Playing the Indian Card

Saturday, February 10, 2007

Oh, What the Heck

The conversation with Jeff Hamsen in the comments is getting pretty repetitious, so I wasn't going to continue to feature it. But what the heck, I figure there are at least a few new assertions in his latest worth refuting. Anyway, I've got the flu, and I'm not up to much more today.

JH:
Re numbers: No matter how you try to twist it, Math is not divine. Math is obsevable. The supernatural is not. Billions of photos and videos, not a single verifiable glimps of a ghost, a god, or anything of the like.

SR:
No, numbers are not directly observable: you cannot see a two, only two objects, or the symbol we use to express the concept ("2"). And you cannot see a perfectly equilateral triangle, because there is no such thing in nature.

They are “supernatural” [sic] in the same way God is: largely visible from their effects.

Nor have you ever seen a photograph of love, hate, anger, happiness, or any given idea. Only their effects or symbols to represent them. Also "supernatural." Therefore, they do not exist?

JH:
Because no number is hidden does not mean it is possible to know all numbers. No matter how much focus is placed on numbers, it is still impossible to know them all.

SR:
But this is true merely by definition, because there is no “all” to an infinite set.

JH:
Exasperated to humor you here, I point out that if you punch someone Steve, it does not mean you can strike an infinity of people.

SR:
Of course not. But you would have to strike the same person constantly or lose the power to do so, by your argument.

JH:
Being dispossessed by religion is the opposite of being born again. In the former, one awakens from the delusions of religion, while in the latter, one falls under religion's delusional spell.

SR:
That’s what all fundamentalists say.

JH:
The Pope's exact apology was for "remaining silent during the Holocaust." Thus, he was speaking for his over-all institution (of course not all Catholics turned their backs on the Jews, but over all, as an institution, they did).

SR:
The Pope’s full statement is available online.

I don’t think your characterization here sounds as though it is even referring to the same document.

JH:
Re the evolution of religion: Man can be greedy. After a while, animal spirits did not satisfy his lust for power, …

SR:
Why is it, Jeff, that, as here, humanism always seems to involve a distain or dislike for humans?

1 comment:

Jeff Harmsen said...

Sorry to hear you're under the weather. Hope you recover soon.

Can't see numbers? Put a couple apples on the table and look at them. Two apples, Steve. Numbers are a classification sytem with predictive powers. Put two more apples on the table and I bet you can figure out what the total will be.

Saying that God is visible from his effects is arguing from a false antecedent (I.e that a god exists in the first place.)

Why this antecedent is false: 1) Historical evidence. (See previous comments, i.e Totism was the first religion).

Another example: Rabbi Joshua, who became known as Jesus Christ after many biblical translations, embelishments and falsifcatations of history, was not recognized as the son of God while he was alive.

Another Rabbi, Saul, who later became know as St Paul, felt guilty for stoning Chrisians to death, freaked out and came up with the idea Joshua was the son of God. (Saul never even met the Massiah and imposed his divinity view onto the backwater clan of fishermen who began Christianity following the crusifix.)

This is but one of a myriad of examples of how mythical stories were concocted for the bible.

2) Then there's scientific proof. If people believe in something as ridiculous as Genesis, they are apt to believe anything, like that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, or that a nuclear war will spur on the second coming.

Third proof of no God: Endless irrefutable arguments of logic. For example, imagine asking serial killers, "If you were a god, what would you have done about hurricane Katrina?" No doubt many would answer they would have diverted the storm from hitting New Orleans, or evacuated the people before it hit, etc.

This means that some serial killers are more humane than God! Because if there was a god he let the disaster happen!

Serial killers more humane than God? How can this be? It's because there is no God to begin with. And don't insult your own intelligence with meaningless brainwashing talk, such as "God works in mysterious ways."

Re: Photos of concepts such as love: there are plenty. When a parent hugs their child, that's an expression of brain chemicals that have evolved into human beings. You can see these chemicals in a microscope. People with certain brain damage can no longer express certain emotions such as love. The supernatural is superflous when explaining HUMAN emotions such as love.

I have read the Pope's apology. His exact words were "the Christian's lack of discernmet." What part of this apology confuses you? In essence, Christians turned their backs on the very people responsible for Christianity (I.e Jesus was a Jew, Mary was a Jew, St. Paul was Jew, well, you get the hypocricy here).

My distain of humanity? Steve, sometimes you argue well, other times you seem like a callow oaf. The whole point of humanism is to place the well being of fellow humans first, as opposed to religion, which places a god first, which has led, and continues to lead, to war and terrorism.

In a manifest of peace, Einsteit might have said it best: "Remeber your humanity; forget the rest."

Religion is antidemocratic and antihumanistic because it causes the superiority complex of a god delusion to fester into acts of superstitious atrocity. Think of this the next time you pretend to drink blood.

Yours in peace,
Jeff