honestly, if I hadn't spent those modpoints on half-ass comments...
Religion is a man-made construct, social by definition and in nature. If you're looking for God, religion is a crutch.
from your sig:
"When did insurgence against imperialism become a bad thing?"
So why is resistance to the psychological imperialism of Scientology a "bad" thing?
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
Yep, L. Ron Hubbard, to be precise; sci-fi author: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L._Ron_Hubbard
Requiem for the American Dream
It's a religion; therefore, I guarantee it isn't accurate.
I prefer Flambe as apposed flamebait.
She should demand a refund. No I'm not blowing smoke. Scientology promises full refunds if you ever wish to receive one on the basis that they didn't help. While not the easiest thing to pursue, there is a group out there (shouldn't be hard to find on the net) that assists former members with this process.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Honestly, this cult has a history of horrible things, and we're not talking hundreds of years ago. Once again, not protesting the religion, just the church. Actually had a few members from the "freezone", that practice outside of the church protest with us. Please stop spreading their lies, they're vocal enough.
Psychiatry only deals with what is normal. Most religious people would be described of as normal according to DSM. This is despite believing in obviously inconsistent events. One who is schizophrenic does have real issues in occupation or social functioning (as the DSM specifies). A schizophrenic may still have a more accurate view of the world.
As has been stated on the Raid Wiki, Anonymous is not protesting against the religion of Scientology itself, Anonymous is protesting against the organisations behind it, primarily the Church of Scientology, RTC and OSA.
I believe you mean DC-8's -- but without the propellers...
Oops! The DC-8 was and is a pure jet aircraft. No propellers.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
As I said to a friend of mine who went.. What were you protesting? Who were you protesting to? At least the protest in Australia was actually about something - tax exempt status - and directed at the government. You can't protest the practices of a church to the church.. that makes not sense.
How we know is more important than what we know.
Easy. You talk to the people who've left it.
Voiceless
Thats one. There are hundreds, if not thousands, more. Including the niece of David Miscavish (the current leader of scientology).
Come on people, the information is out there. You can easily take a balanced view by READING the accounts of the hundreds of people who've been victimized. Look up Paulette Cooper. Shes still alive today to tell her story of being harassed and sued for 15 straight years.
.
Concealing the ideas does not make them less interesting or true. It does just the opposite--perhaps makes them seem more suspect. A sort of 'truth through obscurity' is no way to promote what you think is a reasonable worldview. Still, whatever is in those talks in dark rooms may be reasonable.
Most religions(the Vatican notwithstanding) don't withhold their most sacred texts, and you can find the Bible or Qu'ran or Torah or whatever Hindus read on the Internet, usually posted by their most ardent followers. With Scientology, you can only find them on places like Operation Clambake. (Actually, for that matter, the Vatican mostly withholds texts of other religions...)
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
Prove to me that YOU exist first.
rewriting history since 2109
Lol.. A religion doesn't have to be absurd. All that is necessary is a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith. That was taken from the Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary.
In fact, there have been some people who push science as a religion. You wouldn't say science is absurd would you?
Consensual in the bedroom if fine.
The problem starts when the cult practices brainwashing and attacking anyone who disagrees with them.
That is what Scientology does.
It may START consensual, but it is a FIGHT to get out.
These are the actors from the very same tiny group of the overall population who also feel they should tell you how you should be voting, how the war against terrorism should be run, and why their opinions matter more than anyone else's do, and deserve more airtime (and make-up) than any "ordinary" citizen. The people who drop out of college, and even high school - and are proud of that fact!
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
The message did get a bit skewed, then again, it's hard to herd a bunch of people that don't have a leader. But the main idea was to get word out and let people know what is happening. You can see from reading many of the comments people are willing to push it under the rug just because they think its a religious issue.
Something must be retained from death to birth,
NO! When you die that's it. Your mind is just software running on the hardware that is your brain. When you brain dies and rots away, that's it. Information is lost when you die, and that information is YOU.
Incidentally if Jehovas Witnesses/Mormons/Christians approach you with pamphlets, say this in the tone you would talk to a disobedient dog whilst looking them full in the eye you can sometimes see a flicker of doubt. Fear even.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
You can't take the sky from me...
I don't have a problem with that. What I do have a problem with is a for-profit organisation masquerading as a religion, the secrecy, their aggressive legal tactics, their apparent refusal to ever apologise for any mistake they've made, and their underhand tactics to get and keep recruits.
In the beginning was the Plan.
And then came the Assumptions.
And the Assumptions were without form.
And the Plan was without substance. And darkness was upon the face of the Workers.
And they spoke amongst themselves, saying, "it is a crock of Shit, and it stinketh."
And the workers went unto their supervisors and said 'It is a pail of dung, and none may abide the odour thereof.'
And the supervisors went unto the managers, saying 'It is a container of excrement, and it is very strong, such that none may abide by it.'
And the managers went unto their directors saying, 'it is a vessel of fertilizer, and none may abide it's strength.'
And the Directors talked amongst themselves, saying to one another, 'It contains that which aids plant growth, and it is very powerful.'
And the Vice Presidents went unto the President, saying unto him, this new Plan will actively promote the growth and vigour of the company, with powerful effects.'
And the President looked upon the Plan, and saw that it was good.
And the Plan became Policy.
This is how shit happens!
True, but there is one major difference between the confessional and an auditing session:
The regulations of the Catholic church are very strict that what is said in the confessional -stays- in the confessional under all circumstances (except for a -very- restricted few).
The Church of Scientology -says- that what is said stays confidential, but routinely uses any information obtained during an audit as either a method of coercing the auditee to take more auditing sessions, to refrain from leaving the Church of Scientology, or to attack the ex-Scientologist when they have left with blackmail, or ruining their reputation in the community.
This has been documented by nearly every ex-scientologist--sometimes, all three instances.
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure dome decree
nothing like photos
Well, you see...with $cientology, that's where the money comes into play.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
By that logic, MLK was persecuting and harassing white people?
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
Done, but I can't figure out how to prove to myself that there's anyone to prove it to.
To me, "vigilante justice" means "hanging".
I'm not seeing that. I'm seeing people exercising their LEGAL right to protest.
You can claim it is "hate", but that's just your claim.
Do the research and see the instances of abuse by Scientologists. Including brainwashing.
and you can protest the behaviour of an organisation by exposing their abuses to the public so that they wont get sucked in
Well, still...it makes more sense, and is more peaceful than the Koran.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
You mean it's necessitated by the definition of reincarnation (if nothing was retained it wouldn't be connected at all and therefore not reincarnation) but that's not a really useful statement since there's nothing that indicates reincarnation may be true. It's like proving a fire breathing dragon must have a beefy arm, as long as we're talking about fiction the proof is of no use.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
MLK was protesting to his government over the disequal treatment of the races. Exactly what were these idiots protesting about? A religion exists which they don't like?
How we know is more important than what we know.
not coward, just too lazy. jb255@yahoo.com
if anonymous had members, i'd have been one for two years. if a hacker is a programmer or otherwise comp-savvy individual, then i am one also. every single one of the over 9000 protestors yesterday, myself included, would be a member of anonymous. if there were a membership, the tally is somewhere between 5 and 15 million people.
i've sent dozens of emails to dozens of internet news sources, i've stated in an interview with FOX yesterday, and I keep telling the misinformed in the forums, anonymous is not a group. it's a goddamned adjective. it's a natural outgrowth of instant connectivity and free information. just the way a huge crowd in a public plaza can seem like a living thing, anonymous is a collective of people going about their own daily business, which is mostly passing the time, but can occasionally be persuaded by vocal upstarts on a soapbox. the key difference is that, when anonymous, your history and your reputation are unknown, so every statement arrives equal, and is weighed on its own merit.
someone thought it would be a good idea to raid the CoS, probably as a joke, and the idea caught on like any meme does. individuals with a real beef with the CoS weighed in, persuasively and eloquently, and a distributed, worldwide mob was born.
only a part of a percent of anonymous got out of their computer chairs. most of anonymous doesn't give a damn about the CoS. in fact, I certainly don't. i protested because this is the first time i've ever seen anybody motivate anonymous to do anything they couldn't do from home!
also, I don't understand how "anonymous is a cyber-terrorist group" makes bigger headlines than "anonymous: unprecedented scaling phenomenon associated with information networks"
lurk moar.
No, that's the law, at least in some countries it's punishable to ignore an accident if help was needed.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
When I think hate, I think of some type of violence, which there was none. Hell there wasn't even a threat of violence. Honestly, a majority of the people see the church as a joke and a majority of signs pointed to websites that detailed some of the church's actions. If you think this was about hate, then we obviously weren't doing our jobs.
If it's not absurd, you don't need "ardor and faith" to believe it!
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Sorry, but much of Scientology is crap - Hubbard's ramblings dressed up as scientific research.
Scientology claims Hubbard's techniques work all the time but they don't, and are actually quite a good way of siphoning money from the user. Scientology doesn't submit Hubbard's writing for independent analysis because the organisation in fact is deeply anti-scientific. Their claims of a scientific basis for Hubbard's techniques are about as strong as those of the "psychics" who write horoscopes for the newspaper. It impresses people who have heard of Science and think its kinda cool, but who have no idea what actual Science is.
Scientology the organisation is paranoid, litigious, deceitful, cruel -- sharing many of Hubbard's personal characteristics -- and is ultimately a blight upon humanity. This is the aspect which Anonymous is targeting. Scientology kills people, it harasses, it's a bully who will plant fake evidence on you and then call the cops. It drives its members insane - and runs a forced-labour camp called the RPF.
The antagonism to Psychiatry is because it's a competitor to Scientology in the "healing the mind" market, and because Psychiatry, proceeding according to actual scientific principles, is in probably the best position to know what nonsense Scientology is.
Scientology, like many cults, preys on peoples' need to be part of a group. They use standard cult tactics like smothering new members with attention and building up of dependence upon the group. Bait and Switch is used to increase income from services as there is always another course which needs to be done, or some "urgent" problem in the member's psyche which needs to be "handled" (for a price). The auditing process provides the member with the desired "fix" of attention, and the probing personal questions of a Security Check provide Scientology with excellent blackmail material.
Finally, if you were wondering about my handle ... no, I've never been a Scientologist. But they threatened to sue me, and so I investigated them, and was disgusted by what I found. This is an evil organisation if ever there was one. Calling myself 'elronxenu' is just a small thing; they're very sensitive to the name Xenu and often self-censor it, so they'd probably refer to me in their dossier as 'elron****'. Yes, they do keep dossiers on people who criticise them. Mine is probably pretty thin, as they'd probably consider me only a minor nuisance, unlike a full-blown enemy such as
David Gerard.
I read that book (in the form of a paperback), and I would strongly recommend it. It's informative, balanced and a good read to boot.
In fact, there have been some people who push science as a religion. You wouldn't say science is absurd would you?
No but most of the attempts to equal it to a religion do so to make it seem absurd. Science does not require faith, it requires evidence.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
Your proof is...lacking something. oh yah, facts and data. Otherwise, you're just another one of the voices in my head, where everything else exists. While you're in there, check out the new stores on the mall by my medulla oblongata off-ramp.
rewriting history since 2109
I don't think s/he needs to exist is order to get an answer to why "Something must be retained from death to birth." That is the statement that is used to suggest that reincarnation is possible. First, the statement assumes that birth follows death, so you are already assuming reincarnation is possible. Why must something be retained from death to birth? Then we can talk about what that something is.
Now, before you start saying 'What is death','What is birth': I don't think we need to be overly critical. The original poster used those terms without definition so I am assuming they are the standard terms used by people. For example, death could be when brain function ceases.
It's like here we are talking about Euclidean geometry and you come up and start arguing about parallel lines intersecting at infinity. All well and good, but not relevant in Euclidean geometry. There are just certain things we take as axioms when discussing a particular topic.
Those of the Hindu faith read the Sruti and the Smriti.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
And yes, they do have a legal right to protest.
So, to summarize:
#1. Consensual acts between adults are okay.
#2. #1 becomes not okay when brainwashing is involved or when one person is restricted from leaving.
#3. People do have a right to protest such behaviour.
#4. Their protests are not "vigilante justice".
And when there is lack of evidence and conclusions are drawn from other evidences, you have faith, or a form of it. Faith in that the conclusions in the absence of evidence are correct or will be. But it isn't just the faith like that I am talking about, it is the people who believe it is correct because it is science and science is the true way, not because the other evidence leaves little doubt.
And yes, you can find people like this quite often on slashdot. Just look around.
I'm curious as to what "most sacred texts" you think the Vatican is hiding.
The Vatican has secrets, yes (and its own top-secret archives, full of holy materials like financial records and correspondence), but salvation is only found in [the Church's interpretation of] the Bible. The end.
Except by your method you are guaranteed to get an UNbalanced view. It's called sample bias. If you restrict your sample to only people who left the church, you are guaranteed to get a higher proportion of disgruntled (rightly or wrongly) views. After all, if you loved the church, you probably wouldn't have a reason to leave. Note this goes for many different types of groups. If you go to South Florida you would think that every Cuban despises Castro and communism. Of course, the Cubans who hate Castro the most have the biggest reason to leave, while those that love him stay in Cuba.
My bad. I read it over, and I think the OP assumed reincarnation was possible and so it follows "something must be retained from death to birth." So OP has to explain why reincarnation is plausible. Either way, OP is just saying stuff without proof or evidence. So the onus is on OP to prove or support their point before we can respond with a rational argument.
How comes so few are interested where does Anonymous come from.
And so many are so misguided as to Anonymous motives.
If your mother was drowning, Anonymous wouldn't move a finger. He might laugh, or throw rocks. Anonymous is the motor force behind raids on Habbo Hotel, against random journals on DeviantArt or LiveJournal, they aren't interested in any political agenda. They are a Horde, a bunch of random people interested in spreading chaos and observing its results. They dont' give a shit about Church of Scientology. They just picked it as a commonly disliked target (so attacking it will likely draw support to them) and raided it the same style they raid Habbo, except IRL. Noisy, disruptive and creative, deep chaos that has some artistic feeling to it, and they got to make a lot of fuss about it. But don't be mistaken, they could have raided Mormons, IRS, Public Transport department, Citybank or anything they'd feel like raiding, no political agenda whatsoever. They prefer extreme, weird, mysterious targets but that's not because they really hate them, that's because the public will be more interested.
Yeah, that should mark me as Fair Game to Anonymous. Rules 1 and 2 not broken though.
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
Ran into a guy once who was in debt to Scientology. Apparently for a massive amount of money. It was very important to him to pay this off and to give them even more to "advance" within Scientology. I did not ask him but from everything I have read the story changes as you advance. These factors, in addition to what was mentioned above combine to separate Scientology from any major religion (in their current forms).
It should be trivial to separate Scientology from real religions. Whether or not you give genuine religions a tax break on property based on this is another story and one I don't particularly care about.
a war on terrorism? How can we end a war on a method?
Yeah, cause the EMS and a few county sheriff's cars are there already. So I do just keep driving.
Virginia is for lovers. EVE is for griefers.
The ghost IS the machine. Grow up. Dead is dead. Gone is gone. It's your choice whether you want to face reality or not. Religion is s form of self-medication. Free mental opiates. For the fearful. For fools.
I find your lack of faith...disturbing. =)
Fighting over religion is like seeing whose imaginary friend is best.
Scientology spokesmen accuse Anonymous of hate crimes. Has Anynomous hurt anyone yet, physically?
I'm guessing not, but the question must be asked.
> No. The antagonism to psychiatry is clearly a a conflict of interest.
Actually, I think the antagonism to psychiatry was because L Ron didn't like them telling him he was nuts.
Yeah, that whole space planes carrying people to Earth, gathering them around volcanoes, blowing them up with hydrogen bombs, then netting their souls with electric nets and taking them to theaters to implant lies into their memories and the souls balling up and becoming people isn't a fairy tale at all. The Marcabian race of aliens planting invisible satellite dishes on Earth to transmit false thoughts into our heads actually happens, and we evolved from space clams. You're not taking an objective look, you're taking a selective look.
If you google for a searchable Bible or Qu'ran, you will find a searchable Bible or Qu'ran on the website of a practicing Christian or Muslim. If you google for a searchable OT III, you will find a searchable OT III on xenu.net and not on the website of a practicing Scientologist.
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
Yes you do, if it isn't proven with facts or evidence but still plausible, it isn't absurd. And there are quite a few topics like this in science that people on slashdot have expressed as true or fact because they have the faith in science. Science is the one true way.
But lets get away from science and look at Buddhist It is a religion about a way of life and I don't think it has one absurd thing about it unless your using a weird definition of absurd. (well, I could no be as shard on Buddhism as I think I am)
In Hinduism there isn't a text that is a must for its' followers. One can get to Eternal Bliss(tm) without reading the sacred texts. The Vedas are arguably the oldest sacred texts that are still used.
If you don't derive your truth from logic and observation, nor from divine enlightenment, then...
Wait, so there's a belief system out there where you can just pull truth out of your ass?
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
Actually, It might have also been for the lulz.
You mad
Really? So a single person is a "mob" if that person protests?
Fascinating.
Illogical, irrational and incorrect, but still fascinating.
...this post and all of the subsequent threads will be deleted by the Church of $cientology by tomorrow.
BSD is for people who love Unix, Linux is for people who hate Microsoft.
He said the thought something was plausible. He didn't proclaim any truth.
The Scientology organization is not a religion. It is a deceptive, dangerous cult worthy of as much hate as anyone could possibly throw at it. The Scientology organization defrauds people -- not even for a 10% or 20% tithe, but for hundreds of thousands of dollars, for as much money as it can take. The Scientology organization actively prevents people from receiving life-saving medical and psychiatric care. It tells people that their money is better spent on more e-meter auditing than on chemotherapy. When people try to leave, it harasses them, follows them, libels them, and not infrequently murders them. When people leave the organization and try to find others to practice their beliefs, the Scientology organization sues and attacks them.
Yes, there have been other religious organizations that have done things like this. And we stop them whenever we can.
You dismiss the objections to Scientology only because you have either not read them carefully, or you are being paid by the Scientology organization to dismiss them.
Your words are quite obviously not those of someone who has tried to leave Scientology, and you are deeply wrong.
although I don't have exact numbers
http://www.king5.com/localnews/stories/NW_021008WAB_scientology_protest_SW.accc9b6e.html
Yes, I believe they call it politics.
-50 C windchill is damn cold even for a Winnipeg winter, thank Xenu for Tim Hortons coffee eh?
Murphey's fighting Occam, and we're in the stands.
Not everyone knows that Scientologists are a dangerous cult. It doesn't fall under the "No Shit Sherlock" heading for most people. Only the few who pay attention. Anonymous is trying to make it so that there are more than just a few who know and pay attention. The most dangerous thing for a cult is to have it's workings exposed to the world.
It's not hate of a religion. It's hate of a religious organization that systematically intimidates, threatens, brainwashes and misinforms people with serious real-world consequences. There's a reason they picked Lisa McPherson's birthday as a date to protest.
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
The article practically insinuates that a church that was originally started as a tax shelter has been involved with some sort of misdeed! But that's just ridiculous. I can practically feel my Thetan levels rising!
"Most religions(the Vatican notwithstanding) don't withhold their most sacred texts"
Before the Reformation and Gutenberg, getting a copy of the Holy Bible meant going to your local Catholic church, where the priests were more than happy to interpret it for you. Badly, I suspect.
To this day, IIRC, your Catholic priest would prefer you ask him what it means. And a careful reading of the New Testament could leave you with the impression that the Catholic Church is, in fact, not practicing Christianity.
And to be fair, neither are many if not most TV and other Evangelists. It's so simple, unless you're asking for money.
Written by a Christian. Trying to keep it simple.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
Too much Assassins Creed anyone?
Make SELinux enforcing again!
I made the mistake of sending a CV over to a Panda Antivirus office.
After chatting with some people, I was given a "personality test." I filled it out and left. I googled the people I spoke with only to discover they were all scientologists.
http://www.rickross.com/reference/scientology/france/france17.html
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
[This comment is no longer available due to a copyright claim by the Church of Scientology International]
Your linked-to video voiceless surprised me. I didn't expect to cry.
Years and years ago, I was heavily involved with the Co$. I bought it hook, line, and sinker. I thought I had the ultimate answer to everything and I was willing to fight for that with my life.
I endured grueling 12+ hour workdays and virtually no pay for a chance to save the world. I practiced how to lie effectively (they call them TRs) and due to my "get it done" attitude, shortly had an office in the International Administration Headquarters in Hollywood, the Flag Command Bureau, as a member of the Sea Org. I had a nice office with a window seat overlooking downtown Hollywood, and I wore a uniform that looked sharp and military, with epaulets on my shoulder!
It's hard to explain just how intoxicating it is to think you have the 100% right answer to all the world's problems. And, as a die-hard Scientologist, that's exactly what you think you have. You can create a beautiful world free of drug abuse, crime, insanity, and war. You just have to apply the tech.
You are on the side of freedom, of knowledge, of truth, of unlimited personal power. And anybody who gets in your way needs to be shut up and rendered powerless by any means necessary. It's that simple!
But, something just wasn't quite right. No matter how hard I tried, I could never quite do enough, or do it right enough. I had trouble getting the books and tapes to fully make sense to me. When I disagreed with what I read, I was sent to endless word clearing where we looked up every single word in the dictionary, one by one to try to find the "MU" or "Mis-Understood [word]". I had trouble getting up on time in the morning. I got sick from time to time, which is proof that I was "PTS" and needed ethics handling. I went through endless "ethics conditions" despite my very, very best intentions. They were very careful to keep me convinced that the problem was me.
It's hard to explain how frustrating it was, to be surrounded by people who are apparently "getting it" and not being able to be one of them, despite having a tested genius IQ, and being able to read just about anything *ELSE* just one time and get it immediately. I thought there was something wrong with ME. I often cried before going to sleep at night.
They had the tech, but who could explain me? When I got to work, I got lots and lots done. I was routinely commended for job well done, for quality work, for "stellar levels of production". It seemed that, when I worked, everything I touched turned to gold. Yet I couldn't make the most amazing technology in the world just make sense to me. I could read a book on mathematics, or aeronautics, or software, and turn right around and do it without any problem. (which is their test for comprehension: can you read it, and APPLY the result immediately?) But I couldn't do the same with Scientology. Something was wrong with me.
So began my fall from greatness. Slowly, surely, over months and years, I lost all my former glory. My job title drifted from the international scale on down through the organization until I finally ended up at the very, very, very bottom.
The RPF.
AKA the Rehabilitation Project Force. It's like prison for Scientologists. You are a bad, bad, dude, or something is very, very wrong with you.
You have exactly 7 hours to sleep in a crowded, slummy, cockroach infested triple-bunk in the basement. You wear black jump suits with colored arm bands. You eat only left overs. You get 1/4 the pay of normal staff. You perform grueling, hard, disgusting work from the time you get up until "personal enhancement time", where you have 2.5 hours of time to read Scientology books and tapes until bed time. You are not permitted to talk to staff "in good standing", though they are free to bark orders at you. You are not permitted to walk. (No kidding!) You must run everywhere you go, and if you are ever caught walking you are made to do push-ups or worse. You must be c
Uh, no. Under Catholicism, salvation is found through faith and good works. So not the end! Protestantism faith alone matters (at least many of its denominations).
What's really disturbing to me, is that neither the state nor the federal government does much about Scientology or other cults.
In Washington we have these LaRouche cultists all over the place
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyndon_LaRouche
but especially at colleges, and especially at the UW. They show up on school property rain or shine, and organize various brainwashing events. What's worse, is that they try to make themselves look like some kind of political organization, but actually they're just trying to brainwash you, try to get you to drop out of school, and scam you out of your money.
Instead of doing something about it, the government and the school let them use school facilities to hold their brainwashing sessions, and let them stay on campus harassing students day in and day out.
In California, where the Scientologists are powerful, I'm told that there's a similar situation. The organization is powerful enough that the government would rather look the other way, lest they suffer some kind of smear campaign.
I'm pointing out how you are attempting to abuse the English language because you don't have a defensible position.
You said:
I showed that one person, by your definition, was a "mob".
So, to summarize so far:
#1. Consensual acts between adults are okay.
#2. #1 becomes not okay when brainwashing is involved or when one person is restricted from leaving.
#3. People do have a right to protest such behaviour.
#4. Their protests are not "vigilante justice".
#5. And one person protesting is not a "mob".
You have quite the track record of incorrect statements going there.
Now, there are other religions that are esoteric, but most of them don't pretend to also be scientific, and most of them don't have a ladder of charging you cold hard cash to get them. There are Buddhist teachings that the lamas will only teach you if you're a sincere Buddhist, and there are teachings that only make sense if you've spent a few years meditating and will otherwise distract you from the more important practices. There are Yoga positions that you really really shouldn't try unless you've been doing yoga for a long time, and any clueful teacher will tell you not to try them because you'll just tear your shoulder blade muscles. But the price isn't cash, it's practice. And there are mountains that guides won't take you to if you don't have the experience and physical strength to climb them safely - those guys *will* charge you money, but you've still got to have the skills, and they'll be happy to show you *pictures* of the mountains and recommend that you climb some smaller mountains first. Scientology doesn't want you to see the pictures of Xenu The Evil Space Alien and His DC9 Fleet until *after* your bank account's been tapped.
There are also other religions and similar types of groups that want cash up front. Transcendental Meditation wants whatever their current fee is to give you an initiation and your own personal secret mantra (which is picked from a simple list, not actually customized for you), plus you've got to offer fruit and flowers to their guru and his gods (not to the Maharishi, who just died this week, but to his teacher.) But they'll still tell you what it's about.
There are many religions and preachers that teach that you should give some fraction of your money to the church - some of them want it to help feed the poor, while others of them want it so the preacher can have a big house and a Learjet, and some of them teach about loving God and your neighbors while others mostly teach about Prosperity and how You can get it if you just Believe hard enough. Some of them are Christians, some of them are New Agers, some of them are Buddhists, and you'd think you could pretty much tell which kind are sincere, but a lot of people go in for the bogus ones anyway. (That's of course separate from whether the groups ask for some money to fix the church building's roof or pay the meeting-hall's rent or hire a full-time preacher at a not-very-high salary; if you're going to have an institution you're going to have institutional expenses.)
The price of Scientology auditing is a lot higher than the cost of office space and training volunteer quack psychiatrists to listen to you. And even if they keep some of their teachings secret until you've had the training you need to understand them, that doesn't mean they need to keep their organizational structure or finances hidden.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
I'm not a native English speaker, but doesn't "in lieu of" mean "instead of"? (Lieu being French for "place" and all.) Is this a particular idiom that I'm not familiar with, or is this another case where fancy words are used a substitute for making sense? The goal was probably to say something along the lines of "in remembrance of" or "in reference to"...
To clarify, I believe the grandparent is pointing out that the described harassment tactics seem to be exactly what the masked avengers are doing.
Anyone can "stand up for what they believe", but it takes a very brave individual to change what they believe. - Loundry
I don't care if he said he was a pastafarian. I asked for some sort of observation independent of his belief structure. I mean, if you're claiming something could exist, it helps to know what you're even looking for.
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
You're going to get modded down. One, because of referencing the rather odious practice of "saging" in the *chan imageboards, and for also referencing those imageboards at all. Also, it wasn't funny. Sorry buddy; try again next time.
Yes; but, it's reserved for the highest members of any religious organization. : )
What day is it? Could you please tell me?
If you actually read the revocation, the "term 'fair game'" is not to be used any more. Not a single word about the _policy_, just the wording.
Thise wacos are all about the literal word of wacko-one.
The paper they wave about when the talk about the recention of policy just says STFU when you do this thing.
Really. Read it. Its so obvious and nobody I have ever seen quoted on the subject has gone "hay! that isn't a policy change, its a decree of title."
Innocent people shouldn't be forced to pay for inferior software development.
--"Code Complete" Microsoft Press
Writing for a penny a word is ridiculous. If a man really wants to make a million dollars, the best way would be to start his own religion.
- L. Ron Hubbard
Reading your post triggered a little tangent in my head.
Is it just me, or does the entire Scientology construct simply seem like a really really expensive, poorly written sci-fi based MMO that is ridiculously expensive to unlock new content and with which you are directed within instead of interacting with?
Explains why actors are into it, they can afford the next expansion.
Ice Cream has no bones.
I'm not on either side, but the Anonymous group seems to be practicing secrecy and aggressive legal tactics.
Who are they and who are they going to attack next?
They must have some religious views that don't agree with other religions too.
They could be worse than the group they are attacking.
The Xenu story is revealed only when the scientologist has paid enough to get to OT III level (OT stands for operating thetan). It's not until you get to OT VIII (which very few ever do) that you learn:
For tons of fun and some incredibly bad science-fiction, you can read all the top-secret Scientology documents here. They were released as part of a court case.
Science takes a whole hell of a lot more faith than religion. When the evidence doesn't support the conclusion, make up new trials until it does. And yes I'm a conservative, right-wing, radical christian. ,
21st Century Renaissance Man
Well, before Gutenberg, copies of the Bible were outrageously expensive to produce, which was a factor here. (That the most common copies were in Latin, and the few non-Latin copies were mostly translations of various copies from the Latin Vulgate and of increased distance from the sources was another barrier.)
Well, likely "badly" from the point of view of a non-Catholic Christian (although many of the early leaders of the Protestant churches had been Catholic clergy, so maybe not).
If you recall correctly? So you used to know the personal preferences of Catholic priests but aren't certain you remember them right? My experience is that Catholic Churches tend to both conduct Bible studies and to give out Bibles in, e.g., Confirmation classes, which is rather strange behavior if you don't want people to read the Bible.
They were outside of Seattle's Scientology building also. http://forums.enturbulation.org/viewtopic.php?t=1806&highlight=seattle
However, it is socially optimal to eliminate the Church of Scientology. While mobs are usually too dangerous a force to cause anything productive, if the Church of Scientology were to disappear tomorrow it would relieve a great strain of frivolous lawsuits from the court system, it would relieve a great strain of mental stress from many humans, and it would crunch what would continue to be a large sink of otherwise productive resources.
From a philosophical standpoint, moral rights (as much as rights exist,) are not always the same as legal rights. What is your justification for legal rights, if not to ensure moral rights?
Cool, can we get rid of all the other religions too?
How we know is more important than what we know.
I apparently read the grandparent post completely differently. I took it to mean that *if* you accept the idea of reincarnation, the way it would work would logically require something to carry over from death to (re-)birth, and that that thing could be what they call a "Thetan".
My Photography - http://ian-x.com
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I think you're way underestimating the numbers too:
This guy estimates over 150 people: http://youtube.com/watch?v=BbYTxS8tuxo
And he has video evidence to back it up.
L Ron Ron was apparently taking lots and lots of pills during some years, but crack wasn't around until the 1980s, and he died in 1986. Some of his science fiction, such as Battlefield Earth, was written that late, but most of his work was much earlier. I don't know what he was taking, but amphetamines were popular and widely available in the 1950s, so paranoid sleep-addled drughead is potentially possible, and bad sci-fi is definitely correct.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
...Certainly no obvious fairy tales, like Christian, Jewish, or Islamic miracles. I got one word for you, "Xenu".At the next eco-hypocrisy-meeting, count the private jets used to get to the meeting. Should be interesting to see that
Get WHAT word out? That Scientology is a dangerous cult? No shit Sherlock.
It's still news to much of the general public. And evidently, given the defence some people seem to be giving to Scientology, it seems to be news to some people here...
These "protests" were not about "getting the word out".. they were about hate.
Evidence?
Elsewhere someone was criticising them for shouting Internet memes, which doesn't strike me as "hate". The coverage in the mainstream media suggests that "getting the word out" was done rather well, whilst there's no sign of "hate" at all.
I'm genuinely curious what your actual point here? Do you criticise every protest that happens in the world if you don't think the cause worthy or important enough, or is the issue something else...?
I sure the hell hope so! The Enlightenment happened over 200 years ago. Come on people it's time to give up the bronze age myths and connect your thinking to reality...
Awesome furniture, accessories and cabinetry in Santa Rosa, CA: http://humanity-home.com/
prove it. Of course , we're unable to prove the opposite, too.
Ok, hypothetically let's say you are an atheist and I believe that the Invisible Pink Unicorn will intervene and grant me eternal life and I try to convince you that this is the case and that if you accept him as your saviour, forsaking all others, he will do the same for you. Now I can't prove the IPU exists and you can't prove he doesn't.
In that case would you believe in the IPU? If yes, what about my friend who tells you you will be saved, but only if you worship exclusively the One True God, the Flying Spaghetti Monster? Remember both of them won't tolerate worship of the other.
Or would you be agnostic about him? It seems like a good idea until you realise that you're actually agnostic about every deity ever proposed, even the ones that people fabricated in a couple of minutes to win arguments on the Internet. You don't believe in one of them anymore than you believe in Santa Claus actually. And it doesn't do you any good if any of them do exist because of the damn exclusivity clauses.
Or do you decide the IPU/FSM/God/Santa Claus is just wishful thinking?
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
Well, yeah, you're right (and I knew this, growing up Catholic). The Church interprets the Bible as requiring faith and good works in order to achieve salvation. If you're not following the Church's interpretation and related doctrine, sorry, no salvation for you (although not necessarily an automatic ticket on the bullet-train to heck, either, unlike some flavours of Protestantism).
I just hope these boys take precautions. I understand these Scientology hairpins don't play. It seems people have been hurt messing with them.
If this recent infamous Tom Cruise video is an example of the emotional state of your average Scientologist, I think there's good reason to treat them as if they were dangerous and capable of just about anything.
A joke's a joke and I enjoy seeing nutballs tweaked as much as the next guy, but these folks seem to have snakes in the brain pan and enough money to insulate them from the usual rules of civilization.
You are welcome on my lawn.
... the current protesters do not lie, do not threaten and do not file frivolous lawsuits. Scientology does. As a result, what Anonymous is doing is NOTHING like what Scientology is doing.
Unless the grandparent wants to argue that picketing a for-profit organization is like running the Mafia. In which case, I can't help him. Non sequiturs are impossible to argue against.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
I am not a physicist, but as I understand it, contemporary physics considers the dimension of time as having come into existence at the big bang along with the familiar dimensions of space. If so, "before the big bang" is a meaningless phrase.
Yes, that's weird and hard to comprehend, and outside what human brains are built to grasp. But so is much of physics; the human brain can't really get a handle on the particle/wave duality, relativity, or quantum tunneling, either. The best most of us can do is represent it symbolically with mathematics - and few enough of us can do that.
Anyway, as counterintuitive as it is, "what was there before the big bang" may be as meaningless of a question as "how far do I have to walk on the earth before I get to the end?" We don't need religion to explain what was before the big bang for the same reason we don't need religion to explain what's past the edge of the (flat) Earth.
I stole this sig from someone cleverer than me.
I wouldn't worry about it. As long as you're hating on any sort of religion, especially Christianity, you automatically get +5 insightful!
We figured out a long time ago that it's easier to elect seven judges than to elect 132 legislators.
No, seriously, do you?
Nobody went inside a church. Protests were taking place on public property.
There was no slander. Merely recitation of facts as evidenced by court findings and reported across the world in a variety of news papers.
They wore masks because of the well-known habit of Scientologists to completely destroy anyone who publicly or privately opposes them.
There is no burning of crosses. This isn't even the beginning of a slippery slope.
Scientology isn't being persecuted anymore than Nazis were persecuted by Jews.
Again, do you work for Scientology? Because your line of reasoning is identical to a number of Scientology press releases, anytime there is someone who publicly states their dislike for Scientology.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
Let me guess... the IQ test was designed and administered by Scientology?
Well, the Reformation certainly shook things up. Printing presses came along at just the right time, indeed. Before that, you were pretty much stuck with going to church to hear the Scripture.
As for my recollections of Catholic priests' personal preferences, I have very few. But their doctrine is not so much a matter of personal preference (save that they should at least serve because they believe, and so their personal preference is assumed, by me at least, to agree with Papal doctrine) but of Chirch doctrine and policy. I didn't state that Catholic priests prefer that you NOT READ the Bible, but that they prefer you share their interpretation of it.
So, as a former Catholic, I'm left with several important dillemas. Do I believe that my ppriest is my intercessor before God, or is it Christ? Do I still go to Confession, or can I confess to Christ directly, or even to God? Do I take Communion as the literal flesh of Jesus, transubstantiated in the hand of the priest as I take it into my mouth, or do I recognise the elements of Communion as representative of Christ's sacrifice? The issue of Communion is an important one, and the Catholic Church stakes a lot on it. And yes, wrongly in my opinion, as you can guess.
All religions are subject to interpretation, and all I suspect get pretty thoroughly distorted at one time or another. Scientology, I wonder, isn't so much distorted. L. Ron seems to have gotten it just as he intended. Christianity is not nearly so monolithic, or course, if only because it has a much larger following. Harder to control.
In case you're wondering, I know many Catholics, and I trust in their faith, that is I believe they believe. Their Church may be flawed, but I don't encourage them to abandon it. I encourage them to cling to Scripture, and pray.
As I do you.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
He wants his fifty bucks back.
http://rocknerd.co.uk
Wasted effort. Just think of the REAL things that could be accomplished with all the effort being put into this publicity stunt. We're in an election year with a president and congress at lowest rankings in U.S history, terrorists are using disabled persons as bombers, and these morons are giving free publicity to CoS. In the grand scheme of things CoS is a blip. Why are these people so intent on taking violating the rights of the CoS. The world is full of far more sinister people.
This goes to show you how stupid the myspace generation is.
I do believe you're on to something. However, I have always understood that the reasons actors (and a whole lot of that industry) are into this is good ole' fashion networking. Not that much different from when and why Christianity went real big after emperor Constantine converted. Everyone wanted to curry favor with the emperor and people rushed on in, Jews, pagans, all sorts of people. But these people brought on in a good number of their own practices and the church changed quite a bit.
This doesn't seem to be the case with Scientology (which actually seems a ton more like ancient Gnosticism, at least in principle), though I imagine it could be. What they need is huge and rapid influx of converts (to the point of increasing the total membership 20-fold) and another prophet or two to bring on in the updated truth. If the new prophets would hold out the "truth" free of charge, it'd likely morph Scientology on into a religion rather than the incredible parasitical oddity it is.
Until then, people have to sort of suck it on up so they can get in good with people in power in the entertainment industry. And actors are well... good at faking it.
But how else could Scientology not seem like poorly written Science Fiction given its creator (and his motives)?!? I find it so absolutely bizarre that anybody getting seriously into this couldn't do the most BASIC research into what Hubbard was doing here.
I guess that's why their new nemesis named themselves Anonymous. These guys in Anonymous may be armatures but that doesn't mean they haven't learned from the pro's.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
I believe you mean DC-8's -- but without the propellers...
Oops! The DC-8 was and is a pure jet aircraft. No propellers.
Good catch dude, in addition to be being a bad writer a crook and racist, L Ron Hubbard was also ignorant of airplane propulsion. That's it! The whole sick structure will now collapse.
By the way, the racism link would probably comes as a surprise to all the Hollywood stars who donate to Scientology.
http://www.solitarytrees.net/racism/deny.htm
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
outside what human brains are built to grasp begs a big question.
I am too lazy to look it up, but I am sure there is plenty of discussion that substitutes "what was before the big bang" with, "what was before God".
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
It pretty well matches the rest of LRH's works; calling him a SciFi writer is an insult to the craft.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
So, don't just laugh at this.
Get involved.
They can sue a few people. They cannot sue EVERYONE.
So join protests. Write your legislators. Stuff like that.
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They're tightly wound?
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
my definition of a "cult" is an organization that puts more value on the organization than the people within the organization.
this means there are lots of cults.
jesus was different, though, in that he valued the individual and this *really* torqued the organizations of his day.
true religion is about treating others equal to how you want to be treated (assuming sane person wants to be treated well). eternity is a long time and any kind of physical wealth doesn't even register, but how you treat others will be even more relevant 1,000,000 google years from now than it is today.
exalting an organization and, by default, its leaders, is heading in the wrong direction.
Sorry. You're completely wrong about that. The satellites and dishes are actually the property of Major League Baseball. The MLB just wants us to think we're highly evolved space clams so that we'd more receptive to wearing baseball caps without the tinfoil inserts.
Still there is quite a bit of the religion of Christianity that doesn't make sense, or it is obvious that parts have been left out of the "official" Bible. For example to learn more about Christ's mother you'd need to go to the Qur'an, or more about his Childhood you'd need an Ethiopian Bible.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
No, your response here is proof that you've accepted his existence, at last as well as you're capable of accepting it.
On a side note, a good sig for you might be "Those who don't read Descartes are condemned to recreate him. Badly".
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
The short answer is no it's not just you, I know some people who are addicted to WOW and I've heard of some that are addicted to Co$, the biggest difference is WoW addicts tend to know WoW is fantasy and the Co$ tend to think Co$ is reality.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
If you feel that all other religions are as I described the Church of Scientology to be, that's not my business.
Reminds me of a Philosophy joke:
A philosophy professor walks in to give his class their final. Placing his chair on his desk the professor instructs the class, "Using every applicable thing you've learned in this course, prove to me that this chair DOES NOT EXIST."
So, pencils are writing and erasers are erasing, students are preparing to embark on novels proving that this chair doesn't exist, except for one student. He spends thirty seconds writing his answer, then turns his final in to the astonishment of his peers.
Time goes by, and the day comes when all the students get their final grades...and to the amazment of the class, the student who wrote for thirty seconds gets the highest grade in the class.
His answer to the question: "What chair?"
I'd ask for proof, but I'd really just rather see you hit some dingers.
THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD
Background: The Church of Scientology successfully threatened Slashdot into removing a post containing the text of a copyrighted "holy" text, and further links to the text.
Hypothesis: The Catholic Church wants to suppress its own holy text, the New American Bible. The NAB is the officially authorized translation of the Bible for use by Catholics in the United States.
Conjecture: If a Slashdot poster posts an excerpt from the NAB, along with a link to the full text, the Catholic Church will threaten Slashdot, and Slashdot will remove the post.
Experiment: I am posting the first 10 verses from the book of Genesis, Chapter One.
1 1 In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth, 2 2 the earth was a formless wasteland, and darkness covered the abyss, while a mighty wind swept over the waters. 3 Then God said, "Let there be light," and there was light. 4 God saw how good the light was. God then separated the light from the darkness. 5 3 God called the light "day," and the darkness he called "night." Thus evening came, and morning followed--the first day. 6 Then God said, "Let there be a dome in the middle of the waters, to separate one body of water from the other." And so it happened: 7 God made the dome, and it separated the water above the dome from the water below it. 8 God called the dome "the sky." Evening came, and morning followed--the second day. 9 Then God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered into a single basin, so that the dry land may appear." And so it happened: the water under the sky was gathered into its basin, and the dry land appeared. 10 God called the dry land "the earth," and the basin of the water he called "the sea." God saw how good it was.
The full text of the NAB is available at http://www.usccb.org/nab/bible/
Wait for priests to show up with their three chief weapons, fear, suspense, a fanatical devotion to the Pope... Can we come in again?
*crosses fingers*
I dare anyone to reproduce this experiment and get a different result than I did.
Jenny's got a new number! 09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
Loose lips lose spit.
Because Fox is just that much more trustworthy.
Actually, I believe that what is said during confession is not even touchable by the law. The preist is also fobidden from telling anyone what he has been told, or who told him.
Knowing Google's lust for data collection, the Soviet Union is still alive and well inside the psyche of Sergey Brin....
By the way, the racism link would probably comes as a surprise to all the Hollywood stars who donate to Scientology. http://www.solitarytrees.net/racism/deny.htm Somehow I doubt it.
Anonymous Coward
The problem with Scientology is not in its doctrines but in its techniques, which are hypnotic, and in its finances, which are aimed exclusively at separating people from their money. And when you're all done spending a million dollars over a lifetime they make you a level 8 and tell you the Xenu story. Psychosis is not a viable religious doctrine and should not be supported by the government.
It seems to be that the "next" level is the one that "works". When one gets to that level and superhuman powers aren't attained, then the "next" level is assured to be the one that works.
So far no one has seem to achieve the claims touted in the original Dianetics books. For all the claims of "it works" there's very little evidence presented. It has to be taken on faith, which is what makes Scientology a religion.
I have no doubt that Dianetics does help many people initially, just like any form of self hypnosis, meditation, introspection, or what not. After the amazing ground breaking results L. Ron promised for Dianetics didn't happen, Scientology started layering on more and more advanced levels.
*other social systems usually include capitalism or the military complex
But aren't Thetans what the Scientologists are yanking out?
I just read Slashdot for the articles.
[quote]The antagonism to Psychiatry is because it's a competitor to Scientology in the "healing the mind" market, and because Psychiatry, proceeding according to actual scientific principles, is in probably the best position to know what nonsense Scientology is.[/quote] I think the antagonism is because the psychiatric community were very lukewarm to Dianetics at the start and got colder over time, which made Hubbard angry that they couldn't see how much of a genius he was. Combine a big ego, a little bit of self-delusion, a little bit of paranoia, and he probably ends up assuming the psychiatric community is out to get him. Wait a few years and mix in some strange chemicals and he ends up convinced there's a huge conspiracy trying to keep our thetans subjugated.
I'm leaning towards the view that Hubbard wasn't a con-man, but that he actually believed what he told others. When he got sick he assumed there something was missing in his technology, got himself audited by others, and eventually came out with another "this is it!" level to the technology. He kept himself isolated and surrounded by people who truly believed every word he said, which only fueled his own belief in himself.
i guess it is more like an ARG
Digg has Windows fanboys, /. has scientologists...
No place seems safe these days...
http://www.dieblinkenlights.com
I talk to all kinds of voices in my head each day. Doesn't mean any of them exist.
rewriting history since 2109
Frankly any Christian, whether they be Catholic or Protestant, if they have the new testament they should know better. If a Protestant denomination would see it otherwise they are ignoring foundational biblical text. See below:
James 2:17-18 (New International Version)
17 In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.
18 But someone will say, "You have faith; I have deeds." Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.
As far as the topic at hand, I find it very sad that people are so desperate to find purpose that they believe the workings of a 1950's science fiction author to be truth. Wanna get them good? Start by boycotting Cruise's films. To give him $$$ most likely means a percentage is going off to the CoS.
Hey, I was just protesting your logic, not agreeing with the protesters. In fact that was my point. People protest for all sorts of reasons, and thats their first amendment right. If you disagree with one group of protesters reason for protesting, that doesn't mean that all protesters are equally wrong.
I don't personally have any problem with Scientologists in general, but I *do* have a problem with people who spew logical fallacies at the drop of a hat.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
There are plenty of ex-members of a given religion who do not feel threatened by leaving it. I myself was baptized Catholic when I was younger, but though I don't feel much respect for the policies of that particular church, I don't feel overly threatened by it either.
The stories of many who have left Scientology are quite different, and rather chilling.
So yeah, of those that left, many would likely be disillusioned. But it's like leaving the mob, it takes a lot of guts to do so, and overall it can be a pretty dangerous proposition.
No point in dyin tho.
You got a bad attitude.
You go ahead and rot.
I get my own SEX PLANET to be the God of.
If he hasn't seen your $30, you're still "Pink" to "Bob."
You don't know enough to be a pessimist boy.
http://www.subgenius.com/
Eternal Salvation or Triple your money back. I dare any other flying saucer religion especially "Church of Scientology" to make an offer like that.
They can't because its just bullshit cooked up by a moron who couldn't write decent sci-fi or hold his drugs.*poofter*
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
"You have to understand that most of these people are not ready to be unplugged and many are so hopelessly dependent on the system, they'll fight to protect it."
This is the problem with cult members - they're told that they need to be positive and loving, but the cult leaders say "hurt these people" and they do. They're too brainwashed to understand that the actions of the cult leaders are antithetical to what they preach.
They were in Las Vegas too... Drove by this on the way out of town... maybe 30 people out...
Since I don't care for Scientology (or any other religion), I honked.
Had a great time in Vegas though, I got married!
"There are laws that enslave men, and laws that set them free. " - Sean Connery as King Arthur
And yes I'm a conservative, right-wing, radical christian.
I guess that explains why you don't know anything about science.
I never have frustrations, the reason is, to wit:
If at first I don't succeed, I quit!
Actually, I think that course might cost $10,000. Not to mention all the work you have to put into levels 1-7. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freewinds
Well it is easy to say that someone said something without giving a reference. Hardly scientific. More hearsay in fact.
a Balanced view should differentiate between the original Scientology Hubbard researched and developed and the perversion the church practices today.
It is not surprising the church is attacked so vehemently after the death of Hubbard. A new regime took over and money, not philosophy, became the order of the day. Money became supreme. The philosophy and technology is not practiced any more in the church.
How many people on this list actually know what scientology is I wonder? Not very many I bet. It is all rhetoric and criticism bandied around with no actual reference to the actual philosophy or religious practices. Not very scientific.
The only actual scientologists you will find these days are OUTSIDE of the church actually practicing scientology and improving their lives. No big money involved. No xenu crap. just ordinary people [practicing their own faith.
AND, you might be interested to know, the church does not like them either. After all they are taking business away from the church!
And the church should not be called the church of Scientology any more. Maybe the church that used to practice scientology and now practices something (god knows what) else.
And I can back this up with facts too.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Uh huh. And how much did it cost you? Can you tell us about OT-III?
If I want to go to church, temple, mosque, etc., it doesn't cost me a cent. If I drop out, they won't harass me. If I later say I didn't like the experience, they also probably won't sue me.
And, really: aliens and volcanoes from 75 million years ago? Dude. Try Flying Spaghetti Monster brand religion. It's lots of fun, and, at worships, at least you can get full on the pasta.
Truth, Justice. Or the American Way.
According to this semi recent article, Will Smith is not a member of CoS. I respect Will Smith as a person as well as his career, so after reading him say,"I don't necessarily believe in organized religion." I will sleep better next time I watch one of his movies. :)
We are Anonymous Coward. We are legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget.
it is not. The only entitity I know to know about his response is me, and I think I'm just making it up because I'm bored and lonely being the only thing in existence.
> It was a weird, and these people believe this stuff.
Not that I'm supporting COS or anything, but have you been to a Trekkie convention, lately...?
Truth, Justice. Or the American Way.
Why the masks?
Every mask you see is the face of a victim in whose place we stand to speak. It is the empty place where a life should be that is no more. It is the absence of a friend, a neighbor, a loved one. It is the missing critic, who cannot speak or show his face out of fear.
We are the faceless. We give voice to the voiceless. We step forward to speak for those who cannot.
For every voice silenced through criminal intimidation and the tactics of personal destruction, we step forward.
For every troubled soul who seeks solace but is left with only a treasury of lies, ruin, and loss, we step forward.
For every mother silenced for fear that her words will endanger her child still within the cult, we step forward.
For every business owner intimidated into silence, we step forward.
For every victim locked within an armed compound or re-education labor camp, beyond the reach of law and justice, we step forward.
For every death, we step forward.
For every injustice committed, our numbers are multiplied. For every critic silenced, every reputation falsely tarnished, the truths we speak are made more brilliant. For every child lost, our hearts grow more resolute. We step forward for others who cannot.
Every mask you see is the face of a victim in whose place we stand to speak. It is the empty place where a life should be that is no more. It is the absence of a friend, a neighbor, a loved one. It is the missing critic, who cannot speak or show his face out of fear.
We are the faceless. We give voice to the voiceless. We speak because they cannot.
Yes, I know, this isn't strictly related to the topic, but it proves the parent's point. There are books from many religions far outside of the norm there, but no Scientology.
Space Shuttle was a program that strapped humans to an explosion and tried to stab through the sky with fire and math
Anonymous should take on "FOX News"
Mever nind the typos.
Sorry, no. Scientology is ludicrous bullshit and only gullible idiots defend it.
If you want to talk about "plausible" religions (and I'm using the word plausible VERY loosely), try Greek mythology. I'm happy to believe that some big guy named Zeus lived on a mountain, killed his dad, went around fucking bulls and swans, ate a few of his children, and threw sharp pointy things at people who pissed him off. Hell, you can find people like that living in the US right now; is it so hard to believe that a degenerate redneck like that lived in Greece 4000 years ago?
But ... alien ghosts being dumped in Earth's volcanoes to harass a race of homicidal apes by a galactic despot? That's rather less plausible. Frankly, any race powerful enough to locks ghosts in theatres and brainwash them by making them watching The Passion of the Christ over and over again, is probably powerful enough to dispose of those ghosts properly, rather than just leaving them around to inspire the aforementioned apes to challenge his authority?
Hey, I've got a religion based on the plot of Starship Troopers! Want to sign up? In it, WE live in the spirit world, ghosts of dead mobile infantrymen. Our pain and sadness is caused by the meta-ghosts of dead Arachnids. We can only find peace by arming, drilling, and training, until we're sufficiently disciplined and skilled to be recruited/promoted back into the realm of the living to take up arms against the bugs again.
Yeah, I know. --There are several similar problems with my post, the worst of which was that I had intended it as a response to another thread. I typed too quickly. It's been one of those days.
-FL
I agree; conspiracy and paranoia run through Hubbard and Scientology history.
Hubbard may well have believed in Dianetics (despite obvious evidence to the contrary, such as his first "clear"[*] who could not remember what colour tie Hubbard wore) but I am sure that he started Scientology as a religion for the profit and exemption from income and property taxes.
[*] A "clear" is a Dianetics term for a person who has been rid of mental aberration. Such people, according to Scientology, are supposed to have perfect memory, be able to heal themselves of disease (e.g. Cancer), not catch colds, improve their vision to no longer require eyeglasses, and so on.
Ordinary people would call such a person "deluded" if they believed they had those abilities.
Basically Hubbard just wrote down whatever came into his head, and called it Technology. He had a prolific imagination.
Well, I spelled 'Leeches' incorrectly, and I would fix a couple of other points of grammar, and moreover I would have posted in the thread I'd originally intended to post in rather that this one. It's been a day of mishaps at my keyboard. --But other than that stuff, the content is fairly spot-on. If it seems irrational to you, then I think this might be because you assume I am using the same information set that you have (or one very similar), from which it would be impossible to make such statements as those I have done without indeed being irrational. However, I am not you, and I have a fairly wide sampling of knowledge in these areas, based of a lot of research and enough direct experience to validate much of that research. I don't mean to use the word 'ignorant' in a negative context, but you might do well to ask if perhaps I know something you do not rather than assume otherwise.
Telling me to get help because I happen to be talking about things you do not understand is both rude and, sadly, typical of human history.
-FL
That is completely wrong, and likely an attempt to Karma whore with a quick uninformed search.
That is just a classification, 'Sruti' essentially means those scriptures that have been passed down directly from God to man, while 'Smriti' would be collected ancient wisdom.
There are a number of books holy to Hindu faith, primarily the Gita, the Vedas, and the Upanishads.
~IAA Hindu
Seriously, this is just harassment and persecution. "Watchtower Bible v. Stratton"http://epic.org/free_speech/watchtower.html
This means if I wanted to protest the Catholic Church, or Pope Benedict XVI, I can do so Anonymously. And you know what happens when you protest at a Catholic church? When I did, I got coffee and donuts. That's how you can test the difference between the listeners and the bigots.
I'm sure the KKK did do masked protests. That's the problem with free speech, you'll always find some hate mongering asshat group who you can't agree with. But at the same time it's a mixed blessing, if the haters want to make asses out of them selves and ruin their own cause, that is their right too. Everyone gets free speech, otherwise it wouldn't be free.
The difference is the KKK was an extreme militant group which employed threats, violence, and intimidation. They often focused on individuals and harassed people AT HOME. They wore masks to dodge accountability, not out of fear of retaliation.
One Co$ revenge picket
Anonymous's actions can NOT be described as harassment and persecution as their target was an organization. Scientology's actions can be called harassment and persecution because they target individuals.
There is no sanctuary. There is no sanctuary. SHUT UP! There is no shut up. There is no shut up.
Confession is never fully broken with out the confessee agreeing to it. A priest isnt under canon law allowed to break it even in the case of eminent death resulting from the confession. He can withhold absolution and is trained in methods to get the confessee to cooperate to help police in such cases, but can not break confessional seal.
Pretty much the only time a priest make break the seal is if the issue is something that normally excommunicates the confessee or something the priest needs a more senior member of the clergy to help with. And even that requires the confessee to agree to it.
Not all states and nations respect it, mostly based off their own law history with confidentiality.
I'd say more, but my guild is raiding.
It *was* bad Sci-fi written by a sleep-deprived crackhead. Read about L. Ron Hubbard sometime. He was drugged up on stimulants, depressants, and alcohol almost constantly when he wrote the "holy texts" of scientology. Maybe even more.
No, it's about showing the world that if enough people stand up against the church of scientology, they can't harm you. The church's policy of harassing and silencing critics only works against small groups, it's totally ineffective against large groups, so you need to show everyone that large groups are willing to stand up against them.
Not having a go at anyone in particular, but why does it seem that people who have supposedly become informed as to the real intent of COS, still refer to Scientology as a religion instead of the well organised cult that it is? At the higher levels it's about the most exclusive Boy's Club there is, and at the lower levels it's a blatant parasite on the lower to middle classes. Surely part of the process of stripping away any false claims of legitimacy is not elevating COS to a level akin to religions? Granted some of the religions over the centuries have been responsible for amazingly heinous behavior, but in general most religions no matter the past, don't compare nowadays to the organised potential threat posed by COS. I couldn't imagine a scarier scenario than COS members being elected to US government. Imagine a COS member being the person elected to look after health reforms, mental illness, etc.
or, maybe, just maybe, what you call "silencing critics" they rightfully consider "slander" or "libel" or "religious bigotry" and that's why they sue people who say these things for slander or libel and make sure they "show everyone" that the people who say these things are religious bigots. Seriously, half the people I have replied to here today are 100% convinced that CoS is not a church and don't mind telling people such. The CoS is legally recognized as a church.. handing out leaflets saying it isn't is libel. Most of the reasons put forward for why the CoS isn't a church are of the form "they do X, and other churches don't." Which is basic religious bigotry. And, ultimately, unless one of your family members has become a member, it's none of your god damn business. Live and let live.
How we know is more important than what we know.
Psst... it's all made up. It will never make sense.
It was written by people who have visions and hear voices for heavens sake. The rest were pushing assorted political agendas.
May contain traces of nut.
Made from the freshest electrons.
Well the Taliban, the Inquisition, the SS and the NKVD all believed in something bigger than themselves and it made them act like monsters. Actually I think if you don't it forces you to focus on things nearer to hand like the people around you. And also to judge every issue on its merits rather than letting some religion or ideology tell you what is right against your instincts. And it's no surprise that AA are so keen on religion - they have a lot of cult like characteristics.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
I'm pretty sure you'll find that once your dead all your energy goes to feeding the worms and fertilising the soil. A lot of people go on about this when they try to justify the "something" which might happen when you're dead but they also think people have some sort of non physical energy which power them and that it is this which is then conserved, unfortunately I don't think we have ever discovered any such energy.
Except that Dianetics didn't call itself a religion in the early days or use the name "Church of Scientology". When it did declare itself a religion, it didn't get tax exempt status in the US and many other places (probably part of the reason for their long feud with the IRS probably).
It was strictly a "scientific" venture at the start that provided counseling services, with a very decentralized organization. Hubbard was probably annoyed at all the independent research and organizations with his Dianetics baby, so that later on he essentially declared that everyone else was wrong and competing tech was harmful, and only he and his organization could do Dianetics the right way. This despite his earlier claim that no one person or organization should control Dianetics. Of course this caused a lot of early advocates and adherents to drift away.
There had been problems with the US FDA over calling the e-meter a medical device, and similar problems in other countries, which may have prompted a pragmatic decision to call itself a "church". I suspect a lot of Scientologists don't think of it as a religion and think the word "church" is just a legal device. There aren't rituals or worship and the like. The introduction of aspects that require faith is done gradually which masks the true nature of the "self-help group".
Assume I was drunk when I posted this.
Writing for a penny a word is ridiculous. If a man really wants to make a million dollars, the best way would be to start his own religion.
/Or/ he could have written better stories...- L. Ron Hubbard
May contain traces of nut.
Made from the freshest electrons.
...there are a lot of things we haven't discovered yetWithout having discovered these undiscovered things yet, what indication do you have that there are many of them?
Anonymous is not so difficult to find, and finding them means you passed the test of IQ necessary to join.
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
How much did their IQ Tests cost you? Because I can go out and buy that Dr Kiroshima brain training game for my DS for £20.
Dr Wafa Sultan put it right:
/Z
"Brother, you can believe in stones, as long as you don't throw them at me."
See: Wafa Sultan at Al-Jeezera TV
Maybe after Anonymous defeats Scientology we can Anonymous nicely to destroy the MPAA and RIAA too? They practice much of the same scams and scummy tactics.
09F911029D74E35BD84156C5635688C0
+2 Troll is Slashdot's way of saying groupthink is confused
I don't care about the faith, but the church is a greedy money-grabbing, brain-washing, isolationist, self-perpetuating and destructive movement. Reading about how former members are harassed makes my skin crawl. Reading how former members are still scarred by it many years afterwards make me really sad. Reading about how the church uses its accumulated wealth to shield itself from everything makes me angry.
No, it is my business to stop the church. I will not stand idly by.
If you've researched Scientology, you wouldn't be stating this. Most folk's problems with Scientology stem from their organisational inclinations, the rules they force their members to follow (disconnection, forced abortions, etc.), and finally the lack of clinical trials for what they claim is a science. Of course it's as far-fetched as any religion, but that's the least of the problems with it.
That quote doesn't say anything about his intentions. It's just a statement that probably made sense to him, a snide remark about the religious systems at the time.
It'd help if you gave a source of course.
Truth arises more readily from error than from confusion. -Francis Bacon
Not neccessarily. I often hold conversations with figments of my imagination. It is entertaining, and if I get good enough at that, I could write them down and become a bestseller ;).
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
Even though the street protests are fine and dandy (and lawful), I do have to remind that the same group did engage in a DDoS-attack against CoS. Which at least in my book nullifies any effort against CoS done by "Anonymous".
Also having masks in a public demonstration shows bad form from the protesters.
That's mainly because
1) Masks may arouse fear in the general public. Be it because of terrorism or something else, it should be considered.
2) Having masks might lessen the impact of the demonstration (in the general public). For me that only shows that the individuals who are participating in the protest do not believe in the ideals they claim to support.
3) Enforcing your own cultural ideas inside another culture is probably a bad idea. For example, like Islamist groups try to enforce their cultural ideas inside Christian cultures. Or vice versa.
Now, some of the slashdotters have noted that wearing masks protects the protesters from CoS, and that is a valid argument. I do support anonymity, and I do think that people should be free to wear masks if they want to do so, but wouldn't it be bad if you were thought to be terrorists because of that..?
(That might reflect the stupidity of the general public, but it should be considered if you really care about the message you're trying to convey.)
As a sidenote, I do not support CoS nor the religion they claim to represent.
--I'm not Anonymous, I'm fisuk.
Because that's not Islam doing the killing, but a corruption of it. The RTC, the company that "runs" Scientology, is intrinsically destructive, and has seperated hundreds or thousands of families, and killed dozens. It seeks to do more than that. If radical corrupted Islam had offices around the world, I'm sure they'd get their fair share too.
'Atheism' (as is 'agnosticism') is a label stuck onto us, who would just rather be left alone by the religious types, who cannot for the life of them be convinced that other people don't need a god or an extra label in their existence. To label yourself as such means that you're playing *their* semantic game. Or it may mean that you haven't yet understood what their label-sticking is all about; it's about having fill-in forms with a caption 'Religion' on it. So that *they* can fill in something (and feel proud and confirmed), but also so that *you* have to fill in something. And if you feel bad about that - even if it isn't because you 'miss a god' but because you just don't want to be labeled or because you simply don't know what to fill in there, then they've scored another two points. Reason like this: Am I an atheist ? No. Do I believe in God or am I otherwise religious ? No. Good - now I've confused them.
Religion is what happens when nature strikes and groupthink goes wrong.
Not just in Phoenix or elsewhere in USA.
Here's a partial list, with the protesters count:
Auckland, NZ: 30-40
Sydney, AU: 200
Brisbane, AU: 60
Plymouth, UK: 15-25
Manchester, UK: 125
CLEARWATER, FL, US: 200
Atlanta, GA, US: 200-300
Dallas, TX, US: 115
Houston, TX, US: ~75
Charlotte, NC, US: 60
Berkeley, CA, US: 15 (but mighty)
Indianapolis, IN, US: 25
Philadelphia, PA, US:135
Edmonton, CAN: 40
Montreal, CAN: 50
Toronto, CAN: 150-200
Winnipeg, CAN: 30ish
TOKYO, JAPAN: 1 (but big balls)
Oslo, Norway: 50
Milwaukee, WI, US: 30
Halifax, Nova Scotia: 20-30
Detroit, MI, US: ~100
------
Next protest is on MARCH 15th.
Check out if there's a picket planned in your city: http://forums.enturbulation.org/viewforum.php?f=21
Get informed: http://www.enturbulation.org/
All Hail Discordia. Hail Eris. Fnord.
it's not all made up, there more than a little bit that has been corroborated historically, more has some supporting evidence; you read it with the "voices in the head" and 'political agenda' filters on.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
Hubbard spending a lot of time in the nut-house. He came to hate psychiatry and psychology. This hatred is expressed in his purely fictional works, like "Mission Earth" as well.
At least, that is my understanding.
what?
More like free as in nuts.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I'm now reading Malleus Maleficarum (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum). The similarities are startling.
Get a free bible: http://www.freebibles.net/
Or Read or download one online with thousands of actually very useful footnotes and references: http://www.bible.org/
Get a free Koran: http://www.freekoran.com/
Get a free Book of Morman: http://www.mormon.org/bookofmormon
Estimated cost to get to read all the Scientology "holy" documents: $350,000.
As I understand it, cult leaders love to impress their followers with an "under siege" mentality. When people protest a cult, that only "proves" that the bad guys are out to suppress the truth.
Yes, I know this Politically Correct statement very well. Overused and not true.
For every Muslim which claims that Islam is peaceful is possible to point out at least one other Muslim who thinks quite otherwise.
See: http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/Pages/Islamophobia.htm : killing is promoted by Koran in so many cases.
Also see this book (written by prominent Islamic scholar - Fathi Yakan):
To Be A Muslim
Anyway, If you really want some organization to blame:
Check this: http://www.anti-cair-net.org/
Now the AA is admittedly not very far along the cult scale, but it further along than the sort of organisations I would be comfortable with supporting are. And organisations like the AA did manage to impose their beliefs on everyone else once before, during prohibition. It wasn't as disastrous as communism or Nazism but it wasn't good. And it was only repealed because the wets could still vote. Actually in Sweden, alcohol sales are still very limited because AA like organisations have managed to lobby for it, despite the fact that the vast majority of people would prefer them not to be.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
Assume I was drunk when I posted this.
The documents ae still out there. Look up xenu.net, operation clambake, the fishman affidavit and various others.
whyaretheydead.net also makes a harrowing read.
Read The God Delusion. We are entering the post-post-modern era. Post-modernism failed. Things are whether testable and thus true or false (or unsure), or are not testable and thus not relevant. There is no reason to keep the taboo of attacking someones bullshit beliefs. A religious opinion is not different from any other opinion, so it requires arguments and evidence. All progress comes from keeping the good ideas and throwing away the bad ones. Our society completely depends on this, and this fact is getting more and more attention. Religion was always protected from this, to keep the religious from killing each other. But as society has grown stronger and humanity is rapidly becoming more peaceful, we don't need this taboo any longer. People like Dawkins, Harris and Hitchens do attack religion, and they are gaining momentum. We are entering a new age of reason, but expect the religious to resist.
Trust me, I work for the government.
If slashdot editors would just take two minutes to google around, they would see that this was a WORLDWIDE event covered by local media all over. http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&q=scientology&btnG=Search+News returns over 2300 hits.
Here is a fascinating series of videos from the deposition of Steven Fishman, who was kicked out of the Church of Scientology when he was indited for fraud by the federal government of the United States. According to the deposition, leading Scientologists incited Fishman to pursue the fraud in order to pay for high-level auditing. After his inditement, Fishman was urged by high-ranking Scientologiests to murder his lawyer and commit suicide. Throughout the deposition, Fishman describes a belief structure that is sheer lunacy but which he is still believes wholeheartedly. He states that the most important thing in his life is to "clear the planet" for Scientology.
That was a name that was given to them by Fox News about (18?) months ago to describe the people on anonymous image boards and/or *chans, IRC nets, and such that were griefing people IRL and online (Tom Green, Hal Turner, MySpace and LJ hacks, and so forth).
This name had been taken on in pride by its adherents as a banner of unification among these Internet communities. This war with Co$ is their latest and most ambitious project. It has also drawn in people from the sidelines who might have not agreed with their earlier tactics but would like to participate now that target is deemed worthy, one can suppose.
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
You mean like early Catholics, who couldn't know the Bible without a priest reading it to them? They didn't write the thing in Latin just to make the pages pretty. Donations brothers please!
The IRS allowed the Church to be considered a charitable non-profit. Religious organizations are not recognized at a federal level. Each state has differing laws about recognizing religious organizations and conferring them special statuses or protections.
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
Interesting thought, I was thinking about this the other day when I read this verse in John:
"Truly, truly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door but climbs in by another way, that man is a thief and a robber." John 10:1
Are you implying you know what the things are that we don't know? And c'mon... energy? Energy has a strictly defined meaning, in that it's a conserved, dissipated quantity. In what way has a 'soul' or 'life force' or whatever been shown to exist or even be able to behave anything like that? There's no point inventing entities that can't be measured to explain phenomenona that don't occur.
Would you like a slice of toast?
Sure they sue people, have some bat-shit crazy ideas (IMHO) but why not just leave them alone and let there followers mess up their own life's? If we all ignored them then all we would have to deal with is just the people in the malls selling the books and thats it, right? They are really no different than any other "religion" - so why single them out to get a rise?
Just have your personal beliefs and carry on with your life. Take a hike in the woods, see a play, enjoy your own life, rather than "protesting" something that doesn't affect you personally, heck if you want to protest there are plenty of other causes that need more attention. Seems like a waste of the short time we are here to me
Or am I missing something?
Pluralitas non est ponenda sine neccesitate
Right ON! I have always felt a little uncomfortable calling myself an atheist, because I'm not militant about it -- I just don't think all the hocus pocus is real... and I am uncomfortable calling myself an agnostic because I'm not sure there is anything to know, whether we are capable of understanding it or not!
I like your way of thinking, man!
-Vort
Why do we need organized religions in the first place?
To think that you know what that higher power wants and to try to convince others that you are right about what "God" wants, is just plain arrogant.
If you want to believe in a higher power, fine. That's your right. But respect my right to not believe in a higher power. Freedom of religion also mean freedom from religion.
> How many people on this list actually know what scientology is I wonder?
The Operational Thetan texts (OT III being the more famous one) were penned by Hubbard's own hand, and in deadly seriousness.
It would be hilarity itself if it didn't take itself and its lawsuits so seriously.
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
I don't think that's what the gp poster was implying at all -- it was a question. If there is an absence of proof or even any evidence at all, is there some logical reason/theory to suspect that there is some energy that is unaccounted for after death that could be the soul?
The conversation goes like this:
There's energy loss unaccounted for that could be the soul escaping the body!
No... we've never found any evidence for that.
We may just not have discovered it yet! We may not have the technical means to detect it!
Then... if there's no evidence for that theory, what makes you think it's even a possibility?
I would say it's a fair question. We're pretty good at detecting and measuring all kinds of energy. There is no known energy that is unaccounted for after death. What would make you believe in something like an energy escaping the body as evidence of the soul... when there's no evidence of that potential evidence?
It would be as if I proposed that there's evidence of God's existence because whatever room I'm praying in fills with a bright light (light is a form of energy), and then the scientists show up with photon detectors and see no difference in illumination in the room... after which, I proceed to tell them that I've never actually seen the light, but that the light could be in the non-visible light range and that their photon detectors might not be able to detect photons of that energy level. Or maybe they're photons from another dimension that play by different rules of the known universe, so you can't detect them. It's crazy talk. The fragile theory with no evidence has to stretch itself to the limits of believability (and beyond perhaps) just to maintain that it has a remote possibility of being true.
In the real, rational world... if there's no evidence for something AT ALL and you don't even have a plausible theory for why it could be possible, it's usually accepted to be very unlikely if not completely false.
Also, personally... I would propose that IF the soul were identifiable as a form of energy present in the body that leaves after death, the soul would have a finite lifespan of its own as an energy form. Energy can't be created or destroyed (other than conversion to matter and back), so any time this energy being called the soul did anything, energy would be drained from the soul. If it moved an object, attempted communication with someone, even had a single thought, it would lose energy in the process according to the laws of conservation of energy. Over time, a soul would use up all of its energy and cease to exist if it had no source for new energy. To extend this idea, a soul would need to enter a new body to use as a source of energy to continue to exist which would be reincarnation (or find some other source of energy). Because there are more living people now than have ever existed in the history of mankind, imagine the warfare between souls to inhabit a new body if the population drops.
Taking things to another level, if there were a "heaven" in an afterlife, every soul would need energy to continue to exist... and that energy must come from a source. Since energy cannot be created or destroyed, that energy source would eventually fail to provide power -- unless you're assuming that "God" can make energy... in which case, you have a perpetual power source which would defy the laws of physics.
So... if you were to say that the soul (which would logically require an energy source to continue its existence like any other living entity) will have a perpetual source of energy in heaven, you'd make the leap from science to mystical, religious magic explaining everything. (not that I'm saying that is your position... just speaking in hypothetical terms. I don't mean to put words into your mouth or speculate on your position on religion.)
The argument gets worse:
"hey! we can use science to detect the soul as a form of energy lost at the moment of death!"
"We've tri
then how can we quantify it?
By making shit up.
Thats how all the religions got started, no?
Cheers.
This is my sig. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
The CoS is a nothing more than a disinformation campaign by people opposed to the Galactic rule of Xenu.
They use blatant lies about Xenu to build thier base up.
The aliens Xenu sent to their firey doom weren't just ordinary citizens, they were Galactic Welfare recipients and they were a complete and total drain on the Galactic Tax system. These Aliens were given several chances to get off the welfare system and were all able to work. Xenu had them gathered up and sent to processing, they downloaded their minds into a giant computer where they could spend their eternity living off free Galactic government cheese. But what to do with their bodies? Well Xenu checked and some life bearing planets were facing peril in that they were losing carbon in their biospheres, one such planet Earth needed extra carbon, so they dropped off the brain dead bodies in volcaoes so that any any alien microbes would be sterilized and the carbon would enter the air and thus the carbon cycle. Xenu is so kind to think of us!
The Galactic Communist party was pissed off because their lost a great deal of their voting base (the welfare recipients). Since citizens who have been virtialized only have 1/4 of a vote. So they have agents spreading lies so when Earth joins the Galactic government there are seeds of mistrust against the duly elected Galactic President Xenu who has won in landslide victory after landslide victory and is now in his 1,345,236th term in office. LRH was a recruited by an agent to spread mistrust of Xenu.
It's all down to politics folks.
Tsukasa: All I really want, is to be left alone...
Daily News (take with grain of salt, but here's corroboration) Will Smith is giving out free auditing to the cast members of his latest film.
So, is he or isn't he???
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
Have you tried to search the quote with Google?
:)
Here's the link: (about 168,000 results)
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=If+a+man+really+wants+to+make+a+million+dollars%2C+the+best+way+would+be+to+start+his+own+religion&btnG=Google+Search&aq=-1&oq=
Let's check your logic:
1. A man says that.
2. The same man creates a new religion.
3. You don't think he may have the idea of making money out of it.
Conclusion: he was probably smarter than you
You left out a couple of things, like the church making legal threats after the coroner reported negligence as the cause of death.
"The use-mention distinction" is not "enforced here."
Yeah christians are closer to the bible than catholics but the bible still refuses to be openly discussed and criticized, or at least tries to destroy the credibility of criticizers, with its smart ass disclaimer:
Luke 10:21 "In that hour Jesus rejoiced in spirit, and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes: even so, Father; for so it seemed good in thy sight."
Or its anti-common sense disclaimer:
Jeremiah 17:9 "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?"
Which warns you not to trust yourself.
There are more anti-intellectual, anti-evidence, anti-common sense stuff in the bible. Personally I prefer Hans Christian Andersen's "The Emperor's New Clothes" which to me is the essence of every religion.
I still commend you for not being catholic, or muslin. Really.
But... the future refused to change.
The difference is that I think everyone else is actually trying to provide the therapy you're paying for instead of brainwashing you into lifelong servitude.
Agnostic - Someone who claims that they do not know or are unable to know whether God exists.
Labels exist to simplify things and make them easier to understand. its easier saying "atheist" instead of "a person who does not believe in a higher power" all the time. the same way its easier to say "pancake" instead of "a flat cake of thin batter fried on both sides on a griddle." Labels aren't necessarily a bad thing. It's like using a variable in mathematics to stand for something else that is longer or more complex. I just don't understand the big deal about being called an atheist or agnostic. To me, its on the same level of whether you call someone an engineer or athlete. It's a partial description about a very small portion of that individual's persona or belief structure.
None of the people they terrorized were "everyday people". Not that there hasn't been collateral damage. But the targets of lulz are, generally speaking, asking for it. You never hear why Anonymous attacks anybody because that doesn't make sensational news and the affected users who have blogs don't reveal their own faults. Keep in mind that the activation energy of Anonymous is very high and people spend weeks trying to make the case to get an invasion going. The usual response is "We're not your personal army".
... too much to list but anyone who has Unwarranted Self Importance. I.E:
* Hal Turner (white supremacist, FBI informant)
* Tom Green (just not a funny guy who somehow had a call-in talk show, anon needed to make the show funny)
They also fight perceived threats to people's sanity and internet culture
* Furry that take themselves too seriously
* Fan-fiction writers that take themselves seriously
* DeviantArt (in a nutshell)
* MySpace, Youtube, etc.
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
Yeah, but "Engineer" describes me adequately. "Atheist" does not. :)
"Agnostic - Someone who claims that they do not know or are unable to know whether God exists." -- And I don't think there is anything to know..... which makes me not an agnostic.
-Vort
She was dehydrated and had insect bites on her hands (meaning she couldn't keep them off her). This is a textbook definition case of felony Neglect / Reckless Manslaughter. However, after a deluge of information and testimony from any expert that was willing to accept CoS's money (directed at the M.E.'s office, I might add), the original M.E. threw up her hands and a different, more sympathetic M.E. gave a revised recommendation to the D.A. 18 months after the fact.
Blood clots in the legs, dehydration and insect bites are NOT accidental. That ruling smells worse than her dessicated corpse.
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
http://www.flickr.com/photos/23387891@N05/
I want to say that the DC protest (that I attended as a citizen on the street, uncounted) was probably one of the most "on-target" and organized as evidenced by videos so far uploaded, even if it was only a middling size (~150). Many passers-bye were engaged and genuinely interested, they ran out of fliers, Arnie Lerna speaking, ex-scientologists were speaking, pre-med students were speaking, not that there weren't any Anon-specific momemnts like Rick Rolling but it was more of a morale boost than a mixed message.
I think the one thing that needed to be improved was that clearly there is a division of opinion; that the organization is the problem, and that the tenets of the 'religion' are the problem. Some of us (myself included) think that both are problematic. The message was supposed to focus on the former (because that is the thing that is tangible and easier to change for the better), but many in attendance who made their own signs clearly believed also in the latter.
In any caseiIt is important for people to see that this actually matters and it is not something which is a funny folly of those zany actors in Hollywood; I am certain that this was achieved.
Some say that this was a mere practice run for the 15th of March. I hope that leadership organizing this later event, now with the experiences of one protest under their belts, can learn and improve and really have a clear agenda with an even bigger impact.
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
Apparently not everything is available: http://www.xenu.net/censored/ I got that a couple of time.
At the next eco-hypocrisy-meeting, count the private jets used to get to the meeting. Should be interesting to see that
You know, if you have a better theory of Life, the Universe, and Everything, have away at it.
I'm particularly interested in everyone's Creation story with a really good "before everything existed..." part. Physics as we express it is so lacking in this area.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
Way back in the day (2003), Habbo was of interest only to Europeans; Habbo hotel access cards were placed prominently at checkout counters in drug stores and grocery stores for little kids and tweens to beg for in the EU. Habbo Hotel (a social networking website and Shockwave Flash chatroom of the Sulake Corporation) had yet to break into the US market. With this site you paid for the privilege to access certain areas and get private rooms with furniture and such. That children would beg parents to actually pay to sit around in an isometric 3d chatroom and wait in a line to use a virtual pool when they could beg them to take their lazy asses to a REAL POOL was a completely abhorrent concept that became known to EU and later non-EU 4channers.
/b/tards to create sockpuppet accounts and come to the site to observe the stupidity and screw with the users. Thus began the pasttime of "blocking" access to the pool. Sulake, in their infinite wisdom, designed the pool such that there was only a single egress to the water and few in and out of the popular pooldeck area. Also, users can't move through each other, and you can't chat with anyone you can't see. Which means a small group of griefers has the potential a lot of problems for tweens who want to sit around, swim in a virtual pool and have slowly hunt-n-pecked tinysex.
/b/tards adopted a dress code of black skin, afro, dress suit; the complete opposite of everyone else.
The EU 4channers encouraged non-EU
Everyone who used habbo tended to depict and dress themselves a certain way (spiky hair, tan, whatever). To differentiate themselves,
Eventually these little invasions drew the ire of the paid staff members at Sulake that moderated the chats. They began banning the afro'd interlopers. Pretty soon, they were banning anyone who had an avatar with black skin. 4channers posted videos documenting this phenomenon. Now they had evidence that the moderators were racists (or just lazy).
So they rallied the troops (using the videos/pictures of summary bans for being black to outrage the apathetic), and then wave after of 4channers, YTMND, etc. members launched coordinated attacks on the various congregation rooms of the chat. Moderators were swamped and couldn't ban fast enough. Habbo forums were brought to their knees by customer and invader alike, and so forth. Invasion forces began forming swastikas near exits to send a message to the site admins and users who too began discriminating against anyone who choose a black avatar.
In short, a small group of individuals were able to bait an internet community into attacking another by manufacturing a racism scenario. The original group's motives were simply to shake up a bunch of kids who were getting fat and poor via a stupid online activity. One could claim Sulake is directly responsible for the weight problem and credit card debt we now suffer! Of course that claim is ludicrious.
But it wasn't random, and there is a core of good intentions there, however horrible and bizarre the outcome.
Many similar early Anonymous activities have the same type of progression. A group of users familiar with the activities of another group they dislike encourage the rest of the community to do something about it. Nothing happens until they manufacture populist drama to sway support. This spins out of control with amusing consequences.
The large majority of the raids on DeviantArt accounts (for example) were to punish those who are utter and complete egomaniacs, plagiarists (especially), and sometimes both.
Fursecution and MySpace fuckery I don't partcularly agree with, but I understand why they don't particularly admire these communities. Not much good goes on there.
They're gotten better and more refined over time. They've successfully jailed that pedophile in Canada, got Hal Turner (white supremacist) off the air, fucked with Tom Greene and made his show funny, hounded a tax-evading dominatrix kindergarten teacher, went after a radical feminist who made hateful remarks and threats against her own son, and so forth.
Scientology is just the latest and most visible stop on the train which coincides with recent exposes, lawsuits and book releases; a public climate sympathetic to their cause.
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
But how many upper level college science classes have you actually participated in? I've taken a few especially in astronomy and it's mostly made up malarkey. We have white dwarf stars, but the universe isn't old enough for them to exist. Where did they come from? There are multiple examples of a such occurrences to disprove almost all science. If you can't give me a mathematical formula for it, it doesn't exist. And yes there is a mathematical formula to prove the existence of God.
21st Century Renaissance Man
As I say, try the fishman affidavit. That has some stuff in and is a matter of public legl record - cannot be censored.
The primary objection most people have to AA is that in some countries attending AA is a mandatory punishment for drunk driving, etc. even though AA is a religious organization and, more importantly, does not actually work. The Nazis were atheists, and you relate them to religion. The Nazis were not atheists. The Nazi Party was a Christian religious organization according to their charter, their leaders, and their membership. Virtually every member of the Nazi party was a Christian. Many Lutheran Christian leaders endorsed the party. Many Nazis (including Adolph Hitler) were Catholic, and the Catholic Church supported the Nazi party in indirect ways.
Atheism - Lack of belief in god or gods.
It doesn't bother me at all. I ahve never been guilty.
Sadly, people who believe don't understand lack of belief, so they claim that even lack of belief is belief;which it isn't.
Jerks.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I believe all Non profits in America should have to ahve their books open and easily acceptable. All tenants for there faith, all meeting notes, everything.
Also any mandatory fee or 'donation' should not be allowed.
If you don't want to do that, fine but you aren't getting any tax breaks.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I call my lack of faith in CoS "budgeting".
What is is all that is. Isn't that obvious?
But how many upper level college science classes have you actually participated in?
10-20, I should guess, mostly biology and biochemistry. I've worked for a couple of years in labs, too.
I've taken a few especially in astronomy and it's mostly made up malarkey.
Yeah, I suppose that's why it's commonly understood that your computer runs on phlogiston - science just confirms the same old theories regardless of the evidence, like you said.
I suspect if you had paid better attention in your science classes, instead of writing the whole thing off as "malarkey", you'd be better informed. As it is you're an astounding example of the kind of ignorance so closely associated with your ideology.
We have white dwarf stars, but the universe isn't old enough for them to exist.
This is nonsense, since it's by the age of white dwarf stars that we measure the age of the universe (and it's by the amount that they've cooled that we measure the age of white dwarfs.)
It doesn't take all that long for a star to reach white dwarf, so there's no inconsistency with the existence of white dwarf stars and a 14 billion year old universe. There are no black dwarf stars, and that is a function of the youth of our universe; that's probably where you got confused.
There are multiple examples of a such occurrences to disprove almost all science.
Funny, then, that you could only give one false example. I suspect all your other examples would be the same - things you've misunderstood or been misinformed about, not actual problems with the science. My guess is that you're simply not well-informed enough to actually understand what it is that science doesn't know, currently.
And yes there is a mathematical formula to prove the existence of God.
No, there's not.
I never have frustrations, the reason is, to wit:
If at first I don't succeed, I quit!
Oh Hello Kitty Gas-mask Girl, standing there before the world.
With those shorts, so short and tight, Xenu-bless, they fit you right.
I sit here now, my "flag unfurled", all for you, Hello Kitty Gas-mask Girl.
- Anon
This is why labels are not necessarily a bad thing.
We hope your rules and wisdom choke you / Now we are one in everlasting peace
Plus, how does engineer describe you adequately? I have no clue what kind of engineer you are. as a label it leaves more questions. Atheist just means you don't believe in a higher power. its not trying to describe anything else. its not trying to be more descriptive than that. Engineer can mean software engineer, mechanical engineer, chemical engineer, biomedical engineer, hell, it could even mean you drive a goddamn train. Am I wrong in assuming you do not believe in a higher power? Cause thats ALL the word atheist implies. Nothing more. Its not making any other assumptions other than that. I mean, its like saying calling a girl a blond isn't descriptive enough of their person, therefore you can't say they're blond. Its one adjective describing one facet of a person. its not trying to describe them as a whole. its not trying to describe your lifestyle. Engineer does NOT describe you adequately, neither does atheist. Its just describing a small portion of what one person is. Seriously, I think some people wish they lived back in the 60s so they're just TRYING to find things to rebel against.
The Bible promotes killing a heck of a lot, too. It's not being politically correct, but realising most folks know not to kill, and those that do are corrupted in their view of the world. Ascribing it to one religion and not the other is, well, retarded. There have been plenty of Christian terrorists who've killed innocents, but in the current political climate (where vast amounts oil is/was present in mainly-Islamic countries, the problems we see with fighting between the indigenous populations and us are coming from Islamic areas. Correlation != causation, etc.). If the world was homogenous, with every person in every country living the exact same life with the exact same pressures and problems, you'd have a case. As the world clearly isn't like that, your ignorance is showing.
Why does there have to be an answer to "What came before the big bang?" but not for "What was there before $DEITY?"[0]
[0] I in no way intend to imply we shouldn't look for the answer to the former, just pointing out the inconsistency in this particular criticism by the religious types.
So? The Bible itself doesn't claim to be encyclopedic, nor (outside of certain strains of Protestantism) does Christianity generally claim that the Bible is the sole basis Christian belief.
Well, to learn more about what Muslims think about Christ's mother, you could go there; that may or may not correspond to what any particular subset of Christianity believes on any given point (and on some it directly contradicts core doctrines of Christianity.) It is true that a lot of common Christian beliefs have origins in extra-biblical tradition, both on doctrinal points and on "history" of religious figures that is often tangential, at best, to religious doctrine. But so what? That's not really a problem of any kind when it isn't about doctrine, or for many major Christian groups (which openly hold out Tradition as a basis for belief alongside Scripture) when it is about doctrine.
In what way does the Bible present a "better" theory of any or all of these things.
Why? The Bible doesn't have one of these. The concept is, in fact, logically inconsistent. You can't have a story of what events occurred before there were any entities to participate in those events.
Physics certainly provides an explanation which is more firmly grounded, and which goes back closer to the origin of every entity it invokes. The Bible simply posits a very complex entity (God) with no explanation of its origin.
Wrong. Scientology was all about money and lies all along. Try reading some inside accounts from back when LRH was alive, outrageous prices, billion-year sea org contracts, forced labour were all there. Did you know Hubbard made some $600m off his little Scientology project?
I mentioned lies. Bear with me for a few lines, let me elaborate: In 1934 LRH (*1911) had, according to his own account, spent 7 years in the U.S. marine corps, 6 as a civil engineer, 4 in brazil, 3 in africa, 6 enroute with his flying circus, graduated from college plus a slew of other activities summing up to eighty-four years of life experience.
You seem to be referring to some "light" free-zoning/squirreling. I respect that as a way of handling life for people in need of some spiritual guidance, but please keep in mind it's background. LRH was but a science-fiction writer. Dianetics, E-Meter auditing, Xenu and Man's evolution along the Seaweed - Jellyfish - Clam - Sloth - Ape - Man path are stories thought of by the same person.
Points well taken.
21st Century Renaissance Man
>I dare anyone to reproduce this experiment and get a different result than I did.
Nobody expects... that to happen.
Well! Thank-you first off for offering such a well-reasoned and cordial response.
.
.
.
Secondly, a word about words. .
The internet, and indeed books and conversations, being what they are, can do nothing more than convey stories and ideas. Seeking actual evidence for such claims is, as I am sure you recognize, an intensely personal matter. I always recommend to people when they ask about the kinds of things I am about to describe, is that they get out into the world and do some of their own seeking. This is true for all worthwhile experiences, but it is especially so for the sort which live in the fringes of our modern Western world and which tend to require a deliberate decision on the part of the perceiver in order to see. The cognitive machine which is the human mind is entirely capable of editing out or simply not seeing certain phenomenon. A small case in point before I go further. .
A girlfriend of mine was very good at finding four-leaf clovers. She could walk through a field and come out again with half a dozen or more, some even with five and six leaves. --And strain as I might to find some as well, I would be unable to find any at all. This was true of everybody else who knew of this odd talent of hers. Now perhaps she was just more observant than others, (well, clearly she was in this regard), but it confused me; I wasn't blind and it wasn't that difficult a task. I could find Waldo, so why not an extra leaf? It's not like they weren't there to find; my girlfriend regularly proved this beyond any doubt.
Matters came to a head when one day, we were in a used book shop. I'd taken a book from one of the racks and was flipping through it, reading at random, and I stopped on one page with a baffling paragraph. I tried to read through the thing a couple of times, but was unable to make heads or tales of what it was trying to say. So I turned to show her the book, (I like to write and find that bad writing is enjoyable to pull apart and discuss), and just as I was going to say to her, "Hey, check out this weird writing," she interrupted me and said, "Hey, a four-leafed clover!"
I blinked and looked down, and sure enough, sitting right on the page in front of me was an old four-leafed clover which had presumably been found by the previous owner of the book and put between the pages to be pressed and saved, and then forgotten about until the book had found its way to the shop. The reason I'd not been able to figure out the paragraph was saying was due to the fact that some of the words had been hidden by the little pressed plant sitting on top of them. And amazingly, I had very literally still been entirely blind to the four leaf clover sitting right in front of my nose.
Now maybe I was just being daft that day, but it struck me that this was perhaps as an object lesson in how the mind works. --As a culture, we are told from a very young age that four leaf clovers are hard to find, and while they are certainly far more rare than their three-leafed cousins, perhaps people are doing a little something extra to make that belief even more true than it really is.
Okay. .
You described coming from an engineering background. --I'm the same. My father was a high-ranking Northern Telecom engineer; he'd spent nearly all his working life solving the problems presented by communications technology, working to take the world from mechanical into the new era of digital switching. --Such a life had been fruitful, and he taught his kids how to also find fulfillment through the study of and respect for science and technology. I was always, and still am, a lover of computers and tools and all such things. I learned a lot from watching my dad build additions and install walls and wiring and fixing stuff around the house. So I have a lot of respect for the physical, material universe.
However, the most important thing I learned from my parents was that direct experience was the best teacher, and that judging something before experiencing it wa
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Hello again!
:) Yes the mind can filter out a lot, and does so on a regular basis, but this does not have any link to energy beings beyond being one of many possible excuses for why everyone can't see such things.
1) The reason for your inability to see 4 leafed clovers is overall irrelevant, although a bit amusing
Yeah. This wasn't meant to illustrate an energy thing, just a psychological glitch in the human make-up. --Although, my girlfriend, (no longer), was a very powerful person with regard to energy. And in fact, the way she found four leafed clovers was related to energy in an odd way, though it's one of those stories which I couldn't use for my purposes of exacting useful proof since it didn't have the right components for testing, although by that time I was convinced of the existence of this other spectrum of 'physics' as it were, so my explorations had moved beyond simple "is it real" and more into "how can it be applied?"
She could find four-leaf clovers with her eyes shut, and this was a new discovery for her. --I'd asked her how she found four-leaf clovers so easily, what her process was, and how I could do it too. She hadn't thought about it much, just that as a kid she really, really wanted to be able to find them, since she had been faced with the puzzle the same as everybody else. She said that she sort of just 'knew' where one could be found; that it felt different when she was near one. She could hold her hand over a patch of clover and feel a sort of warmth. I asked her if she could do it with her eyes shut, and she tried, and found a couple that way. (Though, I didn't have the wherewithal to do a proper test at the time; she might have seen one beforehand and remembered where it was, and it was a romantic day on a walk through an orchard where proper scientific methodology would have been intrusive.) Anyway, after a while when I was around her, I discovered that I could do it as well, but only once without looking. I don't know if I was fooling myself, but I did sort of 'feel' something too.
Oddly enough, it wouldn't work when I was on my own. --Though, one time I was by myself and really fed up with not having the kind of abilities that several of these odd people I knew seemed to have and so I spent an afternoon struggling to find four-leaf clovers. I figured that if, as I believed, you get what you ask for in life, then I should be able to access this property of the universe if I asked for it with enough diligence and the right kind of intent. I was really frustrated and didn't find anything for an hour or so, (a long time to be squating on the front lawn with neighbors wondering what the heck I was doing). --I began to get really upset and felt that life was unfair and that I was somehow not worthy. Silly. --Anyway, at the height of my desperation, I got this sudden impulse and I moved over to a patch of grass near the driveway, and found right away almost a dozen or so. --In fact, the patch of clover was just filled with them, along with many which had odd growths and mutations. I figured it was a patch which had been made toxic by oil run-off from the cars which had been parked there over the years. --I went back to the middle of the lawn and found none. --So it seemed that I got what I wanted, but only where they'd been poisoned and where anybody could have found them, and I didn't feel particularly satisfied. Still, in a manner of speaking, I had gotten what I asked for.
Like I said, interesting, but not really useful for proving anything.
2) You said "If you want to live in a universe which doesn't include 'magic' (for lack of a better term), then the Universe accommodates. The reverse is also true."
You didn't define universe. However, I will say that I agree if you mean your universe as in how you see the world. I disagree if you mean the physical universe.
The universe is the word I use instead of 'god'. --The universe contains everything we know and don't know, including w
-FL
Fascinating posts, indeed.
:P)
I don't believe in the current existence of any higher power, and I struggle with believing some of this... but... that thing about that one woman's ability to read your emotions and thoughts resonated somewhat with me.
I don't know that it is any of this, but my best friend... we scare each other with how well we understand each other, and know what the other is going to say. She might just be very tuned into my signals, though, and me tuned into her signals, although I sometimes misread some of her signals. (Or, she's sending them subconciously, but knows she can't act on that due to her situation, but it's irrelevant. Intellectually, I know to discard those signals, however. Or at least try to. It's difficult.) And, I guess knowing what the other is going to say... we've known each other, and how we respond to each other, for a few years now... So I certainly can't say that it's anything like this, but... it did resonate with me.
Also, something rather odd... I work as a computer technician. I often get clueless newbies that can't begin to troubleshoot issues with their computers. Invariably, there'll be some odd issue that they have no clue how to begin fixing. Sometimes it's a printer not printing, or a webpage not loading. Way too many times, I'll walk into the room, and that instant, it'll start working. Or, the instant I touch the computer, it'll start working.
But, there's a twist. My best friend is one of my coworkers, and she HATES computers. One time, I was setting up a system for her, and this service wasn't starting. I had properly installed the OS and the application, but the associated service just WOULD NOT START. I tried again, and again, and again, and again. Nothing! Checked the event viewer. Just a generic error. I tried different ways of starting it. Still nothing.
So I call her to my office - she would know if there's a trick to starting this thing that I didn't know. (This service is rather buggy, and sometimes has trouble starting.)
She sits down at the computer, and does the exact same thing that I had tried the last time. I watched her. I watched EVERY KEYSTROKE. It worked. I can try to explain this one away as subprocesses finally starting by the time she got there, and then the main process starting for her, but I'm not sure.
She's the only one that's been able to do that to me, just like I do that to other people... and it's freaky as hell. (And, honestly, kinda turned me on. Hey, I'm a geek. Nothing quite like a hot chick that I was already somewhat interested in, one-upping me at being a geek.) And, she's done it a couple other times. (Don't tell me to suggest that she become a computer tech - usually, she has very bad luck with computers.
--Computers are funny, and I'm not sure what forces are in effect, but I've certainly experienced what you describe. I've built and maintained PC's for friends and they tend to behave well for me. --And more than once have I made them stop misbehaving simply by standing in front of them. I don't think this kind of thing is unique by any means, as your story would suggest. Though, I've never really done any measuring to see if it's just an observational bit of mental pattern building where really there is nothing special going on, or if there is some kind of reality bubble surrounding certain people which makes computers work better.
Beats me, but I've definitely noticed the effect more than once.
If there's an actual force at work, then my first thought would be that it's simply another aspect of belief and intent affecting the behavior of reality. --I've certainly found that intent changes the behavior of larger events. Why not micro-events?
-FL