Christ the Lord has risen today!

[Justin Z]

1 minute ago, Governor Tarkin said:

 

Alas, it was the days before camera phones were ubiquitous. 

 

I tracked this one down from my facebook. Unfortunately sans foam cross. It wasn't the most comfortable appendage. Especially when the Heath Ledgers kicked in. 

Infinitely more comfortable than the real thing though, one would imagine. 

 

Where's that Dreadlocks Tarkin mockup when you need it? Brilliant work!

[Ray Gin]

9 minutes ago, Governor Tarkin said:

 

Alas, it was the days before camera phones were ubiquitous. 

 

I tracked this one down from my facebook. Unfortunately sans foam cross. It wasn't the most comfortable appendage. Especially when the Heath Ledgers kicked in. 

Infinitely more comfortable than the real thing though, one would imagine. 

 

Amazing

 

[Geoff the Mince]

8 hours ago, Governor Tarkin said:

 

Alas, it was the days before camera phones were ubiquitous. 

 

I tracked this one down from my facebook. Unfortunately sans foam cross. It wasn't the most comfortable appendage. Especially when the Heath Ledgers kicked in. 

Infinitely more comfortable than the real thing though, one would imagine. 

Would 

[Zico]

When did Richard Attenborough’s butler join JKB? Needs to cut down on the blasphemy though.

[Watt-Zeefuik]

Wow, taking this thread as a sample, atheists are rapidly gaining on Christians in general obnoxiousness and assholery. Which given the staggering lead we started with, is really quite an accomplishment. Um, congrats?

[Governor Tarkin]

13 minutes ago, Ugly American said:

Wow, taking this thread as a sample, atheists are rapidly gaining on Christians in general obnoxiousness and assholery. Which given the staggering lead we started with, is really quite an accomplishment. Um, congrats?

 

I'm actually a Christian of sorts too, mate.

But like Hogg's Robert Colwan-Wringham, I'm convinced I've been given a free pass. 

 

?

Edited April 22, 2019 by Governor Tarkin

[AlimOzturk]

14 hours ago, Ugly American said:

Wow, taking this thread as a sample, atheists are rapidly gaining on Christians in general obnoxiousness and assholery. Which given the staggering lead we started with, is really quite an accomplishment. Um, congrats?

 

.

 

Edited April 23, 2019 by AlimOzturk

[Maple Leaf]

21 hours ago, Ugly American said:

Wow, taking this thread as a sample, atheists are rapidly gaining on Christians in general obnoxiousness and assholery. Which given the staggering lead we started with, is really quite an accomplishment. Um, congrats?

 

Possibly true wrt obnoxiousness and assholery, but Christians have a 500-600 year lead in terms of hangings and burnings, which atheists haven't started yet.

[Watt-Zeefuik]

9 minutes ago, Maple Leaf said:

 

Possibly true wrt obnoxiousness and assholery, but Christians have a 500-600 year lead in terms of hangings and burnings, which atheists haven't started yet.

 

We definitely have a substantial lead and a millennium head start, but Pol Pot did his best to get the atheist religious repression tallies up there. Mao's Cultural Revolution is also not given nearly enough credit for modernist atheism's contribution to mass suffering and death.

 

(For those ready to pipe up with, "well, we're not those kinds of atheists!" welcome to compartmentalization and rationalization, Christians have been really good at that too.)

[Jambo-Jimbo]

2 hours ago, Maple Leaf said:

 

Possibly true wrt obnoxiousness and assholery, but Christians have a 500-600 year lead in terms of hangings and burnings, which atheists haven't started yet.

 

Add at least 1000 years onto that time frame, as it didn't take the Christians long to exact revenge on the Pagans of the Late Roman Empire in the 4th century AD.

 

Ok fair enough I'll cut them some slack on that one, because being Lion & Tiger food for a few hundred years would kinda leave a sour taste in their mouths (no pun intended) towards their former Roman masters, so they can have a free pass on this one.

 

The Cathars though, that's a different matter altogether.

[Sidelight]

The New Concise History of the Crusades by Thomas F. Madden.

A must-read book for those who want to understand the history and reality of the so-called crusades.

[Cruyff Turn]

2 minutes ago, Barack said:

We having one-upmanship over which religion or lack thereof, has killed more in history now...?

 

 

Can't wait to see how the next few pages develop, along that track.

 the caveats of kickback take some beating. 

[Cruyff Turn]

3 minutes ago, Barack said:

How many have Jedi's killed.

 

 

 

Quite a few storm troopers and Sith Lords i’d imagine. That wee Yoda guy has probably killed thousands in his 900 years. ☹️

[Cruyff Turn]

13 minutes ago, Barack said:

Hitler: Christian.

 

Yoda: Monster.

 

 

 

Makes you think.

certainly does. 

[Governor Tarkin]

59 minutes ago, alfajambo said:

The New Concise History of the Crusades by Thomas F. Madden.

A must-read book for those who want to understand the history and reality of the so-called crusades.

 

I'll give it a look, cheers. ?

[Governor Tarkin]

42 minutes ago, Barack said:

Hitler: Christian.

 

Yoda: Monster.

 

 

 

Makes you think.

 

[Governor Tarkin]

9 minutes ago, Barack said:

YOU can't ****ing talk!

 

Bloody Death Star.

 

[Watt-Zeefuik]

1 hour ago, Barack said:

We having one-upmanship over which religion or lack thereof, has killed more in history now...?

 

 

Can't wait to see how the next few pages develop, along that track.

 

Bit of gallows, um, I mean, crucifix humor?

 

We could try to figure out who's killed the most per practitioner year, but that makes my head hurt to think about.

[Justin Z]

 

Ended.

[Justin Z]

6 hours ago, Ugly American said:

 

We definitely have a substantial lead and a millennium head start, but Pol Pot did his best to get the atheist religious repression tallies up there. Mao's Cultural Revolution is also not given nearly enough credit for modernist atheism's contribution to mass suffering and death.

 

(For those ready to pipe up with, "well, we're not those kinds of atheists!" welcome to compartmentalization and rationalization, Christians have been really good at that too.)

 

The answer, of course to the guy who loves to preach "but the British focus on a man in the sky is so silly" is "the state was the god". The problem is religious, unthinking devotion, where rationality was suspended on account of true belief. It's not whether the perpetrators of these acts themselves claimed to be atheists. Maybe they were, maybe they weren't--but they were gods to millions of people, and gods kill.

 

Edited April 23, 2019 by Justin Z

[ri Alban]

6 hours ago, Justin Z said:

 

The answer, of course to the guy who loves to preach "but the British focus on a man in the sky is so silly" is "the state was the god". The problem is religious, unthinking devotion, where rationality was suspended on account of true belief. It's not whether the perpetrators of these acts themselves claimed to be atheists. Maybe they were, maybe they weren't--but they were gods to millions of people, and gods kill.

 

Gods don't kill, simpletons do. Of all faiths and especially the aggressive non faith faithers.

[The Real Maroonblood]

8 hours ago, Justin Z said:

 

Ended.

[Joey J J Jr Shabadoo]

The religious groom kids to believe in fairy stories.

[The Mighty Thor]

12 hours ago, Barack said:

We having one-upmanship over which religion or lack thereof, has killed more in history now...?

 

 

Can't wait to see how the next few pages develop, along that track.

I think you'd need to establish a list of the qualifying sky fairies and the derivative branches of followers so we can properly apportion the atrocities. 

Surely christianity leads the way with muslims pushing for a play off spot?

[Sidelight]

36 minutes ago, Joey J J Jr Shabadoo said:

The religious groom kids to believe in fairy stories.

You believe and have faith that your materialistic philosophy is true, I get it.

Faith that natural processes and the laws of nature, wherever they came from, manufactured from nothing all that exists – the universe the creative human mind etc.

Yet you reject the God hypothesis. Why?

 

The tenet that the laws of nature are inviolable is not necessary for science to operate. The rationale of science is to offer natural explanations of natural events. Where is its power or requirement to assert that only natural events can happen?

Edited April 24, 2019 by alfajambo

[Unknown user]

19 minutes ago, alfajambo said:

You believe and have faith that your materialistic philosophy is true, I get it.

Faith that natural processes and the laws of nature, wherever they came from, manufactured from nothing all that exists – the universe the creative human mind etc.

Yet you reject the God hypothesis. Why?

 

The tenet that the laws of nature are inviolable is not necessary for science to operate. The rationale of science is to offer natural explanations of natural events. Where is its power or requirement to assert that only natural events can happen?

Because God isn't real

[Joey J J Jr Shabadoo]

5 hours ago, alfajambo said:

You believe and have faith that your materialistic philosophy is true, I get it.

Faith that natural processes and the laws of nature, wherever they came from, manufactured from nothing all that exists – the universe the creative human mind etc.

Yet you reject the God hypothesis. Why?

 

The tenet that the laws of nature are inviolable is not necessary for science to operate. The rationale of science is to offer natural explanations of natural events. Where is its power or requirement to assert that only natural events can happen?

As mentioned above, there is no such thing as God. 

 

There might have been a chancer, playing magic tricks on folk, but that's no different to the Great Suprendo, the ex-mr Victoria Wood. 

Edited April 24, 2019 by Joey J J Jr Shabadoo

[The Real Maroonblood]

5 hours ago, Smithee said:

Because God isn't real

Exactly because it's a figment of some people's imagination. 

[Maple Leaf]

6 hours ago, alfajambo said:

You believe and have faith that your materialistic philosophy is true, I get it.

Faith that natural processes and the laws of nature, wherever they came from, manufactured from nothing all that exists – the universe the creative human mind etc.

Yet you reject the God hypothesis. Why?

 

The tenet that the laws of nature are inviolable is not necessary for science to operate. The rationale of science is to offer natural explanations of natural events. Where is its power or requirement to assert that only natural events can happen?

 

Science doesn't deal in ontology, it deals in observable facts.  That's why scientific theories can never be used to disprove the existence of supernatural beings.

 

In my view, people should acquaint themselves with the known facts then make up their own mind.  

[maroonlegions]

57 minutes ago, The Real Maroonblood said:

Exactly because it's a figment of some people's imagination. 

Maybe we are all just a figment of each others imagination.  If indeed the universe is some kind of holographic projection ,as some quarters  of "astrophysics"  and "quantum mechanics" is implying then are we all just living in some  kind of  "gravitational"  generated illusion.

 

Another question though, who or what is responsible for the illusion of time, space and matter and dark matter.

 

I dont except the various man made religious/religions views of their creator  or creation,, or indeed the  gods  that come with them but for my part there is something behind this universe and all the other universes that science is currently finding out about ,or at least speculating about through various scientific discoveries. 

 

This is the age of scientific enlightenment, religion in all its forms has had its day, its sciences turn. 

 

The holographic principle is a principle of string theories and a supposed property of quantum gravity that states that the description of a volume of space can be thought of as encoded on a lower-dimensional boundary to the region—preferably a light-like boundary like a gravitational horizon.

 

 

Some peer reviewed papers are speculating that the "holographic principle" is indeed worth pursuing further.

 

This below from Cornell University.

 

The Holographic Principle;

"After a pedagogical overview of the present status of High-Energy Physics, some problems concerning physics at the Planck scale are formulated, and an introduction is given to a notion that became known as ``the holographic principle" in Planck scale physics, which is arrived at by studying quantum mechanical features of black holes".

 

Comments:	15 pages TeX, 1 figure PostScript. Typographical and grammatical errors removed. No changes were made in the physical contents
Subjects:	High Energy Physics - Theory (hep-th)
DOI:	10.1142/9789812811585_0005
Report number:	SPIN-2000/06
Cite as:	arXiv:hep-th/0003004
	(or arXiv:hep-th/0003004v2 for this version)

 

Submission history;

From: Hooft 't G. [view email] 
[v1] Wed, 1 Mar 2000 13:56:41 UTC (22 KB)
[v2] Tue, 16 May 2000 13:28:30 UTC (23 KB)

 

 

 

 

   

  

Edited April 24, 2019 by maroonlegions

[Governor Tarkin]

24 minutes ago, maroonlegions said:

 

The holographic principle is a principle of string theories and a supposed property of quantum gravity that states that the description of a volume of space can be thought of as encoded on a lower-dimensional boundary to the region—preferably a light-like boundary like a gravitational horizon.

 

Been stuck on that bit for a while. I'm glad you were able to clear it up for me.

[Watt-Zeefuik]

20 hours ago, Justin Z said:

 

The answer, of course to the guy who loves to preach "but the British focus on a man in the sky is so silly" is "the state was the god". The problem is religious, unthinking devotion, where rationality was suspended on account of true belief. It's not whether the perpetrators of these acts themselves claimed to be atheists. Maybe they were, maybe they weren't--but they were gods to millions of people, and gods kill.

 

 

So now you're saying that despite the fact that Mao and Pol Pot were strident atheists, and that the Cultural Revolution and Khmer Rouge stated as part of their goals the erasure of religion as an irrational reliance on imaginary gods, the fact that they were revered "as gods" erases their strident, militant, murderous atheism?

 

I mean you just proved my point, unless you're going to make the argument that neither Mao and Pol Pot were real people either.

 

The points of debate should be the practices, actions, orthodoxies, and structures of the practitioners, not whether the gods or Gods or semi-deified humans that were revered have existence that is demonstrable to the practices and institutions of science.

 

I think you've literally just made the case that atheists can in fact be religious, which is a point that atheists always seem to be in a great bother to refute.

[Watt-Zeefuik]

5 hours ago, Maple Leaf said:

 

Science doesn't deal in ontology, it deals in observable facts.  That's why scientific theories can never be used to disprove the existence of supernatural beings.

 

In my view, people should acquaint themselves with the known facts then make up their own mind.  

 

Um, the science of observable facts is an ontology. An ontology is just how you lay out what you're going to break the world down into things.

 

I don't agree with the point alfajambo is making but this rebuttal doesn't make any sense.

[Maple Leaf]

1 hour ago, Ugly American said:

 

I don't agree with the point alfajambo is making but this rebuttal doesn't make any sense.

 

OK I'll take a different approach.

 

For those interested, read Genesis.  Then read 'The Greatest Show on Earth' by Richard Dawkins. Decide for yourself which is likeliest.

[Watt-Zeefuik]

7 hours ago, Maple Leaf said:

 

OK I'll take a different approach.

 

For those interested, read Genesis.  Then read 'The Greatest Show on Earth' by Richard Dawkins. Decide for yourself which is likeliest.

 

And then to really cook your noodle, read "On the modern cult of factish gods" by Bruno Latour, which will make science even weirder than you thought it was but make you love it more all the same.

[ri Alban]

The athiest tolerants being intolerant towards the intolerant tolerants of religion.

?

[maroonlegions]

There  are some right  religious nutters in this world.

 

 

 

 

?

[Maple Leaf]

20 minutes ago, maroonlegions said:

There  are some right  religious nutters in this world.

 

 

 

 

?

 

I'm pretty sure that's a spoof, poking fun at the anti-abortion people.

[The Real Maroonblood]

25 minutes ago, maroonlegions said:

There  are some right  religious nutters in this world.

 

 

 

 

?

[jake]

2 hours ago, Maple Leaf said:

 

I'm pretty sure that's a spoof, poking fun at the anti-abortion people.

It is.

And in Texas there is a law being proposed to outlaw men masterbating along the same line of argument.

[Justin Z]

On 24/04/2019 at 19:45, Ugly American said:

I think you've literally just made the case that atheists can in fact be religious, which is a point that atheists always seem to be in a great bother to refute.

 

I dunno what atheists you've been talking to, but every one I've ever met has agreed that dogmatic adherence to ideas in lieu of critical thinking is the deeper problem. That any religion encourages this outcome because it carries behind it the weight of divine edict is part of the point, but apparently you've been missing the deeper philosophical notion this entire time . . .

 

On 24/04/2019 at 19:45, Ugly American said:

The points of debate should be the practices, actions, orthodoxies, and structures of the practitioners, not whether the gods or Gods or semi-deified humans that were revered have existence that is demonstrable to the practices and institutions of science.

 

. . . which is weird since you said this one paragraph before.

 

I can't speak for these atheists, hypothetical or otherwise, you've been talking to, but if it were possible to search for specific words in my posts on JKB, you'd see the word "dogma" a lot. That I happen to be anti-theism is largely down to the fact that while most human beings might never follow dogma like in, oh I don't know, say Jeremiah 48, "A curse upon anyone who keeps their sword from bloodshed", some people would because it's God's Word™.

 

Or maybe it's that as far as I can see, your bit about "demonstrable existence" is an entirely separate debate? That it is literally impossible for the Abrahamic god described in holy books like the Bible and Qu'ran to possess the omnimax qualities he is claimed to, is a different sort of philosophical statement--an important one, too, but a far more subtle one, deeply removed from the dangerous moral implications of religious dogmatism.

 

Let me give you an example. My friend from my master's programme is a Scottish Muslim hijabi. She is extremely conservative in her faith. She also directly contradicts the teachings of her own text by expressing support for LGBTQ people, opposing the idea of Islam-inspired national legal systems, and so forth. That she holds positions like these in contradiction to what's right there in black and white as God's word because those are good and moral positions to hold increases my respect for her. Likewise Christians such as you who do the same thing with your holy texts. Where mental gymnastics are employed to try to claim there's textual support for things like that, I roll my eyes, because it ultimately just demonstrates the complete irrelevance of books like the Bible or Qu'ran for moral guidance, and tries to ignore the danger that because of their status as divine edict, they are very, very dangerous.

 

Here's another example. Are Trump supporters dangerous in part because they are prone to blind faith? Yes. Are humans generally prone to blind faith? Yes. Are Trump supporters largely evangelical? Yes. Are evangelicals especially primed for blind faith, compared to average? Yes. The problem is lack of critical thinking and believing without consideration every word passed down from on high, be it by Dear Leader Donald or Yahweh. Liberal Christians like you do neither of those things, thank goodness, but you still make excuses for the shitty behaviour of the latter, recorded as it is in your scripture.

[Joey J J Jr Shabadoo]

Bible bashers love making up lies about atheists being religious. They hate the fact we don't need an emotional crutch. 

[Justin Z]

1 hour ago, Joey J J Jr Shabadoo said:

Bible bashers love making up lies about atheists being religious. They hate the fact we don't need an emotional crutch. 

 

While that's true, it's also not fair to say there aren't atheists out there who are absolutely not guided by rationality and the principle that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. In my view, there are far too many who believe absolutely ridiculous things on faith, sometimes on account of the exact same confirmation bias that so entrenches belief in gods.

 

Just because you or I have taken the first major step doesn't mean we're suddenly insulated from falling prey to superstition ourselves.

[Joey J J Jr Shabadoo]

1 hour ago, Justin Z said:

 

While that's true, it's also not fair to say there aren't atheists out there who are absolutely not guided by rationality and the principle that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. In my view, there are far too many who believe absolutely ridiculous things on faith, sometimes on account of the exact same confirmation bias that so entrenches belief in gods.

 

Just because you or I have taken the first major step doesn't mean we're suddenly insulated from falling prey to superstition ourselves.

Fair enough. I don't like being judged by their gullability, though. 

[jambo89]

On 24/04/2019 at 08:19, alfajambo said:

You believe and have faith that your materialistic philosophy is true, I get it.

Faith that natural processes and the laws of nature, wherever they came from, manufactured from nothing all that exists – the universe the creative human mind etc.

Yet you reject the God hypothesis. Why?

 

The tenet that the laws of nature are inviolable is not necessary for science to operate. The rationale of science is to offer natural explanations of natural events. Where is its power or requirement to assert that only natural events can happen?

 

You also Reject the God Hypothesis. May I ask why? 

[Watt-Zeefuik]

12 hours ago, Justin Z said:

 

I dunno what atheists you've been talking to, but every one I've ever met has agreed that dogmatic adherence to ideas in lieu of critical thinking is the deeper problem. That any religion encourages this outcome because it carries behind it the weight of divine edict is part of the point, but apparently you've been missing the deeper philosophical notion this entire time . . .

 

You referenced a kind of snide comment I made in another thread about religion, what I called the "man in the sky" problem. Which was my assertion that people (particularly folks in the UK but also in the US) get way too hung up on debating the proposition, "God exists." Pointing out that Maoists and the Khmer Rouge *acted* in ways that you deem "religious" (and therefore bad) directly demonstrates that the "God exists" proposition is important *within* each religious tradition but is ultimately largely inconsequential in terms of comparative religion, into which the rather crude question, "which is better, Christianity or atheism?" and more nuanced versions of it, fits. I was making the rather narrow point, which you at the time took issue with but later effectively demonstrated agreement with, that we can and should be able to talk about religion in a sophisticated way, but that the actual existence or non-existence of God (whatever God means and whatever existence means, two ENORMOUSLY complicated questions) is effectively tangential to that conversation.

 

Which is to say that saying to a practicing Christian, "your God doesn't exist" isn't an actual useful argument in any way, shape or form. It's at best naive and at worst trolling. (Although I must admit, there's a few Christians whom I endorse trolling at any opportunity, but anyway.) We can have heated, strong, philosophically well-grounded arguments that produce knowledge and clarity and inform each other across faith lines, but that ain't it.

 

12 hours ago, Justin Z said:

 

. . . which is weird since you said this one paragraph before.

 

I'm really not sure what point you're trying to make, or what point you think I'm trying to make that you seem to be working hard to misunderstand, but I'll try to be crystal clear what I'm trying to lay out here that we can hopefully agree upon as a common frame of argument.

 

1. "Atheism" isn't a religion unto itself, because It is simply the disbelief in gods, and therefore has no commonality beyond that.

2. Some atheists, despite not believing in God, can follow dogmas as well. (Leaving aside that there's a lot to unpack in "dogma" but for now, fine.) This doesn't make them theists, it simply makes them dogmatic. 

 

Are you okay with that? Okay, from there, I'm making the following assertions, which I see that you don't agree with, but in my opinion you should.

 

1. Because theism isn't a prerequisite for dogma, focusing on theism when being anti-dogmatic is a mistake.

2. It is instead better to focus on things that we can actually, empirically study across various religions, spiritualities, movements, whatever.

 

Which gets to your next point.

 

12 hours ago, Justin Z said:

 

I can't speak for these atheists, hypothetical or otherwise, you've been talking to, but if it were possible to search for specific words in my posts on JKB, you'd see the word "dogma" a lot. That I happen to be anti-theism is largely down to the fact that while most human beings might never follow dogma like in, oh I don't know, say Jeremiah 48, "A curse upon anyone who keeps their sword from bloodshed", some people would because it's God's Word™.

 

12 hours ago, Justin Z said:

Or maybe it's that as far as I can see, your bit about "demonstrable existence" is an entirely separate debate? That it is literally impossible for the Abrahamic god described in holy books like the Bible and Qu'ran to possess the omnimax qualities he is claimed to, is a different sort of philosophical statement--an important one, too, but a far more subtle one, deeply removed from the dangerous moral implications of religious dogmatism.

 

Let me give you an example. My friend from my master's programme is a Scottish Muslim hijabi. She is extremely conservative in her faith. She also directly contradicts the teachings of her own text by expressing support for LGBTQ people, opposing the idea of Islam-inspired national legal systems, and so forth. That she holds positions like these in contradiction to what's right there in black and white as God's word because those are good and moral positions to hold increases my respect for her. Likewise Christians such as you who do the same thing with your holy texts. Where mental gymnastics are employed to try to claim there's textual support for things like that, I roll my eyes, because it ultimately just demonstrates the complete irrelevance of books like the Bible or Qu'ran for moral guidance, and tries to ignore the danger that because of their status as divine edict, they are very, very dangerous.

 

This is, of course, a personally frustrating line of debate -- despite not knowing much about how I came to my own practices (don't blame you, you can't know everyone's story) you dismiss my experience and your friend as irrational and logically impossible. But in so doing, you effectively try to enforce the Fundamentalist interpretation of what it means to be Christian or Muslim. You're literally helping the fundamentalists do their work for them.

 

This isn't just insulting and dangerous, it's also ridiculously ahistorical. You seem to insist upon a solo scriptura reading of religion as the only viable one, despite the fact that this tenant quite literally did not exist before Luther, and is outright rejected by the Roman Catholic Church! Beyond that, the Eastern churches don't even recognize there being a coherent body of texts that constitute scripture -- there is no "holy book" in an entire ancient wing of Christianity!

 

Now it's *somewhat* fair to criticize both me and your friend on those lines, because of more context. Reliance on scripture *is* historically traditional in the Sunni and Shi'a sects of Islam which it's a reasonably safe assumption that she belongs to, and in the Reformed tradition of Christianity to which I belong. However, you're then insisting on a literalist and inerrant interpretation of scripture, which as I pointed out (I think in the other thread), is scarcely a century old in Christianity! You can say this "directly contradicts the teachings of her own text," but I point out (as I do to Christian fundamentalists and evangelicals making the same argument to me) that among other things, the Gospels record CHRIST HIMSELF showing how to re-interpret texts in context. I mean 2/3 of the New Testament is letters and sermons carefully unpacking older texts in light of the new revelation.

 

Like, I don't expect you to agree, but maybe note that there's a millennia or two of scholarship by millions of scholars, often in heated disagreement with each other, on how to do this, and coming in with very little knowledge of that and saying, "LOL ur doin it rong" and insisting we all adopt a century-old movement tied to American corporate capitalism, because that's the only system you're familiar with, isn't going to be taken very seriously?

 

12 hours ago, Justin Z said:

 

Here's another example. Are Trump supporters dangerous in part because they are prone to blind faith? Yes. Are humans generally prone to blind faith? Yes. Are Trump supporters largely evangelical? Yes. Are evangelicals especially primed for blind faith, compared to average? Yes. The problem is lack of critical thinking and believing without consideration every word passed down from on high, be it by Dear Leader Donald or Yahweh. Liberal Christians like you do neither of those things, thank goodness, but you still make excuses for the shitty behaviour of the latter, recorded as it is in your scripture.

 

If you think that scripture emphasizes nothing but blind faith, you're not reading it very well.

 

However, that *is* a rather common evangelical interpretation. Which raises the point -- you accuse me of somehow enabling the evangelicals, despite the fact that I put way too much of my time into words, actions, and institutions which are attempting to resist what they're doing. On the other hand, by taking the most extreme version of interpretation as the only legitimate one, because it's the easiest one for you, an atheist, to argue against, you're actually helping them. I know you don't mean to, but you are.

[Justin Z]

10 minutes ago, Ugly American said:

1. "Atheism" isn't a religion unto itself, because It is simply the disbelief in gods, and therefore has no commonality beyond that.

2. Some atheists, despite not believing in God, can follow dogmas as well. (Leaving aside that there's a lot to unpack in "dogma" but for now, fine.) This doesn't make them theists, it simply makes them dogmatic. 

 

Are you okay with that? Okay, from there, I'm making the following assertions, which I see that you don't agree with, but in my opinion you should.

 

1. Because theism isn't a prerequisite for dogma, focusing on theism when being anti-dogmatic is a mistake.

2. It is instead better to focus on things that we can actually, empirically study across various religions, spiritualities, movements, whatever.

 

I am mid-paper on Brexit-writing and it's 5,000 words due Monday, but I wanted to say thanks for the reply and also insert something here to consider. Definitely on board with the first #1 and #2--you helped clear up a lot of the angles everyone was shooting from there, us included, and narrowed things down. The second #1 though, we're talking about a world, and especially in our case, a country where the worst kinds of theism built upon the worst kinds of dogmatism do so many anti-progressive political things that hurt so many people, the least of which was getting Trump elected, that by the numbers it simply can't be a mistake to go after it, and go after it hard.

 

And then while I see lots of value in the second #2, and do it myself, that puts me closer to engaging with folks like you on a philosophical level, which given all of our limited time and resources, might be fun, but not really useful in the same way as crushing religious dogmatism and its fruits is--because as I mentioned before, you already behave in ways that directly contradict your scripture because you are a decent human being.

 

--

 

Let's tackle some more later, but that was the primary thrust of what you said that struck me in a way I could bang out a quick reply to without getting too far away from my actual work that counts.

[Watt-Zeefuik]

1 minute ago, Justin Z said:

 

I am mid-paper on Brexit-writing and it's 5,000 words due Monday, but I wanted to say thanks for the reply and also insert something here to consider. Definitely on board with the first #1 and #2--you helped clear up a lot of the angles everyone was shooting from there, us included, and narrowed things down. The second #1 though, we're talking about a world, and especially in our case, a country where the worst kinds of theism built upon the worst kinds of dogmatism do so many anti-progressive political things that hurt so many people, the least of which was getting Trump elected, that by the numbers it simply can't be a mistake to go after it, and go after it hard.

 

And then while I see lots of value in the second #2, and do it myself, that puts me closer to engaging with folks like you on a philosophical level, which given all of our limited time and resources, might be fun, but not really useful in the same way as crushing religious dogmatism and its fruits is--because as I mentioned before, you already behave in ways that directly contradict your scripture because you are a decent human being.

 

--

 

Let's tackle some more later, but that was the primary thrust of what you said that struck me in a way I could bang out a quick reply to without getting too far away from my actual work that counts.

 

Sounds good! I need to be grading papers anyway!

[Governor Tarkin]

Two American intellectual heavyweights slugging it out on Kickback. 

 

Praise be. I love this place. 

[Geoff the Mince]

51 minutes ago, Governor Tarkin said:

Two American intellectual heavyweights slugging it out on Kickback. 

 

Praise be. I love this place. 

And both Trump loving Republicans !