Would the believers kindly provide

[MrDoom]

After more than 6000 years, you've still to show one real piece of evidence that suggests that there is a supernatural entity.

Could any of you procure one morsel of proof that there is a God?

[Pow R. Toc H.]

There isnt any.

Period.

The End.

[freakazoid]

Good one The Crying Orc. He isn't talking to people that already don't belive in a God, he is talking to people like me, :P

MrDoom, Was there any specific reason you have put 6,000 years down? :)

[RNK]

I assumed he's used 6,000 arbitrarily as that's approximately how long ago the first records of human religion come from.

[freakazoid]

Also, In order to prove God I can't just bring out one thing that proves that God exists. Such as if God has spoken to me and telling you that. If I did that I still can't use that as proof, for you could say that it didn't happen or that I am just a crazy person. I also couldn't tell you stories from other people of there expirience with God, for you cvould say that it is either made up or that it wasn't really God. I also couldn't just show you video proof, if there was any, for you could just say that it is fake. I can't just call Him down, like Mussolini did as a joke challenging God to strike him down if he did exist to show that God didn't exist. No, I can't do those things. So what I have to do is show you many small things, things that by themselves would have no meaning but when together are powerfull. Its kind of like math, you have to start with the basics before you get to the more advanced stuff. Things from nature, past events, current events, and all sorts of things. All of which by themselves would seem to mean nothing but together mean something.
I will try to do this, but not right now I have school work that I have to finish and it is all due in about 10 hours and I still need to sleep, :( Stupid procrastination, :(

[ATG]

God doesnt exist but people have the right to believe in what ever they want

[VonClausewitz]

Could any of you procure one morsel of proof that there is a God?

See, now I'm neutral on the whole God/Gods bit, but I'd rather like to see one of you people pull up something that proves that there isn't a God. Slapping me with that whole burden of proof bit is just dodging the issue here, I'm merely curious if you can prove against a God, I'm not in it for some kind of point.

Also, the religious do not need to prove anything, they have their faith in what has happened, what will happen, and what needs to be done to get there. Rather similar to leftists really, and a lot of other social/political systems - it's mostly a matter of faith.

[MrDoom]

Also, In order to prove God I can't just bring out one thing that proves that God exists. Such as if God has spoken to me and telling you that. If I did that I still can't use that as proof, for you could say that it didn't happen or that I am just a crazy person. I also couldn't tell you stories from other people of there expirience with God, for you cvould say that it is either made up or that it wasn't really God. I also couldn't just show you video proof, if there was any, for you could just say that it is fake. I can't just call Him down, like Mussolini did as a joke challenging God to strike him down if he did exist to show that God didn't exist. No, I can't do those things.
Anecdotal "proof" isn't evidence, anyhow.


So what I have to do is show you many small things, things that by themselves would have no meaning but when together are powerfull. Its kind of like math, you have to start with the basics before you get to the more advanced stuff. Things from nature, past events, current events, and all sorts of things. All of which by themselves would seem to mean nothing but together mean something.
I can&#39;t wait. <_<


God doesnt exist but people have the right to believe in what ever they want
True. But that doesn&#39;t mean they can perform whatever behavior they want towards other people.


See, now I&#39;m neutral on the whole God/Gods bit, but I&#39;d rather like to see one of you people pull up something that proves that there isn&#39;t a God. Slapping me with that whole burden of proof bit is just dodging the issue here, I&#39;m merely curious if you can prove against a God, I&#39;m not in it for some kind of point.
It&#39;s not "dodging the issue", it&#39;s rational procedure in determining truth and falsehood within the universe.

The burden of proof is ALWAYS on the positive assertion. Otherwise, the very basis of what we know as fact breaks down and any statement could be taken as truth.


Also, the religious do not need to prove anything, they have their faith in what has happened, what will happen, and what needs to be done to get there. Rather similar to leftists really, and a lot of other social/political systems - it&#39;s mostly a matter of faith.
Tell the millions of people killed or otherwise drained of their social potential throughout history that it&#39;s "mostly a matter of faith". It&#39;s NOT just a matter of faith when it interferes with material science and public life.

[t_wolves_fan]

Such a pointless excercise.

There is no reason to prove God exists. People have spiritual needs and their version of God fills those needs. Right or wrong, they shouldn&#39;t be hassled nor should they hassle others.

And if you believe people don&#39;t have spiritual needs, well that&#39;s your opinion and nothing more. Last I checked, it&#39;s not up to you to determine that for other people.

It&#39;s like trying to prove you love someone. You can&#39;t do it. You can say you do and you can be nice to that person, but can you prove you love someone? No, you can&#39;t.

If everyone just chilled out when it came to this stuff, who knows how much better off we&#39;d be.

[Pow R. Toc H.]

Religion causes too many problems, but mainly it starts wars and divides people. Im pretty sure, however, that even if there wasnt any religion, people would still find things to start wars over and to divide people. Its irrelevant to challenge whether god exists because your not going to change peoples ideas or beliefs. Its called faith because there isnt any proof. Alot of people believe in a god because they have nothing else to believe in. They have a terminal disease, or they have an addiction, or they just lost a loved one. People find comfort in a belief in a higher power and they always will.

[Comrade J]

Originally posted by [email protected] 27, 2006 04:34 am
Good one The Crying Orc. He isn&#39;t talking to people that already don&#39;t belive in a God, he is talking to people like me, :P
Very very worrying. I honestly advise you to go and talk to your doctor.

[Blue Collar Bohemian]

The only thing that has ever really suggested the existence of a higher power to me is Quantum Physics. (I&#39;m serious)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DfPeprQ7oGc

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by Comrade J+November 27, 2006 05:12 pm--> (Comrade J @ November 27, 2006 05:12 pm)
[email protected] 27, 2006 04:34 am
Good one The Crying Orc. He isn&#39;t talking to people that already don&#39;t belive in a God, he is talking to people like me, :P
Very very worrying. I honestly advise you to go and talk to your doctor. [/b]
You realize that prayer, like other positive affirmations, has been shown by scientific study to improve and speed recovery from illness and surgery, right?

[LSD]

I hope you realize that you&#39;re never going to get a satisfactory answer to your challenge.

Religious people not only don&#39;t have proof, they don&#39;t want proof. Proof, like logic, is too "secular" for them. "Faith" is about blind belief, about explicitly rejecting the material in favour of the "spiritual".

We live in such consumerist times, however, that that kind of anti-materialism has become quite unprofitable.

Anyone with even a half-decent education these days is more than aware of just how ludicrous the notion of "God" and prayer are. Which is why, again, there are so few functional faithful around.

Oh sure, they might pray before a surgery ...or before the football game; but how many people really expect that "God" is going to intervene on their behalf?

No, what characterizes modern "faith" is not the pervasiveness of its ideal, but the marginality of an empty ritual.

Religion is dying, very slowly and very gradually, but it&#39;s dying all the same; the problem today is that the "God of the margins" still has a few tooth left. And while he can&#39;t burn witches or appoint kings like he used to, he can still lynch gay people ...and enslave half the women of the world.

And that&#39;s why we need to fight religion, not to deprive people of their "spiritual needs", but to stop them from imposing their "spirit" on the rights of others.

Social policy isn&#39;t about "belief", it&#39;s about actions.


See, now I&#39;m neutral on the whole God/Gods bit, but I&#39;d rather like to see one of you people pull up something that proves that there isn&#39;t a God.

That&#39;s not going to happen either. Proving a negative, especially so vague a negative as "God" is pretty much impossible.

That&#39;s not to say that certain aspects of religion can&#39;t be disproven. A good deal of Biblical "history" is well established to be crap. But so long as Christian apologists can keep redefining their "gospel", there&#39;s really no way to impeach the entire religion.

Nor, again, is there really a point. Religious people pride themselves in believing in the impossible. That contradition is at the heart of modern "faith". Religion today is definied by hypocrisy: having "faith" in the supernatural while relating only to the natural.

When someone&#39;s coming from that confused a mindstate, logic has very little meaning to them.


So what I have to do is show you many small things, things that by themselves would have no meaning but when together are powerfull.

What are you doing?

If you really believe in "God", then you don&#39;t care about "proof"; because if you really cared about proof you wouldn&#39;t believe in "God".

The actual physical evidence is quite definitive. Not only is there absolutely no evidence of a "supreme being", there&#39;s no need for a supreme being. Things make far more sense without one.

So, please, don&#39;t try to justify your "faith" with nonsense appeals to "meaning" or "powerful things". The truth is you believe because you always have believed, nothing more. And you probably only started believing because your parents did before you.

Again, that&#39;s the only way that religion persists: childhood indoctrination.


There is no reason to prove God exists.

Tell that to the Jehovas Witness who visited me the other day. He seemed pretty determined to prove just that.

If this were merely an academic issue, that would be one thing; but the question of "God" and religion and "faith" have definite political ramifications.


And if you believe people don&#39;t have spiritual needs, well that&#39;s your opinion and nothing more. Last I checked, it&#39;s not up to you to determine that for other people.

Of course not, which is why no one is suggesting locking up religious people.

But there is absolutely nothing wrong with having a religious discussion, even one which "offends" your "faith". And the way I see it, the more that is said against religion, the better for society in general.

If you think that this topic is pointless or "offensive", that&#39;s fine, no one&#39;s forcing you to post in it. But questioning the validity of an opinion is not the same thing as "determining" someone else&#39;s "needs".

In case you didn&#39;t notice, this is a discussion board, i.e., a place where we discuss things; political ones mostly, but all sorts. This happens to be the Religion forum so, surprise surprise, we discuss religion in it.

You seem to mainly post in this forum to complain that people are using it to discuss religion.

Talk about a "pointless excersize"... :rolleyes:


If everyone just chilled out when it came to this stuff, who knows how much better off we&#39;d be.

If everyone "chilled out" on this subject, religion would cease to exist.

For every atheist railing against religion, there are a hundred evangelicals touting the importance of their "message". Have no doubt, a moratorium on religion discussion would not be in the advantage of the "faithful".


You realize that prayer, like other positive affirmations, has been shown by scientific study to improve and speed recovery from illness and surgery, right?Y

Yeah, the placebo effect works. Not thtathat has anything to do with the subject at hand...

[t_wolves_fan]

Anyone with even a half-decent education these days is more than aware of just how ludicrous the notion of "God" and prayer are. Which is why, again, there are so few functional faithful around.

I have a friend who has graduate degrees from Harvard and the London School of Economics who is deeply religious.

Explain that for me.


Social policy isn&#39;t about "belief", it&#39;s about actions.

Social policy is about control and nothing else. Whether it&#39;s you banning religion or a fundy voting for a theocracy, there&#39;s no difference, you&#39;re both after control.



If everyone just chilled out when it came to this stuff, who knows how much better off we&#39;d be.

If everyone "chilled out" on this subject, religion would cease to exist.

Yes, there would be. I know you cannot fathom why everyone else is not as brilliant as you are, but the fact remains people would still find ways to answer questions that science cannot answer.


For every atheist railing against religion, there are a hundred evangelicals touting the importance of their "message". Have no doubt, a moratorium on religion discussion would not be in the advantage of the "faithful".

I was under the impression that "freedom" included the freedom to speak your mind, which theoretically ought to apply even to crazy evangelicals jehova&#39;s witnesses?

Or does it apply only to some and not to others? Only to those who&#39;ve accepted your brilliant guidance, perhaps?




You realize that prayer, like other positive affirmations, has been shown by scientific study to improve and speed recovery from illness and surgery, right?Y

Yeah, the placebo effect works. Not thtathat has anything to do with the subject at hand...

Yes it does: explain why it&#39;s up to you to determine how people take advantage of the placebo effect?

[Demogorgon]

I am an atheist, however as a student of philosophy, it does get on my nerves a bit to see people say that believers in God, do not care about proof. It is simply ridiculous to say they don&#39;t when you consider the countless attempts to come up with proofs of God. (Some of them are extremely good as well).

[LSD]

I have a friend who has graduate degrees from Harvard and the London School of Economics who is deeply religious.

Explain that for me.

Again, modern "faith" is all about hypocrisy.


Yes, there would be. I know you cannot fathom why everyone else is not as brilliant as you are, but the fact remains people would still find ways to answer questions that science cannot answer.

Perhaps, and philisophy is certainly not going anywhere. Hell, even the more austere religions like deism or certain forms of Buddhism might survive for a long time to come. But the more "grounded" religions, the doctrinal dogmatic organized "faiths" like Islam and Christianity ...they&#39;re already dying out.

I&#39;m not saying that it&#39;s going to happen tomorrow, but the writing&#39;s quite clearly on the wall.


I was under the impression that "freedom" included the freedom to speak your mind, which theoretically ought to apply even to crazy evangelicals jehova&#39;s witnesses?

Exactly right. Which is why, despite your insistance, no one is going to "chill out" on this topic.

You&#39;re the one trying to stiffle discussion here, not us. You&#39;re the one coming into a philisophical debate and declaring that its "pointless" and offensive and we shouldn&#39;t be having it.

Before you start accusing everyone else of suppressing free speech, you might want to take a loot at exactly what you&#39;re even doing posting in this "pointless" thread&#33;


explain why it&#39;s up to you to determine how people take advantage of the placebo effect?

It isn&#39;t and no one ever said it was.

You seem to be under the impression that someone here is arguing for a "ban" on religion. Well, no one is. This thread is about the concept of "God"; no one is proposing locking people up for believing in "him".

You&#39;re having an argument with yourself here, wofly, &#39;cause no one&#39;s defending the position you&#39;re attacking.

People can placebo themselves as much as they damn want to, it has absolutely nothing to do with the question of religion in general. It certainly doesn&#39;t speak to the issue of "God&#39;s" existance or lack thereof, which is what this thread is supposed to be about.

I get that you like to imagine all communist as bloodthirsty Stalinists foaming at the mouth to strip people of their rights, but for the hopefully last time, no one is arguing for a ban on religion&#33;

If you have nothing relevent to post, seriously, stop posting.


I am an atheist, however as a student of philosophy, it does get on my nerves a bit to see people say that believers in God, do not care about proof. It is simply ridiculous to say they don&#39;t when you consider the countless attempts to come up with proofs of God.

Those attempts are about marketing, nothing more. Evidence makes something easier to sell.

But "faith", by definition, is about believing without proof.

[t_wolves_fan]

I have a friend who has graduate degrees from Harvard and the London School of Economics who is deeply religious.

Explain that for me.

Again, modern "faith" is all about hypocrisy.

So you&#39;re changing your stance: faith is not about lack of education, it&#39;s about hypocrisy.

Can you learn the origin or meaning of life in a scientific environment, out of curiosity?


Perhaps, and philisophy is certainly not going anywhere. Hell, even the more austere religions like deism or certain forms of Buddhism might survive for a long time to come. But the more "grounded" religions, the doctrinal dogmatic organized "faiths" like Islam and Christianity ...they&#39;re already dying out.

Islam is dying out? You sure about that?



I was under the impression that "freedom" included the freedom to speak your mind, which theoretically ought to apply even to crazy evangelicals jehova&#39;s witnesses?

Exactly right. Which is why, despite your insistance, no one is going to "chill out" on this topic.

Chilling out is not about expressing opinion - it&#39;s about trying to enforce one&#39;s opionion or getting ones undies in a buch, as you do, when an opinion one doesn&#39;t like is expressed.


You&#39;re the one trying to stiffle discussion here, not us. You&#39;re the one coming into a philisophical debate and declaring that its "pointless" and offensive and we shouldn&#39;t be having it.

I don&#39;t take offense at anything that people say. What would be the point? Why get hot and bothered when it&#39;s patently obvious that everyone is not going to agree to be as brilliant as I am, or certainly never as brilliant and enlightened as you are? There&#39;s wisdom in knowing what I can change and what I cannot change.

I&#39;m not telling you that you cannot express your opinion about religion, and unlike you I&#39;d even allow you to express your opinion to children. Even your own children.

But then I guess I value freedom over enforcing my own brilliance, which is where we&#39;ll have to disagree.


People can placebo themselves as much as they damn want to, it has absolutely nothing to do with the question of religion in general. It certainly doesn&#39;t speak to the issue of "God&#39;s" existance or lack thereof, which is what this thread is supposed to be about.

Fair enough, I shall stick to the topic of the thread. For that I certainly deserve to be chastised.

Basically another poster already answered it though, faith is not about proof or evidence. Humanity is not a cold, value-less scientific experiment.

So, I guess, thread over.

[Demogorgon]

Originally posted by [email protected] 27, 2006 07:55 pm
Those attempts are about marketing, nothing more. Evidence makes something easier to sell.

But "faith", by definition, is about believing without proof.
All beief in God is based upon faith? The most cursory reading of philosophy disproes that. When Aristotle wrote about the "Prime Mover" I don&#39;t think that bore a great deal of relation to the beliefs in Zeus and co. going around in those days. When Kant demolished several of the arguments in favour of the existence of God it wasn&#39;t his own piety motivating him.

It&#39;s just a straw man to claim it is all based on faith. The average idiot watching Jerry Falliwell doubtless believes in faith over logic. That doesn&#39;t mean that all believers in God do that.

the problem which casual atheists have is they can&#39;t tell the difference between God and religion. To my mind for example Marx never actually disproved the existence of God, all he did was prove religion was a load of rubbish. Even if you were to accept every word Marx said there would be nothing inconsistent in saying "well sure religion is nonsense but I still believe something made the world". It is a lot harder to disprove some infinite being residing outside the universe than it is to disprove religion.

[t_wolves_fan]

I&#39;d like to ask believers in communism for one shred or morsel of proof that communism would work, exactly as you all describe.

Or, is it possible, that your belief in a theoretical system which has never been implemented is..a..get ready for it...act of faith?

[ichneumon]

After more than 6000 years, you&#39;ve still to show one real piece of evidence that suggests that there is a supernatural entity.

mindless semantics - if i had proof, it wouldn&#39;t be supernatural. if god appeared in a bolt of light, and some scientist trapped Him in a test tube and NMR&#39;d His ass, it would be a natural event. it&#39;s light trying to use a flashlight to point out darkness.

i challenge you: come up with a STATIC definition of "natural" that will include every observable phenomemon in the universe, existing today or that will ever be perceived. so that there will NEVER AGAIN be any surprises. separate the possible from the impossible. hmm.. still thinking? and once you make that distinction, you&#39;re stuck with it - if anything you declare "impossible" happens, you&#39;re SOL - God is possible, anything is possible, the supernatural is real.

[violencia.Proletariat]

Originally posted by [email protected] 27, 2006 04:31 pm
I&#39;d like to ask believers in communism for one shred or morsel of proof that communism would work, exactly as you all describe.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_anarc...1936_Revolution (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_anarchists#1936_Revolution)

[An archist]

Originally posted by t_wolves_fan+November 27, 2006 05:56 pm--> (t_wolves_fan @ November 27, 2006 05:56 pm)
Originally posted by Comrade [email protected] 27, 2006 05:12 pm

[email protected] 27, 2006 04:34 am
Good one The Crying Orc. He isn&#39;t talking to people that already don&#39;t belive in a God, he is talking to people like me, :P
Very very worrying. I honestly advise you to go and talk to your doctor.
You realize that prayer, like other positive affirmations, has been shown by scientific study to improve and speed recovery from illness and surgery, right? [/b]
uhhh, actually I saw a scientific study that showed it didn&#39;t make any difference.

[LSD]

All beief in God is based upon faith?

In a modern context, yes.

Thousands of years ago, there may have been attempts at semi-scientific studies of creation. But belief in the supernatural today requires a willfull disregard of logic and empiracism.

That&#39;s why, over the centuries, science and religion have become more and more seperated. Whereas in Aristotle&#39;s day there was room in physics for "prime movers" and other supernatural notions, these days there is not.

In the era of the scientific method, there is simply no evidence or need for a "God"; belief in one, therefore, can only be the result of "faith".

Now if you&#39;re religious, that&#39;s a "good thing". "Faith" is a "virtue" and a sign of ones devotion and "spirituality". For the rest of us, though, it&#39;s a rather disturbing trait, and one that tends to be disproportionately associated with prejudice and intolerance.

If people kept their "faith" to themselves, there woudln&#39;t be a problem; private thoughs affect no one but the person who thinks them. But the nature of "faith" is that it drives people to act upon it.

When "God" commands you to kill the fags, you kill the fags. And that&#39;s why the question of "God" and "faith" is politically relevent. Not because we have some sadistic desrire to "ban" freedom, but because dogmatic "faith" is a direct threat to millions and millions of people.


the problem which casual atheists have is they can&#39;t tell the difference between God and religion.

That&#39;s because "God" is religion. Not all religions include a "God" per se, but any conceptiion of "God" is by definition religious.

Religion, after all, is just a name for an organized system of faith. That includes Christianity and Islam, but in also includes less "traditional" religions like deism or "intelligent design".

Belief in an impersonal deistic "God" existing "outside the universe" may not fit into any traditional religious mod, but it&#39;s nonetheless religious. More importantly, it&#39;s nonetheless a conviction based on faith.

In the absense of any indication of a "God", the sole logical option is to disregard the concept; just as we disregard the concept of space-monkeys living on Venus.

Now, I agree that, politically speaking, that kind of deism is far less harmful than more dogmatic religions, but to claim that it isn&#39;t a form of religion is patently absurd.


Can you learn the origin or meaning of life in a scientific environment, out of curiosity?

Sure.


I&#39;d like to ask believers in communism for one shred or morsel of proof that communism would work, exactly as you all describe.

Or, is it possible, that your belief in a theoretical system which has never been implemented is..a..get ready for it...act of faith?

There&#39;s an immense difference between advocating a political system, even an historically unsuccessful one; and having "faith".

Laissez-faire capitalists also adhere to a political ideology that&#39;s failed every time its been implemented. But that alone does not make their politics bankrupt. In my opinion, there are other facts which do and we could go into all the reasons that I think that communism is still viable and libertarianism is not ...but that&#39;s not what this thread is about.

The point is, though, I have arguments. So do libertarians. Religious people however, by the nature of "faith", do not. Not only that, but their belief system is predicated on not having evidence, on rejecting the entire rationalist paradigm of empirical and logical argumentation.

Again, it&#39;s "faith" itself that&#39;s the problem here, not any one particular manifestation of it.

[Demogorgon]

Let&#39;s put it another way. How did the universe come into existence? A believer will tell you God made it. A non-believer that no God made it. The trouble is because anything a human can know is limited to what is inside the universe and that any god which may or may not exist is outside the universe, it is actually impossible to tell which is correct (if either).

To claim to know what is outside the universe (in your case nothing) is as bizzarre as claiming you know there is something outside it.

Of course as i said I am an atheist myself so I naturally claim there is nothing otside the universe. I do that because it is possible to explain the existence of the universe without a God making it. However at that point I am down to guesswork as to how it came about. So I certainly am not going to be silly enough to claim that my view is based on pure logic and the alternative on based on pure faith.

Of course we could be talking at cross purposes here. It al depends on your definition of God.

[LSD]

Let&#39;s put it another way. How did the universe come into existence? A believer will tell you God made it.

No actually a believer will tell you that his "God" made it.


To claim to know what is outside the universe (in your case nothing) is as bizzarre as claiming you know there is something outside it.

I claim that there aren&#39;t space monkeys on Venus. Does that makes me "as bizzarre" as someone who claims there are?

When no evidence exists for something, we must assume that it does not exist. That&#39;s a basic logical axiom.

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by [email protected] 27, 2006 09:40 pm
When no evidence exists for something, we must assume that it does not exist. That&#39;s a basic logical axiom.
And how often is it proven correct?

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by violencia.Proletariat+November 27, 2006 08:44 pm--> (violencia.Proletariat @ November 27, 2006 08:44 pm)
[email protected] 27, 2006 04:31 pm
I&#39;d like to ask believers in communism for one shred or morsel of proof that communism would work, exactly as you all describe.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_anarc...1936_Revolution (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_anarchists#1936_Revolution) [/b]
Wow, a whole 3 years of success.

Bravo.

:lol:

[LSD]

And how often is it proven correct?

All the time.

After all, most things that "could" be true, aren&#39;t. So, statistically speaking, a random conjecture is far more likely to be false than true.

Again I refer you to space monkeys on Venus.

[t_wolves_fan]

Can you learn the origin or meaning of life in a scientific environment, out of curiosity?

Sure.

Well then let&#39;s see the experiment that proved the meaning of life. I bet it was a doozy.



I&#39;d like to ask believers in communism for one shred or morsel of proof that communism would work, exactly as you all describe.

Or, is it possible, that your belief in a theoretical system which has never been implemented is..a..get ready for it...act of faith?

There&#39;s an immense difference between advocating a political system, even an historically unsuccessful one; and having "faith".

Of course there is...it&#39;s always different "when we do it".

Funny how that works, isn&#39;t it?



Laissez-faire capitalists also adhere to a political ideology that&#39;s failed every time its been implemented. But that alone does not make their politics bankrupt. In my opinion, there are other facts which do and we could go into all the reasons that I think that communism is still viable and libertarianism is not ...but that&#39;s not what this thread is about.

Sure it is - your base point is that if there is no concrete evidence for it, it&#39;s absurd to think it exists (or in communism&#39;s case, will work).

There is no concrete evidence that communism can work, therefore to be intellectually honest you must assume that it cannot work.

Oh but I forget how that&#39;s different.



The point is, though, I have arguments. So do libertarians. Religious people however, by the nature of "faith", do not.

Sure they do, you just don&#39;t accept them.

I realize that your brilliance and enlightenment put you in a position to decide what constitutes an argument and what does not on behalf of other people, but unfortunately the rest of the world does not.


Not only that, but their belief system is predicated on not having evidence, on rejecting the entire rationalist paradigm of empirical and logical argumentation.

So is yours - every time your pet theory has been tried, it&#39;s failed spectacularly. I&#39;d call that empirical evidence that you choose to ignore, sport.


Again, it&#39;s "faith" itself that&#39;s the problem here, not any one particular manifestation of it.

Right, except when it&#39;s your faith in your ideology or pet theory.

That&#39;s different.

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by [email protected] 27, 2006 09:48 pm

And how often is it proven correct?

All the time.

After all, most things that "could" be true, aren&#39;t. So, statistically speaking, a random conjecture is far more likely to be false than true.

Again I refer you to space monkeys on Venus.
Or say the existence of atoms or life in the deepest trenches of the ocean.

I guess because the chances of their existence at one point were statistically improbable, they don&#39;t exist and the statistical improbability itself was the proof.

Have you ever even taken a stats course, out of curiosity?

[luxemburg89]

To those who say we athiests must prove God doesnt exist. You have to prove something does exist, not the other way round. If we are right, that God doesn&#39;t exist how can we prove that if he doesnt exist. There is no proof in that case. However it seems there is no proof he does exist - none at all. Seeing as no one can prove it either way. Proof can only exist if God itself exists. If you can find no proof he does, and we can find no proof he doesnt (which we obviously can&#39;t if he doesnt) then he doesnt exist.

Sorry if that&#39;s confusing it made sense in my head

[t_wolves_fan]

To those who say we athiests must prove God doesnt exist. You have to prove something does exist, not the other way round. If we are right, that God doesn&#39;t exist how can we prove that if he doesnt exist. There is no proof in that case. However it seems there is no proof he does exist - none at all. Seeing as no one can prove it either way. Proof can only exist if God itself exists. If you can find no proof he does, and we can find no proof he doesnt (which we obviously can&#39;t if he doesnt) then he doesnt exist.

Agreed. The problem is, for the faithful, proof is not a requirement.


Sorry if that&#39;s confusing it made sense in my head

:lol:

I thought that as I read it.

[LSD]

Sure it is - your base point is that if there is no concrete evidence for it, it&#39;s absurd to think it exists

No, my "base point" is that if there&#39;s no concrete evidence or logical argument for something, its absurd to think it exists.

Besides, communism doesn&#39;t exist. And it would be absurd to say that it did.

As to whether or not it could exist, that&#39;s a seperate question and a far more complex one. Communism is nothing more than a structure of human society. Since it doesn&#39;t violate any physical prohibitions that we know of, there&#39;s no question that communism could happen, the only question is of probability.

Obviously I think that it has a higher chance of manifesting than you do.

But that conviction is based on my analysis of socioeconomic and historical factors, not "faith". More importantly, I am more than willing to debate by convictions and am prepared to back them up when challenged.

If it were "faith", I would feel no need to provide argumentation. I would just "know".


There is no concrete evidence that communism can work

Sure there is, you just disagree with it. Just like I disagree with the arguments that libertarianism can work.

But in both cases, there are arguments to be made.

What arguments exist for the Bible?


Sure they do, you just don&#39;t accept them.

They have a paradigm, sure, but they don&#39;t have logical arguments. Again, "faith" by its nature rejects the entire notion of materialism so it can&#39;t have a logical basis.

Do you really not see the difference between believing in the Bible and believing in libertarianism? Personally, I don&#39;t think that either are a particularly good idea, but I&#39;m not so naive as to not recognize that they&#39;re two entirely different animals.


every time your pet theory has been tried, it&#39;s failed spectacularly. I&#39;d call that empirical evidence that you choose to ignore, sport.

Except that no one&#39;s ignoring those failures. Like with any other political theory, we study and learn from them.

Lots of political models have failed at one time or another, "faith" is about more than that, though; it&#39;s about not caring what the real world says.

When the French revolutionaries overthrew the monarchy, were they operating on "faith"? I don&#39;t think so. I think they were operating on ideals, many of which were untested. But if you&#39;re going to label any unproven theory to be "faith", then we&#39;re talking at cross-purposes here because that is not what I mean by the word.

"Faith" is not adhering to ideals that have not yet found concerete manifestation -- that describes every politifcal theory at one time or another. No, "faith" is about believing in something without any justification at all; believing for the sake of believing itself.


Or say the existence of atoms or life in the deepest trenches of the ocean.

Until those were demonstrated to exist, they were indeed assumed not to. Just like we must do with "God".

Thank you for proving my point.

[violencia.Proletariat]

Originally posted by t_wolves_fan+November 27, 2006 05:45 pm--> (t_wolves_fan @ November 27, 2006 05:45 pm)
Originally posted by [email protected] 27, 2006 08:44 pm

[email protected] 27, 2006 04:31 pm
I&#39;d like to ask believers in communism for one shred or morsel of proof that communism would work, exactly as you all describe.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_anarc...1936_Revolution (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_anarchists#1936_Revolution)
Wow, a whole 3 years of success.

Bravo.

:lol: [/b]
It didn&#39;t last longer because it didnt work but because they did not have the means to keep the revolution going. The fascist powers heavily out gunned the people. Franco had the backing of Mussolini and Hitler. However, these were not the only reasons. There were many mistakes made and lessons to be learned.

I know you don&#39;t think this is significant, but do you not believe in human nature? If so is this not a direct contradiction to that theory? If it is our nature to compete/kill/whatever why did it last 3 years? There was no government repression that kept the revolution going, the people wanted it.

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by [email protected] 27, 2006 10:15 pm
It didn&#39;t last longer because it didnt work but because they did not have the means to keep the revolution going.
Right, it failed.

You can justify it and explain why it failed all you like. The simple fact is that it is not around any longer, therefore it was not successful.

It&#39;s not like I&#39;m making this stuff up, sport.

[violencia.Proletariat]

Originally posted by t_wolves_fan+November 27, 2006 06:38 pm--> (t_wolves_fan @ November 27, 2006 06:38 pm)
[email protected] 27, 2006 10:15 pm
It didn&#39;t last longer because it didnt work but because they did not have the means to keep the revolution going.
Right, it failed.

You can justify it and explain why it failed all you like. The simple fact is that it is not around any longer, therefore it was not successful.

It&#39;s not like I&#39;m making this stuff up, sport. [/b]
Yes it failed, but it did not fail for reasons you think communism cannot be succesful. It did not fail because the workers could not run production collectively(which they obviously did, very well at that). My point is that socialism has worked in the past, you can&#39;t deny this.

[Demogorgon]

Originally posted by [email protected] 27, 2006 09:40 pm

Let&#39;s put it another way. How did the universe come into existence? A believer will tell you God made it.

No actually a believer will tell you that his "God" made it.


To claim to know what is outside the universe (in your case nothing) is as bizzarre as claiming you know there is something outside it.

I claim that there aren&#39;t space monkeys on Venus. Does that makes me "as bizzarre" as someone who claims there are?

When no evidence exists for something, we must assume that it does not exist. That&#39;s a basic logical axiom.
Let&#39;s try again. According to you, how come a universe exists?

[LSD]

I have no idea.

[Demogorgon]

Originally posted by [email protected] 27, 2006 10:50 pm
I have no idea.
Fair enough, good answer. However I take it you agree that it must have come about some way or another?

The difficulty is that there is no way of knowing how it came about. What I am trying to say is that saying something that fits under the definition of God triggered it is no more absurd than saying something else did. We simply have no way of knowing. Personally I find it far more likely no God involved itself in the process but you could call that "faith in there not being a God" by your definition.

[RevMARKSman]

Originally posted by [email protected] 26, 2006 11:01 pm
After more than 6000 years, you&#39;ve still to show one real piece of evidence that suggests that there is a supernatural entity.

Could any of you procure one morsel of proof that there is a God?
Ooo&#33; Ooo&#33; I know this one&#33;

...God&#39;s Creation, which can be seen all around us and is the epitome of order, justice, and organization that He obviously intended it to be.

[MrDoom]

Originally posted by MonicaTTmed+November 28, 2006 12:05 am--> (MonicaTTmed @ November 28, 2006 12:05 am)
[email protected] 26, 2006 11:01 pm
After more than 6000 years, you&#39;ve still to show one real piece of evidence that suggests that there is a supernatural entity.

Could any of you procure one morsel of proof that there is a God?
Ooo&#33; Ooo&#33; I know this one&#33;

...God&#39;s Creation, which can be seen all around us and is the epitome of order, justice, and organization that He obviously intended it to be. [/b]
SAVE ME NOW, ZOMBIE JESUS&#33;

&#092;o/

[dogwoodlover]

I just wanted to comment that there need be no burden of proof on faith-based religion (that includes Christianity, Catholicism, Islam, Judaism), because it is in no way rooted in any kind of science, it is merely a belief in something beyond what we know (including science).


"faith: belief that is not based on proof" (dictionary.com)


So it gets back to the old question of faith vs. science.

[Blue Collar Bohemian]

I still think the double slit experiment of Quantum Physics is the most convincing evidence of the existence of a higher power.

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by [email protected] 27, 2006 10:50 pm
I have no idea.
You said in another post that science has conclusively determined the answer.

So make with the answer, Jeeves.

[ichneumon]

I still think the double slit experiment of Quantum Physics is the most convincing evidence of the existence of a higher power.

he has a point - it may be that an omniscient obverser must exist to make the universe function as it does. it is certainly the case that observation has an effect on the universe - there is no other word for that experiment than "magic".

[freakazoid]

I can&#39;t wait.

:D


Very very worrying. I honestly advise you to go and talk to your doctor.

What is worrying?


What are you doing?

If you really believe in "God", then you don&#39;t care about "proof"; because if you really cared about proof you wouldn&#39;t believe in "God".

Why does it bother you so much? Is it perhaps becuase you could be wrong? That perhaps I might show that there is a God?



So, please, don&#39;t try to justify your "faith" with nonsense appeals to "meaning" or "powerful things". The truth is you believe because you always have believed, nothing more. And you probably only started believing because your parents did before you.

Again, that&#39;s the only way that religion persists: childhood indoctrination.

So everyone who believes in a God only believes because there parents told them so? That is rather absurd. What about the people who didn&#39;t believe in God and then later in there life became to believe in Him?


Of course not, which is why no one is suggesting locking up religious people.

REALLY&#33;&#33; Perhaps you should read that sticky on how many people believe in a God. Some have shown that they think that anyone that believes in a God should be locked up and some have said that anybody who publicly talks about a God should be locked up, like MrDoom believes.

[MrDoom]

I do not want people to be locked up for their beliefs.

I want people to be locked up for their actions.

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by [email protected] 28, 2006 07:00 pm
I do not want people to be locked up for their beliefs.

I want people to be locked up for their actions.
What religion-related actions would qualify for jail time in Mr. Doomland?

[MrDoom]

Building churches on public land with public material.

Preaching in public.

Indoctrinating children into religion.

[freakazoid]

I do not want people to be locked up for their beliefs.

I want people to be locked up for their actions.

Didn&#39;t you say that public speaking of religion should be banned? What would happen to someone who does it anyways?


Also did you guys know that Max Planck, one of the guys who started Quantum Mechanics also believed in a God? http://www.adherents.com/people/pp/Max_Planck.html

[MrDoom]

Didn&#39;t you say that public speaking of religion should be banned?
Yes.


What would happen to someone who does it anyways?
Community service. Banishment from the public if neccessary.


Also did you guys know that Max Planck, one of the guys who started Quantum Mechanics also believed in a God?
So? He was wrong about there being is God. What does that have to do with anything?

[t_wolves_fan]

Building churches on public land with public material.

So people do not have ownership of anything, you&#39;re actually in charge.


Preaching in public.

So freedom of speech and expression is repressed.


Indoctrinating children into religion.

So parents have no right to instill any values without your approval.



Sounds like freedom to me ace. Sign me up and send me to the rice paddies in a bland green outfit.

[freakazoid]

Yes.
Community service. Banishment from the public if neccessary.

See, LSD was wrong about people not wanting to lock people up.


So? He was wrong about there being is God. What does that have to do with anything?

That was in response to LSD that "educated" people don&#39;t believe in God.

[freakazoid]

Sounds like freedom to me ace. Sign me up and send me to the rice paddies in a bland green outfit.

I like green, and rice, :P

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by [email protected] 28, 2006 07:29 pm

Sounds like freedom to me ace. Sign me up and send me to the rice paddies in a bland green outfit.

I like green, and rice, :P
You&#39;d better, if Doom is in charge.

:D

[freakazoid]

lol, I feel dirty for agreeing with t_wolves_fan.

[MrDoom]

So people do not have ownership of anything, you&#39;re actually in charge.
I&#39;m not in charge, no.

Let&#39;s say that a group of Christians get together in a barren field miles from civilization (or, for fun: a tiny uninhabited island in the middle of the Pacific) and build a church. The church would have to be discovered by the rest of society, and demolished as soon as possible. The Christians would have to be punished. Why?

Because any sort of building requires land and materials. Foremost, they built the church on public land. And where did the building materials come from? They certainly weren&#39;t appropriated by a worker&#39;s council. They were likely stolen.

Then, where did the transportation trucks and construction vehicles come from? Or the utilities, where are they being drawn from? Embezzled from public stockpiles and source, no doubt.

Stealing from the public is wrong.


So freedom of speech and expression is repressed.
You can&#39;t shout "Fire&#33;" in a theatre for nothing.


So parents have no right to instill any values without your approval.
My approval? Where are you getting this from?

Besides the raising of children becoming a communally-oriented endeavor, parents don&#39;t have the right to abuse their children by raising them to believe in lies about the material reality.


Sounds like freedom to me ace. Sign me up and send me to the rice paddies in a bland green outfit.
I want freedom from religion.

[freakazoid]

Because any sort of building requires land and materials. Foremost, they built the church on public land. And where did the building materials come from? They certainly weren&#39;t appropriated by a worker&#39;s council. They were likely stolen.

You know you can make your own tools.


Then, where did the transportation trucks and construction vehicles come from? Or the utilities, where are they being drawn from? Embezzled from public stockpiles and source, no doubt.

What do you need vehicles for to create a building?


You can&#39;t shout "Fire&#33;" in a theatre for nothing.

Long live anarchy&#33;

[MrDoom]

Because any sort of building requires land and materials. Foremost, they built the church on public land. And where did the building materials come from? They certainly weren&#39;t appropriated by a worker&#39;s council. They were likely stolen.

You know you can make your own tools.
Where did the materials used to craft the tools come from?



Then, where did the transportation trucks and construction vehicles come from? Or the utilities, where are they being drawn from? Embezzled from public stockpiles and source, no doubt.

What do you need vehicles for to create a building?
Well, any building worthy of standing requires strong, heavy materials that require special vehicles for both transportation as well as application.



You can&#39;t shout "Fire&#33;" in a theatre for nothing.

Long live anarchy&#33;
Anarchy isn&#39;t doing "what you want, when you want" without organization, government, or social laws. Anarchy is voluntary association, free from the State.

[freakazoid]

Where did the materials used to craft the tools come from?

You already have them. You don&#39;t need special fancy tools to build things. You don&#39;t need electricity. I believe in living a simple life.


Well, any building worthy of standing requires strong, heavy materials that require special vehicles for both transportation as well as application.

Really&#33;? I didn&#39;t know Native Americans had vehicles, or even needed vehicles to construct their buildings.

Anarchy isn&#39;t doing "what you want, when you want" without organization, government, or social laws. Anarchy is voluntary association, free from the State.

I know this.

[Comrade J]

Originally posted by [email protected] 28, 2006 07:45 pm

Then, where did the transportation trucks and construction vehicles come from? Or the utilities, where are they being drawn from? Embezzled from public stockpiles and source, no doubt.

What do you need vehicles for to create a building?
Most ridiculous question ever.

[freakazoid]

Most ridiculous question ever.

Explaine.

[t_wolves_fan]

So people do not have ownership of anything, you&#39;re actually in charge.
I&#39;m not in charge, no.

Then how do you assume your interests will be implemented? Do you simply hope that society one day magically agrees with you?


Let&#39;s say that a group of Christians get together in a barren field miles from civilization (or, for fun: a tiny uninhabited island in the middle of the Pacific) and build a church. The church would have to be discovered by the rest of society, and demolished as soon as possible. The Christians would have to be punished. Why?

Who sets this policy and who implements the punishment?


Because any sort of building requires land and materials. Foremost, they built the church on public land. And where did the building materials come from? They certainly weren&#39;t appropriated by a worker&#39;s council. They were likely stolen.

If it&#39;s a barren desert or a remote island, chances are society doesn&#39;t even know the church exists and that the church was built with local resources (i.e. not stolen from the commune). This being the case, what gives you or the commune the authority to demolish it?

What if a worker&#39;s council does vote to provide the building materials? Do you plan to stop it?


Then, where did the transportation trucks and construction vehicles come from? Or the utilities, where are they being drawn from? Embezzled from public stockpiles and source, no doubt.

Stealing from the public is wrong.

Again, what if it wasn&#39;t stolen from the public?



So freedom of speech and expression is repressed.
You can&#39;t shout "Fire&#33;" in a theatre for nothing.

So you believe there should be as many restrictions on speech as possible, is that your argument? Instead of limiting restrictions to only those instances which have a clear and immediate impact, you seek to expand restrictions (though you&#39;re not in charge, so I have to ask again how these restrictions come about) to further your goals, is that right?



So parents have no right to instill any values without your approval.
My approval? Where are you getting this from?

You said you wouldn&#39;t allow parents to instill religious values in their children, this suggests any values imparted in children would have to meet with some kind of approval.


Besides the raising of children becoming a communally-oriented endeavor,

How do you envision this coming about, out of curiosity?

Be specific. Step-by-step plan for how we get from where we are now to there.


parents don&#39;t have the right to abuse their children by raising them to believe in lies about the material reality.

Being that God can be neither proven nor disproven, you have only your opinion to back up your assertion that religious values are lies.

So again, why is your opinion enforced on others?


I want freedom from religion.

So because you demand freedom from something, nobody else is allowed to express their opinion.

Again, who put you in charge?

Do you understand that freedom from differing opinions is impossible to implement without authoritarian measures?

[MrDoom]

So people do not have ownership of anything, you&#39;re actually in charge.
I&#39;m not in charge, no.

Then how do you assume your interests will be implemented? Do you simply hope that society one day magically agrees with you?
If they&#39;ve already overthrown the capitalists, the majority already does.



Let&#39;s say that a group of Christians get together in a barren field miles from civilization (or, for fun: a tiny uninhabited island in the middle of the Pacific) and build a church. The church would have to be discovered by the rest of society, and demolished as soon as possible. The Christians would have to be punished. Why?

Who sets this policy and who implements the punishment?

The soviet workers.



Because any sort of building requires land and materials. Foremost, they built the church on public land. And where did the building materials come from? They certainly weren&#39;t appropriated by a worker&#39;s council. They were likely stolen.

If it&#39;s a barren desert or a remote island, chances are society doesn&#39;t even know the church exists and that the church was built with local resources (i.e. not stolen from the commune). This being the case, what gives you or the commune the authority to demolish it?
"Local resources" are still public property. Virtually anything on the face of the globe that isn&#39;t being lived on is public property.

And again, the workers have demolition authority.


What if a worker&#39;s council does vote to provide the building materials? Do you plan to stop it?
If they are already in a socialist phase, why would they allow embezzlement?



Then, where did the transportation trucks and construction vehicles come from? Or the utilities, where are they being drawn from? Embezzled from public stockpiles and source, no doubt.

Stealing from the public is wrong.

Again, what if it wasn&#39;t stolen from the public?
Well, who else owned the land, then?




So freedom of speech and expression is repressed.
You can&#39;t shout "Fire&#33;" in a theatre for nothing.

So you believe there should be as many restrictions on speech as possible, is that your argument? Instead of limiting restrictions to only those instances which have a clear and immediate impact, you seek to expand restrictions (though you&#39;re not in charge, so I have to ask again how these restrictions come about) to further your goals, is that right?
Religious totalitarianism is a clear danger.




So parents have no right to instill any values without your approval.
My approval? Where are you getting this from?

You said you wouldn&#39;t allow parents to instill religious values in their children, this suggests any values imparted in children would have to meet with some kind of approval.
Values associated with religion can exist independent of it.



Besides the raising of children becoming a communally-oriented endeavor,

How do you envision this coming about, out of curiosity?

Be specific. Step-by-step plan for how we get from where we are now to there.
Building public centers for the raising of children would be in order.

From there, it&#39;s not difficult to imagine the social climate required.



parents don&#39;t have the right to abuse their children by raising them to believe in lies about the material reality.

Being that God can be neither proven nor disproven, you have only your opinion to back up your assertion that religious values are lies.
There is no evidence that a God exists. For all intents and purposes, until positive proof is brought about, it should be regarded as false.


So again, why is your opinion enforced on others?
Because it is not opinion. As far as rationality is concerned, it is fact.


So because you demand freedom from something, nobody else is allowed to express their opinion.

Again, who put you in charge?

Do you understand that freedom from differing opinions is impossible to implement without authoritarian measures?
Again, I do not care about changing opinions. I care about stopping certain actions, such as the threat posed by religion.

[t_wolves_fan]

If they&#39;ve already overthrown the capitalists, the majority already does.

So the minority is at the mercy, indeed they are slaves to, the majority when it comes to expression of opinion.

That is freedom?


"Local resources" are still public property. Virtually anything on the face of the globe that isn&#39;t being lived on is public property.

What if a band of your merry marauders happened upon a small religious commune that was previously undiscovered...are they to be anihilated like the Spanish did to the native Central and South Americans?


And again, the workers have demolition authority.

So in Doomland, if you are minding your own business or you say something that people don&#39;t like, they can take a vote and demolish your home or your church.

That about it?


Religious totalitarianism is a clear danger.

Only to your hopes of implementing your vision of society, so repressing others&#39; opinions really is about power to you, isn&#39;t it.




Besides the raising of children becoming a communally-oriented endeavor,

How do you envision this coming about, out of curiosity?

Be specific. Step-by-step plan for how we get from where we are now to there.
Building public centers for the raising of children would be in order.

From there, it&#39;s not difficult to imagine the social climate required.

No, more detail.

Explain specifically how the transition is made, and how it is enforced onto those who don&#39;t want to go along.

Be specific.


There is no evidence that a God exists. For all intents and purposes, until positive proof is brought about, it should be regarded as false.

If you do not know if something is true or not, you need to be able to find out, don&#39;t you?

Wouldn&#39;t your system preclude us from finding out?



So again, why is your opinion enforced on others?
Because it is not opinion.

Yes it is.


As far as rationality is concerned, it is fact.

Belief in God can be rational.

You do not have a license on either logic or rationality - what is rational or logical to you is not to others. Therefore you cannot accurately claim to be correct, you are merely enforcing your opinion.

I bet you understand this, which is why you&#39;re purposefully obtuse.


Again, I do not care about changing opinions. I care about stopping certain actions, such as the threat posed by religion.

Of course you care about changing opinions - that is why you would expressly prohibit the expression of an opinion. Your attempts to deflect that basic truth are transparent, pointless, and pathetic.

So again, until you finally answer, why do you get to decide what people believe and what they express? Are people free if you&#39;ve decided this for them?

You know the answer don&#39;t you.

Fortunately, the extremely low probability of your vision coming true makes watching you justify your desire to control others quite entertaining.

[LSD]

You said in another post that science has conclusively determined the answer.

No, actually I said that science was capable of producing that answer. I don&#39;t believe that it has done so yet. Or if it has, I haven&#39;t been made aware of it.

My knowledge of theoretical physics is rather rudimentary anyway, so even if the answer had been determined, I probably wouldn&#39;t understand it.


So everyone who believes in a God only believes because there parents told them so?

Not everyone, but probably around 90%.

There&#39;s a reason, after all, that no one worships Zeus anymore. The texts are still around for anyone to read, but without childhood indoctrination, no one&#39;s buying into it anymore.

The same thing will eventually happen with Christianity and the rest.


Some have shown that they think that anyone that believes in a God should be locked up and some have said that anybody who publicly talks about a God should be locked up, like MrDoom believes.

That&#39;s unfortunate.

Obviously I didn&#39;t count on the naivite of some of the posters on this board. In the future, therefore, I will only speak for myself.

I am not proposing locking up religious people for what they believe or say and neither is anyone else who agrees with me.

As for MrDoom, all I can say is that he&#39;s probably still young and he&#39;s certainly still learning. I&#39;m sure in a few years he&#39;ll grow out of this "redstar" angry atheist phase.

[freakazoid]

As for MrDoom, all I can say is that he&#39;s probably still young and he&#39;s certainly still learning. I&#39;m sure in a few years he&#39;ll grow out of this "redstar" angry atheist phase.

And hopefully the athiest part as well, :)

[t_wolves_fan]

No, actually I said that science was capable of producing that answer. I don&#39;t believe that it has done so yet. Or if it has, I haven&#39;t been made aware of it.

Prove it can be done.

I&#39;d hate to label you a hypocrite LSD, and as you&#39;ve proclaimed repeatedly if affirmative proof is not available it must be assumed to be false.

Since you proclaim science to be the answer, and since only that which has been proven true can be assumed to be true, I can only assume you&#39;ll make with the proof post haste.


There&#39;s a reason, after all, that no one worships Zeus anymore. The texts are still around for anyone to read, but without childhood indoctrination, no one&#39;s buying into it anymore.

But if 90% of people go on believing in the religion of their parents, and all those Greeks presumably had parents....

what happened?

Did 90% of Greek parents die at the same time?


The same thing will eventually happen with Christianity and the rest.

Probably.

[LSD]

Prove it can be done.

I&#39;d hate to label you a hypocrite LSD, and as you&#39;ve proclaimed repeatedly if affirmative proof is not available it must be assumed to be false.

Again, what I said was that if empircal proof or logical argumentation are not present, the conjecture in question must be assumed to be false.

There isn&#39;t any empircal proof of, say, string theory, but that doesn&#39;t mean that it must be assumed to be false. Things like klingons on the moon, however, don&#39;t just not have proof, they don&#39;t have any logic behind them, so yes, we must assume that they are false.

On the issue of the beginning of the universe, I honestly don&#39;t know if we&#39;ll ever be able to determine exactly what instigated it or the exact nature of how it started, but yes, it&#39;s my opinion that based on previous successes and considering the wealth of information, science will eventually be capable of telling us most if not all the relevent details related to that event.

Again, though, that&#39;s an opinion and a hypothetical one at that.

There is a significant difference between questions of "what might happen someday" (like the one you&#39;re asking) and questions of what exists right now (like the "God" one).

For instance, I suppose it&#39;s possible that someday there might be invisible rabbits on Mars. I can&#39;t think of specific events that would lead to that outcome, but it&#39;s possible.

At present, however, I can say with near perfect certainty that there are not invisible rabbits on Mars. And, more importantly, I can say that basic logic requires that, pending any indication to the contrary, either empircal or logical, we assume that Mars is currently devoid of invisible rabbits.

And unless I&#39;m talking to a psychotic, I&#39;m pretty sure that you share that assumption.


But if 90% of people go on believing in the religion of their parents, and all those Greeks presumably had parents....

what happened?

Conversion at the edge of a sword.

So instead of spreading the religion of their parents, they spread the religion of their rullers.

Regardless though, the cycle of dogma through parenting continued unabated

[dogwoodlover]

The only factor that is perpetuating this argument is opinion.

The type of society you seem to be arguing for is one rooted in intellectual elitism and absolute truths, MrDoom. You believe that you are right, and thus, those who disagree must be silenced, because they have a different opinion and are therefore wrong (you communists certainly think alike). Parents can indoctrinate their kids with any kind of ideas, be it theism, deism, atheism, nontheism, polytheism, or whatever else kind of "ism" you can conjure up. The basis for your argument is that your way of thinking has a monopoly on truth, and the logical conclusion is that any other ideas are simply invalid and "bad". Whether you believe in science or faith, you clearly do not grasp anarchism because you lack advocacy of one of its most basic foundations, that being liberty.

[MrDoom]

The type of society you seem to be arguing for is one rooted in intellectual elitism and absolute truths, MrDoom.
What other kinds of truth are there besides "absolute truth"? A statement that is "true" in itself implies absolute truth/falsehood. A statement (as in an absolute dichotomy, or anything else regarding a material observation [meaning, not "one color is better than another"]) is either true, or it is false. Either there is a god, or there isn&#39;t. There is no grey area.


You believe that you are right, and thus, those who disagree must be silenced, because they have a different opinion and are therefore wrong (you communists certainly think alike).
I am (for all intents and purposes) right; until proven false by evidence of a God.


Parents can indoctrinate their kids with any kind of ideas, be it theism, deism, atheism, nontheism, polytheism, or whatever else kind of "ism" you can conjure up.
True, however, "indoctrinating" material fact does not hamper one&#39;s ability to see the material universe.

EDIT: This is assuming of course, that your sentence means "indoctrination can be applied to any outlook", rather than, "parents have the right to indoctrinate their children into anything they wish".


The basis for your argument is that your way of thinking has a monopoly on truth, and the logical conclusion is that any other ideas are simply invalid and "bad".
Religion is invalid as a logical outlook.


Whether you believe in science or faith,
Science is not a religion, you do not "believe" or have "faith" in it; you recognize it as fact proven by evidence.


you clearly do not grasp anarchism because you lack advocacy of one of its most basic foundations, that being liberty.
Good thing that I am not an anarchist. :rolleyes:

However, would you please define "liberty"? Especially after hearing the right-wing cappie "libertarians" spew the word left and right, I&#39;d like to hear the meaning of the word.

[dogwoodlover]

Originally posted by http://www.dictionary.com
Liberty: freedom from control, interference, obligation, restriction, hampering conditions, etc.; power or right of doing, thinking, speaking, etc., according to choice.

[freakazoid]

MrDoom - Also on the needing special vehicles and such for creating a building. I sure hope that you are never stranded out in the wild. Or in a TEOTWAWKI event that you are with someone who actually knows how to survive. Excuse my language but, you would be screwed.

[t_wolves_fan]

LSD,

With regard to the beginning of your post, I&#39;m glad that you agree it&#39;s pretty much all your opinion.

I hope you understand that all your logical explanations of why God probably does not exist still do not grant you justifiable authority to determine for others that they should not believe in God and should not express that belief in public. But on that I guess we&#39;ll agree to disagree.


Originally posted by LSD
Regardless though, the cycle of dogma through parenting continued unabated

Right, you&#39;d just replace it with your communist dogma no differently than they did.

[BurnTheOliveTree]

Right, you&#39;d just replace it with your communist dogma no differently than they did.

If we&#39;re dogmatic, why do we disagree such a hell of a lot? One of our basic principles is to question absolutely everything, all the time, including communism.

-Alex

[jasmine]

Does anyone have a video recording of the big bang? Or maybe even a photo? :ph34r:

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by [email protected] 30, 2006 06:05 pm
Right, you&#39;d just replace it with your communist dogma no differently than they did.

If we&#39;re dogmatic, why do we disagree such a hell of a lot? One of our basic principles is to question absolutely everything, all the time, including communism.

-Alex
Christians disagree with one another as well.

No difference at all.

[BurnTheOliveTree]

For the most part they don&#39;t touch certain things though, i.e. Jesus was son of God, biblical morality is the only proper morality, etc. Nothing is sacred in communism, everything is up for criticism.

-Alex

[BurnTheOliveTree]

Does anyone have a video recording of the big bang? Or maybe even a photo?

For you, Jasmine. (http://www.theempire.com.au/images/2005-11-11/Family%20Guy%20Total%20Idiot%20T-Shirt.jpg)

-Alex

[LSD]

I hope you understand that all your logical explanations of why God probably does not exist still do not grant you justifiable authority to determine for others that they should not believe in God and should not express that belief in public.

Which is why I&#39;ve never advocated such a thing&#33;

Once again, I in no way support banning either religion or the public expression thereof. I may not agree with it, but neither I nor anyone else has the right to control what people can or annot express.


Right, you&#39;d just replace it with your communist dogma no differently than they did.

No&#33;

That&#39;s what you refuse to get. I don&#39;t want children indoctrinated with anything, not religion, not atheism, and not communism.

I&#39;m sure that, in a communist society, the question of communism would come up; but when it does, it should be discussed in a skeptical and questioning manner.

Here, let me put this in simple language: parents who would teach their kids to have "faith" in communism are just as rotten as parents who would teach them to have "faith" in "Jesus".

You see, I don&#39;t care if you worship Lenin, "Jesus", or Hulon fucking Mitchell jr, no matter the dogma in question, it&#39;s indoctrination and "faith" that&#39;s the problem.

Children need to be raised to question the world around them; and guardians who don&#39;t give them the opportunity to do so are not fullfulling their duties as parents.

Again, I don&#39;t want to lock people up for "believing" or for talking about their "beliefs"; but parenting shouldn&#39;t be about what parents "believe", it should be about what their children need.

And while obviously the question of what exactly children do need is a highly charged one, it&#39;s ducking the issue to assert that it&#39;s "impossible" to come to a reasonably unbiased conclusion.

Obviously we&#39;re all subjective animals and our preconceptions shape our thinking, but we nonetheless as a society need to come to an understanding of what is and is not acceptable parental behaviour.

And, in my judgement, dogmatic indoctrination falls on the unacceptable side of that scale.

[jasmine]

My dear Alex or Burn the Olive Tree or whoever - feeling a little uncomfortable are you? Maybe feeling just the slightest twinge of doubt about your certainties? Try the Dogmatists Anonymous Helpline, I think I have the number somewhere. Just call them and they will tell you that you are absolutely right about everything. You&#39;ll feel much better afterwards. :wub:

[BurnTheOliveTree]

On the contrary my dear Jasmine, they&#39;d tell me to trust nothing, and at most, lend temporary agreement when most evidence points to one conclusion. Because that&#39;s the scientific method, believe it or not, perhaps you&#39;ve heard of it. :)

Either way, asking for a video of the big bang is at best a provocative flame and at worst a genuine question. lol.

-Alex

[jasmine]

Alex - maybe you didn&#39;t notice but this thread began with a &#39;provocative&#39; demand for proof of God. All I&#39;m asking for is proof of the pet theories of the materialists. You respond with an insult. What does that say about you? Also, you may do well to develop a sense of humour.

As for the scientific method one small problem is that the &#39;evidence&#39; - often mathematics - is not accessible to the ordinary mortal (also the mathematical evidence is usually disputed and provisional). What reason do you really have to accept the theory of the big bang? You read it in a popular science book?

Also, interesting that you think Dogmatists Anonymous would support your world view.

[t_wolves_fan]

Once again, I in no way support banning either religion or the public expression thereof. I may not agree with it, but neither I nor anyone else has the right to control what people can or annot express.

Right, I mistook you for another poster. My mistake.


That&#39;s what you refuse to get. I don&#39;t want children indoctrinated with anything, not religion, not atheism, and not communism.

Impossible to implement.


Children need to be raised to question the world around them; and guardians who don&#39;t give them the opportunity to do so are not fullfulling their duties as parents.

And I do not see how this opinion of yours gives you the right or responsibility to take them away.


And while obviously the question of what exactly children do need is a highly charged one, it&#39;s ducking the issue to assert that it&#39;s "impossible" to come to a reasonably unbiased conclusion.

I&#39;m not ducking the issue: it is impossible for a large, heterogenous and complex society to magically come to consensus on how to parent children. It is a fantasy, like the easter bunny or technocracy. We cannot even agree on what the speed limit should be, on astro turf versus real grass or on the accepability of the designated hitter, and you want to believe that we can reach consensus on how children should be parenting that will closely align with your beliefs?

That&#39;s a testament to faith that borders on religious. Good grief.

[BurnTheOliveTree]

Well, cry me a river. :lol:

You asked for a video or photo of the big bang, for crying out loud, of course I&#39;m going to insult you, it&#39;s idiotic. If that was an attempt at humour, then I suppose it&#39;s funny in an unintentional sense.

What about the Red Shift, then? If you want to move out of mindless provocation.

-Alex

[jasmine]

You asked for a video or photo of the big bang, for crying out loud, of course I&#39;m going to insult you, it&#39;s idiotic. If that was an attempt at humour, then I suppose it&#39;s funny in an unintentional sense.

It was irony Alex&#33; Or maybe even sarcasm&#33; Are you a stalinist? Or an American? Or both? -hint, there is also some irony hidden in this post.

As I recall the red shift is an indication that the universe is expanding. My point is simply that I have no way of assessing whether the evidence has been correctly evaluated or not. I have to take someone&#39;s word for it. And so do you probably.

I have read articles disputing the evidence of the red shift. I have also read articles arguing that the laws of physics change over time (I think this was based on evaluations of dust clouds at different distances from the earth).

However I do not have the training or expertise to know who is right or wrong. Both arguments could be wrong or partialy correct.

When you accept the theory of the big bang it&#39;s an act of faith on your part. Like it or not.

[jasmine]

Also t_wolves_fan, I agree with a lot of what you say, but are you really a wolves fan? I guess that requires faith&#33; :D

[LSD]

Impossible to implement.

Difficult to implement.


I&#39;m not ducking the issue: it is impossible for a large, heterogenous and complex society to magically come to consensus on how to parent children.

Except we do it already.

Again, we take children away from cultists all the time. It&#39;s only anachronistic "respect" for "faith" that keeps us from enforcing those same standards on all religious indoctrination.

I&#39;m not saying that it&#39;s going to be easy or that it&#39;s going to happen tomorrow, but you asked for an opinion on how children should be raised and that&#39;s mine.

I understand that you think it&#39;ll never manifest, but then you think that communism will never manifest either. In other words, it&#39;s hardly surprising that we have different ideas on what society is or is not capable of. ;)


All I&#39;m asking for is proof of the pet theories of the materialists.

Then take a physics course.


As for the scientific method one small problem is that the &#39;evidence&#39; - often mathematics - is not accessible to the ordinary mortal

Of course it is, you just have to put in the time to learn it.

And, seriously, are you proposing that there&#39;s some "conspiracy" of scientists"? That researchers from thousands of different backgrounds, nations, religions, and beliefs have all gotten together to make up science???

Look, there&#39;s a difference between "faith" and understanding. When I stop at a train crossing, it&#39;s not &#39;cause I have "faith" in the indicator light, it&#39;s &#39;cause I understand what it means.

Well, similarly when I read a news story on a theoretical physics discovery, whether or not I can understand the mathematics behind it, I understand the hurdles that a scientific paper has to go through before it is accepted.

So unless one buys into some massive conspiracy notion (and that would be an article of faith&#33;), one has no choice but to accept the latest findings -- with a reasonbable bit of skepticism of course.

...that is unless one rejects the entire materialist paradigm to begin with, an issue that I notice you haven&#39;t adressed.

So let&#39;s put all the cards on the table, Jasmine: what are your positions on the issues of "God", "faith", and science?

[BurnTheOliveTree]

Your point is, in it&#39;s entirety, that you personally think science messed up a few theories. You&#39;ve got nothing of substance to say, other than we&#39;re too strident in accepting Big Bang and other long standing ideas like it.


I have read articles disputing the evidence of the red shift. I have also read articles arguing that the laws of physics change over time (I think this was based on evaluations of dust clouds at different distances from the earth).

Post the articles, then.

Anyways, my dinner calls me, and it smells good enough to devour, plates cutlery and all. Ciao for now.

-Alex

[t_wolves_fan]

Impossible to implement.

Difficult to implement.

No, impossible because you say you want to end indoctrination and then in the next breath inform me that children should be indoctrinated to question everything.

I know, I know, it&#39;s different when you do it.



I&#39;m not ducking the issue: it is impossible for a large, heterogenous and complex society to magically come to consensus on how to parent children.

Except we do it already.

Again, we take children away from cultists all the time. It&#39;s only anachronistic "respect" for "faith" that keeps us from enforcing those same standards on all religious indoctrination.

We do it already to a very small degree, but what you&#39;re talking about goes way beyond anything that can reasonbly be achieved.


I&#39;m not saying that it&#39;s going to be easy or that it&#39;s going to happen tomorrow, but you asked for an opinion on how children should be raised and that&#39;s mine.

I understand that you think it&#39;ll never manifest, but then you think that communism will never occur and clearly I think it will.

I hope you don&#39;t hold your breath.


Rather than continuing this merry-go-round, how about this:

What would be wrong with a libertarian vision where people are free to express and practice their religion with as few restrictions as possible (i.e. limited to outright physical abuse or human/animal sacrifice)?

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by [email protected] 30, 2006 07:10 pm
Also t_wolves_fan, I agree with a lot of what you say, but are you really a wolves fan? I guess that requires faith&#33; :D
Yes I am and :lol: :lol: :lol:

[jasmine]

LSD - are you a child of the sixties? Anyway, no I am not suggesting there is a conspiracy of scientists, but I am suggesting that much theoretical physics, quantum physics in particular is not provable. You must surely be aware of the discussions about parallel universes, observations about the role of the observer in the experiment (which hark back to idealist philosophy), particles travelling backwards in time, solid objects being mostly space etc. etc.

I am not an expert, I could be wrong, but I think a lot of this is speculative. I think the big bang is a speculative theory. How many people who accept the big bang theory actually do the physics course you suggest and check the evidence, even superficially? Not many. Most accept it it because it fits their world view. It becomes a piece of ideology, a part of the dogma.

I don&#39;t think there is much difference between materialists and theists of various types. Most accept what the priest or the scientist says.

I do not belong to a church or any group and do not wish to do so. I have however had experiences that lead me to believe there is more than just the material world. You can, if you wish, dismiss this as delusional. Of course this is not testable in a lab.

The problem we all have is that in the end we die. We are the only animal that knows this. And I think this is what this discussion is really about.

[LSD]

No, impossible because you say you want to end indoctrination and then in the next breath inform me that children should be indoctrinated to question everything.

They should be raised to question questioning too&#33;

Curiousity isn&#39;t a belief, it&#39;s a skill and one that is fundamental to the human experience. "Faith" suppresses that skill and replaces exploration and discussion with dogma and "authority".

A parent who doesn&#39;t raise his child to question is like a parent who refuses to let his child speak; you may see it as an expression of "parental rights", but I see it as an unconscienable breach of parental responsibilities.

Again, I don&#39;t care what your "beliefs" are, I just care that don&#39;t force them on anyone else. And when it comes to children, dogmatic parenting is a type of force.


What would be wrong with a libertarian vision where people are free to express and practice their religion with as few restrictions as possible

Nothing, I just happen to feel that one of those nescessary few restrictions is disallowing the indoctrination of children. Other than that (and any other violation of human rights), people should be able to "practice" however they want.

You see, I&#39;m not talking about banning religious discussion with children or even disallowing children&#39;s participation in religious events.

But when parents raise their kids without an understanding of reason and skepticism, they do harm them; almost as much as when they make them wear a burqa ...or a garbage bag.

Incidently, you&#39;ve still not answered that question. What is your position on Burqas? Would you consider disallowing that archaic bit of misogynist degradation or does your "libertarianism" proclude you from "interfering" in "religious rites"?

&#39;Cause if it&#39;s the former, your insistance that consensus on this issue is impossible rings a little hollow; but if it&#39;s the latter, then you&#39;re just an ouright hypocrite, frowning on one type of abuse (garbage bags), but smiling on another (cloth bags).


I am suggesting that much theoretical physics, quantum physics in particular is not provable.

Which is why most of what you&#39;re talking about is still speculative and not considered to be a part of the current scientific paradigm.

A lot of the other stuff may appear bizarre, but if there&#39;s evidence for it, appearance doesn&#39;t matter. That&#39;s the entire point of materialism, the excision of emotionalism and subjectivity from our understanding of the universe.

It can&#39;t be done entirely, of course; we are ultimately subjective beings, but the closer we can get to impartiality, the better we can practically deal with the world around us.

That&#39;s why science has given us so much more in three hundred years than religion has in three thousand. Unlike "faith", materialism actually works.


I don&#39;t think there is much difference between materialists and theists of various types.

The key difference, as I see it, is that materialists are willing to question their opinions whereas theists tend to hold their religion as too fundamental to be challenged.

Obviously there are secular dogmatists out there and I am by no means suggestion that simply not being religious is the same thing as being rational, &#39;cause it clearly isn&#39;t.

What I am saying, however, is that by its nature "faith" is antithetical to reason and a barrier to progress. And, as such, it must be opposed by anyone with an interest in progressive sociopolitical evolution.

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by [email protected] 30, 2006 08:17 pm
[Incidently, you&#39;ve still not answered that question. What is your position on Burqas? Would you consider disallowing that archaic bit of misogynist degradation or does your "libertarianism" proclude you from "interfering" in "religious rites"?

&#39;Cause if it&#39;s the former, your insistance that consensus on this issue is impossible rings a little hollow; but if it&#39;s the latter, then you&#39;re just an ouright hypocrite, frowning on one type of abuse (garbage bags), but smiling on another (cloth bags).


I&#39;d not interfere with the burquas.

And I&#39;m only a hypocrite if I accept your proposition that a burqua is abuse. I do not, therefore it&#39;s not hypocrisy.

[LSD]

So refresh my memory, what was your position on the guy that makes his daughters wear garbage bags? &#39;Cause I seem to remember you disapproving of that...

I&#39;m sure I&#39;m wrong, though, &#39;cause that would make you a hypocrite and you just so eloquently stated that you&#39;re not one.

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by [email protected] 30, 2006 08:23 pm
So refresh my memory, what was your position on the guy that makes his daughters wear garbage bags? &#39;Cause I seem to remember you disapproving of that...

I&#39;m sure I&#39;m wrong, though, &#39;cause that would make you a hypocrite and you just so eloquently stated that you&#39;re not one.
The garbage bag...I could be convinced that it&#39;s abuse since it&#39;s not a part of an established religion.

Your label of hypocrisy only holds true if a religious symbol is also abuse. It&#39;s only abuse in your mind, therefore I&#39;m a hypocrite only in your mind.

I&#39;m comfortable with that, and I&#39;m sure I&#39;ll get over it.

So long as you&#39;re comfortable with the fact that you&#39;re a hypocrite for demanding no indoctrination while you call for children to be indoctrinated into questioning questioning questioning questioning questioning questioning everything.

[jasmine]

The key difference, as I see it, is that materialists are willing to question their opinions whereas theists tend to hold their religion as too fundamental to be challenged.

I don&#39;t think this is true mostly. Most people cling to an ideology. Often the ideology is political. How many socialists seriously question their own politics? For most it&#39;s as self evident as catholicism.

Most of us are not able to understand Stephen Hawkings arguments in detail. You say &#39;do a physics course&#39;. Okay, for how many years before I can understand the blessed Stephen? After that I should do a course on evolutionary biology to understand Darwin and post-Darwin evolutionary theory.

In between times I also have to earn a living.

Personally I think that evolution is a very interesting theory and that the big bang is a very silly theory (sorry Stephen).

These are my opinions. I try to remain open. I don&#39;t think science and religion exclude one another. Our biggest enemy is certainty, or dogmatism.

[LSD]

The garbage bag...I could be convinced that it&#39;s abuse since it&#39;s not a part of an established religion.

And that matters ....why?

Since when do "established" opinions grant one more rights than any other opinion?

An act is abusive based on its consequences, not its history. It doesn&#39;t matter whether someone degrades their daughter &#39;cause their Imam told them to or &#39;cause they think their cat told them to, abuse is still abuse.

Beating children is also a long-established part of many popular religions, I suppose, then, that when a devout man hits his son, it&#39;s more acceptable to you than when a secular one does?

You talk about libertarianism, but you&#39;re holding the world to a bizarre double standard.


So long as you&#39;re comfortable with the fact that you&#39;re a hypocrite for demanding no indoctrination while you call for children to be indoctrinated into questioning questioning questioning questioning questioning questioning everything.


Your definition of indoctrination is evidently quite bizarre. By your standard teching kids to read would also qualify as "indoctrination"... :rolleyes:

Again, curiousity is a skill, not a belief; and it&#39;s nurturing is not a "value", it&#39;s a fundamental parental duty.


I don&#39;t think this is true mostly. Most people cling to an ideology. Often the ideology is political. How many socialists seriously question their own politics? For most it&#39;s as self evident as catholicism.

Unfortunately that&#39;s often true, but I&#39;ve certainly seen more secular people change their views than religious ones.

When a "value" comes from "God", you see, it can&#39;t change. No matter the reasons, no matter the evidence, accepting that one&#39;s religious dogma could be mistaken means accepting that the religious paradigm is falible ...and religious people obviously can&#39;t do that.

Again, that doesn&#39;t mean that all secular people are rational or open minded. It just means that, on average, a nonreligious person is more willing to consider contrary views than a religious one.

After all, there is a reason that religion is strongly linked to things like authoritarianism and homophobia.

A secular bigot may not like gay people, but they&#39;re less likely to actively oppose gay rights than someone who believes that fighting faggots is "God&#39;s commandment". They&#39;re also a lot more likely to eventually change their minds.

That&#39;s the thing about religion, it doesn&#39;t just foster "faith", it promotes it. So while people may well have a sort of de facto faith in scientific theories they don&#39;t understand or political models they&#39;ve been socialized to accept, it&#39;s a very weak kind of "faith".

Religious "faith" however is a constructed one. Religious people don&#39;t just have a de facto "faith", they have a de jure one. They have a conceptual paradigm predicated on dogmatic adherence to doctrine.

And while any unwillingness to question is dangerous, active promotion of dogmatism is far worse.


Our biggest enemy is certainty, or dogmatism.

I agree entirely.

[jasmine]

After all, there is a reason that religion is strongly linked to things like authoritarianism and homophobia.

And Stalin and Mao and Pol Pot and Castro. Not authoritarian or homophobic? In my opinion the debate is a false debate. We get bogged down in debating with established opinion, worrying about what others think and fail to notice our own experience.

I think the idea that all that exists is what we can bang our elbows against is silly. It flies in the face of my entire life experience. Nobody else has to accept this. The truth is just around the corner. Máybe when I die the lights really will go out.

The point is to be open to and to be guided by your own experience. Of course listen to other people but really, who needs a guru? Scientist or priest?

[LSD]

And Stalin and Mao and Pol Pot and Castro. Not authoritarian or homophobic?

Not to the degree of a Khomenei or Omar, no.

Besides, Castro reversed his position on homosexuality. How many religious leaders can say the same?


I think the idea that all that exists is what we can bang our elbows against is silly.

Well you have every right to think that, but it&#39;s nonetheless what makes the most logical sense.

Certainly it&#39;s the only paradigm from which we should attempt to shape social policy, since that which we can&#39;t "bang our elbows against" is impossible to measure.


The point is to be open to and to be guided by your own experience. Of course listen to other people but really, who needs a guru? Scientist or priest?

I agree that "gurus" are unnescessary, but our "own experiences" are often wrong and are usually incomplete.

That&#39;s where science comes in.

[t_wolves_fan]

It matters because established religions have been established as norms via the subjective will of society through the political process.

95% of people will not view a girl wearing a burqua as "abuse" because they know it&#39;s part of an established religion. Wearing a garbage bag on the other hand is a novel concept that as far as we know, is unrelated to any religious practice.

Religion, as has been discussed on this thread, is personal. So an established religious practice isn&#39;t our business.

No, not even yours.

An off-the-wall practice like wearing garbage bags, however, raises a red flag. That&#39;s not typical, so it becomes our business.

I sense you are a big fan of rationality and logic. Like most people who worship at the temple of rationality and logic, you demand that logical rules - as you understand them - be applied to every situation. If a situation doesn&#39;t match your logical understanding, well then by God it isn&#39;t logical and needs to change.

Unfortunately, the world does not work that way. You view it as logical that no person should be allowed to indoctrinate a child with anything traditional, but that children should be indoctrinated to question everything, but that&#39;s not really indoctrination because you say it isn&#39;t.

That doesn&#39;t sound logical to me because it&#39;s impractical. I on the other hand view it as logical that the societal norm of nuclear families and parental rights continue and that parents be given free reign - up to a point which is of course arbitrary based on my perception of common sense - to raise their children as they see fit. Religion being personal and another family&#39;s practices not being my business, I see no reason why a parent cannot make his child adhere to a religious practice within reason. Being required to wear a customary headdress is within reason, wearing a garbage bag is not.

Two relatively intelligent (I&#39;m assuming) people come to different logical conclusions about the world based on our experience and our perception. That is our natural tendency as humans to interject our subjective values into our perceptions of logic in action, and it ought to tell you that one logical model cannot be applied to every person and every phenomenon.

But I guess until you stop being arrogant enough to assume that you&#39;re so brilliant that you&#39;ve come up with the perfect logical model that ought to be applied to everyone else, you&#39;re just not going to understand that.

[jasmine]

Not to the degree of a Khomenei or Omar, no.

Excuse me but the word &#39;bullshit&#39; springs to mind. Pol Pot murdered people who wore watches&#33; Have you read &#39;Let History Judge&#39;? (about Stalin).

I wasn&#39;t aware that Castro reversed his opinion about homosexuality but if he did that&#39;s good.

Human beings fight wars and persecute people. Those who do it under a secular guise are no better than those who do it under a religious guise.

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by [email protected] 30, 2006 09:04 pm
Besides, Castro reversed his position on homosexuality. How many religious leaders can say the same?


Nice&#33;

Now all he has to do is stop jailing dissident journalists and librarians.

The pope does that all the time, doesn&#39;t he.

Oh wait...

[LSD]

It matters because established religions have been established as norms via the subjective will of society through the political process.

Norms change and the fact that something was acceptable 700 years ago is irrelevent to whether or not it should be tolerated today.

Besides, surely you&#39;re not so naive as to think that societal values actually reflect the consensus of the enitre community. The "norm" of burqas was estblished in societies where women had no rights.

So, yeah, the empowered few (meaning rich men) got together and "established" a system for subjugating their wives and daughters. So what? We have no obligation to "respect" that anachronistic oligarchic "norm" anymore than we do to respect witch burnings or female circumcision.

Remember, slavery was a "societal norm" for a long time too.


95% of people will not view a girl wearing a burqua as "abuse" because they know it&#39;s part of an established religion.

Actually, I think the current figure is somerwhere around 75% and dropping rapidly.

France has already banned Buraqas in schools, Holland is about to ban them outright (not that I agree with such a move); clearly substantially less than "95%" agree with you on this one.

Besides, a good deal of support for your cause on this issue comes out of lingering postcolonial white guilt. Be sure, if this were a Christian anachronism, far more people would be willing to challenge it.

But because Islam is predominently found in poor and oppressed countries, misguided liberals are retiscent to challlenge their "values".

Just more postmodern relativist nonsense from the people who told us that Saudi Arabian women "like" being subjugated... <_<


Religion, as has been discussed on this thread, is personal. So an established religious practice isn&#39;t our business.

No, not even yours.

An off-the-wall practice like wearing garbage bags, however, raises a red flag. That&#39;s not typical, so it becomes our business.

How does that even pretend to make sense?

Something is only abusive if it&#39;s "new"? I guess spousal abuse is OK in your book then, considering that it&#39;s been a part of "established religions" for centuries...

How can a "libertarian" seriously propose that being "off the wall" is a sufficient standard for societal intervention? Wearing garbage bags is "weird" so the state has a right to interfere??? :o

There is no practical difference between wearing a garbage bag and wearing a burqa -- although the garbage bag may be more comfortable. Treating the two differently because of their "histories" is by any definition hypocrisy. It may be "politically correct" hypocrisy, but it&#39;s hypocrisy all the same.


I see no reason why a parent cannot make his child adhere to a religious practice within reason. Being required to wear a customary headdress is within reason, wearing a garbage bag is not.

Yeah, you keep saying that, but I&#39;m still waiting for a justification.

If the effects are the same and the consequences are the same, who cares about the histories? More importantly, what right does a lack of history give you to intervene?

Society should only interfere in private affairs when there is a clear, objective, and demonstrable harm that needs to be prevented. When that exists, we should get involved; when it doesn&#39;t, we shouldn&#39;t.

If a harm exists with wearing a garbage bag, then it exists with wearing a burqa and both should be stopped; if it does not exist with wearing a burqa then it does not exist with wearing a garbage bag and neither should be stopped.

Either way, you can&#39;t allow one and disallow the other, not if you&#39;re going to maintain even a pretense of respect for personal liberty.


That is our natural tendency as humans to interject our subjective values into our perceptions of logic in action, and it ought to tell you that one logical model cannot be applied to every person and every phenomenon.

Obviously not; but we&#39;ve still got to try.

You have your standard for acceptable parenting, I have mine; if we ask another 100 people we&#39;ll get another 100 answers. So as a society we get together, hash out our arguments and try to come to a conclusion.

And, yeah, we try to be as logical and objective as possible in that process. Will it be perfect? Of course not, but it will nonetheless be better than allowing abusive parents a free hand to torture their kids in the name of "tolerance".


You view it as logical that no person should be allowed to indoctrinate a child with anything traditional, but that children should be indoctrinated to question everything, but that&#39;s not really indoctrination because you say it isn&#39;t.

"Tradition" isn&#39;t the issue here. Again, I don&#39;t want children indoctrinated with anything, no, not even that they should question everything.

There&#39;s a difference between raising a child to accept something unconditionaly, whatever that something is, and raising them to use their natural curiousity and discover the world themselves.

That doesn&#39;t mean prohibiting discussion, in fact it means encouraging it. It just means disallowing the promotion of any opinion, idea, or "value" as dogmatic "truth".

[t_wolves_fan]

I&#39;m going to skip the beginning because it&#39;s just another edition of you saying you know what&#39;s best for others while I ask why you think you have that authority and you answer because you say so.

It&#39;s getting old.


You have your standard for acceptable parenting, I have mine; if we ask another 100 people we&#39;ll get another 100 answers. So as a society we get together, hash out our arguments and try to come to a conclusion.

I guarantee you that at least until long after you and I are dead, when it comes to the practice and indoctrination of religion, society is going to choose my position, as it should.

Is the libertarian position in this regard "fair" to you? Why or why not?


"Tradition" isn&#39;t the issue here. Again, I don&#39;t want children indoctrinated with anything, no, not even that they should question everything.

Then how, specifically, do they question everything?


There&#39;s a difference between raising a child to accept something unconditionaly, whatever that something is, and raising them to use their natural curiousity and discover the world themselves.

Right, it depends on how you indoctrinate them.

Oh I forget, when you do it it&#39;s not indoctrination.


That doesn&#39;t mean prohibiting discussion, in fact it means encouraging it. It just means disallowing the promotion of any opinion, idea, or "value" as dogmatic "truth".

Vanilla and chocolate are still both ice cream, sport.

[LSD]

I&#39;m going to skip the beginning

I&#39;ll take that as a concession. :)


because it&#39;s just another edition of you saying you know what&#39;s best for others

Actually this time it&#39;s you who&#39;s claiming that authority, namely that new or "off the wall" practices should be forbidden whereas traditional ones should not.

Somehow you see that as less arbitrary than judging based on practical consquences.... somehow...


I guarantee you that at least until long after you and I are dead, when it comes to the practice and indoctrination of religion, society is going to choose my position

That&#39;s not an argument.


Then how, specifically, do they question everything?

By not being indoctrinated&#33;

Again, curiousity is natural human behaviour. It doesn&#39;t need to be forced, taught, or instructed.

[jasmine]

Parents indoctrinate children. That&#39;s what they are for (this is irony&#33;&#33;&#33;)

A really great parent will try to educate a child and allow the child to develop his or her own talents and beliefs.

Most parents will not do this. Most parents will dump their beliefs and prejudices onto their children. To what extent should the state interfere in this process?

There is no easy answer here. There are parents who will tell their children that Stalin was a great and wise leader. Should the child be taken into care?

There are parents who will make the child wear a Buraqa. Should the child be taken into care? Should the practice be banned?

We are a deeply flawed species and science will not save us from this. There really are not any easy or logical answers. I recently met a muslim girl, 20 years old, who did not wear a Buraqa but wore a coat, long dress and headscarf in high temperatures. She was happy to do so. Maybe she was indoctrinated I don&#39;t know. It wasn&#39;t my place to judge. That she didn&#39;t feel abused I am certain. She was happy and outgoing.

This may be hard for a westerner to understand but many of us spend much of our lives doing jobs we hate - still, at least we can wear levis.

[LSD]

Most parents will not do this. Most parents will dump their beliefs and prejudices onto their children. To what extent should the state interfere in this process?

It mostly shouldn&#39;t, mainly because the capitalist state is such a corrupt and biased institution that granting it that kind of power would be incredibly dangerous.

In a postrevolutionary context, however, there&#39;s no reason that we can&#39;t take a harder look at parenting techniques and ensure that, to the best degree reasonably achievable, children are not indoctrinated or "dumped upon" by their parents.


There are parents who will make the child wear a Buraqa. Should the child be taken into care?

In our present society? Almost certainly no.

In a postcapitalist one? Absolutely.


Should the practice be banned?

Yes. Although, again, I don&#39;t see how it&#39;s reasonably possible under the present socieconomic system.

[jasmine]

In a postrevolutionary context, however, there&#39;s no reason that we can&#39;t take a harder look at parenting techniques and ensure that, to the best degree reasonably achievable, children are not indoctrinated or "dumped upon" by their parents.

But what is the "postrevolutionary context"? From what I can gather Mr Doom is advocating some sort of ultra-Stalinist tyranny. And the only way you could control parenting is through a police state, using informers, encouraging people to turn in their neighbors etc.

Also, on the question of evidence, nearly 160 years after the publication of the Communist Manifesto and with the enormous amount of real, accessible historical information at our disposal, why do you still believe in the proletarian revolution?

I do think this is a belief on a par with the beliefs of a religious sect.

[uber-liberal]

I do think this is a belief on a par with the beliefs of a religious sect.

Damn skippy. It&#39;s not liberalism, it&#39;s statism.

[jasmine]

Damn skippy. It&#39;s not liberalism, it&#39;s statism.

What evidence do you have to indicate the existence of skippy?

[An archist]

Originally posted by [email protected] 30, 2006 10:13 pm
There are parents who will make the child wear a Buraqa. Should the child be taken into care? Should the practice be banned?

Umm, you may or may not have noticed, but muslim children don&#39;t wear burqa&#39;s or veils or anything, it&#39;s only when they grow up that most girls start wearing veils.
Also, I knew a Turkish muslim girl that was highly religious, but didn&#39;t wear a veil and another girl that was an absolute atheist, from a christian family that did wear a veil.

[Comrade J]

Originally posted by An [email protected] 01, 2006 02:35 pm
...another girl that was an absolute atheist, from a christian family that did wear a veil.
Why the hell did she do that then?

[LSD]

But what is the "postrevolutionary context"?

How we construct society following a revolution ...obviously.


From what I can gather Mr Doom is advocating some sort of ultra-Stalinist tyranny.

Frankly, I don&#39;t know what Doom is advocating, but it&#39;s clearly not what I&#39;m proposing; moreover it&#39;s thoroughly absurd to compare "controlling parenting" to suppressing speech.

The latter is a fundamental human right, the former is a societal duty. No one has a "right" to be the guardian for another human being, regardless of their genetic link to that individual, and this idea that the "family" has some sort of intrinsic validity is anachronistic nonsense.


And the only way you could control parenting is through a police state, using informers, encouraging people to turn in their neighbors etc.

That&#39;s assuming that the "nuclear family" persists and that postrevolutionary society will continue the contemporary notion that "family business" is "private".

Both of those concepts, however, stem from property relations and would have no viability in a classless society. The idea that parents have a "default right" to sole absolute parenting is itself a reactionary construct and one that can be vastly improved upon.

Children should be raised communaly, not only because it creates a more pluralistic and sociable parenting environment, but also because it provides exactly the kind of social net required to catch abusive behaviours without needing to resort to a state.

Besides, a good deal of bad parenting speaks for itself. You don&#39;t need someone to "turn in" a parent who forces their child to wear a Burqa, you just need to see the child.


Manifesto and with the enormous amount of real, accessible historical information at our disposal, why do you still believe in the proletarian revolution?

I do think this is a belief on a par with the beliefs of a religious sect.

Then you don&#39;t understand what it is that religion&#39;s actually about.

There&#39;s an immense difference between advocating a political system, even an historically unsuccessful one; and having "faith".

Laissez-faire capitalists also adhere to a political ideology that&#39;s failed every time its been implemented. But that alone does not make their politics bankrupt. In my opinion, there are other facts which do and we could go into all the reasons that I think that communism is still viable and libertarianism is not ...but that&#39;s not what this thread is about.

The point is, though, I have arguments. So do libertarians. Religious people however, by the nature of "faith", do not. Not only that, but their belief system is predicated on not having evidence, on rejecting the entire rationalist paradigm of empirical and logical argumentation.

Again, it&#39;s "faith" itself that&#39;s the problem here, not any one particular manifestation of it.

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by [email protected] 30, 2006 10:08 pm
I&#39;ll take that as a concession. :)

Why would you?

I&#39;ve already made my position pretty clear, and stated clearly that it&#39;s actually more arbitrary than your position.

Like it or not, life does not follow the simplistic logical map you demand. Like I said before, you worship at the altar of logic, demanding that anything and everything follow your subjectively based "logical" view of the world. Burquas and garbage bags to you are the same thing, and a garbage bag would be abuse, so a burqua is abuse. Logical sounding sure, but totally ignorant of socially accepted and established norms.

In other words, life isn&#39;t that simple. You cannot simply override people&#39;s values with your own "logical" blueprint of how life ought to work.

That&#39;s all I&#39;m gonna say on the matter. Understand or don&#39;t, agree or don&#39;t, I don&#39;t really care. Your vision isn&#39;t going to happen, at least not in our lifetime. Values and opinions, illogical or not, are human nature and aren&#39;t going to go away regardless of how effective your secret police are at stamping out prohibited behaviors.

Your statement that if just left alone children will naturally grow up to behave as you plan is laughable. You&#39;ve simply decided that our natural inquisitiveness is a "skill" while our natural tendencies towards conformity - and they are there - are the result of indoctrination. You simply decide human nature will meet your views of how the world ought to work, which is absurd. People will question and people will conform, and whether you want to call it indoctrination or not, even if you demand that people not conform they are, in effect, conforming to those demands.

Bottom line, your enlightened plans for humanity are unrealistic and naive. But unlike Mr. Doom and others, I&#39;d gladly defend your right to stand in a park and shout them to your heart&#39;s content.

[jasmine]

There&#39;s an immense difference between advocating a political system, even an historically unsuccessful one; and having "faith".

Marx did not simply &#39;advocate&#39; a political system he predicted one would arise out of the contradictions of capitalism. He didn&#39;t believe in God but he did believe in heaven on earth. For Marx the proletarian revolution, the dictatorship of the proletariat, the transition to communism were not a policy or a manifesto, they were the objectively necessary consequences of the materialist dialectic.

Marx called his socialism scientific, in keeping with the spirit of the times (no pun intended). The only way you can test Marx&#39;s science is to compare reality with his predictions. If you do so you can only conclude that Marx was wrong. There is no indication at all that the working class has the capacity to sieze power and run society in the interests of the majority.

So why are you still expecting it to happen?

[LSD]

Marx did not simply &#39;advocate&#39; a political system he predicted one would arise out of the contradictions of capitalism.

Yes he did, but he didn&#39;t exactly lay out an exact time table for how that would happen.


Marx called his socialism scientific, in keeping with the spirit of the times (no pun intended). The only way you can test Marx&#39;s science is to compare reality with his predictions.

I think you need to read this thread (http://www.revolutionaryleft.com/index.php?showtopic=59407).


So why are you still expecting it to happen?

I have a better question, what are you "expecting to happen"?

You have 27 posts to your name, but in browsing them I can&#39;t actually figure out what your political opinions are. So maybe you can help me out here and just spell them out.

You say that there"is no indication at all that the working class has the capacity to sieze power". I take it then that you&#39;re not a revolutionary ...what are you then?

[jasmine]

I don&#39;t know what&#39;s going to happen and neither do you - anyway I&#39;ve opened a new thread to let you explain why communism is different from religion.

[LSD]

I don&#39;t know what&#39;s going to happen and neither do you

That wasn&#39;t my question.

Obviously you&#39;re not prescient, but that doesn&#39;t mean you don&#39;t have opinions ...so what are they?

[uber-liberal]

Originally posted by [email protected] 01, 2006 05:28 pm

There&#39;s an immense difference between advocating a political system, even an historically unsuccessful one; and having "faith".

Marx did not simply &#39;advocate&#39; a political system he predicted one would arise out of the contradictions of capitalism. He didn&#39;t believe in God but he did believe in heaven on earth. For Marx the proletarian revolution, the dictatorship of the proletariat, the transition to communism were not a policy or a manifesto, they were the objectively necessary consequences of the materialist dialectic.

Marx called his socialism scientific, in keeping with the spirit of the times (no pun intended). The only way you can test Marx&#39;s science is to compare reality with his predictions. If you do so you can only conclude that Marx was wrong. There is no indication at all that the working class has the capacity to sieze power and run society in the interests of the majority.

So why are you still expecting it to happen?
Damn... an intellectual in the ranks...

A good point. The average worker doesn&#39;t know about production in the board room or about marketing anymore than it directly affects their specific job. Why would we expect, with all respect to the workers, a ditch digger to understand the finer points of global marketing and advanced economics when their expertise is in their labor?

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by uber&#045;[email protected] 01, 2006 06:17 pm
A good point. The average worker doesn&#39;t know about production in the board room or about marketing anymore than it directly affects their specific job. Why would we expect, with all respect to the workers, a ditch digger to understand the finer points of global marketing and advanced economics when their expertise is in their labor?
Been here a year and I&#39;m still trying to figure that out.

[uber-liberal]

Originally posted by t_wolves_fan+December 01, 2006 06:32 pm--> (t_wolves_fan @ December 01, 2006 06:32 pm)
uber&#045;[email protected] 01, 2006 06:17 pm
A good point. The average worker doesn&#39;t know about production in the board room or about marketing anymore than it directly affects their specific job. Why would we expect, with all respect to the workers, a ditch digger to understand the finer points of global marketing and advanced economics when their expertise is in their labor?
Been here a year and I&#39;m still trying to figure that out. [/b]
Take wall. Bang head. Repeat if necessary/desired.

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by uber&#045;liberal+December 01, 2006 06:38 pm--> (uber-liberal @ December 01, 2006 06:38 pm)
Originally posted by [email protected] 01, 2006 06:32 pm

uber&#045;[email protected] 01, 2006 06:17 pm
A good point. The average worker doesn&#39;t know about production in the board room or about marketing anymore than it directly affects their specific job. Why would we expect, with all respect to the workers, a ditch digger to understand the finer points of global marketing and advanced economics when their expertise is in their labor?
Been here a year and I&#39;m still trying to figure that out.
Take wall. Bang head. Repeat if necessary/desired. [/b]
Well, actually the answers are that a vague syndicate of councils staffed by experts would make everything run smoothly, including the robots who do most of the work.

Which begs the question, are the robots actually in charge?

:o

[jasmine]

T_wolves_fan - you have already said you are a wolves fan but I notice you are in Seattle, Washington. When I asked you previously whether or not you were a wolves fan I was referring to an English soccer team. Perhaps I have misunderstood. Perhaps there are some wolves in Seattle to support. Could you enlighten me please?

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by [email protected] 01, 2006 07:29 pm
T_wolves_fan - you have already said you are a wolves fan but I notice you are in Seattle, Washington. When I asked you previously whether or not you were a wolves fan I was referring to an English soccer team. Perhaps I have misunderstood. Perhaps there are some wolves in Seattle to support. Could you enlighten me please?

I&#39;m not actually in Seattle, but these are the T_Wolves I support. (http://www.nba.com/timberwolves/)

I laughed when you said I have faith as a fan because they&#39;re not terribly good this year.

[jasmine]

Obviously you&#39;re not prescient, but that doesn&#39;t mean you don&#39;t have opinions ...so what are they?

My opinion is you are not comfortable with anything you cannot stick a label on. I have actually expressed quite a few opinions it&#39;s just that they don&#39;t seem to form a coherent whole to you ie you see no formula, no doctrine, no dogma.

I do not know what is going to happen to capitalism. I don&#39;t like it very much but I don&#39;t much like a lot of the so-called solutions on offer here. I do not think there will be a proletarian revolution - history speaks volumes against the possiblity.

I&#39;m singularly unimpressed with the so-called revolutionary left. A dogmatic, angry, unimaginative bunch of people. Also a bunch of people who are too timid to look at their at their own assumptions, too fearful to learn, certainly incapable of leading anything or anybody.

You lot are not an attractive sight - this could go some way to explaining why you are so isolated.

I&#39;ve spent more than enough time here. I won&#39;t be back to read cheap insults that follow.

[freakazoid]

I&#39;m going to miss him, :(

LSD -
There is no practical difference between wearing a garbage bag and wearing a burqa -- although the garbage bag may be more comfortable. Treating the two differently because of their "histories" is by any definition hypocrisy. It may be "politically correct" hypocrisy, but it&#39;s hypocrisy all the same.

I don&#39;t know about this garbage bag thing you keep refering to but would you compare wearing just regular clothes to the same thing as wearing a garbage bag?


and this idea that the "family" has some sort of intrinsic validity is anachronistic nonsense.

I think that the family is very important.


The point is, though, I have arguments. So do libertarians. Religious people however, by the nature of "faith", do not. Not only that, but their belief system is predicated on not having evidence, on rejecting the entire rationalist paradigm of empirical and logical argumentation.

I would have to disagree with you on that also.

Everything else I seem to agree with what you are saying, atleast you are not promoting what MrDoom is.

uber-Liberal -
A good point. The average worker doesn&#39;t know about production in the board room or about marketing anymore than it directly affects their specific job. Why would we expect, with all respect to the workers, a ditch digger to understand the finer points of global marketing and advanced economics when their expertise is in their labor?

That is because they are not aloud to know. It&#39;s not that they don&#39;t have the capasity to learn theses things.

[La Comédie Noire]

As for the scientific method one small problem is that the &#39;evidence&#39; - often mathematics - is not accessible to the ordinary mortal (also the mathematical evidence is usually disputed and provisional). What reason do you really have to accept the theory of the big bang? You read it in a popular science book?

Which is why we call it a theory pending on the aquasition of more evidence. God is a primitive theory with no evidence supporting it, which means it is not logical in phsyical reality, which is why you beleivers have to rely on the illogical to assert your claim. In short, faith.

The reason we look to Science even when it has no evidence to support a claim is because it has a better track record of truth.

Science has given us medicine, transportation, nurishment, and entertainment.

Religion has given us zippo&#33; Except maybe some cold comfort for uneasy people. Who quite frankly humanity could do without. :D

I really doubt you know what you are talking about in regards to Mathematics, give me an example of " disputed" mathematics.

Even your precious religious icon Jesus of Nazerath, if he so did exist, relied on simple Algebraic equations as a carpenter..

P = L(2) + W(2)
A = LW

But when have any of the champions of science ever bowed down and prayed to "god" to help them with the world&#39;s problems? Is it possible that god is a primitivist asshole that does not wish to help the scientific community? Or maybe..just maybe..

HE DOSENT EXIST&#33;

[RevMARKSman]

Which is why we call it a theory pending on the aquasition of more evidence. God is a primitive theory with no evidence supporting it, which means it is not logical in phsyical reality, which is why you beleivers have to rely on the illogical to assert your claim. In short, faith.


No. No. NO.

Before something has adequate evidence to support it, it is called a HYPOTHESIS, not a THEORY.

A THEORY is supported by empirical evidence and logical reasoning, and is therefore a fact until other evidence can be found that contradicts it. Marx did not have a theory, as it has not been proven yet. He had a hypothesis. Workers&#39; self-emancipation has not lasted for any measurable amount of time since he stopped writing. That&#39;s what we want; some of us think it is inevitable, while some of us don&#39;t.

[Zero]

Actually Monica, I wouldn&#39;t be too hastey calling it a Hypothesis. A Hypothesis is based on an educated guess. There is no evidence for this being, there is no reason to believe it exists, and other than the "undeniable" "evidence" of faith ( :rolleyes: ) there is no reason to believe it exists.

If we want to even pretend that the "age of reason" was actually based on reason, and that the 21st century is going to be a century of empiricism, we need to drop the unfounded beliefs&#33;

[RevMARKSman]

Originally posted by [email protected] 08, 2006 11:38 am
Actually Monica, I wouldn&#39;t be too hastey calling it a Hypothesis. A Hypothesis is based on an educated guess. There is no evidence for this being, there is no reason to believe it exists, and other than the "undeniable" "evidence" of faith ( :rolleyes: ) there is no reason to believe it exists.

If we want to even pretend that the "age of reason" was actually based on reason, and that the 21st century is going to be a century of empiricism, we need to drop the unfounded beliefs&#33;
That too. But if it were educated, we&#39;d call it a hypothesis, the same way we treat all other explanations for how things work.

[La Comédie Noire]

No. No. NO.

Before something has adequate evidence to support it, it is called a HYPOTHESIS, not a THEORY.

Excuse the unpercise english. I will be sure to choose my words with more care to context next time.




A THEORY is supported by empirical evidence and logical reasoning, and is therefore a fact until other evidence can be found that contradicts it. Marx did not have a theory, as it has not been proven yet. He had a hypothesis. Workers&#39; self-emancipation has not lasted for any measurable amount of time since he stopped writing. That&#39;s what we want; some of us think it is inevitable, while some of us don&#39;t.

However some of Marx&#39;s other claims have been observed. For instance the Petty Burgeoisie is being abosrbed and turned out into the proliteriate just as marx stated in the communist manifesto. Capitalists of the world are trying to make a global economy with a large proliteriate, as Marx claimed. There are periods of depression in the market remedied by the destruction of surplus goods. There are infact numerous class antagonisms exprienced by workers everyday. It is all evidence that Marx must&#39;ve atleast got it in the ball park. I would chance to say that Marxism has earned it&#39;s place in the realm of theory. I mean there is a whole entire board on this site called "theory", than again one could argue against that.

I don&#39;t know about it being envitable but the human race cannot survive with capitalism much longer and no other system seems to meet the needs of such a large population as communism.

This is what i can withdraw from using reason anyways.

[jasmine]

Science has given us medicine, transportation, nurishment, and entertainment.

Religion has given us zippo&#33; Except maybe some cold comfort for uneasy people. Who quite frankly humanity could do without.

Comrade Floyd - it&#39;s true that science has given us movies (what would we do without them?), global warming (maybe resulting in the extinction of the species), nuclear weapons (maybe also resulting in the extinction of the species) and some very sophisticated torture techniques - sorry just putting the other side of the equation.

Religion has given you zippo. It is presumptuous of you to believe that everybody experiences religion as you do.

Science can make us more comfortable or it can kill us but it cannot tell us whether or not our lives have any meaning.

[La Comédie Noire]

Comrade Floyd - it&#39;s true that science has given us movies (what would we do without them?), global warming (maybe resulting in the extinction of the species), nuclear weapons (maybe also resulting in the extinction of the species) and some very sophisticated torture techniques - sorry just putting the other side of the equation.

Science guided under the capitalist system gave us nuclear bombs and global warming. Torture techniques were created by people wanting information from other people. Science is just a tool, a very effective one. Like all tools science can be misused. That misuse comes from the need to generate short term profit & imperialist conquests.


Religion has given you zippo. It is presumptuous of you to believe that everybody experiences religion as you do.

I mean in regards to material reality how has religion furthered us?


Science can make us more comfortable or it can kill us but it cannot tell us whether or not our lives have any meaning.

Science is a tool grounded in material reality just because it has the capacity to kill us dosen&#39;t mean we should denounce it. "Meaning" is subjective, we make our own menaing, and that is fine, but when that meaning is like a violent, free loader taking up society&#39;s time it has to go.

[jasmine]

Science is a tool grounded in material reality just because it has the capacity to kill us dosen&#39;t mean we should denounce it.

I don&#39;t denounce science. I use it every day, to travel, to wash my clothes, to make my coffee etc. etc.

Science is about solving or creating practical problems. If you think that all there is to life is material reality then this is enough. Religion is so influential because many people believe there is more to life than what you can detect with the five senses.

I don&#39;t like organised religion. I do not belong to any group, faith or church. But I&#39;m afraid the &#39;big bang&#39; just doesn&#39;t do it for me. There is, I believe, a mystery to life, and science, mostly doesn&#39;t address this mystery. Although quantum physics is making some pretty interesting observations.

[La Comédie Noire]

I don&#39;t denounce science. I use it every day, to travel, to wash my clothes, to make my coffee etc. etc.

Yes you use it everyday, but do you use religion everyday?

Infact look at it this way. Try going five days without any innovations of science to aid you, you find it very hard to live don&#39;t you? Now try the same thing with any religious rituals you may have, you find life goes on anyways. Proving that religion and it&#39;s inane rituals, of any kind, have no bearing in the material world. Most people recognize this but state god, or what ever supernatural force you abhere to, is "outside of space and time". Well than I can argue most certainly that Jack Barnes, the main character of The Sun Also Rises, dosent have any visible effect on reality except, for thought, therefore he is simply outside of space and time, which sounds to me like the long way around saying "ficticious". God or any other super natural force is a concoction of the mind, plain and simple.


Religion is so influential because many people believe there is more to life than what you can detect with the five senses.

Yes and this is in the realm of pure speculation. Faith is belief without empirical evidence. No one here is denying that.


I don&#39;t like organised religion. I do not belong to any group, faith or church. But I&#39;m afraid the &#39;big bang&#39; just doesn&#39;t do it for me. There is, I believe, a mystery to life, and science, mostly doesn&#39;t address this mystery. Although quantum physics is making some pretty interesting observations.

The big bang doesnt cut it for you because, as most theologins state, you didn&#39;t see it. Well than i can go ahead and state god doesnt exist because i haven&#39;t seen (him/her/them/it) Tell me if I&#39;m wrong.

I think science uncovers the "mystery" of life quite well without the bullshit. Tell me how does quantum mechanics, the chemical theory that all energey is emitted or absorbed in pieces measured in Planck&#39;s equation E=hv, show existence of a supreme being or super natural force?

[jasmine]

Yes you use it everyday, but do you use religion everyday?

Yes I do use what you call religion every day. It&#39;s much more important to me than coffee.


Faith is belief without empirical evidence.

Of course, but the only evidence you accept is empirical. Is there no other type?


Tell me how does quantum mechanics, the chemical theory that all energey is emitted or absorbed in pieces measured in Planck&#39;s equation E=hv, show existence of a supreme being or super natural force?

I&#39;m not sure this is an accurate description of quantum mechanics. I didn&#39;t say that quantum mechanics shows the existence of God. It doesn&#39;t. I just said it was interesting.

Try to drop the bigotry baggage before debating further.

[La Comédie Noire]

Yes I do use what you call religion every day. It&#39;s much more important to me than coffee.

But I argued that god and religion has no basis in material reality as i stated:


Infact look at it this way. Try going five days without any innovations of science to aid you, you find it very hard to live don&#39;t you? Now try the same thing with any religious rituals you may have, you find life goes on anyways. Proving that religion and it&#39;s inane rituals, of any kind, have no bearing in the material world. Most people recognize this but state god, or what ever supernatural force you abhere to, is "outside of space and time". Well than I can argue most certainly that Jack Barnes, the main character of The Sun Also Rises, dosent have any visible effect on reality except, for thought, therefore he is simply outside of space and time, which sounds to me like the long way around saying "ficticious". God or any other super natural force is a concoction of the mind, plain and simple.

why don&#39;t you try responding to that?


Of course, but the only evidence you accept is empirical. Is there no other type?

Indeed, is there any other type?


I&#39;m not sure this is an accurate description of quantum mechanics. I didn&#39;t say that quantum mechanics shows the existence of God. It doesn&#39;t. I just said it was interesting.

quantum mechanics
n. (used with a sing. or pl. verb)
Quantum theory, especially the quantum theory of the structure and behavior of atoms and molecules.

Planck&#39;s equation expresses how an atom&#39;s electrons move to and away from the nucleas in fixed distances or pieces called quanta. This is called the Quantum Mechanical Model of the Atom. Inturn scientists beleive all energey and motion is quantasized. I think i know what it is.


There is, I believe, a mystery to life, and science, mostly doesn&#39;t address this mystery. Although quantum physics is making some pretty interesting observations.

You just asserted that quantum physics is somehow observing this mystery unfolding. I just assumed that maybe you were tlaking about a super natural force. If that isn&#39;t the case then what were you stating?


Try to drop the bigotry baggage before debating further.

I don&#39;t think i was being bigoted in the least.

[jasmine]

nfact look at it this way. Try going five days without any innovations of science to aid you, you find it very hard to live don&#39;t you? Now try the same thing with any religious rituals you may have, you find life goes on anyways. Proving that religion and it&#39;s inane rituals, of any kind, have no bearing in the material world. Most people recognize this but state god, or what ever supernatural force you abhere to, is "outside of space and time". Well than I can argue most certainly that Jack Barnes, the main character of The Sun Also Rises, dosent have any visible effect on reality except, for thought, therefore he is simply outside of space and time, which sounds to me like the long way around saying "ficticious". God or any other super natural force is a concoction of the mind, plain and simple.

This completely misses the point. You can argue as logically as you want believing that logic is all there is. Religion at an individual level (leave aside the political influence of various churches) is about people finding a meaning in their lives. It&#39;s not much different than why some people adhere to ideologies like Marxism.

[La Comédie Noire]

This completely misses the point. You can argue as logically as you want believing that logic is all there is. Religion at an individual level (leave aside the political influence of various churches) is about people finding a meaning in their lives. It&#39;s not much different than why some people adhere to ideologies like Marxism.

So you just stated that you can&#39;t prove god with logic? I don&#39;t think it misses the point, i think it hits it dead on. I asked that if it has no effect on our material being than how does it relate to real life at all? it dosent. Unless god has remained totally inactive and out of sight thus far in the history of human civillization, than the only other logical conclusion is HE DOSENT EXIST.

I said it was absolutley fine to have personnel faith but I&#39;m asking you to recognize what it is Personnel faith not universal truth.

I don&#39;t know about everyone else on this board but I adhere to Marxism because I see capitalist society as an arena of inequality that causes strife and havoc. I myself have exprienced these inequalitys, I am outraged they are allowed to exist. I&#39;m not just tyring to be comforted by an institution or concept, as you seem to imply.

[jasmine]

So you just stated that you can&#39;t prove god with logic? I don&#39;t think it misses the point, i think it hits it dead on. I asked that if it has no effect on our material being than how does it relate to real life at all? it dosent. Unless god has remained totally inactive and out of sight thus far in the history of human civillization, than the only other logical conclusion is HE DOSENT EXIST.

Why are you so keen to prove that God doesn&#39;t exist?

I have never argued for the existence of God. I have argued that there is more to us than simply a material existance that dies and turns to dust. I do not think this is can be demonstrated logically. But logic is not my God. Logic based on a premise of some version of Marxism is your starting point.

Of course we are having problems communicating.

[La Comédie Noire]

Why are you so keen to prove that God doesn&#39;t exist?

I am trying to show you that the belief in super natural forces, of any kind, are a misintepretation of phsyical reality. God, allah, the force, call it what you will.


I have never argued for the existence of God. I have argued that there is more to us than simply a material existance that dies and turns to dust. I do not think this is can be demonstrated logically. But logic is not my God. Logic based on a premise of some version of Marxism is your starting point.

You have countless times in this thread and around this board argued for some sort of super natural force. Regardless of what you call it you are still arguing for something that has no evidenece to support it. Burden of proof my friend.


Of course we are having problems communicating.

I think I am understanding you just fine, i just don&#39;t happen to agree with you. You are a supporter of intelligent design.

[jasmine]

You have countless times in this thread and around this board argued for some sort of super natural force. Regardless of what you call it you are still arguing for something that has no evidenece to support it. Burden of proof my friend.

I agree I am arguing for something that has no evidence (in your terms) to support it. But I don&#39;t care about your terms. Nor do I care about the burden of proof or logic.

By the way I worked for many years as a computer programmer.

[La Comédie Noire]

I agree I am arguing for something that has no evidence (in your terms) to support it. But I don&#39;t care about your terms. Nor do I care about the burden of proof or logic.

By the way I worked for many years as a computer programmer.

Please tell me in "your terms" how & where a super natural force exists. And if you don&#39;t care about "my terms" than why argue against them? if you are debating, a process that requires proof of your argument, than you need to show another person in someway why you are right. Other wise it degenerates to you saying the samething over and over again.


By the way I worked for many years as a computer programmer.

So you are trying to compare the universe, a natural system, to a computer, a linear system. Now I am interested.

[t_wolves_fan]

Originally posted by Comrade [email protected] 09, 2006 08:06 pm
I am trying to show you that the belief in super natural forces, of any kind, are a misintepretation of phsyical reality. God, allah, the force, call it what you will.


Why do you feel the need?

People are going to believe for their own reasons.

You&#39;re going to have to deal with the fact that you cannot control them into doing otherwise, I guess.

[Bright Banana Beard]

Originally posted by Comrade [email protected] 09, 2006 08:06 pm
I am trying to show you that the belief in super natural forces, of any kind, are a misintepretation of phsyical reality. God, allah, the force, call it what you will.


Why do you feel the need?

People are going to believe for their own reasons.

You&#39;re going to have to deal with the fact that you cannot control them into doing otherwise, I guess.

As you can see many believer died in martyr, it gives them happiness to die with faith than not living it. So will do I, just don&#39;t turn your 5-senses-is-everything to me.

[freakazoid]

An old thread but I had to respond, Planck believed in a God.

[KC]

So religion is merely used to make oneself feel better? Is that what you are saying jasmine?

[freakazoid]

While I can not speak for jasmine it is definitaly not just to make yourself feel better.

[KC]

While I can not speak for jasmine it is definitaly not just to make yourself feel better.

How isn&#39;t it? People use it to explain "life after death" and so that they can believe that there is actually something after death because they are afraid that there is nothing. They are then using it to comfort themselves and make themselves feel better.

[freakazoid]

How isn&#39;t it? People use it to explain "life after death" and so that they can believe that there is actually something after death because they are afraid that there is nothing. They are then using it to comfort themselves and make themselves feel better.

While it has the added benifit of helping you feel better about things that is not the point.

[Jazzratt]

Originally posted by [email protected] 04, 2007 08:21 pm

How isn&#39;t it? People use it to explain "life after death" and so that they can believe that there is actually something after death because they are afraid that there is nothing. They are then using it to comfort themselves and make themselves feel better.

While it has the added benifit of helping you feel better about things that is not the point.
You&#39;re perfectly correct. It&#39;s also very good as a way of shackling our minds.

[Qwerty Dvorak]

While it has the added benifit of helping you feel better about things that is not the point.
The "point" is irrelevant. The fact of the matter is that the only positive function served by religion to society is that of helping the weak-minded to cope with grievances.

[La Comédie Noire]

An old thread but I had to respond, Planck believed in a God.

And how in anyway is that relevant to his equation or quantum mechanics in general?



Why do you feel the need?

People are going to believe for their own reasons.

You&#39;re going to have to deal with the fact that you cannot control them into doing otherwise, I guess.

Why do you feel the need to correct someone when they think a red light means "go" or that the world is "flat? Should we really allow misinformation to be spread just because a few people have sentimental attachments to it? Like what about me starting the first church of Alchemey? Although large amounts of evidence exists that say Alchemey is a psuedo science, a very dangerous one, it is still my right to beleive&#33; So that means It won&#39;t be any fault of my own when i tell my son to drink liquid mercury to get rid of his cold :D

As I&#39;ve said before I&#39;m perfectly fine with faith, people can have all the faith they want, but when it starts manifesting into dogmatic institutions that support racism, sexism, and oppression in general I have a problem. When peopel start enforcing their personel pick me ups and imaginary friends on society in general i think it is a threat against public saftey.

I&#39;m not trying to control anyone, I just wish they&#39;d stop trying to control me.

[rouchambeau]

Just because one has not provided proof for the existence of God does not mean that She does not exist, nor is justification enough to assert that God does not exist.

[razboz]

Originally posted by [email protected] 14, 2007 06:50 am
Just because one has not provided proof for the existence of God does not mean that She does not exist, nor is justification enough to assert that God does not exist.
Well thats the intersting thing isnt it. If i claim that i have invented a cure for AIDS youd like to see proof no? Unitl i show you proof, there is no cure. YOu dont need to spend your time disproving the cure&#39;s existence for it not to exist. Lack of proof is sufficient. SImilarly lack of proof in God makes him/her non-existant, without any firther disproving required.

[Coggeh]

read richard dawkins new book .. suposed to be great for converting people to athiesm :)

[RevMARKSman]

Originally posted by [email protected] 14, 2007 06:14 am
read richard dawkins new book .. suposed to be great for converting people to athiesm :)
I think it would be best if you didn&#39;t use the word "convert" with all its religious connotations. It makes atheists sound "dogmatic" and "irrational". Perhaps "convince"?

Thanks comrade.

[razboz]

No one can be anything more than agnostic, seeing as you cant actually disprove the existence of god, same way you cant prove it.

.Richard Dawkins documentary is brilliant, (http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2456134362500154297&q=the+god+delusion&hl=en) a must watch if i ever saw one.

And i second Monica on the whole conversion thing. People dont convert to atheism. They get Common Sense.

[rouchambeau]

Unitl i show you proof, there is no cure.
No, there is no reason for me to believe in your claim. You still, however, may be telling the truth.

YOu dont need to spend your time disproving the cure&#39;s existence for it not to exist. Lack of proof is sufficient. SImilarly lack of proof in God makes him/her non-existant, without any firther disproving required.

Lack of proof only makes one&#39;s point unprovable to others. It doesn&#39;t strip it of its existence.

[razboz]

No, there is no reason for me to believe in your claim. You still, however, may be telling the truth.

But if nothing justifies a beleif how can anyone claim this beleif to be in any way true?


Lack of proof only makes one&#39;s point unprovable to others. It doesn&#39;t strip it of its existence.

Well how is it relevant if it cannot be proved in any way? If it has no tangible effect on reality then it files under fiction, no?

[rouchambeau]

But if nothing justifies a beleif how can anyone claim this beleif to be in any way true?
That&#39;s true. However, a belief may not be proved, yet still be justified. For example, lets assume a person has a personal experience with God. That person will never be able to prove their experience to a skeptic, but they are still justified in believing due to the experience.

[razboz]

Originally posted by [email protected] 14, 2007 09:06 pm

But if nothing justifies a beleif how can anyone claim this beleif to be in any way true?
That&#39;s true. However, a belief may not be proved, yet still be justified. For example, lets assume a person has a personal experience with God. That person will never be able to prove their experience to a skeptic, but they are still justified in believing due to the experience.
So therefor only people who have had "personal experience" with God could be beleivers. All other beleivers are unjustified.

Also if beleif in God can only be proven to yourself how can you possibly argue that God exists? It is much more likely that your beleif is a delusion or mental illness, is it not? This is the rational scientific explanation which can, and indeed is, supported by scientificly produced evidence, with a replicable method.

[Dr Mindbender]

Originally posted by [email protected] 27, 2006 04:01 am
After more than 6000 years, you&#39;ve still to show one real piece of evidence that suggests that there is a supernatural entity.

Could any of you procure one morsel of proof that there is a God?
The believers would respond &#39;&#39;Prove there isnt a god&#39;&#39;

The truth is , other than philosphical contention, there is no conclusive proof either way.

[Jazzratt]

Originally posted by Ulster Socialist+January 20, 2007 04:02 pm--> (Ulster Socialist @ January 20, 2007 04:02 pm)
[email protected] 27, 2006 04:01 am
After more than 6000 years, you&#39;ve still to show one real piece of evidence that suggests that there is a supernatural entity.

Could any of you procure one morsel of proof that there is a God?
The believers would respond &#39;&#39;Prove there isnt a god&#39;&#39; [/b]
They would be wrong to, as athiests are not making a positive claim about reality therefore the burden of proof does not lie with them.

We should really put that in biog fucking letters at the top of this page.

[Dr Mindbender]

Originally posted by Jazzratt+January 20, 2007 04:24 pm--> (Jazzratt &#064; January 20, 2007 04:24 pm)
Originally posted by Ulster [email protected] 20, 2007 04:02 pm

[email protected] 27, 2006 04:01 am
After more than 6000 years, you&#39;ve still to show one real piece of evidence that suggests that there is a supernatural entity.

Could any of you procure one morsel of proof that there is a God?
The believers would respond &#39;&#39;Prove there isnt a god&#39;&#39;
They would be wrong to, as athiests are not making a positive claim about reality therefore the burden of proof does not lie with them.

We should really put that in biog fucking letters at the top of this page. [/b]
materialism or lack of is a philosophical condition.

The definition of &#39;reality&#39; is also open to debate.

[Jazzratt]

Originally posted by Ulster Socialist+January 20, 2007 04:32 pm--> (Ulster Socialist @ January 20, 2007 04:32 pm)
Originally posted by [email protected] 20, 2007 04:24 pm

Originally posted by Ulster [email protected] 20, 2007 04:02 pm

[email protected] 27, 2006 04:01 am
After more than 6000 years, you&#39;ve still to show one real piece of evidence that suggests that there is a supernatural entity.

Could any of you procure one morsel of proof that there is a God?
The believers would respond &#39;&#39;Prove there isnt a god&#39;&#39;
They would be wrong to, as athiests are not making a positive claim about reality therefore the burden of proof does not lie with them.

We should really put that in biog fucking letters at the top of this page.
materialism or lack of is a philosophical condition. [/b]
This makes no odds.


The definition of &#39;reality&#39; is also open to debate. Not in terms of a logical argument it isn&#39;t.

[Dr Mindbender]

Originally posted by Jazzrat
Not in terms of a logical argument it isn&#39;t.

&#39;&#39;What is real? How do you define real? If by real you mean what you can see, taste, hear and touch then real is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain&#39;&#39;
-Morpheus aka Lawrence Fishburne.

I know its only from a movie but it&#39;s still true. ;)