Know your audience

I like to think that someday, at some point in his life, that kid will stop and think, and that he won't necessarily abandon religion, at least he may abandon some of his closed-mindedness. And that it will be thanks to people like Kroto. Wouldn't that be nice? Of course, what's likely is that he'll continue to be an idiot and he'll marry and have kids and raise them to be idiots, too.

lol mason-dixon line

The problem is people are indoctrinated that their belief is absolute. Anyone who makes them doubt it for even a second is automatically a deceiver and therefore evil. What can you do against that?

That kid doesn't realize it, but he's demonstrating the same sort of ideology the terrorists use to justify themselves.

Cloral wrote:The problem is people are indoctrinated that their belief is absolute. Anyone who makes them doubt it for even a second is automatically a deceiver and therefore evil. What can you do against that?

Build robots that are programmed to exterminate them.

Cloral wrote:That kid doesn't realize it, but he's demonstrating the same sort of ideology the terrorists use to justify themselves.

Exactly. It's the the Christian Right is the American Taliban.

Beldaran wrote:
Exactly. It's the the Christian Right is the American Taliban.

Indeed. I'll be heading to your house with my militia ready to enforce my religion with the sword, err, gun, any moment now. In fact, we have our operatives ready in the highest levels of government and the military. Before you know it, the Constitution will be burned, the Federal Government will be abolished and replaced by the leadership of the SBC, and gays will be taken to death camps. Nonbelievers will be given a choice of deportation, extra taxation, or death.

Starkist wrote:Indeed. I'll be heading to your house with my militia ready to enforce my religion with the sword, err, gun, any moment now. In fact, we have our operatives ready in the highest levels of government and the military. Before you know it, the Constitution will be burned, the Federal Government will be abolished and replaced by the leadership of the SBC, and gays will be taken to death camps. Nonbelievers will be given a choice of deportation, extra taxation, or death.

Christians have done it before [read: middle ages]. There's no reason I shouldn't be constantly wary that you'll do it again. I'm just going on history, behavior, and the underpinnings of your genocidal racist despotic infanticidal schitzophrenic flat earth no science creationistic mysogenistic dictator of a biblical god who not only do I not trust for one second, I don't even believe in him.

Don't try to pretend you don't represent a group of people who obsess over an ancient text written by desert nomads who believed the sun was controlled by magic and who slaughtered their enemies without provocation, their enemies' wives, their enemies kids, their own kids, their own animals, and anyone else who dared to question the supreme authority of the magical being that demanded constant bloody sacrifice to appease his lust for power and brutality.

Riverman wrote:at least he may abandon some of his closed-mindedness

the sun was controlled by magic and who slaughtered their enemies without provocation, their enemies' wives, their enemies kids, their own kids, their own animals, and anyone else who dared to question the supreme authority of the magical being that demanded constant bloody sacrifice to appease his lust for power and brutality.

Normal religion is fine, I like normal religion, that is to say that which has moved with the times, and no longer hold 15th century or older ideas.

Beldaran wrote:Build robots that are programmed to exterminate them.

I was thinking pretty much along those lines. But you make a great point, that these people that have these retarded beliefs in imaginary friends are the same. If you believe in God and that homos and others than are just plain wrong etc etc, the only difference between you and the terrorists we are supposively fighting is that they believe similar retarded things and are killing people over it.

Now many religious retards over here may not be directly killing people over their stupid beliefs, but they do like to make things harder and fuck things up. Example being people against abortion and gay marriage. Sure they aren't shooting anyone (most of them) but they are holding society back and dragging it down.

Anyway, I don't mind people that believe in God, an afterlife, morals, etc. But I don't like people that believe for some reason they have all the answers and everyone must do what they say and other illogical stuff. I mean good will, don't steal, don't murder people, that makes sense for society. But lots of other things don't. The big issue with the middle east is their religion tells them everyone that doesn't believe the same thing as you is evil and you should kill them.

That's why modern (logical) society should group together, and kill them first.

It is a true bigot who does not recognize the one in the mirror.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Breaker wrote:
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.

Breaker wrote: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.

Breaker wrote:
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.

Breaker wrote: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.

Beldaran wrote:

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.

Dechipher wrote: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.

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

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"?

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?

Logical debate on matters of faith is a fallacy. It is a basic fact of logic that should be covered early in any logic book.

A religion, informally, is

a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe

I am going to avoid the word "scientist" to refer to those who place faith in science rather than religion, as in many cases the fanatical take this belief far enough they are willing to violate the principles of science to support their claims. I don't know what to call them but for now I'll just use the phrase "supporters of x theory".

By this definition, we see that science is itself a religion in which one must place faith. Science does insist upon finding provable and repeatable proof behind that which it believes, but in many cases it accepts evidence that is not necessarily as sound as others.

For example, the theories of creation of the universe in both Chrisitanity and the big bang theory are strikingly similar. For simplicity, I will use the term "creation" and its variants in both its creationism sense (spontaneous generation) and the evolutionary sense (existence of a new species through mutation). Both propose the universe was created from some fundamental pieces, and that only via a specific order of events could life be created. Both have a flaw in their logic that requires the believer to make a leap of faith.

For the creationist, one must believe in the existence of God. For the big bang supporter, one must resolve the origin of the matter that caused the big bang.

We have not found evidence to support or deny the existence of a diety. We have not found evidence to explain the origin of the initial matter that fueled the big bang. However, many people place their faith in these theories because, in their eyes, there is enough evidence to overpower the lack of logical, rational evidence.

I understand the fear of indoctrination that athiests hold; as a child I was strongly warned I would be subjected to athiest indoctrination while in college. But understand that science is not a subject that interests the common man to the degree it interests the scientist. Does it matter to my life if I think plants operate by magic or if I understand how the cellular respiration for plants is done? Is the origin of the universe useful to my quest for adequate income to sustain my life?

Please do not discredit all of Christianity because some are content with the knowledge man has already obtained. I am a Christian and I fully support the endeavors of science, even into fields that could possibly discredit my religion. For if I am wrong in my choice of faith, surely I would like to be informed. Keep in mind that many of the world's first scientists were monks. Also keep in mind that at the times when scientists were persecuted for ideas that radically threatened religious beliefs, the clergy held as much (if not more) power than the governments that ruled them.

The enemy is not any system of belief; the enemy is the lust for power that leads men to attack anything that shakes their views of life. The terrorist groups that attack us have very different views of Islamic faith than the majority of the Muslim world. The Westboro Baptist Church stands in favor of views that are radically perpendicular to Baptist doctrine. Galileo was not persecuted by the church alone, but also by defenders of Aristotle's geocentrism. I would be willing to support the idea that in all cases where a religious entity persecuted and crushed a scientific theory, the religious entity had at the very least equal authority to the government of the environment.

No religion is guiltless. In any environment where men gain power based on subscription to a belief, there will be harsh opposition to a new belief that threatens the position of those in power. You'd do well to examine the path you tread, Beldaran. Perhaps the man with the closed mind is you?

I'll close with an interesting observation by a brilliant man, Albert Einstein:

science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind ...a legitimate conflict between science and religion cannot exist.

AtmaWeapon wrote:All that stuff he said

But...but...

Okay, I agree with you. Religion in and of itself--belief in a higher power, or what will happen after death, or who resurrected whom--is not the problem, and surely Kroto knew that and would acknowledge it. It's people of any persuasion that ignore evidence that stands in the way of progress. I'm sure we can all agree on that?

If you are religious, you believe in magic. This precludes you from being a scientist and means your mind is damaged.

Science is not a religion, science and religion are completely incompatible, and people who are religious are suffering from a degenerative self replicating mental virus.

I don't hate religion with a personal prejudice. I feel about religion the way a doctor feels about typhoid fever or malaria. It is a disorder of the mind and I don't like the symptoms it causes society to exhibit, namely intolerance and technological backwardsness.

You are entitled to think whatever you like, but you are not entitled to believe in magical wizards and ancient prophecies and pretend you are a scientist. You forfeit the right to any stance of intellectual legitimacy. You will never be a rational person as long as you believe in magic and any attempt to convince yourself or others is just a symptom of the virus you carry.

Religion is not magic. How can you call this a disease? How can you say that you are not a bigot when you are calling religious people sick?

Hypocrite, bigot, ignorant, and I don't know what else I can use.

Now now boys, let's not call names. I agree that the guy at your collage was out of line, but you're just at the opposite extreme.

And now, in accordance with my role as the Devil's advocate, I must ask...

Fine, if science isn't a religion, but based on solid evidence, show me how the big bang came about. For that matter, I'm very interested in the origin of life. No theories, now, I want solid scientific proof.

Beldaran wrote:If you are religious, you believe in magic. This precludes you from being a scientist and means your mind is damaged.

Science is not a religion, science and religion are completely incompatible, and people who are religious are suffering from a degenerative self replicating mental virus.

I don't hate religion with a personal prejudice. I feel about religion the way a doctor feels about typhoid fever or malaria. It is a disorder of the mind and I don't like the symptoms it causes society to exhibit, namely intolerance and technological backwardsness.

You are entitled to think whatever you like, but you are not entitled to believe in magical wizards and ancient prophecies and pretend you are a scientist. You forfeit the right to any stance of intellectual legitimacy. You will never be a rational person as long as you believe in magic and any attempt to convince yourself or others is just a symptom of the virus you carry.

I was going to pull out phenomenon which science accepts but cannot explain such as gravity, but honestly there's a fundamental difference between what I turn to science to explain and what I turn to religion to explain.

SCIENCE
Let's take ghosts for a fun example that the knee-jerk debater will have a presupposition of my opinion on. "Ghosts are demons or angels and the result of witchcraft"... maybe some Christians believe that but honestly I don't think it's a phenomenon that we should look to religion to solve for us. There's notable research to indicate several natural phenomenon, such as infrasound and heightened electromagnetic activity, that tends to trigger the perception of ghosts in people. There's lots of research to indicate that the brain transmits waves (I'm going to call them brainwaves even though that's really b-movie and I imagine there's probably a scientific term for it) and though I can't seem to quickly locate a source I'm certain I've heard of experiments that seem to suggest individuals in close proximity tend to have brainwaves "in tune" with each other, which suggests the brain can perhaps receive and interact with certain types of wave energy.

Despite all the research into fun science things, there is no proven scientific explanation for ghosts today. Perhaps they are demons and angels. Even if they are, they interact with our physical world and thus there should be a way to detect the presence of a ghost. If the phenomenon is studied enough, perhaps we could create an environment where we could repeatably create a ghost and at this time we will be able to do away with the ghost myths.

I believe there is no reason to say "God made ghosts" and halt research into them entirely. I do believe it's possible they represent some link to the afterlife and therefore too much probing could be dangerous, but I don't think it's probable. Science is clear in its opinion of the afterlife. My doctrine is clear that the afterlife is inaccessible to the living and vice versa. For thousands of years people have reported the existence of ghosts, and it'd be nice if we could have a special on the discovery channel where in several locations they are able to create a phenomenon that looks like a ghost and displays some of the supernatural characteristics that have been reported of them.

Of course, I'm not going to do the research, I'm content to chalk ghosts up to "unknown phenomenon, possibly supernatural in origin" and let scientists that are actually interested in devoting their lives to that study do the hard work. (Actually as of now "supernatural" is appropriate for ghosts since we have no laws in place that explain the phenomenon, but I'm sure you understand I mean it in the "spiritual or magical" sense.)

My point here is that ghosts are an obviously natural phenomenon, and attempting to attribute them to God simply because science has not found the appropriate way to measure them yet is kind of silly. One day someone will make a breakthrough and we will understand them.

Religion
Every day things happen to people. People get sick, people die, people are healed, people have accidents, people have good fortune. Every event in the universe is tied to other events in a complex way (butterfly effect lol). While I don't necessarily subscribe fully to the butterfly effect, I do believe that the universe is deterministic. If you were to capture all of the events of the universe from the start to a particular moment, then start a new universe and make exactly the same decisions, I feel like you'd end up with a universe in the exact same state.

However, noting the state of every event that affects another event is an intractable problem. Suppose I flip a coin. The outcome is affected by the initial velocity of the coin, its mass, its center of mass, the presence of wind, my distance from the center of the Earth, the air pressure, whether it encounters any airborne particles such as dust, and numerous other variables. These variables are all influenced by further variables; eventually we can expand the problem to that of the interaction between billions of particles over the course of a nearly infinite number of decisions.

Because the ability to predict the outcome of an event is so difficult, humans developed the concept of fate to explain why certain events happen. I attribute fate to God because of my religion. A 'scientist' by your definition attributes fate to the inevitable outcome of every event that preceded the event under observation.

I hate the word 'never' based on how many times something that a famous man stated would never happen has been surpassed in my field of science, but I would be willing to put forth the statement that science will never be able to reliably predict the fate of a human. Such matters are the realm of religion and 'magic', which presumably has as much capability to influence fate as does science.

Beldaran, the biggest bigot in this discussion at the moment is you. You put forth the claim that even someone who embraces and encourages scientific study is flawed for attributing fate to the supernatural. You value the concept that people should be able to determine their beliefs free of persecution or threat of force. Yet you simultaneously believe that if someone doesn't believe what you believe, they are wrong and not worthy of being equal.

You, sir, have a mind closed far tighter than this Southern Baptist.

Amaster42 wrote:

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

I knew someone would say this, and I think that's a terrible decision. This topic is generating discussion. Putting it in Think Tank would only take it away from the mainstream posters eye (GD) and slowly the conversation would deteriorate.

Beldaran wrote:
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 fact that so many people believe in a higher beings lends more weight to it and special consideration should be taken into account. I'm not necessarily referring to biblical events and the like (especially the old Testament. Any book as old as the Bible has to be extraordinarily inaccurate.) However, I am merely referencing the existence of a higher being. When so many people 'feel' the presence of something, regardless of whether it is what they think it is or not, you must lend that some credibility. Without ever experiencing that yourself you can't downplay it, because that's incredibly narrow-minded.

You are arguing against specific beliefs of religion, namely Christianity, rather than the idea of a higher being. This is why I feel that atheism is flawed. No matter how hard you try, you can never prove that a higher being does not exist. There is absolutely nothing you can do to prove that. Therefore no intelligent, thinking person can say "There is no God" and have any credibility. You can believe that all you want, but that doesn't make it true. Just like with religion.

Decipher: Even more people "feel" that luck is a completely real entity that has specialized behavior and they put stock in how "lucky" they feel. Probability models have shown luck to be nothing but a construct of ignorant minds. God is no different.

People tend to behave irrationally. You are arguing that if enough people exhibit the same irrational behavior, then it is legitimate and has factual basis. This is INSANE.

I don't believe legitimacy was part of my response. I just said, you can't blithely disregard people's feelings, stating that they are complete morons. People don't "feel" about luck, they think about it. I may think that this brings me luck or that does. I don't have feelings about it, or emotionally respond to it anymore than I would any other facet of my life. However, with religion people do feel so much more, which is part of the problem. They go off how they feel and that leads to friction and all that good stuff. You can't just blindly write off any religious person as a complete moron.

That kid you spoke of in your first post is just as narrow-minded as you are.

Beldaran wrote:Decipher: Even more people "feel" that luck is a completely real entity that has specialized behavior and they put stock in how "lucky" they feel. Probability models have shown luck to be nothing but a construct of ignorant minds. God is no different.

People tend to behave irrationally. You are arguing that if enough people exhibit the same irrational behavior, then it is legitimate and has factual basis. This is INSANE.