I think you will find secularism has killed and oppressed many many times more people then religion ever has.
Secularism doesn't kill and oppress people. People oppress and kill people. I know of nobody in the history of mankind who has been killed or oppressed, for "secularism." In case you plan to bring up Pol Pot, Mao, Lenin or the Bolsheviks, their doctrine -- dialectical materialism -- was more consistent with and more dependent on the doctrine of mandatory charity than any logical consequence of "atheism." Communism has more in common with Christianity and Islam than with so-called "secularism."
Sadly thier chief tool is religion, but make no mistake, it is secular greed, avarice, and power hunger that drives it.
If religion is, as you say, the "chief tool" for whoever you mean that has "killed and oppressed many many times more people then religion ever has," what is its excuse?
What would "make you think it" would be the standard process of evaluating different mythological/religious claims and figures for a sense of harmony with life and internal consistency of the mythos, much like you do everything else.
Christianity and Islam did not become the most dominant religions on Earth via "a sense of harmony with life and internal consistency of the mythos." Hinduism, the religion in which Siddhartha was raised before becoming Buddha, was also the by-product of military conquest of thousands of separate tribes in the subcontinent.
I think we should put all murderers & rapists in prison for life, without possibility of parole or even of outside contact. I would be very curious to see, then, whether the people who remain free would decide they have a need for religion, or preoccupy ourselves solely with pursuit of happiness within our Constitutional and natural rights.
This is just a pet theory, mind you, but I have this germ of a hypothesis -- which happens to be consistent with my views on law and science, both derived logically, as much as possible separately, on the premise of their respective purposes to humans generally -- that criminals are both the direct cause and primary beneficiary of the majority of preposterous beliefs classified under "superstition," "conspiracy theory," and "religion." Consider, for example, the doctrine of "original sin," the most obvious effect of which is to instill an unearned sense of guilt among the innocent. In light of that effect, I think it is only reasonable to speculate -- to hypothesize -- that the purpose of that particular doctrine is to instill such unearned guilt, in order to effect the irrational eagerness to forgive, which is the direct result of that doctrine. Any "intelligent design" would choose a form to follow its function, would it not?
Now that my little tangent, sparked by your "sense of harmony with life" gibberish is over, I note that your position is weak on less subtle measures, as well.
I find many people willing to say "How do you know it isn't figure X or Y or Z instead?"--I find very few who actually will put their effort where there [sic] mouth is and actually argue figure X, Y, or Z. Which, if they truly are asserting they are of equivalent plausibility, they should have no problem with doing.
The post to which you replied did not assert "equivalent plausibility" and your counterargument therefore applies only to the straw man you constructed, not to your actual opponent.
Basically, your question is conceptually identical to saying, "So, you believe in political stance X. How do you know political stance Y or Z or Q isn't actually correct?" Well, by evaluating it, like everything else in life, and this question is hardly a refutation of any stance one may hold for their notion of "X".
Now, you seem to be forgetting the context of the thread, which is, in your words, "political stance X": use of public money in support of a particular religious dogma. The subsequent question to which you replied, why this particular religious dogma, is a fair one, in this context.
I don't know about that other guy, but I did stumble across Anaximander, in a piece of crap called "Encarta," which was so atrocious about topics I already knew that I later bought a real book to learn about Anaximander. Not much seems to be known about him, except that he was so important in his time that a lot was written about him, most of which conflicts. So, you want credit for recommending that? Hmm..
I've seen mentions that the "majestic plural" appeared in Canaanite princes' writings and Phoenecian writings thousands of years ago as well. Apparently, the majestic plural existed in ancient Hebrew as well. But beyond that, I've heard the theory advanced that when God used the plural, he was addressing the angels in Heaven.
That's my understanding also. IIRC, there are many types of angels mentioned in the Bible, and the "We" in that story are the Elohim. Personally, I prefer the interpretation [my own] that a small committee of angels cooked all this up as a hypothesis, and YHWH was left observing the apparatus. Whether he got the short straw or is the envy of the other Elohim (sp?) is what I wonder. But then, I'm agnostic, heavily leaning toward atheist.
Well said, calcapt, but I just want to highlight a more fundamental flaw in one of AC's points. I hope you don't mind.
calcapt:
I won't question your beliefs, but I must say that I'd have other explanations for situations where I was able to succeed when failure appeared inevitable. I'd usually attribute it to last minute quick thinking, thorough analysis of mistakes, help from others, etc. Now whether these things that helped me succeed where I should have failed were an act of God, I don't know. Currently, I believe everything that happens is the result of some causative event resulting in some sort of effect. If I were to make observations supporting that God had a hand in saving my ass, repeatable and verifiable by others, I'd gladly start believing in him.
...which was in response to AC:
Anyways in response to your question, I have had way too many last minute just when I absolutely needed it some sort of solution to a very big challenge has come through right before failure sets in. some times exactly what I needed at just the right time, or a completely unexpected solution will reveal itself at last moment. God does work in mysterious ways.
Once a problem is solved, the search for its solution should, logically, end. To cease pursuing solutions to solved problems is to act rationally, but AC's subsequent analysis of the situation attributes to the "last minute" timing a deus ex machina, when it is AC who deserves the credit for correctly classifying her problem as "solved" and moving onto the next challenge in her pursuit of happiness, or to enjoyment of successfully-pursued happiness, both of which undoubtedly apply at different times. The perception of solutions being delivered "exactly what I needed at just the right time" is no more significant than finding a misplaced item "in the last place I looked." These items are found in the last place one looks, not because of any variant of Murphy's Law or some other mystical truism, but because once found, the search for a misplaced item ceases, except in the cases of lunatics.
...would be gathered/harnessed/transmitted/whatever using a conductive material. Unfortunately, such material would, due to its nature as a conductor, cause any voltage difference at its ends to be uniformly distributed, nearly instantaneously, throughout its mass, defeating its intended purpose. Well, I'm not Nicola Tesla, of course, but I do have my doubts that on this problem I'm missing any loopholes. Very large capacitor plates? I haven't done the calculation recently, but as I recall, I came up with, um, impractical sizes.
I just keep having the nagging feeling that someplace with Tesla's brain involved there is a fast and easier way around all of this energy question stuff. Like it is right there an inch away staring us in the face and we just aren't or refuse-to see it.
Solar power isn't free enough free energy for you?
Some people are religious Christians, some people are religious drunks,
The adverb "religiously" as you used it derives only loosely from one aspect of religion, the practice of religious rituals. You are asserting an equality by means of the false implication that the adverb "religiously" [as in regular performance of an action or adherence to a behavior pattern] is more similar -- in fact, identical -- to that subset of habits that are religious rituals. The difference is in the reason for habits, and is not trivial. Scientists practice the habit of quantifying their results, for example, for a good reason. Likewise, on the generous assumption that you habitually brush your teeth, you do so for a good reason, which does not derive from worship of teeth, a high priest with a degree in dental medicine, or a dental deity. One common usage of the sound denoted by that combination of letters "religiously" is as you characterize it, but the similarity in sound does not trump the difference of meaning. The existence of the colloquialism "religiously" to refer to all habits is not sufficient to bridge the gap in meaning between religions, and all habits of all kinds. Outside of religion, many things are done regularly, which you sloppily equate with ritually, in order to conclude the falsehood "religiously," in order to then equate the distinct, unequivalent usage of that adverb with the noun "religion."
..and, if you don't believe that science can be a religion, you have not tried to discuss facts with someone who has a pet theory.
I am doing so right now, because science is not a religion, and your motive in telling that lie can only be malicious.
Atheism may be a religion for some people: it depends on whether they are atheists because they don't see the need for anything else or because they are against religion.
That is false. Opposition to the intrusion of religion on the unwilling and uninterested is a direct logical consequence of the fact that I "don't see the need for" religion myself and am unwilling to be made to participate in it, nor to help anybody to use the State to compel anybody else to do so. That I habitually contradict your arguments does not imply what you claim, "religiosity."
Many people, perhaps most, are religious about the core things in their life because they accept them on faith and believe them dogmatically, whatever their philosophical underpinnings.
That is what psychologists call projecting. You speak only for yourself when you speak of subjective experiences and motives, despite any wish to speak for the collective.
Science does require faith for the same reason that accepting the Bible as describing spiritual events requires faith: people do not, for the most part, directly experience the things they read about or are told.
Science is a process, not a collection of facts. Your assertion of equivalence of religious dogmas to the memorization of any or even all scientifically proven facts is proven false, and the dogma that science is dogma, with it.
Indeed; would you have agnostics & atheists learn all mythologies ever invented? All that are still actively practiced? All the popular ones? All those with recognizable influence on contemporary cultures? Unless you draw the line at fact & provability, your suggestions logically imply a need to learn by rote every fallacy ever advanced, by anybody, anywhere. That, in turn, would obviously constitute a competitive disadvantage.
Lisa Dizengoff made a good point. Creationists occasionally come close to making a valid point, although I've never seen them quite make it. Science is taught, until college, as a collection of facts. Science is, in fact, a method of understanding the world by testing assumptions or best guesses, called hypotheses, in order to determine and verify the best hypothesis, which may eventually be given the status Theory if it is robust and general enough. Although their specific hypotheses are atrocious, the rest of us could salvage some benefit from the noise of the Bible thumpers by calling for more emphasis in education on science as a method of learning than as a collection of facts, proven scientifically by others, to be dispensed like commodities and taken on faith by all who follow them. If the Bible thumpers' kids were allowed, in one class period per week, to challenge the Theories presented in whatever textbooks are in use, they'd have a much harder time feeling righteously indignant about their hypotheses being "ignored." In classes taught competently, the offspring will also notice that they're wrong. In general, nobody will be able to accurately claim that their point of view is being ignored.
People with certain types of color-blindness can't tell the difference between dark blue and dark green sweaters. Unless I first instruct them in the wave nature of light and the correct use of a photodetector, why should they believe me if I tell them their sweater is "really" a different color than mine?
Stored Procedures can be good, if they're not "scattered around the database." I've seen well-written & well-named stored procedures make subsequent programming much easier. But, they were not "scattered," either.
One thing that drives me crazy is when people don't follow a naming scheme in the database, and with the object classes.
Wow! Yes, that would tend to defeat the purpose of...well, the computer.
Big Egos never give up. Hitler finally had to put a bullet in his brain.
I notice you aren't giving up. I hope you die quickly and painlessly, like Hitler.
The illusionary "system of thought" that you are trapped in. You own little "closed" world of pseudo reality. I can reflect this back on you forever...
Have you forgotten the appointment you just made, with the bullet? I had the impression you're quite flighty, but really, that is ridiculous!
...and you can continue to prove all the points that I made before, about where your big illusionary ego and "closed" little world comes from. Only big egos even consider that there is actually a dualistic "right and wrong".
Oh, re-e-e-e-ally? Then, why don't you just admit that you are wrong? Not so mystical, airy-fairy, pie-in-the-sky & full of ephemeral gibberish, all of a sudden? You just learned that words do have literal meanings. And, you are wrong.
No, jackass. Every time you've responded, you've completely ignored what I said.
You know, among many adults, name-calling is a concession of defeat. And, I have been replying to what you said:
Why do you think the theory was invented?
Like any theory, it was invented to explain something for which no previous theory apparently sufficed. What I have been trying to tell you is that Wiltshire has proven that assumption incorrect, and dark matter was never needed. By Occam's Razor, therefore, the thing to do now is throw it out, unless you can find a good, new reason to keep it.
Yes, that is exactly what Wiltshire just did. The answer is still "42" for the Hitchhiker's Guide cult, and the question was wrong until Wiltshire came along and fixed it!
I'm not going to waste my time on this thread any more since you persist in not paying attention to what I'm saying.
That means that you concede because I persist in paying attention to what you're saying, despite your wish that I pretend that what you're saying is better than the gibberish it truly is.
As I said several times, I am not claiming that dark matter has been shown to exist through its gravitational effects, nor that observed gravitational phenomena have been proven to be due to dark matter.
I am merely saying that dark matter, if it exists, does have observable gravitational effects. This is to correct an earlier poster, who implied that dark matter should be dismissed as a theory because dark matter has no observable consequences.
Well, since then you've been talking to me, and if I wanted to say something to that "earlier poster" you haven't specified, I'd be replying to its lies instead of to yours. Support your assertions or STFU.
(On the other hand, I will claim that it is very likely that dark matter does exist,
I welcome you to proceed, as soon as you're ready to try to back up that bullshi+.
...on the basis of observed gravitational phenomena, as it explains far more phenomena than the ones Wiltshire is trying to explain. Dark matter can simultaneously account for galactic rotation curves, galactic superclusters, large scale early universe structure formation, cosmological expansion, and other effects -- not to mention forms of dark matter being independently and naturally predicted by the Standard Model of particle physics and most extensions thereof.)
It is to you, now, to support the assertions that your pet theory more robustly explains those phenomena than does Wiltshire's. Whenever you're ready, clown.
This conclusion is really scientific (dualistic) thinking? This is why I'm so skeptical of science, religion, politics, they all use the same methods. Yet science presents itself as being "apart" from (above) the others.
Not at all. Politics and religion permit you one vote on the basis of your one belly. Science has standards and prohibits you from voting on the basis of your lack of one brain.
Selection, exclusion, don't look through that telescope, it might nullify a pet theory. Religion had center stage then, but has lost some credibility since. You think the central medical establishment is not on it's way to loosing credibility?
If your standards are "loose," you're likely to misplace, ie to "lose" an "o" now and again, loser. Remember that mnemonic and stop embarrassing yourself in public.
Then why the groundswell of alternatives?
Low and unenforced high school graduation standards, idiot.
With this information employers could decide not to hire you if they felt you drank too much, in their opinion, or at all. Companies owned by fundamentalist christians, mormans or even muslims may decide to do this.
What does your lengthy response have to do with anything I said?
I got onto a tangent related to Black Parrot's comments; there's a chance I completely misplaced that part of my reply!
ttnuagmada:
Look, I'm just pointing out that the original poster was claiming that dark matter should be rejected because dark matter can have no observed gravitational effects, when the whole idea of dark matter was invented BECAUSE it has observable gravitational effects.
The specific "gravitational effect" is the magnitude of the redshift, which has been taken to imply acceleration of galaxies relative to one another; if measurements confirm Wiltshire's hypothesis, and (the correct proportion of) that redshift is the result of gravitational bending rather than acceleration, then the "observable consequences" of dark matter have been merely a furphy and the hypothesis, an appendage to science rather than a contribution to it.
Slashdot Mirror
I think we should put all murderers & rapists in prison for life, without possibility of parole or even of outside contact. I would be very curious to see, then, whether the people who remain free would decide they have a need for religion, or preoccupy ourselves solely with pursuit of happiness within our Constitutional and natural rights. This is just a pet theory, mind you, but I have this germ of a hypothesis -- which happens to be consistent with my views on law and science, both derived logically, as much as possible separately, on the premise of their respective purposes to humans generally -- that criminals are both the direct cause and primary beneficiary of the majority of preposterous beliefs classified under "superstition," "conspiracy theory," and "religion." Consider, for example, the doctrine of "original sin," the most obvious effect of which is to instill an unearned sense of guilt among the innocent. In light of that effect, I think it is only reasonable to speculate -- to hypothesize -- that the purpose of that particular doctrine is to instill such unearned guilt, in order to effect the irrational eagerness to forgive, which is the direct result of that doctrine. Any "intelligent design" would choose a form to follow its function, would it not?
Now that my little tangent, sparked by your "sense of harmony with life" gibberish is over, I note that your position is weak on less subtle measures, as well. The post to which you replied did not assert "equivalent plausibility" and your counterargument therefore applies only to the straw man you constructed, not to your actual opponent. Now, you seem to be forgetting the context of the thread, which is, in your words, "political stance X": use of public money in support of a particular religious dogma. The subsequent question to which you replied, why this particular religious dogma, is a fair one, in this context.
Oh, go cite your sources in the footnotes.
I don't know about that other guy, but I did stumble across Anaximander, in a piece of crap called "Encarta," which was so atrocious about topics I already knew that I later bought a real book to learn about Anaximander. Not much seems to be known about him, except that he was so important in his time that a lot was written about him, most of which conflicts. So, you want credit for recommending that? Hmm..
What do you mean, that's not on the menu? I know the chef can cook it.
calcapt:
:)
Eet smakkelijk!
Lisa Dizengoff made a good point. Creationists occasionally come close to making a valid point, although I've never seen them quite make it. Science is taught, until college, as a collection of facts. Science is, in fact, a method of understanding the world by testing assumptions or best guesses, called hypotheses, in order to determine and verify the best hypothesis, which may eventually be given the status Theory if it is robust and general enough. Although their specific hypotheses are atrocious, the rest of us could salvage some benefit from the noise of the Bible thumpers by calling for more emphasis in education on science as a method of learning than as a collection of facts, proven scientifically by others, to be dispensed like commodities and taken on faith by all who follow them. If the Bible thumpers' kids were allowed, in one class period per week, to challenge the Theories presented in whatever textbooks are in use, they'd have a much harder time feeling righteously indignant about their hypotheses being "ignored." In classes taught competently, the offspring will also notice that they're wrong. In general, nobody will be able to accurately claim that their point of view is being ignored.
People with certain types of color-blindness can't tell the difference between dark blue and dark green sweaters. Unless I first instruct them in the wave nature of light and the correct use of a photodetector, why should they believe me if I tell them their sweater is "really" a different color than mine?
No, your age bracket was excluded because you're impossible, not less difficult.
"I still don't recall ever having had any problems with my memory."
We may never know if it really works, but as a person hoping to one day reach the age at which Alzheimer's is common, I'm in favor of finding a cure.
Yes, that is exactly what Wiltshire just did. The answer is still "42" for the Hitchhiker's Guide cult, and the question was wrong until Wiltshire came along and fixed it!
Amen, brutha!