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Author Topic:   Can a valid, supportable reason be offered for deconversion
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


Message 432 of 566 (598302)
12-30-2010 4:53 AM
Reply to: Message 419 by Dawn Bertot
12-28-2010 5:04 PM


Re: other scriptures
. . . you will stick around to be just an irritant. My guess is that this is also the way you conduct yourself in life, not just this board
Your guess is completely wrong. You have demonstrated repeatedly and amply your inability for rational discourse, so trying to have any kind of rational discussion with you is an impossibility. Frankly, all you've been able to stimulate with your perpetual bullshit have been angry outbursts, admittedly most of them fuelled in part by alcohol. I am not proud of those outbursts, but totally rational responses to your bullshit would have garnered exactly the same responses, as we continually see demonstrated by the efforts of other forum members.
Though I am also reminded of a statement by Robert Heinlein who likened a particular endeavor to trying to teach a pig to sing: not only is it doomed to failure, but it also irritates the pig. Well, perhaps that pig (AKA "swine"; see immediately below) does need to be irritated. Perhaps that will make that swine start to think.
It seems you are limited to bad mouthing creationists, calling them liars and generally doing nothing else
I know that I have explained it before, but then we're dealing with Silly Millie here. OK, here I go casting pearls before swine yet again. My minister has taken me to task for that, but here I go again.
As I have explained before, while "creation science" is a pack of lies, that does not make all who regurgitate those lies liars. In order to be a liar, one must be aware that the falsehoods that one is disseminating are indeed false. Most creationists are followers who regurgitate the lies that they have been fed and who in most cases actually believe those lies to be true. The reason why those creationists really hate to discuss and support their claims is because they do not understand the bullshit that they've just regurgitated; they literally cannot discuss any of it. They do not know any better.
There are those who do know better, or should. Those are the actual creationist liars. Though it admittedly does become difficult at times to distinguish between lying and gross incompetence.
Oh, wow. Given your inability to understand English, you obviously could not understand any of what I have just written. Since it has literally been 54 years since I have thought at a 5-year-old's level, I honestly do not know how to bring it down to your level. I'm going to have to take a chance and bring it down not quite as far: liars need to know that they are lying; people who repeat lies are not actually lying, but rather are themselves victims of the liars.
And the effect of repeating a lie while not knowing that it is a lie has the same effect as actually lying. Sorry, I have no idea how to dumb that down to your level. As if that were even possible.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 419 by Dawn Bertot, posted 12-28-2010 5:04 PM Dawn Bertot has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 433 by Dawn Bertot, posted 12-30-2010 11:10 AM dwise1 has replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


Message 437 of 566 (598441)
12-30-2010 9:58 PM
Reply to: Message 433 by Dawn Bertot
12-30-2010 11:10 AM


Re: other scriptures
Dawn, was there ever a time when you could understand what you read?
What is the subject of this topic we're in? Is it for you to quibble over Isaiah? No, it's about the reason(s) for deconversion. That's a subject that you yourself brought up and yet you have been working very hard to avoid it. Rather odd behavior.
Finding the reasons for deconversion should be a very important subject for you and your church, because you're losing the church's next generation in droves. Was 80% to big of a number for you to handle? Try to picture this then: gather together 5 five-year-old fundamentalist Christian children and realize that within the next 24 years, only one of them will still be a Christian -- barring of course any casualties due to faith healing.
Now, shouldn't it be important for you and your church to understand why that is happening? Shouldn't that be a good reason for you to return to the subject of this topic and stop avoiding it?
I've offered an explanation. Fundamentalists have devised their elaborate theologies and bundled them all up with many bits of strings and spit and whatever else, all wrapped up real tight so that it will hold together. Well, it doesn't hold together that well, not all by itself. It takes continual work and reinforcement and invention of new pieces of string to explain away difficulties (eg, what Isaiah really says). When that continual maintenance work isn't done, or when it's not enough, then the entire ball of spit falls apart, leaving the person ripe for deconversion.
Or another more colorful analogy would be a giant iron tank (50 ft tall, 2.3 million gallons capacity) filled with molasses. When it suddenly collapses with huge chunks of iron destroying entire buildings and releases a lethal flood of molasses, what was the cause? Was it the work of anarchists? Was it a single sudden catastrophic event that nobody could have forseen? Or were the signs of trouble there all along, with many cracks forming in the tank over an extended period of time? And what did the company do when it saw that molasses seeping out of all those cracks? They painted the tank that same color of brown, so that nobody would notice, just as your churches simply cover up the problems, such as the massive deconversion of their children, or blame it on "anarchists" and atheists. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molasses_Flood
The "slippery slope" may be an informal fallacy, but it does describe this deconversion process. Bit by bit, one's theology unravels. The first bits may seem unimportant and easy to cover up, like seeping molasses, but it all adds up. It can take a long time, even years, before the entire ball "suddenly" falls apart and leaves a huge mess. And as we read one deconversion story after another, we find that they tried to fight that process, but they couldn't stop it.
"Creation science" is a pack of lies; there's just no other way to say it. And many fundamentalists have incorporated it as a major part of their theologies, all tied up tight with the rest of it. And because those CS false claims are so easy to expose and refute, that will be the first part of the theology's unravelling.
AND YOUR AN ALCOHOLIC
No, I'm not. Occasional and irregular alcohol consumption does not automatically make one an alcoholic -- except maybe within your own beady little universe. But even if I were one, at least it would be infinitely better than being a pathetic liar -- Message 199.
... creation is demonstratable in reality and in argument form from design
Then demonstrate it! I have no problem with people believing in creation nor with them promoting the idea, but only if they do so honestly and truthfully. I do have a definite problem with people using lies and deception, which has been how creationists and IDists have been doing business. Now, please explain why it is that neither you nor other creationists have been able to be either honest or truthful. Why do lies and deception seem to be your only tools?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 433 by Dawn Bertot, posted 12-30-2010 11:10 AM Dawn Bertot has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 439 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-01-2011 12:15 PM dwise1 has replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(2)
Message 447 of 566 (598688)
01-01-2011 8:26 PM
Reply to: Message 440 by Dawn Bertot
01-01-2011 12:22 PM


Re: other scriptures
The only lie is not including design and therefore a designer, in the explanationof the sources of things in existence.
That is not true. Either you are lying yet again (refer to Message 199) or you are completely clueless. Or both.
Creationists have been presenting their claims for decades and, frankly, none of any meaning have been found to be true. Twaites and Awbrey noted this when they retired from 15 years of debating creationists during which the creationists never ever presented any actual evidence nor any actual problems for science or evolution *. Glenn R. Morton noted this when asking his fellow creationist field geologists, all of whom had suffered crises of faith when confronted daily with rock-hard geological evidence that "creation science" had taught them did not exist and could not exist for Scripture to have any meaning (Morton himself was driven to the verge of atheism), whether any of creationism's "challenges to geology" had proven to be true and none of those creationists could think of even one. I myself started to study "creation science" circa 1981 thinking that they must actually be on to something, but have never found any of their claims to have any merit at all, let alone any grain of truth.
Start at talk.origin's An Index to Creationist Claims (actual list linked-to from that introductory page residing at http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/list.html). Those claims have been exposed as false, decades ago, and yet creationists continue to use them, refusing to correct themselves in the light of the truth. For example, Claim CE011.1:
quote:
Leap seconds have had to be inserted into the year twenty-two times between 1970 and 1999, showing that the earth is slowing 0.77 seconds per year. At this rate, the earth would have slowed to a stop if it were billions of years old.
Also refer to the more general slowing-earth claim that is based on this claim, im CE011:
Earth's rotation is slowing down, so it cannot be more than a few million years old.
The most probably source of that circa 1979 claim is Walter Brown, who apparently had no clue what leap seconds are (even though he was an engineer and retired USAF officer). To his credit, he does not appear to continue to make that claim, though many other creationists still do and it is still propagated through countless creationist websites. One group, the Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance, futilely made An unsuccessful attempt to correct an error on a young-earth creationist web site, that error being this very same obviously false leap-second claim. Of the 15 sites, they got a few responses, but in the end none of the sites made any corrections to an undeniably false claim.
BTW, it turns out that Walter Brown is not one of the rare honest creationists. As I wrote on my old website:
quote:
Brown claimed that on the basis of data from a 1978 study by Margaret Dayhoff, comparisons of cytochrome c show that the rattlesnake is more closely related to humans that to any other organism. When Kenney asked Brown to provide the name of the scientific journal and the page number in which Dayhoff had reached this conclusion, Brown stated that he couldn't. Dayhoff had never reached such a conclusion, but rather Brown's son had used Dayhoff's data to reach that conclusion for a science fair project. It was Brown's son who had concluded that rattlesnakes are more closely related to humans by cytochrome c than to any other organism.
For fifteen dollars, Brown sent Kenney photocopies of his son's project (apparently, Brown's price depends on who you are). Kenney wrote:
quote:
"In the project I quickly found that the rattlesnake and humans differed by only fourteen amino acids. Humans and rhesus monkeys differed by one amino acid. Later, Brown called me again and then explained that of the forty-seven organisms in the study, the one closest to the RATTLESNAKE was the human, not that the one closest to the human was the rattlesnake. You see, among the forty-seven there were no other snakes."
(CEN Vol.4 No.5 Sep/Oct 84, pg 16)
Most of the other organisms in the study were as distantly related to the rattlesnake as were humans; it is coincidence that human cytochrome c was just barely less different than the others. Obviously, this is just semantic sleight-of-hand which can serve no other purpose than to mislead and it is so blatant that Brown had to know what he was doing.
Later after a debate, Kenney found Brown telling a small group about rattlesnakes being more closely related to humans than to any other organism. When Kenney started explaining to the group how misleading that was, Brown quickly changed the subject.
I had included that account in an article about ICR's Dr. Duane Gish's nationally televised false claim of a bullfrog protein that had been found to be more closely related to humans:
quote:
"If we look at certain proteins, yes man then, it can be assumed that man is more closely related to a chimpanzee than other things. But, on the other hand, if you look at certain proteins, you will find that man is more closely related to a bullfrog than he is to a chimpanzee. If you focus your attention on other proteins, you'll find that man is more closely related to a chicken than he is to a chimpanzee."
(Creation vs Evolution: Battle in the Classroom, KPBS-TV, air date 07 July 1982.)
Attempts to get Gish to support his claim failed, producing only his admission that his source was a joke he had overheard.
BTW, that chicken-protein claim Gish mentioned involved lysozyme and also involved Gary Parker having misrepresented the Dickerson and Geis book from which it was quote-mined. Yet another creationist lie.
We could go on like this for days, Dawn. In short, "creation science" is indeed a pack of lies. And making a pack of lies an integral part of your theology (which is what YECs, who comprise a large percentage of fundamentalist Christians, do) is an extremely foolish thing to do, inviting certain disaster for one's faith.
Unless you'd like to argue that making a pack of lies an integral part of your theology is a good thing. It would be interesting for you to come out at least on this point.

{* FOOTNOTE:
Professors William Thwaites and Frank Awbrey taught in the Biology Department at San Diego State University, where they used to run a true two-model course, in which half the lectures were given by creationists, but they had to discontinue it after protests by Christian clubs. In 1977, they pioneered the successful debating strategy of researching creation science claims beforehand and then presenting what the evidence really showed or what the misquoted source had actually said.
In 1993, they announced their retirement from the fray and described their very last debate on 1993 April 29. The description of the debate was preceeded by a summation of their experiences in those 15 years, of what they had hoped to learn, and of what they had learned. They had entered into debates with the hope and expectation that:
quote:
"... a creationist would dig up a real biological paradox, one that would prove to be an interesting brain-teaser for the scientific community. We hoped that we could use the creationists to ferret out biological enigmas much as DEA agents use dogs to seek out contraband. ... While we had discovered that every creationist claim so far could easily be disproved, we still had hope that there was a genuine quandary in there somewhere. We just hadn't found it yet."
(Thwaites, W., and F. Awbrey 1993. Our last debate; our very last. Creation/Evolution 33:1-4.)
What did they discover after those 15 years? Complete disillusionment with the creationists. None of the creationists ever presented any real paradoxes or genuine quandaries. The creationists had no actual case to present.
}

To know that creation is not ture, one would need to know that design did not take place.
Nobody has been talking about creation not being true, least of all me. It's "creation science" that is not true. There's a huge difference. Creation is a religious belief, whereas "creation science" is a systematic deception created specifically for the purpose of circumventing the US court system in the wake of Epperson vs Arkansas, which no longer allowed "monkey laws" to bar the teaching of evolution for religious reasons.
And also, nobody has been able to show any evidence of design. Nor even offered any methodology for detecting or determining design (unlike archaeologists like Coyote). Not only have you failed to, but you have persistently refused to even attempt to.
this is the foundation for ID and creationism, not the Bible. they therefore could not have been lied to
Sorry, Dawn, but that is yet another lie. Creationism is based on the Bible ... OK, rather, it is based on what fundamentalists think is how they must interpret the Bible. Regardless of whether it really is based on the Bible, creationists at least believe that it is. ID is only a bit problematic on this point.
Since they could no longer use religious reasons for barring the teaching of evolution in the public schools, the anti-evolution movement, which was by far a religious movement (at least we might be able to surmise that there were some individuals in it for purely non-religious reasons, even though we know of none), deliberate chose to hide its religious basis so that it could falsely claim to have "purely scientific" reasons to oppose the teaching of evolution and it took its already existing body of Bible-based creationist literature and performed a superficially scrubbing of all overt biblical references in order to support that basic lie. It's described as their game of "Hide the Bible". And when "creation science" was identified by the courts as religious, they then embraced ID as a further game of "Hide the Creationism". Though now ID has also been identified in court as just a cover for "creation science" and hence also religious. Time for them to come up with yet another deception.
Now, ID has not been around for quite as long. Even though it has now merged with "creation science", it had a slightly different origin. Its founders seem to have more of a philosophical difficulty with science and with evolution, complaining of philosophical materialism (which science does not employ) and wanting science to include the supernatural (specifically, Judeo-Christian supernaturalism) in its methodology, more specifically to include the Judeo-Christian god as Creator, known in their weasel-wording as "the Designer" -- even though they will give lip-service to aliens or panspermia or the like, those are just covers and diversions. They have been better at hiding their religious motives and are better at writing pseudo-scientific bullshit than creationists have been. While they are not married to young-earth creationism, even though they are more than happy to cater to that crowd, their theology appears to be little more than "God of the Gaps", as demonstrated by an essay by Phillip Johnson in which he voiced his major objection to evolution: it leaves God with nothing to do. Which anyone who believes in God as the Creator of everything can see as bad theology.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 440 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-01-2011 12:22 PM Dawn Bertot has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 449 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-01-2011 8:57 PM dwise1 has replied
 Message 453 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-01-2011 10:18 PM dwise1 has replied
 Message 460 by ICANT, posted 01-02-2011 1:52 AM dwise1 has replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(2)
Message 451 of 566 (598699)
01-01-2011 9:53 PM
Reply to: Message 449 by Dawn Bertot
01-01-2011 8:57 PM


Re: other scriptures
Ok, I see what your saying, its simply that you and i are using the words Creation science differently.
Dawn, I did not make up that term, "creation science". It has a definite, predetermined, and well-established meaning. Why are you pulling the idiotic trick of redefining terms? Yes, I know that semantic shifting is an all-too-common creationist method of lying, but why are you unable to control your deceptive impulses for even a second?
{ABE: Which I assume means, "Added By Edit".
Dawn, do you remember when I told you what I was taught in logic class (which begs the question of whether you had ever studied logic)? That one of the first orders of business in an actual honest debate was to establish the definitions of the terminology that would be used in the debate? Remember that? Do you also remember how you pissed all over that idea? Which tells us exactly where you stand in the question of honest debates and honest discussion.
You will also notice that one of the first things I tried to do in this topic was to call for agreeing to definitions of our terminology, including what is meant by deconversion.
So here you have tried to apply your own private definitions of the terminology being used. This might serve as an object lesson in the importance of agreeing upon terminology. Duh? But will you learn that lesson? Of course not! Your kind of dishonest dealings depends heavily on such semantic trickery and the confusion that it causes.
}
"Creation science", AKA "scientific creationism", was named by the creationists themselves. Large numbers of creationist clubs and organizations incorporate the phrase "creation science" in their titles and many creationist books incorporate either phrase in their titles.
I was just using the correct term for that which I was referring to. You are the one who has no clue what he's talking about.
Here, I'll cast another pearl before you; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creation_Science:
quote:
Creation Science or scientific creationism is a branch of creationism, which attempts to provide scientific support for the Genesis creation narrative in the Book of Genesis and disprove generally accepted scientific facts, theories and scientific paradigms about the history of the Earth, cosmology and biological evolution. Its most vocal proponents are fundamentalist Christians in the United States who seek to prove Biblical inerrancy and nullify the scientific evidence for evolution. The main ideas in creation science are: the belief in "creation ex nihilo"; the conviction that the Earth was created within the last ten thousand years; the belief that mankind and other life on Earth were created as distinct fixed "baraminological" kinds; and the idea that fossils found in geological strata were deposited during a cataclysmic flood which completely covered the entire Earth. As a result, creation science also challenges the geologic and astrophysical evidence for the age and origins of Earth and Universe, which creation scientists acknowledge are irreconcilable to the account in the Book of Genesis. Creation science proponents often refer to the theory of evolution as "Darwinism" or as "Darwinian evolution". Proponents of creation science claim that it is a genuine scientific challenge to historical geology, the antiquity of the universe, and the theory of evolution.
The scientific community states that Creation Science is a religious, not a scientific view, and that Creation science does not qualify as science because it lacks empirical support, supplies no tentative hypotheses, and resolves to describe natural history in terms of scientifically untestable supernatural causes.
The earliest creation science texts and curricula focused upon concepts derived from a literal interpretation of the Bible and were overtly religious in nature, most notably linking Noah's flood in the Biblical Genesis account to the geological and fossil record in a system termed "flood geology". These works attracted little notice beyond the schools and congregations of conservative fundamental and evangelical Christians until the 1970s when its followers challenged the teaching of evolution in the public schools and other venues in the United States, bringing it to the attention of the public-at-large and the scientific community. Many school boards and lawmakers were persuaded to include the teaching of creation science alongside Darwinian evolution in the science curriculum. Creation science texts and curricula used in churches and Christian schools were revised to eliminate their Biblical and theological references, and less explicitly sectarian versions of creation science education were introduced in public schools in Louisiana, Arkansas, and other regions in the United States.
The 1982 ruling in McLean v. Arkansas found that creation science fails to meet the essential characteristics of science and that its chief intent is to advance a particular religious view. The teaching of creation science in public schools in the United States effectively ended in 1987 following the United States Supreme Court decision in Edwards v. Aguillard. The court affirmed that a statute requiring the teaching of creation science alongside evolution when evolution is taught in Louisiana public schools was unconstitutional because its sole true purpose was to advance a particular religious belief.
I can say however that design is science because it bases itself in observation of clear design in reality reality, using a logical and sound proposition for its conclusion, the conclusion of which is irrefutable and irresistible
this removes creation concept and or design far from any religious idea
That is still bullshit. Proponents of design have yet to do the work necessary for it to be considered science, but rather instead have followed the exact same dishonest tactics of creationists, including sham public debates. Swaying public opinion does not make something science; convincing the scientific community does.
You have never presented design in a logical manner, but rather just posted unintelligible bullshit. You refused to explain anything, responding to questions with insults and attempts at intimidation. And you refused to offer any support at all for your premises -- in addition to their structure, logical arguments are absolutely depedent upon their premises. And you refused to offer any methodology for detecting and determining design.
I've seen your kind of misconduct before, though not in as severe a form. One of the things that creationists (of the "creation science" ilk, of course) really hate is for someone to try to discuss their claims with them. For the originators of those claims, it's because they know that the claim is bogus, but for the followers, they don't know what they're talking about so they literally cannot discuss their own claims. Sometimes, they can't even repeat the claim right. Is that it, Dawn? You don't really understand your own claims so you have to avoid our questions?
Edited by dwise1, : minor cleanup in the end aisle
Edited by dwise1, : ABE towards beginning about defining terminology

This message is a reply to:
 Message 449 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-01-2011 8:57 PM Dawn Bertot has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 473 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-02-2011 3:01 AM dwise1 has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(1)
Message 452 of 566 (598700)
01-01-2011 10:04 PM
Reply to: Message 439 by Dawn Bertot
01-01-2011 12:15 PM


Re: other scriptures
when I say reasons for deconversion, I dont mean vauge examples and illustrations of the fact that people are leaving. Im mean a well set out argument from perhaps a Biblical perspective, or a philosophical argument to that affect
Then you really are not interested in reasons for deconversion. Why create the pretense that you are? By defining it so narrowly, you are excluding most deconversions from examination.
We are talking about people with deeply held beliefs and theologies. That means strong emotional and psychological ties to their religion. So you expect somebody to one day start constructing abstract philosophical musings that lead to him dumping his deeply-held beliefs and possibly even his family ties (one frequent problem faced by deconverts)? Are you really that clueless about how humans think and act?
Your artifical restricting reasons for deconversion to such a narrow set renders this topic useless. Name the one or two specific philosophical reasons why somebody enlists in the military. Or re-enlists. Or decides to not re-enlist. But more importantly, how would automatically eliminating the vast majority of real reasons help to understand those decisions? It would not, no more than your own artificial restrictions would help to understand deconversion.
Since you are obviously not interested in the reasons for deconversion, then could you please come clean and admit what you are after? Your little farce has gone on for far too long.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 439 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-01-2011 12:15 PM Dawn Bertot has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 455 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-01-2011 10:35 PM dwise1 has replied
 Message 459 by arachnophilia, posted 01-01-2011 11:15 PM dwise1 has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(1)
Message 457 of 566 (598712)
01-01-2011 11:02 PM
Reply to: Message 453 by Dawn Bertot
01-01-2011 10:18 PM


Re: other scriptures
design is one that can be demonstrated. Its was around long before man was here to contemplate it
Then why haven't you demonstrated it? Why haven't you even tried? Why have you refused to even tell us what would take?
I already told you: if you want to promote your ideas, then you must do so honestly and truthfully. Two things that you have yet to be here. Or, I strongly suspect, anywhere else.
You're bullshitting again.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 453 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-01-2011 10:18 PM Dawn Bertot has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(1)
Message 458 of 566 (598715)
01-01-2011 11:11 PM
Reply to: Message 455 by Dawn Bertot
01-01-2011 10:35 PM


Re: other scriptures
Don't you ever understand anything?
You're not looking for reasons for deconversion. What it looks like is that you believe that you have an invincibly perfect theology and you want to show it off by having it deflect everything we could throw at it. Your earlier lie (Message 199) seems to have been caused in part by your own confusion. You were trying to put on the pretense of asking why anybody would deconvert, but you kept asking for reasons for you personally to deconvert. I think that latter is what you were really looking for. Like you were daring us to knock you off your perch. Stupid!
Enough of your stupid games! Come clean!

This message is a reply to:
 Message 455 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-01-2011 10:35 PM Dawn Bertot has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 463 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-02-2011 2:31 AM dwise1 has replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(1)
Message 461 of 566 (598726)
01-02-2011 2:20 AM
Reply to: Message 460 by ICANT
01-02-2011 1:52 AM


Re: other scriptures
Honest enough. Which is actually refreshing.
More specifically, I would have stated (italics used to indicate added text) "Creation by a supernatural agent, such as a Creator god, is a religious belief, ... "
I have no trouble with religious beliefs per se. I have lost track of how many times I have sworn an oath that I take very seriously, to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States of America against all enemies, both foreign and domestic (service so far has been from 1976 to less than one year from now, when I shall be forced to retire due to age, so 35 years). Part of that Constitution includes the First Amendment, which guarantees religious liberty. I have no trouble with anyone's religious beliefs, will defend their rights to those beliefs, have actively promoted children receiving instruction in their own perspective religions (by actively promoting the religious badges programs promoted by Boy Scouts of America, Inc, even though they had violated their own officially published policies to expell me for being an atheist), and have even performed non-directive peer-to-peer counselling for individual Christians upon those individuals' requests. I do have trouble with those who try to use the government or government agencies to promote their particular religious beliefs.
The how and why is what is debated.
Yes, but just how is that debate to be conducted? Honestly and truthfully? Or deceptively and with guile?
I call for honesty and truthfullness. Far too many creationists (especially those of "creation science" and ID persuasion) choose deception and guile.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 460 by ICANT, posted 01-02-2011 1:52 AM ICANT has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 466 by arachnophilia, posted 01-02-2011 2:36 AM dwise1 has replied
 Message 523 by ICANT, posted 01-03-2011 1:12 AM dwise1 has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(1)
Message 462 of 566 (598727)
01-02-2011 2:29 AM
Reply to: Message 460 by ICANT
01-02-2011 1:52 AM


What does Christian Doctrine say ... ?
ICANT, I have a question. It would likely seem off-topic, but then Dawn himself has pulled this topic off-topic so many times already.
What is Christian Doctrine on "lying for the Lord"? Lying is supposed to be wrong, but if it is to aid in "the cause of the Lord" (eg, to gain converts through lies and deception), then is it condoned? I mean, absolute morality is absolute morality, but isn't "lying for the Lord" a case of the ends justifying the means (AKA, moral relativism)?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 460 by ICANT, posted 01-02-2011 1:52 AM ICANT has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 464 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-02-2011 2:36 AM dwise1 has replied
 Message 469 by arachnophilia, posted 01-02-2011 2:51 AM dwise1 has replied
 Message 522 by ICANT, posted 01-03-2011 1:01 AM dwise1 has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


Message 465 of 566 (598730)
01-02-2011 2:36 AM
Reply to: Message 463 by Dawn Bertot
01-02-2011 2:31 AM


Re: other scriptures
Indiana? What the frak does Indiana have to do with anything?
Please stop wasting bandwidth with such crap messages and get back on topic!

This message is a reply to:
 Message 463 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-02-2011 2:31 AM Dawn Bertot has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


Message 467 of 566 (598732)
01-02-2011 2:39 AM
Reply to: Message 464 by Dawn Bertot
01-02-2011 2:36 AM


Re: What does Christian Doctrine say ... ?
aw Jeebus! What a frakin' idiot!
Instead of sticking to the topic of the reasons for deconversion, you keep pulling it off into arguments over Isaiha and other arguments over prophecies and inspiration, etc. None of which has anything to do with deconversion.
Please get a frakin' clue!

This message is a reply to:
 Message 464 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-02-2011 2:36 AM Dawn Bertot has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 470 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-02-2011 2:52 AM dwise1 has not replied
 Message 494 by arachnophilia, posted 01-02-2011 4:24 AM dwise1 has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(1)
Message 477 of 566 (598742)
01-02-2011 3:13 AM
Reply to: Message 466 by arachnophilia
01-02-2011 2:36 AM


Re: liars, or lied to?
Aye. They are more victims than anything else. However, once they have learned that what they are saying are lies and yet they continue to use them ... . At what point do we stop saying that they are themselves victims and that they should now know better?
in any case, you can pretty clearly see how dawn is doing that very thing in this thread. why else would a valid, supportable reason to "deconvert" have to be personal to dawn, such that we should convince him?
Yes, I do see that. I have often viewed fundamentalist Christian mentality as having been arrested. Eg, obviously, their rules-based morality, which is normally outgrown before age 10. There's another stage of development in which a child before a certain tender age, about 5 years I think, cannot distinguish between its own thoughts and the thoughts of another; ie, if the young child knows something (eg, what the puppet is seeking is hidden under the teacup) then the other person must know it as well. There is a stage of development where the child comes to realize that other people are indeed different and know and think things differently than the child does. Apparently, Dawn has regressed back from that stage of development and believes that everybody has the same beliefs as he does.
Our church has (or had) an actual adult RE course called, "Building Your Own Theology." And a fundamentalist friend at work has verified that this is also true for them. Everybody builds his own theology and it is that theology upon which he bases his beliefs and his religious actions. Furthermore (my own thoughts here), while one may try to pattern one's own theology on some kind of standard theology, all that one may accomplish is an approximation, one's own misunderstanding of that theology. Furthermore, since the theology being emulated is that which has been presented by a teacher or an author, we have that each such approximation is itself trying to emulate another emulation, which was an approximation of another emulation, etc for millenia.
Dawn's own theology, which he apparently believes is perfect, is instead his own imperfect misunderstanding of what he thought he was trying to emulate. And it appears that he has no idea that it is only one of billions of different Christian theologies that have existed. He appears to believe that his theology is the only one that could exist. Such that only something that would show that his own theology is wrong could possibly be a valid reason for deconversion.
In fact, anything that would show anybody's theology to be wrong or unworkable would be a valid reason for deconversion. A very simple example would be one whose theology had incorporated "creation science" (note for Dawn: refer to Message 451 for the actual definition of "creation science", not your own personal fracked-up re-definition), such that realizing that those "creation science" claims are lies would be valid reasons for deconversion.
But apparently Dawn's development is arrested at the point that he thinks that only his own personal theology exists.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 466 by arachnophilia, posted 01-02-2011 2:36 AM arachnophilia has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 480 by arachnophilia, posted 01-02-2011 3:30 AM dwise1 has not replied
 Message 481 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-02-2011 3:31 AM dwise1 has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(1)
Message 482 of 566 (598747)
01-02-2011 3:35 AM
Reply to: Message 468 by Dawn Bertot
01-02-2011 2:47 AM


Re: liars, or lied to?
If people have deconverted based on the reasons dewise suggest concerning creationism, then they did not understand what creation and its primary arguments were
Does not matter. If their own personal theologies were based on such misunderstandings of creation and what its primary arguments are, then that is the basis for their deconversion.
Here's a stupid question: why are some theologies so harshly subject to deconversion while others are not? HINT: your own theology is very much subject to deconversion, as per the vast majority of the deconversion stories out there.
Look at me as if you were looking and speaking with a Vulcan.
Pon farr! I'm quite positive that I heard Hoshi use it in a rather heated conversation with T'Pol, but the network censors have cleaned that up in the meantime.
No Im not delusional and think I actually am.
You are not delusional, but you think you actually are? Well, then you very probably are delusional.
Not who deconverted, not why you think they deconverted. Not who is lying and who is not. Simply the argument that swayed them to that position
We have been trying to tell you, but you stubbornly refuse to listen!
Read the deconversion stories. It's almost never one single argument. It's a long and excruciating process, slowly sliding down that slippery slope. Refer back to my Message 437 and the Molasses Flood of 1919 analogy:
quote:
Or another more colorful analogy would be a giant iron tank (50 ft tall, 2.3 million gallons capacity) filled with molasses. When it suddenly collapses with huge chunks of iron destroying entire buildings and releases a lethal flood of molasses, what was the cause? Was it the work of anarchists? Was it a single sudden catastrophic event that nobody could have forseen? Or were the signs of trouble there all along, with many cracks forming in the tank over an extended period of time? And what did the company do when it saw that molasses seeping out of all those cracks? They painted the tank that same color of brown, so that nobody would notice, just as your churches simply cover up the problems, such as the massive deconversion of their children, or blame it on "anarchists" and atheists. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molasses_Flood
You are fixating on that giant chunk of iron that crushed the fire station. But what about all those cracks in the tank that were seeping molasses long before the final collapse? Which the plant owners responded to by painting the tank molasses-brown so that the leaks would not show?
It is no single argument, but rather the unravelling of the entire package.
Are you ever going to get it?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 468 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-02-2011 2:47 AM Dawn Bertot has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 484 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-02-2011 3:42 AM dwise1 has replied
 Message 485 by arachnophilia, posted 01-02-2011 3:44 AM dwise1 has replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(1)
Message 486 of 566 (598751)
01-02-2011 3:48 AM
Reply to: Message 469 by arachnophilia
01-02-2011 2:51 AM


Re: What does Christian Doctrine say ... ?
so, granted, this is before the law, and is perhaps part of the general period of amorality that necessitates a clear and pre-agreed-upon system of law. but this the general jewish exception for the prohibition on bearing false witness. the logic goes like this: you're a jew, living in 1940's germany. you're hiding several more jews in your attic. when the gestapo comes around, asking if anyone's seen any jews, you have two choices:
When I transfered from JC to university (well, state college at the time, but it became a university a year or two later), I enrolled in a Rabbinic Literature course taught by a rabbi. One thing we learned is that the Law (ie, the Torah) is the Law, but if one must violate the Law in order to save a life, then save that life! Contrast that with a news story around that time in which a child died because his parents had withheld medical treatment due to their faith-healing beliefs and the parents, at their sentencing, testified that in the same circumstances they would have done the exact same thing. 'Nuff said?
I have always had the utmost respect for Judaism, and myself fall just short of kissing my books. But the fundamentalist Christians keep talking about "absolute morality". Given the ease with which creationists will lie and will enable lying, I cannot help but wonder how such an attitude can be reconciled with "absolute morality".

This message is a reply to:
 Message 469 by arachnophilia, posted 01-02-2011 2:51 AM arachnophilia has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 490 by arachnophilia, posted 01-02-2011 3:55 AM dwise1 has replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(1)
Message 488 of 566 (598753)
01-02-2011 3:54 AM
Reply to: Message 484 by Dawn Bertot
01-02-2011 3:42 AM


Re: liars, or lied to?
maybe because some one somewhere might be right, or is that not a possibility for you. That fact that you attack me personally because i hold to what I know to be true, because i have tried and tested it for nearly 45 years, simply aggrevates you
Oh, you believe that your man-made theology is absolutely true? As a fundamentalist fellow-traveller, I know that nothing man-made can possibly be absolutely true.
OK, Dawn, explain that to me!
Here's a hint -- consider it my casting yet another pearl before you -- : Every theology is wrong, because every theology gets something wrong, usually something in the details. At the same time, most every theology is also right, because most of them do get something right.
But to expect any one theology to be absolutely right is a recipe for disaster. And I suspect that most fundamentalists believe that their own theology is absolutely right.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 484 by Dawn Bertot, posted 01-02-2011 3:42 AM Dawn Bertot has not replied

  
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