Crocefisso

The claim that religion propagates ignorance does not need to be backed up with any evidence so long as it is made clear that the potential is latent and therefore not necessarily present in every instance that there is religion operating within a community (though historically religion has tended to do so anyway). (Might have been said already, I got bored reading the line of discussion).

:o Look at Duff with his 344 posts - I swear he only used these forums for about 6 months!

This is exciting news indeed.

Music is not so mathematical that it should make any difference. It's not like I'm trying to compare the shape of bananas and pears - the point that, in my mind, Carreras is a better singer than Bieber is not affected by the fact he does not make teen pop.

The guy is actually talented too, that's the sad part. I think that's pushing it. A good performer he may be, but he is certainly no musician (I say this as someone who doesn't post hate about him). Clearly you've never heard him sing without auto-tune then. He actually has a pretty good voice. [spoiler=Bieber w/out autotune] In my view, that is not a singing voice. This is a singing voice: [spoiler=A better singer w/out autotune]

The guy is actually talented too, that's the sad part. I think that's pushing it. A good performer he may be, but he is certainly no musician (I say this as someone who doesn't post hate about him).

Am I right in thinking the Democrats are sad because Lugar's replacement is in effect a Tea Partier (and by extension both highly partisan and politically mad)?

I'm afraid I don't see it, really. Like someone else said, it's more that they're generic looking lizard creatures than anything else.

These 2 parts of a post should not have been combined into one. I agree with Gabe. It was an almost macabre post.

Just as an interesting aside, if you read the Kojiki (perhaps you have) you will see that when Izanagi and Izanami try to create deities of the aspects of nature, the latter's genitals are burned giving birth to the fire deity and she falls ill, and from her vomit, faeces and urine, some thirty or so deities are created. :blink: Probably the strangest creation story I've ever come across.

Sadly, I have to agree with the above assessments. In America these days (among older and less educated people especially), progress and open mindedness are dirty words.

^ Surely the larger proportion of the band's income is from record sales?

I can see many years of happiness in his future. I can see him and his future wife on Jeremy Kyle in a few years. Is that equivalent of like, Dr. Phil? I think it's similar, but I've never seen the show you're talking about. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Jeremy_Kyle_Show

This was exciting news until I found out what it actually was. <_< Can we assume work on TES VI is going to be put on hold now?

I can see many years of happiness in his future. I can see him and his future wife on Jeremy Kyle in a few years.

The nature of all debate is to dissect the views of others. The only thing that ever makes it unpleasant is if people cannot handle this being done to them once they've got involved, and they become upset. I think the only examples of harshness I ever see on this forum are in Tip.It Times threads - other than that, debate is only personal if one choose to take it as such.

I'm not familiar with the Catholic bible, so could you explain the "4 different gospels that also contradict themselves?" The Gospels are the same (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John) because there is only Bible. Jona is referring to the fact that the 4 gospels offer contradictory accounts of Jesus' life and deeds and so on, owing to the fact they were composed by different authors across some decades (I forget how many) and with what I presume were different sources.

^ I absolutely agree that fundamentalist Christians are stupid in their interpretation, I was just being slightly pedantic in pointing out that fundamentalists, for all their absence of common sense, are just doing what their holy book of choice says.

Though I agree with this, all marketing is like this to some extent, and it's best just to switch off to it.

Fundamentalists misconstrue the teachings of a religion. This is not the fault of the religion. A thing doesn't become bad in itself because it is often abused. As such, religion isn't bad just because fundamentalists are stupid. This is very debateable indeed. For the most part, fundamentalists often stick the bare essentials of a religion with as little interpretation as possible (hence the 'fundamental' part). I would argue they are, in religions such as Islam, more true to their religion than the apologists, whose adherence to scripture (in the Abrahamic religions I know a little of) tends to change with the times. Extremists that go above and beyond that which is written in their religion, on the other hand, such as the Spanish Inquisition, are not fundamentalist but merely extremist (or so I think).

When you're putting traits as labels onto the average person who holds faith - it wasn't clear at the time he was talking about creationists/extremists and I personally don't feel that continually going back to these psycho-fringe groups progresses any mature discussion on the matter - that do not accurately represent that group, and continue to do so, I think they do. In what way is Powerfrog stating something religion based is amusing to him immature? :rolleyes: This is a God based discussion and, being able to relate to his post, it made me smile at the thought of the people he was referencing. The post was perfectly clear to me: there was nothing about labelling entire groups in the post - in the context, it is obvious he used 'so many' as a relative term to the absurdity of the belief - and the post had no relation to the average person who holds faith (again, I say this as a person who holds faith). Better adjectives would have been 'amusing' and 'relevant'. I am sure that you would act within the spirit of those scriptures, which is the point I was trying to make, so yes I think you would. The point you made, however, was that nobody of any faith would assume human superiority over other creatures, implying a knowledge of all the scriptures. :unsure: The last clause confuses me - you think I would act within the spirit of the scriptures, I presume, but that still doesn't address how you know the teachings of the Shobogenzo and can make blanket statements.

That's really not what most religious people think at all - not those who are true to the teachings and aware of their respective scriptures. That viewpoint seems every bit as arrogant as the vilified theists this topic is portraying. so many =/= most. Besides. It's in the bible. Not sure what you mean by true to the teachings. As for the "somany != most thing" I don't know what you mean to point out. Every group has their extremists. If we're basing our views only on the extremists, then this isn't a discussion worth having. As such, I don't think it's right in the least to take such an arrogant/flippant position in such a strong, difficult discussion. Powerfrog was pointing out that he wrote "so many people do x" and you responded "most people do not do x", and by writing "so many =/= most" he was indicating this. As adjectives go, 'arrogant' and 'flippant' are certainly not the right ones in this situation. And yes, the attitude that Powerfrog highlighted still persists among many, not most, creationists that I have come across. Saying that people would not hold such a view if they were aware of their "respective scriptures" implies knowledge of all the scriptures ever. For example, I am a Soto Zen Buddhist, and the main scripture in my life is the Shobogenzo - are you sure such a view is not expressed there?

^ This is true to some extent, though I agree with another poster who stated that the ultimate burden of evidence lies with theists. The original conjecture, if you will, is that God exists, and until that has been proven any atheist need only point out that God is unproven to disbelieve in him. Only strong atheistic claims such as "God can not exist under any circumstances ever" need be proven.

I absolutely agree. I wrote an article on this here and was completely dismissed. Good to see someone else shares my view. I think what people mean to say when they say that 'x will cause the end' is that x will hasten the end.

Quite a nice, unique song. It's definitely going on spotify. Some sections sounded a bit awful, but for the most part I liked it. 7/10 Just had a visit from my maternal grandmother, introduced me to this wonderful/hilarious song.