Crikey! Is that what it sounds like when I talk about medicine? I am ignorant of your pure mathematics stuff. But back to Christianity.
Can you give me some examples of some items of faith and rationally deductions that are made from them?
There ARE intellegent christians in america.
Moderator: Available
You know it's been 15 years or so since I devoted any thought to such things. Everything I've written so far is off the top of my head, and as it happens, I can't answer your question very well without getting back into it. I'm not really inclined, something I'm sure you can appreciate. All the examples that spring to mind are either insipid or things I've always found fault with, like the Humanae Vitae encyclical. My 15 year memory is that it is ostensibly rational but not a good example, a logical sieve, hence my disagreement. It was written to slam the door on the possibility implied by Pope John XXIII that the church might moderate its teaching on birth control. Pope Paul VI was certainly not of the same mind as his predecessor. As I recall, John Paul II used to write some well-reasoned encyclicals. Again, I haven't read one for over a decade.IJ wrote: Can you give me some examples of some items of faith and rationally deductions that are made from them?
As for what the core beliefs are, that's easy. Just refer to the Nicene creed. Most add at least spiritual infallibility of the Bible, some even unqualified infallibility. That's unfortunate from a rational perspective because it has an explosive effect on the number of things that are only one step from an explicit article of faith, but it is what it is. Never said it was a well-designed system from a logical perspective. It's also not, IMO, the steaming pile of incoherent inconsistency that Maher makes it out to be. This whole bit about "magic" is probably worth explaining, as Christians don't believe Jesus was "magical". Well, some do, but they're missing the point.
Mike
IJ
Again, your parseing the meaning down past the usual use of the term.
Mahr's base posit is that relgious people are essentially mentally ill or stupid......either conditon kinda precludes the needed reason for a true act of courge........think about it---if your either too stupid or crazy to actually understand what your doing is dangerous then its not really courage in the usual use of the term.
Beisides, praiseing the 9/11 highjackers for their "courage" as Mahr did--again would be, given Mahr's position on the religious being essentially mentally ill or stupid---be kinda like praiseing Jack the Ripper for his "courage"----mental illnesses that drive you to kill large numbers of innocent people---regardless of you risking your own life to do it---are almost by defiantion not acts of "courage"........merely the tragic results of your mental illness.
You know IJ if you would spend half the time focusing on your own sloppy logic, thinking your own flawed reasoning through, cease defending the indefensable, running away from me to hide under your bed when I point out the error of your thinking.... etc......as you do focused on my poor spelling.........well we would all be a lot happier.
Even you..........trust me, once you stop lugging around the weight of your knee-jerk ideology and its sloppy logic, your mood gets better, your clarity improves....kinda like if you stopped taking drugs or drinking heavily.
Yeah, sure, nobody really "thinks" when they throw themselves on a grenade----but that is so not what Mahr was talking about.
Mahr's own example--in context with Mahrs own statements, was a carefully planned, long term, well thought out, deliberate act.
Quite different from your post-hoc defense of Mahrs' orginal statement.
Which I should not have to explain to a man of your claimed education and vast intellect.
Again, your parseing the meaning down past the usual use of the term.
Mahr's base posit is that relgious people are essentially mentally ill or stupid......either conditon kinda precludes the needed reason for a true act of courge........think about it---if your either too stupid or crazy to actually understand what your doing is dangerous then its not really courage in the usual use of the term.
Beisides, praiseing the 9/11 highjackers for their "courage" as Mahr did--again would be, given Mahr's position on the religious being essentially mentally ill or stupid---be kinda like praiseing Jack the Ripper for his "courage"----mental illnesses that drive you to kill large numbers of innocent people---regardless of you risking your own life to do it---are almost by defiantion not acts of "courage"........merely the tragic results of your mental illness.
You know IJ if you would spend half the time focusing on your own sloppy logic, thinking your own flawed reasoning through, cease defending the indefensable, running away from me to hide under your bed when I point out the error of your thinking.... etc......as you do focused on my poor spelling.........well we would all be a lot happier.
Even you..........trust me, once you stop lugging around the weight of your knee-jerk ideology and its sloppy logic, your mood gets better, your clarity improves....kinda like if you stopped taking drugs or drinking heavily.
Yeah, sure, nobody really "thinks" when they throw themselves on a grenade----but that is so not what Mahr was talking about.
Mahr's own example--in context with Mahrs own statements, was a carefully planned, long term, well thought out, deliberate act.
Quite different from your post-hoc defense of Mahrs' orginal statement.
Which I should not have to explain to a man of your claimed education and vast intellect.
Forget #6, you are now serving nonsense.
HH
HH
CXT, so much hot air. Go read this:
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/courage
Not a word about smarts or understanding. Do you know something about English that Random House doesn't? Just like you've got an understanding of healthcare that all the clinicians, administrators, and legislators involved in healthcare lack? Back to the primary issue...
Has anyone read Hitchens or Dawkins on the subject of their atheism? I've just read Dawkins, and the book is pretty convincing (to a nearly convinced atheist, much like Dawkins, who wishes it weren't so). In the religion section of bookstores, I've read several critiques, but none really dealt with his arguments.
For example, he presents info on how you cannot reason backward from the odds against life forming spontaneously to conclude there was a creator, given the incredible number of solar systems out there, and given that no one who loses the lottery looks at that as proof of God not existing... it's a unique problem of the rare black swan, wondering why they exist, but if they didn't, no one would be around to wonder. The anxiety doesn't establish a source of the swan. Further there's the whole issue of explaining God. If Earth is so amazing only the Almighty suffices as an explanation, how do we explain the Almighty? Does curiosity end there? One recalls the student who asked what God was doing before He created Earth, and the reply, "Creating Hell for all those who ask such questions."
The critiques didn't really address these issues, they just looked at the odds and said, well, there must be a God if spontaneous life is vanishingly unlikely. It sounds like an argument proceeding from a conclusion. On the other hand, I haven't given them the treatment (ie, buying them and reading cover to cover) I have for Dawkins.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/courage
Not a word about smarts or understanding. Do you know something about English that Random House doesn't? Just like you've got an understanding of healthcare that all the clinicians, administrators, and legislators involved in healthcare lack? Back to the primary issue...
Has anyone read Hitchens or Dawkins on the subject of their atheism? I've just read Dawkins, and the book is pretty convincing (to a nearly convinced atheist, much like Dawkins, who wishes it weren't so). In the religion section of bookstores, I've read several critiques, but none really dealt with his arguments.
For example, he presents info on how you cannot reason backward from the odds against life forming spontaneously to conclude there was a creator, given the incredible number of solar systems out there, and given that no one who loses the lottery looks at that as proof of God not existing... it's a unique problem of the rare black swan, wondering why they exist, but if they didn't, no one would be around to wonder. The anxiety doesn't establish a source of the swan. Further there's the whole issue of explaining God. If Earth is so amazing only the Almighty suffices as an explanation, how do we explain the Almighty? Does curiosity end there? One recalls the student who asked what God was doing before He created Earth, and the reply, "Creating Hell for all those who ask such questions."
The critiques didn't really address these issues, they just looked at the odds and said, well, there must be a God if spontaneous life is vanishingly unlikely. It sounds like an argument proceeding from a conclusion. On the other hand, I haven't given them the treatment (ie, buying them and reading cover to cover) I have for Dawkins.
--Ian
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fivedragons
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Depends what one means by the Almighty or God. Standard disclaimer: don't belong to a religion. I pretty much understand that the word "God", "Almighty", etc. is supposed to denote something that is completely beyond human understanding, at least in the intellectual sense.
I think this applies in the 3 big monotheistic religions.
It's funny, because it's completely unrelated to the satirical spaghetti monster concept.
There seems to be a vast, insurmountable gulf in perspective and communication between religious scholars and scholars of atheism that could only be bridged by electroshock therapy, or maybe random personality changes brought on by having a stroke or something.
I think this applies in the 3 big monotheistic religions.
It's funny, because it's completely unrelated to the satirical spaghetti monster concept.
There seems to be a vast, insurmountable gulf in perspective and communication between religious scholars and scholars of atheism that could only be bridged by electroshock therapy, or maybe random personality changes brought on by having a stroke or something.
Well, we don't know that life is vanishingly unlikely yet, but we do know something that's vanishingly unlikely--monotheists agreeing on a religion. Did I just say that?IJ wrote: The critiques didn't really address these issues, they just looked at the odds and said, well, there must be a God if spontaneous life is vanishingly unlikely.
Mike
When people say God they usually mean a specific entity, something you can slap the pronoun "He" or rarely "she" on. That other God, the one that Einstein used to talk about, that means "things we don't really understand about how the universe works," is more a description of awe for the vastness, complexity, and unreachableness of the universe and subatomic world, and I think of that as more spiritual than religious.
I'm still in awe/spiritual about the chance events and vast improbability of the right sun, planet, distance, water content, stability, temperature, you name it that permitted ?? molecules to become self replicating, survive huge mass extinctions and evolve to the point of self awareness and to where life could manipulate matter itself, and then, the odds against me personally being here. If anyone tells me they have all the answers I lose interest pretty fast.
I'm still in awe/spiritual about the chance events and vast improbability of the right sun, planet, distance, water content, stability, temperature, you name it that permitted ?? molecules to become self replicating, survive huge mass extinctions and evolve to the point of self awareness and to where life could manipulate matter itself, and then, the odds against me personally being here. If anyone tells me they have all the answers I lose interest pretty fast.
--Ian
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fivedragons
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- Joined: Thu Mar 17, 2005 7:05 am
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Stryke
I think the best mathematical rationalisation of god is simply
a set containing everything cannot by defintion contain or exclude itself , therefore there needing to be something more than everything .
yeah its not really mathematical
I think maths highpoint though is
Women = evil
women = moneyXtime
time = money
money = root of all evil
women = (sqr root evil)X(sqr root evil)
women = (sqr root evil)*2
women = evil
now so much for the comic releif and back to the regularly scheduled programm 
a set containing everything cannot by defintion contain or exclude itself , therefore there needing to be something more than everything .
yeah its not really mathematical
I think maths highpoint though is
Women = evil
women = moneyXtime
time = money
money = root of all evil
women = (sqr root evil)X(sqr root evil)
women = (sqr root evil)*2
women = evil
now so much for the comic releif and back to the regularly scheduled programm
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fivedragons
- Posts: 1573
- Joined: Thu Mar 17, 2005 7:05 am
The door it opened slowly,
My father he came in, I was nine years old.
And he stood so tall above me,
His blue eyes they were shining
And his voice was very cold.
He said, Ive had a vision
And you know I'm strong and holy,
I must do what Ive been told.
So he started up the mountain,
I was running, he was walking,
And his axe was made of gold.
Well, the trees they got much smaller,
The lake a lady's mirror,
We stopped to drink some wine.
Then he threw the bottle over.
Broke a minute later
And he put his hand on mine.
Thought I saw an eagle
But it might have been a vulture,
I never could decide.
Then my father built an altar,
He looked once behind his shoulder,
He knew I would not hide.
You who build these altars now
To sacrifice these children,
You must not do it anymore.
A scheme is not a vision
And you never have been tempted
By a demon or a god.
You who stand above them now,
Your hatchets blunt and bloody,
You were not there before,
When I lay upon a mountain
And my fathers hand was trembling
With the beauty of the word.
And if you call me brother now,
Forgive me if I inquire,
Just according to whose plan?
When it all comes down to dust
I will kill you if I must,
I will help you if I can.
When it all comes down to dust
I will help you if I must,
I will kill you if I can.
And mercy on our uniform,
Man of peace or man of war,
The peacock spreads his fan.
Leonard Cohen - The Story of Isaac
My father he came in, I was nine years old.
And he stood so tall above me,
His blue eyes they were shining
And his voice was very cold.
He said, Ive had a vision
And you know I'm strong and holy,
I must do what Ive been told.
So he started up the mountain,
I was running, he was walking,
And his axe was made of gold.
Well, the trees they got much smaller,
The lake a lady's mirror,
We stopped to drink some wine.
Then he threw the bottle over.
Broke a minute later
And he put his hand on mine.
Thought I saw an eagle
But it might have been a vulture,
I never could decide.
Then my father built an altar,
He looked once behind his shoulder,
He knew I would not hide.
You who build these altars now
To sacrifice these children,
You must not do it anymore.
A scheme is not a vision
And you never have been tempted
By a demon or a god.
You who stand above them now,
Your hatchets blunt and bloody,
You were not there before,
When I lay upon a mountain
And my fathers hand was trembling
With the beauty of the word.
And if you call me brother now,
Forgive me if I inquire,
Just according to whose plan?
When it all comes down to dust
I will kill you if I must,
I will help you if I can.
When it all comes down to dust
I will help you if I must,
I will kill you if I can.
And mercy on our uniform,
Man of peace or man of war,
The peacock spreads his fan.
Leonard Cohen - The Story of Isaac
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fivedragons
- Posts: 1573
- Joined: Thu Mar 17, 2005 7:05 am
IJ
Why switch the subject?
Were talking about Mahrs statements and the 9/11 hijackers and courage....which again in context was not throwing yourself on a grenade---but a deliberate, long term planned act.
The grenade was your example--not Mahrs-----you do know what "context means don't you?
A very different spin than your doing---in post hoc fashion I might add.
Mahr simply is not consistant with his logic----his perception of relgious people being either mentally ill or stupid robs his icky statments about the hijackers as showing courage moot.
Again, people too crazy or stupid to really know what they are doing can't really be showing "courage"....not in the usual sense.
What your seeing is a tragic result of their inabilty to really understand the ramification of their actions.
By the razor thin defiantion and approach your using you could equally prasie Jeffery Damer for his "courage" or Jack the Ripper for his "courage."
Do you and Mahr think that people that shoot abortion providers also act with "courage?"
Were the guys that tortured and killed Shepard "couragous?"
Not in my book-----but apparently so in yours and Bill Mahrs.
Why switch the subject?
Were talking about Mahrs statements and the 9/11 hijackers and courage....which again in context was not throwing yourself on a grenade---but a deliberate, long term planned act.
The grenade was your example--not Mahrs-----you do know what "context means don't you?
A very different spin than your doing---in post hoc fashion I might add.
Mahr simply is not consistant with his logic----his perception of relgious people being either mentally ill or stupid robs his icky statments about the hijackers as showing courage moot.
Again, people too crazy or stupid to really know what they are doing can't really be showing "courage"....not in the usual sense.
What your seeing is a tragic result of their inabilty to really understand the ramification of their actions.
By the razor thin defiantion and approach your using you could equally prasie Jeffery Damer for his "courage" or Jack the Ripper for his "courage."
Do you and Mahr think that people that shoot abortion providers also act with "courage?"
Were the guys that tortured and killed Shepard "couragous?"
Not in my book-----but apparently so in yours and Bill Mahrs.
Forget #6, you are now serving nonsense.
HH
HH
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fivedragons
- Posts: 1573
- Joined: Thu Mar 17, 2005 7:05 am
Actually courage has no moral implication, simply taking action in the face of peril or hardship.
Just a word, go by the accepted usage or create your own, dictionaries are all slightly different, and they are just compilations of commonly accepted interpretations of symbols made up of strings of simple designs denoting vocalizations meant to convey a varying range of meaning.
Just a word, go by the accepted usage or create your own, dictionaries are all slightly different, and they are just compilations of commonly accepted interpretations of symbols made up of strings of simple designs denoting vocalizations meant to convey a varying range of meaning.
