Know your audience

[Beldaran]

You are correct. I am bigoted against the following:

Murder
Irrationality
Mind Control
Mysticism
Oppression
Bigotry

I am proud to be "bigoted" against those things.

[Dark Entity]

Listen, if religion works for you, then that's great. I have no problem with someone who finds happiness in religion. I don't believe that all Christians and other religious folk are zombies who reject intellectualism, bash gays, and start wars. Some people are truly happy and actually follow the most important message of the Bible... you know, the one about loving other people and being kind and charitable to fellow humankind.

Just don't... DON'T try to push your beliefs on me or anyone else, and especially not on your children. Let people think for themselves, and draw their own conclusions. And for the love of (insert deity), let's all just get along and coexist! There are wonderful and terrible people, and regardless of their beliefs, it is their character that determines what sort they are.

EDIT:
Heh, the content of that post was fairly off-topic.

At my current school, I frequently encounter people who are stubbonly opposed to evolution, and I am irritated at knowing that these same bastards got it removed from my high school curriculum. I'm not paying to attend university to be ignorant, and so I welcome the objective study of this science. Others are quite lazy and just don't want to do the work.

[Breaker]

Beldaran; you're criticizing others that believe the bible holds absolute truth, and yet, you share the exact same mentality. You're being a hypocrite. Get over it and move on.

How is pushing your beliefs on your children, or anyone for that matter, that a higher being doesn't exist any different than teaching them that it does? Athiests and Christians have a lot more in common than most probably care to realize.

[koopa]

I go to Baylor University, where a large majority of the students are evangelical conservative baptists. In other words they are primarily made up of racists, homophobes, and advocates of non-science (or some combination thereof)

If they deny any truth in science as such, that in my humble opinion doesn't exactly qualify them as a "university". Just two questions: 1) Why did they invite Professof Kroto at all if they don't agree with his statements? 2) What are you doing at that place (except probably getting pissed off at it) ?

How is pushing your beliefs on your children, or anyone for that matter, that a higher being doesn't exist any different than teaching them that it does? Athiests and Christians have a lot more in common than most probably care to realize.

Quoted for truth. I might add that I don't think much of parents who don't "force" any idea of right and wrong at all onto their children. I'm not saying atheist parents are principally worse than religious ones, but there's some concept of "right and wrong" that I believe is universal and that all parents should really teach their children.

[Daarkseid]

How is pushing your beliefs on your children, or anyone for that matter, that a higher being doesn't exist any different than teaching them that it does? Athiests and Christians have a lot more in common than most probably care to realize.

Within the context of our society, its not Atheist politicians being elected by idiotic dogmatic Atheist constituents.

This is where Beldaran's normally abrasive and vitriolic diatribes are most appreciated. He's railing against a very real and menacing presence in our system.

I should also point out that the situation Beldaran described was not him saying to a colleague "That speaker was a fundy douche, wasn't he?", but rather the opposite.

Until Atheists are successfully fielding militant candidates for public office, and trying to through force of law and authority, cramming the belief in no god down people's throats,

I refuse to accept the idea Atheists and Christians within the frame of American society today, have all that much in common. Christianity became politicized within the last few decades, resulting in a large organized interest group capable of wielding considerable influence on our government, and unlike Atheists, who can only rely on separation of church and state to keep from being persecuted, fundamentalist Christians are lobbying wherever the hell they can to sidestep the first amendment so as to force their narrower idea of the pursuit of happiness onto a great many people who don't share that narrow view, even fellow Christians of other denominations.

The only thing in common perhaps is the anger one side has towards the other, but Atheist anger never manifests itself in voter initiatives banning stem cell research or gay marriage.

[Beldaran]

Beldaran; you're criticizing others that believe the bible holds absolute truth, and yet, you share the exact same mentality. You're being a hypocrite. Get over it and move on.

Being skeptical and using reason to think for yourself is completely different than believing in magic without questioning it. This is a basic underlying principle of scientific thought. You don't need to call people names because you don't understand the foundation of the argument.

How is pushing your beliefs on your children, or anyone for that matter, that a higher being doesn't exist any different than teaching them that it does?

I would neaver teach a child that god doesn't exist. I would teach him to use his mind to decide what he thinks exist based on available evidence. Since there zero evidence for god, there is only one rational conclusion.

Athiests and Christians have a lot more in common than most probably care to realize.

Perhaps you should read a book before your talk. This is just a compeltely false statement and shows a grade school understanding the philosophical difference between atheism and religion.

[Dechipher]

I would neaver teach a child that god doesn't exist. I would teach him to use his mind to decide what he thinks exist based on available evidence. Since there zero evidence for god, there is only one rational conclusion.

The absence of evidence does not warrant total disbelief. Rather, it only warrants doubt. For something as big as Christianity, one must allow that there may be some merit based solely on the fact that it is so big (or even religion in general.) 10 Million Chinese can't be wrong about rice. It can't just be merely disregarded, but there is not enough evidence to warrant belief either.

[Beldaran]

The absence of evidence does not warrant total disbelief. Rather, it only warrants doubt. For something as big as Christianity, one must allow that there may be some merit based solely on the fact that it is so big (or even religion in general.) 10 Million Chinese can't be wrong about rice. It can't just be merely disregarded, but there is not enough evidence to warrant belief either.

Scientific fact is not a democracy. An idea does not carry more or less weight based on the number of deluded people who accept it as holy truth. Do you believe Thor is the god of thunder? Do you believe in Zues? I thought not. Just because hundreds of thousands of people believe in a magical wizard who created the universe does not give it any scientific merit whatsoever.

How can a billion people be wrong? Because people are fucking idiots that's how.

I don't believe that a magical unicorn named Steve created the earth. This does not require "faith" on my part. I don't believe it because it's a compeltely random, unsupported notion. Christianity is not disprovable, true... and that is part of it's lunacy. The number of non-disproval notions possible is infinite, and therefore Christianity has a mathematical probability that approaches zero.

[The_Amaster]

How can a billion people be wrong? Because people are fucking idiots that's how.

Anyone who's read my posts in "Evolution vs. Creationism" knows how I feel about this. Science is just a religion too, just one that explains itself with rational thought, and anything we may believe about science could, and likely will be proved wrong in the next day, week, year, decade, century, whatever.

How about the Big Bang? There's almost no rational explentaion for how that could have come about, yet almost all scientists accept it.

The number of non-disproval notions possible is infinite, and therefore Christianity has a mathematical probability that approaches zero.

Proof only works in math, and only as an abstraction. Even a landslide of evidence can't really prove anything, just make it very likely.

I'm not religious at all, but I don't really believe in science either. As of about three years ago, I'm just witholding judgement.

Oh, and at this point, shouldn't this be moved to "Think Tank"?

[phattonez]

Beldaran, I don't follow religion because it is the faith of my parents. I have my own reasons and personal experiences that led me to religion. What that professor said was unintelligent and outdated. The church is not out today to ruin religion. Do I need to point out the fact that previous popes have embraced science? The Big Bang, evolution, etc. Although it is not doctrine, these ideas are not shunned by the church. The church has changed from the mindset of the middle ages and is looking for truth, not for personal gain. It seems to me that science has completely abandoned relgion and is now claiming that religion is stupid. This is bigotry and I don't understand it. I have to give credit to Breaker for calling you out on this. How can you support someone who so blindly hates something?