Godless BY CHOICE From Ohio

[Synnical]

http://www.columbusdispatch.com/news/religion/faith-story.php?story=dispatch/2006/09/08/20060908-D1-00.html

For some, idea of Supreme Being just seems implausible

. . . .

"I left the church not because I didn’t like it," he said. "I left it because I thought it wasn’t true."

While dwarfed by the number of Christians, Muslims and Hindus in the world (about 4.3 billion altogether), those who don’t believe in a god number 500 million to 750 million, according to sociologist Phil Zuckerman’s survey, published in The Cambridge Companion to Atheism last year. That makes the godless the world’s fourth-largest segment in religious surveys.


. . . .

When he first left his church, he was troubled by the idea of a world without divine purpose. He was depressed for a time, he said, but discovered that life still had meaning.

"I just kind of realized after living and getting up every day it’s like, look, there’s more reasons to live than because God tells you to, or God provides purpose," Sterling said.

"Our emotions and our culture and our attachments to other people create things that we as humans need and want. And that’s where our goals come from."


. . .

The idea of a god "seems as likely as a Santa Claus," Cox said. "It’s absurd to think that somebody comes to your house and delivers presents. And I guess it’s the same thing that somebody’s listening to prayers."

. . .

"It’s almost like asking somebody, ‘What color is Saturday?’ " he said. "It’s like we say God, (but) we don’t know what a god would be."

. . . .

[e-mail]


Xposting to the Ath/AG forum

-Cindy in Fort Lauderdale :)

[alternativethot]

1. God! Is IT implausible

I think it's a struggle in the 21st century US to NOT believe in god. Suddenly I'm being asked to explain myself - so I've taken to asking religious fundamentalists to explain themselves. They just can't do it adequately for me so I guess that answers their own question. Sometimes feels like an island

[razors edge]

2. critical thinking is not happy.

subjecting your own mortality to the first law of thermodynamics is not encouraging.

[Warren DeMontague]

3. But if you popped out of nothingness, it's still a free lunch.

Just sayin'.

[Synnical]

5. A Free Lunch?

I have no idea what you mean. Thanks for any clarification.

[Warren DeMontague]

6. I don't know how to make it any more clear.

Universe. Existence. Free Lunch.

[Synnical]

29. Universe. Existence. Death.

End of Story. I don't know how to make it any more clear.

Death is exactly the same as before you came into existence.

-Cindy in Fort Lauderdale

[Synnical]

4. It's the Second Law, Love, that you are wrong about

Try again.

[mikelewis]

8. Amen to that...

[razors edge]

16. ah yes the

second law, and you state that i am wrong about it, but do not state where i am wrong. and maybe please explain how the first law does not apply, then debunk the second.

[mikelewis]

7. The laws of thermodynamics are not applicable...

Hawking will tell you that once we start moving into the higher dimensions, the very nature of physics begins to break down and becomes sort of ethereal. It is from these higher dimensions that emotions and thoughts form and they begin to impact the lower dimensions in ways that are clearly evident but only vaguely understood. Right now, your mind is forming these words in your head, creating a personal dialog between you and I. However, where did I pull these thoughts from? How am I able to communicate them to you? Because words and ideas are not bound to the laws of Thermodynamics, we can maintain the concept of God beyond the confines of our visible existence. This concept exists as sort of a collective consciousness; much like the idea of Love and Hate, Good and Evil, Moral and Immoral. None of these ideas "exist" in our physical world, yet they impact this existence in very real ways.

Try this little experiment...

Draw a Square...

Now draw a Box...

Without the square, the box cannot exist and vice versa, they are tied in by their dimensional relationship yet which one, if both were given awareness, would be able to more fully comprehend the aspects of the other? Could the square more fully understand the Box? Could it see all sides? Could it understand the depth of the box's existence?

We are the square and God is the Box in which we exist. We can neither comprehend his shape nor appreciate his depth but there are ways to reach out and touch that vastness our dimension cannot comprehend (especially if we are using our physical laws as a gage.). You cannot see God because everything you see is God. Some do not feel God, because every emotion is contained withing the depth of God. If you are looking for the Kingdom of Heaven with your eyes or your math or your science, you will not be able to find him. To find God, you must reach out with your heart and then he can quite plainly be seen.

You said that "subjecting your own mortality to the first law of thermodynamics is not encouraging." However, according to those same laws, we shouldn't exist at all. Where did the Big Bang get it's power source? How did that power coalesce in the first place? Since all things that are at rest tend to stay at rest unless acted upon by an outside force, what power existed that brought the very fabric of our universe into existence? What inconceivable force caused everything in that mass to explode into existence and then start moving apart and dying. According to the laws of thermodynamics, 15 billions years from now, this universe could simply dissipate into nothingness... it will be like a dream that fades away and is forgotten. Some theoretical physicist believe that the Universe could actually contract before that point and go in reverse until all things return to the Plank Epoch... and then we could quite possibly start this whole insane ride all over again. If that is so, what source drives this perpetual engine? If it's not, then what was it that kicked off this whole crazy dream in the first place?

The physicists are currently searching for something called the M theory. Douglas Adams called it the answer to "Life, The Universe and Everything". They believe there is one universal equation that can explain the very nature of everything in our universe. They are convinced it exists but they are having a hell of a time trying to figure it out. I bet you can guess what I believe that "M" theory is. Yep, you guessed it... the Alpha and the Omega... the "I am" that spoke to Moses and showed him creation... the spirit that moves Man like blind sheep toward the end of this dream. Friend, the M theory is God.

Religion has nothing to fear from science because science is the study of the square, not the box. What God has made cannot be undone by the idle thoughts of man. If you so choose, you can pick up a Bible or a Koran or the Bhagavad-Gita and find out if what I say is true. To find God, all you need to do is look for him and be willing to see him. It really doesn't matter which religion you adhere to as long as your eyes are closed and your spirit is open. You have to trust that he has the power and the wisdom to reveal his nature and his depth, this is what faith is. It is seeing indistinctly as Man but seeing clearly as a child. When you look for him, follow those who have seen him and have laid out clues as to how to find him. Don't get caught up in the impossibility of it all because Life itself is impossible and completely illogical. Just reach out and touch the hand of God and you will dwell forever in the place from which Love enters our souls.

For me, I prefer to explore the mystery that is God through the Bible. When I look for God, I read the stories of Man who tried desperately to create an image of God on Earth. When Man failed to create an image made of gold, he crafted one of words and the ignorant worship that as God. Do not be like them. God exists on the other side of the words. When I read through the Bible, I find myself saying "God couldn't be like this", "God doesn't do these things", "What idiot believes God kills babies with swarms of locusts?" When I read it and challenge it, I begin to explore the nature of God. I reach down into the infinite depths of the universe and pull in the most infinitesimal scraps of an image lost in a dream. I try to see what Moses saw upon that mountain when the voice that said "I am" spoke to him. I try to envision Ezekiel as he called out to God for vengeance upon a corrupted and wicked city. I try to imagine walking with Jesus and delighting in the amazing wonder that must have been in the eyes of those who beheld him.

Is it possible that the entire book is a work of fiction? Most definitely, however the book tells you quite clearly, not to look for God in any thing on Earth (which would of course include the Bible) so fact or fiction becomes irrelevant. To overcome this ridiculous paradox, I try and create a connection to the spirit that put quill to parchment so many years ago. What is real and can be relied upon is that the spirit of Man wrote this book with the intent of opening up a window to God.

Why Christianity appeals to me more than any other religion is because after reading through the Bible, I have come to believe that those who wrote the Old spoke as children but when the spirit became Man, it put away childish things. The prophets of Old could see God "indistinctly, as in a mirror" but the Son of God could see him "face to face". The Old knew partially but the New was fully known.

"For we know partially and we prophesy partially,
but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away."

I prefer the Bible because I love the stories and because I love the hearts of those who wrote the stories. Not all the writers were perfect but their inspiration was. The Bible is a labor of Love, with all of its imperfections and hypocritical self-righteous rants (it reminds me a lot of DU), it's still just a Love story. When we find out that "God is Love", it begins to make a little more sense.

A man named Paul described Love. He said, "If I speak in human and angelic tongues but do not have love, I am a resounding gong or a clashing cymbal. And if I have the gift of prophecy and comprehend all mysteries and all knowledge; if I have all faith so as to move mountains but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away everything I own, and if I hand my body over so that I may boast but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind. It is not jealous, (love) is not pompous, it is not inflated, it is not rude, it does not seek its own interests, it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury, it does not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth.
It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.Love never fails. If there are prophecies, they will be brought to nothing; if tongues, they will cease; if knowledge, it will be brought to nothing." If you look real hard, you just might be able to see what I see in these words. I don't know what your eyes behold but on the other side of these words, I see God.

I'm not telling you any of this to gain anything. You have your own beliefs and I have mine. Whether or not you choose to adopt a religion is not my concern. As Cain said to God, "I am not my brothers keeper." I have tried my best to show you how I see God but my words cannot do him justice. As a Christian, it is my duty to God to tell you these things as best as I know how. It is your choice to accept them or discard them at your leisure. However, it is what Captain Hook referred to as "Bad Form" to believe you can mock someone's faith when you don't understand the one you profess to worship. If science is your answer to "Life, The Universe and Everything", I suggest learning some of it. It really is quite fascinating.

Please don't take offense if I ask my imaginary freind to bless you and your family. May he bless you and keep you and guide you through to salvation and eternal life.

Signed
Mike; a Christian

p.s.
If I'm right and your wrong, I'll look you up when we get on the other side and maybe we could go fishing together.

[Warren DeMontague]

9. Question: How come the "perpetual engine" and the big bang need a "source"

but "God" doesn't?

What you write is well-written, and respectful. Here's my respectful reply: There are places where logic breaks down. You can drag in metaphysical superheroes to explain these ineffabilities, but it is no more logically sound to say "The Universe had to come from somewhere, so 'God' must have made it- but 'God' didn't have to come from anywhere- he just is" than it is to say "The Universe, the Multiverse, the big bang(s) or the context in which they occur (look all around, and what do you see? 'Cuz I see Natural Processes) didn't have to come from anywhere- they just are".

Dig? If your worldview rests on faith, cool cool. Let it sit there- but trying to use logic to "prove" your point while simultaneously saying the same logic doesn't apply to your (as you put it) imaginary friend... Captain, that's not logical.

Me? I'm gleefully Agnostic (because the one thing I know is that I don't know)/Discordian (I think "God", such as she is, not only has a wicked sexy sense of humor, she also plays high stakes craps with the Universe, and looks a lot more like Benoit Mandelbrot than Euclid)/Taoist (because if I can say what it is, you know I don't have IT.)/Buddhist (See below)

And for purposes of the simple up-down-yes-no political discourse in this country, I also classify myself as an Atheist. I can safely say I don't believe in anything remotely resembling the Deity of the Western Monotheistic religions. Certainly, the word "God" is so widely defined -and not just in some AA meetings- as to make it difficult to nail down just what, precisely, it is I'm saying I don't believe in. I think if you start at the point of "Everything is God", that's wonderful- but essentially as meaningless as saying "everything is orange" or "Everything is funny".

If "God is Love", I have to think it might make life easier for everyone if we just dropped the word "God", then, and stuck with just "Love". It occurs to me that it might be harder to start wars over a sentence like "My Love is the REAL Love and has commanded me to kill all the followers of YOUR Love"- but one thing human history has taught us, people can be awfully creative when it comes to justifying wars...

so what do I know.

I do agree to some extent with that particular piece of Paul (didn't like his take on women, sorry), but I think Robert Hunter summed it up better in "Without love in the dream, it will never come true".

So I think it's worth examining, when you're talking about a dream- it does tend to imply a dreamer. Hmmmm. Okay, Where could this dreamer reside?

I think the Sufi legend of Nasrudin's donkey is instructive, here:

There is a story about the Sufi sage, Mullah Nasrudin, which goes that one day he was seen riding frantically through the streets of the town on a donkey, looking this way and that, reaching the walls of the town and doubling back, constantly crossing the main marketplace. Eventually one of the townspeople called out to him, "Mullah, what are you looking for?", and without stopping he cried over his shoulder, "I'm looking for my donkey!"

Also, Peter Gabriel's D.I.Y.

When things get so big, I don't trust them at all,
You want some control, you've got to keep it small.

Just my two cents. Peace.

[immoderate]

10. A fine example of circular reasoning.

God is the box the universe comes in? Inconceivable power -- and then you conceive it right here in a DU post?

So where does god get his power?

--IMM

[razors edge]

11. perhaps the thought

itself may not involve energy, I say may, but it travels inside a vessel that does.

if the conciseness of the individual can be removed from the host, it will have to be in a form that does not involve energy or it will begin dissipating throughout the universe, I'm no great thinker but I'm no idiot either and I believe that would leave me spread a little thin.

If an invisible cloud dweller has devised and constructed some type of hidden grid if you will, to collect and store those individual souls, it would be a construct existing outside the known dimensions and when you get past eleven dimensions I get bed spins.

All that being as it may, an all powerful ruling over said construct devoting it's time and attention to whether or not it was accepted and revered by each and every creature would seem a great effort in futility, if said all powerful was capable of creating such a universe and construct, why not just create on where love and adoration of its creator is the only thing possible for a lower species and move on to other things.

What possible reason would an all powerful have of devising the human race to begin with?

[neebob]

14. I'm still trying to comprehend

how your little statement about energy and mortality brought forth this whole big essay about the male box god.

[lvx35]

17. Actually, words and ideas ARE bound by thermodynamics....

I have to pipe in here because this is just what I am studying, thermodynamics and evolution and cognition. Everything in this material universe is explanable in terms of this material universe, and entropy is a particularly useful thing because it describes so much of it so beautifully...Now I too am a theist, but my God doesn't intervene by will in the physical universe, his will IS the physical universe, amongst other things. I don't see nature and God as separable, I relate to Einstein's statement about studying the universe because he "wanted to understand the mind of God". I like religious belief because a) I know the limits of knowledge b) atheist king Richard Dawkin's statements about "memetics" have lead me to conclude religion has been naturally "selected" because it is good for humanity.

[cosmik debris]

18. religion has been naturally "selected" ???

Isn't that just another way of saying social darwinism?

And as for "good for humanity"...some of religion's victims might disagree.

[lvx35]

20. Its not social darwinism, but ideological darwinism.

i.e. Religious ideas which appear all over the world with common themes do so for a reason, religion works for people that's why people have it. If it didn't work for people, it wouldn't have lasted.

And as for "good for humanity"...some of religion's victims might disagree.

Do you believe genetic selection is good for a animal species? I suppose the members of a species that were not selected and died before passing on their genes might disagree, but on the whole I think genetic selection is good for a species. So ideological selection is probably good as well....Now you are talking about victims of religious motivated violence? Religious violence is a sort of rare thing, because the thing successful religions want most of all is conversions, I think most violence tends to have an ethnic/genetic/cultural motivation.

[cosmik debris]

21. "Religious violence is a sort of rare thing" ???

That certainly does not jive with my reading of history or even current events! Are you speaking of HUMAN behavior or some other species?

[lvx35]

22. Human behaviour.

I've had a lot of disagreements about this on this forum. Basically, if you look at a lot of violent conflicts in history, they are ethnic/genetic, not religious. For instance, you don't see blond/blue non-christians in the concentration camps, or hear about jews getting released after converting to christianity; it was genetic, thus called genocide. You see similar themes in all the ethnic conflicts all over the place, Bosnia, Rwanda, etc. Ethnic cleansing is a good term. In fact, if you took some isolated group like the kurds, and had them all become shi'ites without changing their social power structure, i believe their status and conflicts would not change at all.
I can't comment on all of the conflicts, and its true that some are purely religious. But ethnicity, not religion, seems to lay behind a lot of the world's conflicts.

[cosmik debris]

23. Not interested in a contest to see who can name the most wars

But you seem awfully anxious to overlook any evidence that disagrees with your hypothesis. Take for example the history of the British Isles and Ireland. The hallmark of that culture's history is the struggle between two opposing religious views and it is punctuated by enormous violence. If you have lived in Britain or Ireland in the last 500 years, there is a very good chance that you have been exposed to religious violence. If you lived in London, Madrid, New York or Washington DC in the last 5 years, you have been exposed to religious violence. Now I know you will say that they hate us for our freedom, but their own words tell us different.

I don't really care if you want to ignore evidence of religious violence, but the victims can't ignore it. The last time I was a victim of religious violence was 1992. Now that may meet your definition of "rare", but to a victim once is enough.

[lvx35]

31. What's your story?

Now I'm curious, what happened in 1992, if you don't mind telling?

To respond to the rest, I wish you just present your counter evidence without accusing me of ignoring it. But anyway, you mention the conflicts in Ireland, which have two ethnically similar people divided along religious lines fighting. This is indeed a counter example to the claim that all conflicts are ethnic. But if its a hypothesis you want to destroy, let me give you one because that was just a generalization for a forum.

MY HYPOTHESIS: War and conflict are not caused by cultural, racial, or religious differences, but by conflicts over resources and power usually by powerful/ruling classes. However, as these smaller conflicts between the powerful grow, they tend to cause fissures in the society where the conflict takes place, and societies tend to fissure across certain lines. I claim that societies will tend to divide over cultural lines (especially where different languages of the society are concerned), ideological and political differences, racial differences, before they will divide by religious or sectarian lines.


Example: Powerful interests in the US eyed Saddam's oil, and Saddam's powerful Ba'ath regime intended to fight back. As the conflict slipped into guerrilla warfare, it grew. This created a religious (sectarian) fissure in the Iraqi society between Shi'ite and Sunni, but ONLY because the Iraqis had the same culture, similiar political and ideological training, and the same race did it split across religious lines.

Point: religion does not create war, but is a fissure line across which societies inflicted under war split, and a relatively insignificant one at that.

Anyway, if you want to educate me by ripping some hypothesis apart, show me significant counter-examples to that one.

[cosmik debris]

36. My story

Briefly, I was a civilian employee of the Department of Defense. In 1990 I was required to attend a religious service on government property on the clock. I filed an EEOC complaint and the DoD response was to allow the Christians to sit and have snacks at their religious service while I was required to continue working. An Administrative Judge ruled in my favor on the EEOC complaint, but the DoD ignored the ruling. I filed a civil suit in Federal Court but lost because I did not have sufficient funds to fight the herd of lawyers that the DoD threw against me. During the two years from the time of the first complaint until the time I was fired my car and home were repeatedly vandalized and the kind loving followers of the prince of peace repeatedly threatened my safety and the safety of my family. Ultimately I lost the EEOC complaint, the lawsuit and my job because I did not have enough money to defend my Constitutional Rights from people who claim to value religious freedom above all.

Now I am sure you will interpret this as something other than religious violence and I don’t really care. You and I disagree on the role of religion in history and there is no point in arguing the issues. If I say it is religiously motivated, you will say it is culturally motivated and nothing will be resolved. One lesson I learned from my experience is that I should not stand up to the Christians until I am ready to kill them. I am not ready for that yet, so you win. Congratulations, Peace.

[lvx35]

48. That's terrible.

I'm really sorry to hear that...Its a total violation of your civil rights and you deserve better. I support the civil rights of Atheists and alternative religions 100%, thus the ACLU sig line...

Now I am sure you will interpret this as something other than religious violence and I don’t really care.

I'm not sure HOW to interpret the evil in this administration, but please, watch the assumptions. I am religious, and have gotten serious opposition from Bushies because I'm not a Christian. Since I was involved in eastern spiritual studies and occult organizations, I have had a nice taste of the kind of oppression thrown at you, from dumb ass fundies who think I am a satanist. But its a double punch to get attacked for it here...Hindus, Buddhists, taoists, Qabalists, you name it have always wanted to just be accepted as religious, and have the religious freedoms promised in the constitution. But there is a narrowing of the definition of the word "religious" to apply only to Christians in the USA, so only their freedoms can be guarunteed.

So a heads up: I think when you say the word "religious" it brings up the picture of a monster truck with jesus painted on it to you, but when I say it, I see a Hindu woman puttin a flower into a river as an offering, or a taoist in meditation. So we are probably very much on the same side here, in many ways, though the words are different.

[cosmik debris]

50. Of course you are right, you are always right

You can never be wrong when you define the terms so that they mean whatever you want them to mean. It he above case you define "religious" to exclude 75% of all Americans. You may live on the banks of the Ganges, but I live in America and I have to deal with the definition of "religious" that includes Americans.

No more weightlifting. The universe you live in is not the same as the universe I live in.

[lvx35]

52. NO I DID NOT!

I defined religion to INCLUDE the 75% of the rest of the world who is religious but no Christian. Guess what? there are MUSLIMS out there! Jews! Hindus!

edit: You know what? I debate for fun, to talk about ideas. When you told me about something hard that happened to you, I went out of my way to express sympathy, and find common ground. And you come back yelling at me and calling me weights. Its just disrespectful. I am not weights.

[cosmik debris]

55. Pardon me

My understanding of internet etiquette was that yelling was the use of all upper case letters. I guess you re-defined that too. I just can't keep up.

I did not relate my story for sympathy, but it demonstrate that religious (as it is defined in my universe) violence is more common that you seem to believe. You wrote it off as the act of this administration even though it happened 15 years ago. It was not the act of any administration that vandalized my property and threatened me and my family. It was my neighbors, my co-workers, and members of my community. They turned on me as if I was a rabid dog because I threatened their religious (as it is defined in my universe) practice. But all you could see was the administrative action that lead to the violence because actual vandalism for religious (as it tis defined in my universe) purposes does not fit with your preconceived notion that religious (as it is defined in my universe) violence is rare. Your sympathy came across as shallow and insincere.

I am tired of weightlifting. You may have the last word.

[lvx35]

56. Thankfully last words.

This administration is the current manifestion of a network of people who have been operating for a long time. You know these conservatives held a lot of power in places like DoD in 1992, and they were taking over the American evangelical movement at that time as well. I wouldn't be suprised if the unfair policy you encountered was designed to make you profess a belief you didn't hold, rather than convert you...
But all of this is secondary. I accept your idea that we live in different universes. and I offer you my apologies if i did something to offend you. Its easy to slip into conflicts when all we actually want to do is build bridges between the universes we are living in. Anyway, I hope all is well, take care, and peace.

[Realityhack]

58. A horrible...

and probobly all to common story. Never mind those who never speak up out of fear.

Sorry to hear what happend to you.

[trotsky]

37. Hmmm...

War and conflict are not caused by cultural, racial, or religious differences, but by conflicts over resources and power usually by powerful/ruling classes.

What resources are present in Israel that would incite people to violence? Much of the territory that surrounds it is stocked with petroleum, so why do they fight over the one little patch of desert in the area that doesn't?

Now obviously your agenda here is to completely absolve religion of any responsibility over any violence, any time in the history of humankind. Not having a religious mindset, I find it very difficult to think in terms of absolutes - but can you tell me honestly that religion has never been the primary motivator in a conflict?

[cosmik debris]

40. Weightlifting

1. I have already presented evidence that disproves his hypothesis and he declined to refute it.
2. He restated his hypothesis without adjusting for the new evidence.
3. His hypothesis is not disprovable because it depends entirely on his own interpretation of historic events.
4. Debating with lvx35 is like weightlifting. You may get some good exercise, but the weights are oblivious.

edit: They hate us for our freedom!

[trotsky]

44. ...

:D

[lvx35]

51. Very well Trotsky.

Not having a religious mindset, I find it very difficult to think in terms of absolutes

I see your skills have learned from our last conflict Neo. It will be much harder to pin me down now. But do you really think that's air were breathing?



Do you really think that things like logic matter in a place like this?

Now HIT me! :)

[trotsky]

54. So you're abandoning this discussion, too...

when you have nothing left.

[lvx35]

57. No, I am making a little joke at my own expense to set the tone.

Laugh Trotsky, its good for you. ;)

Anyway, you brought up the situation in Israel, which is a good point. I would counter that the major resource at play in the Israeli situation is just land. The post holocaust jewish population saw how tenuous their financial resources could be and realized that they desparately needed land if they were to be safe. The power players in the muslim countries saw this as a deep threat, because they lost a pretty big chunk of it, and sought to get it back, utilizing the themes in the religion in the area to orchestrate the struggle.

But the major part of the divide in the area is still more cultural, you have different languages, different ethnic identities (jewish/arab) and different political systems.(?) To support my hypothesis, I would bring up the Arab Christian population in Lebanon and other countries around their, who live peacefully with the Muslim majority.

[trotsky]

59. I'm not going to laugh when you're so decidedly biased.

You've made it clear that you have already decided religion will never be to blame for any conflict. You then approach every example with this belief that you have pre-determined is true, and look desperately for some other reason.

Well in numerous cases (and please note here that unlike you, I do not take the absolutist position and say all of them), and in the case of Israel in particular, the problem IS religion. You think Israel is "a pretty big chunk" of the middle east? Your desperation has never been more clear than it was with that statement. No honest person can look at a map of the Middle East and think that Israel is "a pretty big chunk." It's just utterly false.

And to characterize Jewish/Arab differences as ethnic? I'm just flabbergasted you could even try to play that card. Utterly ridiculous.

[lvx35]

61. Whatever.

This is an argument not a conversation/debate. Bye.

BTW:

ethnic:
2 a : of or relating to large groups of people classed according to common racial, national, tribal, religious, linguistic, or cultural origin or background <ethnic minorities> <ethnic enclaves>

[trotsky]

63. Hope you enjoy your absolutism.

It's certainly not the lone domain of far-righties like Jerry Falwell, evidently.

[kwassa]

64. My slight disagreement.

lvx35:
"MY HYPOTHESIS: War and conflict are not caused by cultural, racial, or religious differences, but by conflicts over resources and power usually by powerful/ruling classes."

Wars are basically power grabs, of one group against another group. These groups can be defined by many things, and are usually defined by multiple things, including nationality, culture, race, religion, language, and all those aspects that add up to define the identity of a group. The most powerful leader must be able to invoke aspects of the group identity, and threats to that identity, in order to rally the membership of that group to go to war. The leader can't do it alone.

So, to me, religion can certainly be part of the mix. What I see sometimes around here are people who see it as the ONLY part of the mix, choosing it out of all the other factors, and attributing the problem to religion alone, when even in the most apparently religious conflicts are many other elements as well.

(Incidentally, I also just looked up the "causes of war" on Wikipedia, which has a long entry on the subject. From this I can see that there is no agreement among the experts, but a long list of different theories from different schools of thought.)

[Finder]

24. What about the disabled or atheists or homosexuals or Freemasons...

who were victims of the holocaust? Most of them were non-Jews. Jehovah Witnesses and Romanians were victims as well. Many children of Jews were spared by being adopted by Catholic families.

[lvx35]

30. Fact check time.

who were victims of the holocaust? Most of them were non-Jews.

Last I heard, total death tolls at 11 million, 6 million of them jews, so most of them WERE jews, and the rest were deamed racially inferior. I will directly quote wikipedia:


The Jews of Europe were the main victims of the Holocaust in what the Nazis called the "Final Solution of the Jewish Question" (die Endlösung der Judenfrage) or "the cleaning" (die Reinigung). The commonly used figure for the number of Jewish victims is six million, though estimates by historians using, among other sources, records from the Nazi regime itself, range from five million to seven million. Millions of other minorities also perished in the Holocaust in addition to this figure.

About 220,000 Sinti and Roma were murdered in the Holocaust (some estimates are as high as 800,000), between a quarter to a half of the European population. Other groups deemed "racially inferior" or "undesirable": Poles (6 million killed, of whom 3 million were Catholic/Christian, and the rest Jewish)...

source:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocaust

So of around 11 million killed, 6 million were jews, 3 million catholics/christians of a different race. Now I have given you my source, you need to provide an equally viable source supporting the idea that jewish children were let out of concentration camps if thye converted.

[Finder]

39. Hmm, you misread my post...

I was stating the Freemasons, Atheists, Homosexuals, Disabled were mostly non-jews. Nice try partially quoting me.

I was disputing your statement about blond hair and blue eyes in prison camps.

Here are another group of blondes you may forget--the Lebensborn:

From 1939, one of the most horrible side of the Lebensborn policy was the kidnapping of children "racially goods" in the eastern occupied countries. These kidnappings were organized by the SS in order to take by force children who matched the Nazi's racial criteria (blond hair, blue eyes, etc....). Thousands of children were transferred to the "Lebensborn" centers in order to be "Germanized". In these centers, everything was done to force the children to reject and forget their birth parents. As an example, the SS nurses tried to persuade the children that they were deliberately abandoned by their parents. The children who refused the Nazi education were often beaten. Most of them were finally transferred to concentration camps (most of the time Kalish in Poland) and exterminated. The others were adopted by SS families.

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/Lebensborn.html

As far as the Jewish children...I never stated they were let out of camps. Many of these children were handed to the church by their parents prior to arrest in order to save them.

[Finder]

41. Also, Pavelic...forced conversion of serbs to Catholicism...

As the leader of the Ustaše he directly ordered, organised and conducted a campaign of terror against Serbs, Jews, Gypsies, and communist Croats. The extent of this campaign reached the proportions of genocide. As far as the Serb population of the puppet state was concerned, the stated aim was the extermination of a third of their numbers, exile for another third, and a forced conversion to Catholicism for yet another. The Ustaše succeeded in reaching their first goal, exterminating close to one third of the Serbs and possibly more. Pawelic's regime was not officially recognised by the Vatican, but at no point did the Church condemn the genocide and forced conversions to Catholicism perpetrated by the Ustaše.<1> Soon after coming to power in April 1941 Pavelić was given a private audience in Rome by Pope Pius XII, an act for which the Pope was widely criticised. A British Foreign Office memo on the subject described Pius as "the greatest moral coward of our age" for receiving Pavelić.<2>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ante_Paveli%C4%87

[struggle4progress]

32. The Nazis killed plenty of blond blue-eyed Jewish people.

In many historical cases, cultural issues have determined "otherness" more than genetic facts: this is clear (for example) in the Jim Crow South or in apartheid South Africa, where individuals with a majority of Northern European ancestry would be identified as "colored" if there was any evidence of African ancestry.

So I doubt your theory that most conflicts are genetic. Ethnic, by the way, is not a synonym for genetic background but a term that refers to culture, and religious upbringing has typically been a cultural issue. So your fusion "ethnic/genetic" is incoherent.

[lvx35]

34. No, my term ethnic is right on.

It talks about culture, genetics, upbringing and heritage, of which religion is a small part. The reason the terms "genocide" and "ethnic cleansing" are interchangeable is because they are so related.

Also, your talking about Jim Crow and South Africa, which are clearly and obviously genetically defined systems of oppressions. If there were whites in South Africa or the American south which were oppressed in these systems, its a historical footnote, not a major trend.

[struggle4progress]

60. The Jim Crow and apartheid oppressions were NOT "genetically defined":

such phenomena exhibit clearly that "race" is a cultural idea, rather than being defined by scientific fields such as genetics.

Here is a simple experiment you can do to illustrate this fact: show people a photograph of Frederick Douglass and ask what "race" he is. Almost everyone will say he is "black," but no coherent scientific theory underlies the answer most people give. In fact, Frederick's father (a slaveholder) had raped his mother (a slave), not an uncommon occurrence. The assertion, "Frederick Douglass was a black man" reflects cultural history, not genetic history.

My assertion in the Jim Crow South or in apartheid South Africa .. individuals with a majority of Northern European ancestry would be identified as "colored" if there was any evidence of African ancestry reflects a peculiar sociological context, not a scientific fact. The gyrations of the Afrikaaner state to provide operationally effective definitions for its racial classifications are hilarious from a scientific viewpoint (although they must have been humiliating for people subjected to the tests): simply put, they tried to attach a meaning to nonsense. The nonsense served a specific objective: it helped maintain a caste system with a desperately poor labor pool forced to work for subsistence wages; it accomplished this aim by providing an ideological system based on "race" which served to mystify the oppression. And that, in fact, is a typical use of nonsensical racist ideas ...

[struggle4progress]

33. There were also blond blue-eyed Christians in the Nazi camps

Dietrich Bonhoeffer comes to mind, for example

[lvx35]

35. Of course there were exceptions...

...but lets talk about probability: These people were primarily exterminated due to race. The idea that the Nazis were not racists is simply absurd. A Christian motivation would not have killed 3 million Christians, as I noted above.

[Finder]

42. You and your strawmen...Nobody is saying Nazis were not racists.n/t

[trotsky]

43. "A Christian motivation would not have killed 3 million Christians"

Because, as we all know, Christians have NEVER disagreed with each other, and have never called fellow Christians heretics and killed them.

Apologists like you are what give Christianity a bad name. Admitting failure and learning from past mistakes can only help a religion grow and become more tolerant and tolerable (to its non-adherents, on both counts).

You sound like a "love it or leave it" type Republican who thinks his country (religion) has never done wrong.

[lvx35]

46. I'm not even a Christian.

I just telling you the holocaust was not about religion, it was about eugenics, race.

[trotsky]

47. And we're telling you you're wrong.

No matter what you consider your religion to be.

When you get around to addressing the failures of your argument, please let me know.

[lvx35]

49. The failures of my argument?

Would me mind telling me what part of the statement "the holocaust was fundamentally motivated by genetic factors and not religious ones" is wrong? Its right. The Nazis where motivated by genetics, thus its called genocide.

[trotsky]

53. See above. n/t

[struggle4progress]

62. There's no such thing as "race." There are racists, who use this ..

.. nonsense idea to justify their own bad behavior. But just as "witches" do not exist, even though idiots burned many people as "witches," the fact that there are racists does not mean "race" is a sensible idea.

Nobody was "exterminated due to race," though the racists killed millions of innocent people: those who died, died as the result of hateful actions by sociopaths who spouted nonsense to justify their behavior ...

[trotsky]

25. Excuse me.

"atheist king" Richard Dawkins?

Knock it off.

[razors edge]

28. works for me, but if i don't

see you, or anyone else there for that matter, peace.:toast:

[Random_Australian]

66. Nope nopisky I declare this argument flawed, and back myself up:

But first, you are right about one thing: higher dimensions and whatnot do mean that the various laws don't work strictly all of the time.

Now, the wrong bits:

"It is from these higher dimensions that emotions and thoughts form"

Oh? Really? Funny you should say that, given how the 11 dimensions are pretty much the same (well, beyond the first 3 they are curled up, and some curled to an arbitrarily large length), it makes as much sense to assert that as it does to say "emotions form in width, and thoughts in length"... which is to say it doesn't.

"Because words and ideas are not bound to the laws of Thermodynamics"

Who said they aren't? Where is the law that talks about information.... I remember, it is the second one. Sheesh.

"None of these ideas "exist" in our physical world"

Funny that - remove some neurons and they dissappear mighty fast. Almost like they were containing the information.

Just to be picky, the thing you mention is not an experiment.


Look, if you answer this, I'll respond to the rest. It is not worth the effort if this is to be ignored.

[Zhade]

12. "but discovered that life still had meaning"

Here's the dirty little secret: life holds just as much meaning without belief in gods as it does with believing in gods. In my case, much more so - I've never been as alive and happy as I have been since I stopped trying to believe in myths.

It's really neat to learn that firsthand, too. Very rewarding for this atheist!

[TallahasseeGrannie]

13. I'm glad for you, Zhade

it's nice to read something positive once in a while.

[Zhade]

15. Believe me (heh), it's great to be able to say it!

:)

[YankeyMCC]

26. Nicely put!

I've tried to express that in the past but your simple statement says it so clearly. This is exactly my experience as well.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

19. What color is Saturday?

That's easy. Kind of light green in the morning and it gets bluer as the day goes on. Saturday night is dark blue.

To me, at least!

[Synnical]

27. My favorite color is clear

I re-call a girl doing acid stating that. I witnessed that. :)

Edit: No Disrespect to you TG, but religion is nonsense I will state that far and wide.

-Cindy in Fort Lauderdale

[TallahasseeGrannie]

38. No offense taken

we can agree to disagree quite happily. State it as far and wide as you wish!

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

45. Erm... not actually choice.

If it was, I could force myself to believe that the capital of Saudi Arabia is Knoxville. Try THAT.

[hunter]

65. Sadly, this says a lot more about life in Ohio...

... than it does about the meaning of life.

Who's next on the Columbus Dispatch's alien weirdo list? Homosexuals?

When he first realized he was sexually attracted to men, he was troubled by the idea that he would never have a girlfriend. He was depressed for a time, he said, but discovered that life still had meaning.

"I just kind of realized after living and getting up every day it’s like, look, there’s more reasons to live than having a girlfriend, or that only heterosexual procreation provides purpose," Sterling said.

"Our emotions and our culture and our attachments to other people create things that we as humans need and want. And that’s where our goals come from."

This must be what happens when you grow up breathing all that mercury from coal fired power plants. You become quite mad.

God Bless America!