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The Trouble with Atheists (Read 16870 times)
Raven
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Re: The Trouble with Atheists
Reply #60 - Aug 29th, 2016 at 1:57pm
 
Dnarever wrote on Aug 28th, 2016 at 9:48am:
The Trouble with Atheists

They just don't believe.


It's also a non-prophet organisation
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Quoth the Raven "Nevermore"

Raven would rather ask questions that may never be answered, then accept answers which must never be questioned.
 
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Parannoyed
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Re: The Trouble with Atheists
Reply #61 - Aug 29th, 2016 at 1:58pm
 
John Smith wrote on Aug 29th, 2016 at 1:19pm:
Parannoyed wrote on Aug 29th, 2016 at 1:12pm:
To me atheists are simply people who don't need to complicate life with the supernatural.


hit it in one 
(oh, damn! I could have saved myself a lot of keyboard action couldn't I?  Grin)
... although if you ask Misty (culture warrior) he'll tell you that you're rebelling.


Wellll, I'd just have to tell Misty he's rebelling against having to accept that the universe doesn't rotate  around the faithful wouldn't I?   Wink
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Raven
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Re: The Trouble with Atheists
Reply #62 - Aug 29th, 2016 at 2:15pm
 
issuevoter wrote on Aug 28th, 2016 at 2:14pm:
Dnarever wrote on Aug 28th, 2016 at 9:48am:
The Trouble with Atheists

They just don't believe.


Those who bothered to read my OP, will probably have guessed the gist is somewhat tongue in cheek. While it is ostensibly a critique, it is also an oblique shot at their opponents. I find most discussions of this subject rather weak, on both sides. Those who wish to bang on about “belief,” should be required to stipulate what they mean by belief. Call me old fashioned, if you wish, but I cannot believe anything I do not know. And if I know anything, it must have a grounding in my experience. Those who wish to believe in things beyond experience, should do what they think is right. But it is reasonable to presume they are indulging in wishful thinking. I see wishful thinking passed off as knowledge, all over the forums.





Raven has always been of the opinion that it is better to have an idea then a belief. You can change an idea, changing a belief is harder. People die for it people kill for it. Belief drives people to fly planes into buildings, makes everyday people blow up abortion clinics and encourages parents to mutilate the genitals of their sons and daughters.

But if you do have belief then question everything because if what you hold as true stands up then you are stronger for it.

If it doesn't stand up to the questions then you are better off devoting your time to more worthwhile things.
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Quoth the Raven "Nevermore"

Raven would rather ask questions that may never be answered, then accept answers which must never be questioned.
 
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Re: The Trouble with Atheists
Reply #63 - Aug 29th, 2016 at 2:17pm
 
Bobby. wrote on Aug 28th, 2016 at 2:08pm:



You know he's got a damn fine point, we should all go outside, drop to our knees and give thanks to the great ball in the sky that literally controls the f.ucking weather.
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Quoth the Raven "Nevermore"

Raven would rather ask questions that may never be answered, then accept answers which must never be questioned.
 
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Re: The Trouble with Atheists
Reply #64 - Aug 30th, 2016 at 10:43am
 
Doomsday comes around and it turns out God exists. Holy smoke! We are in deep do-do now!
St Peter is out there with his shepard's crook seperating the faithful from the crowd. Not that there is many of them. In Revelation, God already said he is only going to redeem a measelly 144,000!

I hear a lot of nashing of teeth and wailing as people dropping on their knees. But it looks like the Jews and Muzlims and Christians got it right after all, but its a pretty small group who actually believed. Funny, I don't see any clergy.

And then there is the rest of us sorry lot, and we're as pissed off as Republicans after the referendum.  A Buddhist says, “See, I told you it was all meaningless.” Mel Brooks wants to talk to Moses about remaking the Ten Commandments. A stoned Rasta still think he and Haili Salase are going to Heaven. But the Atheists step forward and start shaking their fists at St Peter, “Not so fast Pete, we want to know why!”

But St Peter silences them, “None of your God Damn business!”

In the back of the crowd a couple of Agnostics are whispering, “I knew it! I knew it! And all of those wasted lottery tickets!”

Abraham is commending his little band of Jews, Muzlims and Christians, and they all chorus in with “We told you so,” and point at us. And then I hear their sing song taunt.

“You're gunna burn in Hell . . . Nah Nana Nah Nah!”

But there is an Almighty clap as God's two hands come together squashing everything he has ever created, into a blob of clay. And when it is totally silent, he lobs the ball out into the middle of nothingness, and sits back on his throne. Scratching his chin he muses, “Well . . . If first you don't succeed, try, try, again.”

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Re: The Trouble with Atheists
Reply #65 - Aug 30th, 2016 at 8:17pm
 
Raven wrote on Aug 29th, 2016 at 2:17pm:
Bobby. wrote on Aug 28th, 2016 at 2:08pm:



You know he's got a damn fine point, we should all go outside, drop to our knees and give thanks to the great ball in the sky that literally controls the f.ucking weather.



George Carlin was very smart.
He will be sorely missed.
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Re: The Trouble with Atheists
Reply #66 - Aug 30th, 2016 at 10:21pm
 
Forget Jesus - the stars died so you could be here today:

13:16


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Re: The Trouble with Atheists
Reply #67 - Aug 31st, 2016 at 6:28pm
 
Prime Minister for Canyons wrote on Aug 29th, 2016 at 11:51am:
Postmodern Trendoid III wrote on Aug 28th, 2016 at 7:52am:
Prime Minister for Canyons wrote on Aug 26th, 2016 at 8:51am:
John Smith wrote on Aug 26th, 2016 at 8:09am:
Yadda wrote on Aug 25th, 2016 at 10:42pm:
Nobody who reads the bible, and understands what it is saying [to the human psyche], imo, could remain an atheist.



A. The bible is a work of fiction and not the word of god and
B. the only way the bible makes sense is if you use the 'god works in mysterious ways' mantra to excuse all the contradictions in it.



Postmodern Trendoid III wrote on Aug 24th, 2016 at 1:24am:
Their problem is that they begin from rebellion rather than curiosity; that is, rather than asking what proof is there for god, they begin by not liking the concept of god or what has been done in the name of god then working backwards from there.


You probably shouldn't start such statements by questioning others intelligence. Especially when you follow it with such blatantly stupid comments. You've never spoken to any actual atheists have you?




No but he's worked in tertiary education so clearly he knows intellectual curiosity. I'm beginning to suspect Culture Warrior is like my uncle who conned my grandmother when she told him I had found a job in tertiary education. My uncle said I work in tertiary education too, when in actual fact all he did was clean the toilets at the local university.


You're proving one of my points. Do you think off-topic attempts at ad hominem make your atheism more legitimate or superior?




And yet your comment about rebellion wasn't ad hominem?


No it wasnt. Ad Hominem means 'to the man', such as your comment on me being nothing more than a janitor. My original point made a distinction between a 'dislike' of something and a 'refutation' of something. Atheists often mistake the two. İt's a point that goes back at least as far as Hume's 'fact/value' distinction. 'Dislike' is the realm of values and 'refutation' deals with the realm of facts. 

As İ stated originally, it's very hard to encounter intelligent atheists.
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« Last Edit: Aug 31st, 2016 at 6:37pm by Postmodern Trendoid III »  
 
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Re: The Trouble with Atheists
Reply #68 - Aug 31st, 2016 at 6:30pm
 
Parannoyed wrote on Aug 29th, 2016 at 1:58pm:
John Smith wrote on Aug 29th, 2016 at 1:19pm:
Parannoyed wrote on Aug 29th, 2016 at 1:12pm:
To me atheists are simply people who don't need to complicate life with the supernatural.


hit it in one 
(oh, damn! I could have saved myself a lot of keyboard action couldn't I?  Grin)
... although if you ask Misty (culture warrior) he'll tell you that you're rebelling.


Wellll, I'd just have to tell Misty he's rebelling against having to accept that the universe doesn't rotate  around the faithful wouldn't I?   Wink



So what banned member were you? Or are you hiding something from other posters?
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Postmodern Trendoid III
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Re: The Trouble with Atheists
Reply #69 - Aug 31st, 2016 at 6:35pm
 
Parannoyed wrote on Aug 29th, 2016 at 1:12pm:
[i] [quote]


The operative word for me in these arguments is "need".  They need to believe in it, and I don't.  Why would I want to take something from them that I don't want??


'Need' may be the defining reason why some believe but there are others.
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Re: The Trouble with Atheists
Reply #70 - Aug 31st, 2016 at 9:21pm
 
I don't know what circles you move in, CW, but I have met many intelligent people who subscribe to one of the self-imposed trinity, Atheist, Agnostic, God worshiper.
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Re: The Trouble with Atheists
Reply #71 - Sep 1st, 2016 at 8:40am
 
Postmodern Trendoid III wrote on Aug 31st, 2016 at 6:28pm:
Prime Minister for Canyons wrote on Aug 29th, 2016 at 11:51am:
Postmodern Trendoid III wrote on Aug 28th, 2016 at 7:52am:
Prime Minister for Canyons wrote on Aug 26th, 2016 at 8:51am:
John Smith wrote on Aug 26th, 2016 at 8:09am:
Yadda wrote on Aug 25th, 2016 at 10:42pm:
Nobody who reads the bible, and understands what it is saying [to the human psyche], imo, could remain an atheist.



A. The bible is a work of fiction and not the word of god and
B. the only way the bible makes sense is if you use the 'god works in mysterious ways' mantra to excuse all the contradictions in it.



Postmodern Trendoid III wrote on Aug 24th, 2016 at 1:24am:
Their problem is that they begin from rebellion rather than curiosity; that is, rather than asking what proof is there for god, they begin by not liking the concept of god or what has been done in the name of god then working backwards from there.


You probably shouldn't start such statements by questioning others intelligence. Especially when you follow it with such blatantly stupid comments. You've never spoken to any actual atheists have you?




No but he's worked in tertiary education so clearly he knows intellectual curiosity. I'm beginning to suspect Culture Warrior is like my uncle who conned my grandmother when she told him I had found a job in tertiary education. My uncle said I work in tertiary education too, when in actual fact all he did was clean the toilets at the local university.


You're proving one of my points. Do you think off-topic attempts at ad hominem make your atheism more legitimate or superior?




And yet your comment about rebellion wasn't ad hominem?


No it wasnt. Ad Hominem means 'to the man', such as your comment on me being nothing more than a janitor. My original point made a distinction between a 'dislike' of something and a 'refutation' of something. Atheists often mistake the two. İt's a point that goes back at least as far as Hume's 'fact/value' distinction. 'Dislike' is the realm of values and 'refutation' deals with the realm of facts. 

As İ stated originally, it's very hard to encounter intelligent atheists.


Confirmation bias then
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In a time of universal deceit — telling the truth is a revolutionary act.

No evidence whatsoever it can be attributed to George Orwell or Eric Arthur Blair (in fact the same guy)
 
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Re: The Trouble with Atheists
Reply #72 - Sep 1st, 2016 at 2:57pm
 
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-09-01/worlds-oldest-fossils-in-3.7-billion-year-...

The oldest fossils known to date have been discovered in 3.7 billion-year-old rocks in Greenland by an Australian-led team of researchers.

Key points

Evidence of ancient bacterial communities known as stromatolites uncovered in rocks in Greenland
Dating of rock above and below stromatolites places them between 3.7 and 3.68 billion years old
Analysis pushes back earliest known evidence of life on Earth by 220 million years
The discovery of the fossilised bacterial communities, known as stromatolites, could be the first clear biological evidence of the earliest known life on Earth, according to a paper published today in Nature.

Before this find, the earliest accepted evidence for life were 3.48 billion-year-old fossil stromatolites from the Pilbara region in Western Australia.

Lead author Professor Allen Nutman of the University of Wollongong has been investigating ancient rock formations in the Isua Supercrustal Belt in south-west Greenland for more than 30 years.

The rocks were known to contain a unique carbon signature, but until now, it was unclear whether the signature had been created by ancient life forms or changes in the rock caused by heat and pressure.

Twelve of the oldest fossils we've discovered so far



Fossils are the hard evidence behind our picture of life on Earth. Here are a dozen of the oldest-known fossils we've discovered in the last 20 years.
During one of their visits to the area four years ago, the team found a new outcrop had been exposed by increased melting of the summer snow.

"There were some new outcrops that, as far as I can see from historical aerial photographs, have not been exposed in at least the last 40 years or so," said Professor Nutman.

Those rocks bore unusual features that the group instantly recognised.

"We could see this very diagnostic layering where one side of the layering was completely flat and then rising out of that, we had this irregular distribution of bumps or hummocks along it," Professor Nutman said.

Within those bumps and hummocks, they could also see the fine layering that is distinctive of stromatolites, where calcified layers are gradually built up by bacteria over hundreds and even thousands of years.

Analysis of rock layers pins down date

Two fossil researchers holding the stromatolites
PHOTO: Allen Nutman (left) and Vickie Bennet (right) with a specimen of 3.7-billion-year-old stromatolites from Isua, Greenland. (Supplied: Yuri Amelin)
The team used sophisticated techniques to carefully date the layers of rocks above and below the fossils.

The analysis placed the stromatolites between 3.71 and 3.695 billion years of age.

"So we've really pinned it down," Professor Nutman said.

Evidence from the "molecular clock" — the mutation rate of genetic material — has long suggested that life first emerged on Earth around 4 billion years ago.

As the product of bacterial communities, stromatolites suggest some degree of sophistication already existed at 3.7 billion years ago, Professor Nutman said.

The discovery could also help guide the search for evidence of past life on Mars, he added.

"At that particular time on Mars, there was still water on the surface, so if life has taken this path already on Earth by 3.7 billion years ago, it does increase the possibility of finding evidence of life on Mars."
Scientists will be 'queuing up'

Commenting on the finding, biogeochemist Dr David Wacey, Future Fellow at the University of Western Australia, said the find would undoubtedly have paleobiologists "queuing up waiting for more snow to melt and reveal additional new outcrops in this region".

Dr Wacey said the discovery was exciting, but not necessarily surprising, given that microfossils and stromatolite fossils dated to around 3.48 billion years ago had previously been found.

"This shows that life had attained a certain degree of complexity at this point so it follows that some considerable amount of time had probably passed since the origin of life itself," he said.
Dr Wacey stressed that the Isua fossils would need to undergo the same rigorous scrutiny as previous ancient microbial fossils had been before this could be considered 100 per cent proof of life 3.7 billion years ago. But at this stage, he said, there were no other competitors for "world's oldest fossil".
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In a time of universal deceit — telling the truth is a revolutionary act.

No evidence whatsoever it can be attributed to George Orwell or Eric Arthur Blair (in fact the same guy)
 
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PZ547
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Re: The Trouble with Atheists
Reply #73 - Sep 1st, 2016 at 4:23pm
 
The 'supernatural', 'esoteric', 'metaphysical' etc. exists, regardless of whether one person or 8 billion of them 'believe' (or do not) in one or more gods

People personalize their god. It gives them comfort.  It's the tent pole which holds up their often scary world

Others are disappointed in what they believe is their god's failure to give them what they want/need

Some choose not to believe in any god at all and are content with the belief in an eternity of black oblivion after they die

I don't care what others do or do not believe

I know the unseen is far more perplexing, confusing, confounding etc. than the seen

But then we actually see so little.  Humans are relegated to seeing and hearing approx. one percent of all that exists as reported by science

We blunder around, blind and deaf to 99% approx.  We're like kittens and newborn babies.  Not surprising we've concocted some strange belief systems over the millennia, nor is it surprising that some can't see the point in subscribing to those belief systems



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Re: The Trouble with Atheists
Reply #74 - Sep 3rd, 2016 at 6:49am
 
Prime Minister for Canyons wrote on Sep 1st, 2016 at 8:40am:
Postmodern Trendoid III wrote on Aug 31st, 2016 at 6:28pm:
Prime Minister for Canyons wrote on Aug 29th, 2016 at 11:51am:
Postmodern Trendoid III wrote on Aug 28th, 2016 at 7:52am:
Prime Minister for Canyons wrote on Aug 26th, 2016 at 8:51am:
John Smith wrote on Aug 26th, 2016 at 8:09am:
Yadda wrote on Aug 25th, 2016 at 10:42pm:
Nobody who reads the bible, and understands what it is saying [to the human psyche], imo, could remain an atheist.



A. The bible is a work of fiction and not the word of god and
B. the only way the bible makes sense is if you use the 'god works in mysterious ways' mantra to excuse all the contradictions in it.



Postmodern Trendoid III wrote on Aug 24th, 2016 at 1:24am:
Their problem is that they begin from rebellion rather than curiosity; that is, rather than asking what proof is there for god, they begin by not liking the concept of god or what has been done in the name of god then working backwards from there.


You probably shouldn't start such statements by questioning others intelligence. Especially when you follow it with such blatantly stupid comments. You've never spoken to any actual atheists have you?




No but he's worked in tertiary education so clearly he knows intellectual curiosity. I'm beginning to suspect Culture Warrior is like my uncle who conned my grandmother when she told him I had found a job in tertiary education. My uncle said I work in tertiary education too, when in actual fact all he did was clean the toilets at the local university.


You're proving one of my points. Do you think off-topic attempts at ad hominem make your atheism more legitimate or superior?




And yet your comment about rebellion wasn't ad hominem?


No it wasnt. Ad Hominem means 'to the man', such as your comment on me being nothing more than a janitor. My original point made a distinction between a 'dislike' of something and a 'refutation' of something. Atheists often mistake the two. İt's a point that goes back at least as far as Hume's 'fact/value' distinction. 'Dislike' is the realm of values and 'refutation' deals with the realm of facts. 

As İ stated originally, it's very hard to encounter intelligent atheists.


Confirmation bias then


İn regards to what?
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