A personal question

Originally posted by gene90:Ok, so Christians are morally inferior because they supposedly do or do not do things for fear of being punished...however a nontheist is more moral because they are more afraid of than the Christians are of punishment?Afraid of what?

Originally posted by Delshad:Your replies concerning the relevance of moral codes in society and about the nature of the human being has run out of steam.
Everything I have stated concerning this issue has been either over-skipped by you or given an slippery reply (as if you were trying to skip the issue at hand).Morality is subjective.Concerning the religious matters however, your way of just writing that( Ohh, I really wished it were so but it isnt )is irrelevant.
Sure, a lot terrible is happening in the world in the name of religion, but religion is not responsible for that, it is each of those inviduals responsibility because it is their own decision that made them to use religion as a cover for, oppression, terrorism, etc.A religion is nothing without those who believe in it. They all create god in their own image.Just as it wasnt science`s responsiblity when Hitler decided to execute all those Jews because he thought he had been given the right to do so according to his scientists,Hitler was a Christian and it was his religious beliefs which he believed gave him the right.The folkish-minded man, in particular, has the sacred duty, each in his own denomination, of making people stop just talking superficially of God's will, and actually fulfill God's will, and not let God's word be desecrated. [original italics]

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For God's will gave men their form, their essence, and their abilities. Anyone who destroys His work is declaring war on the Lord's creation, the divine will. Therefore, let every man be active, each in his own denomination if you please, and let every man take it as his first and most sacred duty to oppose anyone who in his activity by word or deed steps outside the confines of his religious community and tries to butt into the other.

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Hence today I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord. [original italics]

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-- Adolf Hitler, from "Mein Kampf",
translation by Ralph Mannheim. or when the Nuclear Bombs were dropped on Japan in the name of preserving democracy.I believe that this was a cowardly act as well.Or when Stalin killed all those people in the name of communism.
Do you see where I am getting at?Stalin had been influenced by the Church. He had been a seminary student. BTW, it was in the name of Stalinism.

Originally posted by gene90:I think it was absolutely necessary. When the war is over, the fleet is rebuilt, and the draft is ended it's quite easy to gloss over certain things. Anyway, this is the sort of thing that happens when you mix military targets with civilian population centers. [/QUOTE]Actually, no, it was not neccessary at all. The Japanese were willing to surrender with only one condition, that they be allowed to keep their emperor as leader. The Americans wanted a totally unconditional surrender and wouldn't accept even this small request. The two targets had no military value at all, in fact they were choosen for that very fact.

Originally posted by Andya Primanda:The atheists on EvC (you, and Compmage i think) introduced this phrase, which has been a good point to contemplate for me lately.

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Let me tell you a local story. I was taught in elementary school (about late 1980s to early 1990s) taht atheists are bad, nonmoral people. My teacher said that their lack of faith made them behave as they wish, indulging in depravities. Why do they taught me this? It was a political agenda. Indonesians experienced a horrible point in history in the Communist Party coup of 1965, and the aftershock, which include the massacre of communists and the reign of Suharto's New Order, planted a trauma in Indonesians' minds, a hatred towards Communists. Since the commies were atheists, by then denigrating atheists has been a part of the political propaganda in education. I was taught that. Religion, good; atheism, bad.

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However, now I have found that not all atheists were moral degenerates; sometimes I think that they faced a greater battle--to maintain a moral position without having a good prospect of what he/she will gain from his/her moral acts. If I give small change to a beggar, part of me did that because charity can earn me heaven. But if an atheist did the same, he/she does not do that in order to get to heaven or avoid hell.Even the Webster's Dictionary had defined atheists as being evil, or wicked, at one time.As for my own position, I think they overdo the shariah. Recently there has been some political Islamic parties which gain favor in some local governments in Indonesia (in Aceh), and they practised Islamic law there. However, I cannot endorse that they would prefer to make rules that prohibit women to walk alone at night than to strengthen the economy or stop the war between separatists and the Army. Most Islamic fundies fall into symbolism while neglecting the more real problems.That is the thing with fundies, they think that they are so right that they will do anything to make sure that everyone is the same as they are and normal moral "niceties" mean nothing to them. We see this in the recent bombing in Bali. Wasn't the group responsible called "Defenders of the Islamic Faith" or something like that? Some asked why they would want to bomb paradise, the answer is they want it to be only their paradise.ANyway, wasn't the Taliban made in USA? They were part of the Communist-battling troops sponsored by AMerica to fend off Soviet troops, as a puppet of the Cold War. No wonder they were put up again as another puppet, this time to make Islam seem anachronistic and cruel.If you look closer at most of the problems in the Middle-East now you will see that it is because of their policy of the Cold War of "The enemy of my enemy is my friend" and the placing of "friendly" leaders into positions of power and control. The Americans had to destroy the "Dirty Commies" at all costs. And the ironic thing after all this this to destroy them they finally just fell apart on their own. What agencies, like the CIA, weren't telling the USA is that during the 20 to 30 years before the fall of the USSR that it was little more than a third world nation itself and really not the big threat they had made it out to be. There was much profit in hating, and fearing, the USSR.[This message has been edited by nos482, 10-18-2002]

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Originally posted by Andya Primanda:
Don't forget Osama bin Laden, former CIA agent. And Al-Qaeda? Who else but USA Some espionage experts here commented that either CIA made Al-Qaeda or CIA infiltrated agents into them which turn them into sick terrorists, and the US media cheerfully made them covergirl of the month.

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Not only do they start and help foreign terrorists, but domestic ones as well. The so-called anti-government militia movement was started by the US Government as a means to fight against a possible Soviet invasion. You give paranoids weapons and they will eventually turn on you. The Cold War did far more self-inflicted damage than the so-called enemy could have ever done.

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Originally posted by Delshad:
Yes ,of course, I would be glad to discuss the subject with you Quetzal.
This thread is starting to lean towards politics and that was not my intention with it.
But I hope you wont be dissapointed with our coming discussion because I cant question anything you have written in your essay.
It is all scientific facts, but perhaps I could add some facts and bring the issue to a more social and human level.
Who should make the topic?
And if it should be me then my suggestion for the title would be
(The neccesity of religion in our modern society).
What do you think?

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Sincerely Delshad

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Why would religion be a neccesity in a modern society? This is a time when religion has much less control over everyday life in the 1st world nations and dispite what most may think this is one of the most moral times in history in comparison. It just looks worse because we have almost instant communications and are aware of much which our ancestors would be totally amazed at. They would see the Internet as witchcraft and burn us at the stake. The places which seem to need religion are those of lesser developed nations where things aren't as free and open as they are in most 1st world nations today.[This message has been edited by nos482, 10-18-2002]

Originally posted by gene90:So the Soviet Union wasn't dangerous because of its financial status? Hmm, 22,000 warheads in an economically stable, coup-free government with well-payed scientists and adequate means of accounting for those weapons vs. 22,000 warheads in an unstable, coup-threatened nation where the scientists barely can keep food on the table and that cannot afford to keep up with their weapons?What they didn't tell you was that many of those missile tubes were empty. And much of their capabilities was mostly propaganda. What I had meant was that the USA didn't really have to worry about an all out nuclear strike from the USSR.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by gene90:No, the Taliban is a product of extreme Islamic schools in Pakistan. As I understand it they were even backed by Pakistanis during the Afghan coup of 1996.Of course they were formed on their own. He was saying that the USA (CIA) helped them out with weapons to fight the Soviets and as a result they were able to take over Afghanistan.

Originally posted by gene90:Right now there is some speculation about that but hindsight is always 20/20. Like I said, the war has been over for a long time and you might have had a different opinion if you had been drafted and were in a boat waiting on a very bloody invasion of Osaka.In that case why don't you nuke Iraq. It sure will save a lot of American lives.It also flies in the face of Japanese military culture in 1946, that surrender=shame and those that surrender were not worthy of humane treatment (hence the summary execution of downed American aviators, the Bataan Death March, and dozens of other atrocities).They also did whatever their emperor said to do since he was their living god.We had to gave them two heavy-duty doses of reality before they were ready to sign the treaty. And doing so is no more cowardly than when we use airpower to hit Iraq, it saves our troops from getting killed in the process.They were not given enough time to respond before dropping the second one. Plus, you must remember that it wasn't like it is today, the Japan of then was still quite primative.Quite the contrary, I think the decision to drop the bomb was a brave one because it might have failed to detonate and then the prize of the Manhattan Project would then be in enemy hands. There is strong circumstantial evidence to suggest that Japan had been attempting a crash nuclear program, with help from Germany.The Nazis were not about to share such things, even with their "allies", afterall there was after the war if they won.The Japanese were unwilling to surrender before the nuking began.I know that American history education is as bad as their science education, but it is a fact that they were ready to surrender before the bombs were dropped.You might notice one obvious point, we had to drop TWO of them before they started talking to us. The reason being they hoped that maybe we only had one bomb and they could still beat us at a war of attrition on the ground in Japan.See above.Actually we did grant them this request, they retained their emperor in the post-war government.But he is not their absolute ruler, and not concidered their living god. He is nothing more than a figurehead.That's also incorrect. Hiroshima had quite a bit of military infrastructure. This is from the official homepage of the City of Hiroshima:By the time of the bombings the infrastructure of Japan was in near chaos. The main reason why these cities were chosen was not because of what military potential they had, but because of the size and the shape of the city was suited to the destructive power of the A-bombs. Because Hiroshima had not been bombed, ascertaining the effects of the A-bomb on buildings and a large civilian population would be relatively easy.That is why a purely military target such as a base, and the like, was not chosen as well. The civilian population was a major factor in their choice.Another reason why the bombs were used was;At the Yalta Conference in February 1945 the USSR had secretly agreed to join the war against Japan within three months of Germany's surrender. The USA wanted to force Japan to an unconditional surrender before the USSR could enter the war to secure a stronger political position in the area as they did in Europe.[This message has been edited by nos482, 10-18-2002]

Originally posted by gene90:
Because we can use precision conventional weapons to neutralize Saddam's regime. Because Iraq does not yet possess nuclear weapons it is not a significant threat to the United States and there is no need for total war. Warfare has changed since the second World War. While we still use dumb bombs to kill enemy troops in huge numbers we no longer have to drop dumb bombs and incendiary weapons on cities to get the job done and hope they get near the target.The main reason why they won't use nukes is because they want the oil.In the war against Japan they had nothing but dumb bombs (conventional or otherwise) and a very large, relatively unskilled, draft army. Today we have a highly skilled, relatively small professional army that is capable of very rapid deployment almost anywhere. They would not have had that capability in a hypothetical ground war in Japan (no helicopters). We can get in and out of Iraq very rapidly and destroy targets even in densely populated areas with near surgical precision.Japan had nothing worth taking.One more thing: when we hit Iraq it will almost certainly be a route, perhaps even a massacre. Most US casualties will probably be friendly fire.Isn't that the norm now?Theoretically but who was calling the shots, the emperor or the generals? As I understand it the generals were, they attacked the US after having promised the emperor that no American bomb would ever fall on Japan (they would have elminated our carriers at Pearl).And who calls the shots now, Bush or his "advisers"?They had telephones and they had teletype machines. They also had a considerable shortwave radio broadcasting capability that they used to wage a propaganda war against American servicemen.Would you believe it at first that anyone would use such a wepon on people? How long would it take you to react?Then why, in March of 1945, was a U-boat (number 234, in fact) intercepted en route to Japan carrying V-2 rocket parts, jet fuel, and approximately 1,200 pounds of uranium oxide? By the way, that uranium may have eventually reached Japan, after having been confiscated by the United States and used to produce the bombs we dropped there.Do you have evidence of this? I see from your reply that you go more for the "official" version.Size and shape of the city had nothing to do with it. In fact Nagasaki was a lousy target because its topography prevented maximum
destructive yield.That is why it was not the first target.If we had wanted to kill the largest number of civillians possible we would have hit Tokyo instead.Tokyo wasn't a good target because of many other factors.Now, if the Japanese were falling over themselves to surrender, why did it take TWO bombs?I didn't say that they were "falling over themselves to surrender". I had said that they were willing to surrender.I have a feeling that even if they had surrendered instantly the USA would have still dropped the second bomb.What evidence do you have of that? I have Truman's diary and speech that say that he intended for the target to be exclusively military, therefore implying that the civilian casualties were incidental (as happened in Dresden and several other cities during the war).He wanted the target to be military only, but other factors forced him to choose this.Uh yeah. We nearly fought WWIII over Berlin and had we built a wall in Tokyo we might not be around to type this today.

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By the way you need to check your history. We did NOT force Germany to an unconditional surrender, we left that to the Soviets and so we had to divide Germany.Germany didn't attack you on your own "soil" and humiliate you either.We took care of Japan ourselves and didn't have to give half of them over to communism.It was mostly a case of revenge in regards to Japan.

Originally posted by gene90:Are you making this up or do you have sources?

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Look, the current treaties we're tossing around are to reduce both Russian and American warheads down to no more than 4,250 per side before January 1, 2003.

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Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START II) Which should be easy to do for the Russians.How many Americans do you think can be killed with 4,250 hydrogen bombs? And that's a current goal of arms reduction. How many do you think there were during the height of the Cold War?The Cold War was mainly a war of propaganda.Well, according to this (Japanese) site:"It follows from this that the Soviet Union had outstripped the U.S. in the number of nuclear weapons by the end of the 1970's."

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http://www.cnfc.or.jp/plutonium/pl10/sympo.e.htmlOr appeared to.Propaganda:1. Information that is spread for the purpose of promoting some causeThe victor gets to write, or influence, the official history.In other words most of written history didn't happen in the way it is portrayed to make those who won look better. Most people will accept what they are told as being true if it comes from authority. I.E. The bible.[This message has been edited by nos482, 10-19-2002]

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Originally posted by schrafinator:

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As long as they are of our own group. The Other is always a threat to be dealt with. Animals only kill when they are either hungry or feel threatened. Humans are one of the few animals who kill for sport or pleasure, and even prey on their own.

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Lots of animals will eat their own offspring.

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Animals such as weasels, fishers, raccoons, dogs and cats all kill for pleasure.

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It's not terribly uncommon.

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They kill out of instinct, they are predators.

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Originally posted by John:

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Originally posted by nos482:
They kill out of instinct, they are predators.

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Your black vs. white perceptions are sometimes most amusing. Schaf is right. Many animals kill for the hell of it.

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You are humanizing them. Bonk, bonk.

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Originally posted by John:

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Originally posted by nos482:
You are humanizing them. Bonk, bonk.

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No I'm not, Nos. Ask a primatologist.

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You make the error opposite the one of which you accuse me -- that of mechanizing animals, of drawing a hard line between 'them' and 'us' Animals, mammals in particular, have more or less all of the same brain structure and chemistry as do we. It is absurd to reduce animals to autonomatons.

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Whatever.

Originally posted by Mammuthus:Atually by his definition of aberration, any behavior which jeapordizes the individuals ability to pass on genes is an aberration. So altruistic behavior would be an aberration and thus the basis for complex social interaction. Especially altruism i.e. saving a non related persons life at the expense of your own would then have to be an aberration.

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Also, for a fluke it is amazing that homosexuality is both common among diverse species and is found at a relatively high frequency in different human cultures throughout the world (i.e. not a restricted or isolated event i.e. fluke)You're wasting your time. To the theists it is a sin and a choice and no amount of evidence will change their minds on this. It is bad enough, to them, when heterosexuals engage in sex other then for reproduction. They concider sexuality of any kind to be evil and dirty, even when they deny it. They will even compare it to things which are totally unrelated. I.E. pedofilia, mental illness, and cannibalism.