Free-will and Atheism
heavenlyabyss wrote:
Fair enough.
I actually have held your views in the past, but lately it just seems to me that this kind of thinking is counterproductive. If a kind of thinking serves no purpose, is it useful? Yes, maybe. But it is important not to become masochistic as well. Sometimes thoughts run around in my head so much that I end up attacking myself. A person must believe in something if they wish to serve a purpose. They may be wrong, but at least they are not destroying themself in the process.
To me, hard determinism implies moral nihilism which is in my opinion a destructive force in this world. People need to believe things. To deny all reality is damaging to oneself.
Not sure if that makes sense or not. I get your point, but I believe in free will because I find it beneficial. Sometimes we need to think about what is useful. And thinking about what is useful is changing the course of hard determinism, because I believe it be so.
I actually have held your views in the past, but lately it just seems to me that this kind of thinking is counterproductive. If a kind of thinking serves no purpose, is it useful? Yes, maybe. But it is important not to become masochistic as well. Sometimes thoughts run around in my head so much that I end up attacking myself. A person must believe in something if they wish to serve a purpose. They may be wrong, but at least they are not destroying themself in the process.
To me, hard determinism implies moral nihilism which is in my opinion a destructive force in this world. People need to believe things. To deny all reality is damaging to oneself.
Not sure if that makes sense or not. I get your point, but I believe in free will because I find it beneficial. Sometimes we need to think about what is useful. And thinking about what is useful is changing the course of hard determinism, because I believe it be so.
Yes, I can see how it could be counterproductive. I don't experience it as such, but I can certainly see it being that for many people. I find the idea almost comforting. Although in the past I battled against nihilism, and somehow came out both an optimist, and a determinist. I see everything as interconnected, a chain, one, massive, complex chain. I see every event as a manifestation of that chain of events, and while it can seem random, was very much not so. Everything causes everything, so to speak. And somehow, this is soothing for me.
I've contemplated why it is comforting, and all I've come up with is that this concept parallels immortality and permanency. If I am simply one small manifestation of the chain, and my actions are predetermined like the spinning of a gear in a clockwork, then even though I only last a brief moment in comparison, my actions and deeds echo throughout time infinitely. And so, in that sense, I am eternal, even if my consciousness is not.
_________________
I am Ignostic.
Go ahead and define god, with universal acceptance of said definition.
I'll wait.
Vigilans wrote:
cw10 wrote:
Vigilans wrote:
Its not that complicated.. you're just not getting the standards used to define "founding fathers", which I pretty clearly explained, and which two different ones are used in that paragraph which leads to the nonsensical numbers leading to more than 55
Well no again because the paragraph only refers to the 55 delegates that chose to accept both the delegation and to show up and be counted as present. The paragraph is counting the 55 delegate attendees and nothing more. It's not making any reference to "founding fathers", it's a subset of data in reference to the founding fathers, to be more specific the 55 that attended the conference. It's common sense to use the phrase "55 delegates of the constitutional convention" to mean the 55 delegates that were in attendance because they are the only one's who were officially counted by their presence. There are more than 74 founding fathers, but only 74 were delegate candidates. Of those 74 only 55 were either recognized as present, or did not accept the delegation, or did but did not attend.
There's nothing confusing about this very simple mathematical solution, you're just making it harder than it is. The numbers don't lie.
cw10... its the "Religion" subsection in "Founding Fathers of the United States". Of course its making reference to the Founding Fathers... FFS
The author first uses the conference attendees as the example of religious demographics, but clearly mentions people afterwards who did not attend, while still making blanket statements about the "entirety" of the Founding Fathers (thus, not just this one conference, despite it being the source s/he chose to use to demonstrate their point...). This in itself is dishonest since there are dozens and dozens of individuals not even being considered for the "Religion" meta topic. There really isn't anything confusing about this, either you just don't get it or are being typically disingenuous. Furthermore this pointless tangent once again allowed you to slip out of answering the actual questions posed to you
If you can't agree on the hard facts, what's the point to answering any of your questions? What's the problem with making blanket statements about the "entirety" of the Founding Fathers? Why is it dishonest to only choose the most important conference in the history of the nation for a comparison when it's easily highly studied and more widely known?
The author uses the phrase "Of the" in order to single out the particular conference in question.
The second paragraph is important. It's talking about prominent (standing out or projecting beyond a surface or line : protuberant 2 a : readily noticeable : conspicuous b : widely and popularly known : leading — prom·i·nent·ly adverb) Founding fathers not the founders in general. I think this is where you're having trouble. Look up the definition of "prominent", no wait! I did it for you.
You are the one who made an inaccurate blanket statement about the founding fathers when you said they were Deist. I countered with proof of you're fallacy and now you're trying to make me into the villain when I come out with a factual statement and do the math for you and for whoever it was that can't add properly. My math is accurate, the paragraph is accurate, this is the last time I'm going to talk about this. You're clearly not understanding facts, no matter how many times they are presented to you, and these are HARD FACTS, not opinions. Whatever trouble it is you had with your mother, I suggest you leave them out of these forums. It'll help you form a clearer view of reality and may improve your reading and comprehension skills.
Last edited by cw10 on 26 Feb 2012, 6:31 am, edited 1 time in total.
Declension wrote:
MCalavera wrote:
Hard determinism explains everything in this reality
You know that you can make choices. You know this far more intimately than you know about physics. If you really think that the two conflict, then you must abandon the latter, not the former.
MCalavera wrote:
I challenge any absolutist to come up with evidence for an absolute standard for our morals.
You know that there is such a thing as right and wrong. You know this far more intimately than you know about the origin of human societies. If you really think that the two conflict, then you must abandon the latter, not the former.
Hi Declension,
You're sounding more & more 91-ish, but the "you know" part fails because the "knowing" happens after the actions acting out the "choice":
Tadzio wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
Robdemanc wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
Robdemanc wrote:
It started in his mind as a thought.
Do does preparing for you next meal.
Everything we do or say starts as a thought. Our brains operate our bodies.
ruveyn
Does that mean that thinking operates our bodies? And if philosophy is thinking then philosophy operates our bodies. So that makes it important?
Look at the definition. Philosophy is the love of wisdom. Philosophy is not synonymous with thinking.
ruveyn
"Everything we do or say starts as a thought. "
WRONG!! ! A physical response starts before the neurological activity of a "thought" starts. "Thoughts" happen shortly AFTER the physical response.
"Philosophy" is a set neurological tricks from the development of operant scheduled "thoughts" patterned from schedules of reinforcement involving the earlier "trained" physical responses.
Therefore, the easily observed physical body responds to the environment which trains the neurological system to increase the frequency of responses to some distinguishable stimuli. When the physical responses are in the brain and directly correlated to "verbal behaviour" (and "in the brain" making the responses very difficult to detect without extremely sensitive Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Imaging equipment), and function as internal stimuli themselves to surrounding neurological correlations, the convenient, and rather vague, label of "a thought" is frequently applied.
A rather large repertoire of such verbal behaviours is often described as "having" a philosophy.
Tadzio
Near endless loophole technicality arguments against/for such is presently at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_of_free_will
I'm still annoyed about the "meditation to joyfulness" parts, because I have temporal lobe epilepsy that gives me ecstatic seizures. This is often labeled by hard-core pro-meditators as a "dirty" blissfulness instead of a clean & divine pureness of blissful joy from the "hard" working at meditation (or just taking hard drugs like heroin before heroin was made "dirty" (old-school doctors tried stopping bad effects of my epilepsy with opium, which didn't work & wasn't as great)). You can play with your Limbic morals electromagnetically too: http://www.shaktitechnology.com/
You seemed to have confounded "silly" with "utility" here also. Bertrand Russell best marks the difference involving solipsism.
Tadzio wrote:
One of my favorite books which includes a chapter on solipsism is "Human Knowledge: Its Scope and Limits" by Bertrand Russell. I don't agree with it much on technicalities, but it is enlightening on the reasoning and philosophy involved.
I like radical Skinnerian Behaviourism much more, as effective application is the most easily accomplished, and satisfies Ockham's razor the best with the phrase "beyond freedom an dignity". It is in many ways the very inverse of solipsism, as the external environment created me and gave me the knowledge of myself (that's why the "me" uses mainly English, base-10, etc. in "thinking").
I prefer the fictional works of Dostovesky in dealing with Nihilism, as the levels of his address to Nihilism matches the characteristics of the "epileptic personality" that I have much in common with from a lifetime of epilepsy.
Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) and epilepsy have a major intersection, with temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) being a very common form of epilepsy involved. TLE often involves the "Geschwind Syndrome" of emotional/personality characteristics which intersect strongly with Nihilism (there's major disagreement involving experts, but most are on obfuscating technicalities), while ASD is more influencing to the levels of social and emotional interactions with other individuals which matches more closely the characteizations of Solipsism, though Solipsism and Nihilism intersects in many ways.
A very rough clue is books-dot-google for "temporal lobe epilepsy solipsism" giving 36 results.
"temporal lobe epilepsy nihilism" giving 170 results
"autism nihilism" giving 2,360 results,
"autism solipsism" giving 2,760 results.
"nihilism solipsism" giving 13,600 results,
"autism temporal lobe epilepsy" giving 10,300 results,
"epilepsy autism" giving 124,000 results
"epilepsy nihilism" giving 5,750 results, and,
"epilepsy solipsism" giving 399 results.
The ngram shows autism the more recent, surpassing solipsism in 1965, and nihilism in 1983, and nearing epilepsy recently:
http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?co ... moothing=3
Tadzio
I like radical Skinnerian Behaviourism much more, as effective application is the most easily accomplished, and satisfies Ockham's razor the best with the phrase "beyond freedom an dignity". It is in many ways the very inverse of solipsism, as the external environment created me and gave me the knowledge of myself (that's why the "me" uses mainly English, base-10, etc. in "thinking").
I prefer the fictional works of Dostovesky in dealing with Nihilism, as the levels of his address to Nihilism matches the characteristics of the "epileptic personality" that I have much in common with from a lifetime of epilepsy.
Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) and epilepsy have a major intersection, with temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) being a very common form of epilepsy involved. TLE often involves the "Geschwind Syndrome" of emotional/personality characteristics which intersect strongly with Nihilism (there's major disagreement involving experts, but most are on obfuscating technicalities), while ASD is more influencing to the levels of social and emotional interactions with other individuals which matches more closely the characteizations of Solipsism, though Solipsism and Nihilism intersects in many ways.
A very rough clue is books-dot-google for "temporal lobe epilepsy solipsism" giving 36 results.
"temporal lobe epilepsy nihilism" giving 170 results
"autism nihilism" giving 2,360 results,
"autism solipsism" giving 2,760 results.
"nihilism solipsism" giving 13,600 results,
"autism temporal lobe epilepsy" giving 10,300 results,
"epilepsy autism" giving 124,000 results
"epilepsy nihilism" giving 5,750 results, and,
"epilepsy solipsism" giving 399 results.
The ngram shows autism the more recent, surpassing solipsism in 1965, and nihilism in 1983, and nearing epilepsy recently:
http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?co ... moothing=3
Tadzio
Are you also contending that individuals who are visually limited in discerning various tints, as revealed by tests with Ishihara plates, "can't claim to know anything"???
Tadzio
Declension wrote:
Oodain wrote:
our perception is inherently flawed and this leads us to think we have free will
As soon as you allow yourself to think that your own perception might be inherently flawed, then you can no longer believe anything! If your perception might be inherently flawed, then how do you know that anything is real? How do you know that you have really learned about science? How do you know that you were correct when you decided that the science made sense? All of this relies on your perception.
Well, quite. We believe a great number of things that are not based on solid evidence. Most of them are more or less right (let us say, "true enough"). But our perceptions are flawed, and our beliefs are not reliable. We can't actually "know" anything. We can only do our best to interpret what we experience, and one effective way to do that is to compare notes with other people. If you and I get roughly the same experience from something, it's more likely that we're both right than that we're both experiencing the same delusion.
It's not so much a case of our subjective viewpoints "lying" to us. It's more that they're taking shortcuts. Objective analysis is slow and difficult and brings back a lot of unnecessary data. It's easier to assume that, since every other cabbage we've eaten was safe, this one will be too. The odds are good, but we don't *know* - as the occasional food poisoning bout can attest.
Vigilans wrote:
This is such condescending BS. I'm not angry at something that doesn't exist. I get angered by the actions of stupid people in the name of something that doesn't exist. I don't claim to have all the answers, like you and others like you claim. I have doubt, and the drive to discover the truth. You cannot honestly say the same, since you have already made up your mind about what the truth is
Look, as far as the condescending BS goes, I think we see a lot more from the atheists on this forum than from the Christian apologists. I just thought I'd lay out what I see as your subconcious motivation - and risk your anger. Of course I might be wrong, and, I even sort of got told off by Shrox!
Can you go into more detail about what you mean when you say "the actions of stupid people in the name of something that doesn't exist"? Is someone coming up to you and saying "YOU must do this action because the "sky fairy" has come to me and told me to tell you that you have to do it". Is that it, or is it a point about lifestyle? Say me (or any God-believer) has an ordinary life, which involves going to a church, synagogue, or mosque; does this in your opinion make the rest of their life stupid? Or are you talking about, say, David Koresh and his Branch Davidians who exegeted their way into a gun battle with the FBI? I think these episodes are best avoided, and I'll talk about the LRA later.
Every Christian has their doubts. Mother Theresa talks about her doubts in interviews, Cardinal Basil Hume talked about his doubts, and each Christian I know who serves others seem to get doubts. I do too, it seems to go with the territory. If you think I've decided what is true before, I can only say this is not the case. And I don't wish to aplogise for putting my case with confidence, as I don't think this serves anyone. Nelson Mandela said "The world is not served by (you) playing it small"
Vigilans wrote:
So Atheists = Communists/Totalitarians? Stalin killed anyone who disagreed with him. His motivations, as well as Pol Pot and others who try to crush religious (and basically all other free thought, which you seem to neglect considering) thought are to control the minds of the people and ensure there is no competition to their own cult of personality- the state religion of most dictatorships, Communist or Right wing. You assume their tyranny was in the name of the atheism. This is simply incorrect.
You probably didn't know Stalin let the church "return" during the Second World War because he understood the morale boost it gave and gave him a major public relations victory with his people. He was an opportunist, really. If there is one leader who really did hate theism and make a point to persecute it, it was probably Enver Hoxha of Albania, and strangely enough you guys never seem to mention him, instead going for the big cliche names who are themselves flawed arguments in this context. Showing how well learned and informed most willing to go down this road are Hoxhaism involved active campaigns to combat religion in Albania. Even so, what he stands for is certainly not what I or other atheists stand for.
You aught to consider that "Stalinism", "Maoism", "Hoxhaism" are what people were killed for, not "atheism"
You probably didn't know Stalin let the church "return" during the Second World War because he understood the morale boost it gave and gave him a major public relations victory with his people. He was an opportunist, really. If there is one leader who really did hate theism and make a point to persecute it, it was probably Enver Hoxha of Albania, and strangely enough you guys never seem to mention him, instead going for the big cliche names who are themselves flawed arguments in this context. Showing how well learned and informed most willing to go down this road are Hoxhaism involved active campaigns to combat religion in Albania. Even so, what he stands for is certainly not what I or other atheists stand for.
You aught to consider that "Stalinism", "Maoism", "Hoxhaism" are what people were killed for, not "atheism"
The point I'm trying to make is much simpler than you are making it out here. Firstly, you asked me a question, "what is it that atheists do that causes you so much consternation?" There's my answer, boss, no problem with that is there? Look at them, they're athiests and they're killing innocent people, damn them all. And the point I'm making is a kind of tongue in cheek one: if they'd actually gone to work in the garden on their days off, or became Christians, perhaps they wouldn't have given orders that resulted in the slaughter of so many people. But the serious point is, you atheists have no OBJECTIVE reason not to prefer Nazi morality to Christian morality. I'm with William Lane Craig on this one - you have nothing but evolutionary and functional reasons for whatever morality you say you have. The question is how to ground the objectivity of moral truths without reference to God, not whether moral truths can be known without believing in God or whether it’s possible to behave morally without believing in God. The point is neither epistemic nor behavioral, but ontological. Care to respond?
Vigilans wrote:
While on the topic of Uganda, I wonder what your thoughts on the LRA are. Your brethren are fighting to create a Christian theocracy based on the ten commandments- and using tens of thousands of child soldiers to do it! Bravo!
Why do none of you seem to understand what atheism even "is"?
Why do none of you seem to understand what atheism even "is"?
I don't know the basis used by the LRA claim an attempt to build a Christian theocracy, or why they need to use force to pursue their claims. It is a very convenient claim, but I can only say what I did before. The acid test of what makes a Christian a Christian is whether they love their enemies. The Lord's Resistance Army should try that, not bullets. Or using child soldiers. I would freely condemn their actions as terrorist actions.
Quote:
Marx was dead long before the creation of any Communist society
However, his ideas have taken a long time to debunk. His ideas about the dictatorship of the proletariat completely ignores the fact that most revolutions are started by middle class people. LOOK AROUND YOU! The Arab spring continues in being mostly because middle class people decided enough was enough, although presumably they have the most to gain by by maintaining the status quo. Marx's ideas about alienation and explotation of the workers when seems to create unrest where there's none.
Many thanks for the reply you gave.
MCalavera wrote:
I don't talk about cars to my hair stylist either. In fact, I don't even talk about cars much to anyone.
I do love discussing the flaws of religion, though. Can't stop me from doing so.
I do love discussing the flaws of religion, though. Can't stop me from doing so.
Oh yes, just like Herod in the gospels. He listened to John the Baptist, even though he'd thrown him into prison. Are you a Herodian, Mr Calavera? And I read in your posts that you used to be a Christian: is this why you like slamming the likes of me?
You don't get any more fanatical and evangelical anti-smoker than an ex-smoker......
NarcissusSavage wrote:
I will out of necessity of communication sometimes speak as if I am certain of something, but even then I'm not completely certain of it. It's just practical to do so. Belief is silly, in my opinion, possibly even delusional.
First, I think that usually when people say that they believe something, all of these quibbles are already included in their use of the word "believe". So maybe you're not really being more careful than anyone else, you're just labouring the point more.
Second, there are some things that you are completely certain about, such as that you exist and can make choices.
Oodain wrote:
you say that science cannot be more reliable than perception itself, yet it is blatantly obvious that all science is, is a way to improve upon our perceptive abilities through systematic observation and comparrison of those observations.
How do you know that it is "blatantly obvious"? Didn't you come to the conclusion that it is blatantly obvious by using your perceptions?
Oodain wrote:
you also say you can prove you can make a choice, please do, in a peer reviewable manner,
I don't say that I can prove I can make choices. I say that I know that I can make choices.
Oodain wrote:
to be honest i dont even know how anyone cant see that human perception has obvious limitations
What would we use to see such a thing? Our perceptions, of course!
Tazdio wrote:
You're sounding more & more 91-ish
Yes, that's not a coincidence. I am trying on different worldviews to see if I can find one that doesn't have holes in it. I am not a very original person, I just steal things.
Tazdio wrote:
but the "you know" part fails because the "knowing" happens after the actions acting out the "choice":
I don't see it like that. It's not just that I remember making choices, and assume that I can make choices by induction. It's more than that. I know that I can make choices, as an essential property of the sort of thing that I am, call it an agent, a person, whatever. The ability to make choices is one of the preconditions of my existence.
Last edited by Declension on 26 Feb 2012, 3:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.
1062651stAvenue wrote:
The point I'm trying to make is much simpler than you are making it out here. Firstly, you asked me a question, "what is it that atheists do that causes you so much consternation?" There's my answer, boss, no problem with that is there? Look at them, they're athiests and they're killing innocent people, damn them all. And the point I'm making is a kind of tongue in cheek one: if they'd actually gone to work in the garden on their days off, or became Christians, perhaps they wouldn't have given orders that resulted in the slaughter of so many people. But the serious point is, you atheists have no OBJECTIVE reason not to prefer Nazi morality to Christian morality. I'm with William Lane Craig on this one - you have nothing but evolutionary and functional reasons for whatever morality you say you have. The question is how to ground the objectivity of moral truths without reference to God, not whether moral truths can be known without believing in God or whether it’s possible to behave morally without believing in God. The point is neither epistemic nor behavioral, but ontological. Care to respond?
Hi 1062651stAvenue,
Are you sure you know your dear sweet William Lane Craig's chameleon positions, especially with the examples you cited of the true harsh reality of the exceptional cases you choose as "outlier" exceptions to your views? Do you retain any convenient "doubts" to hide behind with beyond these you particularly deny?
Your position of being the humble servant to a proclaimed morality from divinely inspired "apologists" delivering your religious morality in manner of your self-proclaimed "I'm with William Lane Craig on this one", with your "reality" examples, do you parrot WLC's sympathy for the perpetrator's of crimes against humanity under guidance of the "True God", since the individuals at the consequence end are more
held by believers in the "True God" more quickly delivered to your believed level of divine reward?
Perhaps more layers of divine snake-oil will give a higher level of protection factor in polemics, but some historian is still liable to write a book with such titles as "Hitler's Pope", "Hitler's Willing Executioners", "The Rendering of Cathars By Crusade", and "Nixing Cults By Offered Water From God's Apologists".
In WLC's words, does your position match WLC?:
A "one star" review of William Lane Craig's book "Reasonable Faith: Christian Truth and Apologetics" at amazon-dot-com includes the nearly identical "opposite" quote from Craig's website:
"So whom does God wrong in commanding the destruction of the Canaanites? Not the Canaanite adults, for they were corrupt and deserving of judgement. Not the children, for they inherit eternal life. So who is wronged? Ironically, I think the most difficult part of this whole debate is the apparent wrong done to the Israeli soldiers themselves. Can you imagine what it would be like to have to break into some house and kill a terrified woman and her children? The brutalizing effect on these Israeli soldiers is disturbing."
http://www.reasonablefaith.org/site/New ... le&id=5767 around the 7th paragraph from the bottom of the long web page.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pRujL0t9 ... re=related
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pRujL0t9ui4&feature=related[/youtube]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6JQD6uVVqf0
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6JQD6uVVqf0[/youtube]
Vigilans wrote:
Pretty sure this quote comes from Scott D. Weitzenhoffer
Last edited by Tadzio on 26 Feb 2012, 3:59 pm, edited 1 time in total.
cw10 wrote:
Vigilans wrote:
cw10 wrote:
Vigilans wrote:
Its not that complicated.. you're just not getting the standards used to define "founding fathers", which I pretty clearly explained, and which two different ones are used in that paragraph which leads to the nonsensical numbers leading to more than 55
Well no again because the paragraph only refers to the 55 delegates that chose to accept both the delegation and to show up and be counted as present. The paragraph is counting the 55 delegate attendees and nothing more. It's not making any reference to "founding fathers", it's a subset of data in reference to the founding fathers, to be more specific the 55 that attended the conference. It's common sense to use the phrase "55 delegates of the constitutional convention" to mean the 55 delegates that were in attendance because they are the only one's who were officially counted by their presence. There are more than 74 founding fathers, but only 74 were delegate candidates. Of those 74 only 55 were either recognized as present, or did not accept the delegation, or did but did not attend.
There's nothing confusing about this very simple mathematical solution, you're just making it harder than it is. The numbers don't lie.
cw10... its the "Religion" subsection in "Founding Fathers of the United States". Of course its making reference to the Founding Fathers... FFS
The author first uses the conference attendees as the example of religious demographics, but clearly mentions people afterwards who did not attend, while still making blanket statements about the "entirety" of the Founding Fathers (thus, not just this one conference, despite it being the source s/he chose to use to demonstrate their point...). This in itself is dishonest since there are dozens and dozens of individuals not even being considered for the "Religion" meta topic. There really isn't anything confusing about this, either you just don't get it or are being typically disingenuous. Furthermore this pointless tangent once again allowed you to slip out of answering the actual questions posed to you
If you can't agree on the hard facts, what's the point to answering any of your questions? What's the problem with making blanket statements about the "entirety" of the Founding Fathers? Why is it dishonest to only choose the most important conference in the history of the nation for a comparison when it's easily highly studied and more widely known?
The author uses the phrase "Of the" in order to single out the particular conference in question.
The second paragraph is important. It's talking about prominent (standing out or projecting beyond a surface or line : protuberant 2 a : readily noticeable : conspicuous b : widely and popularly known : leading — prom·i·nent·ly adverb) Founding fathers not the founders in general. I think this is where you're having trouble. Look up the definition of "prominent", no wait! I did it for you.
You are the one who made an inaccurate blanket statement about the founding fathers when you said they were Deist. I countered with proof of you're fallacy and now you're trying to make me into the villain when I come out with a factual statement and do the math for you and for whoever it was that can't add properly. My math is accurate, the paragraph is accurate, this is the last time I'm going to talk about this. You're clearly not understanding facts, no matter how many times they are presented to you, and these are HARD FACTS, not opinions.
cw10 wrote:
Whatever trouble it is you had with your mother, I suggest you leave them out of these forums. It'll help you form a clearer view of reality and may improve your reading and comprehension skills.
More insults... You're a 38 year old man? Are you sure about that?
I think its about time the mods had a word with you
_________________
Opportunities multiply as they are seized. -Sun Tzu
Nature creates few men brave, industry and training makes many -Machiavelli
You can safely assume that you've created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do
1062651stAvenue wrote:
MCalavera wrote:
I don't talk about cars to my hair stylist either. In fact, I don't even talk about cars much to anyone.
I do love discussing the flaws of religion, though. Can't stop me from doing so.
I do love discussing the flaws of religion, though. Can't stop me from doing so.
Oh yes, just like Herod in the gospels. He listened to John the Baptist, even though he'd thrown him into prison. Are you a Herodian, Mr Calavera? And I read in your posts that you used to be a Christian: is this why you like slamming the likes of me?
You don't get any more fanatical and evangelical anti-smoker than an ex-smoker......
Are you kidding me? You think being blunt and honest is slamming you and acting like a Herodian?
1062651stAvenue wrote:
Look, as far as the condescending BS goes, I think we see a lot more from the atheists on this forum than from the Christian apologists. I just thought I'd lay out what I see as your subconcious motivation - and risk your anger. Of course I might be wrong, and, I even sort of got told off by Shrox!
That depends, you guys tend to see any disagreement as an insult or disrespect. Most of the atheists here are rather polite, they just get frustrated arguing with people incapable of logical deduction
Its best that you don't make assumptions about my motivations, since you have no basis to make these assumptions. All you need to know is I have been a lifelong pragmatic atheist, I never "abandoned" faith, so don't make the mistake of thinking I "abandoned" anything or have "subconscious motivation" for thinking the way I do.
It is highly condescending, for example, when theists claim they are just trying to "save" people by forcing their doctrine on them
1062651stAvenue wrote:
Can you go into more detail about what you mean when you say "the actions of stupid people in the name of something that doesn't exist"? Is someone coming up to you and saying "YOU must do this action because the "sky fairy" has come to me and told me to tell you that you have to do it". Is that it, or is it a point about lifestyle? Say me (or any God-believer) has an ordinary life, which involves going to a church, synagogue, or mosque; does this in your opinion make the rest of their life stupid? Or are you talking about, say, David Koresh and his Branch Davidians who exegeted their way into a gun battle with the FBI? I think these episodes are best avoided, and I'll talk about the LRA later.
Well, people certainly do say things like that. In this thread for example, cw10 has gone on about his prejudice in thinking atheists have no moral framework because they "don't believe in anything". Lots of Christians act this way. I get tired of people calling me immoral when often times I am a better person than they are. I get annoyed by religious people forcing their doctrine on the rest of society, or by the fact that they by default consider themselves better than I and others who don't think like them, because they are destined to eternal paradise.
Having religion in one's life does not make the rest of their life stupid
1062651stAvenue wrote:
Every Christian has their doubts. Mother Theresa talks about her doubts in interviews, Cardinal Basil Hume talked about his doubts, and each Christian I know who serves others seem to get doubts. I do too, it seems to go with the territory. If you think I've decided what is true before, I can only say this is not the case. And I don't wish to aplogise for putting my case with confidence, as I don't think this serves anyone. Nelson Mandela said "The world is not served by (you) playing it small"
Ultimately their faith beats their doubt and reason though. Religion/theism is absolute certainty, despite whatever platitudes may be said on its behalf
1062651stAvenue wrote:
The point I'm trying to make is much simpler than you are making it out here. Firstly, you asked me a question, "what is it that atheists do that causes you so much consternation?" There's my answer, boss, no problem with that is there? Look at them, they're athiests and they're killing innocent people, damn them all. And the point I'm making is a kind of tongue in cheek one: if they'd actually gone to work in the garden on their days off, or became Christians, perhaps they wouldn't have given orders that resulted in the slaughter of so many people. But the serious point is, you atheists have no OBJECTIVE reason not to prefer Nazi morality to Christian morality. I'm with William Lane Craig on this one - you have nothing but evolutionary and functional reasons for whatever morality you say you have. The question is how to ground the objectivity of moral truths without reference to God, not whether moral truths can be known without believing in God or whether it’s possible to behave morally without believing in God. The point is neither epistemic nor behavioral, but ontological. Care to respond?
That bolded statement is a big problem for me. You should keep in mind most Nazis and Fascists were Christians... Your assertion that "God" is somehow the ground needed for moral truth is blatantly false, if it were true, Christians would be infallibly good, which is clearly not the case; believing in God has *not* stopped millions of believers from acting immoral or even perpetrating acts of great evil and suffering. Belief in God is no more necessary for moral principles than *not* believing in God. Does that make sense to you?
1062651stAvenue wrote:
I don't know the basis used by the LRA claim an attempt to build a Christian theocracy, or why they need to use force to pursue their claims. It is a very convenient claim, but I can only say what I did before. The acid test of what makes a Christian a Christian is whether they love their enemies. The Lord's Resistance Army should try that, not bullets. Or using child soldiers. I would freely condemn their actions as terrorist actions.
Well clearly they are terrorists, but they are also evidently utilizing the same God as you for their moral groundwork. So how come they are not a moral person like you, and instead immoral and evil like me?
1062651stAvenue wrote:
However, his ideas have taken a long time to debunk. His ideas about the dictatorship of the proletariat completely ignores the fact that most revolutions are started by middle class people. LOOK AROUND YOU! The Arab spring continues in being mostly because middle class people decided enough was enough, although presumably they have the most to gain by by maintaining the status quo. Marx's ideas about alienation and explotation of the workers when seems to create unrest where there's none.
You need to realize the concept of "Middle class" was not exactly existent as we know it at the time. At that time, industry was a new thing, and new social trends were still appearing. However the actual Communist revolutions that have occurred generally occurred in nations without substantial middle class. Because a Communist revolution requires working class people to fit that definition. The "Arab Spring" is fundamentally different.
Alienation and exploitation of the new industrial working class existed before Marx, which is why his works were almost an inevitability... Not the other way around
1062651stAvenue wrote:
Many thanks for the reply you gave.
Thank you for at least cutting back on being condescending, there is no reason for us to be rude to each other
_________________
Opportunities multiply as they are seized. -Sun Tzu
Nature creates few men brave, industry and training makes many -Machiavelli
You can safely assume that you've created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do
heavenlyabyss wrote:
The idea of hard determinism does not sit right with me but if you can give some scientific reason for why I should believe it, I might change my mind.
Do you need a scientific reason for why we should believe there are no souls? Of course not.
Same with free will.
Oodain
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Joined: 30 Jan 2011
Age: 33
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Location: in my own little tamarillo jungle,
Declension wrote:
NarcissusSavage wrote:
I will out of necessity of communication sometimes speak as if I am certain of something, but even then I'm not completely certain of it. It's just practical to do so. Belief is silly, in my opinion, possibly even delusional.
First, I think that usually when people say that they believe something, all of these quibbles are already included in their use of the word "believe". So maybe you're not really being more careful than anyone else, you're just labouring the point more.
Second, there are some things that you are completely certain about, such as that you exist and can make choices.
Oodain wrote:
you say that science cannot be more reliable than perception itself, yet it is blatantly obvious that all science is, is a way to improve upon our perceptive abilities through systematic observation and comparrison of those observations.
How do you know that it is "blatantly obvious"? Didn't you come to the conclusion that it is blatantly obvious by using your perceptions?
Oodain wrote:
you also say you can prove you can make a choice, please do, in a peer reviewable manner,
I don't say that I can prove I can make choices. I say that I know that I can make choices.
Oodain wrote:
to be honest i dont even know how anyone cant see that human perception has obvious limitations
What would we use to see such a thing? Our perceptions, of course!
Tazdio wrote:
You're sounding more & more 91-ish
Yes, that's not a coincidence. I am trying on different worldviews to see if I can find one that doesn't have holes in it. I am not a very original person, I just steal things.
Tazdio wrote:
but the "you know" part fails because the "knowing" happens after the actions acting out the "choice":
I don't see it like that. It's not just that I remember making choices, and assume that I can make choices by induction. It's more than that. I know that I can make choices, as an essential property of the sort of thing that I am, call it an agent, a person, whatever. The ability to make choices is one of the preconditions of my existence.
and all of that is meaningless unless i verify those observations with others,
when you read about many of the finest scientific thinkers the world has seen they all hold one thing in the front of their mind, their own fallibility.
you can decide to make it a black and white question but its not,
some things we verify with others through our entire lives and when we reach adulthood we take them for truths, many of those truths can later turn out to be wrong (many myths fall in this category, cramps when swimming after eating)
it only takes a short review of the countless perception experiments that have been done to show that there is at least some deterministic behavior(one of the reasons magic tricks work, they are basically tricks of perception, some tricks only work because our perception is inherently flawed (the ball going upwards is created in the brain visually where in fact the magician still has the ball in their hand, even they dont know why but it works)
also i am not arguing either for or against hard determinism, only that to say we can objectively prove either in any rational way we first need to know the physical basis of our thought process, something we havent quite gotten to yet.
also you keep saying you know you can make choices, how?
short of viewing multiple timelines that is kinda impossible, you only know you think you have choices.
_________________
//through chaos comes complexity//
the scent of the tamarillo is pungent and powerfull,
woe be to the nose who nears it.
MCalavera wrote:
heavenlyabyss wrote:
The idea of hard determinism does not sit right with me but if you can give some scientific reason for why I should believe it, I might change my mind.
Do you need a scientific reason for why we should believe there are no souls? Of course not.
Same with free will.
I don't believe humans have "souls", as in some essence that outlives us.
shrox wrote:
This thread is boring now!! !!
Hi shrox,
When the enraging of the hordes quits having a beneficial response rate to churches, religions often quickly return to being mostly "boring" repetition from dusty books, since the defense of "How could a dusty book inspire the Crusades?" usually is taken as at least passive innocence.
("John Cornwell has revisited this seminal work of history with a new introduction that both answers his critics and reaffirms his overall thesis that Pius XII, now scheduled to be canonized by the Vatican, weakened the Catholic Church with his endorsement of Hitler?and sealed the fate of the Jews in Europe.").
Tadzio
Tadzio wrote:
shrox wrote:
This thread is boring now!! !!
Hi shrox,
When the enraging of the hordes quits having a beneficial response rate to churches, religions often quickly return to being mostly "boring" repetition from dusty books, since the defense of "How could a dusty book inspire the Crusades?" usually is taken as at least passive innocence.
("John Cornwell has revisited this seminal work of history with a new introduction that both answers his critics and reaffirms his overall thesis that Pius XII, now scheduled to be canonized by the Vatican, weakened the Catholic Church with his endorsement of Hitler?and sealed the fate of the Jews in Europe.").
Tadzio
Yes, good thing I am not Catholic. I don't like fish much anyway.