Evolution Sucks! by dougp59

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
I find it sad, really, that all you atheists from your perspective, are on the same plain as the Hitlers and the Stalins of history. You see, from your worldview, there is no punishment for evil. There is just the same ol' nothingness upon death irregardless of your behaviour in this life. How sad. I thank God that the truth of His world view, is that the Hitlers, the Stalins etc. of history are being justly punished for their evil.

No, its' just that we take on the responsibility for defining evil and then for figuring out what to do about it. Most Xtains I know just leave it up to "God" and "his" ministers to do the heavy lifting -and thinking- for them.

The Bible says something like "By their works you shall know them". So, how do you account for the fact that atheists are generally more moral (lie, cheat, steal, and divorce less) than "believers"?

Quote:
Barna's results verified findings of earlier polls: that conservative Protestant Christians, on average, have the highest divorce rate, while mainline Christians have a much lower rate. They found some new information as well: that atheists and agnostics have the lowest divorce rate of all.

www.religioustolerance.org/chr_dira.htm

And what about those Founding Fathers? They must have been Godly men, to devise such a worthy system! Well, not quite:

Quote:
“Twenty times in the course of my late reading, have I been upon the point of breaking out, ‘this would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it.’”- Adams

"Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call on her tribunal for every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason than that of blindfolded fear" - Jefferson

"Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise"- Madison

“...the arguments of the Deists, which were quote to be refuted, appeared to me much stronger than the refutations, in short, I soon became a thorough Deist"- Franklin

Here are more quotes so you can verify that I didn't take a sentence of phrase out of context:
www.deism.org/foundingfathers.htm

Evil Uncle Chuckles (Pat Robertson) calling for various assassinations and Dubya himself are certianly NOT good advertising for religious morality!

---------------------------------
Please don't think they give a shit.

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 10:58 AM

DOUGP59

To all the atheists and evolutionists here regarding your various posts.

I have presented a website with a series of questions. MOST of the posts in this thread to date contain no attempts to answer my questions, but instead contain insults or attempts to put me on the defensive. There have been a few exceptions, even some good philosophical questions, but most have contained neither.

To those that have actually taken the time to go through my site and to actively explore the links presented there, cudos. Even if you don't agree with me, at least you have broken with the herd and have shown some real independence.

With free minds such as yours, there is still hope for civil discourse.

I would point out that many of the posts here could not have possibly been as a result of a thorough investigation not into just my questions, but the links I present as well. Why the knee jerk reaction?

I have not endeavoured to insult individuals, if I have errored, than you have my apologies. I will continue however, to knock this silly big theory called evolution.

The ID movement will grow for many reasons, not the least if which is the sound science and intelligent reasoning being applied by well educated and credentialed minds.

It is my fervent hope that many will come to know the truth and be set free.

Yes, I believe in God and in His Son. I believe that the heavens declare His glory. The whole panorama of the heavens and of life here on earth is simply to complex to have had any other origin.

I hope one day you will find that truth.

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 10:58 AM

I found it amusing how quickly our superstitious friend demonstrated the power of Godwin's Law.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin's_law

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"That's what governments are for, [to] get in a man's way." -- Malcolm Reynolds

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 11:01 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by dougp59:
all you atheists

I've avioded saying this becasue I believe that whether or not one believes in god should have no bearing on their view of science, and thus it evolution, but I am not an atheist.

Quote:
You see, from your worldview, there is no punishment for evil.

Laws are made to punish just that. Evil is defined differently in different places, but the idea, if not the word, is the grounds for punishment in all non-utilitarian socities.

Quote:
There is just the same ol' nothingness upon death irregardless of your behaviour in this life.

There is more to life than what comes after. Tell me, if you knew that when you died you would not face punishments for your sins would you act like Hitler? If you would than I find you sad. I really do, and I do not mean it in a derogitory way, I just feel deep pity for you.

Quote:
I thank God that the truth of His world view, is that the Hitlers, the Stalins etc. of history are being justly punished for their evil.

And what of the Pauls of the world, Paul the one who went into Christian homes and dragged them to imprisonment and concented to their deaths? Is he being punished for his evil? Or did he get forgiven for his sins?

Is Lot, who offered his two virgin daughters up for gang rape, being punished? Lot who Saint Peter calls a model of peity.

What if Stalin repented? Have you thought of that? I mean Paul targeted Christians, Stalin didn't do that.

And what of the people who have good in them, but also do evil? Is the good part of them being punished along with the bad, or are they split in two upon death?

Justice is a slippery thing.

And what of you? You strike me as a Christian, as you might have noticed, so I've just picked up a copy of the bible. Tell me, are you loving your enemies? Can one of your enemies, say a Samaritan for those were the enemies of Jesus' people in the time of your Christ, be good?

Have you given your money to the poor? And when you did your charitable deeds did you "sound a trumpet before you like the hypocrates" or did you "take heed that you do not do your charitable deeds before men"? When you pray do you pray in churches like hypocrates, or do you "go into your room, and when you have shut your door pray to your Father in the secret place"?

Do you judge not?

Are you without sin that you may cast these stones?

Perhaps you are, but when I read your words I am reminded of the Gospel of Mathew:
"Well did Isaiah prophesy about you, saying:
'These people draw near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.'"

-

I feel better.

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 11:05 AM

Quote:

I find it sad, really, that all you atheists from your perspective, are on the same plain as the Hitlers and the Stalins of history.

You see, from your worldview, there is no punishment for evil. There is just the same ol' nothingness upon death irregardless of your behaviour in this life.

How sad.

I thank God that the truth of His world view, is that the Hitlers, the Stalins etc. of history are being justly punished for their evil.

The truth is that Hitler was an avid and devout christian, and a die hard creationist. This is why the accusations made by eurocollectivists that social darwinism eventually led to the holocaust don't hold water. The truth is that social darwinism is a theory about how societies evolve, and the collectivists were afraid that this would ultimately lead people to support the idea of a meritocracy, and so conveniently blamed them for WWII. To the best of my knowledge, none of the people involved in the planning of the Third Reich were social darwinists, and a great number, if not all, were creationists.

As a Taoist, my faith doesn't call for, or perhaps allow, the existance of an omniscient sentient, just living forces in natural progression. If this seems like fringe wackoness to the Xtians, I would offer that my chosen faith has a following comparable to that of Christianity, Islam, Buhddhism and Hinduism. Just saying, not a fringe belief, but also not atheism.

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 11:08 AM

HEB

Hey Doug,

I just realised you only joined the site yesterday.

Welcome to the board!

So how did you get into firefly?

Heb

...................
Well, my sister's a ship... we had a
complicated childhood
.................
I wear the cheese. It does not wear me.

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 11:14 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
And what about those Founding Fathers? They must have been Godly men, to devise such a worthy system! Well, not quite:
Quote:
"Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call on her tribunal for every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason than that of blindfolded fear" - Jefferson

I just want to point out that it is my understanding Jefferson was actually a devout Christian, he simply believed that god wanted people to use their brains. I agree with that belief, and I believe every religion should agree.

Many (but not all) of the other founding fathers were alike in that view. The things quoted were against blind or irrational faith, not against god.

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 11:22 AM

There's no such thing as a scientist who believes in "intelligent design," nor one who buys into ignorant spewings about "problems" with evolution.

From the official 2004 position paper of the Society for the Advancement of Real Science:

Quote:
Intelligent Design is the latest attempt by creationists to force God into science and destroy evolution. It is the most dangerous form of creationism to date because it self-consciously avoids reference to God. Nevertheless, its creationist agenda bleeds through its empty rhetoric at every turn. It is in fact a politico-religious movement that masquerades as science and attempts to force a wedge between the scientific community and the wider culture. Its ultimate goal is to establish a theocracy in which the Bible becomes federal law and Genesis is taught as fact.

Although some details about evolution remain to be worked out, there is no debate among real scientists about the fundamental facts of evolution. Evolution is as well established as the Earth being spherical or going around the Sun. The evidence for evolution is overwhelming, and to reject or challenge it is not just to abjure science but to place society at grave risk. Many diseases are the result of natural selection in action, and those who minimize or question evolution are endangering public health and, in all likelihood, are already complicit in the deaths of countless people.

The Society for the Advancement of Real Science therefore urges all genuine scientists to use all legal means to oppose and overthrow this creationist pseudoscience. Although some Intelligent Design practitioners have advanced degrees in the sciences, in every known case they obtained those degrees for the express purpose of inveigling themselves into the academic and scientific communities to subvert science.

To give "ID" the stature of something worthy of serious debate is to raise the childish imaginings of a six-year-old to that of a learned scholar.

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"That's what governments are for, [to] get in a man's way." -- Malcolm Reynolds

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 11:31 AM

STORYMARK

Quote:
Originally posted by dougp59:
I find it sad, really, that all you atheists from your perspective, are on the same plain as the Hitlers and the Stalins of history.

You see, from your worldview, there is no punishment for evil. There is just the same ol' nothingness upon death irregardless of your behaviour in this life.

How sad.

I thank God that the truth of His world view, is that the Hitlers, the Stalins etc. of history are being justly punished for their evil.

Lovely. People present well reasoned and documented responses to your points, and not only do you ignore them, but you claim they're avoiding the questions.

And having no response to their arguments, you call them all atheists just because they don't subscribe to the EXACT same view you hold, and then you compare them to Hitler. Very mature.

Now, according to Godwins Law as linked above, you have just implicitly lost the debate (thanks to whoever posted that - hadn't heard it before). Personally, I'd give you the benefit of a doubt, and let you stay in the game. But you have to actually address the points raised to you (which now include scientific, philosophic, and theologic points - just pick one), without namecalling, or loopy comparisons to despots. If you can do that, great - it's a debate. A matter of civil discourse.

Otherwise, you're just a fundamentalist nut who only hears what they want to hear.

And for the record, my view is a mix of both. I believe the theory of evolution is sound. But I also believe that evolution was kick-started by a higher being.

"Well, my days of not taking you seriously are certainly coming to a middle."

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 12:19 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by dougp59:
To those that have actually taken the time to go through my site and to actively explore the links presented there, cudos. Even if you don't agree with me, at least you have broken with the herd and have shown some real independence.

I have in fact journeyed to your site, and followed many of the links there, but I have not yet built up a coherent picture of exactly what it is you believe.

For example one of your links leads me to a site with the sentence:
The question we’re concerned about here is not whether we can rule out every conceivable naturalistic theory, but whether scientists have shown that biological systems evolved naturalistically.

A noble goal, to be sure, but hardly and argument for your side. If it has not been conclusively shown it only means that we need not take it as solid fact, it hardly means that we need to accept the next theory in line, it doesn’t even mean we need to reject it.

Your sites show nothing that even implies scientific research of the point at which specified complexity is indicative of intelligence. It does say that things that exist now are extremely unlikely as a result of random choice, but it does not deal with directed non-intelligent choice from random occurrence.

The current theory of evolution is refuting the idea that life is random, rather it states that life changed randomly, but evolved by directed by choice based on survival.

Quote:
Originally posted by dreamtrove:
The truth is that Hitler was an avid and devout christian, and a die hard creationist.

While this is (more or less) true I think his point was that all of us dirty heathens believe that when we die we will receive the same treatment as the Christian who was Hitler.

For those amoung us who do not believe in an afterlife that is completely true, however it is hardly an argument for his case.

Quote:
Originally posted by heb:
So how did you get into firefly?

Something we all want to know, I'm sure, but I figured I'd give him the benifit of the doubt and assume he simply wants to bring other fans "to the light," and therefore respect his right to have an off topic thread.

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 1:36 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by christhecynic:
Something we all want to know, I'm sure, but I figured I'd give him the benifit of the doubt and assume he simply wants to bring other fans "to the light," and therefore respect his right to have an off topic thread.

Hmm, how Doug got to the site...

Search for a site with a high hit rate, has a forum and a user base that is intelligent, and unlikly to believe drival like ID is 'science' and post.

This brings us to the conclusion that doug is a what?

More insane ramblings by the people who brought you beeeer milkshakes!
The statistics on sanity are that one out of every four persons is suffering from some sort of mental illness. Think of your three best friends -- if they're okay, then it's you.

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 2:13 PM

AERIN

Oh, come on, Doug had the T-word written all over him right from the get go, but there are way too many intelligent, well-informed people on this site not to have a discussion about something as philosophically and scientifically interesting as evolution. I only wish Doug really supported Intelligent Design instead of closet-Creationism. Then we could have a real discussion with him. You can't discuss anything fundamentalists.

In reality, we are enjoying a stimulating discussion with eachother while laughing at the sillies.

Jayne: I once hit a guy in the neck from 500 yards with a bent scope. Don't that count upstairs?
Book: Oh, it'll be taken into consideration.
Jayne: You made that sound kind of ominous.

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 2:21 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
To those that have actually taken the time to go through my site and to actively explore the links presented there, cudos. Even if you don't agree with me, at least you have broken with the herd and have shown some real independence.

I and others HAVE gone to your website and, by golly, we answered your questions about DNA (thanks DT for making that explicit) and transitional fossils (punctuated equilibrium, the speed of light (altho irrelevant to this discussion), SETI (improper analogy), and the amopunt of DNA (not necessary for complex creatures to have more DNA).

However, you haven't provided us any reasoning or evidence as to why we should consider your... umm... theory. How do you account for fossils? What is the role of DNA and heritability in your...um.. theory? How do you account for the apparent age of the universe? I think it's time that you answered ours.

---------------------------------
Please don't think they give a shit.

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 2:28 PM

Yeah, Just wanted to dispel the myth the Dougy-boy could be anything but a certain under bridge dwelling anthropomorphic...

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 3:00 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
I just want to point out that it is my understanding Jefferson was actually a devout Christian, he simply believed that god wanted people to use their brains. I agree with that belief, and I believe every religion should agree.

It's my understanding that many Founding Fathers were deists and some were agnostics. In their view god should be discovered through nature. Christian religion, the Bible, and the clergy were all pretty much looked on as something between quaint and dangerous.

Quote:
Deists do not accept the belief of most religions that God revealed himself to humanity through the writings of the Bible, the Qur'an or other religious texts.... They regard their faith as a natural religion, as contrasted with one that is revealed by a God or which is artificially created by humans. They reason that since everything that exists has had a creator, then the universe itself must have been created by God. Thomas Paine concluded a speech shortly after the French Revolution with: "God is the power of first cause, nature is the law, and matter is the subject acted upon."

www.religioustolerance.org/deism.htm As such, they were not Christian although many of them would come close to Intelligent Designists (if indeed IDists were not simply Fundamentalist Xtians in disguise). The Founding Father's outlook wasn't derived from Christianity as much from the French Enlightenment. Don't forget that the Founding Fathers weren't backwoods hicks. They knew of Rousseau, Voltaire, and other Enlightenment figures.

---------------------------------
Please don't think they give a shit.

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 3:16 PM

Saying intelligent design is christianity in disguise is like saying that this guy, who actually wore this while robbing a bank, was travelling in cognito:

Also, those founding fathers were masons, and modern day, well 18th century rather than 14th, illuminati, which means they did not believe in the power of the church, or the church-state which is why we have separation of church and state.

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 3:35 PM

An interesting article about the founding fathers and deism:

http://www.lawfulgov.org/deists.htm

Many insightful quotations and factoids, from numerous sources, bearing on how the founding fathers, clearly and explicitly, do NOT endorse christianity as the basis for American law, and indeed clearly speak of the need to prevent such endorsement:

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/ed_buckner/quotations.html

Any fundamentalist christian who pretends the founding fathers envisioned a christian nation is either ignorant of the facts, or baldly lying. There is no middle ground there.

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"That's what governments are for, [to] get in a man's way." -- Malcolm Reynolds

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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 4:33 PM

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying they endorced any religion. It is merely my understanding that Jefferson and others believed in Jesus as the Christ, that fact did not stop them from useing their brains and saying that others should do the same. Jefferson was (obviously) very clear on his belief that people should question everything.

-

I will look into your links later, but I don't think a couple of web pages can fully capture the situtation. (I think that is true regardless of which of us is right.)

-
-

My view is that god, who I do believe in, would not have put millions of years of evolution into giving us brains if we were meant to defy all logic in an attempt to blindly follow those who claim to know his will.

(If you are right than my views are, apparently, closer to the founding fathers than I thought.)

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 3:51 AM

I think you'll enjoy the links, actually. In many of the lengthy quotes contained there it's clear to me some of them were definitely christians; it's also clear to me they were dedicated to not letting that belief system become enshrined as the law of the land. I have no problem with christians, muslims, wiccans, even discordians. I only take issue when a member of any faith attempts to push laws or teachings on non-believers; if you're not specifically asked, you keep your religion to yourself. It's that simple.

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"That's what governments are for, [to] get in a man's way." -- Malcolm Reynolds

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 5:36 AM

I wouldn't go that far. I think every faith has the right to advertise itself, just as companies, non-profit organizations and governments routinely do. The problem for me comes when a religion makes itself law, thus enforcing the rules of their own theological doctrine on those who have not yet willing accepted the faith.

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 5:51 AM

You do have a point. My attitude comes from some overzealous followers of certain faiths and their demonstrated inability to stay within the bounds of what I consider acceptable behavior. The "give them an inch, they take a mile" syndrome. Evangelists must either learn to keep from being obnoxiously forward, or their behavior must be moderated by outside control. Freedom of religion does include freedom FROM religion, and my right to be free of it is a Constitutionally protected one.

ETA: I should clarify: by freedom from religion I don't mean I should never have to see a church, or someone wearing a star of David, or get offended if someone says, "god bless you" when I sneeze. That would be excessive. What it does mean is I have a Constitutional right to be free of laws imposed on me which are based on someone else's religion. For example, in New York I can't buy a beer before noon on Sunday. Why? Sure, buying a beer at 10AM on Sunday morning is far from a critical need, but there should be no law preventing me, unless that law serves a demonstrable public need and has no basis on religions which hold Sunday to be different from other days of the week. To me it's just a day off from work, and that's all it should be. If someone wants to honor their faith by abstaining until the sun's over the yard-arm, that's wonderful--just don't force (or even expect) me to do the same.

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"That's what governments are for, [to] get in a man's way." -- Malcolm Reynolds

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 7:06 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Jefferson was NOT a Christian. Altho he believed that a moral teacher named Jesus existed, he stripped away all miraculous attributions in his own "corrected" version of the Bible. He thought the Bible was written by men and that it justified willful ignorance, charlatanism, bigotry, and tyranny.

Quote:
Among the sayings and discourses imputed to him [Jesus] by his biographers, I find many passages of fine imagination, correct morality, and of the most lovely benevolence; and others again of so much ignorance, so much absurdity, so much untruth, charlatanism, and imposture, as to pronounce it impossible that such contradictions should have proceeded from the same being.

www.nobeliefs.com/jefferson.htm

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Please don't think they give a shit.

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 7:16 AM

Interesting. That seems to jibe with the way he references Jesus in this quote:

Quote:
But a short time elapsed after the death of the great reformer {Jesus} of the Jewish religion, before his principles were departed from by those who professed to be his special servants, and perverted into an engine for enslaving mankind, and aggrandizing their oppressors in Church and State. (Thomas Jefferson, in a letter to Samuel Kercheval, 1810; from George Seldes, ed., The Great Quotations, Secaucus, New Jersey: Citadel Press, 1983, p. 370)

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"That's what governments are for, [to] get in a man's way." -- Malcolm Reynolds

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 7:17 AM

THESOMNAMBULIST

Ultimately we're all in search of the truth right? Some choose to Evolution, and some choose Religion....

Fact is it's all acquired knowledge therefore equal leaps of faith in light of insuffiecient evidence.

The
Somnambulist

www.cirqus.com

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 7:21 AM

ARAWAEN

Quote:
Originally posted by heb:
I always assumed that 1+1 equalled 2 by definition but apparently here is the proof for it:

http://mathforum.org/library/drmath/view/51551.html

No mathematician, but I find it odd that if the complete proof for 2+2=4 involves 2,109 subtheorems and 22,607 steps that 1+1=2 would be so short and succinct. I was under my assumption because when I was in college (over a decade ago), my calculus teacher mentioned the proof being hundreds of pages long and disputed.

Gödel supposedly showed that it is impossible to prove consistency of Peano arithmetic while assuming the axioms themselves.

As I am not mathematically inclined the arguments themselves go over my head, but I think the proof you linked assumes Peano's axioms to be a given and that may account for its brevity.

It is possible that it has not only been solved but that an easy solution was discovered (the universe was only 5 billion years old when I was in college, now its 10) and it is possible that I am mixing up recollections, cause I am almost as old as the universe (Ok, maybe not that much).

Quote:

Regarding the whole debate over whether ID is science:

The definition of science, as defined by Richard Feynman, is that the only test of knowledge is experiment.

From Wiki:
"Empiricism is therefore the philosophical doctrine (-ism) of "testing" or "experimentation," and has taken on the more specific meaning that all human knowledge ultimately comes from the senses and from experience. Empiricism denies that humans have innate ideas or that anything is knowable without reference to experience.

It is generally regarded as the heart of the modern scientific method, that present theories should be based on our observations of the world rather than on intuition or faith; that is, empirical research and a posteriori inductive reasoning rather than purely deductive logic."

Knowledge is sorrow; they who know the most
Must mourn the deepest o'er the fatal truth,
The Tree of Knowledge is not that of Life.
-- Byron

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 7:40 AM

HEB

No idea about the 1+1 thing sorry. I just googled it. Whoever's original point it was though is still valid seeing as you can prove 2+2= 4 even if you can't yet prove 1+1=2.

Sorry I'm not sure I follow what your view is on the science thing?

...................
Well, my sister's a ship... we had a
complicated childhood
.................
I wear the cheese. It does not wear me.

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 8:32 AM

Quote:
Origianlly posted by Dreamtrove:
I wouldn't go that far. I think every faith has the right to advertise itself, just as companies, non-profit organizations and governments routinely do. The problem for me comes when a religion makes itself law, thus enforcing the rules of their own theological doctrine on those who have not yet willing accepted the faith.

Just because it's gettin' all philosophical:
What makes a religion forcing its rules on other people any different to a Government forcing its laws on people?

Smoking in public places is illegal in some places, what's the difference between forcing a smoker not to smoke and forcing someone to adhere to another religions rule?

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 8:37 AM

I think I can defer to Thomas Jefferson to answer that one, citizen:

Quote:
"The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg." (Edwin S. Gaustad, Faith of Our Fathers: Religion and the New Nation, San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1987, pp. 42-43. )

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"That's what governments are for, [to] get in a man's way." -- Malcolm Reynolds

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 8:42 AM

I'd agree, but Governments don't just enforce laws that are about injury to others, and religous laws aren't solely about only worshipping that religion.

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 8:45 AM

Also true; I was focusing on your example of smoking. Smokers do measurable, demonstrated harm to the health of non-smokers near them when they smoke.

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"That's what governments are for, [to] get in a man's way." -- Malcolm Reynolds

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 9:01 AM

But the people nearby have the option of removing themselves from that situation...
If you can't smoke anywhere you have no option.

But then let's look at the beer example of yours. Drinking often harms others around you, in many ways, including anti-social behaviour. I'd also make the leap to saying that it does more damage on the whole than smoking. So...

How about recreational drugs? Many of those only directly harm the user, yet most governments make their use highly illegal.

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 9:24 AM

I don't know about not being able to smoke anywhere. All the places where I work, shop and eat have designated smoking areas designed to keep the resulting smoke away from others. It might not be convenient for the smoker to have to go to a removed location to indulge, but the health of non-smokers who don't want to be harmed by tobacco smoke has been determined by lawmakers to outweigh the rights of smokers to have a convenient place to light up. Smoking is a choice. Having someone walk up to you and blow smoke into the air you breathe isn't, and having to remove yourself because someone else decided to "light up" next to you is no more fair than having to surrender your seat on a bus because some obese (or smelly, or otherwise unpleasant) person just decided to sit in your lap rather than stand.

As for buying a beer on Sunday mornings, it comes down to what purpose was the law forbidding it enacted to serve? If, for example, studies show that a majority of drinking/driving accidents were caused by people who bought beer on Sunday mornings, the law is demonstrably designed to reduce accidents caused by drunken drivers and it's obvious it serves the public welfare. If there are no data showing that such accidents resulted from buying beer at that specific timeframe as opposed to any other, then laws prohibiting beer sales as a way to reduce drunken driving accidents don't have any cause to be linked to specific days. The simplest approach would to be banning sales of beer completely, though of course history has demonstrated that Prohibition isn't workable in America. The aim of protecting the public welfare, then, gets served by laws designed to restrict people from drinking and then driving, through education, programs to assist drunken people in getting rides, and punishment of offenders.

Where, then, the Sunday morning prohibition? Rumor has it the law was designed as an incentive to get men into church services, rather than dropping off the wife & kids and congregating at the local pub. In any rate, the specific target of Sunday morning is quite suspicious in the light of that time being traditionally connected to christian church services, and I can't see any way the law serves any compelling public need. It smells like a law based entirely on some religious pretext, and hence it's one to which I object. If such a public need is ever demonstrated to me, I'll be satisfied and will drop my objection. If I'm right, if it has only a religious basis, then it impels me to ask: what religious observance will be forced on me next? Will it eventually become illegal not to be in church on Sunday mornings, or will they just try to abridge my right to marry someone of my own gender if I so desire, based on writings in a book that means nothing to me?

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"That's what governments are for, [to] get in a man's way." -- Malcolm Reynolds

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 9:30 AM

Citizen,

Theoretically, a govt. imposes laws because it answerable to the people, and therefore represents their collective will. It is the right of everyone to have no one go into the center of town and set off a nmuclear device. The right of the one person to set off the bomb does not supercede this. This is the structure under which government exists.

This is not just the structure of democracy, it is the structure of government. Even monarchies are supposedly acting on behalf of the will of the people, and if they fail to do so can usually be held accountable through some process and forced to resign.

If a govt. feels that no person can be accorded any freedom for fear that to allow them such freedom would allow the possibility of wrongdoing, then what you could have is a statist entity. I refrain here from saying socialist because I get so much flack for it, so I'll say it's only socialist if it follows the two founding principles of socialism (ie 1. favoring general welfare of the individual and 2. based on cooperation rather than competition) *AND* if it openly calls itself 'socialist.'

But even if it's not socialist, it can still be statist, giving most power to the govt to control things, and limiting personal freedom to only that which could not by some stretch of the imagination be used to harm anyone else. This is sometimes refered to derogatorily as the 'Nanny state.'

A statist regime is NOT by definition totalitarian. It may in fact be directly accountable to its people, may have elections with different socialist candidates or may have the rule of a consortium. But socialism in particular does not *lend* itself to the process because of a tendency to rely on cooperation rather than competition, and democracy is a competitive process.

Still, all forms of govt. tend to in some way be accountable to the people, or in the absense of a mechanism of accountability, have the people's sworn interests at heart. If the govt. should completely fail to meet these criteria, then the people will rise up to overthrow the govt.

All of that said, I agree, govt. sometimes legislates things it shouldn't. I believe in a minimalist govt. in which the only responsibility of govt. is to ensure that the rights of the people (to swing their arms as long as they don't connect with someone else's nose) are protected. This includes the rights of the people to be free on unjust rule (the right not to be bashed in the nose by the long arm of the law or any other unjust entity, corporate, religious, etc.)

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 9:57 AM

In a brief aside, I'd like to say how pleasant I find it when a troll's thread is hijacked into something even remotely interesting/constructive.

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"That's what governments are for, [to] get in a man's way." -- Malcolm Reynolds

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 11:04 AM

SIMONWHO

Quote:
Originally posted by TheSomnambulist:
Ultimately we're all in search of the truth right? Some choose to Evolution, and some choose Religion....

Fact is it's all acquired knowledge therefore equal leaps of faith in light of insuffiecient evidence.

I'm paraphrasing here but as someone once said "They used to think the world was flat and that was wrong. They used to think the world was spherical and that was wrong. But if you think they were both equally wrong, then you're more wrong than both of them put together."

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 12:17 PM

THESOMNAMBULIST

Quote:
Originally posted by SimonWho:
Quote:
Originally posted by TheSomnambulist:
Ultimately we're all in search of the truth right? Some choose to Evolution, and some choose Religion....

Fact is it's all acquired knowledge therefore equal leaps of faith in light of insuffiecient evidence.

I'm paraphrasing here but as someone once said "They used to think the world was flat and that was wrong. They used to think the world was spherical and that was wrong. But if you think they were both equally wrong, then you're more wrong than both of them put together."

and if you think they are both correct?

www.cirqus.com

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 12:42 PM

DT, Spinland:
Good answers.

Quote:
Originally posted by Spinland:
In a brief aside, I'd like to say how pleasant I find it when a troll's thread is hijacked into something even remotely interesting/constructive.

It bet Dougy-boy's real upset that we're not tearing strips off each-other...

Quote:
Originally posted by TheSomnambulist:
Quote:
Originally posted by SimonWho:
I'm paraphrasing here but as someone once said "They used to think the world was flat and that was wrong. They used to think the world was spherical and that was wrong. But if you think they were both equally wrong, then you're more wrong than both of them put together."

and if you think they are both correct?

To them I say, I have a time-share in the Maldives, great price...

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 12:43 PM

RUE

I have a vote and I'm not afraid to use it!

This thread is far too long for me to catch up on right now, but I wanted to express my opinion on this:

Quote:
You see, from your worldview, there is no punishment for evil. There is just the same ol' nothingness upon death irregardless of your behaviour in this life.

We can conceive of a hell on earth that has nothing to do with eternal flame. The war of all against all. Endless effort without rest or reward, the treadmill of survival. No place of trust. Watching our children die.

We create that hell through our beliefs, and we can relieve that hell through our beliefs.

Nearly everything I know I learned by the grace of others.

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 1:45 PM

WORKEROFEVIL

In regards to the variable speed of light issue. I actually examined this in data analysis in college. When you look at the results of the various experiments throughout the ages that have measured the speed of light using a weighted regression, you get a perfectly flat line. A weighted regression means that the more accurate measurements (i.e., the ones with the smallest standard errors) are given more weight. When that is graphed it shows the speed of light to be constant. The speed of light is not changing and has not changed.

In regards to how DNA can increase in a species, mutations. Entire sections of DNA or entire chromosomes can be duplicated through what is essentially an error. Most times this will cause a diasadvantage and the creature will die. Some times it will have no effect and the change might or might not be passed on. Rarely, it will prove to be beneficial in some way (making protein better or faster for example) and will be passed on to offspring.

I will probably respond to other stuff when I get further through this discussion.

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 1:50 PM

MINIME

I have nothing intelligent to add to this discussion.

I was not, however, when I clicked on the link with the title 'evolution sucks' prepared to actually encounter an actual debate about evolution. I was more prepared for a comment about the friendliness of orang-utans, or the idiocy of many supposed intellectuals, both of which topics I feel I could discuss more freely.

I have enjoyed reading other people's posts.

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 2:02 PM

WORKEROFEVIL

Quote:
If on the other hand, you're positing that no statements about God are provable, then the statement "There is no God" must certainly fall into that category. If that's the case, why conclude, out of hand that He doesn't exist? Or that He didn't create the universe?

I don't think science argues that God doesn't exist. Science (real science anyway) ignores the question of God because it is inherently unscientific. It can't be proven or disproven. It's a matter of faith or belief (to use Book's word). If you believe in God, that's fine. I have no problem with that. Personally, I'm agnostic. I don't know if there's a God, but I'm not arrogant enough to say there's not. I have a problem with people trying to put discussion of God in a science classroom. God is not science. God is faith.

Also, evolution is actually provable, but only if you're talking micro-evolution. That is, a lizard evolving into a different lizard species. It's just that a lizard changing to a bird that can't be DIRECTLY seen. That's because it would involve many more adaptations which are slow to arise.

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 2:37 PM

Minime:
Welcome to fireflyfans.net...

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 2:42 PM

CAUSAL

Quote:
Originally posted by WorkerOfEvil:
Quote:
Science (real science anyway) ignores the question of God because it is inherently unscientific. It can't be proven or disproven.

Actually, I think that strictly speaking, we should say that science ignores the question of the existence of God, because it's unscientific. But it would be difficult to deny that the strict material monism (even it's a methodogical monism) has ramifications for the question of God's existence. If each and every physical phenomenon (past and present) is assumed to have been part of a random causal chain operating according to deterministic laws, then there is no place for God. Either he can't act in the physical world, or he can but doesn't. Either way, the net effect is the same. God winds up as some kind of impotent transcedent spiritual entity, and I don't know about any other theist, but that's not a very compelling vision of God.

Quote:
I have a problem with people trying to put discussion of God in a science classroom. God is not science. God is faith.

I have a problem with God being discussed in the classroom, too. As I understand it, though, the statement that was to be read in the Delaware classroom didn't reference God or religion in anyway. It's easy to merely assume that Intelligent Design is God in science's clothing, but as I understand I.D., it's not religion as such; it's philosophy (which incidentally doesn't have a place in the science classroom, either).

________________________________________________________________________
I wish I had a magical wish-granting plank.

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 3:16 PM

I didn't get this earlier. I thought someone was saying c isn't really a constant, which it isn't, it depends on the medium. But no, it doesn't change steadily through time. If it did, it would not produce the results we see.

The more plausible tired light hypothesis is about wavelength and frequency and not about speed. Light may lose energy as it passes through space over extremely long distances. If this is true it obviates but does not preclude a big bang.

I particularly think that tired light is more important than big bang, but I also think that big bang is viewed incorrectly, in a pseudo-religious manner. The universe is far larger than the one we see, and any past big bang is likely to be far smaller. Little bang, as it were, but pretty big if you were standing right next to it.

Also, the universe by necessity would expand as it feeds off of the outer larger universe it lives inside, which it virtually must do since our universe is a black hole. But again, this expansion, addition to our local area of space or universe is not necessarily what we are seeing when we see doppler shifts. That may be, and I suspect is, just a reflect of the lifespan of the energy of a photon before it is reduced to its zero quantum state, which is about 16 billion years.

Final note, if you doubt this, the light sky paradox is in error, because eventually all radiation would be absorbed deflected or might even possibly expire after an extrodinarily large amount of time. Still, we should see a perpetual 21cm glow, which we do. This is a sign of an, if not infinite, an extremely large universe. I've seen nothing that strongly supports the idea that this is looking back into time into a big bang.

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 3:45 PM

DreamTrove:
c IS a constant. It doesn't change. c is not the speed of light, c is the speed of light in a vacuum.

Quote:
Also, the universe by necessity would expand as it feeds off of the outer larger universe it lives inside, which it virtually must do since our universe is a black hole. But again, this expansion, addition to our local area of space or universe is not necessarily what we are seeing when we see doppler shifts.

Huh? There's nothing to suggest there's any 'larger' universe. Or that our Universe is a singularity within it?
Where did you get this from, just curious?

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 3:57 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Spinland:
I only take issue when a member of any faith attempts to push laws or teachings on non-believers; if you're not specifically asked, you keep your religion to yourself. It's that simple.

I agree with you about pushing laws or teachings, but as for keeping it to one's self:

I don't see the problem with believers of a faith, whatever it may be, trying to "spread the word." I just think when it becomes clear someone doesn't want to hear it they should shut up.

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 4:02 PM

My sister in law is the head optic engineer of laser diagnostic inc., she says the speed of light is not a constant, so I accept that. But it's not unconstant in an ever diminishing way that would explain the astrological anomolies we see in space.

I read a lot about this stuff at some point. The dean of my college was the astronomy professor and we got into a long debate and I read lots of stuff, and it eventually ended with no conclusion, but there's enough evidence to suspect that the universe is in fact a black hole within a larger universe. Also, there's no such thing as a singularity, that's an illusion. Most probably matter within the event horizon is a mixture of highly compressed particles and plasma orbting a central focus, but not actually *in* the center. The external illusion is more or less the same.

About faiths, I agree. I think the limit should be the same as the limit to which people can advertise political parties, action groups, charities or other organizations.

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 4:10 PM

DHARMAGAL

Interesting thread. All I have to say is this: if you really think evolution sucks, you only get one flu shot.

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 4:57 PM