I can't for the life me understand why. Why are so many people clinging to ancient mystical bullshit over knowledge and reason? Are they scared of these modern times? Do they fear technology? Do they just hate our world as it is right now and yearn for fantasies laid out in ancient texts?
Thomas Jefferson must be rolling over in his grave.
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Religion is about much more than mysticism and it is quite possible to follow the moral philosophy learned from religion without believing in the mysticism present in the ancient texts.
You cannot have a populace that is more and more ignorant of science, history and philosophy and still embraces the ideals of the Enlightenment that allowed for the principles that divide this nation from the more primitive nations of the world. Such people are infinitely more susceptible to accepting fairy tale explanations for the mechanics of the universe. It's simpler and it makes their heads hurt less.
On top of all of that, there seems to be a celebration of ignorance. You mentioned Jefferson. Can you imagine someone of that intellect and variety of pursuits rising in modern politics? Da Meatheads would villify him as some elitist egghead from the coast. Not a real American. Theodore Roosevelt read a book a day. Has Dubs ever read a book from cover to cover? If you ever get the chance to listen to some of the more obscure members of the House of Representatives when they appear on Fox or MSNBC. Chris94 once corrected me when I lamented the existence of Barbara Boxer by writing that there are 200 bigger dummies in the House, and he was entirely accurate. You could probably find more competent and intelligent members at your local dive at 1 AM on a Friday night.
We're doomed and everyone here above the rank of idiot knows it. Fortunately, you and I will probably be dead by the point we've reverted to some Hobbesian state of nature.
Church attendance is, at most, stable in America (if you don't pull out Catholics, it is down quite a bit).
Technological advancement and the progress of knowledge is on an asymptotically ascending path, and has been for hundreds of years. Science is gradually killing religion, and this will undoubtedly continue. The average "Da Meathead" you pull off the street knows infinitely more about the way things work than Benjamin Franklin did.
Congress has always been filled with idiots. The notion that this has recently changed is an intellectual fallacy that you have fallen prey to. Ditto, Presidential candidates. Many of the men you cite were demonized in their own time, and it is not clear that they were the paragons you believe them to be, or simply myths created by historians in the intervening years.
Stop being such a whiny little Chicken Little.
You're not really basing you argument on that, are you?
To be honest, I assumed you were equating the "rise of fundamentalism" with scientific ignorance. Either way, I am vastly more optimistic than you are.
I am willing to bet that the explosion in patent applications coincides not with scientific exploration but rather a change in the law that encouraged corporations to flood the PTO with applications that previously were not worthwhile.
Any patent lawyers around here?
I don't dispute that there have been changes in the way the patent system is used with regard to carving out protection from competition (at least for a while). Nevertheless, there is a clear and accelerating upward trend in virtually every area of science and technology.
Read the first paragraph from a book review Michael Shermer did in the WSJ the other day:
"If every image made and every word written from the earliest stirring of civilization to the year 2003 were converted to digital information, the total would come to five exabytes. An exabyte is one quintillion bytes, or one billion gigabytes—or just think of it as the number one followed by 18 zeros. That's a lot of digital data, but it's nothing compared with what happened from 2003 through 2010: We created five exabytes of digital information every two days. Get ready for what's coming: By next year, we'll be producing five exabytes every 10 minutes. How much information is that? The total for 2010 of 912 exabytes is the equivalent of 18 times the amount of information contained in all the books ever written. The world is not just changing, and the change is not just accelerating; the rate of the acceleration of change is itself accelerating."
That is incredible (while on one level it is rather depressing that part of this is from people posting YouTube videos of their friends crashing bikes into trees).
Link: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203646004577213203698503484.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
On the "exabyte front", I'm not remotely convinced that (a) those statistics are true or (b) more importantly, the quantum leap in additional "information" reflects much more than an explosion in useless bullshit.
How many exabytes consist of the Kardashians, the Octomom, John and Kate, and whatever else fills the 2000 channels on my FIOS? Do you think the patent or the exabyte statistics actually reflect scientific advancement?
You're the one trying to poke holes in the only empirical evidence offered in this entire thread, pedant. You tell me what percentage of the data is Kim Kardasian versus decoding of human, neanderthal, mammoth, flatworm DNA...versus data generated by particle collisions at CERN...versus information transmitted from the Cassini probe...versus design specifications for the Core i7 chip at Intel....etc etc etc.
And yes, I do believe they (and the thousands of graphs that look exactly like them) actually represent scientific advancement. Do you think they represent scientific regression?
I also don't think we've suddenly become more focused on scientific achievement. I think we're at a point of our development where more of our advancements are patentable (and patented), which is exacerbated by the ability to patent things like gene sequences that people would not have thought to patent before. I think as private money lines up behind science more than ever before (as opposed to government funded research), more things will be patented, partly because more research will be aimed at creating consumer and commercial products.
I appreciate that I am unscientifically debating your scientific argument (about science - kind of ironic in light of what I am arguing actually). Apologies for that. It's the skeptic in me that sees these statistics as reflections of our consumer and corporate society more than as evidence of scientific achievement.
Gung hay fat choy!
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...they will have been outsourced to China, circa 2075.
Our downfall will be our debt & deficit, not our lack of adherence to reason and science.
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Hong Bao Na Lai
May I have the red envelope, please...
...at least our court system is grounded on English common law, basic Judeo-Christian principles, and of course whatever the ATLA says.
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You'll be familiar with what you see. It's your standard M.O.
Obviously, you need a --
Light!
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...so, after a little science and engineering, voila! Man conquers reason again! Just because you cannot imagine or understand it, does not mean it is not plausible and provable. Take that computer you're wasting your time on every night. Understand how to write code? Naw. Still believe your machine will help you work and communicate? Heh.
One does not contradict the other.
Would that be Hinduism, Buddhism or Shinto?
Edit: typo
Catholicism got authority from Christ (assuming, for the moment), and used that authority to provide teaching from two sources: (1) non-scriptural Tradition and (2) Scripture. Thus, it was improper for me to compare the bible alone to reason. Protestantism discarded Tradition, and embraced Scripture alone. Protestantism is based on the principle of every individual applying their own logic to the bible, which leads to thousands of denominations which disagree with one another; Catholicism is based on interpretation of the bible in view of the Church's Tradition and overall authority. That is what I mean by "Church Teaching"
I will let non-Catholics make their own defense.
But I do note that many of them incorporate non-scientific and disprovable principles into their faith, like young earth creationsism. That is a personal problem for them. Catholicism does not import any disprovable concepts as points of doctrine, and therefore does not contradict reason.
It must therefore be a scientific and provable principle, according to your logic.
Shirley, you jest.
I'm not saying my religion is provable. I'm saying it is not disprovable...unlike some of the protestant faiths which incorporate some disprovable concepts, such as young earth creationism.
Ya' know what...I flew. Can you or anyone disprove that?
My point was, that if you were as astute as ya' think ya' are then you would have noticed that I took all of YOUR quotes and inverted them. Negative to positive, if you will...and you took the bait, lead weight and all.
C'mon Ned...admit it... you are like a reformed smoker. Once a non-believer now an adventist.
Don't insult your own intellect, man...you know better than that.
Edit: typo
I consider things like the big bang theory (conceived by a Catholic, by the way) and evolution to be scientific principles that can be disproven. We may learn something in the future which disproves them. Indeed, those principles may have already disproven other theories that were predominant before them.
Statements like Jesus rose from the dead, and you flew last weekend, or there is an undetectable invisible pink unicorn inside the wall of my house are generally not disprovable. They are not statements of science.
Now, there are two kinds of religions:
1) Those that incorporate scientific/disprovable statements into their dogma; and
2) Those that don't.
I was arguing that Catholism is a "class 2" religion. For example, Catholicism states that the Bible is inerrent theologically, but not necessarily scientifically. Granted, some Catholics are creationists (which is disprovable by evolutionary science), but that creationist belief is extra-dogmatic; that is, it is an allowed belief, but not a required belief to be a Catholic.
But, some protestant faiths are "class 1" religions in that they require belief in scientifically disprovable concepts like a 6000 year old earth, with no evolution. Those religions are anti-science. Catholicism is not, which brings me back to my original point: I, as a Catholic, need not hold the bible over reason, or reason over the bible--there is not inherent disagreement. Other religions must defend themselves.
Now, that as my point. Perhaps I was missing your point? I admit my words are flowing fast now. I blame it on the pinot grigio.
"I consider things like the big bang theory ... and evolution to be scientific principles that can be disproven. We may learn something in the future which disproves them. Indeed, those principles may have already disproven other theories that were predominant before them."
Once the mysticism, occult, and anagogics are laid to rest, ususally because of science or logic, we proceed with what we do know? Example, we thought the world was flat...
All the fire gods, and sun gods, etc. have been laid to rest for the most part.
Perhaps someday the creation god will be disproven, but I'm not sure how science can possibly do that, since science is inherently limited to testing within the created universe, and cannot test non-causal features external to the universe.
The Catholic religion is extra-scientific, not anti-scientific. Science does not require atheism. It does not address the issue...at least to the extent that religions are non-disprovable like Catholicism. If religions are disprovable (e.g., they don't believe in the Big Bang, or they believe in a fire god making fire), then science can address the issue...which is a personal problem for those religions.
then at least with the use of logic.
Yes, the Catholics are certainly pro science, just not when it has to do with Catholicism.
I'm not trying to beat up being Catholic or religious, it's the argument religion needs to be part of our governing body I dislike. I do not want religion in my government the same way I don't want the inverse.
Having a mandate all HC providers (of which are corporate, if not in name, at least by financial clout), cover birth control to women should they desire it is not the government interfering in religion.
Odd, when the GOP initially put this as a government mandate over a decade ago, everything was A OK. The Dems and Obama mandate it, suddenly the sky is falling and the Black President is killing our babies.
Cherry picking or Bigotry? Your choice. Either way, the GOP and their followers are full of it.
I think separation of church and state is good for both church and state.
Forcing religions to do something against their conscience is a violation of that separation.
.
Can you provide a link to this GOP mandate which did not have an exception for religious conscience? If true, I would not defend the GOP on this. I certainly don't remember it passing and being enforced. That would have created an uproar against the GOP for sure. No cherry picking. The only bigotry is the disrespect for religions.
from the GOP mandated restraints.
Odd it's been years and no one noticed this and yet, here we are; Hate for the Black President.
PS: I will look for the stats on that when I have a moment.
Examples being Arizona, New York, Arkansas - all under GOP Governors. - Oh and Mitt Romney in Mass. So it was Pitaki (sp) Huckabee (sp) Romney and whoever the AZ gov, was all in the 2000's.
I look forward to your elaboration on the state rules. My understanding is that there is a general mandate in each case, but that there are exceptions for religious conscience in each case.
if it ain't that, then it's cherry picking which is equally as bad (actually it is the same thing). So, your choice really - racism or racism.
And yes, it is agreed by all news services, including christian and Catholic news, 28 states have a mandate requiring contraception coverage in corporate HC. Each state has varying mandate strengths but all 28 were put into play by Republican authority. 7 of 28 the states had much stronger language than that of the initial federal mandate.
This only became an issue because when a Black man became President and is in office presenting this as a federal mandate. When the GOP was pushing for this back in the 90's, there was no opposition to it at all. Suddenly - well, you can take it from there.
This issue is a red-herring for the GOP base.
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Though you're trying.
Link: http://www.uhnd.com/bb/forum/index.php?action=display&forumid=2&msgid=212654
I replied (see link below). As I said, my understanding is that all of those so called state mandates have exceptions in them. But I went ahead and found your source for you anyway. It is the White House's document defending the move. The Bishops replied on this point already:
White House Claim: “Over half of Americans already live in the 28 States that require insurance companies cover contraception: Several of these States like North Carolina, New York, and California have identical religious employer exemptions. Some States like Colorado, Georgia and Wisconsin have no exemption at all.”
USCCB Response: This misleads by ignoring important facts, and some of it is simply false. All the state mandates, even those without religious exemptions, may be avoided by selfinsuring prescription drug coverage, by dropping that particular coverage altogether, or by taking refuge in a federal law that pre-empts any state mandates (ERISA). None of these havens is available under the federal mandate. It is also false to claim that North Carolina has an identical exemption. It is broader: It does not require a religious organization to serve primarily people of its own faith, or to fulfill the federal rule’s narrow tax code criterion. Moreover, the North Carolina law, unlike the federal mandate, completely excludes abortifacient drugs like Ella and RU-486 as well as “emergency contraceptives” like Preven.
Link: http://www.uhnd.com/bb/forum/index.php?action=display&forumid=2&msgid=212665
Not too Sorry to disappoint on that.
I was looking for independent source with confirmation on this.
Your notes say what I said. 28 states have contraceptive mandates for corporate HC. All but 7 (could be 8) have no exemptions for religion or faith. All were put in place by Republicans.
There wasn't an outcry until the Black guy wanted to mandate it for all states as part of his HC bill (legislation I think is a piece of junk).
When you bring up racism on this issue, you do make me want to stop talking to you.
After all, who is more the fool, the fool, or the person who debates with the fool?
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...existence of a multi-verse?
(You seem to have a hard-on for Protestants, BTW.)
Biblical inerrancy is the doctrinal position that the Bible is accurate and totally free of error. Is this your postulate, Shirley?
Since you are bent on contradiction, (linguistically speaking) what makes you believe "those religions" (and I'll remove Protestantism from this conversation) are [sic] antiscience and yet Catholicism is not? Does Catholicism believe that Jesus turned water into wine?
You seem to waffle between science and "non-scientific" faith whenever it suits your game.
Perhaps, as you stated, your mind is tainted with too much "holy water".
String theory and multiverse: I'm open. My view on scientific issues is the scientific view. When the evidence reaches a point that it would be "perverse to withhold provisional assent" I grant that assent. So, for example, I accept the major theories that have general assent among scientists, such as relativity, quantum theory, "big bang-esque" type theories, the usual. I'm also open to the more modern theories. I find them all fascinating...neither required by my faith nor barred by my faith.
You said: Biblical inerrancy is the doctrinal position that the Bible is accurate and totally free of error. Is this your postulate, Shirley?
The bible is a theological document. Anything historical or scientific which is not required for the theology is extra material, and not necessarily inerrent. Thus, if it says that bats are fowl (as it seems to do in Leviticus), that would be a scientific error, not a theological error. In general, Catholics believe in theological inerrency of Scripture; some other religions believe in total inerrancy.
You said: ...what makes you believe "those religions" (and I'll remove Protestantism from this conversation) are [sic] antiscience and yet Catholicism is not? Does Catholicism believe that Jesus turned water into wine?
Only those religions (not all protestant religions) that add disprovable concepts to their dogma have problems with science. Any church that requires its adherents, for example, to believe that the earth is 6000 years old in direct contradiction to the fossil record, background radiation, etc. The Catholic Church does not require this.
I understand your point on the water into wine. The direct answer to your question is yes. And yet, now, no one can disprove that, can they? Convenient for us, I know, but that is kind of the point. We don't have any beliefs that are currently disprovable by science, so we are not anti-science. We recognize that miracles (isolated deviances from outcomes expected by science) can occur, but those one-timers are not repeatable, and so not testable and disprovable by science.
You said: You seem to waffle between science and "non-scientific" faith whenever it suits your game.
I am big on science and faith. I'm not waffling back and forth. I embrace both. Because I believe there is no contradiction between them, I don't have to waffle.
[Edit: typos; clarificaton of inerrancy point]
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Funny thing. Disney film makers induced the lemmings to jump off the cliff into the sea for their movie called White Wilderness. Disney = Murderers of small harmless rodents.
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There is nothing sacred in these tomes. They may indeed have postulated some wonderful life lessons, but sacrosanct they ain't.
And to those that think that 21st century slaughter is no worse than 14th century slaughter are merely cut from the same cloth, albeit in a different time capsule.
Scary as it may sound to the McCarthyists, Marx was correct, religion IS the opiate of the people(s).
Man makes religion, religion does not make man. Religion is, indeed, the self-consciousness and self-esteem of man who has either not yet won through to himself, or has already lost himself again. But man is no abstract being squatting outside the world. Man is the world of man – state, society. This state and this society produce religion, which is an inverted consciousness of the world, because they are an inverted world. Religion is the general theory of this world, its encyclopaedic compendium, its logic in popular form, its spiritual point d’honneur, its enthusiasm, its moral sanction, its solemn complement, and its universal basis of consolation and justification. It is the fantastic realization of the human essence since the human essence has not acquired any true reality. The struggle against religion is, therefore, indirectly the struggle against that world whose spiritual aroma is religion.
Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.
The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that veil of tears of which religion is the halo.
In the 15th century and onwards, Christians discovered new lands full of unbelievers, and they did to the Africians and to the American Indians exactly what they did to the European unbeliever, but there was one difference. Christian artwork had depicted Satan and his demons as black. Not suprisingly Christians decided that Africans and Indians were a lot closer to Satan than white skinned Europeans, and they (Christians) acted accordingly to protect themselves from the "pollution" of contact with dark skinned people.
People should avail themselves and read Historian, Forrest. G. Woods' Book "The Arrogance of Faith" for an in depth exploration of the Christian origins of Racism, Slavery, and Segregation.