It is the essence of democracy that people should be able to decide the moral rules that govern the nature of a community. If people don't have that power, then they are living under an autocracy.
True, this majority rule is not unlimited. It is limited by what the government has the power to do. Consequently the majority cannot, in general, vote to seize the homes and accumulated savings of rich people. Leaving aside exceptional cases, government cannot mandate how parents how should raise their children. These kinds of power lie outside the scope of government in a free society.
Majority rule is also circumscribed by individual rights. But these are the rights clearly specified in the Constitution. A majority of citizens cannot prevent an individual from voting because voting is a basic right, as is the right to freedom of speech and freedom of religion, and so on. The state is constitutionally prohibited from undermining these enumerated rights.
Now the high court of California has made gay marriage into a right that is immune from restriction by the majority of citizens in the state. We already know what California citizens think about gay marriage: they oppose it. A referendum outlawing gay marriage was passed with the support of the state's voters.
How, then, can a court invalidate the referendum and over-rule the will of the people? Basically through a kind of legal fraud. The court has to pretend that there is a right to gay marriage even though it is nowhere evident in the state constitution. Read the constitution, hold it up to the light, squeeze lemon juice on it--you won't see a right to gay marriage in there. It is simply not an enumerated right, nor is it a right that can be clearly derived from other enumerated rights.
Here we see liberal jurisprudence in its arrogant willingness to subvert the will of the people in order to achieve its ideological agenda. This has nothing to do with whether you think gays should be allowed to marry. If you think they should, go ahead and vote for candidates who support gay marriage. But you should still oppose the manufacture of bogus rights in order to reach a result that democracy would not by itself allow.
Attempting to insulate themselves from the political fallout, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have both said they oppose gay marriage. The real question, however, is what they would do to express this opposition. What would a President Obama do, for instance, to protect traditional marriage? Here the answer appears to be: nothing!
In the past Democrats have always appreciated courts doing their dirty work when it comes to issues like abortion, pornography, prostitution and gay rights. This way Democrats can advance their permissive agenda without having to take political responsibility for voting against the values of a majority of voters.
I know that there are gays who desperately want gay marriage, and in a way I'm happy for them. But at the same time I'm sad for constitutional democracy, which suffered a grievous blow at the hands of the California high court.
Reader Comments ( Page 85 of 86)
1261. Peter: Why Are We Here? [Why we exist? What is the purpose of life?]
PV: That Dawkins, what a kook. He admits he's a random ape evolved accidentally; he admits that propagating genes is nature's purpose for all life; then he wants to find "the purpose of that." Dawkins is no philosopher, that much is for sure. It's such a testimonial to Theism that Dawkins is deeply disturbed by the Darwinian meaning of life---he himself can't accept it! That's classic.
What is classic is your theological world view. Putridly classic due to its reliance upon unproven and unprovable beliefs that pretty much all violate the known and well tested laws of Nature.
Evolution is only partially guided by accidental mutations, mostly it's guided by natural selection.
Peter: Yes, in fact they exist within your brain as you experience them.
PV: Conceptual thoughts, love, and reason are immaterial. The only material thing that actually exists in the brain is the electro-chemical reactions of cells passing matter and energy back and forth.
It's only our way of thinking of them due to a lack of knowledge that has people think of conceptual thoughts as immaterial.
Everything about their existence is physical, electrical, chemical, biological, logical, computational, and communicational. Our thoughts are cells passing matter and energy back and forth. There is nothing else, and no need for anything else. There is no evidence for anything else. Above all brain science has demonstrated this.
Peter: Bush, Cheney, Castros, Clinton (42) and likely Clinton (44vp), .... They are responsible for many state sponsored terrorist acts against innocent people around the world.
PV: Comparing Stalin to Bush and Clinton shows just how uneducated and incapable of reason you are.
The comparison of these despots is valid since they are all mass murderers who lead people ordering them to kill. Granted Stalin is in a league few gain entry to however Bush, Cheney, the Castros, Clinton, etc... are mass murderers, war criminals who have committed crimes against human beings - namely murder and death.
Just because you don't like the point of view that compares certain leaders to other criminals doesn't undermine its validity nor it's basis in rationality. In fact one could say that "how many people a leader gets killed" is a much more objective measure of a leader than any other. By this objective measure Bush, Cheney, Clinton, the Castros, Ahmadinejad, and many others are war criminals who have or are committing crimes against humanity. While they might not yet have killed as many people as Stalin, Hitler, Pol Pot, or others, it is only a matter of one or two orders of magnitude. They are still guilty of crimes against humanity.
Peter: I'm an anyone and a logical person
PV: You are not logical. You believe in "The Singularity from the Nothing." You are in the Singularity-from-the-Nothing cult.
Well, whatever. I employ logic and don't believe in things without proof. As stated numerous times I don't believe the singularity from nothing hypothesis; I certainly understand it quite well, but understanding and belief are quite different. By way of another example, I understand much of christian theology being raised within a christian context, but it's very clear that I don't believe any of it. You on the other hand believe - by your own admissions here - all kinds of wild Natural Law violating nonsense including dead bodies rising from the dead and the notion that all things had a designer.
Peter: I don't have any faith or belief in the big bang. There are just facts that have so far been determined
PV: The Big Bang, while certainly a theory, is entirely theory at the present time. You often fail to distinguish between theory and proven science. We both agree about proven science, but you regularly mistake theory as scientific fact, and you put much faith into those theories.
I've linked you to the evidence at the Nasa and other sites where the research is being carried out. In science a theory is essentially the same as fact. As the facts line up in support of a hypothesis and none of the falsification tests succeed in ruling it out the hypothesis gains ground as a scientific theory. By the time a hypothesis has reached the level of testing it is essentially indistinguishable from facts on that topic - a scientific theory is well tested facts with an explanation that accurately predicts the Natural phenomenon in the real world.
The big bang hypothesis-theory is well on it's way to being a well tested scientific theory. Although there are some contenders to the big bang hypothesis they will have to pass all the tests that the big bang hypothesis has already passed. Thus it was with Einstein's work, thus it is with Evolution, and thus it is with any scientific theory and it's contenders.
Peter: Obviously you are the kind of person who prefers belief over fact.
PV: Wrong. I'm the kind of person who understands that truth is obtained through historic study, law, logical reasoning, and the scientific method equally.
Recall that history is most often written by the victors and the further you go back history is written by those who had the power, knowledge and skills of writing and how to protect that writing. These usually were people of the ruling elites in most cultures back then, certainly near 1 AD.
History simply can't be trusted, and often must be verified, but even then... it's just a story, and most definitely not evidence of a god, or a jesus, or any violations of Nature.
Oh, that's funny, your mythical god is a violation of Mother Nature! Yikes, your god raped Mother Nature! How shameful of your god.
Even our calendar is poisoned with religion, sheesh.
PV: You only allow for the scientific method, as you are uneducated on the subject of what constitutes evidence/proof.
Not the case. For proof of god nothing less than actual evidence of god's existence is sufficient. Not less is Einstein's work put to the rigors of the scientific method over and over and over again, and no less standard should a hypothesis (if you ever manage to generate a well formed one that is) of god. In fact due to the wild claims of believers in god any god concept must be put to the highest standards of testing for evidence. Since you've never demonstrated one iota of proof that holds up under the scrutiny of scientific inquiry you and your ilk have failed to prove your god exists. I suspect you never will for it's the realm of belief that you exist within not the realm of hard facts of objective reality.
PV: It took me hours to get you to admit that eyewitness testimony is a legit standard of proof, and I still can't get you to admit that prescience (if demonstrated by history's outcomes) is proof. Everyone else but Peter knows that these constitute evidence and proof.
I've not admitted anything, so your imagined victory in that regard is another false belief you taken on. Obviously eyewitness testimony can be used as evidence in a court case, however there are many well known limitations of eyewitnesses - they lie, they distort, they forget, they see things from different angles, they tell different versions, they can be bought, ... and many more faults with eyewitness testimony.
Simply put eyewitness testimony is not sufficient for the scientific method nor for the extraordinary claims you and your ilk make of your mythical god.
You are applying eyewitness evidence out of context of how it can be used. Obviously it works for you in the peddling of the delusional beliefs that you peddle as most people might not be knswledgable in this field.
Peter: You look for facts to fit your beliefs and ignore the other inconvenient facts out there.
PV: All scientists do that. There is nothing "objective" about the hypothesis part of the scientific method, and it is the hypothesis part that drives the outcomes of the method.
No, not all scientists do that, and those that do are poor scientists. Certainly taking on various points of views as possibilities is a valid approach in the verification of a scientific hypothesis but to take it on as a belief as if it's true usually goes too far and begins to influence the quality of the science. This is one reason that an important part of the scientific method is peer review and constant retesting of the assumptions of a hypothesis and of well known and well tested laws of Nature. Objective reality is the measure by which a hypothesis succeeds or fails.
Since you claim that your god is immaterial, can't be proven, your god hypothesis can't be tested. Thus it fails as a scientific theory. It means it's simply theological nonsense that was made up. Sure for historical purposes it's of interest to some, but as a way of living life, we've moved on as civilization has advanced through the Enlightenment up till today, and we'll continue to advance as long as you faith freaks don't pull the nuclear trigger - hear that Bush? Cheney?
Peter: You ignore the evidence...since it would mean that your well constructed belief system could come crumbling down
PV: Absurd. Rather, you are confused about agency vs mechanism. That is, you are of the illogical view that the laws of nature preclude a designer of laws of nature. You think "natural mechanisms and laws" weren't designed by a designer. That's where you and Dawkins go astray.
Yes, I've linked to the evidence for some of the evidence of the big bang over at Nasa who are doing a stellar job of finding out about the beginnings of the universe. (Pun intended). You've not adjusted your thinking to correspond to the objective realities that must be as a result of this evidence, thus you've ignored the evidence. QED.
Yes the laws of Nature preclude the possibility of a designer of nature. The Speed of Light prevents it. Simple spacetime prevents it. Thermodynamics prevents it. The work of Wolfram proves that a designer is not needed, as does the work of Darwin. And so on with many well tested and well known laws of Nature.
The fact is that you don't accept these theories even though they are proven scientific facts of the laws of Nature.
Peter: That is fine as long as you don't hurt others with your evil and vile mind poo for a belief system.
PV: As we have learned from history, state-sponsored atheist cults do all the mass murdering and mass genocides. Such is logical, for the atheists are forced to be material and social darwinists who can't find any basis for OBJECTIVE human rights.
Well, obviously you'll continue to classify Stalin et. al. as atheists when the facts are against you on this. I and others have demonstrated that they were cult leaders for sure but not atheistic cults, as their primary tactic was to take advantage of people's brains abilities to believe in any nonsense, and communism is sure a load of evil and vile nonsense.
I gather that the only bit we can agree on with regard to this topic is that they were evil and vile. Oh, wait, right you're a nihilistic catholic and if you lost your beliefs and were grounded from your leap of faith you'd think that Stalin and Hitler were good guys. How shameful of you. How vile of you.
Peter: If you really want to prove to the world that your god exists then come up with the evidence.
PV: In the real world, complex mechanisms and blueprints *must* be the work of an engineer, as they are full on intelligence and they defy all statistically probabilities. Fools like you have to deny this objective reality to maintain your religious devotion to "The Singularity from the Nothing" creation myth.
No, that is not the case - as I've pointed out numerous times here to you specifically. Let me say it yet again. It has been proven that simple systems do in fact generate complex systems as complex as any complex system generated by a complex system. That is a proven fact of computer science. That is a proven fact of chemistry. That is a proven fact of Evolution Theory.
What we have here is that you keep going back to your modal operator of necessity "*must*". What you are describing to me is your belief system ad nauseum. Unfortunately for you your belief that there "*must*" be a designer is *disproven* by the proven fact that some simple systems do generate complex systems. You are an example of the work of evolution and of simple systems at work generating complex systems - from a chemical perspective, from an evolutionary perspective, from a biological perspective, from a computational perspective, and from others as well.
A well used principle in science is to disprove ideas by the application of other ideas that have been proven. Application of this principle (as described in the previous paragraph) is what disproves your "*must*" assertion of your belief system notion that there must have been a designer. It's a bankrupt idea along with oh so many others on the dust pile of human history.
Not to mention that your claim that ANY complex system *MUST* have a designer IMPLIES that your mythical god *MUST* have had a designer!!! This alone makes your failed god hypothesis more complex than it needs to be. This fact is one of the major reasons that your ill formed god hypothesis fails.
Peter: The longer you fail to show the evidence the more probable it is that your god does not exist. Oh wait, it's been many thousands of years with no solid independently verifiable proof
PV: Again, you reject history and legal reasoning and statistical probabilities as proof. So, no wonder you continue to have your head in the sand. The proof is there. But you think that if something doesn't show up in a CAT scan it doesn't exist.
I like the sand in objective reality most of the time. I don't like it when it has pests in it of course, but then it's not sand, it's sand+pests.
CAT scans will reveal what they reveal.
Legal reasoning has nothing to do with the lack of proof of god. Scientific method does. You can't even form a valid falsifiable scientific hypothesis for your claimed mythical god.
Peter: God of the Gaps
PV: The "god of the gaps" talk is idiotic. Theists don't posit that "God must be the reason for things we do NOT understand," but rather posit that God must be the reason for the things we DO understand. Natural selection, to the extent it works, is an intelligent mechanism, just like the mechanisms of the cell or the atom or the human eye. Intelligent mechanisms and blueprints always point us to intelligent engineers. It is the atheist who for the first time wants humankind to believe foolishly that intelligent mechanisms and blueprints DO NOT point to intelligent engineers.
Sure, history points out that the god of the gaps is used by faith freaks all the time. You like history so go look it up.
Science overrules your faith based explanations with hard facts that have actual predictive powers (e.g., object will be in place in orbit such and such at such and such time) without claiming super natural violations of Nature as Theists posits REQUIRE!!!
There is no intelligence in Natural Selection. It's the battle for life and continued existence that generates "natural selection", nothing intelligent about it. It's simply this organism died before reproducing, that organism mutated and reproduced like a rabbits gone wild video thus the rabbits with certain genes lived while others didn't. Those that lived to pass on their genes where selected naturally. No intelligence present until man started selecting which animals live and reproduce and which don't.
PV: "Intelligent mechanisms and blueprints always point us to intelligent engineers."
That is factually incorrect and Stephen Wolfram has PROVEN that your statement false. Darwin also PROVED your statement is false. There are others who have PROVEN your statement is false.
If you were to get that your statement is false your world view would have no choice but to shift. Therein lies the problem as your belief system has a mind of its own, in fact it's usurped your mind by ignoring facts of objective reality. You've been conquered by your beliefs. Free yourself.
Peter: So let's review. When a Christian couple gets married, we have all of these forces that should be working to keep them married...
PV: The Catholic Church alone understands that divorce and remarriage is permanent adultery and thus prohibits it (as per Christ's teaching). That's why Catholics have a much lower divorce rate than evangelicals. Evangelicals believe that God allows divorce and remarriage, and so that is why evangelical groups permit it.
Actually the study that I posted has evangelicals divorcing more.
Peter: If God puts something together, shouldn't it be impossible to break it?
PV: You've misunderstood the scripture you yourself quote. Jesus said that what God joins together (i.e., the institution of marriage) men OUGHT NOT separate. That is, humans OUGHT to use their will to obey God's ethical prescriptions. God, as Law Giver, sets guidelines for the common good of society while also giving humans the freedom of thought and will to decide whether or not to follow such.
Oh, so it's a moral prescription not an order eh? Well, whatever it's still delusionally based in a whacked belief system.
I do agree that people ought to keep their word if possible and if not possible then they ought to extract themselves from the situation OR recommit. However, the choice to do that is up to them not some outside agency or belief system.
Peter: Given the fact that an all-powerful, prayer-answering God is supposedly looking over the lives of a Christian couple, guiding them in the spirit...
PV: You've got it all wrong. God "looks over" the lives of the human race by having revealed enlightened utility-based moral codes that people OUGHT to follow and which the Church mandates that they follow. Thus, if people do not KNOW the codes and are not adhering to Church governance, they are not "being looked over by God." God does not mystically speak to people on an individual basis apart from The Law of God and apart from the ruling dynasty of the People of God as they exist in real history. Though people DO have conscience, that conscience must be educated and matured until it grasps the good sense and reasonability of God's laws.
Nice summary of that aspect of your theology.
How can you possibly make any of the claims that you make about god there? You can't prove any of them. Go ahead, prove just one of those supernatural claims.
Sure you can show me where in your bible or scriptures or other writings your beliefs are written but that's not proof that your god exists or that your beliefs are valid. In fact the sheer number of extraordinary claims in your above paragraph is stunning. What's more stunning is that not one of those claims is backed up with ANY EVIDENCE OF AN OBJECTIVE NATURE as it is ALL BELIEFS based upon LEAPS OF FAITH and a long tradition of faith-based-illogic over the centuries that faith-criminals like yourself have had time to develop and evolve it.
Peter: Again you make what can easily be interpreted as a death threat.
PV: Only by sociopaths who cannot tell the difference between a dialogue about the philosophical implications of death and a real attack on a person's body. You appear to be one of these sociopaths.
It's important to watch your language online and especially important to clarify the context of your statements.
I don't like death threats and I'll call them publicly when I see them so that they are on the public record.
Peter: Nothing has ever violated the laws of Nature.
PV: Dawkins himself argues that today's humans have freed themselves from the compulsory evolutionary laws and are now working entirely contrary to evolutionary determinism. As he says, if our genes could see us today "our genes would be aghast." So even that nut job believes that the laws of Nature can be suspended or thwarted or countered.
Nonsense, any changes we make to our evolution are still within the laws of nature. You are either deliberately taking what he said out of context OR you don't comprehend what he said and how it relates to objective reality. Either way it is a sad day for you.
You arguments are incredibly foolish.
Humans find new ways to adapt and one of those ways is selective breeding of animals. The fact that we don't let cows reproduce with any bull means that we've overridden natural selection but it doesn't mean that we've violated a law of nature. It simply means that we are the ones shaping - to some degree - the selective pressures on the bovine species and not an unguided Natural principle.
PV: And again, I mock your "The Singularity from the Nothing" creation myth/delusion. That unproven and untestable belief defies not only science but common sense.
Fine, go ahead, while I might care (I don't) objective reality, as you've pointed out, doesn't care.
The more that the big bang theory is a creation "MYTH" the less I'd be willing to accept it. The more hard core facts that support it that there are the more compelling it becomes especially when there are no facts disputing it.
As I've said I don't take on beliefs or non-beliefs as it is belief itself that leads to so many dangers in life. When you find a belief or non-belief kill it.
Keep your beliefs if you wish. I prefer to kill any beliefs as it brings me closer to objective reality. If you should meet your mythical god on the road, kill that belief especially quickly.
Peter at 1:52PM on Jun 4th 2008
1262. An American Soldier fulfilling his duties.
WARNING EXTREMELY GRAPHIC CONTENT of a US soldier throwing an innocent puppy off of a cliff killing it, committing a war crime in their act of depraved murder.
WARNING EXTREMELY GRAPHIC CONTENT SHOWING DEATH
http://www.idkwtf.com/videos/latest-videos/us-soldier-throws-puppy-off-cliff
The morals of the sick soldiers in this video demonstrate many of the points that I've been making. Horrific.
Do you consider what these US Soldiers did was moral? If so why? If not why?
Do you believe these US Soldiers should be punished? If so why? If not why?
Peter at 1:55PM on Jun 4th 2008
1263. It is known that killing of small animals is a sign of mass murderers.
Peter at 2:48PM on Jun 4th 2008
1264. Peter: Everything about their existence is physical, electrical, chemical, biological, logical, computational, and communicational.
PV: Mind poo. The only thing material is the chemical energy transfer passing between cells. Everything else is immaterial.
Peter: Our thoughts are cells passing matter and energy back and forth.
PV: I agree that cells pass matter and energy back and forth. But that's the only material part that really exists. To say that conceptual thoughts and love exist is total poppycock.
Peter: The comparison of these despots is valid since they are all mass murderers who lead people ordering them to kill.
PV: Even if you were right in comparing Stalin to Clinton and Bush (you are not), you still have to conclude that they are all simply acting as good animals do. And I doubt you express outrage when animals kill. So, you're being inconsistent with your own atheism.
Peter: I employ logic and don't believe in things without proof.
PV: You believe in "The Singularity from the Nothing." In fact, as we've discovered, this is your equivalent of the Christian God. For when we continued to trace matter and energy backwards in time, you hit a dead end, where you could not point to any prior mass or energy source. So you threw up your hands and invented "The Singularity from the Nothing" as the ultimate first cause and source of all matter and energy. In contrast, I posited Intelligent Non-Matter as the ultimate source and cause. And when we compare your "The Singularity from the Nothing" to my "Intelligent Non-Matter, we see that my thesis is more reasonable. Why? Because it's more sensible to theorize that intelligence was involved in the origin of intelligently designed energy/matter than than to theorize that unintelligence was the source of intelligently designed energy/matter.
Peter: I understand much of christian theology being raised within a christian context
PV: You do NOT know christian theology too well at all.
Peter: In science a theory is essentially the same as fact.
PV: Not true. In the discipline of science, a FACT is something that can be proven via observable repeatable experiments in a laboratory setting. Moreover, piling up unproven theories upon other unproven theories is precisely what causes disasters of scientific theory. That's a house of cards, and it comes crashing down hard when even a single card (theory) collapses. One wrong assumption can lead to the invalidation of an entire theory that rests upon it.
Peter: The big bang hypothesis-theory is well on it's way to being a well tested scientific theory.
PV: Obviously, I agree that it is a theory. But whether it's actually provable or not, I'd have to say no. It's impossible for us to replicate the event in any experimental observable way. So, it will always be an unprovable theory.
Peter: Recall that history is most often written by the victors...
PV: History is not always perfect, but it is quite reliable. Moreover, science constantly overthrows its past beliefs when new ones arise or new facts arise that show the old ones to be outdated or wrong.
Peter: History simply can't be trusted, and often must be verified, but even then... it's just a story
PV: THis leaves you uncertain whether or not Plato or George Washington ever existed. And it will leave others in the future uncertain as to whether or not you ever existed. You really need to rethink your understanding of what history is.
Peter: most definitely not evidence of a god, or a jesus, or any violations of Nature.
PV: History can show a person's predictions to have been either false or true. In Jesus' case, history shows that his predictions for the future turned out to be true. And that's prescience, which everyone knows is beyond known natural explanations.
Peter: For proof of god nothing less than actual evidence of god's existence is sufficient.
PV: Eyewitness testimony is proof in any court of law. Prescience is proof of supernatural foreknowledge as well. You reject these forms of evidence. End of discussion, really, for only kooks reject such. You also have no proof for where energy/matter came from, yet you would rather believe by faith that an unintelligent "Singularity from the Nothing" is the origin of energy/matter than embrace the more reasonable claim that Intelligent non-matter was the origin.
Peter: Obviously eyewitness testimony can be used as evidence in a court case, however there are many well known limitations of eyewitnesses - they lie, they distort, they forget, they see things from different angles, they tell different versions, they can be bought
PV: Eyewitnesses are just observers, that's all. One doesn't need scientific testing to properly observe that a crucified man dead three days and locked away in a guarded tomb is dead. Yet the eyewitnesses all said that they saw Jesus alive after that, and all went to their own violent deaths defending that what they saw really was true.
Peter: all scientists do that, and those that do are poor scientists.
PV: Wrong. The hypothesis, by nature, is a biased and subjective guess guided by the internal state of the scientist. Once a scientist commits to one hypothesis, he is forced to not pursue other possibly true hypotheses that either he didn't think about or pre-judged to be wrong without any testing.
Peter: Well, obviously you'll continue to classify Stalin et. al. as atheists when the facts are against you on this.
PV: They were atheist cults that gained state sponsorship. They are also a great argument for why atheists must never again be allowed to have state power.
Peter: It has been proven that simple systems do in fact generate complex systems as complex as any complex system generated by a complex system.
PV: I agree that simple cells and DNA and such lead to more complex systems. But they do so by the fact that the simple parts contain complex blueprints and engines that construct the later complex result. And complex blueprints and engines and mechanisms and such are always linked with Intelligent sources, in the world we know.
Peter: history points out that the god of the gaps is used by faith freaks
PV: Not by the catholic church. And by the way, you have a gaps system where anything you can't explain you just make up a theory or say some scientific tests will eventually someday reveal it.
Peter: Actually the study that I posted has evangelicals divorcing more.
PV: Yes, evangelical divorce more often because they believe God allows it. Ideas have consequences.
Peter: Oh, so it's a moral prescription not an order eh?
PV: Of course. God's Law is moral prescription. People may choose to violate it and reap the consequences, such as people may choose to violate the law of gravity and have consequences.
Peter: Not one of those claims is backed up with ANY EVIDENCE OF AN OBJECTIVE NATURE as it is ALL BELIEFS based upon LEAPS OF FAITH
PV: Again, you reject eyewitness testimony and historic record. So, you're basically a kook who won't accept those forms of proof no matter what. End of discussion.
Peter: Nonsense, any changes we make to our evolution are still within the laws of nature.
PV: Wrong. In the video clip you posted, Dawkins marvels at how humans are living in total defiance of evolutionary laws.
Peter: The morals of the sick soldiers in this video demonstrate many of the points that I've been making. Horrific. Do you consider what these US Soldiers did was moral? If so why? If not why?
PV: If there is not any God, then there is only animal behavior. And, these men acted entirely like lions and tigers. That's all. Your outrage is entirely self-contradictory. End of discussion. Moving on to other threads.
preteristvision at 5:09PM on Jun 4th 2008
1265. You are right about it being an end to the discussion since you've added nothing new.
You are a very strange person PerVerted. You argue for christian morals yet when confronted with sick US Soldiers who - for fun - murder an innocent puppy you drop to nihilistic morals that you think for some reason that atheists have.
I can tell you that this atheist and every other one that I know would be horrified by the video showing the US Soldiers murdering the puppy. It shows your true character that you'd have nothing compassionate to say about such an evil and vile act by those despicable people.
You also have missed the larger concerns raised by the video, that being how do those soldiers treat human beings that they encounter? Will they be killing humans just as gratuitously? IF so the US Military is nothing more than a bunch of mass murderers, at least it's harboring many of them, and potentially a very large percentage of their staff could be considered war criminals of the worst kind.
The torture videos also showed this culture of death within the USA. And you devolve to nihilistic morals to justify it and ignore dealing with the moral issues raised? You really are a horrific freak.
Peter at 5:47PM on Jun 4th 2008
1266. Once again I meet christians whose morals are depraved.
Peter at 5:48PM on Jun 4th 2008
1267. PV: "I agree that cells pass matter and energy back and forth. But that's the only material part that really exists. To say that conceptual thoughts and love exist is total poppycock."
Just because you can't comprehend what I'm saying doesn't mean it's poppycock. eg, Electricity is made up of particles known as electrons and they are quite material.
Peter at 7:57PM on Jun 4th 2008
1268. Without the processes in your brain you'd not experience love, conceptual thoughts, nor any other thoughts.
As with computers human minds, and thus thoughts, are indivisible from the wet-wear bio-conputer of the brain. Without the brain no thoughts would exist.
Now it might be possible for there to be an artificial intelligence but again that is a device that would think the thoughts.
In either case, a wet-ware brain or a computer AI, the thoughts are located in the physical objective reality within that brain or computer system.
While we can encode information in digital form and store it on paper as ink or on a disk as magnetic patterns, again it's physical. In fact you can't have information unless it's physically stored somewhere. The only known exception to this is math and then math is still built upon the physical computation and wet-ware of our brains. The philosophical question of whether or not math exists in the real objective world is an interesting one.
The bottom line is that your thoughts exist in the physical world somewhere - in your brain, as patterns of electricity, as chemical messages being passed around between neurons or within cells, as computational thoughts by your neurons, etc... they always exist somewhere in physical reality otherwise you'd not have them!
Again the immaterial is immaterial...
Peter at 8:33PM on Jun 4th 2008
1269. Peter: Once again I meet christians whose morals are depraved.
PV: Don't be stupid. I have, for the sake of argument, argued against you *as one atheist to another.* You are an inconsistent atheist, for you have not yet embraced moral relativism. You still believe there is objective right and wrong, which is an impossible view to hold from within an atheist paradigm.
If you were a consistent atheist, you'd be a moral relativist. But you're not. You still act as if there is objectively good and evil acts, and you're entirely unhappy with social darwinism. Obviously, that's a leftover inconsistency that you have retained from your Catholic training. But it's time you parted ways with religious Catholic ideas such as "good" and "evil" acts. Atheist assumptions about the nature and origin of beings destroy all possibility of objective right and wrong. You cannot, as an atheist, argue that what those soldiers did to the puppy is wrong. Your atheism and your moral outrage are at odds with each other.
As a Theist, I can (and do) argue for objective right and wrong. End of discussion. See you around.
preteristvision at 9:37PM on Jun 4th 2008
1270. Peter: Once again I meet christians whose morals are depraved.
PV: Don't be stupid.
That's not being stupid, it's my considered opinion of YOU Perverted.
PV: I have, for the sake of argument, argued against you *as one atheist to another.*
But you are not an atheist, and as an atheist I assert that you have ZERO understanding of what an atheist is.
PV: You are an inconsistent atheist, for you have not yet embraced moral relativism.
So you define what an atheist is now do you? Funny. Ha. Ha. Ha. Your notion of moral relativism is horrific and not connected to the biological moral realities of human beings.
PV: You still believe there is objective right and wrong, which is an impossible view to hold from within an atheist paradigm.
I do not need to believe or not believe that. I'm the one who says what I believe thank you very much.
PV: If you were a consistent atheist, you'd be a moral relativist.
That is simply your belief and an incorrect one at that.
PV: You still act as if there is objectively good and evil acts, and you're entirely unhappy with social darwinism.
You've not paid attention to what I and others have said. Another example of your belief driven delusions.
PV: Obviously, that's a leftover inconsistency that you have retained from your Catholic training. But it's time you parted ways with religious Catholic ideas such as "good" and "evil" acts.
My morals and ethics have always been more advanced and humane than any that christians have attempted to teach.
PV: Atheist assumptions about the nature and origin of beings destroy all possibility of objective right and wrong.
Only in YOUR NARROW MINDED NIHILISTIC VIEW that your christian beliefs force you to think.
I have repeatedly stated otherwise to no avail with you. That is why you are intellectually dishonest, you don't actually care what someone tells you. You're an idiot - you don't even know me and you think you can tell me what I believe? That's not funny as it's too sad for your life.
PV: You cannot, as an atheist, argue that what those soldiers did to the puppy is wrong.
Only in your sick twisted world view I can't. In reality I can and I do, and I did in fact do so. Your denial of the facts demonstrates the depth of your delusions and your dishonesty with yourself and with what you write here.
PV: Your atheism and your moral outrage are at odds with each other.
Nonsense. Only in your limited nihilistic views. No wonder you're a sick christian monster.
PV: As a Theist, I can (and do) argue for objective right and wrong.
Well you argued that the depraved act that the soldiers committed was perfectly fine and not wrong. That makes you highly depraved Perverted.
PV: End of discussion. See you around.
Who knows. Whatever. Discussions with you are essentially pointless except to point out how stupid your methods of attempted arguments are. Your pathetic views are only matched by the likes of Dinesh D'Souza.
Peter at 12:41AM on Jun 5th 2008
1271.
Peter: Your notion of moral relativism is horrific and not connected to the biological moral realities of human beings.
PV: I can't believe you are in such denial. Moral relativism is the *only* morality that can logically exist in a system where there is no objective standard for right and wrong acts. I can't believe you continue to deny this plain truth.
Peter: That is simply your belief and an incorrect one at that.
PV: It is PROVED TRUE by simple observation of animal and human behavior and society. The human animal, like the rest of the animals, murders and steals and rapes and even cannibalizes. On what basis can you say such acts are objectively "wrong" for humans to do?
Peter: My morals and ethics have always been more advanced and humane
PV: There is no basis for you to suggest that your ethical choices are any better or worse than the Nazi morals and ethics, other than your own subjective feelings on the subject.
Peter: that is why you are intellectually dishonest
PV: You're the one who is intellectually dishonest. You're saying that YOUR ethical standards are better than the ones the Nazis selected while having no basis for doing so. It's just your personal belief that your personal ethics are better, even though the reality is that they are equal, objectively speaking.
Peter: Only in your sick twisted world view I can't. In reality I can and I do, and I did in fact do so.
PV: Sorry, but this tendency of yours to say "It's true because I say so" just isn't going to fly. Why is it wrong to kill puppies, Peter? I look forward to your answer.
Peter: Well you argued that the depraved act that the soldiers committed was perfectly fine and not wrong.
PV: I argued that *if there is no objective standard of right and wrong* (and there isn't one in the atheist paradigm where an objective Law Giver doesn't exist), then indeed the soldiers didn't do anything "right" or "wrong" in killing the puppy. I know it makes you uncomfortable to embrace your atheism fully, but I encourage you to do so. Stop reverting back to the objective moral codes of the theists, Peter. Embrace moral relativism. It's the only morality an atheist can have given his lack of an objective moral Law Giver.
preteristvision at 9:20AM on Jun 5th 2008
1272. Peter: Your notion of moral relativism is horrific and not connected to the biological moral realities of human beings.
PV: I can't believe you are in such denial. Moral relativism is the *only* morality that can logically exist in a system where there is no objective standard for right and wrong acts. I can't believe you continue to deny this plain truth.
That's quite funny. Obviously you don't' understand the actual implications of morality without god since you can't seem to comprehend a universe without god.
As has been said before you paint the worst picture possible of atheists as a contrast with the nice sweet rosy picture of your christian world view. That is simply a survival mechanism that your beliefs use to keep you a christian - if you even are one of those since your writings indicate otherwise.
Based upon what you have written your logic is flawed. Your understanding of philosophy - as spouted here - is deeply flawed. Your contrast is simplistic at best. It simply ignores reality. Any philosophy that ignores objective reality is nonsense.
Peter: That is simply your belief and an incorrect one at that.
PV: It is PROVED TRUE by simple observation of animal and human behavior and society. The human animal, like the rest of the animals, murders and steals and rapes and even cannibalizes. On what basis can you say such acts are objectively "wrong" for humans to do?
You're still stuck on that. I explained that to you oh, many messages back and you've not progressed in the discussion. This shows that you are not adaptive. It shows that you are stuck in your point of view. It shows that you can't or haven't yet considered that it is your logic that is flawed, not mine.
My sense of morals takes account of what happens in the real objective world by MEASURING these differences and by measuring the meaning and context of the situations.
If you can't see that stealing, murder, rape and cannibalism are wrong then there is something wrong with you.
Rape is wrong since in objective reality the person raped is harmed.
Murder is wrong since in objective reality the person murdered was seriously harmed.
Stealing is wrong since in objective reality the person stolen from is harmed (although there certainly is a wider range of harm possible here).
Objective measurement of ones actions is crucial for use in determining whether or not some action is moral. Harm to another is one very significant way to determine if an action is morally objectionable.
You still have not answered if you find it morally objectionable to toss puppies off of cliffs and have fun doing it. Please answer the question (and don't bother to answer with your pretend atheist views on it as you've already wasted enough time doing so).
PV: There is no basis for you to suggest that your ethical choices are any better or worse than the Nazi morals and ethics, other than your own subjective feelings on the subject.
The fact that you can said a sentence like that is evidence of your lack of morals and evidence of your depravity and intellectual dishonesty.
In objective reality there is a measurable difference as a consequence of the moral choices of one person and a different choice of another.
I explained why you, PerVerted, are intellectually dishonest: (1) you consistently fail to accept the word of the people you debate with and think that you know their thoughts better than they do; (2) you fail to read and comprehend the materials provided that demonstrate that your statements of reality are false; (3) you simply flip around and retort back regurgitating what people say to you with your twisted sense of what you believe they should be RATHER than actually listening to what they have to say. The list goes on.
PV: You're saying that YOUR ethical standards are better than the ones the Nazis selected while having no basis for doing so. It's just your personal belief that your personal ethics are better, even though the reality is that they are equal, objectively speaking.
Yes, my moral standards are infinitely better than the Nazis - and YOURS given what you've written.
In objective reality there is a measurable difference as a consequence of the moral choices of one person and a different choice of another.
I evaluate my morals to be of higher standards. I don't kill innocent puppies. I don't kill human beings when I disagree with them as Bush and Cheney and company do. Those who don't harm people have objectively better morals than those who do.
Peter: Only in your sick twisted world view I can't. In reality I can and I do, and I did in fact do so.
PV: Sorry, but this tendency of yours to say "It's true because I say so" just isn't going to fly.
I never said "it's true because I say so" when speaking about objective reality. Within my subjective reality and my points of view, yes, I am the one who gets to say what is true. Unlike you and other beliefists I keep a wall of separation between objective reality and subjective reality. You and other beliefists however project beliefs about reality from your leaps of faith. You don't seem to be able or willing to construct a wall of separation between what is real and what you believe is real.
Yes, it's difficult but it's worthwhile discriminating against ones subjective point of view when the evidence is clear that objective reality is different than one thought. Objective reality overrules my subjective point of view. Is that the case for you and other beliefists? The evidence say no. Yet you can learn as anyone can learn that immaterial beliefs are well, immaterial for life.
It's also important to realize that immaterial beliefs get in the way of being in the moment now living life to the maximum. By choosing belief over reality you loose the wager in the here and now - all that there is for living beings. That is why Pascal's Wager is a poor bet for those who choose to believe in god.
PV: Why is it wrong to kill puppies?
That is a question I asked you first and which you have failed to answer. That is yet another intellectually dishonest trick that you constantly use Perverted. You don't answer the questions that others ask of you yet you insist that they answer them back.
Notice how you never answered the question with your own opinion. All you do is spout what you think an atheist would answer; unfortunately for you and fortunately for atheists, atheists are not as you think they are.
It is another example of how you are intellectually dishonest - by projecting your view of what an atheist is upon others relentlessly rather than asking questions and listening to their answers and updating your views. You fail to update your views as demonstrated by your instance that if you don't follow the mythical christ you're automatically a person with nihilistic morals. Since that isn't the case with me your logic is flawed PerVert.
Killing puppies by tossing them off of a cliff for fun is morally objectionable. It is a classic sign of a likely sick person who could potentially be a serial killer. In the case of a soldier doing it it could indicate how he might treat humans, with contempt. It indicates a sadistic person. It indicates a perverted person.
Oh, wait, that seems to be your name... hmm...
Peter: Well you argued that the depraved act that the soldiers committed was perfectly fine and not wrong.
PV: I argued that *if there is no objective standard of right and wrong* (and there isn't one in the atheist paradigm where an objective Law Giver doesn't exist), then indeed the soldiers didn't do anything "right" or "wrong" in killing the puppy.
YES, you didn't answer the question put to you. That is a dishonest trick.
Your views on morality are nonsense Perverted. In objective reality there isn't a Law Giver and thus your Law Givers morals are just as relativistic - you just pretend that they are objective. And yet your imagined law giver god - well really priests, monks, priors, etc... since god doesn't exist - says thou shall not kill. So much for absolute morals.
All morals are relative even if they don't seem that way to people. However the consequences of moral relativism are not what christian philosophers think.
Our choices in life - morals choices being one kind of choice - HAVE consequences in objective reality. These consequences can be objectively measured. One of the choices in life is how to evaluate the impact of these consequences and what they mean. Entire legal systems have been built up to do so.
PV: I know it makes you uncomfortable to embrace your atheism fully, but I encourage you to do so.
Your idea of atheism is not mine nor anyone else's that I know. It's not Dawkins. It's not Hitchen's. It's not Harris's. It's not Dennet's. It's not that of my many atheist friends. Your view of atheists is perverted.
It's quite funny - well really it's sad - that you dictate what a christian is and now you also presume to dictate what an atheist is even though you are a perverted christian.
PV: Stop reverting back to the objective moral codes of the theists, Peter.
Again you claim that I am "reverting back to the objective moral codes of the theists". I'd never accept the horrific moral code of the bible thumpers there PerVert.
PV: Embrace moral relativism. It's the only morality an atheist can have given his lack of an objective moral Law Giver.
You have a very simplistic view of things. Simplistic pervert whose views are so distorted that he can't see objective reality through the jungle of delusional beliefs he's constructed. Oh, there is a way out, destroy your beliefs and come to objective reality. Fear objective reality not, for it is your true salvation from a life of delusional beliefs.
Peter at 2:36PM on Jun 5th 2008
1273. "An EXTREME moral relativist position might suggest that judging the moral or ethical judgments or acts of another person or group has no meaning, though most relativists propound a more limited version of the theory." - wikipedia
This EXTREME FORM of MORAL RELATIVISM is the view taken by PerVerted, and possibly by Dinesh and his ilk, as a contrast to their proposed "absolute fear based mythical god morality".
The reason that they take such a stark contrast is to support their proposition that their mythical god exists as the sole decider of what is right or wrong.
Without their mythical fear based god they loose any sense of moral certainty in their lives. They actually believe that they will become evil if they give up their beliefs in god. Their cult mind control really has their balls in a vice grip. What they fail to see is how they are evil with a mythical fear based god belief system controlling them! Worse than that, their beliefs are so powerful that they can't even see that that is the case. They really are blinded by their blind faith.
They incorrectly assert that there are not other possible positions that people can take other than being a pure christian faith freak or being an atheist devoid of any morals what so ever. They are oh so wrong.
The fact that atheists exist in objective reality who demonstratively have morals of high character doesn't seem to impact them as they continue with their nihilistic dual view of reality.
Either it's an nihilistic absolute fear based based god morality or THEIR MISINFORMED NIHILISTIC view of an atheist's morality.
Well, in objective reality it's neither an absolute god based morality nor a nihilistic morality. I am proof of that. As are many - if not all - atheists that I personally know.
They then like to say that horrific people like Stalin was an atheist - even though that is continually refuted.
Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Hitler, Bush (41 & 43), Cheney, Clinton (42), Bin Laden, Castro Brothers, etc... are all BELIEFISTS who believed or believe that they were or are right and that others lives don't matter compared to their belief in being right. They all have committed crimes against humanity in the name of their belief regardless of the nature of their belief: be it a belief in themselves as a leader, in the cult of communism, in christian faith, in freedom, or whatever. Their beliefs kill people in unforgivable numbers. As leaders they are all failures. As people they are war criminals. The objective measure is as simple as the numbers of people they had killed. Arguably this objective measure is the only measure that can be used to bridge across all the different human societies and moral values.
-------------------------------------------------
"Was Stalin an Atheist?" quoted material follows.
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Was_Stalin_an_atheist
Stalin is quoted as saying "You know, they are fooling us, there is no God...all this talk about God is sheer nonsense" in E. Yaroslavsky, Landmarks in the Life of Stalin, Foreign Languages Publishing House, Moscow 1940
However it's important to emphasize that Stalin's religious life has contradictions of whether he truly was an atheist or not:
Stalin's daughter Svetlana Alliluyeva Stalin said (documentary "Mysteries of the Century: Kremlin Kids" ("Тайны века" - "Дети Кремля") 2003-03-19, 1 Channel 1 Russia), how Stalin told her that Christ existed.
Journalist: It is interesting, that from all Kremlin' residents, maybe, just Stalin believed in God...
S.Alliluyeva: In father's library, between other books, were few tomes of "Christ". It was history of Christ written by vox populist Morozov. I said to my father: "But Christ didn't exist!" and he answered "Oh no, Christ, surely existed."
Under Stalin's insisting In 1939-11-11, Politburo of the Central Committee has admitted prosecutions of believers "inexpedient". In 1939-11-11 Stalin canceled Lenin's instruction from May, 1st, 1919 for N 13666-2 "About struggle against priests and religion" and gave orders to People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs (NKVD) to release from custody already arrested priests "if activity of these citizens didn't harm the Soviet authority".
Stalin "hated" religion so much, that in 1951-06-27 he gave "Stalin's Prize" to English clergyman Hewlett Johnson. Various prizes under Soviet authority [were] received [by] other priests.
"So the common claims that Stalin was an anti-theist is wrong, a deeper research into Russian history will give you a different perspective. "
Peter at 3:17PM on Jun 5th 2008
1274.
Peter: As has been said before you paint the worst picture possible of atheists
PV: I accurately paint them as unavoidably stuck with moral relativism.
Peter: My sense of morals takes account of what happens in the real objective world by MEASURING these differences and by measuring the meaning and context of the situations.
PV: You believe genocide is "wrong." The Nazis believe genocide is "right." Who is correct, and why?
Peter: If you can't see that stealing, murder, rape and cannibalism are wrong then there is something wrong with you.
PV: That's like me saying, "If you can't see that god exists then there is something wrong with you." I want PROOF from you that murder and rape and cannibalism and stealing are objectively "wrong." But you can't provide any proof.
Peter: Rape is wrong since in objective reality the person raped is harmed.
PV: You are committing the logical fallacy of circular reasoning ("harming people is wrong because harming people is wrong," which is like saying "God exists because God exists.") I know that you'd never accept such an explanation. So I ask you point blank: Why is it wrong to harm someone?
Peter: Murder is wrong since in objective reality the person murdered was seriously harmed.
PV: Again, why is it wrong to harm someone?
Peter: Stealing is wrong since in objective reality the person stolen from is harmed
PV: Why is it wrong to harm someone?
Peter: You still have not answered if you find it morally objectionable to toss puppies off of cliffs and have fun doing it.
PV: Since it was the result of the soldier's evolved natural instinct to do so, the act was natural and was entirely consistent with actions found in the rest of the animal kingdom.
Peter: In objective reality there is a measurable difference as a consequence of the moral choices of one person and a different choice of another
PV: But why would one consequence be right and the other wrong?
Peter: Yes, my moral standards are infinitely better than the Nazis
PV: Says who?
Peter: I evaluate my morals to be of higher standards.
PV: Based on what do you evaluate differing acts?
Peter: I don't kill innocent puppies. I don't kill human beings when I disagree with them
PV: So what? That's your personal choice. Another person may choose the opposite personal choices.
Peter: I never said "it's true because I say so"
PV: You are repeatedly claiming that specific acts are "bad" because you say so.
Peter: Killing puppies by tossing them off of a cliff for fun is morally objectionable.
PV: I know what you believe. But I want you to prove to me that it is morally objectionable? After all, we know it wasn't morally objectionable to that soldier, and we know that some cultures eat puppies. So why would your objections to such behavior be right?
Peter: you didn't answer the question put to you. That is a dishonest trick.
PV: I did answer. The answer hinges entirely upon whether or not there is a god.
Peter: In objective reality there isn't a Law Giver and thus your Law Givers morals are just as relativistic
PV: Then you've answered your own question about the puppy. Killing the puppy is right for some people (the soldier, for instance) but wrong for you (for Peter).
Peter: All morals are relative even if they don't seem that way to people.
PV: Then killing the puppy is right for some people (the soldier, for instance) but wrong for you (for Peter).
Peter: Oh, there is a way out, destroy your beliefs and come to objective reality.
PV: Objective reality is that the soldier killed the puppy and he thought it was right to do so. So now what?
Peter: The reason that they take such a stark contrast is to support their proposition that their mythical god exists as the sole decider of what is right or wrong.
PV: You think killing the puppy is wrong. Another person thinks killing the puppy is fine. Now what?
Peter: They actually believe that they will become evil if they give up their beliefs in god.
PV: The problem is not what people would become, for people and other animals already kill puppies and murder and rape. The problem is that such acts cannot be objectively considered as "evil" if there is no objective law giver, and thus the acts would not be right or wrong. And what society would criminalize people for just being themselves and following what their evolved nature tells them to do?
Peter: The fact that atheists exist in objective reality who demonstratively have morals of high character doesn't seem to impact them
PV: The problem is that "morals of high character" becomes a meaningless concept if there is no authority to determine what constitutes "high character" vs. "low character."
Peter: it's neither an absolute god based morality nor a nihilistic morality. I am proof of that. As are many - if not all - atheists that I personally know.
PV: All you are "proof" of is that some people don't like murder and killing puppies. But the real example of people who do like murder and killing puppies shows that other moralities contrary to yours exist, and you have no basis for saying your morals are right and their morals are wrong.
Peter: Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Hitler, Bush (41 & 43), Cheney, Clinton (42), Bin Laden, Castro Brothers, etc... are all BELIEFISTS
PV: Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot were atheists. And, since human rights is a concept derived from the view that God has bestowed basic rights to every person that are not under any circumstances to be abrogated, those regimes did not allow for any humans to have a right to life or liberty. Nuff said.
preteristvision at 5:41PM on Jun 5th 2008
1275. Stalin's daughter Svetlana Alliluyeva Stalin said (documentary "Mysteries of the Century: Kremlin Kids" ("Тайны века" - "Дети Кремля") 2003-03-19, 1 Channel 1 Russia), how Stalin told her that Christ existed.
S.Alliluyeva: In father's library, between other books, were few tomes of "Christ". It was history of Christ written by vox populist Morozov. I said to my father: "But Christ didn't exist!" and he answered "Oh no, Christ, surely existed."
Peter at 10:25PM on Jun 5th 2008