How about " I am an atheist, and proud of it?

[Nightwing 0]

Well...I don't know about you guys...
But I've never seen an atheist starting a war or killing innocent people to spread his belief.

I'm pretty much an atheist, as I believe that if things aren't going my way in life, only I have myself to blame and only I can do something to help myself.

I don't mind JC followers, (my wife is one) as long as they don't try and shove their shit down my throat.

Drags me down, like some sweet gravity...
Nightwing has stirred, and taken to flight...the silence is over, he's shattered the night!!!

[Royd 0]

Welcome to the discussion. I havn't had this much fun since the last time I went skydiving.
Here's a good opportunity to improve your thinking and writing skills.

[kelpdiver 2]

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Well...I don't know about you guys...
But I've never seen an atheist starting a war or killing innocent people to spread his belief.

Unfortunately, this is probably proven wrong by 20th Century communist governments. At its core Marx viewed religion as an institution meant to control the people and the communist governments didn't want to share any authority.

[niolosoiale 0]

Not to be the cold, insensitive one here.

I'm pretty sure when climbing Everest there is an understanding by all those involved that chances are, you will die. As such, if you die, or are at the point of being near death, there is very little anyone can do to help you that doesn't involve harming themselves.

Do you chase someone who is undeployed, unconscious, with no AAD? How far? At which point does it become more harmful than helpful? If ya climb everest, you know the risks, the people you're going with know the risks, and unless you have some sort of ultra close compadre who you can't live without, self-preservation, rationality, many things will be working to let you leave them behind.

If that climber would have died instead of being rediscovered to be alive, I doubt there would be as much fanfare about the situation.

EDIT: Did it suck that they left him? Yes. Do I blame them? No. Was it wrong? No.

[kelpdiver 2]

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If that climber would have died instead of being rediscovered to be alive, I doubt there would be as much fanfare about the situation.

that was a different 'dead' guy. The Aussie lived, the Brit died.

I talked for a good while with my mom about this (for reference, she's heading to Denali on Friday for her own expedition). She pointed out that these climbers had Sherpas who certainly could have been tasked with helping this guy.

[Royd 0]

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Not to be the cold, insensitive one here.

A little play on words. You weren't. They were.

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Do you chase someone who is undeployed, unconscious, with no AAD?

Moutain climbing is generally a slow motion sport. Especially at that elevation. I know few of the details, but if the group had enough combined O2 to get the man to the next base camp, that should have been priority one.
Forget reaching the summit, so that you could take a picture and slap each other on the back.
We are discussing an imbedded sense of morallity.

[Royd 0]

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Society's definitions of right and wrong are constantly changing.

It is called situational ethics.Bill Clinton was a proponent of the movement.
If I can deny something long enough, it didn't actually happen.

[SpeedRacer 1]

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Well...I don't know about you guys...
But I've never seen an atheist starting a war or killing innocent people to spread his belief.

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Unfortunately, this is probably proven wrong by 20th Century communist governments. At its core Marx viewed religion as an institution meant to control the people and the communist governments didn't want to share any authority.

Good point.

As a matter of fact, look at nearly ALL of the hugely-devastating wars of the last three centuries. They weren't about religion!!

If some asshole wants to start a war, you can take religion away, and they'll just start the war in the name of something else (communism, nationalism, racism, imperialism, whatever).

These people who say religion is the cause of all war are blatantly ignoring history.
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on another topic: these people who refute religion because it doesn't explain physical phenomena are missing the point, as I have pointed out previously. Religion is not SUPPOSED to take the place of science. So it doesn't make sense to say it's BS just because it isn't something it was not supposed to be in the first place.

Which doesn't logically stop you from thinking it's BS for other reasons. But you gotta drop the whole religion-as-science angle.

Just because the Bible says we are saved by the blood of Christ does not mean the Bible then needs to describe hemoglobin.


It's kind of weird that fundamentalist Christians and fundamentalist atheists are equally fucked up on this point & have reached the same totally messed up conclusion: That of Science and Religion: if one is correct, then the other must be incorrect.

The Fundies on both sides need to snap out of it.

Speed Racer
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[Luv2Fall 0]

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The Fundies on both sides need to snap out of it.

This is one of the few things I've read today that made any sense.

[SpeedRacer 1]

Fundies

Speed Racer
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[Luv2Fall 0]

[micro 0]

fundies.... oh damn, that made me guffaw heartily!!!!! i hope we can meet and get drunk together some day, catholic scientist to catholic scientist!

and this...

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Just because the Bible says we are saved by the blood of Christ does not mean the Bible then needs to describe hemoglobin.

is a right FINE sig line!!!

I miss Lee.
And JP.
And Chris. And...

[SpeedRacer 1]

oh and also, if the Blood of Jesus saves ALL of mankind, then Jesus must have blood type O rh-negative.

Speed Racer
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[micro 0]

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oh and also, if the Blood of Jesus saves ALL of mankind, then Jesus must have blood type O rh-negative.

true dat boo!

I miss Lee.
And JP.
And Chris. And...

[JackC 0]

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on another topic: these people who refute religion because it doesn't explain physical phenomena are missing the point, as I have pointed out previously. Religion is not SUPPOSED to take the place of science. So it doesn't make sense to say it's BS just because it isn't something it was not supposed to be in the first place.

I think the overlap that people make between science and religion is big enough for it not to be ignored. Both Michelle and Royd have made comments to the effect that no theory (god included) should be ignored when trying to explain natural phenomenon. My point is that god doesn't explain anything so we would be wise to ignore it.

That said, science and religion shouldn't overlap. If you try to apply one to the other it doesn't work so something has to give. That doesn't stop people trying, as the intelligent design crowd illustrate. Science doesn't say anything about god and most religions don't try to take the place of science but they do try to promote some type of theory on subjects that science does better at explaining.

For me, if I apply the scientific method to religion, religion fails on all counts. Unfortunately I can't suspend the scientific side of my brain long enough to take religion seriously.

[Royd 0]

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For me, if I apply the scientific method to religion, religion fails on all counts. Unfortunately I can't suspend the scientific side of my brain long enough to take religion seriously.

Definitions from the dictionary;
Religion-Object of great devotion
Examples
Epicureanism- the doctrines of Epicurus
Gk. philosopher who was regarded as teaching the doctrine that the pleasures of the senses are the highest good.
hedonism- Ethical theory or doctrine that pleasure is the chief good.

My argument here is that everyone practices some type of religious behavior.
Very few people do not have something or someone who is their end all.

Some people practice Christianity, some people are Christians.
Are you practising atheism, or are you an atheist?

By definition,I would be considered a Bohemian.

[pirana 0]

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Why don't you post your own thread and boast about how nothingness has always been there to help you out in your darkest hour? Is it Christ or his flawed followers that really pisses you people off?

Why do so many Christians think that there is either God or nothing?

A freind of mine who found God after being severely injured in a motorcycle crash went from being a healthy skeptic to a totally illogical and unquestioning true believer. I'm OK with his faith in God, though I miss our intellectual dissection of issues. What irks me is he has now bought into many of the wacko fundamentalist ideas and has become heavily anti-science. This despite the fact that with anything less than the current state-of-the-art nueroscience advances, he'd be a vegetable today.

Keep faith where it belongs and stop trying to credit supernatural explanations for perfectly explainable natural phenomena. If you want to believe in a diety that is fine, but denying reality just destroys your credibility as a rational person.

" . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

[pirana 0]

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I'm pretty sure when climbing Everest there is an understanding by all those involved that chances are, you will die.

Actually, there is A CHANCE you will die. Last I looked there had been something like 150 or so deaths on Everest. That was back when the number of successful ascents was about 1200 or so. There are no good numbers on the number of attempts made.

I think that at least 50% of the people to climb would have to die on the mountain for your statement that ". . . chances are, you will die." to be true.

" . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

[JackC 0]

First you'd need to define what you meant by religious behaviour. From what I think your definition is, ie anything done with passion, you could desribe almost anything as religious behaviour - skydiving, beer drinking, republicanism, a deep rooted rubber fetish. I think this definition is so wide it's useless. So I'll stick to the usual "religion=god belief" definition.

And how, pray tell, does one "practice" atheism?

Are you a practicing FSM/thor/zeus/ganesh/helios/hotei /mithras/njord/etc etc atheist?

[Royd 0]

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A freind of mine who found God after being severely injured in a motorcycle crash went from being a healthy skeptic to a totally illogical and unquestioning true believer

That is a personal opinion.

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What irks me is he has now bought into many of the wacko fundamentalist ideas and has become heavily anti-science. This despite the fact that with anything less than the current state-of-the-art nueroscience advances, he'd be a vegetable today.

I believe that is pretty common, regardless of the philosophy or disipline, a person tends to go in full blast i.e. skydiving.

Do you believe the statment That when your number is up, your ticket is going to be punched?
If so, all the science in the world would not have saved your friend's physical life.

[lurch 0]

There's only one road that leads to God and that is through Christ. There aren't many roads. Jesus made that clear. You may not buy that but that's what's in the message.

1: There ARE many roads. An infinite possible number of them. Amazing that you walk through your life every day seeing people walking those other roads but you claim the roads they're walking on don't exist. How limited.
2: You assume everyone wants to go to this god of yours. Maybe some of us want to go elsewhere, anywhere, somewhere far beyond, just so long as it doesn't dead-end in this god thing with no more new questions.

"why live by any rules or moral conduct at all."
Easy answer. Theres far more to life than following a rigid caveman rule structure you think was imposed on you by something else. Many of us, by our own free will, choose to make life for ourselves and loved ones better, just because we can.
Just because you cannot conceive of a moral system not imposed on you by the supernatural and divorced from the value systems it supposedly enforces does not mean that such a system does not exist, nor that there are not people living by it. I am one of them, walking a road you declare nonexistent.
Most of the best people I've known had value systems at least loosely based on the idea of not hurting people because we don't like being hurt ourselves and don't like seeing it happen to others.
Amazing, huh? Authentic self-worth derived from a sense of value of yourself to yourself and others, based on respect for those others, and yourself. We're only here a short time, lets make it as good as we can for each other.
With a value system like this one, what do I need your jesus for?

Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

[pirana 0]

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First you'd need to define what you meant by religious behaviour. From what I think your definition is, ie anything done with passion, you could desribe almost anything as religious behaviour - skydiving, beer drinking, republicanism, a deep rooted rubber fetish. I think this definition is so wide it's useless. So I'll stick to the usual "religion=god belief" definition.

And how, pray tell, does one "practice" atheism?

Are you a practicing FSM/thor/zeus/ganesh/helios/hotei /mithras/njord/etc etc atheist?

Exactly how deeply rooted?

" . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

[pirana 0]

[JackC 0]

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First you'd need to define what you meant by religious behaviour. From what I think your definition is, ie anything done with passion, you could desribe almost anything as religious behaviour - skydiving, beer drinking, republicanism, a deep rooted rubber fetish. I think this definition is so wide it's useless. So I'll stick to the usual "religion=god belief" definition.

And how, pray tell, does one "practice" atheism?

Are you a practicing FSM/thor/zeus/ganesh/helios/hotei /mithras/njord/etc etc atheist?

Exactly how deeply rooted?

Very. One might even say "evangelical".

Hypothetical of course.

[Shotgun 1]

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Atheistic faith: The sudden appearance of all matter from nothing, by nothing, and for nothing.

Actually, I tend to think that the existence of matter is infinite - that it has always been here and always will be, in one form or another (or something like that).