751. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #158558 by MaxD on April 10, 2008 at 6:29 pm

Who did we flag?

752. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #158555 by MaxD on April 10, 2008 at 6:07 pm

I've put lots of hot sauce on it...is that okay?

753. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #158549 by MaxD on April 10, 2008 at 5:47 pm

Transubstantiated Richard hmmmm, mmmmm, good.

754. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #158543 by MaxD on April 10, 2008 at 5:39 pm

The thing about most of these serious apologetic tracts is that they are intellectually dishonest. In just about anyway you care to look at them.
Their researcy, their interviews, their interviews, presentation. Sadly most of it can't even be chalked up to ineptness like forgetting to clear up copy-right infringement. Much of what they do is simply out right hostile to the notion of truth, fairness and balance. They consciously play on the lay publics's vs scientific use of the word theory. They quote out of context. And if Shermer's review is indicative of the way the film is chopped together we can be sure they played fast and loos with the truth throughout. I'm sure Ben Stein deplores Michael Moore's style documentary tactics. I know I do. But here he is sleeves up around his elbows as he shovels his manure about.

ID/creation has not earned the scientific cred to be called a theory. In fact it is a busted hypothesis.

755. Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov tries suicide after realising he was wrong about doomsday

Comment #158390 by MaxD on April 10, 2008 at 12:21 pm

I wasn't sure where Frankus was going with it. We are an odd lot and a mistake we make is assuming we all believe the same way. So I am glad that you asked for clarification Zeke.

756. Fleabytes

Comment #158374 by MaxD on April 10, 2008 at 12:03 pm

Don't sweat it Diacanu.

757. Fleabytes

Comment #158358 by MaxD on April 10, 2008 at 11:41 am

Al,
Just pmed you.

758. Fleabytes

Comment #158350 by MaxD on April 10, 2008 at 11:28 am

Having read David's response to Richard, I really do wish he, David, would do a bit of statistical analysis on the subject before he opens his self-serrving mouth. (Thanks David for letting us know about your friends pathfinder and douchebag. Also I am glad to see that such dishonesty isn't unchristian. I mean do you ever see what total fucking hypocrits you are? THere were numerous reasons for shortness with Pathfinder and Douchebag, and none of them had anythign to do with their reasonableness.
I mean no quote mining and gut instinct. No selective fucking highlighting of texts that favor his myopic view of this site. On the Richard Morgan debacle I would be willing to bet there is no pulse to finger because we are all over the fucking map on the issue. As we are on most issues.
The discussion of Richard Morgan was confused because it was so sudden and, dare I say it, strange. I of course wish RM all the best but I can't say that I find his tactics in any way shape or form honorable. What ever though. To each his/or her own.

But David you, with your half-assed generalizations, you with your fucking certainty, you with your selective honesty (My new euphamism for your dishonest approach to debate) you sir can walk east till your hat floats. That is a polite way of saying.........
Fuck off.

759. Beware the Believers

Comment #158327 by MaxD on April 10, 2008 at 10:51 am

Well I certainly hope Kyrie reads my rebuttal. I hope this character doesn't pull a theaction and run.
Oughtta be a law....

760. Fleabytes

Comment #158319 by MaxD on April 10, 2008 at 10:36 am

Uh Richard Morgan,
You said:

(Yes - I am the phantom deleter.)

Uh...why did you delete your posts? Good to see you back at the site and speaking again, though I think parenthetics means whispering. Why remove all the posts? Why run off?

761. Expelled producers accused of copyright infringement

Comment #158000 by MaxD on April 10, 2008 at 12:40 am

Isn't this the second time a big creationist production has had this happen?

762. Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov tries suicide after realising he was wrong about doomsday

Comment #157995 by MaxD on April 10, 2008 at 12:23 am

Ah Steve...you poor deluded soul.
Because of your marriage I made the immiediately logical step and visited the courthouse to look int the possiblities of making a life committment to a wonderful horse I see on my walks.
I apprehended the logic of it only when I thought about gay marriage.
Come on.
Obviously.

763. Beware the Believers

Comment #157993 by MaxD on April 10, 2008 at 12:10 am

Kyrie, or perhaps more appropriately,
"Oh Lord!"
Where to begin, where to begin?
I have been in biology for the better part of 10 years. And I have never had the instance where the profs discussed God unless brought up by students. And then alot of hand wringing occured where the profs slipped the question.
"Well that is not what this is about. This is about evolution."

You say.

it betrays a complete lack of knowledge."
PhDs are awarded for contributing to the knowledge pool. It is at the disgression of falible, emotional people what is accepted and what isn't. The intellectual value of a contribution by a PhD holder outside their focus is non sequitur.

Well no one said that there was infalliblity. But there is error correcting machinery in the sciences. Peer review, replicablity, testing etc. What isn't the case is uncovered because there is a wealth of accolades for someone who overturns established theory.

Your point about the value of an intellectual offering by a brilliant person out side their area of expertise as being invalid is just utter silliness because it invalidates rather handily your non-point about brilliant scientists who were Christian. You rattle off a few guys you think very brilliant and then show off their status as believers. You do this with nary a care as to what they actually believed. Newton for instance held a great deal of crack pot theories. He was an alchemist. He didn't believe Jesus was the son of God. And Hawking is an atheist. In any event what do you care, you don't believe their expertise in their respective fields qualifies them to adjudicate on such matters anyway.

"... why atheism enjoys such high rates of incidence among biologists and cosmologists."
The reason is conjecture from professors the students look up too because of their high intellectual honors.

Sadly this is not likely to be the case. Go talk to some biologists, or cosmologists and then maybe you will have some idea why they think the way they do. You will find it enlightening as you will not be pulling things out of your a...well you know. Dude the only time this gets brought up is by students. The question of God is irrelevant to the study of Biology, physics or cosmology. Believe them if you want, it just doesn't affect the observations.

With each new discovery in the area of constants, the possiblity of "accidental" life mathematically decreases.

If by accident you mean random, no one is saying that at all. But I don't think you have a really solid idea what you mean by accidental.
Your ground here is utterly, utterly thin. We don't yet know what kind of a universe we live in. Or why the constants are the way they are. You are proposing a weak God of the Gaps theology. And one thing the history of that idea has demonstrated is a catastrophic inability to explain or predict new discoveries. It boils down to, I don't know what happened here, so [insert God]. Of course you run into the age old problem of whose God exactly.
I'm glad that is your problem and not mine.

You say...

The best minds; Newton, Bacon, Pascal, Galileo, Polkinghorne, were Christian. Steve Hawking attends church as often as possible.

As I've already shown your last bit is irrelevant because you don't care about their expertise anyway. (Did you know that Newton was a horrible horrible man?)

Missing my point entirely you say,

"Wouldn't it seem like the people most dealing with subjects deeply germaine to humanity, life"
Humanity has to do with thought, belief, memory, volition, etc., all of which is non-material.

Did you really just say that? Really? What part of what you wrote is none material? Do you ever read anything other than what you are told? Or what comforts you most? Just where do you think things like thought, memory, belief, "volition" get done? If you are struggling with that let me help. It happens in the brain, and can all be altered by manipulating the brain.

You have no idea what you are talking about do you?

Biology has to do with the material part of life. Material, your hand for example, does nothing of note without "thought" acting on it.
"and origins"
This is all theory; no one has proof of how we got here.

Proof? This isn't geometry. But we have a mass of evidence and it all points in one general direction.

To teach one theory only is indoctrination. Darwinism is disturbingly useful to the government and anyone wanting to justify actions that might harm another person.

Oh My Lord Have Mercy! I hope it is okay to use your own name in a less than friendly manner as I just did. Simply the way you used the word theory shows me you don't know what you are talking about. Scientists use the word in a very technical sense. It is very unlike your use which would encompass the baseless accusation of suppression on the part of scientists of creationists. For more than one scientific perspective to get a decent airing it must have a good amount of evidence in its favor. This cannot be said for ID at all. Not even a little bit. They have no research program, they have leaky hypotheses and no idea where to begin. Not only are they up the creek, but they have no oars, or boat.

Teaching one theory is not what goes on anyway. They are all evolutionary theories, and hypothesies but Darwinism is a piece-admittedly very large-of an even larger puzzle. If you want more time for ID/Creation then produce some results and evidence. Even your major "theorists" admit this hasn't been accomplished and that their "theoretical arm" has outpaced their experimental one.
I wonder why.

Your point about Darwin being a useful political tool is really rich. Go watch the US presidential debates to find out why. Moreover your "argument from negative consequences is useless. The theory could be just as corrosive as you say and it wouldn't change the veracity of it one bit.

Finally you go too far.

"would find some corrobarating evidence of their God. They never do."
There isn't a lack of evidence, only a supression of evidence.

I spit my milk out at this line. Of course in perfect conspiracy fashion. Well where is your evidence?
They supressed it.
Who did?
They did. The scientists.
Which ones?
They did.
Ah.....
It can never be error, or poor research or a lack of understanding. Conspiracy please, it spares me the need to look more squarely at my world.

"Apologetics" is the genre that answers questions for skeptics and thinkers;

I have a different word for it of course. And it isn't quite the same as yours....

764. Beware the Believers

Comment #157962 by MaxD on April 9, 2008 at 9:54 pm

Kyrie elesion means Lord have mercy or Oh Lord in greek according to wikipedia.

It is the most oft repeated phrase in the Eastern Christian tradition I guess. for more go hither.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyrie

765. Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov tries suicide after realising he was wrong about doomsday

Comment #157960 by MaxD on April 9, 2008 at 9:44 pm

Zeke,
I have to say I grow a bit weary of the dragging of goats and other wildlife into these discussions. This is a tactic common on FoxNews (Frankus not linking you to this crowd!). But this is the frequent progression.
"Two guys marry, what is to stop a guy and two girls? Or three? Or what about a guy and his pet goat?"
The only thing more common is the tendency to worry that letting homosexuality be legal will lead to a NAMBLA paradise. (Is it just me or is there a tendency to come down much harder on male homosexuality and associate with it, baselessly, a host of wicked behavior?)

As far as state recognition, I think it probably ought to be one person to one person because marriage offers a host finacial benefits, tax breaks and incentives. Honestly though I haven't given it much thought beyond that. I am against LDS style marriages because women aren't afforded the same rights to marry as many men as they want. As such it just strikes me as unfair.

However you are most certainly right that the LDS situation would go forward whether gay folk had the right to marry or didn't. Because the LDS has a long history of pushing this issue over and over and, well you guessed it, over again.
Well that was my own not yet fully formed opinion of the matter.

766. Beware the Believers

Comment #157956 by MaxD on April 9, 2008 at 9:28 pm

Kyrie,
You say:

Every line in the Rap, and even parts of lines, are all from scripture and the context is unflattering.

Clearly that part isn't true. Why did you say it?
"Dick to the Dawk to the Ph.D, He's smarter than you he has a science degree. "
I can't find even a piece of that in my bible.
While you are digging around in your bible to find me the appropriate chapter and verse maybe you could flesh out this statement

When one rejects the study of wisdom, it leaves one completely crippled in that entire field.

Thanks!

767. Beware the Believers

Comment #157954 by MaxD on April 9, 2008 at 9:18 pm

I think one reason Professor Dawkins may not have grasped the song's slant from the get go, indeed many of us missed it on the first hearing is because it has a few ambigiuous passages, namely a few positive references to darwin and speaks more or less highly-or appears to- of Darrow at Scopes.

Its own trickyness of tone is a barrier to understanding any clear message that the author may have wanted to convey. (This can be positive for discussion as it has been here. Ambiguity can further discussion by allowing several interpretations-quite justified-at once. Then we can push the limits thereof and see if we can understand things, about the piece, or ourselves better than we did before.)They don't want to come right out and say which side they support, but they do find dawkins and the atheists to be, at the very least unhelpful. Clearly the tone was never very kind during the Dawkins centered chorus.

Another reason? Not everyone listens to rap or understands when its expressions are being flattering, and when they are being mocking.

I thought, on the second listen-thru that it was more post-modernist than Christian apologetic. Who cares?

Your assertion that every rap phrase was lined with scripture is going to have to be substantiated though. I have just listened to it and your phrase seems meaningless to me. I mean maybe there is a word found in scripture in every phrase. But there is probaly a word found in every phrase of the song that is also found in The Brothers Karamozov. I get the sense though they don't mean anything so general as to share words like, "and," "the," and "he." So I find myself unimpressed-as yet-with this claim. Not of course that it will mean much either way. But stylistically it could be an achievement to a certain kind of mind.

768. The Atheist Next Door

Comment #157944 by MaxD on April 9, 2008 at 7:58 pm

Zeke, I had seen that first "cool-headed and calm" panel when it happened. I remember wanting to kick my screen. The second one with Dennis Prager I had not seen. But what a cheap bit of sophistry at the end of the clip. He is to bright to not miss his own dishonesty. What a prick.

769. Beware the Believers

Comment #157936 by MaxD on April 9, 2008 at 7:21 pm

The smugness of her tone isn't helping me see her humility either.

But whatever. Thinking that you are simply jumping through "social loopholes" to get a Ph.D is the kind of assine comment made by someone who couldn't get into, or finds disgusting the idea of getting into, a graduate school. Nevertheless it betrays a complete lack of knowledge.

I would asker her why atheism enjoys such high rates of incidence among biologists and cosmologists. Wouldn't it seem like the people most dealing with subjects deeply germaine to humanity, life and origins would find some corrobarating evidence of their God. They never do. That isn't a clincher but man wouldn't it make you wonder?

770. Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov tries suicide after realising he was wrong about doomsday

Comment #157922 by MaxD on April 9, 2008 at 6:44 pm

Frankus,
As you disagree with me, I feel my honor slighted and must challenge you to Muy Thai Style death match before a gathered throng of friends and family, and whoever....(smacks forehead).

Chivalrous, chivalrous, not honor culture obsessed psycho, not honor culture obsessed psycho.

No offense taken Frankus. I just thought it was odd that Mike kept trying to use these weird, and given the context, negative gender terms. He says ladies and gets called on it, switches to Gents. It seems just the tiniest bit passive aggressive to me. Needling just a bit.
It is entirely true that sometimes this format loses obvious tones foundin live conversations. Furthermore sometimes we assume that ourfriendships in this web community are like the ones in our day to day lives. Perhaps we think a certain tone is understood because our other "reallife" friends get it. So misinterpretations arise all the time. It is one reason I try to get clarification before I rip someone a new asshole.
I do think such clarifications and qualifications have largely been observed in this argument.

(Looks around the room for the twine to wrap his wrists for the Muy Thai style death match....)

771. Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov tries suicide after realising he was wrong about doomsday

Comment #157742 by MaxD on April 9, 2008 at 1:44 pm

Dr. Benway.
I have to say that was what i thought was implied too.

772. Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov tries suicide after realising he was wrong about doomsday

Comment #157686 by MaxD on April 9, 2008 at 12:19 pm

Keith,
I hope I wasn't the one with the egregious contradictions! That would be so....disappointing!

773. Beware the Believers

Comment #157659 by MaxD on April 9, 2008 at 11:48 am

Kyrie Elesion says:

Excluding intelligent critics will decay the ability to accurately evaluate one's own actions and attitudes.



Who is excluding intelligent critics?

774. Richard Dawkins: 'Growth in creationist beliefs a problem for schools'

Comment #157283 by MaxD on April 8, 2008 at 8:28 pm

Bonzai,
We've had our disagreements but quoting the boss lets me know that you are good people indeed!

775. Richard Dawkins: 'Growth in creationist beliefs a problem for schools'

Comment #157275 by MaxD on April 8, 2008 at 8:06 pm

Stryer,
Al has given evidence you don't find it compelling. He does. I think it is time to realize that you two are not going to agree and let it go.
There is no point in arguing about it. Really. None. And the two of you could have it out in PM without occupying this board. Come back and gloat about who ever won later.
Doesn't that seem reasonable?

776. Richard Dawkins: 'Growth in creationist beliefs a problem for schools'

Comment #157059 by MaxD on April 8, 2008 at 2:15 pm

No don't feel that way quetz, I found it to be an important link.

777. Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov tries suicide after realising he was wrong about doomsday

Comment #156928 by MaxD on April 8, 2008 at 12:01 pm

ZekeCDN,
Hope I didn't mischaracterize what you were saying. I thought you had rather succinctly fleshed out a story that desperately needed it. I was trying to see if there was a time when people would relax a bit and laugh. For my own part I think it is perfectly with in the scope of the human emotional apparatus to feel that a thing is a genuine tragedy AND also laugh at the absurdity of a situation.
There is a great line about this sort of thing in No country for Old Men when the sheriff reads a horrible story to his deputy and his deputy laughed but then tried to stifle himself. The sheriff says "I laughed too. What else can you do?"

Dunf2562.
Whose sockpuppet,
are
You?

778. Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov tries suicide after realising he was wrong about doomsday

Comment #156714 by MaxD on April 8, 2008 at 7:18 am

I hope I didn't say I wanted to kill these people. Maybe I implied it. I'm just saying I don't know how much I would be willing to do if they weren't wanting to get help. Having worked with more than my fair share (I kept finding myself in mental health between field jobs) I must confess a certain hopelessness for the ones out in the world. Especially the obviously dangerous ones.

Someone with a simple narcissistic personality disorder is fine and rather easy to spot-if not help-, and yes Dr. Benway they do have their charms (though they aren't often charming after you get to know them, as the manipulations become annoying, but their self-inflicted drama can be strangely intridguing from an academic perspective. When are they going to stop that? I always asked.)

Anyway though there is a subset that bears some careful scrutiny like you say, from a safe distance. I'd like to see the lot of them get help. I hope that is clear. I just thing the ones that have gotten away with it for so long are dangerously reinforced in their own delusions and power and much much harder to help.

779. Richard Dawkins: 'Growth in creationist beliefs a problem for schools'

Comment #156708 by MaxD on April 8, 2008 at 7:09 am

This was one of the reasons I withdrew from my K-12 education program. I was taken to task because in a paper about this very subject I said there were times I wouldn't give credit, any credit for even well written essay questions. That there was indeed a time when Ithought that a kid could be mind numbingly wrong. (Not that I would be mean about it or anything. And of course I framed my position in a suitably academic way.)
On the paper I got back a line about not being open to new truth, or the student's truth and that as a biologist who values science, how could I justify being so rigid. Oh my fucking goodness did that piss me right the hell off. I was asked to give my paper some thought and resubmit.
I asked her why it was in my subject that this seemed okay? Why would you be so open, and any less rigorous than in mathematics or physics say?

Most of my profs could not entertain the distinctions I was trying to make. Kids could argue and write interesting and diverse things about legitamate scientific controversies (do warbler feeding zones really indicated resource partioning? Was it an astroid or disease or some combination that wiped out the dinosaurs, were the aforementioned endothermic or was the climate so warm they simply appeared to be) but anything that suggested the world was 6000 years old would be counted wrong in my class room. I took heat for that the whole time I was in the program. There are loads of other problems in Education but that one really bugged me.

Anyway in the US at least in the halls where many educators are educated in somethig fuzzy called Education a subtle strain of postmodernism lurks. One of my profs even said "If it is right for you it can't be wrong?" To which I almost replied, whew now I won't have to feel bad if I go fuck around on my spouse.

780. Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov tries suicide after realising he was wrong about doomsday

Comment #156695 by MaxD on April 8, 2008 at 6:46 am

I was thinking about Diacanu's post a page or so ago, wherein he responds to MJWalkers accusation that if indeed the man was inches in front of him, and blithering and drooling and going on in truly mental ill style that he wouldn't let the guy try to off himself ala Homer Simpson. Diacanu said he would probably try to save the guy. And if he was mentally ill to the degree MikejsWalker seems to think this Russian prophet was, was then maybe it is the right thing to do. I suspect David Koresh was mentally ill too, but in that unhealable sociopath kind of way. Do you try to stop him in the same situation?

It seems like a great deal hinges on how fucked up this guy really was. I mean was he a total unstable schizophreniac? Or was he a under the spell of a severe narcissitic personality disorder, while also being a self-serving twat (Dr. Benway inspired me to use that word) as ZekeCDN has implied? If the picture ZekeCDN has painted is the correct one then aren't the vast amount of our sympathies for this prophet character spent in the wrong place on the wrong person? I'm thinking that maybe the better place to spend this milk and human kindess currency is on the poor suckers in the unstable cave.

If this guy is the later kind of person, that is a self-serving narcissist, sociopath type (and I had some access to this kind of knowledge, perhaps not likely to be the case in the real world) then I for one would probably not lift a finger to prevent the self-snuffing. Or if I did, it would be to call 911 and let the authorities, whose job it is to deal with this kind of thing, deal with this kind of thing.

As I said it would be hard to have that kind of perfect knowledge of such a situation. But it can happen. Jerry Falwell was for instance a tub of contradiction. I think he believed a great deal of what he said, and where he didn't, it is as we all know fine to lie for Jesus so long as you are doing to bring more sheep into the flock. But I don't know if you could say he was mentally ill. Partaking of a hugely divisive, troubling and often evil delusion, but acting rationally given his first principles, and his general principle of lining his wallet (why does that shit so often go together for these "holy men"). I don't think I would have shed too many tears had he gone a few years sooner with a little self-help. (You would, for instance never find me on Youtube under a sheet mascara streams running down my face screaming through sobs...."LEAVE JERRY ALONE, just...sob...leave...HIM ALONE!!!)

Would it be sad? Sure. It is always sad when someone has so few options to reconcile their world view with what ever is ailing it. But not everyone is willing, or able to receive the counselling necessary to help them over the hump.

781. Get out of here, atheists!

Comment #156565 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 9:58 pm

This was my brief letter to the DNC

To Leaders of the DNC
I would hope that someone with a significant leadership role will kindly take some time to explain the Representative from IL Monique Davis that telling a citizen that he doesn't belong at a meeting simply because his beliefs don't conform with hers is wrong. Moreover, trying to intimidate and silence an opponent is precisely the wrong way for we democrats to proceed. Her fearful, thoughtless shouting at Rob Sherman was easily one of the more disgusting things I've seen in this political season. I think that is saying quite alot.

Shouting at someone "You have no right to be here! We believe in something. You believe in destroying! You believe in destroying what this state was built upon," seems deeply anti-American, and anti-freedom of speech. I hope you, in places of leadership will not let this soft, bigoted form of piety disfigure our party and our morality the way it has our Republican opponents. This would be a sad way to move our party forward. Or rather move it backward.

Short/sweet.

782. Get out of here, atheists!

Comment #156520 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 6:08 pm

Mintcheerios said:

If she said something like that to a Muslim, her career would have ended on the spot.

One would also worry much more for her safety after so vehemently attacking muslims in the way she attacked that guy. Certainly she would have too. There is not likely to be any such worry on her part after this. A good thing, it is one of our endearing qualities. Rationality and shit.

783. Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov tries suicide after realising he was wrong about doomsday

Comment #156519 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 5:56 pm

I actually think Richard Morgan has been a bit less his usual self ever since the tiff he and Al-rawandi had. Which I thought was also a bit strange for its intensity.

I could be wrong of course.

784. Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov tries suicide after realising he was wrong about doomsday

Comment #156515 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 5:38 pm

I had a splendid moment at the Gym the other day where I uttered something terribly insensitive. We were watching the news (I was on the mats stretching after I ran and there were some other people stretching too). On the news one of American stories, shooter goes in to building x shoots a bunch of people then turns the gun on himself. Every body around me immediately felt bad. you could tell by the body language.

"Man I wish these guys would just skip to the part where they shoot themselves." I said it and gave that bitter laugh that accompanies such news. I also got the distinct impression that what I had said bugged them. Like I had stepped over the line. I just wanted to give voice to what I felt about this stupid phenomena.
I wondered for a bit if I was a bad person. I came to the conclusion though that I had meant what I said, and that it wasn't a kind of sigh, or stress relieving noisemaking exercise. If these people cannot see fit to get help I really do wish they would just skip the narcissism and shoot themselves.
I'm not sure if that makes me a bad person, or insensitive but there it is.

785. Get out of here, atheists!

Comment #156417 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 1:58 pm

Well I called the numbers provided and voiced my displeasure. The secretary was very nice. But no Rep. Davis to chat with.

786. Get out of here, atheists!

Comment #156408 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 1:32 pm

What the fuck?!

787. Richard Dawkins: 'Growth in creationist beliefs a problem for schools'

Comment #156311 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 9:53 am

I think when pressed for a position by a theist it will be a Brazilian Jiu-jitsu position called knee on the stomach. They won't like that position at all because...oh you meant something else. Sorry.

788. Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov tries suicide after realising he was wrong about doomsday

Comment #156305 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 9:41 am

Benway,
Noted. I am practicing. That unctuous caring bit will be the hardest part I think. Its just a bit beyond me I think.

789. Fleabytes

Comment #156295 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 9:16 am

Frankus,
I must not get it eh? I'm Glad clearthinker pointed that out to me.
I guess by serious point he meant one he considers serious and worth whining about. Though he did try to sound nice and respond nicely to Annabanna for awhile there. I lost track of that little substory there. Did that continue or did his tone change with her?

790. Fleabytes

Comment #156288 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 8:46 am

Allow me to note though that he did it again.
Clearthinker avoids real discussion. I wrote a bit in answer to the way his morality might be placed on a firm setting, certainly a firmer setting than his currently sits, by useing a bit of current moral philosophy to which I have been recently exposed.

However he chose to bemoan the lost 300, the RD.net person whoever it might have been, either diligent fraud, or mistaken poster. Woe is he I guess. Clearly we have left his whiny unflattering, inaccurate, ignorant posts up without censorship. He has yet to mention that so intent is he to find fault with the forum, RD, Paula and atheists.

Dissappointment.

791. Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov tries suicide after realising he was wrong about doomsday

Comment #156287 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 8:35 am

I was just kidding of course. I was doing an impression of Clearthinker in my Comment #156269.
however glad you liked the post!

792. Richard Dawkins: 'Growth in creationist beliefs a problem for schools'

Comment #156283 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 8:30 am

It is a deeply troubling problem. Here in the US we think that the respect for religion, that is we will not infringe means that you can just say whatever you want and be unchallenged in all areas of your daily life.

In one of my education classes we got into this discussion of evolution and creationism and how it is handled in Science classes. There is a notion that I have to respect beliefs simply because they are important to people.
Eh-eh. Wrong. There all kinds of beliefs that are important and comforting to people but that doesn't make them off limits! I noted that the ideals of National Socialism were quite important to Nazis but I don't think any one would hesitate to deal harshley with Nazi notions of morality.

At some point simply believing something "important" made it almost impossible to critique, or to improve. Certainly derision was out of the question unless you'd like to be called a bigot. This attitude is probably one of huge parts of the wedge.

793. Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov tries suicide after realising he was wrong about doomsday

Comment #156269 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 8:09 am

Well I am pissed! No one thought it important to respond to my deeply profound Star Wars morality comment. That is it I am never coming back to this site again.
Later I will post a huge summary of this post and the website. It will be condescending and hurt in tone and will clamor for equal time.
Also after saying I will never come back I will lurk and occasionally explode at callous treatment of my intellectual fruits.
I say.....
GOOD DAY.

794. Fleabytes

Comment #156159 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 1:19 am

Night all. Tired. Tired. More fun tomorrow.
Steve we will continue the tag team work then.

795. Pastor attacks scientist's talk

Comment #156156 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 1:12 am

"My atheist friend said she was disappointed that RD wasn't that great a speaker."

Interesting. I'm a fan of RD's books, but I think he is one of the better presenters of an idea than almost anyone I know. Having listened to him speak on a number of occasions I have listend to him he manages to be the most original each time out. I like Hitch and Sam about equally. Dennett seems oftent the hardest of the four to follow.

I understand personal taste comes into the court of things. But it is strange that you are always using the most strange ways to give RD the metaphorical, a literary backhand.

796. Fleabytes

Comment #156152 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 12:59 am

Steve!
The Selfish Gene was entirely about the evolution of altruism and the longstanding problem of it in evolution. As much it is about the solutions of Hamilton and Trivers to the problem and Williams too.
What is amazing has been what we have learned about the fallout of this tension, especially in social animals like ourselves between the contingent strategies of selfish and selfless.

Clearthinker,
I underrstand you are through with this thread, but I am going to suggest an answer to the morality question.

Its not my own I first heard it from Steven Pinker and it may not have been his. I suggest that all we need is a common human nature, knowledge of what causes suffering to that nature and empathy and you have the basis for a universal human morality. Add the understanding that people don't fully get to choose their own fate. Thus you would try to set up the society as if you were coming back and placed somewhere randomly in your country. How do you do your best to equalize rights and opportunity without reduceing freedoms.
Anyway, that is a start.

797. Fleabytes

Comment #156148 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 12:45 am

Clearthinker here you become guilty of what you claim we are all guilty of, namely talking with authority about areas far outside our own.

You say in tone rich with condescension:

I love this. What fantastic proof of the fantasy world that some atheist live in. Disney and Dawkins get it together. The Golden Rule is 'do unto others as you would have them do to you. And this is found all over the animal kingdom. So the next time a seal takes a bite out of a salmon, a lion attacks a young deer, or a bird swipes up a worm - I must think this is the Golden Rule at work! Hilarious stuff!

What you obviously don't realize is anything about the study of animal behavior or the pressures the drive it evolution. Not every interaction in the natural world is driven by organismal selfishness. There are are circumstaces where altruism and behavior that at least looks selfless can arise.
The concept that Disney has of nature and the one Dawkins has couldn't possibly be more different. But thank you for the eloquent example of your ignorance of the subject. It has been enlightening.

798. Fleabytes

Comment #156144 by MaxD on April 7, 2008 at 12:36 am

Clearthinker.
You said.

Unfortunately for the rd.net poster - my publisher saw the quotes themselves, as did many others. I kept a record of them (date and time etc) and still have them. The reason they do not appear on RD.net now is that they, together with over 300 posts, were removed. One assumes that rd.net knows this. At best this is an example of ignorance being used to accuse someone of lying - at worst it is just simply falsehood.

I thought that Paula had gone over this with you before about the three hundred posts. There is yet another explanation that you haven't entertained-simple error. Networks, computers etc are all subject them.
I of course don't know the details but that seems like it should be on the list you gave too.

I'm not sure why you would think that anything you have said would be so damaging or edifice crumbling that anyone would take it down. In fact in the spirit of what this website stands for it would have to stay up.

I realize you think you have crafted the ultimatel rebuttal to TGD but in fact you haven't. But your plucky insistance that you have is endearing.

799. Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov tries suicide after realising he was wrong about doomsday

Comment #156126 by MaxD on April 6, 2008 at 11:17 pm

Steve Zara,
In response to your old post about feeling bad for the Storm Troopers...
When I thought they were an all volunteer force, I felt not a bit of sympathy for them. I didn't believe in their cause. I mean can you really work for a fellow like Darth Vader, or Grand Admiral Tarkin and think you are on the right side?

However the Clone trooper plight seems terrible. As does the Jedi's when you think about it. The whole morality of the episodes 4-6 is very simple. Well fairly simple. Obi-Wan and Yoda lie their asses off to Luke with their post-modernist claptrap and it nearly gets Luke killed. But you have an order of Light that essentially pull a Scientology on young kids that show talent. Do they ever see their parents again? Then look at the Clones they are manufactured to do nothing but fight for a system they have no stake in, and under direct orders of a tyrant.

Okay that was too much geekyness.
I will stop.

800. Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov tries suicide after realising he was wrong about doomsday

Comment #156119 by MaxD on April 6, 2008 at 8:37 pm

Dr. Benway,
Alot of our regulars got a bit disgusted, deeply offended by the gallows/dark humor. Some of the offense taking came from corners I'd not have predicted.
Also, I am hearing Baeolophus bicolor in crazy song mode here in my neck of the woods.