Observer-Reporter forum

Brant · Posted: Mon Jan 11, 2010 1:16 pm Post subject:

I can (and did) provide my children with moral guidance (some of which is mirrored by Biblical teachings) without the benefit of fairy tales. The hocus pocus and mumbo jumbo is simply extraneous and ultimately useless.
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The priests of the different religious sects dread the advance of science as witches do the approach of daylight.

- Thomas Jefferson

freethinker · Posted: Mon Jan 11, 2010 2:25 pm Post subject:

"You're "holier than thou", and do not even recognize it. As if I am only 5/6 of a man, while your faith gives you that extra 1/6 that only believers have. I can assure you, that I have passion, heart, and soul like you wouldn't ...."
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Well, thank you dick.... for not only your psychoanalysis, but also your assumption of what I believe
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where-ever you get it - there you have it. - Anon.

freethinker · Posted: Mon Jan 11, 2010 2:54 pm Post subject:

Brant, you cannot logically extract the hocus-pocus from childhood guidance, without ultimately recognizing your own guiding force...

Trust me, I am not at issue with atheists, unless they attempt to use science or logic to attack my belief, or defend their own...All choices are legitimate in this game...
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And FYI, on a separate forum, I attack "Christian Fundamentalists"
with fervor
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where-ever you get it - there you have it. - Anon.

dick · Journeyman Joined: 28 Jan 2009 Posts: 3134

freethinker · Posted: Mon Jan 11, 2010 3:05 pm Post subject:

dick, I'm honored....
You have paid close attention...
Now we can disagree and co-exist
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where-ever you get it - there you have it. - Anon.

dick · Journeyman Joined: 28 Jan 2009 Posts: 3134

Amen to that! Wink

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freethinker · Posted: Mon Jan 11, 2010 3:21 pm Post subject:

amen to you, my friend
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where-ever you get it - there you have it. - Anon.

Brant · Posted: Mon Jan 11, 2010 7:27 pm Post subject:

Free, my own guiding force was my knowledge of the difference between good and evil, right and wrong, moral and immoral. And from a very early age, I recognized that the ability to make those distinctions had nothing whatsoever to believe in a guy in the sky and his kid who rose from the dead like a holy zombie.
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The priests of the different religious sects dread the advance of science as witches do the approach of daylight.

- Thomas Jefferson

freethinker · Posted: Mon Jan 11, 2010 8:42 pm Post subject:

I drank a "Holy Zombie" once...I was out for three days.. Nervous humor aside, these distinctions I make do not apply to you; Rather, you apply them to your children as teaching or brainwashing...
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I once knew a guy who invented a Whale God, complete with a set of
commandments that required forgiving your enemies, honoring your elders, helping those less fortunate, etcetera, etcetera...It required a
pilgrimage in August and September, a mile long trek to the beach
carrying a bag of salt, a song, an invocation, a dance, and a procession of throwing salt into the sea, to honor the Whale God
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You and I can easily laugh at his mad invention, as he does too. And so do his grown children...But they will also defend his procedure, and intend to continue the practice with their own children...As I've said before, the human heart needs things that intelligence cannot deliver
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where-ever you get it - there you have it. - Anon.

Amphikalein · Posted: Tue Jan 12, 2010 12:26 pm Post subject:

freethinker · Posted: Tue Jan 12, 2010 2:08 pm Post subject:

Well said, Amph...It's also a logical fallacy to assume that higher education produces greater intelligence...I could give some personal examples, but you've seen them on the Leno show...And it's a proven fact that the modern human brain is capable of the same deductive reasoning as a Cro-Magnon...
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The fact that we have more books on our shelves, does not make us smarter....Though our ancestors could not program a Blackberry, they were not stupid, and they faced the same philosophical questions that we do...Why are we here...? Where are we going...? What do I teach to my aggressive and unruly children...?
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And dick, to claim that spiritual belief has stifled scientific understanding, contradicts all human history....Add it up -- The majority of people are religious, and scientific advancement is still increasing...
And it's quite ironic that you use yourself as an example against
Christian teaching, when you are, in fact, one of the sharpest knives in this forum's drawer.....Something must have worked, doncha think?
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where-ever you get it - there you have it. - Anon.

Amphikalein · Posted: Tue Jan 12, 2010 2:16 pm Post subject:

The idea that science and religion must necessarily be opposed is another fallacy. Except when it comes to fundamentalists. Then again, i suspect even they don't believe what they espouse otherwise they wouldn't feel the need to be so shrill.
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"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter." ~Martin Luther King Jr.

"May we, in our dealings with all the peoples of the earth, ever speak the truth and serve justice." ~Dwight D. Eisenhower

Amphy's blog | Proud Member NDA

Cylinsier · Master Joined: 29 Sep 2008 Posts: 13229 Location: Oh shi-

You are confusing individual intelligence with collective intelligence. Individual people haven't been smarter from generation to generation in a long time, but as each generation dies off, it leaves its work and progress for the next. That is why we have things like blackberries now. They don't just happen because of the times. Its not like 1991 rolled around and blackberries started dropping out of ducks' asses. That's a sign of progress, from the guys at blackberry who built off of mobile phone technology, and those guys who built off of satellite technology and landline technology, and those guys who built off of radio technology, all the way back to some dude in China who put beads on a stick and called it an abacus - the first calculator. If each generation had to start from scratch, we'd still be settling disputes by throwing spears at each other. But collective intelligence is constantly moving forward. It is a given that each generation is smarter than the last because each generation builds on the progress of the last, no matter how insignificant it might have been.

And as we increase our understanding in the fields of science and math, the need for a supreme being lessens.
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Amphikalein · Posted: Tue Jan 12, 2010 2:22 pm Post subject:

Sorry, but 'progress' is one of those things that provokes my terminal cynicism. Sometimes it seems to me that under a facade of moving forward, our collective intelligence is actually devolving. Just read any of Phony's or BB's posts. Laughing

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"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter." ~Martin Luther King Jr.

"May we, in our dealings with all the peoples of the earth, ever speak the truth and serve justice." ~Dwight D. Eisenhower

Amphy's blog | Proud Member NDA

Brant · Posted: Tue Jan 12, 2010 2:26 pm Post subject:

Aside from medical advances, I'm not so sure our lives have improved over the last 100 years.
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The priests of the different religious sects dread the advance of science as witches do the approach of daylight.

- Thomas Jefferson