Recent Posts

21

Chatter / Re: Increasing secularisation - going full circle

« Last post by DVZ3 on Today at 01:08:26 AM »

@DVZIII

I get it.

Let me just confirm it with you.

This is how to make a smart argument to prove how smart you are and how dumb the other guy is:

So it's weird to witness these people like you

Assumptions: Equating people whom you don’t know with people whom you don’t know based on no evidence whatsoever of at least one of those groups

with your life's experiences you've +1'd

Assumptions: Presume certain actions based on implicit motivations that are not proven.

your made up god

Assumptions: There is a god, and it is made up.

you've been passed down by your family/geography (statiscally)

Assumptions: It is ok to add 'statiscally' (sic) if you recognise you are making an assumption because it sounds more scientific. It will definitely fool the C students.

to participate in this forum for most who were like you or never were

Assumptions: Play it safe by covering all possibilities; include those who are and those who aren’t

but just knows how the game works;

Assumptions: It is reasonable to ‘just know’ when I am saying it, but no one else might claim the same privilege – because I KNOW. Ah yeah, and it is a game.

or is rigged and marketed to us dumb humans.

Assumptions: Whether I understand it or not, if it looks like a game it must be a game. And statiscally speaking, if there is a minority of people who think it is a marketing gimmick  then it MUST be true. Because ‘A+ students.

Or maybe it is smart thinking to judge the validity of a religion by the action of the smartest people you could possibly get together (sports people) because that is easier than asking theologians.


So DVZIII,

Since I have the median pole firmly up my arse, why don’t you enlighten me about the superiority of your position?

Please explain to me:

* Atheists claim that they are above ‘superstition’, even though research  suggests otherwise. (http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10508619.2013.771991) In fact, I am reading between the lines, but it might even give you a hard-on?

* When people discover there is no Santa, they don’t turn into a-Santas, and nobody feels compelled to save the children from this abomination and lie, to celebrate an event that is a stupid marketing gimmick. Yet here you are, evangelising in the name of reclaiming society from the warped god-botherers? (Thomas Nagel, (philosopher and atheist), says he simply doesn’t?want?there to be any such person as God. He is honest, what about you?)

* How come it is OK to say that we don’t have a free will, but you chose atheism?

* And if the evolutionary process determined that result for you, it also did the opposite for me; why does it bother you and how am I supposed to change it?

* How come it is the smart thing to do when you are confronted with a question; to say that the question does not exist? That is what I was told when I asked WHY?

* Elucidate for me why the shelves at the bookstores are packed with new-age and self-help literature? What kind of ‘meaning’ are these people looking for and why do they think they are going to get it if it does not exist? It looks awfully that this search for meaning is universal? Yet the only ‘meaning’ there is ‘surviving’, right?

* What actually caused the Universe then?

* Why do you think it is smart to call other people dumb?

Because you don't know how to solve any of today's worlds problems without inventing god. Problems don't get solved by inventing shit up, dennis. Let's let the adults who doubt god caused the universe try and solve it.  you're like a child but I know you're an adult! Children can learn new ideas

You never ask the question of what's more likely!?  dennis, with the information about our universe that we know today, your god doesn't exist. Sorry. Oh, sorry for calling you dumb too. You're not dumb, your just being taken advantage of by others that probably love you but don't know any better either; have you ever set up dominos standing up next to each other so that when you tip the first one over it knocks down the next one, and so on and so forth.

I don't expect you to change you're thinking, you're a big boy now! I was brought up in church and had to break the news as a teenager that I didn't believe in the god my mom did. Call me a 0.1% and proud to be. I know which way our reality and science is trending and it's certainly not the Christian god. She prays for me today still and won't even visit this forum because well, we're an evil cult etc...

Your same personalities were weird to me as a child and they are even weirder today as an adult having met and talked with so many of you in real life at church. Domino... I mean dennis, ever been in a revolving door where the same people and ideas don't ever do anything but go round and round?

dennis, you presume and make assumptions that I have no or minimal experience with personalities like you. I know your hand and you people always think you're holding pocket afterlife aces.  Myself and others called your hand and have never had anything to show.

Why do you feel so proud to be part of a group of people who's Vegas odds are so very poor and predictable?

22

Chatter / Re: Increasing secularisation - going full circle

« Last post by dennis on Today at 12:57:29 AM »

"Everything in the universe that begins to exist has a natural cause"
"Everything in the universe that begins to exist has a natural or supernatural cause"

You would prefer the second statement to the first, right, Dennis?  So, what is your evidential jusification for it?  What is wrong with the first premise, if you have evidence for it but not for the second one?

I would prefer:
Everything in the universe that begins to exist has a natural or supernatural cause

Adding universe and adding natural/supernatural is unnecessary.

The reason for not going with what you think I prefer (option 2) was answered above (#177 I think)

But in essence, if you DON'T adopt it, then you run into a problem of having to keep on asking  - 'and what caused that cause'.

Additionally, I am not sure natural and supernatural covers ALL the options either? I think it does, but you have to be sure before you include them as qualifiers.


EDIT: fixed postr reference to 177

23

Chatter / Re: Increasing secularisation - going full circle

« Last post by dennis on Today at 12:51:57 AM »

I am enjoying this discussion. Kudos to everyone, esp. dennis for sticking with it. 

Drugs, illnesses like epilepsy, schizophrenia and brain injury can produce the same feelings of awe and spiritual connection as religious belief. This fact should at least give people who believe that people in the bible really experienced miracle events pause. Nowadays, anyone who hears voices or sees strange things that nobody else can see is treated for mental illness or assumed to be under the influence of some drug.

I have no doubt that our supernatural experiences has physical/natural manifestation.

That feeling of 'awe' must have natural/physical/chemical component: THAT is how we are made to function.

Awe is not something that is intangible that floats in the air and then magically 'cloaks' me when I look at a sunset.

Awe is the experience we are DESIGNED to have. (We'd say God made us that way, and that we function according to the laws of God.)

To say it can be replicated by drugs is to miss the point entirely.

Th REAL issue is: why do you feel/experience AWE?

Have you ever seen a cow contemplating the sunset? Has your cat ever suggested they go to a retreat?

When A Chimp dances under a waterfall with abandon, it may mimic 'joy' but it aint'.

<>

24

Science / Big Bang Theory Debunked

« Last post by Nam on Today at 12:50:01 AM »

http://www.piercepioneer.com/big-bang-theory-debunked/37461

A new study has looked at a more detailed analysis of microwave polarization from the aftermath of the Big Bang. Scientists are trying to make good or bad of last year’s claim that gravitational waves had been detected from a burst of cosmic inflation.

But they have not been able to confirm this is the case.

And so, famed British physicist Stephen Hawking has been working on a new theory which might predict the origin of the universe.

“The gravitational wave signal could still be there, and the search is definitely on,” comments NASA Jet Propulsion physicist Brendan Crill, who is also a member of the Planck and BICEP2 teams.

Caltech theoretical physicist Sean Carroll commented that “the bottom line is simply that the current data don’t say much about inflation, one way or another.”

He goes on to say, “The original BICEP2 detection seems to have been incorrect, but it was a surprisingly high amplitude, so having it go away just sends us back to where we were a year ago, which is fine. I am not at all sure that we will someday see evidence for inflation, but I’m certainly open to possibility.”

Physicist Matt Strassler discussed that he had hoped to someday see evidence for or against inflation, one way or the other; but then stressed “I don’t think I should presuppose what we might discover.”

He continues, “It’s also worth mentioning that it is fairly common for the first claim of a discovery to not hold up under further scrutiny. That’s part of why we always want to see confirmation from a different experiment before we accept such claims. It’s disappointing this discovery claim was premature, but it’s not particularly unusual. Doing science at the forefront of knowledge is hard.”

-Nam

25

Chatter / Re: Increasing secularisation - going full circle

« Last post by Azdgari on Today at 12:47:49 AM »

"Everything in the universe that begins to exist has a natural cause"
"Everything in the universe that begins to exist has a natural or supernatural cause"

You would prefer the second statement to the first, right, Dennis?  So, what is your evidential jusification for it?  What is wrong with the first premise, if you have evidence for it but not for the second one?

26

Chatter / God and Faith (ROI)

« Last post by DVZ3 on Today at 12:47:05 AM »

ROI or Return On Investment in the financial community. When you offer afterlife as your return how do you compete or withdrawal emotional investment with a person?

Anyways, this article just sparked the obvious I suppose.

http://money.cnn.com/2015/01/28/technology/social/zuckerberg-internet-cook/

"It matters to the kind of investors we want to have," Zuckerberg said."


"If you want me to do things only for ROI reasons, you should get out of this stock, Cook said."

"If we were only focused on making money we might put all of our energy on just increasing ads to people in the U.S. and the other most developed countries," he said. "But that's not the only thing that we care about here."

Regardless of motives, these companies are big enough to simply tell those that don't want to assist in their humanitarian efforts (again, regardless for business motives) to just... Go away then.

Republicans and Donald trump won't understand this whatsoever.

Apples Tim Cook is gay. Turns out god smiles upon those who eat the apple. 

If Jesus were alive today he would also have the most friends on FB but only in certain parts of the world... 

27

Chatter / Re: Increasing secularisation - going full circle

« Last post by dennis on Today at 12:42:23 AM »

@DVZIII

I get it.

Let me just confirm it with you.

This is how to make a smart argument to prove how smart you are and how dumb the other guy is:

So it's weird to witness these people like you

Assumptions: Equating people whom you don’t know with people whom you don’t know based on no evidence whatsoever of at least one of those groups

with your life's experiences you've +1'd

Assumptions: Presume certain actions based on implicit motivations that are not proven.

your made up god

Assumptions: There is a god, and it is made up.

you've been passed down by your family/geography (statiscally)

Assumptions: It is ok to add 'statiscally' (sic) if you recognise you are making an assumption because it sounds more scientific. It will definitely fool the C students.

to participate in this forum for most who were like you or never were

Assumptions: Play it safe by covering all possibilities; include those who are and those who aren’t

but just knows how the game works;

Assumptions: It is reasonable to ‘just know’ when I am saying it, but no one else might claim the same privilege – because I KNOW. Ah yeah, and it is a game.

or is rigged and marketed to us dumb humans.

Assumptions: Whether I understand it or not, if it looks like a game it must be a game. And statiscally speaking, if there is a minority of people who think it is a marketing gimmick  then it MUST be true. Because ‘A+ students.

Or maybe it is smart thinking to judge the validity of a religion by the action of the smartest people you could possibly get together (sports people) because that is easier than asking theologians.


So DVZIII,

Since I have the median pole firmly up my arse, why don’t you enlighten me about the superiority of your position?

Please explain to me:

* Atheists claim that they are above ‘superstition’, even though research  suggests otherwise. (http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10508619.2013.771991) In fact, I am reading between the lines, but it might even give you a hard-on?

* When people discover there is no Santa, they don’t turn into a-Santas, and nobody feels compelled to save the children from this abomination and lie, to celebrate an event that is a stupid marketing gimmick. Yet here you are, evangelising in the name of reclaiming society from the warped god-botherers? (Thomas Nagel, (philosopher and atheist), says he simply doesn’t?want?there to be any such person as God. He is honest, what about you?)

* How come it is OK to say that we don’t have a free will, but you chose atheism?

* And if the evolutionary process determined that result for you, it also did the opposite for me; why does it bother you and how am I supposed to change it?

* How come it is the smart thing to do when you are confronted with a question; to say that the question does not exist? That is what I was told when I asked WHY?

* Elucidate for me why the shelves at the bookstores are packed with new-age and self-help literature? What kind of ‘meaning’ are these people looking for and why do they think they are going to get it if it does not exist? It looks awfully that this search for meaning is universal? Yet the only ‘meaning’ there is ‘surviving’, right?

* What actually caused the Universe then?

* Why do you think it is smart to call other people dumb?

28

General Religious Discussion / Re: Jesus didn't pay for sins.

« Last post by Bereft_of_Faith on Today at 12:41:31 AM »

Here, I'll make it even easier.

God sacrificed __________ so we could be saved from him.

Hmm.  Seems to have worked  .  What's he going to do about all his followers?

29

General Religious Discussion / Re: They're getting desperate...

« Last post by natlegend on Today at 12:35:11 AM »

Meh, I never said they were good arguments.

30

General Religious Discussion / Re: They're getting desperate...

« Last post by Nam on Today at 12:33:38 AM »

I don't presuppose a god. I presuppose a delusion of something that doesn't exist based off the lack of evidence for it.

-Nam