insane

If shallowness is such a problem, I think you'd be better off creating restrictions on advertising rather than on games. Whether shallowness should be "prevented" or not is totally a matter of morals, it's hardly dangerous as such. Still, I'd be willing to accept that games create shallowness the day when there's not at least 3 semi-nude models per commercial break on television. Agreed. Wow, that's a first :lol:

He doesn't deserve to live, nobody has to deserve the right to live. You just have a right to live and nobody can take that away from you IMO. But who knows what kind of information you could've got out of this man? And also, I'm trying to point out that it isn't good if everybody starts taking 'justice' in their own hands. I'm sorry, but you weren't *in* the situation. You can't say that the police didn't make the right choice because honestly, in their position of authority, almost any disputable choice they make, will be considered right in the eyes of the people. I see your point of viewing life as valuable, but given the situation, alot more lives would've been lost had he not been shot (again, you weren't in the situation, so you actually *can't* say he couldn't have detonated).

That's part of the problem though. It's not just pixels anymore. The line between reality and computer-generated images is becoming increasingly blurred. I mean, look at where we were with computer game graphics 10 years ago. Think of where we'll be 10 years from now. Although, there is the possibility that we could hit a wall soon, and what we have now is as good as we'll get for a long while.. Would watching a movie containing violence and sex harm those under 18 years of age any more than a pixel-y game would? It doesn't really matter how advanced the graphics get, it still won't be real. It'll always be just a bunch of pixels. It depends on what you'd call "harming" a child. Looking at women as sexual objects instead of people creates shallowness. Shallowness is often what women hate about men, and I'm positive games like this do not help this matter.

Okay, for everyone that thinks going to hell is unfair: I believe it is the heart behind the choice - saying no to God is saying "I can do life on my own" - the whole message of Christianity is "I can't do life on my own, I need God" - and this independent attitude of doing life without God is what God so strongly dislikes, or hates, if you will. All of this "It's my life, I can do what I want, worship what I want, believe what I want", I believe is coming from a selfish and flawed mindset - if God exists (which is what this topic assumes), then it's not *your* life - God is creator, and you belong to Him whether you like it or not. And just like aerodynamics can be applied incorrectly, so can free will, so can Christianity. Just like there are bad Christians, there are bad choices, we can freely choose not God, and it's a bad choice, IMO. So if you dislike God, you do not choose Him - that is what the definition of "hell" is... seperation from God - so you're getting exactly what you want, if you choose *not* God during your life on earth - you're choosing *not* God for after - all of this physical pain and suffering is located in the book of Revelation and that is most likely the most symbolic book in the Bible - and even if there is pain and suffering, it will not compare to the non-presence of God - which will be of more pain - after all, mind over matter, n'est pas? So I don't see it fair for atheists who think they should be able to choose *not* God - and then find it unfair when that's what they get afterwards - to expect God to put them in heaven (which by defintion, is the presence of God - the very thing an atheist would abhorr), seems ludicrous to me.

Hi! I'm still around ^_^ wanna readd insane o? :P Oh, and mysticsmagic was the first diamond amulet crafter ;)

Heh, Nietzsche went insane ^_^. Not that it's relevant to the work he wrote when he was sane, but, what if he was insane the whole time? :o dun dun dun... [/ridiculous conspiracy theory] I'm interested on your views on origins. Because it is clear that something has to have always existed (Laws of conservation) - and if something has always existed - wouldn't it's entropy be infinite by now? Why aren't we all completely "inanimate rubble" if entropy has had an eternity to maximize itself?

NOTE: I got this from Hohto's picture site. The picture belongs to him. The old server status page :P listed who was online, for how long they were online for that session, and for how long they've been online collectively. Also, note 'speedis' at the top right of the page ;) .org anyone? :P

Crazy stuff! Have fun ^_^ ^_^ ^_^ ^_^

This just isn't going too well now is it?

I'm sorry but it's irrelevant. He asked us to pray. Don't undermine it by unnessecarily posting that you won't. It's being unsupportive, whether or not prayer is the biggest joke on the planet. And just for the record - for that article, just because people prayed, does not mean God will heal. As far as I'm concerned, we're to pray God's will for a situation - and that we will see the big picture, that He will help us through it, etc. God is *not* one to be commanded. Though He does heal (I've experienced it in my peer's lives) miraculously, it's not something you just ask for and get. So the article is also, irrelevant to prayer's "effectiveness". Again, I was never talking about the well-wishing, I was talking about the "I won't pray" comments.

Millions suffering is irrelevant to God's existence, sorry (even though you didn't outright state it, I have a pretty good feeling this is one of the reasons you don't believe). And if you're saying that it would be more loving to let people never have existed than lived a sufferable existence on Earth... then that is incredibly speculative (there's no way to know that not existing is better than a sufferable existence - seeing as everybody here has not always been non-existent).

Alot of people here say that we do a good job :) and that's appreciated here, but if you'd compare the number of topics complaining about the mods here, to the number of topics complimenting the mods... actually wait, let's do one better ;) Multiply the number of moderator complimenting topics to the number of "thank-you's" a mod/admin gets in their private message box per week, and then compare that to the complaints topic... etc... etc... I'm sure you get the idea :P

Sorry, I came across the wrong way - I wasn't trying to condemn others posting here, I was just angry at everyone saying "I won't pray", when it wasn't necessary to say so.

Other people have said they won't pray because they're atheist, i fail to see the difference here. If he wants to wish him well, i don't see why you should feel inclined to jump on him for it. That being said, i'm an atheist too but i do wish your brother well. Well I don't think he's excluding the atheists - I think this post was singled out because he said that praying wouldn't do anything. Instead of being a neutrality and simply refusing to pray, he went one step further and said that anyone here that said they would pray were doing something completely worthless. But I don't think any of the posts are necessary or nice, even. The author is asking people to pray for his brother. And more often then not, people say "I won't pray". This is not supportive, in the context of his request. He's not asking for your *verbal* (or textual :P) support. He's asking for *spiritual* support. And if you don't believe in that, that's fine, but don't bring it here and kill his request.

Children learn 10x more in their first 10 years of life than in the rest of it put together, they will become the adult they were raised like as a child. Telling kids not to do it doesn't work. You're just working in a perfect situation, but in your way there would be no racism already. Telling someone it hurts others feelings is no where near as effective as showing them how badly it hurts. If you accept that children are '10x' as impressionable, surely they are also much easier to hurt mentally as well, why should we subject them to such a slapdash experiment by this woman, who by the way now exploits money from copycats at seminars and workshops. Okay, ends *don't* justify means cjlh. Just because they learned a good lesson doesn't justify the way they learned it. I could "teach" you that murder was wrong by murdering your sibling, but even though you "learned" a lesson, doesn't make it right! (this is a far fetched example, but it's a parellel) However, whether or not these children were permanently affected by this is completely unproveable so please keep the unbased assumptions to yourself higothrekk.

Yet you are still here. Here's the door.

You make it sound like satanists are the only people that kill for religion. Have you not been reading the news lately? Even scrapping the latest developments with holy wars (Palestinians, 9/11, Hollocaust), you've only got to think back to Roman times to see another example of people killing for their god. Also - people killing in the name of religion says nothing to the religion itself. It's simply (in most cases) a bad application of a beautiful principle.

'tis a pity some of the replies weren't so lighthearted or fun. This was left open all day and was only locked when people started to get really nasty. The mod who locked that started a new thread for discussion on the bombings soon after, as they knew it was a subject that needed to be discussed. The standard I was given is to lock topics bumped after a month. Overruling that for any reason I believe is disrespectful to the administrator that gave me the guideline, and if I took matters into my own hands - it would make me look power hungry or giving leeway to certain topics I like... I find as a moderator I need to be completely objective to do the best job. Subjection only brings complaints and leaves room for blame.

*shrugs*

This coming from a blink fan?... :|

One more offtopic and irrelevant post about spelling and/or grammar, and this topic gets locked; unfortunately. I think that two entire pages devoted to an irrelevant discussion such as this is quite enough.

Or, there is considerable other evidence already around, that a find of that kind is not a very long stretch at all from what is currently known... as opposed to that which was written, many years ago... by... someone. Ironically I find that science and/or philosophy can prove a creator, in a very simple way. We are here. Since something cannot come from nothing, something has always existed. I find it ludicrous to believe that some energy has just always existed, it violates therodynamic laws and pure logic. However a God by definition would transcend our thinking and science (it is rather convenient I understand), and would make alot more sense to have always existed than this "matter" that somehow transcended thermodynamic laws. Therefore since we are here, there must be a creator. I don't really have time to go indepth to the thermodynamics but maybe after a little vaca. up north if this topic is still active I'll go more indepth. As for what you believe God to believe Grin (and I don't particularily think that your view of the "Christian" God to be exactly Biblical, unless this isn't the Christian God you were talking about), that's personal and irrlevant to this discussion. Of course, making God out to be a complete and utter jerk really makes it seem alot more unlikely that he exists than if you made him out to look alot better - that's compeltely illogical, but I wouldn't be surprised if alot of the posters buy into it. So I guess if it works, why not?

Where is the Christian God being bashed? I sure haven't seen it. Way to go, you just described not only half of the Athiests in the world, but you have also described half of the Christians. If you would open you eyes and quit being so narrow-minded like most people of the Christian faith are, you would realize that almost none of the so-called Christians in this world have any idea what they are talking about either. If you were sitting in church and you started up a serious conversation about people and their religion and why they choose to worship Him over anything else or nothing at all, most would not be able to answer your questions. I am an atheist, and I could probably cite more bible verses and tell more stories then most Christians in this world. Please quit ignorantly bashing Athiests as well. It is their choice what they choose to believe in, even if that is nothing at all. if you have read it you probably have more knowledge about it then half of the pro-christain debaters in this forum, too. I consider God being "bashed" when people say negative things about Him which are not true. Just because alot of Christians don't know what they're talking about, doesn't mean that I shouldn't point out the same trait of another group. Two wrongs don't make a right, and assuming that I'm one of the ignorant Christians isn't right either. I was making my post based on my experience with atheists in this forum. If you've read my posts I hope you'll see that I'm not completely ignorant :) And I'm not ignorantly bashing atheists; I was simply asking them to stop making insults from ignorance, it may have been a little harsh, but that's because in the past being less harsh has done nothing for the debating. And I've read most of the Bible, I'm working my way through it, I'm probably 95% complete :)

Actually you don't know much about fossils do you here is a page about it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fossilisation or check out any other site about it. Much like the document says it is rare because you need specific environments for fossilisation to occur. But there still seems to be many more discoveries of "normal" species rather than linking species. Also - read the link I posted about the fake fossil - why was everybody so quick to buy into it? I believe it makes sense that they were so desperate for a fossil to prove evolution that they blindly believed...

Eric, you asked me why God didn't create us to do only right... so I explained why God did create us without that ability. Obviously I'm going to go to an authority on what God desires of us - the Bible. What would you rather I use? A chemistry textbook?