Atheists - prove it.

Post Reply New Topic

Well then, given the choice, I choose deluded!

Com, mista prairie-mon: This may take a while:

MP spricht:

"While my point was really more directed at what appeared to be an apology (in "Apology of Socrates" sense) of leejosepho (as he was playing this "I'm not arguing, even if I'm replying to your points for counterpoints/statements that contradict what you just said"), it is quite clear that you regularly leave comments during theist/anti-theist debates that you have no intention of backing up or carrying through. It's sort of an attempt on your part to have the best of both worlds (deliver monologue's denouncing the philosophical naivete of anti-theists while claiming you're not in a debate)."

A. leejosepho needs no apology My injection evenhandedly pointed to the fact that the "debate" had degenerated toward the "You did - I did not - did so - prove it - I just did - did not" level of unproductivity.

While I am not in fact a moderator of this discussion sdction, I have enough academic in me that the old cab horse - fire horse - war horse syndrome [pick your variant of the figure often draws me to step in and point out the problem when the players are in a clinch.

B. I suspect most of the comments you object to are this type of umpirage from the desk by the blackboard [that it is black dates me of course]. When and if someone asks me to expand on a comment I am pleased to do so. But I am not arguing one side or another. Like I know everything?

C. I examine the available data, including those in the public domain and those in my private box that for one reason or another are not to be shared, and I draw my conclusions/ I assume each here does the same. SINCE I do not have access to all your data nor you to mine, in most cases conviction is a wild goose. I will point to failure to use compatible definitions, and or supply as data my public data and my conclusion.

Honi soit qui mal y pense.

AND again. I shall neither plow nor plough through point after point, be selective, Philologe.

MP resumed his parable and said:

Do you really write like this when you're publishing peer-reviewed lit papers? I mean, I know that standards on the Internet are a trillion times lower for everything, but you're posts frequently point out an irony that is either anachronistic, very obscure and really tangential to the conversation or debate at hand, or related to some obscure linguistic theory that's not being discussed. Not that I'm not tangential or obscure from time to time, but I try to stay on point or at least make comprehensible points when I'm arguing on a topic on these forums.

Well, of course not. The argument structure and language of a professional paper [peer-review is irrelevant here and a sideroad down which I shall not travel] are vastly different from those appropriate to an advanced discussion group, such as I conceive this to be.

Irony - yes, some of us engage in irony and the raied and slightly vibrant eyebrow. Even the allusion that we know SOME in the group will catch leaving others cold.

Anachronistic - Guilty as charged. My mentality was formed in the late 50s and early 60s and was hardly in synch with my contemporaries. I have tried for decades to spend as little time as possible on O tempora, o mores and bemoaning that I was born out of myh time.

As to tangential - SINCE this is not a formal setting if someone brings up an interesting insight I will often run with it. I usually return to the point.

But obscurity - which I am sure you will grant dodes not equate to obscurantism - If I bring in points linguistic which hoi polloi do not automatically relate to, you bring in obscurities of politique of intersest to you - for which I respect you and them, and I have said I salute the fact that the NDP is in general more aware than other politically minded I have encountered. But still, The Declaration of Pomona and Schultheisz' response to Marx fly as far over my head as Philologos' critique of Government and Binding does over yours.

MP quoth:

"You really haven't provided any "data" for any of your beliefs, and while I agree with some of your Canadian political positions, the fact of the matter is that you just state them out of the blue without any connection to anything. It's "data" in terms that it's your beliefs, I guess, so if I was a survey conductor measuring beliefs I might find what you say somewhat interesting. But in terms of discussion, where one expects statements to be part of a meaningful framework, no - you're beliefs are not interesting."

I have provided minimal data. Which IF they elicited any interest I could and would expand - but as you say on the whole my conclusions are of interest to very few, and when expansion occurs it is likely to be in a pm aside.

Further, I believe much is in the type of data I present. To the thus and so minded [not an Emersonian slur, and he should talk], but an observed fact], "anecdotal data" are not data. "Peer reviewed data" from the wrong peer group are not data. Data should ideally be presented as links to videos, web essays, otr at least journal citations.

The data I throw out [including in formal presentations] are generally output from my own researches, and here from my own experience and items gleand from a life of extensive reading and listening.

IF interest were expressed I could often point one to a source.

But to me what is the interest and value of wading through Hirschfeld's grammar of Revon Podunk, when I have acces to a native speaker of the Utopj dialect?

To end it all.

The KF reference was not a random datum. I would happily even now expand the account if you displayed interest, but to me the PBS principle is at least as valid a rule as Occam, and in my experience more useful.

As to random data and PBS, you obviously remember that 99% of all posted video linkages are useless to my computer. I do not doubt that if I could and did I would find the Bully Boys ffrom Metropolis and Gotham witty and perhaps apropos - I make you that compliment - but youth isd wasted on the young and videos on me.

In the interest of opennness for those who wish they had not bothered reading the past umpteen posts, PBS abridges Pearls Before Swine. The rule of engagement is related but NOT identical to the Thumper Principle [If you can't say nothin' good, don't say nothin' at al[].

I'm not sure I get why Philo's dialogue is incomprehensible to some. Dude "loves words" as his username suggests. And I can relate to that. English class was my best and favorite in high school. I don't seem to have trouble expressing myself clearly in writing, but I do struggle in spoken conversation. I tend to get overly technical in everyday conversation, and even in writing I spend a lot of time thinking up the EXACT word that will relate precisely what it is I'm thinking. I like Philo's approach because it helps me think of the written language as well as the original ideas expressed in novel ways. I think his spelling leaves much to be desired, but the words themselves are no problem. And considering the nature of the forum we're posting in, you know, where THINKING is encouraged, language difficulties ought to be a non-issue.

Certainly. Other than for innocent children who have yet to hear the truth of the matter, only a fool would believe Santa Claus actually exists and/or had filled the stockings hung on the mantle, and then only a fool would even further actually "believe in" (or "place faith/trust in") Santa Claus for any given reason at all. Interesting though, and this has just now struck me: Any parents telling their children Santa Claus will be bringing gifts are actually "believing in" a non-entity (or in the lie of same) to actually bless their children with good feelings! But again, and more simply said:

I really and truly once was actually dying of alcoholism, and so I just did not have any more time to play around within the delusion of "Santa Claus theology" within Christianity as I had always known it.


I usually avoid placing adjectives in front of the word "question", but that is a very astute and extremely-excellent question!

Belief of and/or or belief in and/or even outright disbelief of and/or disbelief in make/s absolutely no difference whatsoever in relation to the power of God in human transformation! Hence, this:

Note: A little background info is needed to catch all of this, yet it still serves well here on at least the specific point at hand ...

"My friend suggested what then seemed a novel idea. He said, 'Why don't you choose your own conception of God (rather than re-trying to re-swallow any particular religious view of the past)?'
"That statement hit me [an agnostic intellectual] hard. It melted the icy intellectual [and agnostic] mountain in whose shadow I had lived and shivered many years ..."
"When, therefore, we speak to you of God, we mean your own conception of God ...
"Do not let any prejudice you may have against spiritual terms deter you from honestly asking yourself what they mean to you ...
"We needed to ask ourselves but one short question. 'Do I now believe, or am I even willing to believe, that there [even] is a Power greater than myself?' As soon as a man can say that he does believe, or is [at least] willing to believe, we emphatically assure him that he is on his way. It has been repeatedly proven among us that upon this simple cornerstone a wonderfully effective spiritual structure can be built."
("A.A.", the book, pages 12 and 47)

So again: Belief of and/or or belief in and/or even outright disbelief of and/or disbelief in make/s absolutely no difference whatsoever here!

i beilieve that there a powers greater than man, doesnt make me religious.

we live in a vast universe with untold possibilities, yet we constrain ourselves by coming up with terms we have no need for.

i think most modern religions stem from nothing more than philosophy and a will to change mankind,
yet the followers of these religions, in the end, became one of the reasons the paradise these religions spoke of never happened.
maybe the authors of the originals were thinking that people would think and learn for themselves, with the help from scriptures as a guide, not as an anwer.

... and you and me and Shaul (Paul), the apostle, all share that particular trait!

QuotedForThePreservationOfTruth

Agreed. Faith is the belief in unprovable things, while religion is how a person expresses that faith (mostly by making up arbitrary dogma and imposing it on others).

... yet another definition of the word 'religion' - a collection of un-necessary rules.

Agreed. I believe that religions start with good intentions...

... and as the saying goes, "The road to Hell is paved with good intentions".

Then they had more faith in humanity than the available evidence would support.

People are prideful, greedy, lustful, deceitful ... sinful ... and this is why Christianity has gone from a simple carpenter's philosophy of "Blessed are those who..." to a state where classism, embezzlement, pedophilia, lies, and generally bad behavior are exhibited by Christian leadership - the "Saved", the "Chosen", and the "Born Again".

Ok so a page in the AA book is supposed to prove that they don't? It's not like you're a professional substance abuse counselor that has treated over 90% of your patients and have the testimony to back it up. You just simply had a crowd of faceless people on the internet vouch for you, and that's not really saying much at all. Besides AA isn't some research institution, it's a program that relies on religious faith to rehabilitate people.

If I went on youtube, acted like an internet thug, and had people believe I was an actual thug, does that make me a real mothaf*ckin' G? Or does it mean preaching to the choir on the internet doesn't mean s**t since my own faceless choir can only scrutinize me so much on the intarwebz?

Last edited by AceOfSpades on 10 May 2011, 10:16 am, edited 1 time in total.

Do you even understand what your AA magic book is talking about? Your quote says that any participant of AA must at least BELIEVE some higher power. People like me who reject any form of 'higher power' cannot even join. Yet you say believe of disbelieve (in) a higher power does not matter?



Based on what you said you are just as innocent. More ironically, you gave an example where the belief in Santa, rather than Santa itself that produces the result.

My brain spells poly kala in vielen Sprachen, but my fingers are ignorant and the keyboard is agin me.

PBS, DGND, CASG, and let him who hath ears.