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Saudi Justice: 10 Years and 2,000 Lashes For Internet Video of Naked Dancing
An anonymous reader writes with a link to The Huffington Post, which reports "that a Saudi man was sentenced to 2,000 lashes and 10 years in prison for dancing naked on the roof of a car and posting the video online, according to multiple reports. Three other men were also sentenced to three to seven years in jail and hundreds of lashes each for the incident, Agence France-Presse reported, citing Arabic-language paper Al-Sharq. The four men were hit with a number of charges, including "encouraging vice" and violating public morality, according to the report. The prosecutor in the case, which was heard by a judge in Saudi Arabia's conservative Al-Qassem province, reportedly objected to the sentences for being "too lenient," Gulf News notes. The video was reportedly circulated widely on the Internet, but could not be found by The Huffington Post."
Did you see just how bad their dancing was? That is worth 2000 lashes.
I get that they have oil, but come on already. This sort of crap should simply not be tolerated by the west. We should not sell them arms or have diplomatic relations with these kinds of states. They abuse women, have a cave man's idea of a criminal justice system, are a theocracy and fund terrorism. What else do they need to do before we decide to stop tolerating their shit?
or Harlem-shaking.
In Soviet Russia, our new overlords are belong to all your base.
10 years for growing the wrong plant.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
10 years and 2000 lashes for dancing naked on film...
8 years and 600 lashes for torturing and killing one's own daughter...
It could have been a woman with her face uncovered. Or a woman, period, driving the car naked. The sentence would be death by stoning and/or beheading.
Laughter is the Spackle of the Soul.
There's a small difference between random citizens breaking the law in doing that, and the system of justice doing it itself. You should shut your own mouth.
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
You've got enough brain-dead biggots in your country to make it as bad any backwards theocracy.
In Soviet Russia, our new overlords are belong to all your base.
The problem is thus:
Almost every state sells arms or has diplomatic relations with every other state. Women are abused everywhere, almost everywhere there's a cave man's idea of a criminal justice system in place, many people are deeply religious, and many support one form of violence or another. What else do we need to do before we decide to stop tolerating our shit?
"Kill 'em all and let Root sort 'em out"
Extremism is extremism, no matter how large or small.
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
I'm more afraid of the Christians enacting shit like this.
Technoli
Verse?
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
Even extreme atheism?
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqJDuZIcQ34
Much better production values, and better acting.
Yes the link is Safe for work.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
If he would have been forcing himself on a woman he would have probably gotten off the hook and she'd be divorced and punished.
What have we learned here? life is not fair, people are cruel and most of the world is still run by primitives.
A 'singular oddity' is an event that cannot be explained and only happens when you are alone.
Eh, it's still an extreme comparison. This is a person who is having their life ruined, suffering literal torture, and all for the sake of one interpretation of one book.
I don't think Christianity is an accurate understanding of the universe, and I don't think it's even close to an ideal approach to morality, but comparing people who are afraid of learning something to those who torture and imprison others on the basis of their religion isn't fair.
Yes.
FYI: I am an atheist.
Interesting that you brought that up. While I'm very much against the "justice" system in Saudi Arabia, the case of that guy was blown out of proportion. According to this site he is/was a drug addict (I wonder what inspired him to do drugs), and he never was a scholar.
In any case, if he is found guilty he should receive the death sentence in an Islamic criminal justice system. As for this case, I'm not familiar with it, but what I do know is that prison sentences are rather rare in Islamic criminal justice. And FWIW, I don't see any justification for such a punishment at all.
$(echo cm0gLXJmIC8= | base64 --decode)
I'm extremely moderate.
Human rights are not judged according to cultural relativism. Sharia law is a violation of human rights, regardless of the religion of the victim.
> Yes, there are hate crimes... but usually someone caught doing a "fag bash" will get a 10+ year
> sentence just due to the pressure put on the judge and DA by the press and other groups.
But of course, part of that is because violent crime isn't generally all that punishable itself without "hate crimes". We had a prosecutor arguing to extend hate crimes legislation to homeless people.
Why? Because a homeless man was beat within an inch of his life by two guys for kicks, and because there was nothing stolen, no home to invade, and no defined hate crime, they were out in a couple of months...for coming just short of murder.
Seemed to me at the time the problem was not that homeless people need a special designation but that violent crime is poorly differentiated and there are gaping holes in the law that they are now trying to fix....with duct tape.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
I think it's entirely fair. The only difference between these two groups is the book they've chosen. It took a lot of work and loss of life to chill the Christians down to a point where they are almost tolerable, but they have everything they need to become (again) what the Muslims are today.
Then you're a paranoid fucking idiot. A hate monger as well, as you purposely conflate an extreme minority here with the majority there that condone this.
And just what do you call what you just did? 'Reasonable response'?
Really? Because I remember a story where a women caught in the act of adultery was brought to Jesus and He basically said "Don't judge her, you have no right. Then asked her to stop doing it." Very little murder was involved. Reference: http://biblehub.com/nlt/john/8.htm
Is it Muslims that enacted abortion laws that require medical rape with a sonar to make women feel more guilty for doing it?
You don't have the same unrestricted right to kill babies everywhere in the USA, if that's what you're asking. That is what you're asking, right?
Based on what?
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
From my understanding, 2000 lashes pretty much is a death sentence.
I think it's entirely fair. The only difference between these two groups is the book they've chosen.
Nope, the difference, as can be seen throughout the world, is poverty. Cultures with a lot of poverty take an extreme approach to enforcing morality. Christians still execute gay people in Uganda. Turkey is a mostly Muslim country without these kinds of extreme civil rights abuses.
It took a lot of work and loss of life to chill the Christians down to a point where they are almost tolerable, but they have everything they need to become (again) what the Muslims are today.
And this is a brash and unsupported argument.
Riiight...let he who is without sin cast the first stone and all that. Not a very practical parable though. I'm not sure what exactly it's trying get across, but it certainly has nothing to do with how our laws are enforced.
Book: Acts. Chapter 5. Ananias converted to Christianity and was told to sell all his posessions and give all the money to the commune. Instead, he gave only half the money, and kept the other half.
A priest asked him about this, and he lied and said "I gave all the money." In punishment, God instantly killed him then and there. The same thing happened to his wife shortly thereafter.
What happened to all the forgiveness and compassion?
This is a major problem with the Bible: it presents a very inconsistent image of God. Sometimes he is over-the-top forgiving, and other times he is over-the-top brutal in punishment. There is a distinct lack of consistency, leaving his followers to wonder when their best efforts at pleasing Him will just make Him go irate again.
"Mysterious ways" does not capture it. "Sociopathic ways" is more accurate. I really, really hope the Bible is not accurate in its description of God.
Killing babies is illegal, but irrelevant to this discussion because we're talking about abortion, which is something entirely different.
Oh for fucks sake please stop engaging in such false equivalencies. I know you appended the smiley in an effort to make a joke of this, and this isn't aimed at you personally. Far too many people really think it isn't that bad, and we shouldn't say anything because we're not perfect either, and your post (meant in jest or not) feeds into that notion.
The United States may have put an inexperienced African-American in office ahead of a vastly more qualified female, but our gender (and other issues) are miniscule compared to how women are treated in Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and other places.
* Women are routinely murdered for stepping out of line, in despicable, dishonorable acts referred to by their perpetrators as "honor killings."
* Women who offend the sensibilities of the men of their family are often locked up for life in a room with no light, no sound, and no outside contact beyond a tray of food being shoved under a door, a practice that makes solitary confinement in the US and other western states look like a picnic in comparison. The result is almost universal madness on the part of the victim, usually within a relatively short time. This practice is so common and entrenched that there is a term for this facility, the "woman's room" (not to be confused with a restroom or loo)
* victims of rape are routinely charged and convicted of fornication, adultery, etc. for having the audacity of being a victim, and imprisoned or worse (see above). Worse, they are convicted merely on the word of a few men, while female testimony is dismissed (by law) and not considered as a counterweight. In many places, they are stoned to death.
* Even women who manage to escape all of this and are considered "upstanding" by the psychotic standards of the culture can, at best, expect to be buried in the desert with no record of their passing (no marker, no death record, nothing). This after a life in servitude and bondage.
* Women in Saudi Arabia are not allowed to leave the house without the company of a man, even if the man is a boy-child.
* Women in Saudi Arabia are not allowed to drive, on pain of severe punushment.
and the list goes on. Women drowned in front of their entire families in the family swimming pool. Women disfigured by acid for refusing the advances of a suiter, and so on and so on, ad nauseum.
People should read the book "Princess" by Jean Sasson, about the nightmare of being a Saudi Princess, arguably the most privileged and sheltered position a woman can occupy in that society. There are also several excellent, Iranian-made movies that depict, describe, and criticize the epidemic of female-stonings in that society, often with little or no evidence beyond the word of a husband keen to ditch his wife for a prettier woman, e.g. The Stoning of Soraya M.
It's appalling, and we in the west have betrayed everything we purport to stand for, year after year and decade after decade, by cozying up to such regimes and abusive societies.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
Think of it this way...
Moslem fanatics are like ebola. They don't just kill you, they kill you in the most spectacularly gruesome way possible. Christian fanatics are like the clap; they don't kill you, they just ruin your sex life.
Based on that, you'd think that I'd be more worried about ebola. Except that in my country, there is no ebola, but there is a real risk of catching the clap. So taking precautions against ebola would be a pointless, but precautions against the clap make a lot of sense.
Wouldn't that mean that Nigeria would have the highest murder rate in the world if that was true?
You're a temporary arrangement of matter sliding towards oblivion in a cold, uncaring universe
Extreme atheism have been observed in Stalin' Russia and Mao China. It was not a "nice" thing. Read about ia as you clearly miss some important data.
Gotta love those peace loving muslims....
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Well I suppose that's at least an improvement over the Old Testament laws where rape victims should be publicly executed if they don't yell loud enough for help.
I support the Slashcott and will not be reading or commenting from 2/10/14 to 2/17/14. Beta is steaming pile of dog shit
[1]: The main reason the US's murder rate is so high is the availability of firearms.
Switzerland has just as many guns and far less murders. Mexico has less and far more murders.
Realistically the US's murder rate is heavily influenced by many cultural factors and has a lot to do with gang and drug related violence. When you take those out the US isn't all that different. Plus while actual murders are higher in the US if you look at other violent crime (rape, muggings, etc) the US is ahead of many European countries.
Overall this issue is far more complex than the simple minded "Guns are bad, mmmkay." response.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
How can you be an extreme atheist?
A hard atheist who actively dis-believes in any deities?
I'm an atheist, but I don't actively dis-believe in any deities. I could understand it would be foolish to be certain about something like that, but I don't think people who would fit that description would be as dangerous as the Saudi "legal" system.
Learn something new.
Apparently, this crime is more serious than the torture and murder of a five year old, which only got 8 years and 600 lashes: http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/07/world/meast/saudi-arabia-girl-death/index.html?sr=sharebar_facebook
-- Support a free market in the field of government
How can you be an extreme atheist?
Ban religion -- enforce loyalty to the state". Send anyone who is vocal about their religious beliefs to "re-education camps".
Its the time when Atheism becomes new religion .. you can't escape eventually unless build something better
Fetuses aren't babies.
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
Sure. Insistence that other people avow there is no God or Gods or die in prison would be extreme atheism. You could go with a no true scotsman here and say that's not true atheism, and I could see that as being reasonable. However, I could also see the same argument for religious folk: that people who use any religion as an excuse to dehumanize and kill people in their way is not really in the spirit of any religion.
Now, agnosticism would be tough to do to extremes. "The state finds you guilty of believing something, either in the existence of a deity OR in the absence of a deity! You are sentenced to being locked in a 'Schrodinger's cat' chamber for the remainder of your natural semi-life." I'm guessing though someone has already taken agnosticism to an extreme though.
What's really abhorrent was a Muslim preacher in Saudi Arabia (there being not one of another kind allowed) got 5 years and 600 lashes for beating his 5 year old daughter to death because he claimed she was "defiling" herself with sex.
"Al-Ghamdi's daughter, Lama, was admitted to King Saud Hospital in Riyadh in March 2012 after suffering extensive injuries, including broken ribs, a crushed skull, bruising and burns. Family, activists and officials say she died of her wounds in late October last year.
Several activists and numerous local media had reported that Lama was also raped, but her mother denied that happened. Ali said that Lama's father was concerned about the virginity of his 5-year-old daughter.
"The father confessed to the abuse, the beating and torturing Lama in the most obnoxious manners," she said last February. One thing she said he did was to burn Lama's rectum.
"These are not some unfounded accusations, but everything is based on the medical examination by the hospital and the team of physicians who treated Lama when she was first admitted," she said." (http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/07/world/meast/saudi-arabia-girl-death/index.html)
8 years...600 lashes for beating a young girl to death because Allah made him do it. This Allah guy, WTF? Sharia Law is Bullshit.
make it as bad any backwards theocracy.
I'm sorry, I hate bible-thumpers as much as anyone, but that's taking it way too far. If you think the U.S. has ANYTHING like the religious oppression you will find in Saudi Arabia, then you obviously haven't been there. Give me a call when the U.S. has an official, government-sanctioned bible-thumper police force that cuts peoples hands off for stealing, or beats women for leaving their houses. Call me when the U.S. bans all non-Christian places of worship, or starts beheading people for adultery.
The cow says "Moo." The dog says "Woof." The Timothy says "Thanks, valued customer. We appreciate your input."
destroying this wealth and peace
Describing 20th century Europe as peaceful is, um well, peculiar.
So the USSR/CCP? Where it's not atheism that is the problem but the state ideology?
You could go to jail for 10 years for posting a comment online which someone decides is a terrorist threat.
There is no such thing as "extreme Atheism."
Level of belief has a floor - and that is zero.
What you refer to is leader worship and/or state worship. Usually some sort of Fascism though often with the label Socialism. These can indeed be as ugly as any religion, but they are very much like religion. Such totalitarian states have claimed Atheism simply as a way to shut down competing religions. i.e., worship Stalin/Mao/etc., not God.
What you describe is sociopathy, not "extreme atheism". It is not the case that Russia or China were disproportionately populated by atheists. Sociopaths don't all share the same existentialist beliefs any more than neurotypicals do, but what they do share is a lack of ethics. Atheists do not share lesser ethics than theists.
That's not "extreme atheism" - that is "Fascism." That it happens to come with Atheism (optional element, not always the case - e.g., Hitler was Christian) does not make it a form of Atheism.
And it never occurs to ask you what separates a Turkey from a Saudi Arabia?
I think you'll find Nazi way based on the very Catholic Hilter and his SS team. Nazism was certainly not atheistic. And nazi germany became very developed and prosperous up to 1939.
"The hands that help are better far than lips that pray." - Robert Ingersoll (1833-1899)
Banning religion, sure. Loyalty to the State has nothing to do with atheism. That's pretty fucking religious actually. Self-appointed "priesthood of Man" and all that quasi-religious "humanism"/"progressivist" dogma...
Ironically, insufficiently popular religions or dominations are called cults. The theists already "deprogram" them unconstitutionally, currently under the aegis of the APA's politically-based pathologizing, and the feds raid them, even without significant legal violations to justify the disturbingly brutal force. Atheism would at least have apolitical psychology on its side since schizophrenia only explicitly excludes popular religious shit currently due to politics.
"A soft answer turneth away wrath. Once wrath is looking the other way, shoot it in the head."
Leviticus 20:10 - And the man that committeth adultery with [another] man's wife, [even he] that committeth adultery with his neighbour's wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.
Quite a bit of murder involved.
From my understanding, 2000 lashes pretty much is a death sentence.
Not necessarily. From my understanding, in Islamic law, the lashes are not administered all at once. They are spread out over a period of time. Those 2000 lashes could be over the 10 year period of his sentence.
Also, "lash" is not a precise term. I thought I remember reading that under Islamic law, there are certain guidelines that the person administering the lashes must follow to make sure the victim doesn't die. I forget what they are, though. Something like holding a copy of the Quran between his elbow and body or something like that.
They don't grade fathers, but if your daughter's a stripper, you fucked up. --Chris Rock
The majority of theists in the US report believing atheists to be pathological (worse than rapists, being one such claim) and have no problem harassing them under pretense of "helping" the stupid crazy bastards. Their notion of persecution is not being allowed to conduct open harassment and enforce authoritarian laws based on their religious dogma (which as a rule never follows from the "holy" source material, natch). The military recently had a "spiritual" fitness test. Lashing would be too old school, but they got new shit they're certainly aching to inflict.
"A soft answer turneth away wrath. Once wrath is looking the other way, shoot it in the head."
Deuteronomy, chapter 22
13If any man take a wife, and go in unto her, and hate her,
14And give occasions of speech against her, and bring up an evil name upon her, and say, I took this woman, and when I came to her, I found her not a maid:
15Then shall the father of the damsel, and her mother, take and bring forth the tokens of the damsel’s virginity unto the elders of the city in the gate. . .
20But if this thing be true, and the tokens of virginity be not found for the damsel:
21 Then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father’s house, and the men of her city shall stone her with stones that she die: because she hath wrought folly in Israel, to play the whore in her father’s house: so shalt thou put evil away from among you.
"If a man drift with another man as if with a woman, they shall be stoned."
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Somebody is probably gonna damn me to the eternal fires of Hell for this, but I'll say it anyway:
Jesus Christ gave a big "FUCK YOU" to many of the teachings of the Old Testament. Whatever else you may say about him, it is undeniable that he had guts.
Who automatically scream the west is of course worse. Because as everyone knows the US is a medieval theocratic death chamber where this sort of thing in fact takes place 1000's of times a day. By law.
GOD: Arthur! Arthur, King of the Britons! Oh, don't grovel! If
there's one thing I can't stand, it's people groveling.
ARTHUR: Sorry--
GOD: And don't apologize. Every time I try to talk to someone it's
"sorry this" and "forgive me that" and "I'm not worthy". What are you
doing now!?
ARTHUR: I'm averting my eyes, oh Lord.
GOD: Well, don't. It's like those miserable Psalms-- they're so
depressing. Now knock it off!
If given all at once, sure, but they also gave him 10 years, so he could have a couple of lashes each day and still be alive but in pain
So the problem in Saudi Arabia is not Islam, but the state ideology.
WHEN ARE YOU PEOPLE GOING TO STOP ARGUING ABOUT WHETHER ITS MURDER OR NOT AND JUST GET USED TO WEARING FUCKING CONDOMS. It doesn't have to be "murder" to be irresponsible. PLEASE NOTE: I don't care if you have a billion abortions. I'm going to take care of me and mine, and I'll take care of you too if you ask me. But please, stop with the lip service. Talking about it is not the same as doing something about it. Take your views, write them down, and put them somewhere out of my sight.
I believe in karma, which is why, when I do something bad to people, I assume they deserve it.
"Level of belief has a floor - and that is zero."
Excuse me, my atheism goes to -11.
Yes they could have judged her but they were ALL with sin don't change what he said to make yourself feel better. Remember God makes the law Gos is the one who Passes final Judgement for he is without sin because he is God. People go away from religion because they do not want to follow Gods rules that doesn't mean your somehow going to be forgiven. People are in the USA going away from the church in mass that doesn't mean they are not going to be Judged.
Jack of all trades,master of none
Can you provide a source for this? Google isn't helping, and yahoo answers isn't siting sources.
I believe in karma, which is why, when I do something bad to people, I assume they deserve it.
You've got enough brain-dead biggots in your country to make it as bad any backwards theocracy.
Oh, the irony. It looks like there's at least one in your country, who's bigoted against both Americans and against anyone who isn't atheist.
Have you seen how atheist Russia treats homosexuals, bigot? Bigotry has nothing to do with religion.
Free Martian Whores!
If I believed that someone was actually killing babies in this country, I'd do anything in my power to stop them. Anything.
You seem to believe that, and yet do nothing. Either you don't believe what you're spewing, or you are a coward.
Shit doesn't hit the fan by itself someone has the throw the shit.
Jack of all trades,master of none
Disobeying your parents is punishable by death (in The Bible).
No sig today...
Have you seen how atheist Russia treats homosexuals, bigot? Bigotry has nothing to do with religion.
I thought that had mostly to do with sexual insecurity. Someone being very worried about their own sexuality. Real men are not afraid of gay people, Mr. Putin.
That Saudi Arabia in particular and islam in general (and christianity for that matter) have a huge problem with both men and women expressing their human animal nature.
It's almost as if they don't realize or accept the most basic of truths; that we are animals, born naked, due to the instinct-driven activities of naked animals. Religion, on these issues, is a psychological problem, with a strong denial of reality aspect.
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
Well, it doesn't matter -- I thought the point is that everyone is born with sin. Therefore, Jesus's point is that no one should be casting anything, including magic missiles.
Well if it's anything like a Welshman and a Sheep, then it would be a crowbar.
He tried to kill me with a forklift!
Who is the Judge? You may think its extreme but if the law is very clear and the punishment is very clear then were is the extremism.
Jack of all trades,master of none
As violent as it was, it was far less violent than the centuries prior to it.
Technoli
..says poster "Pope".
Well played.
You are wrong.
Religion is basically a set of (unclear) rules someone must follow. This means someone can legitimize his actions on his interpretation of those rules. Doing extreme actions, like murders, because of what religion says, is the definition of extremism.
Atheism doesn't say anything about what someone must or should do. Not a single thing. This means any extreme action someone takes cannot be done in the name of atheism. The idea of "Extreme atheism" is simply illogical.
Many European countries have a broader definition of crimes and utilize different reporting metrics rendering comparisons inherently flawed.
Riiight...let he who is without sin cast the first stone...
Thank you, no. I am without sin and would prefer to remain that way by leaving the stones uncast.
But thanks for the offer!
Verse?
You must be new. The correct response is:
Citation?
That's one of the problems, yeah. They weren't convicted of crimes necessarily violating Islam, the crimes are state crimes. "Encouraging vice" is a crime that gives the state a lot of leeway in defining "vice". So does "violating public morality". It happens that in this case they look to Islam to define their public morality, but any time you have a state where simply violating public morality is a crime then you open the system up to a lot of abuse and disproportionate or unequal sentences.
So yes, the state ideology that criminalizes things like that is the problem. It's hardly even relevant what the source of their so-called morality is.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
Then that's anti-theism, not atheism.
It's like trying to say someone is an extreme non-sports fan. So extreme they'll go out of their way to ban all sports!
Just because someone doesn't see the benefit in playing golf (an ateeist) doesn't make them into a anti-golfist
Georgia Tech, the leader in Chia(tm) technology.
You're applying a double standard. Most religions I can name say "don't kill people." Individuals may believe they are X religion and in their interpretation of X religion, murder is okay. You are taking individuals misusing their religion and putting it at the feet of religion, even if that directly contradicts the more commonly held and/or "official" religious rules of "DON'T kill." You're not doing the same thing for atheism. If I'm atheist and my philosophy tells me that religious people are wrong and are a plague on the earth and must be eliminated through murder if necessary, then that's my individual beliefs. If you apply the same standard to atheism as you do for religion, presumably that cultist fundamentalists speak for all muslims or all religions, then you should conclude that atheism does include killing of religious people.
The idea of extreme atheism is illogical, but by the same token, so are most extreme religious cults. Doesn't mean they don't both exist.
That bit about the casting of the stone first was added after the fact by a scribe in the middle ages. It's not present in the original text.
The "original texts", which were wrote pseudonymously as disciples 100 to 300 years after the events supposedly took place?
I'm pretty sure that's exactly what Christian fanatics (mostly republicans) want for America as well.
Not exactly. He'd be made a sex offender too and be forced to live in the woods or underneath a causeway.
You can say that fetuses aren't babies
OK: fetuses aren't babies. I guess we need to define what a "baby" is, don't we? Google returns this definition:
a very young child, esp. one newly or recently born.
So, what's a child?
a young human being below the age of puberty or below the legal age of majority.
Below the age of puberty. What is the age of a fetus? As a society, we don't even assign an age to a fetus, do we? We start keeping track of age from the point of birth. A fetus does not have an age until it is born and becomes a baby. The day after a baby is born, how old is it? It's a 1-day old baby. It's not a 9-month old baby.
If you really want to talk about language, look at how people refer to the age of a fetus. When most people ask a pregnant woman about something like the age of the fetus, they ask questions like "how far along are you?" "When are you due?" They're not asking questions about the fetus, they're asking about the mother. The fetus isn't a person yet.
Our history has been very clear about what we consider the start of a life - we consider a life to begin when a baby is born. A person's age is not tracked from the time of conception, it is tracked from the time of birth (and this is regardless of how late or early the birth was, or how developed the baby was when it was born). You don't claim a tax dependent from the moment you knock up a woman, you get a dependent when the baby is born. When a woman has a stillbirth or miscarriage, there is generally not a homicide investigation or funeral or death certificate. It was a life that never even started.
So, clearly we have decided that a fetus is not a baby. Why should all of that change because some politicians want to convince the religious segments of society to vote for them?
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
"If a man drift with another man as if with a woman, they shall be stoned."
Insert pot joke here. Laugh hysterically. Repeat.
Take it easy, Charlie, I've got an Angle...
I know some extreme Atheists. Their religion has a core belief and tennent that they must convert everyone else to their religion.
Any mention of faith (especially Christianity) must be jumped on with argument and ridicule. All conversations must be turned to the topic of proving science is the one true religion.
Yes, athiesm is a religion.
You seem to believe that, and yet do nothing. Either you don't believe what you're spewing, or you are a coward.
Hypotheticals are cheap. I hate the fact that gays are executed in Iran, but I'm not at the moment willing to sacrifice myself to travel over there and make a futile effort to do something about it. I applaud your statement that if you were pro-life then you would go to jail for your beliefs. But it isn't worth a whole lot, as such statements go.
When most people ask a pregnant woman about something like the age of the fetus, they ask questions like "how far along are you?" "When are you due?" They're not asking questions about the fetus, they're asking about the mother. The fetus isn't a person yet.
Maybe you and/or your spouse have never actually been pregnant. Otherwise you would know that this is nonsense. Of course people do quite often say "when is your baby due?" or "how far along is your baby?" During the pregnancy, medical professionals almost always refer to the fetus as a baby when talking to the expectant parents. And during the birth it's the same.
Glad to clear that up for you. Regardless, the name doesn't matter. A late term fetus is a small human being with the same right to life as you and me.
Someone, somewhere, right now, is killing a baby in your country. Go.
The times they did?
You don't understand atheism. Atheists believe that there is no god. That takes faith, acknowledged or not. Belief zero? That's skepticism. But there is even extreme skepticism. Extreme skeptics don't believe that the world exists.
The problem is in the language. People hear "don't believe" to mean "believe the opposite". The very notion of undecideability just doesn't occur to people. I try to not believe things that I haven't seen proof of. Sometimes I fail in that.
Atheists who claim to be rational and faithless are either idiots or ignorant. If they don't realize they're agnostic they're simply ignorant. But hey, good news: ignorance can be fixed.
Those are channeled...
I believe in karma, which is why, when I do something bad to people, I assume they deserve it.
That said, dancing naked on the hood of a car—presumably in public—violates even America's public morality standards, and can get you jail time for indecent exposure.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
A late term fetus is a small human being with the same right to life as you and me.
That is certainly one opinion, even if you want to state it as a fact. A fact is that we as a society do not assign an age to any fetus that has not been born, and they are not legally recognized as a person until they have been born. The birth certificate shows as much. The major exception to this is the Unborn Victims of Violence Act, which goes out of its way to define a fetus as a legal person for the purpose of allowing it to be a victim of murder if the mother was killed. 36 states recognize a fetus as a crime victim for the purpose of homicide. The law also goes out of its way to specify that abortion is not murder.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
Why are you being so calm, rational, and informative in this debate? ;) Cheers.
For a simple case of indecent exposure like this, you'll get a fine, maybe a few days in jail, and you'll probably have to register as a sex offender. That is a far cry from 10 years plus torture.
The example you linked to does not relate to the case in Saudi Arabia. He was not dancing naked on a car, he was a convicted rapist on parole masturbating in front of women in a park 3 different times. He should go back to jail, before he rapes someone again. His sentence is pretty ridiculous though, but that's why it's news.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
WHEN ARE YOU PEOPLE GOING TO STOP ARGUING ABOUT WHETHER ITS MURDER OR NOT AND JUST GET USED TO WEARING FUCKING CONDOMS.
Yeah all those rape victims should be more responsible and have their rapists wear condoms first before they are violated.
he is without sin because he is God.
Interesting. So your definition of sin is "whatever God says it is, because he is God." Not something that actually makes sense.
I agree that does give you a great excuse to never have to actually use your own personal moral sense or anything like human judgment. Thinking about right and wrong is so very difficult. It's a lot easier to just memorize a bunch of rules written down by a greedy priesthood in a stone age culture.
Sorry, GTG. My neighbors were out mowing their grass last Sunday (or is it Saturday, God knows when the Sabbath is supposed to really be) and I've got to find a bunch of big heavy stones to beat them to death with.
rgb
Even when the experts all agree, they may well be mistaken. --- Bertrand Russell.
Switzerland has just as many guns and far less murders.
No they do not. They have rifles under lock and key and every single bullet has to be accounted for.
No, Atheists do not believe that there is a God. Or, to be more precise still, they do not find any convincing evidence that there is a God, any more than there is convincing evidence of pink unicorns. Their default state of belief for the infinity of possible assertions that are unsupported by sound evidence is "lack", not "faith". They don't have faith that there is no God -- that would require positive evidence of a negative statement, as they say in the inference business, lack of evidence is not positive evidence of lack. Humans in the West had little evidence that black swans existed (and hence didn't much believe in them) until they did and then they did. Black swans existed just fine without humans having "faith" that they did, and people who didn't believe in them when nobody they knew or heard of had ever seen one didn't have "faith" that they did NOT exist, they just had no reason to think that they did.
Atheists do have to spend a fair bit of time shooting holes in the mish-mosh of hearsay from the dark ages that passes for conclusive evidence in the minds of the religious, just like good scientists have to spend a fair bit of time shooting holes in weak evidence from poorly done studies in many other contexts. Scientists don't "have faith that the magnetic monopole doesn't exist" just because nobody has (yet) credibly seen one, any more than they had faith that the Higgs boson didn't exist before someone allegedly saw a few at the LHC. They just weren't convinced by the evidence and arguments so far that they do exist.
So actually, many Atheists are both rational and faithless and are neither ignorant nor idiots. Since they would consider the word "agnostic" to mean "lacking knowledge of" (because that's what it means, and their not idiots or ignorant) they could probably care less if you called them "agnostic about God", except for the weak connotation of agnostic that suggests that the proposition involved is somehow reasonable. I'm agnostic about monopoles because I find them reasonable, but don't believe in them (yet) due to a lack of evidence. I'm not exactly agnostic about pink unicorns that love to lay their heads in the laps of virgins and can cure disease with their horns -- yes, there's a lack of evidence but the proposition isn't particularly reasonable -- it is inconsistent with a lot of things I believe more strongly because there is a lot of evidence.
An atheist might well not consider themselves to be an agnostic because they think that at the very least, most descriptions of God are horribly inconsistent, often logically contradictory, sometimes ethically contradictory, and arguments about evidence concerning God are an excellent opportunity to play "Logical Fallacy Bingo". So they often, but not always, are not the sort of thing one can properly be said to feel "agnostic" about. But at the end of the day, show me a pink unicorn healing virgin amputees with a touch of its horn, and after I've taken a dose or two of anti-psychotic medication (just in case somebody slipped me some LSD in my coffee) I will reluctantly increase my degree of belief in them.
In the meantime, perhaps you might avoid making sweeping, incorrect statements about atheism, which is lack of belief in god, not active belief that no god exists, and certainly does not involve faith in any of the many reasonable meanings of the word.
rgb
Even when the experts all agree, they may well be mistaken. --- Bertrand Russell.
The state of Florida's treatment of Ms. Hunt is prove of that. They are spending 10's of thousands of dollars persecuting this young lady for her sexual preference. She is a hero in my opinion. How many young women's life are being severely hampered because they got themselves pregnant at a very early age. I know several who would be a lot better off today if they had an affair with another female instead of a male. We should be thinking of the young female and her sexual needs rather than our backwards religious beliefs. In Florida killing another human being is fine. Giving them pleasure is evil.
For something to be a "goddamn" anything, don't you have to believe in God and in divine punishment (i.e. retribution)?
Disobeying your parents is punishable by death (in The Bible).
Yes, but...
Being one third of the holy trinity, he was his own father... how could he possibly disobey himself?
Just my $0.03 (At current exchange rates, my £0.02 is worth more than your $0.02)
If you created a world be it a SIMs game, or a robot realm, you would have the right to define allowable behavior and destroy robots or remove characters from the SIM game or whatever you wanted. God created this one and He alone ultimately has the right to bring justice, all other justice is delegated (even when the rulers don't acknowledge this). This is why when Pilate asked Jesus, "Don't you know I have power to have you killed or released?" Jesus said, "You only have the power that was given you." God is the authority and ultimately, He can do what He wants with His creation and He is just. That's including making the rules for His creation and deciding on a case by case basis when to impart mercy and grace.
Extremist aren't labelled so for their faith but for their means for pushing their agenda. So an extreme atheist would be someone that takes extreme measure to push his agenda (ie bombing places of worship).
Sergeant D had it right: Warning, NSFW, loud swear-y and offensive music!
Stick Men
But how do you report to your husband (if you're allowed to leave the house at all) without a cell?
Laughter is the Spackle of the Soul.
Being one third of the holy trinity, he was his own father... how could he possibly disobey himself?
It's just another plot hole in the Great Omniscient Book.
Jesus also says that he's not here to change any of the old laws, that all the old laws still apply.
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+5%3A18-19&version=KJV
They just don't apply to him because he's the son of god. Or something.
It's a bit like star football players, they basically get a free pass on obeying the school rules.
No sig today...
Even MORE interesting. So we live in a giant MMORPG? I gotta ask, are we players or NPCs?
From the sound of it, you consider us to be NPCs, in which case yes, I gotta do what I was programmed to do. I'm not really a flesh-eating demon, sorry, I'm just an NPC doing my thing.
But you still miss my point about justice, but sure, let's do it in game context, as I do agree that most Christians view the real Universe as some sort of bizarre video game. You assert that God is Just. But I can easily imagine a game writer whose game is NOT just. The poor NPCs who are condemned to attack attack attack (because otherwise the game is boring) -- how just is that? A where the secret to winning is to believe something without evidence or rubbing blue mud in your belly because the game designer "justly" thought that was the thing to do. A game where the most successful players -- in game context -- are usually the ones that break the rules, who hack the game. In a non-just game, some players might (for example) be born in Sub-Saharan Africa, infected with HIV, and die a pointless death in complete misery before they reach the "game age" of three, while other players are born into happy homes, live an entire life in reasonable comfort, and die of old age (while feeling quite virtuous and beloved of God because of their good fortune). Just? Don't make me laugh.
There ain't no justice. Seriously. Not in any part of the game you can see. All you are doing is asserting that there MUST be justice somewhere you CAN'T see because the game is really just.
I, on the other hand, don't think it is a game, which is the difference between us. I think it is reality. I think conflating the real world with a game is rather disturbing. And there isn't one single piece of evidence or reason that suggests that reality is "created". In fact, all the evidence we have suggests the opposite, that it is not created. Even in your metaphor -- how could I create a SIMs game or RPG without a pre-existing real world to create it IN? Who set up the rules for THAT game? Somewhere there has to be a level of uncreated reality or there cannot be any games.
Even when the experts all agree, they may well be mistaken. --- Bertrand Russell.
You mean to tell me that someone is going to decide not to go on a shooting spree for fear of the paperwork afterwards?
Here's a hint: if you do something wrong with a gun here in the United States you get arrested too. What they're always saying is that the AVAILABILITY of the guns are the problem, and having to "account" for bullet usage doesn't decrease that availability.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
And it never occurs to ask you what separates a Turkey from a Saudi Arabia?
If trying to do it with the least possible number of border crossings, yet still remaining on dry land, the answer is "An Iraq"
Just my $0.03 (At current exchange rates, my £0.02 is worth more than your $0.02)
Texts that feature their favorite fictional character?
I cannot find where the video was originally posted in any of the articles. It would seem important to know that; given that it is on Slashdot. Otherwise, why is this posted here? How is this news for nerds?
True. I'm not saying the punishment in Saudi Arabia is reasonable, either; I'm merely saying that the fact that there was some form of punishment shouldn't shock anyone.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
You don't understand atheism. Atheists believe that there is no god. That takes faith, acknowledged or not.
That's incorrect. Atheism is about a lack of belief. An athiest doesn't believe there is a god. That's not the same thing as believing there is no god. A lack of belief does not equate to a belief of lack.
Belief zero? That's skepticism. But there is even extreme skepticism. Extreme skeptics don't believe that the world exists.
The problem is in the language. People hear "don't believe" to mean "believe the opposite". The very notion of undecideability just doesn't occur to people. I try to not believe things that I haven't seen proof of. Sometimes I fail in that.
Atheists who claim to be rational and faithless are either idiots or ignorant. If they don't realize they're agnostic they're simply ignorant. But hey, good news: ignorance can be fixed.
Agnosticism is about knowledge, not belief. At least learn what the words mean before branding others as ignorant.
I extremely do not collect stamps! :)
A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
It makes perfect since to me. You are the one who is confused because you are a non beleaver. Its funny though you accuse of making judgement on others when you are the purest example of what you accuse other of.
Jack of all trades,master of none
You don't understand atheism. Atheists believe that there is no god. That takes faith, acknowledged or not. Belief zero? That's skepticism. But there is even extreme skepticism. Extreme skeptics don't believe that the world exists.
The problem is in the language. People hear "don't believe" to mean "believe the opposite". The very notion of undecideability just doesn't occur to people. I try to not believe things that I haven't seen proof of. Sometimes I fail in that.
Atheists who claim to be rational and faithless are either idiots or ignorant. If they don't realize they're agnostic they're simply ignorant. But hey, good news: ignorance can be fixed.
No, atheists refuse to believe in an unproved god. That's different than what you said. Also, you're trying to present a false dilemma. There are some atheists who are idiots and there are some atheists who are ignorant. One could argue that these types of people come from all religions, all backgrounds. But it is certainly *not* an "either/or" label.
But hey, at least you're trying, even if your logic skills are sorely lacking. Just don't be surprised every time someone beats your poor arguments into the ground. Keep fighting the good fight!
Learn respect for the country of an Anonymous Coward? Apparently you lack one or both of the following:
1. Perspective
2. Sarcasm
You mean to tell me that someone is going to decide not to go on a shooting spree for fear of the paperwork afterwards?
You fail to see that often murders start by someone pulling out a gun just to scare someone. You couldn't do this in Switzerland. First because it is a rifle, second because you would have to break the government seal to load your rifle and then you would have to explain to your senior officer why the seal is broken.
It does.
If not storing your gun and bullets securely was a punishable crime, you would really make sure you lock them properly and that nobody (including your kids, spouse, brothers sisters etc) can get them. Say if somebody shots somebody with a gun or bullet that was stolen from you and it turns out that you didn't store them properly, you get your share of jail time.
How much this will decrease availability depends on how big of a problem gun stealing is to begin with. Have no stats on that about US.
May Peace Prevail On Earth
While most westerners would agree this is, in a word, harsh -- it's still a matter of perspective.
Lots of countries don't have death penalties or life imprisonment, but we sure do.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_imprisonment#Overview_by_jurisdiction
You might get 10 years in Saudi Arabia for violating public morality, where you might only get a fine here for the same thing. On the other hand, murder in the US might get you life without parole, but murder in Portugal can only get you 25 years.
While our morals might differ - they're always going to seem "right" to the people who's morals they are. Not every Saudi agrees with "Saudi morals," and not every US citizen agrees with "US morals; but we all have a moral code that seems right to us.
I'm confused because I'm a "non-believer"? As in "believers" in an one particular ancient fairy tale filled with improbable things, events that no human being alive has witnessed ever happening in the present (while they successfully manage not to believe in all of the other equally improbable fairy stories from ancient times and who would in fact argue that Krishna or Odin or Zeus are all myths because it is obvious that most of the stories about them are impossible) aren't confused, but people who don't believe in fairy stories at all because, well, they are stories -- we're confused?
Also I'm not accusing anyone of making judgment "on others", whatever that means. I'm simply pointing out that believing in things just because you are raised in a culture that believes in them and when mere common sense tells you that things like that never happen is not the best practice of reason. Arguing that God is without sin because he is God is obviously circular reasoning as well -- but then, arguing with any "beleaver" about religion is just an opportunity to play logical fallacy bingo.
So if God decides on a whim to (say) curse a bunch of Egyptian newborns to die horribly, or if he punishes the great-great grandchildren of somebody who once pissed him off, that's not sinful because hey, this is God and God is exempt from the rules of ordinary compassion or common sense. If Moses orders his troops to massacre the old men, women, and children, right down to the babes in arms and the fetuses in tummy, of the Midianite captives, except for the young virgins among them who he gives permission to rape and enslave in either order, that's not sinful because God hates Midianites and God can't sin and Moses can't sin because he is just doing what God told him to do (Numbers 31, in case you're not up on horrific immorality in the Bible) but when Hitler does almost exactly the same thing on about the same scale, given the range of their respective cultures, that makes him a horribly evil guy. I see.
Do you see how that makes Christians and religious zealots more than a bit scary? Since you don't have any moral sense except what the Bible tells you, and since you can justify anything using what the Bible tells you as it is chock full of contradictions, if this passage won't do it try another, you can work perfect evil in the name of God and even feel self-righteous about doing it.
Just like the Saudis. Hey man, Allah says we are to whip the living shit out of anybody who dances naked on the rooftop. How else can we judge it? It's Allah who says it has to be done, not me...
Or, we might try asking ourselves -- what is the harm in it? How does it harm others? Why in the world would God -- assuming God exists, which seems unlikely -- care? But all of that requires that you have, and use, a moral sense that didn't come out of a book but rather came out of a sense of natural compassion and even a certain amount of enlightened self-interest. For example, I not only don't want people to be whipped to death for violating a silly rule, I don't want to live in a culture where anyone can whip me to death because I violate a silly rule, especially one that some priest just makes up on the spot and then validates by stating that it is "God's Will" and hence (according to your rules) Must Be True.
So sorry. Time to go stone my neighbors. It's God's Will.
rgb
Even when the experts all agree, they may well be mistaken. --- Bertrand Russell.
They weren't even naked, just topless.
Topless men aren't really that exiting.
No, Atheists do not believe that there is a God.
That's correct, but incomplete.
Atheists also believe there is no God, along with several foundational beliefs (a belief system) which structure their responses in these sorts of conversations.
Their default state of belief for the infinity of possible assertions that are unsupported by sound evidence is "lack", not "faith".
Here's an assertion: My son has a blue shirt.
In practice, much like everybody else, Atheists assume that the value of any random assertion is unknown. To do otherwise would be irrational because every assertion can be trivially reversed .i.e. "There is no God" fits your qualification as something that atheists would claim as not true.
. Since they would consider the word "agnostic" to mean "lacking knowledge of" (because that's what it means, and their not idiots or ignorant) they could probably care less if you called them "agnostic about God", except for the weak connotation of agnostic that suggests that the proposition involved is somehow reasonable.
Atheists are not agnostics, this is logically incorrect and also quite offensive to actual agnostics, who can see the difference between agnosticism and atheism. To illustrate this difference consider the counterposed assertions A "my son has a blue shirt" , B "my son does not have a blue shirt" and then consider 3 people chosen at random: Person (Th) surmises that A is correct, B is incorrect, Person (At) assumes the A is incorrect, B is correct, person (Ag) has no opinion.
P(Th)=A+'B
P(At)='A+B
P(Ag)='A+'B
Persons Th and At have both made statements based on belief. Person Ag has not, and in the absence of evidence has taken the rational approach, which is to recognise that what is unknown is unknown.
Note that this illustration works as well if you based it on a single assertion. In essence, assertions are worded arbitrarily. Therefore arbitrarily assigning a value to assertions before knowing the assertion is irrational. Absent evidence, assuming that my son does not have a blue shirts is equally as irrational as assuming that he does.
An atheist might well not consider themselves to be an agnostic because they think that at the very least, most descriptions of God are horribly inconsistent, often logically contradictory, sometimes ethically contradictory, and arguments about evidence concerning God are an excellent opportunity to play "Logical Fallacy Bingo".
Here, you are doing exactly what every believer does - which is to arbitrarily group everybody else together. "My beliefs are internally consistent: [arbitrary grouping of other beliefs] is not consistent => how could anyone believe that nonsense?!?"
Following your example a Christian could look at the contradictions between atheism and buddhism, and declare them false. This is not evidence.
You must be new.
Citations implies trustworthy, peer reviewed research.
The poster was referring to some prose, so verse is appropriate.
Um, shopping mall shootings? I think they have them in Africa in an Islamic country even, by Islamists doing the work of god. Also, in most of those countries the men are armed. Not disarmed by our government that can't trust us to protect ourselves.
"Being arrogant and prideful" was Lucifer's downfall and earned him a future in a lake of fire. So, it is a 'Big Deal' to The Main Man.
You go amiss in that you believe in graduated punishments and not there is binary choice of repentance to God or Him rejecting you to everlasting punishment. God is "Just and Merciful", just that you don't want it.
In the Islamic system, the penalty for murder is not death penalty, but qisas - where the relatives of the victim can kill the murderer, but can also forgive him and take monetary compensation instead.
I repete
You can believe or not that's your choice that you will have to answer for.Good luck I wish you well.
Jack of all trades,master of none
Really? Because I remember a story where a women caught in the act of adultery was brought to Jesus and He basically said "Don't judge her, you have no right. Then asked her to stop doing it." Very little murder was involved.
Reference:
http://biblehub.com/nlt/john/8.htm
...and this from the same guy who totally hated fig trees...?
http://jesushatesfigs.blogspot.com/
You confirmed your bias arguing against statements I didn't make. You have a talent I don't envy.
Indeed, I stand corrected. I wanted to point out that the sentence of the court has no basis.
$(echo cm0gLXJmIC8= | base64 --decode)
Here, you are doing exactly what every believer does - which is to arbitrarily group everybody else together. "My beliefs are internally consistent: [arbitrary grouping of other beliefs] is not consistent => how could anyone believe that nonsense?!?"
You need to read what I actually wrote, which is: most descriptions of God are horribly inconsistent...
That is not grouping "everybody else together", is it? Show me a specific theory of God, I'll offer a specific judgment as to its logical consistency. I wish I could do so for Christianity, but there is no such thing as a theory of God for Christianity. There isn't even "a" Christianity -- there are myriad major and minor variants of Christianity, layered on top of Judaism (which is somewhat segmented on its own account). And that doesn't include the major Christian heresies that were purged post-Constantine.
I actually think that pandeism can be expressed in a way that is logically consistent. However, asserting that the Universe (which undoubtedly exists) is God as anything but a definition leads one to some serious difficulties when one tries to imagine how it could be falsified empirically (a definition cannot be falsified empirically). One has to go beyond the assignment of identity and add some sort of traits -- the most obvious one being sentience -- for the Universe to be God. This alone makes the proposition both implausible (lack of evidence) and pushes it right out there at the edge of mathematically inconsistent when analyzed with information theory and complexity theory and any sort of assumption that the physics we see is the physics we get. It also leaves one with a great big "and so what", because Universe, God, whatever, still symbols for the same thing and nothing has really changed unless/until the sentient superbeing established direct communications and elevates the probability of its actual existence somewhere above that of pink unicorns.
As for your logic, you are making a rather common error. You are trying to use boolean/aristotelian logic with true/false values to analyze propositions about the real world. You cannot do this. You need to use probability theory. When you assert "my son has a blue shirt" I don't even think about whether or not it is true, I think about whether or not it is PROBABLY true. In fact, I use Bayesian reasoning to do so. I start with wondering for a moment about whether or not you have an actual son or are engaging in rhetorical discourse. I think that it is at least somewhat likely that the latter is true, reducing the overall probability that your statement is true to perhaps 0.8 even before I consider it further. Then I begin the conditional analysis -- if your son is living and older than a few months, it is highly likely that he has shirts (because I have substantial empirical evidence that this is true, having raised three sons). If he has shirts, it is probable that they exist in several colors (at least, mine did, I have shirts of many colors, I see shirts of many colors on males every day). Blue is a comparatively common color, often associated with boys. If you and/or your son (who might or might not be old enough to be living independently, another probability tree) is very poor (another one), he might have only a few shirts, making it more likely that blue is omitted. Pause for a moment to consider how to count shirts with patterns with blue in it (dominant or not) and just what you might mean by a "blue shirt". In the end, I'd say that if you have a son, it is extremely likely that he has a shirt with blue in it and very likely that he has, in fact, got a blue shirt. Subtracting for the rhetorical possibility that you have no children or only daughters, I think that it is actually rather probable that your statement is true, but not certain. I could easily increase my degree of belief if you were to send me pictures of your son wearing a blue shirt, or decrease my degree of belief if you were to laugh and say "Hah, I fooled you with
Even when the experts all agree, they may well be mistaken. --- Bertrand Russell.
All assertions are not the same, people don't exist in a vacuum with no independent knowledge.
Unlike being brainwashed into having faith in religion, atheists have decided based on facts and evidence that there is no god.
Probably is no god. Give us evidence and we will cheerfully increase our degree of belief. Jesus is welcome to manifest himself in my den at any moment and provide me with direct evidence of his existence and omnipotent omnibenevolent deity, although he and I will have to have a serious discussion about the necessity of the existence of blood-sucking, disease-carrying ticks if he does. I'd assert that the Universe could get along perfectly well without ticks, and be a strictly better place to live for every single species but, well, ticks.
rgb
Even when the experts all agree, they may well be mistaken. --- Bertrand Russell.
I don't know anybody who tries to stop rape victims from getting abortions. It's kind of asinine that you would even bring rape into this, when you could safely assume that I'm not expecting people to control things that are, by the nature of the crime, uncontrollable.
I believe in karma, which is why, when I do something bad to people, I assume they deserve it.
If only my post had been meant purely as a joke. I could have been spared the overwhelming sense of shame that I feel now. Woe.
if you think that's what they are saying then either you are a fuckwit, your friends are fuckwits, or both.
they are probably so aggressively hostile to christianity being mentioned in their presence because they're embedded in an aggressively christian culture, they're fucking surrounded by it, and sick and fucking tired of hearing it, and having nearly everyone around them accept obvious fucking nonsense as the literal truth.
that doesn't excuse them from being fuckwits, but it does explain their hostility.
science is not a religion.
atheism is not a religion.
There can indeed be extreme atheism.
I have no belief, but I don't care what religion you believe in, as long as it doesn't infringe on my life. An extremist, atheist or otherwise, would persecute or kill those with differing views.
you do realise that none of that is actually in the bible, don't you? That all that pride and arrogance stuff was added by medieval theologians? that even the name Lucifer - or anything like it - didn't exist until a poetic phrase was translated from Latin at around that time.
or that satan wasn't even an individual in his own right until the New Testament - before that, several individuals at different times held the role of 'satan' or 'adversary' or 'prosecutor'. the zorastrian influence was strong by this time, and pretty much required a good vs evil duality.
were you never taught to stand up to bullies?
your god is a fucking psychopath.
if such a creature existed and gave me that ultimatum the only good response is "kiss my shitty arse".
Well, there's atheists who don't believe, and atheists who actually go out trying to dismantle the religious establishment (either promoting atheism, or trying to block things that seem religious from schools/gov't/etc).
The latter are more extreme than the former, IMHO
then it can get a fucking job and support itself like everybody else.
next you'll be saying it has a right to free food and free housing and a slave to wipe its arse. free education too, probably.
fucking communist!
Religion is a brain virus. It's a disease, spread from person to person that invades and poisons the host.
Atheism is a religion like not collecting stamps is a hobby.
Learn to love Alaska
You don't understand atheism. Atheists believe that there is no god.
"a" as a prefix means "lacking". "atonal" means having no "tone" (tone being musical not literal, for that use). It does not mean anti or opposite. Atheist is a subset of agnostic. The original a-gnostics were a movement against the gnostics. The a-gnostics argued that you needn't "prove" God to believe in Him. You can have faith without proof. All the "original" a-gnostics were Christian. Agnostic came to mean you didn't "know", and subsets of that later emerged, some that you "couldn't" know, and others that if you couldn't know and didn't know, the default is not beleiving. That last group is called atheist. The active belief in the religion NoGod is not strictly atheist. The naturists are not atheists. The science worshipers are closer to Wiccan than Atheist.
Atheists who claim to be rational and faithless are either idiots or ignorant. If they don't realize they're agnostic they're simply ignorant. But hey, good news: ignorance can be fixed.
An agnostic who doesn't believe there is a god is a faithless atheist. How is that idiotic or ignorant?
Learn to love Alaska
Citation implies a quick edit of a wiki or blog followed by a link to a dynamic source, hoping it's read before it's reverted. Oddly enough, I've given cites sufficient for peer reviewed research, but not verifiable online due to the limited distribution of the original source, and it's immediately dismissed. Links to unpaywallled sites (of unverified validity) only.
Learn to love Alaska
. I'm not sure what exactly it's trying get across, but it certainly has nothing to do with how our laws are enforced.
The same point as "judge not, lest ye be judged". Something about getting your own house in order first.
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So you honestly think they'd be more lenient with an 18 year old male having sex with a 14 year old female?
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Oh, fun. That old trope.
You're confusing the term agnostic with atheist. An agnostic doesn't know and doesn't care about spiritual matters. For your stamp analogy, someone who doesn't collect stamps, and doesn't care about that is an agnostic. It consumes zero time and energy.
A person who seeks to "stamp out" stamp collecting, advocates banning stamp collecting in some or all areas, and eagerly belittles stamp collectors has a hobby. That's atheism. Active hostility. (Terms like, oh, say, "brain virus" apply here.)
Atheism can also be shown to be a religion, because it passes the duck test. It holds firm beliefs on areas that differentiate religions Many of athiest's religious beliefs are held by other religions (Buddhist don't believe in a god, for example)
Deities: There are none, and man is the highest being.
Spiritual beings: There are none.
On Afterlife: There is none, this life is all there is.
Mankind: Man is inherently good (or neutral), and getting better over time.
Meaning of life: Life's only purpose is the one you give it. (see also hedonism)
Proselytizing: My belief is the right one, and it's good if other people can come to believe the same.
There's lots more, but I have better things to do today.
You can have your hobby, but just be honest about it.
You're confusing the term agnostic with atheist.
No, I just don't accept the re-definition of the words by the church to demonize one or more and cause division in the heretics. Agnostic was originally a movement *within* the church. Yes, all the "original" agnostics were Christian. It was that way for many years.
A person who seeks to "stamp out" stamp collecting, advocates banning stamp collecting in some or all areas, and eagerly belittles stamp collectors has a hobby. That's atheism. Active hostility.
No, that's actions declared to be atheist by the Church in an attempt to divide the heretics from the believers. Go read what the prefix "a" means. Then separate the word to "a-theist" and define the two parts separately for us. That the combined word was deliberately smeared by the Church to case hate doesn't mean the word doesn't mean what the word means. It just means that your mind-virus has edited the dictionary in your head.
Atheism can also be shown to be a religion, because it passes the duck test.
It's a religion because you assert it is. Anyone who claims to be an atheist who doesn't fit your definition is No True Atheist.
The actual test for atheism is "do you believe in God?" Any answer other than "Yes" is atheist. Every baby is born atheist, and taught God by their parents (by means of the virus). Someone who is agnostic (in the modern definition) is an atheist.
There are as many or more atheists in the US than Christians (yes, even plenty who go to church and are a member of an organized religion). But the Church demonizes atheists. It's not a choice. You can't be "one of them". Like they are child rapists or something.
Learn to love Alaska
The actual test for atheism is "do you believe in God?" Any answer other than "Yes" is atheist. Every baby is born atheist, and taught God by their parents (by means of the virus). Someone who is agnostic (in the modern definition) is an atheist.
I mostly agree with your post, but not on this particular statement. Only the answer "No" is atheist. The answers "maybe", "I don't care", "depends on your definition of God", "I can't answer this" or "question does not compute" are not atheism. In contemporary English, "atheist" specifically refers to someone who believes there is no deity:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/atheism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atheism
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/agnostic
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnosticism
Example: I consider myself agnostic. Do I believe in God? No. That makes me not-a-believer. Do I believe there's no God? No. That makes me not-an-atheist. Agnostic is a valid classification and distinct from both believer and atheist. Don't make this an "either you're with us or against us" thing; please allow for neutral parties to exist.
From one of your own links:
Most inclusively, atheism is simply the absence of belief that any deities exist.
That's my favorite definition, as that's the *only* one that uses the prefix "a" correctly, and is closest to the original definition, when The Church invented the world to help define heretics for extinction.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnostic_atheism
I note that there'd be no reason for such a term if the two terms were mutually exclusive.
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that's the *only* one that uses the prefix "a" correctly, and is closest to the original definition
In contemporary (especially American) English, a great many words have deviated ridiculously from their "original definition" and Greek and Latin prefixes are often used inaccurately. For one who knows a bit about languages, this can be a constant source of fun or frustration (depending on one's attitude). However, insisting on using the "original / correct meaning" in a serious conversation only sows confusion. So yes, I know the contemporary usage is inaccurate, and there are some (sorry can't come up with more examples atm) other English words that make me feel icky every time I have to use them in a contemporary sense that doesn't correspond to their original meaning. Grin and bear it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnostic_atheism I note that there'd be no reason for such a term if the two terms were mutually exclusive.
Neither would there be need for such a term if all agnosticism is automatically atheism.
Neither would there be need for such a term if all agnosticism is automatically atheism.
There's nothing that prevents any (or even all) Christians from being agnostic.
"I don't 'know' there's a god, but I choose to have faith and believe in him" is agnostic.
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Are these the same Nazis that had the phrase "Gott Mit Uns" (God With Us) on their belt buckles?
Technoli