If they didn't they would have to kill their friends if they worshipped false gods (ie, had a different religion), and do all kinds of crazy stuff.
For the record, Colossians 2 indicates that laws from the Old Testament, such as this, are cancelled during the age of the New Testament. (Although some are explicitly carried on by being repeated in the New.) And Jeremiah 31:31 said ahead of time that God was planning on this happening.
I know you probably don't care, but if you've ever wondered if Christians have a reason for that, well, there it is.
There are even good rebuttals to the issue- I'm surprised that you don't know them.
I'm afraid you missed my point. I do know them. And if you already knew them, you'd've done better to start by indicating that you already knew them, as well, and what problem you have with them.
Any biblical literalist who wants to debate evolution better have them available at the drop of a hat.
I didn't post here today to debate evolution. I posted to make a funny comment about fundamentalists and slashdot.
PMuse observed what seems to him to be two contradictory statements in the bible
... and hasn't got the foggiest idea what Christians actually believe about those two statements and why they don't contradict. If he'd indicated he already knew WHY Christians don't believe those statements are in contradiction (i.e., he already knew what explanation Christians have) but found that the explanation still didn't resolve things for him, and offered a reason why not, then it'd be clear that it'd be worth my time to dig into the details with him. It's like solving a problem with your computer. To say, "Well, I've got this problem, what's the solution?" doesn't say nearly the same thing as, "Well, I've got this problem, and I tried A, but it didn't work, so I tried B, but the problem with that was..."
There are many, many, many places on the web where someone can look to see explanations for all kinds of alleged contradictions in the Bible. This one is about as easy as "Genesis 6:15 says the ark was 450 feet long, but Joshua 3:14-15 says two men carried it on their shoulders across a river." But he can't be bothered to check to see if there's a reason Christians have never noticed this "contradiction" before. No, clearly to him the reason is that Christians must be out of their minds.
If someone wants to know WHY Christians don't think those passages conflict, and is clearly willing to put forth some minimal effort to find out, and is then willing to discuss the results of his search, I might be willing to talk with him. But for someone who's starting out by saying, "Nope, the only reason Christians think this is they're nuts," it's just not worth my time.
Whenever someone talks about the Bible and says something is "very clear," it's always a sure sign that they are insisting one possible understanding is true when others are valid. I've done it myself, and still catch myself doing it from time to time.
A number of them manifestly do not, but usually it is for disagreements over specifics of the Christian faith which would likely not interest people here.
But honestly, most of the Christians I know are similar to me: believe in literal creation, don't see a need to force that belief on people. I think they would all self-describe as fundamentalists. Most of them are not as libertarian as me, but they are also nowhere near as authoritarian as the slashdot crowd thinks.
Of course not! We need to get back to separation of school and state, the way the nation's founders (all diests and thus abhorrent to the fundamentalist mindset) intended.
Can't I say, "I think it's the former, but I might be wrong because it's the latter?" Do I have to turn in my fundamentalist membership card or something?
I'm sorry, maybe you guys have to find a more militant fundamentalist or something. I guess I've let you down.:)
Don't get me wrong. I'm not an IDer. But for God's sake, this is flaimbait. An obvious attempt to get the discussion going again so mods can have fun down-modding any IDer into total oblivion while patting themselves on the back for being so enlightened, so much more intelligent than the masses.
Okay, here I am. I'm a fundamentalist creationist. I believe the literal understanding of Genesis is the most likely explanation of what happened, although it may not tell the full story, and/or may be figurative or symbolic or something.
Have fun. Beat me. Slap me. Mod me down. I know someone will get their jollies. I'd hate to deny it to you just because Martorana pointed out where this was going and tried to stop it.
Maybe eventually we can just get the discussion simplied to something like "Is not!!!" "Is so!!!~!1~!" to save time or something.
I've recently come to believe that I never want to use a cheap DVD mechanism again. They seem to become more susceptible to minor disk flaws over time. I've had this problem with two players and a laptop, but I never had the problem with my Pioneer Tivo DVD-R. Lens cleaning didn't help, and though I heard a million voodoo ideas on the Internet, the one that made the most sense was "don't buy a cheap DVD player."
No, I don't think that Tivo should be allowed to restrict other people from using the same idea of recording television to a hard drive and all that entails, even if I do happen to think that Tivo has the best and coolest implementation, and even if I am worried that they might go belly up if they are not granted such special monopolistic privileges.:(
I just happened to sit down at my wife's computer and check Slashdot. The wife just recently got her own account (yes, I am lucky)... and when I saw this I freaked! Simultaneously thought "cool, there's some kind of customizing," and "what in the world prompted her to spend the time to do this... and... hey... she wouldn't say "ponies"... what gives?"
No. I'll simply expel them from the community. My children will have the chance to be emancipated at any time once they are adults, and that may come even before they are 18.
I wish the law would expel ME from the community, actually. I'd rather withdraw completely from the system.
I think you missed what he's saying. He's saying it should only be defined by a household, which is a small community. In other words, my wife and I decide whether or not our children will have access to porn, noone else. And we decide was does and does not constitute it (assuming such a distinction matters based on our first decision).
What the law should say is that Smut cannot be forced on those not desiring it, however they must also take common sense steps to avoid it on their own.
I am in complete agreement with that sentence and with the post you replied to.
It's worth noting that, I think, dada21 doesn't expect porn to be outlawed or decency standards to be established much further than the level of "household" or "small community." I think what's he's looking for is for that kind of law to disappear at the federal level, giving the states the freedom to decide it for themselves, and then to disappear at the state level, giving cities the freedom to decide it for themselves, and so on down the line until people are voluntarily living in small communities that are what they want (allow or do not allow porn) and people can freely move to the next town over if they are not happy with it.
Personally, I don't want to see any laws about this at any level. This is illegal in my household (for my children) period, and I don't want any help from meddlers who might not know all the subtle nuances of the standard I intend to enforce, nor do I want to impose my standard on other people.
Yeah, my comment here was that the person talking about this seems to define success as "being a good advertiser for Google," as opposed to "having a wildly successful forum," which would be closer to my definition of success.
The reason many websites make money on AdSense right now is because a user finds the site via a search engine, sees nothing they like and just wants to get away. Yet these eyesore sites sometimes don't offer a lot of exit links -- except for the ads. The user clicks the ad just to get out (instead of closing the browser window), which earns the site money.
Wow; that is so weird to me. I visit everything in a new tab. If I don't like it, I close the tab. I guess I do not understand the non-geek target market at all, lol.
How many geeks here have every clicked a relevant ad on slashdot?
Only thinkgeek ads, for junk I didn't need. (But which was, nevertheless, cool.) I miss 1999.
I've blocked slashdot ads for a while. Before I installed adblock, I routinely right-clicked and "block all images from this server"'ed any ads featuring nude or partially nude women. I don't look at women dressed sexily unless they are my wife. The rest of you can make fun of that all you want, but it's the way I live. So slashdot hit that filter around 2003, at which point I ceased seeing many of their ads (but not all, IIRC). Then when Drudge Report started trying to get around popup blocking I installed adblock and went nuclear with Filterset.G. I don't see ads any more.
I think there are some very good points here. I've always valued functionality over form and beauty. (I own ten year old cars, for example.)
But it's interesting to me that he defines success as making a lot of ad revenue. My websites do not exist to get me revenue. They exist to build communities. Somebody else might have yet another definition of success for his website. I think the general principles raised are true no matter what the purpose of your site is, but I find it interesting that some people don't see a point for their site other than "make a lot of money carrying Google ads." More power to them if they can... it means they are providing something people want, financing it through advertizing, and making a bundle along the way. It's just not my purpose in having a website.
This is documented in the Bible all the way up to the Kings (Known as chapters Kings I and Kings II).
The writings you are describing are known as books, not chapters, and they are known as I Kings (First Kings) and II Kings (Second Kings), not Kings I and Kings II.
I tend to not take the word of experts on anything. Maybe it's just a genetic trait I have or something. But it's a very common theme in many aspects of my life. (Including religion... I'm a member of a church that opposes the theology of just about every Protestant and Catholic religious body out there.)
Experts are often wrong. That doesn't mean we should assume they are wrong. But take the field of medicine, for example: for the most part, I think "alternative medicines" are hogwash. But every so often something comes along that completely shakes up known medicine. Nutritional recommendations seem to change daily, for example. Experts don't always know. Again, that's not cause for assuming them to be wrong. But I don't like to automatically ascribe anyone authority simply because some other authority ranks them "an expert in their field."
Slashdot Mirror
If they didn't they would have to kill their friends if they worshipped false gods (ie, had a different religion), and do all kinds of crazy stuff.
For the record, Colossians 2 indicates that laws from the Old Testament, such as this, are cancelled during the age of the New Testament. (Although some are explicitly carried on by being repeated in the New.) And Jeremiah 31:31 said ahead of time that God was planning on this happening.
I know you probably don't care, but if you've ever wondered if Christians have a reason for that, well, there it is.
There are even good rebuttals to the issue- I'm surprised that you don't know them.
I'm afraid you missed my point. I do know them. And if you already knew them, you'd've done better to start by indicating that you already knew them, as well, and what problem you have with them.
Any biblical literalist who wants to debate evolution better have them available at the drop of a hat.
I didn't post here today to debate evolution. I posted to make a funny comment about fundamentalists and slashdot.
PMuse observed what seems to him to be two contradictory statements in the bible
... and hasn't got the foggiest idea what Christians actually believe about those two statements and why they don't contradict. If he'd indicated he already knew WHY Christians don't believe those statements are in contradiction (i.e., he already knew what explanation Christians have) but found that the explanation still didn't resolve things for him, and offered a reason why not, then it'd be clear that it'd be worth my time to dig into the details with him. It's like solving a problem with your computer. To say, "Well, I've got this problem, what's the solution?" doesn't say nearly the same thing as, "Well, I've got this problem, and I tried A, but it didn't work, so I tried B, but the problem with that was ..."
There are many, many, many places on the web where someone can look to see explanations for all kinds of alleged contradictions in the Bible. This one is about as easy as "Genesis 6:15 says the ark was 450 feet long, but Joshua 3:14-15 says two men carried it on their shoulders across a river." But he can't be bothered to check to see if there's a reason Christians have never noticed this "contradiction" before. No, clearly to him the reason is that Christians must be out of their minds.
If someone wants to know WHY Christians don't think those passages conflict, and is clearly willing to put forth some minimal effort to find out, and is then willing to discuss the results of his search, I might be willing to talk with him. But for someone who's starting out by saying, "Nope, the only reason Christians think this is they're nuts," it's just not worth my time.
You should check out documents like How to Ask a Question. Show me you've done some homework first.
Whenever someone talks about the Bible and says something is "very clear," it's always a sure sign that they are insisting one possible understanding is true when others are valid. I've done it myself, and still catch myself doing it from time to time.
A number of them manifestly do not, but usually it is for disagreements over specifics of the Christian faith which would likely not interest people here.
But honestly, most of the Christians I know are similar to me: believe in literal creation, don't see a need to force that belief on people. I think they would all self-describe as fundamentalists. Most of them are not as libertarian as me, but they are also nowhere near as authoritarian as the slashdot crowd thinks.
Thanks for the help.
just don't teach it in school.
Of course not! We need to get back to separation of school and state, the way the nation's founders (all diests and thus abhorrent to the fundamentalist mindset) intended.
Can't I say, "I think it's the former, but I might be wrong because it's the latter?" Do I have to turn in my fundamentalist membership card or something?
I'm sorry, maybe you guys have to find a more militant fundamentalist or something. I guess I've let you down. :)
Your only assertion is about what you believe, not what you think others should be taught as fact.
Kudos for noticing that.
Don't get me wrong. I'm not an IDer. But for God's sake, this is flaimbait. An obvious attempt to get the discussion going again so mods can have fun down-modding any IDer into total oblivion while patting themselves on the back for being so enlightened, so much more intelligent than the masses.
Okay, here I am. I'm a fundamentalist creationist. I believe the literal understanding of Genesis is the most likely explanation of what happened, although it may not tell the full story, and/or may be figurative or symbolic or something.
Have fun. Beat me. Slap me. Mod me down. I know someone will get their jollies. I'd hate to deny it to you just because Martorana pointed out where this was going and tried to stop it.
Maybe eventually we can just get the discussion simplied to something like "Is not!!!" "Is so!!!~!1~!" to save time or something.
Electronics is dirt cheap, so are DVD mechanisms.
I've recently come to believe that I never want to use a cheap DVD mechanism again. They seem to become more susceptible to minor disk flaws over time. I've had this problem with two players and a laptop, but I never had the problem with my Pioneer Tivo DVD-R. Lens cleaning didn't help, and though I heard a million voodoo ideas on the Internet, the one that made the most sense was "don't buy a cheap DVD player."
No, I don't think that Tivo should be allowed to restrict other people from using the same idea of recording television to a hard drive and all that entails, even if I do happen to think that Tivo has the best and coolest implementation, and even if I am worried that they might go belly up if they are not granted such special monopolistic privileges. :(
I am nothing, if not consistent.
I just happened to sit down at my wife's computer and check Slashdot. The wife just recently got her own account (yes, I am lucky) ... and when I saw this I freaked! Simultaneously thought "cool, there's some kind of customizing," and "what in the world prompted her to spend the time to do this ... and ... hey ... she wouldn't say "ponies" ... what gives?"
And if you don't like it, it can be changed with your vote.
I keep voting, and nothing changes. Experimentally, I seem to have disproved your assertion.
No. I'll simply expel them from the community. My children will have the chance to be emancipated at any time once they are adults, and that may come even before they are 18.
I wish the law would expel ME from the community, actually. I'd rather withdraw completely from the system.
I think you missed what he's saying. He's saying it should only be defined by a household, which is a small community. In other words, my wife and I decide whether or not our children will have access to porn, noone else. And we decide was does and does not constitute it (assuming such a distinction matters based on our first decision).
What the law should say is that Smut cannot be forced on those not desiring it, however they must also take common sense steps to avoid it on their own.
I am in complete agreement with that sentence and with the post you replied to.
It's worth noting that, I think, dada21 doesn't expect porn to be outlawed or decency standards to be established much further than the level of "household" or "small community." I think what's he's looking for is for that kind of law to disappear at the federal level, giving the states the freedom to decide it for themselves, and then to disappear at the state level, giving cities the freedom to decide it for themselves, and so on down the line until people are voluntarily living in small communities that are what they want (allow or do not allow porn) and people can freely move to the next town over if they are not happy with it.
Personally, I don't want to see any laws about this at any level. This is illegal in my household (for my children) period, and I don't want any help from meddlers who might not know all the subtle nuances of the standard I intend to enforce, nor do I want to impose my standard on other people.
Yeah, my comment here was that the person talking about this seems to define success as "being a good advertiser for Google," as opposed to "having a wildly successful forum," which would be closer to my definition of success.
The reason many websites make money on AdSense right now is because a user finds the site via a search engine, sees nothing they like and just wants to get away. Yet these eyesore sites sometimes don't offer a lot of exit links -- except for the ads. The user clicks the ad just to get out (instead of closing the browser window), which earns the site money.
Wow; that is so weird to me. I visit everything in a new tab. If I don't like it, I close the tab. I guess I do not understand the non-geek target market at all, lol.
How many geeks here have every clicked a relevant ad on slashdot?
Only thinkgeek ads, for junk I didn't need. (But which was, nevertheless, cool.) I miss 1999.
I've blocked slashdot ads for a while. Before I installed adblock, I routinely right-clicked and "block all images from this server"'ed any ads featuring nude or partially nude women. I don't look at women dressed sexily unless they are my wife. The rest of you can make fun of that all you want, but it's the way I live. So slashdot hit that filter around 2003, at which point I ceased seeing many of their ads (but not all, IIRC). Then when Drudge Report started trying to get around popup blocking I installed adblock and went nuclear with Filterset.G. I don't see ads any more.
I think there are some very good points here. I've always valued functionality over form and beauty. (I own ten year old cars, for example.)
But it's interesting to me that he defines success as making a lot of ad revenue. My websites do not exist to get me revenue. They exist to build communities. Somebody else might have yet another definition of success for his website. I think the general principles raised are true no matter what the purpose of your site is, but I find it interesting that some people don't see a point for their site other than "make a lot of money carrying Google ads." More power to them if they can ... it means they are providing something people want, financing it through advertizing, and making a bundle along the way. It's just not my purpose in having a website.
It is also the first step towards trying to teach it as if it wasn't actually religion when it is. Freedom doesn't give you any right to mislead.
Freedom means I can say whatever I want to say, and you can take it or leave it.
As for teaching children in the classroom, children are clearly not free if they are forced to be somewhere.
There are a few that are psycho fundamentalists, but only christians are putting crazies in the most powerful position on the planet.
If you'd actually read through the things I'd post, you'd see that I support eliminating that position.
This is documented in the Bible all the way up to the Kings (Known as chapters Kings I and Kings II).
The writings you are describing are known as books, not chapters, and they are known as I Kings (First Kings) and II Kings (Second Kings), not Kings I and Kings II.
that one simply has to take the word of experts
I tend to not take the word of experts on anything. Maybe it's just a genetic trait I have or something. But it's a very common theme in many aspects of my life. (Including religion ... I'm a member of a church that opposes the theology of just about every Protestant and Catholic religious body out there.)
Experts are often wrong. That doesn't mean we should assume they are wrong. But take the field of medicine, for example: for the most part, I think "alternative medicines" are hogwash. But every so often something comes along that completely shakes up known medicine. Nutritional recommendations seem to change daily, for example. Experts don't always know. Again, that's not cause for assuming them to be wrong. But I don't like to automatically ascribe anyone authority simply because some other authority ranks them "an expert in their field."