Re: On Godliness

[Charlie Bell]

On 26/02/2008, at 2:54 PM, Doug Pensinger wrote:
>
>
> So how would you define your atheism?

You phrase it like it's a belief. It's not. I spent a long time  
exploring my Christianity, and in the end found it empty. So I stopped  
believing.

I do not believe in gods, ghosts, telepathy, bigfoot, bunyips or the  
loch ness monster. I think it likely on balance of evidence that all  
gods are human constructs (why else do they all act so much like  
people...).

Maybe there's a creator or supreme being, but if there is it's truly  
beyond the petty super-humans of our myths. It makes no difference to  
me, anyway.
>
>
>>
>> Just 'cause one can imagine something, it doesn't mean it's actually
>> true, or indeed mean it isn't. There's a little thing called data. If
>> we get some that shows that there may actually be transcendental  
>> races
>> of "Old Ones" or whatever, then fantastic. Until then, it's fantasy,
>> sci-fi, or wishful thinking.
>>
>
> But then where would we be if we had _no_ imagination?

Sitting in caves. Or possibly trees.

Charlie.

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Re: On Godliness

[Charlie Bell]

On 26/02/2008, at 2:32 PM, Doug Pensinger wrote:

> Charlie wrote:
>
>>
>> Well, we are going to be unique in the universe. Evolution isn't  
>> going
>> to follow the same path twice (if snowflakes are all unique, then
>> intelligent life, which is much rarer, will be unique to a greater
>> degree...) However, most atheists I know who have any sort of science
>> education reckon it's probable that there are many inhabited worlds  
>> in
>> the universe.
>>
>
> I meant unique as in the only instance of intelligent life.

I know that's what you meant. And I know of no non-religious person  
who expounds that view. I was explaining both why you were both right  
and very wrong at the same time.

The only people I've ever heard express the view that we must be  
unique were creationists (who also happened to be geocentrists, ie  
totally deluded...).

Charlie.



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Re: CNN Breaking News

[Charlie Bell]

On 26/02/2008, at 11:31 AM, Dave Land wrote:
>
> I think it was also because some significant chunks of very new, very
> secret technology might have survived reentry and potentially gotten
> into the wrong hands.

I say this already. Noone listen to me.

Charlie.
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Re: Godliness

[Doug Pensinger]

Jon  wrote:

>
> I prefer a mundane god, myself, or perhaps a species evolving to the
> point of singularity and modifying its own genetic structure to self
> uplift in order to become transcendent.
> Jon M.
>
>
Just a stranger on the Bus?

Doug
'cept the Pope maybe in Rome, maru
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Re: On Godliness

[Doug Pensinger]

Warren wrote:


>
>
> Thus, under LDS doctrine, if you remain righteous and are
> "sealed" (married in a temple) to a spouse, when you and your spouse
> ascend to the highest plane of heaven, you will be given your own
> world to populate with your own spirit children born into mortal bodies.
>

Yikes.


> Presumably, therefore, god and his wife came into this planet via a
> similar means. The reason, BTW, that you and I and the rest of us
> don't remember being spirit children and living in heaven before
> coming to Earth is we pass through a "veil of forgetfulness", which
> prevents our having absolute knowledge -- which would interfere with
> our free agency. Life on Earth is a kind of test, and you have the
> possibility to screw up (sin), though under LDS doctrine it's pretty
> hard, at least, to get yourself thrown into hell. God is cast as
> considerably more forgiving and tolerant than you typically find in
> ultra-right-wing systems. (Though he's still quite anti-gay. You can't
> be a "practicing" homosexual* in the LDS faith.)


Or African American up until a few decades ago, eh?

* Expert homosexuals, on the other hand, are welcome.
>

Those that don't need any practice, I take it.

Doug
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Re: On Godliness

[Doug Pensinger]

Dan  wrote:
>
>
> Well, I think that type of god would be a very poor excuse for God. It
> reduces God to the mundane, and removes the transcendental nature of God.


Only to those that  reach  God's level of knowledge, eh?

>
> I think the question and the comments made within this thread of whatever
> there is needing to part of the universe assume a connection between
> understanding the universe and understanding what things are really like
> apart from us that the evidence is tending against.


Huh? Needing to part of the universe?

>
> One reference that I find useful in considering this is:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interpretation_of_quantum_mechanics
>
> which includes a partial table of QM interpretations.  Reading through
> these
> various interpretations of QM and you get a wide variety of descriptions
> of
> reality.  I can add a few more descriptions that would also be consistent
> with QM.
>
> This is not to say there have been no advancements in the understanding in
> the foundation of QM.  There have been, including the work on decoherence
> that offers some hope of a QM theory of QM measurement (works OK as a toy
> model, but hasn't gone much furtherbut that's still not a bad thing).
>
> However, with all of these advances, the QM "weirdness" has not been
> eliminated, it's just been pushed to another corner.  In the sciam website
> there was a discussion of a potential experimental test at the Plank limit
> that might be able to turn at least some interpretations into theories.
> But, further reading on this subject indicates that the same sorta thing
> that happens with decoherence will also happen here.the fundamental
> interpretation problem is not solved by turning the interpretation into
> theoriesrather the interpretation problem is merely stated in a new
> way.
>
> So, given this state of the mundane, I hope you can see why I do not
> believe
> in a God rooted in the mundane.


So what are you saying Dan?  We're at the end of knowledge?  There must be a
god because we're not smart enough?

Imagine if you will, human beings with bio-computational implants that not
only give them the memory and computational power of todays supercomputers,
but the ability to network with others that have the same implants.

Then try to imagine that that's just the very beginning.

Doug
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Re: On Godliness

[Warren Ockrassa]

On Feb 25, 2008, at 9:03 PM, Doug Pensinger wrote:

> Warren  wrote:
>> There's one god for Earth. Other planets each have their own gods.
>>
>> (That's not facetious; it's LDS doctrine.)
>
> Inhabited planets?  Do they the gods get the planets when they're
> undeveloped and tend them like gardens?  How are they dolled out?

Well, see, it's like this.

God has a wife, and he and she engage in a kind of spiritual  
reproductive process which causes the birth of spirit children. These  
spirit children are born into mortal bodies and live out their lives  
on their god-parents' world. When they die, assuming they've kept in  
alignment with the deific rules, they will be reunited with their  
terrestrial spouses, whereupon they will be given their own planets.  
They'll then engage in the same cycle.

Thus, under LDS doctrine, if you remain righteous and are  
"sealed" (married in a temple) to a spouse, when you and your spouse  
ascend to the highest plane of heaven, you will be given your own  
world to populate with your own spirit children born into mortal bodies.

Presumably, therefore, god and his wife came into this planet via a  
similar means. The reason, BTW, that you and I and the rest of us  
don't remember being spirit children and living in heaven before  
coming to Earth is we pass through a "veil of forgetfulness", which  
prevents our having absolute knowledge -- which would interfere with  
our free agency. Life on Earth is a kind of test, and you have the  
possibility to screw up (sin), though under LDS doctrine it's pretty  
hard, at least, to get yourself thrown into hell. God is cast as  
considerably more forgiving and tolerant than you typically find in  
ultra-right-wing systems. (Though he's still quite anti-gay. You can't  
be a "practicing" homosexual* in the LDS faith.)



* Expert homosexuals, on the other hand, are welcome.

--
Warren Ockrassa
Blog  | http://indigestible.nightwares.com/
Books | http://books.nightwares.com/
Web   | http://www.nightwares.com/

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Re: On Godliness

[Dave Land]

On Feb 25, 2008, at 8:03 PM, Doug Pensinger wrote:

> Warren  wrote:
>>
>> There's one god for Earth. Other planets each have their own gods.
>>
>> (That's not facetious; it's LDS doctrine.)
>
> Inhabited planets?  Do they the gods get the planets when they're
> undeveloped and tend them like gardens?  How are they dolled out?

When I was being evangelized (is the that the word I want?) by my
Mormon then-girlfriend and her LDS Brothers, I wondered about things
like this. As I recall, mentioning the "As man is, God was, as God
is, man may become" doctrine was considered bad form: I think some
Christians used it as a bit of a cudgel to berate Mormons for their
beliefs.

Do any of the LDS folks on the list know if this is still the case:
Is this something that was supposed to be kept within the Church, or
is it general knowledge that Mormons have this doctrine?

It does beg the question of whether there are GODs above all these
men-become-Gods who make the assignments. Then again, perhaps by
the time you've become a God, you have the power to do what our local
God is reported to have done and you simply will your personal planet
into existence.

> Pluto!  WTF am I supposed to do with that frozen PoS! Maru

God1: For my sake, this isn't even a planet! What kind of God to you
take me for?

God2: If that's the best planet you can speak into being, not much of
one. Behold my lovely Saturn: with RINGs, even!
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Re: On Godliness

[Doug Pensinger]

Warren  wrote:
>
>
> There's one god for Earth. Other planets each have their own gods.
>
> (That's not facetious; it's LDS doctrine.)
>

Inhabited planets?  Do they the gods get the planets when they're
undeveloped and tend them like gardens?  How are they dolled out?

Doug
Pluto!  WTF am I supposed to do with that frozen PoS! Maru
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Re: On Godliness

[Doug Pensinger]

Charlie  wrote:

>
> Of course I consider the possibility. In fact, given the size of the
> universe, I'd be surprised if there weren't some sort of
> transcendental or sublimed beings of mind or something.
>
> But that's a fair cry from saying that there's a being above and
> outside the universe that created the universe and meddles with our
> existence in a personal yet undetectable way, or indeed that any of
> Terra's religions are in anyway connected to such a being (whether
> supernatural or just really old).


So how would you define your atheism?

>
> Just 'cause one can imagine something, it doesn't mean it's actually
> true, or indeed mean it isn't. There's a little thing called data. If
> we get some that shows that there may actually be transcendental races
> of "Old Ones" or whatever, then fantastic. Until then, it's fantasy,
> sci-fi, or wishful thinking.
>

But then where would we be if we had _no_ imagination?

Doug
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Re: On Godliness

[Doug Pensinger]

 Max wrote:

> I wrote:
> > Sheesh,  we can't even remember lessons learned from a  war a few
> decades
> > ago and we're going to perfect godhood? 8^)
>
> Certainly we don't seem quite up to the challenge at the moment, but if
> Kurzweil's tracking for the upcoming singularity is correct we may have
> to sink or swim sooner than we think...


Well let's hope they don't put Republicans in charge of passing out life
jackets.


> (At GDC Kurzweil apparently
> said that those that can live to 2015 may probably live "forever", I
> only wish I had been there to see his charts...)


Have you read any of his books?  They look to be very interesting.

Doug
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Godliness

[jon louis mann]

Well, I think that type of god would be a very poor excuse for God. It
reduces God to the mundane, and removes the transcendental nature of
God.  
Dan M. 

I prefer a mundane god, myself, or perhaps a species evolving to the
point of singularity and modifying its own genetic structure to self
uplift in order to become transcendent.
Jon M. 



  

Never miss a thing.  Make Yahoo your home page. 
http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs
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Re: On Godliness

[Doug Pensinger]

Charlie wrote:

>
> Well, we are going to be unique in the universe. Evolution isn't going
> to follow the same path twice (if snowflakes are all unique, then
> intelligent life, which is much rarer, will be unique to a greater
> degree...) However, most atheists I know who have any sort of science
> education reckon it's probable that there are many inhabited worlds in
> the universe.
>

I meant unique as in the only instance of intelligent life.

Doug
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Godliness

[jon louis mann]

Yes, but those wouldn't be "god" as defined by the world's major
deistic systems -- i.e., they would not have created the universe and 
everything in it.

I'd be quite surprised if we lived in an otherwise sterile universe, 
actually; and given the age of the cosmos positing an ultra-advanced
godlike civilization is no more mad than positing a civilization that
hasn't yet got out of its equivalent of the bronze age. But those
advanced civilizations still don't qualify as the gods of the old
testament, the Koran or the Vedas.
--
Warren Ockrassa

i would also question whether such godlike beings would even bother to
uplift lesser intelligences (let alone interfere in our destinies). 
imagine if social insects were uplifted, or cock roaches, or higher
animal orders, such as rats...  
don't get me started on hybrid species...
--
jon mann


  

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Find them fast with Yahoo! Search.  
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Re: On Godliness

[Warren Ockrassa]

On Feb 24, 2008, at 4:14 PM, Doug Pensinger wrote:

> So that set me to wondering; would those of you among us that are  
> religious
> consider the possibility that their supreme being(s) was at one time
> something similar to what we are today?

When I was religious, that was the only possibility that eventually  
ended up making sense to me. And, of course, the LDS view isn't the  
only one -- Hinduism has had it for millennia. (Depending on the  
meritorious karma you've accumulated you can easily be reincarnated as  
a god in a future life.)

> And to those of you that are atheist; would you consider the  
> possibility
> that there may be entities in the universe, evolved from lower life  
> forms
> that could for all intents and purposes be considered gods?

Yes, but those wouldn't be "god" as defined by the world's major  
deistic systems -- i.e., they would not have created the universe and  
everything in it.

I'd be quite surprised if we lived in an otherwise sterile universe,  
actually; and given the age of the cosmos positing an ultra-advanced  
godlike civilization is no more mad than positing a civilization that  
hasn't yet got out of its equivalent of the bronze age. But those  
advanced civilizations still don't qualify as the gods of the old  
testament, the Koran or the Vedas.

--
Warren Ockrassa
Blog  | http://indigestible.nightwares.com/
Books | http://books.nightwares.com/
Web   | http://www.nightwares.com/

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Brin: Random stuff from the blog

[jon louis mann]

Brin blogged:
The world's rush to embrace biofuels is causing a spike in the price of
corn and other crops and could worsen water shortages and force poor
communities off their land, according to a U.N. official. 

What caused the spike in the prices of vegetable food is the increase
of income of millions of chinese and indians. They got richer, they
wanted to eat less veggies and more meat, and the
production of meat takes about 7 times more vegetable than the
production of veggie food.

But a biofuel startup in Illinois can make ethanol from just about
anything organic for less than $1 per gallon, and it wouldn't interfere
with food supplies...   And if it becomes economically viable (a big
if), then why on Earth would the organic waste be priced at zero?

Here in Brazil, the price of animal fat was near zero, then we started
transesterifying it to make biodiesel. 

Guess what?  Now it's price is getting close to soybean oil.

Alberto Monteiro

biofuel from organic waste doesn't raise food costs, but  using land
for corn, switchgrass, hemp, or sugar cane, to make ethanol, does take
land away from being used for pasture, or growing food crops.   i
understand a lot of rain forest is being burned in brazil for that, and
other reasons?

i think the consensus is that upward mobility (in formerly third world
countries) and biofuel production, along with war, population growth
and other factors, all contribute to increasing starvation in fourth
world countries.
in the same way, pollution, carbon emissions and other factors, along
with natural causes (volcanos, axial tilt, orbital wobble, termites,
etc.) all contribute to climate change.
jon mann



  

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Re: On Godliness

[Warren Ockrassa]

On Feb 24, 2008, at 9:09 PM, Doug Pensinger wrote:

> Ronn!
>> You are well over a century late with that conjecture ;):
>>
>> 
>>
> I made no claim concerning originality.
>
> from the website:
>
> "As man now is, God once was: As God now is, man may be
>
> So why would there only be one?  Or is there just one that's in  
> charge?

There's one god for Earth. Other planets each have their own gods.

(That's not facetious; it's LDS doctrine.)

-- \/\/

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RE: On Godliness

[Dan M]

> -Original Message-
> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
> Behalf Of Doug Pensinger
> Sent: Sunday, February 24, 2008 5:15 PM
> To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion
> Subject: On Godliness
> 
> Not that speculative fiction really influences my personal philosophy, but
> in reading Bank's Matter I am reminded why I doubt rather than I am
> assured
> that there are no gods.  If you believe in some sort of technological
> singularity, its easy to imagine how an intelligent entity such as a human
> being can raise themselves to an existence that is well beyond what we now
> experience; sublimation or transcendence.  And if one can raise themselves
> one level, what's to say that there are not many levels above our own?



> So that set me to wondering; would those of you among us that are
> religious consider the possibility that their supreme being(s) was at 
> one time something similar to what we are today?

Well, I think that type of god would be a very poor excuse for God. It
reduces God to the mundane, and removes the transcendental nature of God.  

I think the question and the comments made within this thread of whatever
there is needing to part of the universe assume a connection between
understanding the universe and understanding what things are really like
apart from us that the evidence is tending against.

One reference that I find useful in considering this is:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interpretation_of_quantum_mechanics

which includes a partial table of QM interpretations.  Reading through these
various interpretations of QM and you get a wide variety of descriptions of
reality.  I can add a few more descriptions that would also be consistent
with QM.

This is not to say there have been no advancements in the understanding in
the foundation of QM.  There have been, including the work on decoherence
that offers some hope of a QM theory of QM measurement (works OK as a toy
model, but hasn't gone much furtherbut that's still not a bad thing). 

However, with all of these advances, the QM "weirdness" has not been
eliminated, it's just been pushed to another corner.  In the sciam website
there was a discussion of a potential experimental test at the Plank limit
that might be able to turn at least some interpretations into theories.
But, further reading on this subject indicates that the same sorta thing
that happens with decoherence will also happen here.the fundamental
interpretation problem is not solved by turning the interpretation into
theoriesrather the interpretation problem is merely stated in a new way.

So, given this state of the mundane, I hope you can see why I do not believe
in a God rooted in the mundane.

Dan M. 


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Re: CNN Breaking News

[Dave Land]

On Feb 25, 2008, at 2:10 PM, Curtis Burisch wrote:

> Lance A. Brown said:
>
>> The point of shooting the satellite was to disrupt the fuel  
>> storage.  If
>> the satellite came down in one piece, there is a chance the hydrazine
>> fuel on board would survive to reach the surface.  If it impacts on
>> land, you get nasty poisonous gas cloud.
>
>> If the missile did it's job, the fuel storage was destroyed.  The
>> satellite (or remaining parts) will still come down, but now the
>> hydrazine will burn up during reentry.
>
> This is indeed what they said, but frankly that's just a ludicrous
> statement. Hydrazine isn't fun, but nobody has cared before in the
> slightest about spacecraft with much bigger loads of un-burnt  
> hydrazine
> crashing to earth. Given the very remote possibility that this US
> spy-bird had crashed in a populated area, the negative effects of
> hydrazine landing on your head would be far less problematic than a
> piece of hurtling space junk tapping you on the head.
>
> The general consensus among many (e.g. www.theregister.co.uk)  
> appears to
> be that the US wanted simply to test their sat-interceptor systems,  
> and
> maybe make a bit of PR capital by flexing their muscles on the world
> stage.

I think it was also because some significant chunks of very new, very
secret technology might have survived reentry and potentially gotten
into the wrong hands.

BTW, I receive a link to a short video that shows the launch, a stage
separation and the moment of impact of the shoot-down:

mms://wm.ksdk.gannett.edgestreams.net/news/022108_deadsatellite_ksdk.wmv

Dave

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Re: Brin: Random stuff from the blog

[David Brin]

Hmmm. Interesting as usual, Alberto...

Good perspective.


--- Alberto Monteiro <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> Brin blogged:
> >
> > The world's rush to embrace biofuels is causing a
> spike
> > in the price of corn and other crops and could
> worsen
> > water shortages and force poor communities off
> their land,
> > according to a U.N. official. 
> 
> Ok, but this is not the consensus. What caused the
> spike in
> the prices of vegetable food is the increase of
> income of
> millions of chinese and indians. They got richer,
> they wanted
> to eat less veggies and more meat, and the
> production of meat
> takes about 7 times more vegetable than the
> production of
> veggie food.
> 
> > But a biofuel startup in Illinois can make ethanol
> from
> > just about anything organic for less than $1 per
> gallon,
> > and it wouldn't interfere with food supplies... 
> 
> And if it becomes economically viable (a big if),
> then why
> on Earth would the organic waste be priced at zero?
> Here
> in Brazil, the price of animal fat was near zero,
> then
> we started transesterifying it to make biodiesel.
> Guess what?
> Now it's price is getting close to soybean oil.
> 
> Alberto Monteiro
> 
> 
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> 

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Re: Blowing things in space [was: Fwd: CNN Breaking News]

[Julia Thompson]

On Mon, 25 Feb 2008, Alberto Monteiro wrote:

> Alberto Monteiro
>
> PS: I hope the subject does not make anybody think about
> Monika Lewinsky in a space shuttle.

The thought had not occurred to me until I read this.

:)

Julia

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Blowing things in space [was: Fwd: CNN Breaking News]

[Alberto Monteiro]

Curtis Burisch wrote:
> 
> The general consensus among many (e.g. www.theregister.co.uk)
>  appears to be that the US wanted simply to test their sat-
> interceptor systems, and maybe make a bit of PR capital by flexing 
> their muscles on the world stage.
> 
OTOH, this shows the capacity to hit a fast-moving object (speed
in the order of 10.000 meters/second) from Earth, which might
be useful when there's a need to blow an asteroid with nukes.

Alberto Monteiro

PS: I hope the subject does not make anybody think about 
Monika Lewinsky in a space shuttle.

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RE: Wal-Mart and more L4

[Curtis Burisch]

>>If you think black helicopters are a-comin-a-gitcha, you
>>ain't seen nothin' yet: Think black flying saucers.

>Which make a lot more sense for alien invaders to use than ones which 
>glow bright green . . .

Black is way more cool. Ever seen a pink ufo?? Hah! Thought not!



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RE: Fwd: CNN Breaking News

[Curtis Burisch]

Lance A. Brown said:

>The point of shooting the satellite was to disrupt the fuel storage.  If 
>the satellite came down in one piece, there is a chance the hydrazine 
>fuel on board would survive to reach the surface.  If it impacts on 
>land, you get nasty poisonous gas cloud.

>If the missile did it's job, the fuel storage was destroyed.  The 
>satellite (or remaining parts) will still come down, but now the 
>hydrazine will burn up during reentry.

This is indeed what they said, but frankly that's just a ludicrous
statement. Hydrazine isn't fun, but nobody has cared before in the slightest
about spacecraft with much bigger loads of un-burnt hydrazine crashing to
earth. Given the very remote possibility that this US spy-bird had crashed
in a populated area, the negative effects of hydrazine landing on your head
would be far less problematic than a piece of hurtling space junk tapping
you on the head.

The general consensus among many (e.g. www.theregister.co.uk) appears to be
that the US wanted simply to test their sat-interceptor systems, and maybe
make a bit of PR capital by flexing their muscles on the world stage.

Curtis.

Alpha-male syndrome Maru.


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Brin: Random stuff from the blog

[Alberto Monteiro]

Brin blogged:
>
> The world's rush to embrace biofuels is causing a spike
> in the price of corn and other crops and could worsen
> water shortages and force poor communities off their land,
> according to a U.N. official. 

Ok, but this is not the consensus. What caused the spike in
the prices of vegetable food is the increase of income of
millions of chinese and indians. They got richer, they wanted
to eat less veggies and more meat, and the production of meat
takes about 7 times more vegetable than the production of
veggie food.

> But a biofuel startup in Illinois can make ethanol from
> just about anything organic for less than $1 per gallon,
> and it wouldn't interfere with food supplies... 

And if it becomes economically viable (a big if), then why
on Earth would the organic waste be priced at zero? Here
in Brazil, the price of animal fat was near zero, then
we started transesterifying it to make biodiesel. Guess what?
Now it's price is getting close to soybean oil.

Alberto Monteiro


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gawd is the singularity

[jon louis mann]

my point is that any conclusion that we are unique in the unimaginable
vastness that is the universe for lack of evidence overestimates the
utility of our perspective.
Doug Pensinger

Well, we are going to be unique in the universe. Evolution isn't going
to follow the same path twice (if snowflakes are all unique, then
intelligent life, which is much rarer, will be unique to a greater
degree...) However, most atheists I know who have any sort of science  
education reckon it's probable that there are many inhabited worlds in
the universe.
Charlie.

Certainly.  It's always important to consider how much you might not
know.  That doesn't mean you need to pre-assume anything about what you
don't know, however.  (The whole "don't count your alien chickens
before they are zygotes in a thick shell" thing, you know?)  I'm all
for exploring the unknown--  projects like SETI and the Hubble
telescope and 
whatnot.  I just think we all have to admit that thus far results have
been pretty scarce to come by and if we *seem* right now to be alone
inthe universe.

Certainly we don't seem quite up to the challenge at the moment, but if
Kurzweil's tracking for the upcoming singularity is correct we may
haveto sink or swim sooner than we think...  (At GDC Kurzweil
apparently said that those that can live to 2015 may probably live
"forever", I only wish I had been there to see his charts...)
--Max Battcher-

i hope he is right, but just in case, i plan to be freeze dried, and
keep all my organs for a tissue match!~}  
i also am skeptical about intelligent life in the universe (because of
the drake equations and the fermi paradox) but if there is other
intelligent life out there, it has probably transcended into the
singularity, which would explain how we missed their brief emissions
window...
--jon mann


  

Never miss a thing.  Make Yahoo your home page. 
http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs
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Re: Brin-l Digest, Vol 369, Issue 6

[William T Goodall]

On 25 Feb 2008, at 17:10, Dave Land wrote:

> On Feb 24, 2008, at 8:43 AM, Ronn! Blankenship wrote:
>
>> At 09:48 PM Saturday 2/23/2008, hkhenson wrote:
>>> At 01:00 PM 2/23/2008, William T Goodall wrote:
>>>
 Religion has a vested interest in discouraging critical thinking.
>>>
>>> I think it's *much* worse than that.
>>>
>>> In "Evolutionary Psychology, Memes and the Origin of War" I make a
>>> case that the psychological trait(s) for religion arose as part of
>>> the  complex set of traits for wars.  Religions are seed xenophobic
>>> memes. In times where the population sees a bleak future, they  
>>> become
>>> more influential.  Eventually they served to synch up the warriors
>>> for a do or die attack on neighbors.  Even though the warriors may
>>> have died, the genes were always better off than starving.
>>>
>>> One of the effect of this complex of traits is to shut off rational
>>> thinking.  It's not rational at the personal level to go out and try
>>> to kill neighbors, but in some circumstances the interest of a  
>>> person
>>> and their genes diverge.
>>>
>>> Religions give "reason" to take such chances.
>>>
>> So where in this hypothesis do #s 5 through 10 of the Ten
>> Commandments, the Second Great Commandment, and the Golden Rule fit?

They are the bit of the snake-oil salesman's pitch where he promises  
world peace and a cure for baldness if you buy his nostrum. Later he  
gets to the price which in religion includes tithing, genital  
mutilation and wearing funny garments.


>>
>
> Ronn! seems to think that there is some internal logic or  
> rationality to
> the anti-religion rants that periodically hijack otherwise reasonable
> discussions on this list. I am glad for Ronn!'s question, but I'm  
> not at
> all sanguine about his getting any answer that does not involve some
> random act of lunacy by a person religious.
>
> Because we all know, deep in our hearts, that the only people  
> who
> ever do anything evil in the world do so because religion has addled
> their
> minds.

That depends if people who are clinically insane actually commit evil  
acts or whether those should be counted as acts of god :-)

Evil or Mad Maru?

-- 
William T Goodall
Mail : [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Web  : http://www.wtgab.demon.co.uk
Blog : http://radio.weblogs.com/0111221/

"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit  
atrocities." ~Voltaire.

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Re: Brin-l Digest, Vol 369, Issue 6

[Dave Land]

On Feb 24, 2008, at 8:43 AM, Ronn! Blankenship wrote:

> At 09:48 PM Saturday 2/23/2008, hkhenson wrote:
>> At 01:00 PM 2/23/2008, William T Goodall wrote:
>>
>>> Religion has a vested interest in discouraging critical thinking.
>>
>> I think it's *much* worse than that.
>>
>> In "Evolutionary Psychology, Memes and the Origin of War" I make a
>> case that the psychological trait(s) for religion arose as part of
>> the  complex set of traits for wars.  Religions are seed xenophobic
>> memes. In times where the population sees a bleak future, they become
>> more influential.  Eventually they served to synch up the warriors
>> for a do or die attack on neighbors.  Even though the warriors may
>> have died, the genes were always better off than starving.
>>
>> One of the effect of this complex of traits is to shut off rational
>> thinking.  It's not rational at the personal level to go out and try
>> to kill neighbors, but in some circumstances the interest of a person
>> and their genes diverge.
>>
>> Religions give "reason" to take such chances.
>>
> So where in this hypothesis do #s 5 through 10 of the Ten
> Commandments, the Second Great Commandment, and the Golden Rule fit?

Ronn! seems to think that there is some internal logic or rationality to
the anti-religion rants that periodically hijack otherwise reasonable
discussions on this list. I am glad for Ronn!'s question, but I'm not at
all sanguine about his getting any answer that does not involve some
random act of lunacy by a person religious.

Because we all know, deep in our hearts, that the only people who
ever do anything evil in the world do so because religion has addled  
their
minds.

Dave

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