(March 14, 2012 at 5:14 pm)One King Wrote:

Praise the Lord. Fantastic news Saved. You made the greatest decision of your life and I promise you that you will not regret it. You are going to find that life only gets better from here on out. I'm so happy to have yet another new brother in Christ. That's what we are. We are all brothers and sisters in Christ.

I've known the Lord Jesus Christ now for over15 years and I couldn't be happier.

So very happy to hear that another soul will join us in Heaven someday. Contact me anytime. I'd be more than happy to help guide you should you have any thoughts or questions.

Another one for the flock hey Wan king?



And all in a cage of your own making.

I am thinking that this is what distresses atheists the most...not that these individuals want to worship a deity...but the castigate their own potential and confine themselves to a slavery of minor intellectual capacity to the world issues that face humanity today that makes the religious seem like they would be better at being biomass that would best serve as compost for the hungry...

And YES ... I am in a BAD mood

(March 15, 2012 at 9:08 am)KichigaiNeko Wrote: I am thinking that this is what distresses atheists the most...not that these individuals want to worship a deity...but the castigate their own potential and confine themselves to a slavery of minor intellectual capacity to the world issues that face humanity today that makes the religious seem like they would be better at being biomass that would best serve as compost for the hungry...

And YES ... I am in a BAD mood

It bothers me that a lot of people would rather cuddle up in a corner with a blanky in fear of reality and do nothing but dream away in their own little fantasy world. Instead of standing up, accepting the facts laid out before them and actually do something constructive that helps in speeding up gaining knowledge, understanding and building a better future. It bothers me that many would rather stand in the way of science and knowledge and support stupid old religious beliefs that goes all the way back to the fucking no nothing goat herders.
Wishful thinking. That's all it is. Also when they talk like 'one king' does, it's obvious they lack the ability to use reason. It's just sad and pathetic. An insult to human intelligence.

Fantastic business model don't you think??

Was in a franchiseeship today and the way that they are monitored is nothing more than this religious model of "God" is watching EVERYTHING you do.

ergo...kill religion and you kill the business model

I am convinced that 'Wanking' is just a sock puppet for some former religious nutjob troll

(March 15, 2012 at 9:08 am)KichigaiNeko Wrote: I am thinking that this is what distresses atheists the most...not that these individuals want to worship a deity...but the castigate their own potential and confine themselves to a slavery of minor intellectual capacity to the world issues that face humanity today that makes the religious seem like they would be better at being biomass that would best serve as compost for the hungry...

And YES ... I am in a BAD mood

Sorry you're in a bad mood... could you please define how belief in a diety is confining or limiting to intellectual capacity? Feel free to wait until you're in a better mood if this conversations will upset you more, I can easily take a rain check.


@Ace - As always I still can't see where you make the jump from wishful thinking and holding up progress to completely irrational?

(March 16, 2012 at 4:27 am)tackattack Wrote: could you please define how belief in a diety is confining or limiting to intellectual capacity?

If I may just take your Yahweh as an example; the characteristic of your deity is so contradictory and repulsive that no amount of reasoning will harmonize it with modern ideas of justice, purity, and morality. Yet, apologists like you continue to defend this character. A person of intelligence will definitely not defend this evil, imperfect concept.

As Thomas Jefferson rightly said:

Quote: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 blind-folded fear.

(March 16, 2012 at 4:27 am)tackattack Wrote: could you please define how belief in a diety is confining or limiting to intellectual capacity?

A deity is a non-being that serves as the sum of all non-answers to the relevant questions of why do we exist? By what means do we exist? And what is reality?

God is an irrelevant emotional concept that prays on our hopes and fears, rather than one based on solid logic and reasoning that needs empirical and measurable evidence to flourish.

A personal deity is a comfort blanket that suffocates the human enterprise or pursuit for understanding phenomena and our universe. It damages the filter for evidence to discern fact from fantasy, thereby sabotaging one's capacity to learn and acquire new knowledge.

That's not to say there isn't a god or some higher-being out there, though any concept that mankind has come up with so far, or what we're tempted to imagine would be a deity right now, has been nothing but a pointless exercise in mental masturbation.

Believing in a god and uncritically accepting its existence, without actually bothering to investigate the cosmos for its existence first, is not just laziness but it prevents us from ever acquiring the truth as to whether or not it really exists.

I'm an atheist because there's no sufficient evidence available to me and therefore I have no good reason to believe in such a being.

(March 16, 2012 at 4:27 am)tackattack Wrote: @Ace - As always I still can't see where you make the jump from wishful thinking and holding up progress to completely irrational?

Easily. Believing in something unsupported and improbable simply because you want it to be true is irrational and does stand against progress. It is wishful thinking. I still maintain that religion is the greatest insult to human intelligence. Fools fall so easily to their imagination, it's embarrassing just to watch. Seeing fellow human beings grovelling on the floor to their imaginary friend, on their knees talking to their invisible friend in the sky. It's humiliating. You probably don't see it, but I do.

I think Welsh Cake pretty much nailed it.

(March 16, 2012 at 5:14 am)Forsaken Wrote:

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(March 16, 2012 at 4:27 am)tackattack Wrote: could you please define how belief in a diety is confining or limiting to intellectual capacity?

If I may just take your Yahweh as an example; the characteristic of your deity is so contradictory and repulsive that no amount of reasoning will harmonize it with modern ideas of justice, purity, and morality. Yet, apologists like you continue to defend this character. A person of intelligence will definitely not defend this evil, imperfect concept.

As Thomas Jefferson rightly said:

Quote: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 blind-folded fear.

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This has nothing to do with character, right and wrong or good and evil. I asked how it limits intellectual capacity. From your perspective, wouldn't coming up with endless answer to rational questions about something perceived as imperfect necessitate more brain work?

(March 16, 2012 at 5:39 am)Welsh cake Wrote:

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(March 16, 2012 at 4:27 am)tackattack Wrote: could you please define how belief in a diety is confining or limiting to intellectual capacity?

A deity is a non-being that serves as the sum of all non-answers to the relevant questions of why do we exist? By what means do we exist? And what is reality?

God is an irrelevant emotional concept that prays on our hopes and fears, rather than one based on solid logic and reasoning that needs empirical and measurable evidence to flourish.

A personal deity is a comfort blanket that suffocates the human enterprise or pursuit for understanding phenomena and our universe. It damages the filter for evidence to discern fact from fantasy, thereby sabotaging one's capacity to learn and acquire new knowledge.

That's not to say there isn't a god or some higher-being out there, though any concept that mankind has come up with so far, or what we're tempted to imagine would be a deity right now, has been nothing but a pointless exercise in mental masturbation.

Believing in a god and uncritically accepting its existence, without actually bothering to investigate the cosmos for its existence first, is not just laziness but it prevents us from ever acquiring the truth as to whether or not it really exists.

I'm an atheist because there's no sufficient evidence available to me and therefore I have no good reason to believe in such a being.

---

If the question of our existence is relevant, why is postulating a possible solution, limiting to intellect in any way? But this really isn't about relevance, emotionalism, or imagery of a suffocating blanket. Nor is it about how Thor, Abraham, pixies, or any belief at all is correct or incorrect. You haven't established clearly how discerning fact from fantasy sabotages one's capacity to learn and acquire new knowledge. If I believed in unicorns, how would that limit my ability to learn quantum mechanics or applied chemistry? You then further than that, assume that adherents to said belief do so uncritically or blindly.

(March 16, 2012 at 6:28 am)Ace Otana Wrote:

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(March 16, 2012 at 4:27 am)tackattack Wrote: @Ace - As always I still can't see where you make the jump from wishful thinking and holding up progress to completely irrational?

Easily. Believing in something unsupported and improbable simply because you want it to be true is irrational and does stand against progress. It is wishful thinking. I still maintain that religion is the greatest insult to human intelligence. Fools fall so easily to their imagination, it's embarrassing just to watch. Seeing fellow human beings grovelling on the floor to their imaginary friend, on their knees talking to their invisible friend in the sky. It's humiliating. You probably don't see it, but I do.

I think Welsh Cake pretty much nailed it.

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Then the same questions and burden apply to you. Establish that any belief limits intellectual capacity.



Let me break it down for all the above a little. Let's say I have an equation to which the solution is unsolvable ATT:

3+5+6+2+9+x+y+z=?

and most materialsts and atheists find it (and rightly so) more practical to eliminate variables that are also unknowable, thus:

3+5+6+2+9=?

Then they come up with just as unprovable a solution as we had with the variables, because not everything is yet accounted for.

x,y and z= might very well be 0 and I'd be in the same place you all are.

1-I postulate the at least x or y seems like soemthing real to me and I'm more stupid because of it?
2-Isn't removing a subset (or relationally removing any possibility of evidence that could change your equation) in an equation more limiting than allowing for their possiblity?

It would not be foolish to postulate an alternative beginning to our species and reality itself- it is foolish to blindly claim without evidence that an ancient book which makes no scientific sense holds the answers you're looking for.

Now, as for the equation, I hold a different view. I wouldn't solve with the varaibles, or eliminate them. I'd try to figure out what they were before I solved it. As scientists are doing. Your comparison is flawed, because the numbers and variables in that equation are merely random, whereas in reality, we have the means to find the "variables", the variables being knowledge of the physical world.

Fundies, on the other hand, seem to think that if we don't have the answers as this moment, we never will, so why bother? That's one of the many things that makes them dangerous.

Now, as for why believing in unicorns would make you terrible at quantum mechanics- it would not, as long as you searched in an unbiased way for evidence and employed scientific method correctly. However, most creationists skip large chunks of the scientific method and use their god as justification to jump to conclusions without proof. That is obviously detrimental to knowledge, reason, and society itself.