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Author Topic:   How Dawkins made me a better person
ZenMonkey
Member (Idle past 4510 days)
Posts: 428
From: Portland, OR USA
Joined: 09-25-2009


Message 16 of 71 (551237)
03-22-2010 2:20 AM
Reply to: Message 14 by slevesque
03-22-2010 1:41 AM


Thanks.
slevesque writes:
Ok man. Seriously. You gotta stop this, there is nothing constructive in this ...
I say that as a fellow christian+creationist.
Thanks, slevesque. Your response is better than anything I could say about this particular poster and shows some real character and respect on your part.. I appreciate it very much.

I have no time for lies and fantasy, and neither should you. Enjoy or die.
-John Lydon

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Den
Member (Idle past 5101 days)
Posts: 36
From: Australia
Joined: 03-21-2010


Message 17 of 71 (551245)
03-22-2010 2:41 AM


quote:
slevesque writes:
Ok man. Seriously. You gotta stop this, there is nothing constructive in this ...
I say that as a fellow christian+creationist.
Thanks, slevesque. Your response is better than anything I could say about this particular poster and shows some real character and respect on your part.. I appreciate it very much.
Your attempts to silence me are not unusual, as a proud Athiest I am like other Athiests accustomed to Religious people trying to supress my views.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
OK seriously, Im having a joke here. I am not affilliated with any Religion nor am I Athiest, I might be labelled as agnostic by some. While the arguement continues I remain open to consider all possibilities, though I suspect the subjects and arguements have remained unresolved for so long simply because they are both wrong.
Edited by Den, : added final sentence

Replies to this message:
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Larni
Member (Idle past 164 days)
Posts: 4000
From: Liverpool
Joined: 09-16-2005


Message 18 of 71 (551267)
03-22-2010 7:26 AM
Reply to: Message 17 by Den
03-22-2010 2:41 AM


Having a joke is fine, but we get so many wing nuts espousing similar as fact that it's no suprise folk thought it was gospel (pardon the pun).
Far better to state your position honestly to move an interesting discussion onwards.

This message is a reply to:
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Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


(1)
Message 19 of 71 (551270)
03-22-2010 7:54 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by Den
03-21-2010 1:16 PM


Richard et al replies
I am so grateful to you for making me come to realize the ridiculousness of my prior life, I was in fact living 2 lives, one life as nature intended and the other deluded part which I dedicated to a faith in Religion and I am now thanks to you able to lead a more natural and factual existence rather than following a silly faith, for example;
Though you still have hangups. You talk like nature has intentions and that having false beliefs isn't natural
Now that I understand from your books that we humans evolved together with our emotions simply for the purpose of survival of the fittest you have made me finally realize the purpose of human life as per Darwin’s survival of the fittest, which is becoming the strongest person I can be physically and mentally and ensuring I successfully pass on and spread my genes as far as possible.
Maybe you should read them again. Pick up The Selfish Gene. You are not compelled to become the strongest physical and mental person you can be. Your ancestors are marked in that they have all successfully reproduced. Those relations of your ancestors that didn't aren't here anymore. Some of that might be because of luck. Some of that might be down to having, on average, inherited the right suite of genes.
Previously during my silly Religious period I was limited to only having 2 children because of our financial situation. Thanks to your guidance I have worked out a way to be an even more successful person, simply hand your children over to an orphanage, then you are immediately relieved of the financial burden and bingo! You can then have more children!
Yes, dividing child care amongst the community is a valid strategy. Some species have specialised child carer castes even! Still - as with many strategies there are potential ways to exploit it and it might not be therefore evolutionarily stable. As with cheaters, a counter-strategy is required: In this case if you are seen to not be pulling your weight (ie., making the community work harder at raising your kids than you are putting back into the community) you will probably start to lose friends and allies. This might impact on your financially or socially which might result in a net reduction in reproductive fitness.
This is especially true if we look at the current types of free communal child care system in place over the world. The best ones are extended family. But is it better to have 30 kids in 'care' under 1 adult and each other. Or to have two kids being looked after by two parents plus extended family, siblings etc? I think the latter, to be perfectly honest, if you want to convince me otherwise you'll have to do the maths.
If it turned out it was better for our children to be cared for in large groups by specialist carers rather than by family, I would think that is the way we should do it. Some people would naturally deny the evidence because it makes them feel uncomfortable.
I immediately took my 2 kids to the orphanage as soon as I finished reading the greatest show on Earth, my wife could not stop crying, which was a nuisance as I could not copulate with her for more than a week after we dumped our offspring at the orphanage. I explained to her that the sadness she felt dumping the children is just a primitive human chemical emotion which evolved to make us care for our children in tougher primitive times - to ensure our genes survived on, now that we have institutions that can care for our kids we don’t need to worry about them any more, dump and pump I say!
Yeah - realistic wives would probably withhold reproductive privileges longer than a week if you gave their children to an outgroup to be cared for. Which is perfectly consistent with the evolutionary context the Great Apes have gone through.
The best parts now of becoming an Atheist and evolution follower are the improvements in my work and social life, since from an evolutionary perspective adultery is not a flaw, it’s an attribute of success! For years I have been lusting over my secretary and now there’s no problem, we now have regular sex even though I’m married.
It's only not a problem as long as:
1. Your wife remains good with it.
2. Your secretary remains good with it
If your wife is ignorant of things then you do have a problem. You have to keep a secret from another human. Humans are very good at detecting deception. Not, it turns out, on an individual case by case basis, but give them a pattern of deception (even if it is just a coincidence) and the suspicions will begin, and once the suspicions start, you are in a lot of trouble (especially if they are particularly deceptive about their suspicions). Then you may end up with no sexual partner, and a reputation for not being trusted.
I really love weekends catching up with other married couples, our friends, though it’s getting a little frustrating, the other men’s wives are all frigid no matter how drunk I get them, but lately I’ve been looking at their single daughters too! I’m sure my best friends daughter Eve is ovulating by now, we were just at her sweet 16 birthday party and I’m so keen to get her pregnant it’s not funny, she’s so ripe. I can’t believe that lusting for someone at such a young age did not even occur to me during my Religious years, it’s just natural, you don’t see other animals getting judged by age, as soon as the female is sexually fertile ready she is copulated by the strongest most suitable male around. Age discrimination is just a silly unfair human rule when it comes copulation, its not fair to the children, especially those who sexually mature at a young age, they should have every chance of passing on their genes immediately and becoming a successful part of the greatest show on Earth!
You come from a Roman Catholic background and it never occurred to you to have sex with teenagers despite the fact that you voice a sexual desire to do so? Odd. Maybe you should go back and read the Holy Bible again. Isaac married Rebecca when she was at most 14. Some people think Rebecca was actually only 3 at the time of marriage. Religious justifications for marrying teenagers are rampant throughout history and I'm surprised you missed it.
But I agree - the strange HIGHLY MODERN cultural norm of partnering up with someone of similar age and definitely not going below 16/18/21 is biologically weird. But then, living to 85 is biologically weird too and I'm happy with that state of affairs.
Since I only have 2 children I’m worried that I’m not being successful enough, making more offspring is not happening as fast as I’d like, so I am now considering whether it’s wrong for a man to force himself onto a women? Its common in the animal world, why should it be wrong in the human world? We are animals too aren’t we?, why cant we follow the same rules as other animals?, it doesn’t seem fair, I want to be successful in the eyes of evolution too but all these stupid human rules Laws are in the way.
What do you mean by 'wrong'? Without defining that you are stuck. If you are going to define 'wrong' in terms of what other animals do, you are going to be committing some very questionable acts.
And why the arbitrary 'animal kingdom' what's wrong with getting morality from plants?
Anyway - you can try engaging in mass rape and seeing how that works out for your reproductive success. You may find that social animals want to defend their sexual resources and the investments they have made and it is in their interests to dissuade cheaters. Those human laws are just the interests of society not just each individual. This occurs in the animal world too. There are some animal structures in which only one male in the group has mating rights for example. Thus any other male engaging in sex with a female would be 'wrong' and would be punished by the group (stupid Walrus laws, they might think to themselves).
I wish you could make the laws Richard because I’m sure stupid laws like those that prohibit rape would be abolished under your wisdom, since they prevent the strongest men from passing on their genes as much as they could. Laws against rape are absolutely a crime against humanity; not allowing the strongest men to dominate the breeding is ruining the human gene pool, these laws are plainly immoral.
If you had read any of Richard's words you would know that his position is that we should try to avoid to live in a raw Darwinian society. You would find then, that Richard would not enact the depraved child raping promiscuous rape 'n' murder fest that you seem so keen on.
Anyhow thanks for your guidance and wisdom, I’m now undoubtedly both a brighter and better person thanks to you, I just wish all the Religious fools would wake up from their deluded, morally inferior world.
I, and Richard believes that things that seem to be a rational benefit to society, despite it's possible immediate negative impact on the self are morally correct because it makes society better to live in which is where we live which is desired.
The religious believe that something is right if a powerful enough person says it is.
PS Great news, I just found out this morning my secretary is pregnant! I guess it’s a new definition for being successful at work! I can’t wait to tell my wife about my latest success!
Yours Sincerely
Jack Smart
Hopefully she will understand. Sarah understood when Abraham slept around, and King David would, I'm sure, be proud.

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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


(1)
Message 20 of 71 (551284)
03-22-2010 8:50 AM
Reply to: Message 9 by Den
03-21-2010 11:41 PM


@ Dr Inadequate I believe my satire points out the obvious flaws in adopting the emptiness of Atheism and accepting Evolution as fact.
But of course it does not. Because you made it up. It exposes the wickedness and folly of the imaginary atheists who live in your head, about whom you like to fantasize because you can't find any real flaws in the real atheists who live in the real world that you actually inhabit.
You may have intended it as a satire on atheism, but what it actually does is expose to everyone just how filthy and degraded a Christian's mind may become once he is truly enslaved to his dogma. You intended to invent an atheist boogeyman --- what you have achieved is to display the real, true, non-imaginary evangelical boogeyman in all his disgusting glory.
You fantasize that atheists are like the imaginary person whom you invented in your head. Whereas I know that there is at least one Christian who is just like you.
It's you.

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Den
Member (Idle past 5101 days)
Posts: 36
From: Australia
Joined: 03-21-2010


Message 21 of 71 (551288)
03-22-2010 9:09 AM


Thanks for the responses everyone.
I wish the other satire I wrote wasnt locked, because I was wondering what would happen if all the churches closed overnight and the world became universally Atheist/evolution believers, obviously this would destroy the churches ability to do their immense scope of charitable work?
Obviously there would be a transitional period of uncalculable suffering before other groups could take over the churches presently run charitable initatives. I wanted to know would the Athiest movement "Brights" take over and manage all of these responisbilities? from soup kitchens to helping the homeless, orphaniges, providing funds for food and medical aid etc.

Replies to this message:
 Message 22 by Huntard, posted 03-22-2010 9:17 AM Den has not replied
 Message 25 by nwr, posted 03-22-2010 9:28 AM Den has not replied
 Message 26 by bluegenes, posted 03-22-2010 9:33 AM Den has not replied
 Message 27 by Modulous, posted 03-22-2010 9:37 AM Den has not replied

  
Huntard
Member (Idle past 2295 days)
Posts: 2870
From: Limburg, The Netherlands
Joined: 09-02-2008


Message 22 of 71 (551291)
03-22-2010 9:17 AM
Reply to: Message 21 by Den
03-22-2010 9:09 AM


Den writes:
I wish the other satire I wrote wasnt locked, because I was wondering what would happen if all the churches closed overnight and the world became universally Atheist/evolution believers, obviously this would destroy the churches ability to do their immense scope of charitable work?
And nobody but churches can do charitable work because? {ABE}: Also, "believing" in evolution has nothing to do with athesim. There are atheists who reject in evolution, you know.
Obviously there would be a transitional period of uncalculable suffering before other groups could take over the churches presently run charitable initatives.
Why? If everybody became atheist, but nothing else changed in their views, why would they not simply turn their churches charity into a non-christian charity? Since atheism has nothing to do with whether or not you want to help other people.
I wanted to know would the Athiest movement "Brights" take over and manage all of these responisbilities?
Have the people that are doing it now do it as well. Remember, nothing about these people changed, except their belief in gods. So they are just going to continue doing what they did, they just won;t believe in god anymore.
from soup kitchens to helping the homeless, orphaniges, providing funds for food and medical aid etc.
Indeed, because we all know atheists don't do any of this stuff, they'd much rather watch people suffer and laugh in their faces, right?
Edited by Huntard, : Added {ABE} bit

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Replies to this message:
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Larni
Member (Idle past 164 days)
Posts: 4000
From: Liverpool
Joined: 09-16-2005


Message 23 of 71 (551294)
03-22-2010 9:24 AM
Reply to: Message 22 by Huntard
03-22-2010 9:17 AM


I fear the xianity equals morality boat is hoving into view.

This message is a reply to:
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lyx2no
Member (Idle past 4716 days)
Posts: 1277
From: A vast, undifferentiated plane.
Joined: 02-28-2008


Message 24 of 71 (551295)
03-22-2010 9:26 AM
Reply to: Message 13 by Den
03-22-2010 1:18 AM


Fibber
Are all your arguments based upon lies you tell others or yourself?
P.S. I like the way both your first and last name are apt lead-ins of "ass".

You are now a million miles away from where you were in space-time when you started reading this sentence.

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nwr
Member
Posts: 6408
From: Geneva, Illinois
Joined: 08-08-2005
Member Rating: 5.1


Message 25 of 71 (551298)
03-22-2010 9:28 AM
Reply to: Message 21 by Den
03-22-2010 9:09 AM


Den writes:
I wish the other satire I wrote wasnt locked, ...
I am not seeing anything locked.
The way this site works, you start a thread with a proposal. That proposal is locked, after copying to a discussion forum. The only recently locked threads I am seeing are proposals that were promoted (i.e. copied) for discussion.
Den writes:
..., because I was wondering what would happen if all the churches closed overnight and the world became universally Atheist/evolution believers, obviously this would destroy the churches ability to do their immense scope of charitable work?
There is lots of charity work done by secular (i.e. non-religious) groups. I don't know the numbers, but I would guess that the bulk of charitable work is secular, not religious.

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bluegenes
Member (Idle past 2477 days)
Posts: 3119
From: U.K.
Joined: 01-24-2007


Message 26 of 71 (551299)
03-22-2010 9:33 AM
Reply to: Message 21 by Den
03-22-2010 9:09 AM


Who's really giving to whom?
Den writes:
I wish the other satire I wrote wasnt locked, because I was wondering what would happen if all the churches closed overnight and the world became universally Atheist/evolution believers, obviously this would destroy the churches ability to do their immense scope of charitable work?
You might get a clue to this if you research and examine the varying levels of religious belief in different countries around the world. The least religious ones, you'll discover, are net givers of international aid, and the very religious ones tend to be net receivers. In other words, the more secular section of the world seems to be subsidising high religiosity in what used to be called the "third world."
There's a tendency amongst religious people to believe that whatever religion they believe in would benefit the world if belief in it was universal, but there's certainly evidence against this.
Do you really think that a country like Sweden would benefit from returning to the high levels of supernaturalism that you can see in Bangladesh, the Philippines, or Nigeria?
As for the soup kitchens, examine what the Swedes do in socio-economic policy and how effective it is, and there's your clue. Perhaps the soup kitchens are there to patch up the inadequacies of the economic policies that conservative Christians seem to be so keen on.

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Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 27 of 71 (551300)
03-22-2010 9:37 AM
Reply to: Message 21 by Den
03-22-2010 9:09 AM


Obviously there would be a transitional period of uncalculable suffering before other groups could take over the churches presently run charitable initatives. I wanted to know would the Athiest movement "Brights" take over and manage all of these responisbilities?
The Brights wouldn't. They'd be smart enough to leave it to the secular charities that are already established experts in charitable aid and who many Brights and atheists and agnostics and Christians and Muslims and Marxists and Capitalists already donate to.

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Huntard
Member (Idle past 2295 days)
Posts: 2870
From: Limburg, The Netherlands
Joined: 09-02-2008


Message 28 of 71 (551301)
03-22-2010 9:48 AM
Reply to: Message 25 by nwr
03-22-2010 9:28 AM


nwr writes:
I am not seeing anything locked.
And it's not. The thread The God Delusion, how it converted an evangalist is still open. It was suggested to get closed though, since these two threads are basically about the same thing.

This message is a reply to:
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 29 of 71 (551305)
03-22-2010 10:19 AM
Reply to: Message 14 by slevesque
03-22-2010 1:41 AM


Ok man. Seriously. You gotta stop this, there is nothing constructive in this ...
I say that as a fellow christian+creationist.
Well, it's weird, isn't it?
Out of every Christian who thinks he has a mission to talk to atheists, 90% of them will start off by explaining to atheists that they're all hateful wicked people who like to eat babies, spit out their bones, and then dance on their graves. Or something of the sort.
And the result of this is, of course, that atheists think: "Oh, look, Christianity drives people insane".
Really, after reading Den's filth, I've had to wash my mind out by thinking over and over again of all the Christians I've met who were good and decent people. Den offers a great temptation to every atheist to look at the depth of Den's degradation and say: "Ah, yes, that is Christianity".
The only way he could have done worse for Christianity on the internet is if he could have found some way to burn people at the stake using standard TCP/IP.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 14 by slevesque, posted 03-22-2010 1:41 AM slevesque has not replied

  
Den
Member (Idle past 5101 days)
Posts: 36
From: Australia
Joined: 03-21-2010


Message 30 of 71 (551323)
03-22-2010 11:37 AM


I think what I am saying is being taken out of context, Im looking at things from a practical sense. Im not religious, but I respect the work many religions do in order to help the needy.
It is irrellevant who does more - secular charities vs Religion, when the fact is that no-one is trying to destroy secular charities, on the other hand there is an Athiest movement attacking Religion with the ambition to reduce its membership and influence, prefferably irradicating it altogether. The fact is that religious groups donate billions of dollars a year with armies of unpaid volunteers dedicated to charitable causes, what happens if you turn that tap off?
even slowing the tap down will have a negative effect, so my point here is that should the Athiest movement which is trying to turn the tap off accept any responsibility for the consequences of this situation should it occur?
I mean every person that the athiest movement convinces to leave religion, makes one less person donating their time and money towards the charitable initiatives of the church, = less for charity.
Lets assume that all the people who leave the church commit the same donations to secular charities instead(unlikely, but a percentage probably would), what about the lost volunteers? time is just as important, this you cant get back once these people have turned Athiest. Athiesm does not have intiatives mobilising people to donate their time to charitable causes the last time I checked.
It really makes a case as to which party has moral superiority, while in judging individuals there may not be an arguement, but as an institution it is obvious as daylight as to who leads this race.

Replies to this message:
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 Message 33 by Dr Jack, posted 03-22-2010 11:50 AM Den has not replied
 Message 35 by Huntard, posted 03-22-2010 11:59 AM Den has not replied
 Message 52 by Taq, posted 03-22-2010 4:40 PM Den has not replied
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