I’d also like to see a discussion about social issues such as women’s and gay rights, and how that relates to the counterjihad and Western renewal. Since Dymphna is busy writing something else, why don’t we have a topic without a whole essay, or a guest essay, or whatever. It’s long overdue. To save time, it could read something like: Women. Gays. The West. Discuss. We all have lots to say, we don’t have to wait for someone to write a whole essay.
You asked for it, you got it. Discuss.
I’ll just put in my own two cents before the food fight starts in earnest.
All the rights that women have or might want to have — or the rights held by anyone else, for that matter — do not trump the rights of the larger community. When any given personal right, if fully exercised by large numbers of people, threatens the existence of the community or the culture at large, then that right is forfeit.
It’s unfortunate, but true: your right to do X without restriction is worthless if the simultaneous practice of X by millions of people leads to the destruction of society. Then the barbarians — who summarily execute people who practice X — take over, and the whole question becomes moot.
In the case of women, such issues might include voting, abortion, contraception, etc. Many other practices have been added to the list of modern “rights”: the autonomy of children, sex outside of marriage, homosexuality, bestiality, satanism, you name it.
An argument over any given right would do well to examine whether the full implementation of that right would tend to destroy the culture that permits it.
OK, check all your weapons at the door, and then have at it.
410 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 400 of 410 Newer› Newest»Hey Hesperado: If you use Zenster's label of "magical thinking" about my "New World Order uses violent Islam as a tool" theory, does that make me a witch? Just asking?! Ha!
Witch is just another label used to unfairly (there's that word again!) blame women for evil in the world. Islam still believes in witches - and persecutes people for being witches. Argh!
Egghead -
"Sagunto, Hesperado, and Zenster: What a complete luxury it is for you that Blogger allows you to post more than three short sentences in a single post!"
Yes, for some reason I seem to fit quite nicely into the NBO (New Blogger Order), should I be worried? Perhaps the Blogger-daimon is more of a "fem-filter" instead of just a spam filter ;)
I'd advise you to always paste from a txt file, but you probably did that already.
Take care.
Hesperado -
Not confusing anything here, but thnx for keeping things in perspective. My last comment had very little to do with "the West at large". Instead, what I said was that over the years, I have seen a lot of thought put into political arguing, back and forth, but far less, if any, into creative solutions that would help ordinary folk in achieving small victories in their day to day dealings with Muslims, hence my idea of the "CJ workplace".
I must admit though, that arguing about grand schemes and all remains interesting and on occasion, I still find it worth my while trying to point out to you, for instance, where your MC PC omnipresence-thesis is failing.
Kind regs from Amsterdam,
Sag.
Egghead,
I just think the West is healthier than you seem to think. It would be easier if the problem were a secret cabal that we could somehow detach from the West, even though, paradoxically, we impute to it enough power to control the entire West.
One has to wake up from the dream of the conspiracy and see that one's West is not evil nor controlled by a cabal of evil, and strangely powerful, "Elites". Only then will we begin to grasp what is going on. An what is going on may be found in our own hearts and minds, since (unless we are singular psycho- or sociopaths) we are not that different from the politically correct multiculturalists.
Baron,
I don't have the energy to look through all the comments to see if someone else had answered this, but Imust respond to your statement: "But not all moral conclusions. An atheist can find no logical or Darwinian case against genocide, since the extermination of a competing set of alien genes confers a selective advantage on the genotype of one’s own group."
Please. You are definitely smarter than this. I am an atheist, I can tell you there are many, many reason not to want to "exterminate" a "competing set of genes". That might work for lions and tigers, but we humans - even we atheists - know the value that can be added to a bloodline from mixing in other genes.
If you look - as Mark Twain once commented upon, and has been confirmed many times since him - at the contribution to the knowledge and culture of the world provided by those of Jewish blood and cultural heritage, you would instantly see the error in your remark. This atheist gentile believes we will never appreciate all we lost when the German government led by Hitler attempted to rid the world of Jews. And that is but one race, one "competing set of genes". You don't have to be religious or believe in a Supreme Being to understand that.
I am not a multi-culturalist, and would love to see Islam eradicated if it cannot be reformed into something other than the death cult it has always been. But not through genocide.
Hesperado: The New World Order "cabal" that you underestimate is NOT so secret - just stealthy. :)
In the same way that Hitler and his Nazis worked their way up to total mayhem, the New World Order is chip - chip - chipping away at the basic foundations of Western civilization to make the West ready for totalitarian rule.
If you had been alive prior to WWII, would you have dismissed the imminent danger of Hitler and the Nazis as being a "secret cabal"?
The key to future control will be the ownership of RFID chips and the access to goods and services that such chips will provide and deny to all humans.
The "cabal" that controls RFID chips, also controls the world! My bet is the New World Order....
No more war, just eternal human slavery. To be accurate, women need not worry about losing the vote because everyone will lose the vote - much for their own "benefit" of course. :)
Egghead: Your depiction of modern women as 1) "extracting paybacks against men," 2) "sticking it to men," and 3) "regard[ing] Islam as a way to bring down the West’s White male dominated 'system'" is dismaying. Argh!
I am a woman who talks to a lot of women, and I have NEVER heard any women speak of the goals that you mention above - in any fashion in any situation.
Evidently, you don’t live in the political and social basket case collectively known as California.
Reg T --
You misunderstand me — I don’t deny that there are other reasons not to want to commit genocide. I only maintain that they cannot be logically derived from the premises that atheists normally acknowledge.
I have had many philosophical and moral discussions with atheists over the years — since I am an unrepentant intellectual, and enjoy the company of other intellectuals, most of my friends are atheists, because that is currently the most popular faith among intellectuals.
If I ask an atheist what the basis of morality is, the answer is generally referred to natural selection — that is, the desire to do “good” is beneficial to one’s gene pool.
However, since different genetic groups are competitors, even within the same species, the extermination of a competing gene pool can benefit one’s own gene pool. Hence there is no Darwin-based argument against genocide as such.
One may oppose genocide because one doesn’t like it and finds it repugnant. But it can’t be opposed based on logic and reason alone.
If you think you can prove me wrong, lay out your premises — which presumably include a physical universe generated ex nihilo, having no deity or creator, and including biological entities that have evolved out of non-living substances — and show me the logical case against genocide. Not that it is simply repugnant or ghastly, but in what way it is wrong.
I’d be interested to see your chain of reasoning.
Sorry, Egghead: you lost me at "chips".
latté island: Just to set the record straight, this thread was also Zenster's idea. I only suggested that we skip having an introductory essay.
Thank you, latté island, for spreading the blame … er, I mean, sharing the glory here. In light of all the rancor being expressed about gender, it is worth noting that this thread’s roots have both X and Y genes.
Zenster, you and I are in general agreement about the gay thing, but when you refer to gays, or extremist gays, attacking the family, can you and everyone else be more specific?
I think Egghead covered a lot of the ground I might have in a more succinct manner. As she noted, if gay marriage is officially recognized then it fully legitimizes homosexuality as a cultural construct which would then qualify it for status as curriculum in public schools, something that is already happening. I think homosexual interaction is an entirely adult subject and inappropriate for primary and elementary school course planning.
My own, admittedly, muddled approach to this is that whatever consenting adults want to do behind closed doors is up to them. However, as an example, just because a certain subset of people enjoy SMBD (Sado-Masochism Bondage and Discipline), does that mean it also qualifies for being taught in our public schools? Homosexuality is a sexual choice and may not necessarily qualify as something which should be officially recognized as an entirely separate subset of society. Fair? I’m not sure but I’m even less sure that developing young minds should be exposed to the exceptionally confusing messages that learning about gay culture can deliver in a non-adult framework.
To be quite honest, having grown up in California and seen gay culture in action for many decades, very few gay (or bisexual) people I have met did not have some serious internal personality conflicts going on. Yes, this might be a result of external societal pressure to conform but there could just as easily be some major psycho-pathology at work that continues to make me wonder about just how healthy the gay (or other alternative type) “lifestyle” is or ever will be. That said, I have also known gay couples who had a more stable relationship than many other heterosexual couples I know but they are the exception and not the rule by any stretch of the imagination.
Someone I know predicted that the real upheaval would come when gay divorces became commonplace. Untangling all of those snarled passions and absurdities in public could polarize popular opinion against gays far more than the issue of marriage ever will.
This is why I protest about “hate speech” and “hate crimes”, because they unfairly and unnecessarily confer special status upon ordinary criminal acts which should be prosecuted with equal vigor as with any other similar sort of crime against an individual or group within our society. The upshot is that certain “lifestyles” are granted what may be unwarranted legitimacy in the eyes of the law.
Finally, there remains a societal bottom line in that far fewer gay couples will ever have children that then contribute to social security and maintaining the economic stability of our nation. In an age of shrinking demographics, this becomes an unavoidable issue. Being gay is a genetic box canyon and delegating any portion of our nation’s resources to a segment that simply will never reciprocate with contributions like those made by nuclear families becomes an issue of substance. All of the deductions and benefits granted to heterosexual couples have some remote chance of being repaid by their potential offspring. Nothing of the sort can be said about gay couples. Cold blooded? Yes. Yet, we are in an era where some seriously cold blooded decisions are going to be required of us.
Baron Bodissey: I only maintain that they [reasons not to want to commit genocide] cannot be logically derived from the premises that atheists normally acknowledge.
What about the simple fact that no one can predict with any assurance which race or ethnic group might prove to have the specific genetic traits that confer immunity to HIV/AIDS or, for that matter, even cancer?
Despite having scaled down a lot of my own environmentalist leanings, I still promote conservation of old growth regions due to their having significant bioceutical resources that simply cannot be restarted once they have gone extinct.
The same reasoning and its accompanying logic applies to genocide.
As an Agnostic I have really begun to resent the implication that lack of belief in a supernatural deity specifically prohibits the complete formation of a comprehensive and cohesive moral construct.
Zenster --
As an Agnostic I have really begun to resent the implication that lack of belief in a supernatural deity specifically prohibits the complete formation of a comprehensive and cohesive moral construct.
You, too, are misunderstanding what I say.
Your agnosticism does not prevent you from developing a comprehensive and cohesive moral construct. Not at all. You just can’t do it logically.
There is no logical reason for a gene pool not to exterminate another gene pool which is in direct competition with it in the same environment. This is what happened during the Ustasha genocide against the Serbs in Croatia during WW2: the Croats made a serious, systematic, and quite deliberate attempt to exterminate their Serb competitors, and wiped out about a third of them. There was no logical argument against their attempting this, not from a utilitarian standpoint involving population genetics.
A person who believes in God can find a transcendent moral imperative against genocide and other abominations. But an atheist can call on no external moral force to help organize against what he feels is immoral; hence his morality is irrational and incoherent as far as moral philosophy is concerned.
But I offer fervent thanks to God that all the good, decent atheists and agnostics I know still have a well-functioning moral compass, despite the lack of any basis for it in their faith. They are all my brothers and sisters in this struggle.
Baron wrote:
"This is what happened during the Ustasha genocide against the Serbs in Croatia during WW2: the Croats made a serious, systematic, and quite deliberate attempt to exterminate their Serb competitors, and wiped out about a third of them. There was no logical argument against their attempting this..."
There is also no logical argument (in the same relativist scheme) in favor of their attempting this. I.e., there are no real absolute relativists: all supposed relativists are really absolutists (like the rest of religious mankind). The only difference is that many of them have a more or less complex system of denial about their absolutism. (This is due in part to the historical development of activist atheism in the West, beginning in the 17th century and gaining velocity with each passing century since then -- an activism which tended to be propagandistically and ideologically negative in reaction to the ideological structures of the theocracy which they were resisting.)
Baron Bodissey: A person who believes in God can find a transcendent moral imperative against genocide and other abominations. But an atheist can call on no external moral force to help organize against what he feels is immoral; hence his morality is irrational and incoherent as far as moral philosophy is concerned.
I find it curious that someone so admirably meticulous as yourself has rather conspicuously omitted where an Agnostic stands in your previous assessment.
Please elaborate. That is, unless you largely equate Atheism and Agnosticism; something that I find highly unlikely in a person with your abilities of discernment.
Hesperado: According to the non-fiction book Spychips by Katherine Albrecht and Liz McIntyre, the BAR CODE people manage the RFID technology. So, whether YOU believe in RFID chips is less relevant than what the experts in product tracking technology believe.
Many major companies throughout the West are implementing RFID chips in amazing and horrifying ways....
Let's see what Wal-mart is up to:
Wal-Mart's plan to use smart RFID tags sparks privacy concerns
It's easy to see what the RFID chip people are working on:
RFID Journal
This link should work: :)
RFID Journal
P.S. The Wal-mart article is very misleading in one way: notably, the idea that consumers can easily locate and disable RFID tags. WRONG!
RFID tags can be placed inside the actual product instead of packaging AND can be virtually invisible - as small and flat as one period in the small print on a package.
Dear Egghead,
You do yourself a tremendous disservice by indulging in whatever conspiracy theory it is about RFID chips that has caught your attention to such an unprecedented degree.
Far too much of your other writing is of exceptional cogency whereby it should see its credibility suffer such dilution at the hands of some other less worthy conspiracy obsession.
Are there concerns to be had about RFID technology? Hell yes. Are they of such immediate and looming importance whereby they should dominate yours and our discussion of the counterjihad? Not hardly.
Try this on for size. Way back in the early 1990s, there was federal discussion about putting barcode on all American paper currency.
If that doesn't give you a case of the full blown heebie-jeebies, nothing will.
Please, just like a stopped clock, Hesperado gets it right every so often. One such instance is in his assigning PC MC to a non-conspiracy laden motive and it merely being a byproduct of hyper-tolerant, universalist overly altruistic and, almost fatally, myopically short-sighted altruism.
Even by your own lights which hold the Law of Parsimony in such justifiable esteem, this explanation beats the snot out of Fjordman's and everybody else's Vast-Leftwing-Soros/Trilateral Comission/New World Order led plot.
Not that those bastards aren't out to impose much of the same tripe upon us; it's just that there are few ways whereby they could so effectively orchestrate the many disparate and relatively conflicting factors we see into any kind of coordinated front.
Again, for the nonce, please drop the RFID fantasy. Yes, I'm sure there is some dastardly cabal that would like nothing better than to see all of us "chipped" at birth, but they DO NOT and WILL NOT have anywhere the influence you assign to them anytime soon nor in the near future.
Yer Pal,
Zenster
Zenster -
"Please, just like a stopped clock, Hesperado gets it right every so often. One such instance is in his assigning PC MC to a non-conspiracy laden motive and it merely being a byproduct of hyper-tolerant, universalist overly altruistic and, almost fatally, myopically short-sighted altruism."
That is a gracious compliment to the untiring work of the Hesperado in the service of his PC MC thesis. But there might be more merit to it than you ascribe, besides, I think it is not one of the strong points in the defence of this meme, that the mere word "elites" always seems to cause a reflexive response that immediately and without any further ado, denounces the other party as engaging in some kind of "conspiracy" discourse.
Hesperado -
I think it might be a good idea to have a short topic over here at GoV about your PC MC claims (I realize @Baron, that this might look like another request, like that of Latté's). I think that there's much merit in some of your assertions in defence of this meme, but also some very weak points, that I'd like to see it strengthened through discussion.
Take this claim of yours for instance:
"I just think the West is healthier than you seem to think. It would be easier if the problem were a secret cabal that we could somehow detach from the West [..]
One has to wake up from the dream of the conspiracy and see that one's West is not evil nor controlled by a cabal of evil, and strangely powerful, "Elites"."
This claim is just what it is, a claim that appeals to logical reasoning, but without much corroboration by any kind of proof or foundation in daily experience. I detect a number of assumptions that are debatable:
- Speaking of elites amounts to "dreaming" and entertaining "conspiracy theories"
- Things would be easier if PC MC was limited to a conspiring "cabal" (why that word, by the way?
- People think that the "elites" could be detached from the West, and then that would be it.
In all of these claims, I think the exact opposite could be argued, in line with concrete evidence and day to day experience.
So, perhaps you could write a short intro delineating the basic tenets of your PC MC thesis, and what I'd like you to add, or maybe I should do that myself in the comments section, is special attention as to why PC MC is so widespread; why ordinary folk all seem to support it (my counter-claim would be that they don't) and especially, why we would take such a wrong turn, just talking about elites every now and then, and why the problem would be much easier if it really were a problem of just elites (I think that claim is also unwarranted).
I think it would help a lot if you didn't come up with the "visit my blog" answer, which is commendable enough, for this platform seems more of the right place for some collective work on your thesis.
For the greater good of all, for sure ;-)
Kind regs from Amsterdam,
Sag.
Egghead -
Keep up the good work :)
Sag.
Zenster --
An agnostic faces the same epistemological problem as the atheist: how to construct a coherent moral philosophy without recourse to the supernatural. A believer in God obviously does not face the same dilemma.
Your moral sense is admirable, but it cannot be logically derived ex nihilo from the premises acknowledged by an atheist. An agnostic normally has to rely on the same premises as an atheist, since he cannot posit the existence of God. Therefore the agnostic faces the same moral task as the atheist: to create moral justifications using Darwinian or other purely utilitarian rationales.
As I said, your moral compass is sound, but it is inherently irrational. And I thank God for that! Rationality in atheism leads to the mass abattoirs that were perfected by the nihilistic ideologies of the 20th century.
Sagunto,
You quoted me --
"I just think the West is healthier than you seem to think. It would be easier if the problem were a secret cabal that we could somehow detach from the West [..]
One has to wake up from the dream of the conspiracy and see that one's West is not evil nor controlled by a ccabal of evil, and strangely powerful, "Elites"."
-- then wrote:
"I detect a number of assumptions that are debatable:
- Speaking of elites amounts to "dreaming" and entertaining "conspiracy theories" "
Right off the bat, you posit a straw man. My words which you quoted do not say that mere "speaking of elites" amounts to dreaming and entertaining conspiracy theories. My words describe the content of such dreams about conspiracy theories: namely, that the West is evil and controlled by a secret cabal and that this evil control explains the problem of the West's inability to fight Islam (and even, to some, explains Islam's threat since it would be manipulated by the evil Western cabal).
When we move from the specific purport of my words to a generic "speaking about elites", we have to determine how those "elites" are being spoken of, to see whether they fall into the type of Gnostic thought which I was describing. I have never said that mere "speaking of elites" always falls under that category. I have conceded many times that in the West, elites are real and do exert deleterious influence on the West's ability to manage the problem of Islam. My point has always been that because the West is singularly free, healthy and democratic (and unprecedentedly so compared with all other polities throughout the history of the world), elites can only have influence over a problem like Islam to the extent that the non-elites let them. And, again due to the singularly free, healthy and democratic nature of the modern West, non-elites, in granting elites the amount of influence they do in this regard, are neither sheep nor being amazingly manipulated: the more likely explanation is that the non-elite masses are, in sufficient numbers, themselves sincerely pc mc in this regard concerning the problem of Islam (though not necessarily in all other regards which pc mc affects).
I further find that the resistance many in the AIM have to this explanation seems to indicate a curious alienation from one's fellow Westerners and from one's modern Western popular culture, which represents the sun on a sunny day out in the open sky, while these AIM people seem hunched in the dark speculating about how powerful and dark forces are causing the general myopia to the danger of Islam. In doing so, they seem cut off from the massively influential, and normal, habits of heart and mind which have characterized the modern West for generations now and have become dominant and mainstream not through some dastardly Macchiavellian project, but through an organic civilizational process of change in Weltanschauung.
[see next post]
[part 2]
"- Things would be easier if PC MC was limited to a conspiring "cabal" (why that word, by the way?"
The word only is appropriate when people speak of elites manipulating the problem of Islam out of reach of the common man and the normative sociopolitical processes by which major issues are adjudicated.
"- People think that the "elites" could be detached from the West, and then that would be it."
You here are not grasping what I mean by "detached". I mean conceptually detached, in the sense that the West remains in the mind salvageable, yet currently in thrall to the evil power and influence of these alites. This is often not a coherent conceptualization, for sometimes the "good West" seems so small -- a Saved Remnant in a sense -- and the "bad West" so monumental, one wonders whether there is any real West left in these people's minds. At any rate, your incomplete quotation of my phrase there lopped off that very paradox I was attempting to allude to:
...a secret cabal that we could somehow detach from the West, even though, paradoxically, we impute to it enough power to control the entire West.
"In all of these claims, I think the exact opposite could be argued, in line with concrete evidence and day to day experience."
I'm not sure what "experience" you are referring to. Nobody has experience of a secret cabal: people have various experiences of Big Government doing this, that and the other annoying or intrusive thing, and then some of those people construct interpretations of what these various experiences mean, which may or may not lead to descriptions that reflect a Gnostic alienation from authority structures whose function becomes one metaphorically akin to, for example, the Pauline "principalities and powers" controlling the cosmos and frustrating the salvation, or escape, of the true believer.
"...why ordinary folk all seem to support it (my counter-claim would be that they don't)..."
They do and they don't: i.e., they do about some things, but they don't about other things. The point is, the pc mc reflex about Ethnic Minorities and therefore about this Ethnic culture Islam has enormous cachet among a broad swath of diverse people throughout the West -- more than almost any other issue -- including conservatives and ordinary folks as much as Leftists and elites. On other sociopolitical issues, such a demographically diverse swath is not as pronounced.
Baron Bodissey: As I said, your moral compass is sound, but it is inherently irrational. And I thank God for that!
Not a drop of wasted irony in that statement there, good Baron. No, siree!
I still do not believe that you have definitively posited why an Agnostic is incapable of moral surety. There is most clearly such a thing as Right and Wrong. A prime example is how:
RAPE IS ALWAYS WRONG.
Proof: Even if there was only one woman left on the entire earth and humanity's continued existence relied upon her bearing children; raping her in order to obtain those offspring would be illogical because she could just as easily shun them as objects of her trauma and let them starve, if not kill them outright.
As I pointed out earlier, genocide does not make sense for reasons of its own.
Furthermore ― although this goes too far astray to warrant truly detailed discussion ― Agnostics may retain access to aspects of human spirituality that Atheists could possibly be denying themselves of.
This retention of human spiritualism provides Agnostics with a dimension of positive mysticism ― as opposed to the more frequently employed obfuscatory or negative mysticism that is used to render so much of our world as "unknowable" ― which may not be on offer to Atheists. I'll ask that this board's Atheists check in with their own reading of that.
Well, I think that is enough brain twisting for now.
Zenster --
“Rape is always wrong” is a moral statement, but it cannot be logically derived from premises that do not include a transcendent moral order.
From the standpoint of the rapist’s DNA, multiple repeated rapes of conquered women are a positive good, since his genome will thereby be reproduced more widely.
From a political standpoint, if it helps to subdue and cow an enemy population, it is a positive good.
From his personal standpoint, if he enjoys the process it is a positive good.
You cannot find an absolute logical moral argument against rape (or any other repulsive activity, for that matter) without recourse to principles that lie outside a godless physical continuum. It simply can’t be done.
Since belief in God is already illogical, a believer doesn’t labor under the same constraints.
As Walt Whitman said in “Leaves of Grass”:
Hurrah for positive science! long live exact demonstration!
[…]
Gentlemen! to you the first honors always:
Your facts are useful and real — and yet they are not my dwelling;
(I but enter by them to an area of my dwelling.)
Baron Bodissey: From the standpoint of the rapist’s DNA, multiple repeated rapes of conquered women are a positive good, since his genome will thereby be reproduced more widely.
From a political standpoint, if it helps to subdue and cow an enemy population, it is a positive good.
From his personal standpoint, if he enjoys the process it is a positive good.
You left out the part about how rape victims and their spouses tend to hunt down and kill rapists. Short of child murder, rape tends to engender some of the most enduring hostility imaginable. It is worth noting that even hardcore prison populations reserve special treatment for rapists.
Occupying forces that engage in mass rape encounter far more entrenched opposition and lethal resistance.
Finally, any man who is capable of deriving pleasure from the rape of another human being is so morally void that "positive good" no longer pertains to such an individual. They have crossed over into a realm of demonic and diabolic existence that has little to do with life or humanity.
Try watching Oliver Stone's superb production of Amy Tan's "The Joy Luck Club" to see what abused women are capable of doing to a husband's child. I suggest that rapist's offspring have often received similar treatment throughout much of history. This does not even account for how a traumatized rape victim may no longer be able to render effective childcare even if she wanted to.
You are entitled to reduce this argument down to simple genetics or bare politics but this is the realm of humans and human emotions, which are anything but simple.
As a final example; Native American women made a practice of staking down rapists naked and then using oyster shells to slowly scrape away the entire exposed epidermis of their victim until the man was literally flayed alive but able to survive quite well afterward in ultimate agony for many long hours.
Rape has rightful consequences for those vile enough to engage in it. I find it impossible to confer any genetic, military or evolutionary benefit upon an individual who has discarded such a large portion of their humanity whereby they are capable of justifying, much less practicing, rape on any sort of mass scale. The empty husk that remains of what once was a living person is no longer able to fulfill anything else remotely definable as human.
Muslim men ― who do regard rape in such a positive manner ― are prime examples of how such moral vacuity totally retards both gender and culture alike. We have already seen the hideous burden imposed by consanguineous marriage. Who knows what insanely dark malignancies are spawned by a widespread acceptance of rape by Muslim men.
It is difficult to conceive of a more searing indictment against Islam and Muslim men than their ready acceptance and participation in rape. It is so heinous as to rival Islamic terrorism, if only because of how much more frequently it has been practiced. In reality, it is a direct form of terrorism so there really is no rivalry.
All I know is that these abhorrent aspects of Muslim culture make it very likely that ― should all of Islam be immolated in nuclear fire ― it will be difficult for me to squeeze out a single tear.
Zenster --
I didn’t say that utilitarian arguments couldn’t be made against rape. I merely emphasized that your assertion that “rape is always wrong” cannot be logically supported using atheist or agnostic premises. It is logically untenable.
The same goes for all other stated moral positions. One may argue the pros and cons of them based on utilitarian considerations, but they cannot be absolutely right or absolutely wrong without reference to a moral order that stands outside the continuum.
Your arguments, in effect, consist of waving your hands, raising your voice, and saying with ever-greater volume and vehemence, “IT’S WRONG!”
Well, it is wrong. But it can’t be proven wrong, not given your premises.
Instead of repeating your assertions over and over in lieu of proof, I suggest you use Aristotelian methods of argument. Lay out your premises or postulates clearly and specifically, and then use logical analysis on them carefully in a series of steps to prove your case.
I won’t respond to any more hand-waving — there’s no point.
I totally agree with you about what is right and wrong, but there is no logical basis for it in the premises available to agnosticism. There just isn’t.
Zenster:
You seem to hold very PC, radical Yin feelings about rape. Do you know that for millions of years rape has been pretty common among non-human primates? Or that rape was considered OK in the Bible and in the ancient Hellas (so-called kidnap marriages). In the Old Testament you could abduct a girl from another tribe and the only condition was not to rape her in the first two months.
And let’s not talk about the Greco-Roman world. The Rape of the Sabine Women for example is a corner stone for the culture that begot me, Cesar, and all of us: an episode in the legendary history of Rome in which the first generation of Roman men acquired wives for themselves from the neighboring Sabine families.
@ “As a final example; Native American women made a practice of staking down rapists naked and then using oyster shells to slowly scrape away the entire exposed epidermis of their victim until the man was literally flayed alive but able to survive quite well afterward in ultimate agony for many long hours.”
Zenster:
I am curious who is the real monster here. In another thread you said that you read my book The Return of Quetzalcoatl. If this is true, how could you have forgotten the fact that, before the European conquest of the continent, the Amerindians perpetrated flaying on totally innocent victims? If you really read my book I find it shocking that you missed it. (Also, throughout the continent the Amerindians practiced infanticide and child sacrifice on a gigantic scale—please don’t use them as your moral compass!)
I am not saying that it’s good to rape women in modern times or that I want to turn the clock back to the Old Testament times or even to the Greco-Roman world. But what you say strikes me as extremely confused and inconsistent for the moral standards of a true “agnostic”.
I notice also that Zenster's attempted arguments against rape often tend to be circular: he cites how people tend to abhor and punish rapists as evidence that rape is wrong; but such a citation begs the question. At best, Zenster's basis for opposing rape is "well, most people throughout time have opposed it". That is not a good enough basis, since people throughout history also do bad things (or things one would wish to deem "bad").
Baron: "...belief in God is already illogical...."
I beg to differ. :)
Belief in God is the only way to create a society worth living in - particularly for your particular wife and children. Ensuring that your progeny are members of a stable society increases the chances of your genetic survival for longer than your lifetime.
P.S. Both Muslims and I label Allah as a different entity than God, so everyone here can avoid citing Islam against me. Indeed, Islam proves my point that a society living without God is vicious to women and children.
Zenster: One word: Cassandra. I come from a long line of intuitive thinkers. You'd be amazed! :)
All that I ask of you is that BEFORE you dismiss the power and plan of RFID chips being used to control humanity, read the non-fiction book Spychips by Katherine Albrecht and Liz McIntyre.
Baron, we do not corporeally exist outside of reality. Ergo, all human value judgments must be made on a utilitarian basis. Not doing so is both irrational and counter-productive.
Your resort to demanding that a Supreme Being is required to establish moral authority is as irrational and arbitrary, if not more so, than any construct I seek to introduce.
Our existence provides indisputable proof that the universe is life oriented. Therefore, whatever controlling set of parameters (e.g., Tao, etc.) that can possibly be conceived of as transcending reality, of standing "outside of the continuum" must be life-oriented as well. If there is to be any definition of “good” it must be that which is in accordance with the universe’s own construction and operative system. The universe is beyond question a benevolent entity or else something so incredibly unlikely and fragile, such as human life, could not possibly exist.
Rape is most clearly not life-oriented. Otherwise, it would be the norm for procreative processes, which it most clearly is not. Continuation of the human species has always depended upon a quasi-benevolent family structure with which rape is not consonant. Nowhere does anyone see any sort of flourishing “rape cult” or “rape-based culture” wherein rape is the primary mode of reproductive intercourse. Much to the contrary, cultures within which rape is a relatively dominant interpersonal feature usually tend to display retrogressive characteristics.
Perpetration of rape is contrary to that life-orientation which is demanded by the universe of surviving individuals in order to perpetuate their own DNA. Ergo, it is against or contrary to reality. Voiding itself of utilitarian aspect also voids itself of moral aspect as morality must ipso facto be life-oriented and reality-based. The universe — and what is consistent with its own operative structure — is a de facto handbook of what is moral and immoral. My arguing that is no different but far less arbitrary — save to the extent that you regard the universe itself to be arbitrary — than adding an entirely unnecessary layer of construct required to posit the existence of a Supreme Being and, by subsequent extension, morality.
As to suggestions that my position on rape is exceedingly yin, the superior (yang) man has no need to commit rape, does not need to initiate violence and eschews such senseless barbarity. Term that as yin if you so desire but you would be exceedingly wrong in doing so.
Sagunto: Thank you for being open-minded. I am grateful! :)
Hesperado: Is Islam itself a "secret cabal"?
If so, then it seems that you are determined to "hog" the "secret cabals" all for yourself.
That's just not FAIR. :)
Egghead,
Islam is not a secret cabal in the sense of a putatively evil and dangerously subversive cell for which one has no massive smoking gun evidence. The conquests of Persia, India, Christian Middle East, Christian Africa, Christian Spain and Christian Eastern Europe -- coupled with 1,000 years of formal military attacks on the West (resulting in over 200 million massacred and millions more horribly oppressed and tortured and enslaved) (not even counting the resumption of terrorism against the West in the last 50 years escalating with each passing decade) -- amount to massively dangerous and subersive behavior which no cabal in history has ever provided.
The fact that I have to point out this monstrously elementary distinction is dismaying.
Hesperado: Methinks I hit a nerve.
Assuming for a moment that we are ALL on the side of human freedom, it would be FAIR of you to admit that I have made a salient point:
An examination of the beginning of Islam indeed reveals that Mohammed employed a "secret cabal" to start Islam. Look how far Mohammed got - without using modern technology!
Even today, after 1,400+ years of destructive behavior and Sharia-complicit imams in plain sight, the majority of the PC MC crowd (most citizens of the goodhearted USA and Europe, according to you) steadfastly denies that the goal of Islam is to conquer the world.
So, why would I be surprised that YOU would ignore an abundance of tangible evidence that the New World Order is using Islam as a tool to achieve its own goal of world domination to be enforced using modern technology - namely RFID chips implanted in humans?
Cabal
VeriChip TV Ad Confirms Critics’ Fears: They Want Everyone Implanted
I'm obliged to observe that this thread has sorely failed to yield anything close to the very-much-needed-accord it once seemed to promise.
That is nothing short of a tragedy.
I will make a final restatement of my position on the rational deduction of a moral code from observable reality in a separate post.
However, I am first obliged to remark upon how objectionable it is that no other Atheists or Agnostics came forward to either assist or productively dispute my own earnest attempts to demonstrate a rational basis for deducing a moral code from extent reality.
I do not know if it is plain cowardice, an inability of others to codify their thoughts or a sudden inarticulateness right when clarity is most needed, but I find it exceedingly disappointing.
Especially so with respect to the usual counter-productive sniping that others seek to pass off as legitimate debate. Again, where is there any significant attempt to seek out some sort of middle ground in all of this?
Zenster,
I am a sort of agnostic too. Or a “panentheist” (nor pantheist) perhaps (classic German idealism)? Whatever, I am definitively not a theist. The Problem of Evil refutes theism. And I do believe that non-theists have a strong platform for moral standards. My own standard is compassion. I know this may sound a little “Yin” but it’s a complex subject for a mere post. Compassion makes me feel pity for the Other, even if the Other is a Muslim, a Somali immigrant or a Jew. So I cannot approve atrocities, torture, or whatever causes extreme suffering. It is false that only theists have strong moral standards.
You should visit other blogs too, it is refreshing. My favorite is Counter-Currents Publishing. Greg Johnson’s latest article there has aroused much support from the nationalists who post in other blogs.
Zenster,
When you are speaking about Islam your sarcasm, wit, and vehemence seem appropriate but on this subject your indignation is a bit overdone. I agree with the Baron both in his view and his statement that you have missed the crucial point. Or I guess it could be that you simply do not agree but you did not directly engage it. In your last round you did male a better argument for yourself but its a teleological one which is great and which also happens to be one of the most powerful arguments for the existence of a god.
Zenster,
I'm an agnostic who believes in a transcendent source of morality. As an agnostic I don't "know" it, but I nevertheless believe it.
I agree with Baron that the material universe cannot provide such a source, since matter/energy has no moral value or positions, and if there is no transcendent source, "man" is just one more material thing in the universe. His various feelings that seem subjectively moral may feel that way temporarily, but they have no authority to stand as the truth of the moral matter under consideration. In such a scheme, "morals" are just ideas based on feelings, and all of them are various configurations and concatenations of biochemical matter,ultimately. When you have one conglomeration of biochemical matter opposing rape, and another conglomeration of biochemical matter supporting rape, there can obviously be no arbiter over and above the two, if everything relevant to humans is ultimately biochemical matter.
Zenster: As the Buddhists would remind you, perhaps you ask the wrong question when you ask, "Has an agnostic/atheist a GOD nature?"
In honor of the Japanese people:
"The word mu is central to the following well-known Zen Buddhist koan, which is also known as the Mu koan[1]:
"A monk asked Zhaozhou Congshen, a Chinese Zen master (known as Jōshū in Japanese), "Has a dog Buddha-nature or not?" Zhaozhou answered, "Wú" (in Japanese, Mu).
—The Gateless Gate, koan 1, translation by Robert Aitken
"This koan is one of several traditionally used by Rinzai school to initiate students into Zen study, and interpretations of it vary widely. Some earlier Buddhist thinkers maintained that animals did have Buddha nature, others believed that they did not. Zhaozhou's answer, which literally means that dogs do not have Buddha nature, has been interpreted to mean that such categorical thinking is a delusion, that yes and no are both right and wrong. Alternatively, Yasutani Haku'un of the Sanbo Kyodan maintained that "the koan is not about whether a dog does or does not have a Buddha-nature because everything is Buddha-nature, and either a positive or negative answer is absurd because there is no particular thing called Buddha-nature.
"In his 1974 novel Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Robert M. Pirsig translated mu as "no thing", saying that it meant "unask the question". He offered the example of a computer circuit using the binary numeral system, in effect using mu to represent high impedance:
"For example, it's stated over and over again that computer circuits exhibit only two states, a voltage for "one" and a voltage for "zero." That's silly! Any computer-electronics technician knows otherwise. Try to find a voltage representing one or zero when the power is off! The circuits are in a mu state.
"A kōan is a fundamental part of the history and lore of Zen Buddhism. It consists of a story, dialogue, question, or statement, the meaning of which cannot be understood by rational thinking but may be accessible through intuition.
"The purpose of kōans for a Zen practitioner is to become aware of the difference between himself, his mind, and his beliefs, which influence how he sees the world; and, ultimately, to help him realize his true nature. Once a Zen practitioner becomes aware of his mind as an independent form, the kōan makes sense and the teaching point is realized."
Source: Mu(negative) and Koan Wikipedia
To wit, I reply to you, Zen-ster: Remember your God nature, and you will remember God. :)
I read Kapleu’s The Three Pillars of Zen twice: in 1978 and 2005. Zen Buddhism is the perfect example of a non-theistic religion. Since then I’ve become more and more skeptical that the historical Sidjata Gotama experienced “satori” (“kensho” or illumination); and wrote about it in my blog in Spanish (just as, since I lost my Christian faith, I have become more and more skeptical that the historical Yeshu resuscitated among the death—“form criticism”, “redaction criticism”, etc.—Schweitzer’s The Quest of the Historical Jesus the starting point of these studies).
"Zen Buddhism is the perfect example of a non-theistic religion."
Yes, I did realize - and yet who could resist referring to Zen when talking with Zen-ster - especially where the mu koan is so relevant to his present dilemma? :)
I am very philosophical about who believes in God (and when) because I believe that each soul will come to God in its own time - maybe in this life, maybe in another. :)
Machs nix. It is all about your soul growing to perfection over time - and finally reuniting with God. :)
Albert Schweitzer, 1915:
"But what is civilization?"
"The essential element in civilization is the ethical perfecting of the individual as well as society. At the same time, every spiritual and every material step forward has significance for civilization. The will to civilization is, then, the universal will to progress that is conscious of the ethical as the highest value. In spite of the great importance we attach to the achievements of science and human prowess, it is obvious that only a humanity that is striving for ethical ends can benefit in full measure from material progress and can overcome the dangers that accompany it........” “The only possible way out of chaos is for us to adopt a concept of the world based on the ideal of true civilization.”"
"The will to civilization is, then, the universal will to progress that..."
That sounds pretty Hegelian. After all, it was 1915.
Yin = advanced civilization (Both interior and exterior improvement are emphasized. Western people attempt to improve themselves as well as society.)
Yang = barbarism (Exterior improvement is emphasized. Muslim people attempt to improve their living conditions at the expense of the living conditions of others.)
Wikipedia on Hegel:
"The finite has to become infinite in order to achieve reality. The idea of the absolute excludes multiplicity so the subjective and objective must achieve synthesis to become whole. This is because, as Hegel suggests by his introduction of the concept of "reality", what determines itself--rather than depending on its relations to other things for its essential character--is more fully "real" (following the Latin etymology of "real": more "thing-like") than what does not. Finite things don't determine themselves, because, as "finite" things, their essential character is determined by their boundaries, over against other finite things. So, in order to become "real", they must go beyond their finitude ("finitude is only as a transcending of itself")."
Talking about Yang/Yin and women's "rights", these excerpts from "a conservative from another world" is what I believe:
http://caesartort.blogspot.com/2011/01/anthony-ludovici-conservative-from.html
More Wikipedia on Hegel:
"The result of this argument is that finite and infinite—and, by extension, particular and universal, nature and freedom—don't face one another as two independent realities, but instead the latter (in each case) is the self-transcending of the former. Rather than stress the distinct singularity of each factor that complements and conflicts with others--without explanation--the relationship between finite and infinite (and particular and universal, and nature and freedom) becomes intelligible as a progressively developing and self-perfecting whole."
Wikipedia on Hegel on Religion 1:
"Hegel's thoughts on the person of Jesus Christ stood out from the theologies of the Enlightenment. In his posthumous book, The Christian Religion: Lectures on Philosophy of Religion Part 3, he espouses that, "God is not an abstraction but a concrete God...God, considered in terms of his eternal Idea, has to generate the Son, has to distinguish himself from himself; he is the process of differentiating, namely, love and Spirit". This means that Jesus as the Son of God is posited by God over against himself as other. Hegel sees both a relational unity and a metaphysical unity between Jesus and God the Father."
Wikipedia on Hegel on Religion 2:
"To Hegel, Jesus is both divine and Human. Hegel further attests that God (as Jesus) not only died, but "...rather, a reversal takes place: God, that is to say, maintains himself in the process, and the latter is only the death of death. God rises again to life, and thus things are reversed." Hegel therefore maintains not only the deity of Jesus, but the resurrection as a reality."
While we're mentioning Hegel, it would be helpful to read Eric Voegelin's On Hegel: A Study in Sorcery.
Excerpt, opening paragraph:
When the gods are expelled from the cosmos, they world they have left becomes boring. In the seventeenth century, the ennui explored by Pascal was still the mood of a man who had lost his faith and must protect himself from the blackness of anxiety by divertissements; after the French Revolution, the ennui was recognized by Hegel as the syndrome of an age in history. It had taken a century and a half for the lostness of a world without God to develop from a personal malaise of existence to a social disease.
There is one group, the members of which perhaps bear the greatest responsibility and blame for our current predicament.
The members of this group are the academics, the professors and instructors who teach our young and mold their opinions. These are the people who teach our journalists and our teachers. These are the people who populate the think tanks, are hired by government, advise our governmental officials, appear on media as “experts,” and write
popular books.
In the most prestigious colleges and universities, up to 80 to 90% of the faculty are of the liberal/left political persuasion. Most believe and support PC MC dogma in all its manifestations. They hire according to its tenets and tend to only hire those who share their PC MC beliefs. Like many educated people on the left, they have a tendency to mistrust and dismiss Christianity—but they do like Islam. Their effects upon our society over time have been pervasive and nothing short of catastrophic.
And yet I don't remember anyone on this blog suggesting the possibility of restricting the voting rights of Academics :)
Hesperado -
Would you be willing to consider participation in a topic, sometime in the near future, on your PC MC thesis, if I asked the Baron to provide us with the opportunity? I think the matter important and reckon it would be appreciated by many.
Kind regs from Amsterdam
Yes Sagunto, I would like to participate in such a discussion. I may have to wait until after May 1, due to time constraints (if the participation entails too much time).
Thanks for the invitation.
Hesperado -
Of course, and before anything else, all depends on the Baron/Dymphna consenting to such a special on your PC MC thesis.
But assuming that will be the case, let's make it a classic, worthwhile topic then, and prepare for an interesting and entertaining start of May ;-)
For the public discussion I have in mind, your full online presence, attention and participation would be invaluable, so I'll wait to "formally" ask the Baron to provide the opportunity.
Thanks and as always, kind regs from Amsterdam,
Sag.
I was just sitting here thinking that the Welfare State essentially parallels polygamy in Islam. In other words, the Welfare State encourages men to have multiple female partners/families.
By assuring men that any progeny produced via any number of girls and women will be supported into adulthood, the Welfare State encourages men to reproduce.
The oft-cited (argh) biological imperative for men to "spread their seed" far and wide might indicate an inherent male stake in the Welfare State culture.(Egghead)
And perhaps the easy removal of men from their families courtesy of easy welfare might present a valid reason for men not to commit to building a family and therefore having a stake in civilisation.
Coming in late to the conversation as usual, but I'll try and finish reading everything in the next few days.
Basically, when it comes to the "feminisation of Western civ", I'm a long time reader of both The Spearhead and Roissy, and believe while the content is challenging and their commenters likewise, there is still some truth to be gleaned.
I'm well aware that as a woman who reads both of those I'm a bit of a freak, but "Feminism" has run its course and is now a tool for those who would return us to serfdom.
There are far too many policies that favour the female at the expense of the male. The no fault divorce is one of them.
When one person can walk away from a supposedly binding contract with few repercussions, then the contract is worthless.
When men, moreso than women, are portrayed as buffoons in the media, are legally discriminated against in the job market purely because they are men, then why on earth would we expect them to realise that they are worthwhile inheritors of our totally awesome civilisation?
Being all-inclusive has brought nothing but trouble, and the newspeak of the New Age has clouded minds.
Women are no better nor worse than men. We are all just people, and when we pull together in concert, we can reach the tallest heights ever.
When we are disunited, however, we fall.
I will give a shout out to Queen, by the way, and her comments on introducing islam to feminists. :)
When feminists try to tell me about how islam honours women, I just ask them why they think that beating your wife is an honourable thing to do.
4.34 shuts them down every time.
(amusingly enough, the word verification is "yinst")
"One may oppose genocide because one doesn’t like it and finds it repugnant. But it can’t be opposed based on logic and reason alone."
Baron, I think you might find this just a little too close to your position for comfort. Have you really never met an atheist who was familiar with the Iterated Prisoner's Dilemma or the Golden Rule?
The Golden Rule is why I would have no objection to Israel taking any measure against the Muslim population of the Gaza Strip, without limit. Hamas having declared their intent to kill every Jew, whether in the territory of Israel or elsewhere, they have forfeited any moral right to forebearance; Israel has carte blanche in my book to do whatever is required to eliminate Hamas. It is Hamas which has eliminated the option of "live and let live", so it is right that those who brought Hamas to power should pay the price.
Zenster, I've been much too busy to even get to the end of this fast-moving thread until today. Otherwise I would have had your back.
On another matter, it's no wonder that Egghead's comments are blocked. Conspiracy junk must be flagged as spam so often that it must practically beg the filters to catch it. A chip may be the size of a pinhead, but it will require a much larger antenna to interact with the world; that antenna makes it susceptible to e.g. frying with microwaves. Many such chips can also be reprogrammed and all can be spoofed, subverting the system.
Last, I find a lot to agree with in your comment, Nilk.
Queen: this is perfect example of female thinking at work. It is not about taking away your specific right to vote. It is about women in general. Women, in general, cannot generalize. You just proved that. Women in general like sexy over reliable, like security over liberty, like cute over competent. Women in general also think that one counterexample disproves statistics.
There are exceptions. The problem is that they are EXCEPTIONS.
Your arguments - all based on "me, me, me", and also complete validations of Vox Day's rule about women's most passionate arguments always based on how it makes them FEEL - are PERFECT examples of why women SHOULD NOT vote.
"Ditto the mothers of the 11 and 12 year olds being targeted by Muslim rape gangs in Britain. THIS IS A WOMEN'S RIGHTS ISSUE LIKE NO OTHER.
There is no way the multi-culti feminists can blunt this argument."
Don't you get it yet?
Feminism is a SUBSET of leftism. When it comes to a conflict between feminism and Islam, feminism gives way, every time.
If you were less inclined to screaming fits at the name "Roissy" this phenomenon might actually make sense to you. In any case, this battle is a losing one, it has been lost every time it has been attempted. But hey, don't take my word for it, go prove me wrong: turn Islamization around based on feminist arguments.
Ok, having read the rest of this, I see no reason to change what I have said.
Equal rights and equal suffrage is something that got invented a hundred years ago. The corresponding trends regarding growth in government and increasing disfunction are clear. That they are directly causally related is not proven, but it would be foolish to claim there is no connection when we have thousands of years of history of doing it the other way, WITHOUT the specific societal disfunction
I realize how hard this is for modern women to accept. In fact I don't expect them to. I expect that they will try to preserve the system, will fail - due to the young men being absolutely unmotivated to contribute - and that building the one I advocate will be my children's and grandchildren's task. They will have the benefit of seeing the utter failure of the feminist system before them.
And if I am wrong, it costs nobody anything, because the feminists will have won already and we will all be living in a shiny futuro-technomage society of peace and rainbows.
Rollory,
I’ve redacted the insults and profanity in your comment. If you do something like this again, I will delete the comment outright. I don’t have time to play censor.
=======
(wow, the things you find when you stay away from a thread for a week!)
"that WOMEN have done for the cause for YEARS before people like "Rollory" even knew what Islam was all about."
[insults redacted]
"I'll continue to fight Islam on my own, but I part company with anyone who wants to take away my right to work, vote, or be an equal citizen in my country. I've read this blog for many years, but if this is the way it's going to go, I'll continue to go my own way.
Please do NOT go down this route. You will only alienate intelligent women like me who have given our hearts and souls to the counterjihad for years."
Ok. Here's the deal. You want things to work your way, MAKE IT HAPPEN.
What you ARE NOT allowed to do is to benefit and champion feminism and then complain that men aren't responding to the resulting incentives the way you think they should - that is, they aren't being sufficiently slavish to you. It doesn't matter how this makes you FEEL. It does not WORK.
My claim is that fighting Islam, just like any other great project, will depend entirely and solely on the Western/European/white men deciding to actually DO it, and that they WILL NOT decide to do so as long as the current female-empowered society remains in place. You can complain about this. You can throw tantrums. You can mount whisper campaigns behind people's backs. You can take your ball and go home. NONE OF THAT MAKES A [intensifier] BIT OF DIFFERENCE. The only thing that counts is success. If you can stop Islam your way, DO IT. If you are sure you are correct, you should not be afraid of me.
What I am advocating is: one family, one vote, with the patriarch as the executive. This is the traditional, historically sound system. It is the system that has been overthrown over the course of the last century. It is the system that was overthrown in the fading days of the Roman Empire, and in the weak years of the Caliphate before the Mongols, and in every society that is trending toward dissolution and collapse. These things are not random coincidences, nor are they evil conspiracies. They are facts of life and human nature. That they make you FEEL bad does not make them go away.
Hi Engineer-Poet: Before you dismiss RFID chips, read Spychips by Katherine Albrecht and Liz McIntyre.
Remember, the BAR CODE people are in charge of RFID chips, so the people who manage tracking believe in RFID chips. I trust that they know more than you. :)
There is one group, the members of which perhaps bear the greatest responsibility and blame for our current predicament.
The members of this group are the academics, the professors and instructors who teach our young and mold their opinions. These are the people who teach our journalists and our teachers. These are the people who populate the think tanks, are hired by government, advise our governmental officials, appear on media as “experts,” and write
popular books.
In the most prestigious colleges and universities, up to 80 to 90% of the faculty are of the liberal/left political persuasion. Most believe and support PC MC dogma in all its manifestations. They hire according to its tenets and tend to only hire those who share their PC MC beliefs. Like many educated people on the left, they have a tendency to mistrust and dismiss Christianity—but they do like Islam. Their effects upon American political thought, over time, have been pervasive and nothing short of catastrophic.
And yet no one on this blog has suggested the possibility of restricting the voting rights of Academics :)
Please pardon the delay in my response but I felt that Gates of Vienna deserved my best effort at this eternal question. That effort took some three days in total.
Michael Servetus: In your last round you did make a better argument for yourself but it’s a teleological one which is great and which also happens to be one of the most powerful arguments for the existence of a god.
Michael Servetus, I really appreciate your sincere reply. I do not seek to propose a fully teleological argument as one must when arguing the existence of a Supreme Being. There may, indeed, be no absolute or ultimate purpose the existence of this universe.
However, that does not render human life without its own purpose. Call it creating order out of chaos if you will, but I do not believe, nor is it a foregone conclusion, that the universe is not a relatively well-ordered system. Einstein said that the most incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it is so comprehensible. Should that orderliness be the case ― and there is much to suggest such a thing ― then there is little argument against how that pattern of order can provide a schematic for other dynamics of perception or conduct.
The most significant thing is that these percepts can be drawn logically and rationally from empirically observable events in our surrounding universe. They do not require any reliance upon the supernatural or inductive steps in reasoning. Moreover, these percepts in no way preclude the existence of a Supreme Being but neither do they conjure up the conundrum of who designed the Designer.
Given: The universe is, for the most part, benevolent
Given: That benevolence enables the existence of life
Given: Life does not manifest in the absence of energy
Given: The regular and persistent patterns of life are positive
Given: These patterns only emerge as a result of energy flow
Given: These flow patterns may not be an intrinsic property of matter
Given: The dualistic property of energy endows it with polarity
Given: Matter does not readily exhibit a similarly dualistic physical property
Given: Energy exerts an organizational influence upon matter
Given: That organizational property is, at least temporarily, enthalpic
Given: Energy’s enthalpic property tends to self-reinforce
Given: This feedback loop tends to reinforce more positivistic energy
Given: That which benevolently continues life is the most positive
Given: This positivistic energy is a direct manifestation of universal benevolence
Given: Positive energy is of value or worth to non-human and human life
Given: Behavior which increases the flow of positive energy is worthy
Given: Increasing the flow of positive energy is generally beneficial to life
Given: Many values that generally drive life can be mapped onto human existence
Given: Selection of the most utile values forms a catalogue of functional behavior
Given: Adopting functional behavior increases chances of life and overall lifespan
Given: Increasing ones chances of life and lifespan is beneficial to ones DNA
Given: DNA benefits best from benevolent organizations of positive energy flow
Given: Overall quality of life thrives more on benevolent activity than the opposite
Given: Worthy behavior is most conducive to positive energy flow
Given: Worthy behavioral modes that enable functional patterns of life are truisms
Given: These truisms can be aggregated into a value structured catalogue of functional behavior
Given: The prioritization of such a value structured catalog of functional behavior is useful
Given: The most useful and life promoting functional behaviors are components of moral conduct
Ergo: Morals can be derived from consistent and observable patterns of benevolent, universal life-giving energy flow
I welcome critiques of this if they are given in earnest.
Engineer-Poet: Zenster, I've been much too busy to even get to the end of this fast-moving thread until today. Otherwise I would have had your back.
Thank you, I appreciate your support. Here's a grand opportunity to provide a bit more if you see fit to.
Egghead, at your suggestion I looked through some of the links that you have provided.
I agree with you that the prospects envisioned by these RFID promoters are deeply disturbing. The degree with which they tie into apocalyptic scenarios from the Bible almost seem to transcend coincidence.
One conjecture I will draw from such notions as embedding microchips in this nation's population is that of revolution or civil war. Any attempt to do what you have been alluding to and, otherwise, proposed by these obsessive control freaks masquerading as scientists would constitute more than adequate grounds for a popular uprising.
I hope this balances any appearance of having been dismissive about this technology. It's dire implications were already quite clear to me when I first commented about this topic. However, in all fairness, you do deserve a fair hearing on the subject and I hope this was something of the sort.
on-my-own-in-berkeley: And yet no one on this blog has suggested the possibility of restricting the voting rights of Academics
I think that once they've received their just desserts for such near-universal treason, being able to vote might not even be in question.
Testing
Zenster: Thanks for being open-minded! :)
I will look at your moral construct theory later today, and reply back to this thread.
Per RFID chips, the strength of any comment about RFID chips is that the plans are already out in the open in American patents. The companies are clear about commercial plans.
Get a copy of the book Spychips for a more complete story. There are passive and active RFID chips which will be used for different purposes. The passive chips can get the government pretty far in controlling individual access to resources. The active chips can track people anywhere on Earth when implemented via satellites.
Once you are generally aware about RFID chips, then you can tease further plans from news items.
For example, the reason that Obama is determined to force socialized health care onto American citizens (and illegals) is in order to chip us - in due time.
Obama is on record saying how great it would be if everyone had a permanent central location for their medical records. People who would never dream of accepting an implantable RFID chip will take a chip if it is the only way for them and their children to receive "free" medical care "provided" exclusively by the government.
But, in case people decide to hold out, the Dept. of Homeland Security has a regulation on the books that enables POLICE (rather than medical personnel) to enter your house and forcibly vaccinate you. P.S. RFID chips are small enough to be put into shots.
Latte Island,
If you are still reading this thread, I agree with everything you say. I am firmly against affirmative action but I support meritocracy and believe that women should be allowed to express their talent.
I am very put off my misogyny on right wing blogs, and this has caused me to withdraw and stop commenting. I have second thoughts supporting a movement that wants to send me back to the kitchen. (I have a PhD and am a published author; I am also a wife and a mother).
Zenster -
Your reply @Michael Servetus is testimony to such clarity of vision, that it merits quotation in full:
"I really appreciate your sincere reply. I do not seek to propose a fully teleological argument as one must when arguing the existence of a Supreme Being. There may, indeed, be no absolute or ultimate purpose the existence of this universe.
However, that does not render human life without its own purpose. Call it creating order out of chaos if you will, but I do not believe, nor is it a foregone conclusion, that the universe is not a relatively well-ordered system. Einstein said that the most incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it is so comprehensible. Should that orderliness be the case ― and there is much to suggest such a thing ― then there is little argument against how that pattern of order can provide a schematic for other dynamics of perception or conduct.
The most significant thing is that these percepts can be drawn logically and rationally from empirically observable events in our surrounding universe. They do not require any reliance upon the supernatural or inductive steps in reasoning. Moreover, these percepts in no way preclude the existence of a Supreme Being but neither do they conjure up the conundrum of who designed the Designer."
You have just cogently stated the firm beliefs in Reason that were practised and promoted in medieval Europe. That is, minus the leverage of the Supreme Being of that time, necessary as a precondition now recognized by more and more scholars of the history of science.
I'll explain this as briefly as possible because I suspect that you're already knowledgeable in the field. Simply put: yes everything will proceed as you state and the medieval scientists of Europe have stated. The Universe we inhabit displays remarkable order, even "reason", that can be understood by man, using his rational faculties. There is one thing in demand however, to get this whole display on the road, and that is the truly revolutionary idea that scientific knowledge of the Universe, and unravelling its secrets by means of reasoned investigation, was possible in the first place. That was a unique and singular grand scheme with little precedent. It represented and gave rise to the "miracle of European Civilization" and the birth of science as we know it.
This primordial idea was able to take root in medieval Europe and only there, because of the basic conception that there was a Supreme and basically benevolent Being that had created the Universe according to reasoned and orderly principles. It dispelled the idea that celestial bodies were some sort of gods themselves, or part of some large organism, and so on. This belief extended to humans the capacity to unravel the Universe through the use of their faculties of reasoned thought.
The grand Cathedrals in e.g. Bologna, Florence, Paris and Rome were built as world-class solar observatories stand as structural witnesses to this fundamental, and fundamentally Western, basic Idea.
Kind regs from Amsterdam,
Sag.
Egghead, I read systems specifications and device data sheets. I hold a BS in engineering and I've held a Federal license related to this for 3/4 of my life. I know what things can do, what they can't do, and how they can be made to do things other than what the makers intended. That's what you don't understand about the bar code group; they are interested in things which are cheap and useful for their intended purposes, and details like guaranteeing security of the system against hacking or hardness against microwave ovens will not be part of their design criteria. Remember, both DVD and HDMI encryption have fallen to hackers.
Sagunto, the consequence of so many grand phenomena of the universe from the sub-atomic to the cosmos being derived from a few essential laws and principles suggests that the "Mind of God" is anything but the capricious, emotional, all-too-human concepts in every major theology of which we know. The rights of [humans] as conceived by the USA's Founders depend on what humans are, not how they came to be. The validity of scientific knowledge does not depend on alchemy, Aristotelian cosmology, and other preceding notions either.
Hi Engineer-Poet,
Thank you for caring enough to try to provide me with contradictory evidence that RFID chips will be used to rule us all much to our collective and individual human detriment. I would truly like for someone to convince me that humanity will escape this evil. :)
With that said, I have read the non-fiction book Spychips and find its thesis and information to be compelling. The authors searched existing patents that have been authorized to huge name-brand companies in order to predict where RFID technology might lead.
I would feel much better if you read or even skimmed Spychips and then offered specific examples where the authors may have erred and/or exaggerated. My library had the book, but you can buy it on Amazon for $6 used.
Egghead, what Engineer Poet seems to be pointing towards is that even some of the most complex and widely employed encryption systems currently in use have already been compromised.
For the "Spychip" RFID network to obtain successful approval, it would have to meet far more stringent encryption criteria than your average rental video.
Human intelligence, in combination with Moore's Law, literally assures that all but the most difficult to use encryption methods (e.g., one time pad or Vernam cypher), will ever yield an adequate level of security to meet that which will be required for the wide accessibility of critical personal information like medical records or an electronic identity code.
Until the RFID people are able to overcome such a monumental obstacle, they will have a difficult time selling their idea to the government. After all, who would want a system where any basement hacker could reprogram your RFID implant for the price of a new video game?
Hi Zenster and Poet-Engineer, I fully understand RFID chips have both technical limitations and vulnerabilities, but so do many other important instances of modern technology - and yet the modern world still employs those technologies in a variety of situations. For example, it was recently reported that the Chinese (?!) just "hacked" the computer of the Prime Minister of Australia, but presumably the Prime Minister will continue to use computers. :)
In any case, RFID chips are going to be placed in every product that you own and then tied TOGETHER to create a net for each human where a wide range of information about every action that you take can be monitored, stored, analyzed, and taxed - and your access to all necessary resources and the price that you pay for resources will be determined by your individual RFID chip profile.
Two current examples of RFID chips that you do or will have are RFID chips in cell phones and cars.
RFID could be in all cell phones by 2010
Passive Tags Track Cars
The Future of RFID Tags in Cars
My prediction is that the use of RFID chips is the way that corrupt New World Order leaders are going to reign in barbaric Western Muslims - after barbaric Western Muslims have served their useful purpose to cause enough mayhem that all Westerners are willing to accept limited human and civil rights (e.g., full body searches in airports) in order to obtain security via totalitarianism.
If you at all think that I am smart, check out Spychips. :)
Zenster: Regarding your thesis that agnostics and atheists can rationally deduce a moral code from observable reality and thus independent of God: I would posit that God IS an observable reality, but that would be a circular argument, I suppose. :)
In any case, in my reading of your thesis, I detect personification in your use of some words, and it seems to me that personification would be more appropriate in a discussion about God being responsible for establishing a moral code.
Specifically, labeling the universe as benevolent seems to be personification of the Universe (1a) and also teleological (1b, 2).
Definition of benevolent:
1a : marked by or disposed to doing good (a benevolent donor)
1b : organized for the purpose of doing good (a benevolent society)
2 : marked by or suggestive of goodwill (benevolent smiles)
That said, I was absolutely sincere in my previous comment that "Belief in God is the only way to create a society worth living in - particularly for your particular wife and children. Ensuring that your progeny are members of a stable society increases the chances of your genetic survival for longer than your lifetime."
I believe that my thesis suffices for EITHER God or the "neutral" Universe to deduce a moral code.
1. God option: Show me a godless society worth living in. Indigenous members of godless societies (Muslim, Communist, etc.) recognize the absolute superiority of God-filled societies and attempt to immigrate and stay where possible. Sennels conveys that the only "punishment" that Muslim immigrants fear is deportation from God-filled Western societies. In stark contrast, indigenous members of God-filled societies rarely attempt to immigrate to godless societies. Immigration patterns clearly indicate the inherent worth of God-filled societies.
2. "Neutral" universe option: Show me a society without a moral code worth living in. Societies without a moral code are chaotic rather than stable - and tend to violence and war which threaten long term genetic survival of individual members. Societies with a moral code are more stable - and tend to avoid violence and war which increases the chances of long term genetic survival of individual members. Thus, even godless humans freely choose to live in stable societies that enforce a moral code - a moral code that is, in truth, generally derived from a God-filled society.
Thus, atheists and agnostics may logically follow a moral code that is deduced from a God-filled society. The need for atheists and agnostics to deduce a moral code is irrelevant, in practice, because a God-filled society has already established a moral code sufficient to increase the chances of long term genetic survival of individual members.
The vain (yes this is a pun) desire of atheists and agnostics to deduce a moral code independent of God is persistent as a de facto "proof" of their lack of belief in God and the idea that man can stand apart from the concept that morality is established by God.
Hi Felicie, I think the Roissy fad has died down enough that it's more pleasant around the right-wing blogs lately.
It occurs to me that when Marine Le Pen saves France, that will enlighten some people.
Egghead, Baron, et al; Feel free to substitute the word "benign" for "benevolent" if that makes it any easier for you to wrap your mind around this idea.
Yeesh.
Here's some Dutch enlightenment on the issue of Sex, G***nder and Civilization, as seen from the perspective of Dutch women themselves. It is an article about a book by psychologist Ellen de Bruin, "Dutch women don't get depressed"
Kind regs from Amsterdam,
Sag.
Egghead -
Following up on my previous comment, it gets even better with this original article about the same book by De Bruin, in the NYT. I think you'll love it.
Some inspiring quotes:
"We have a built-in distrust of central governments and a very high need for, and rates of, personal freedom in every aspect of our lives."
BINGO!
"A large component of the Dutch woman's happiness today derives from the importance attributed to the nuclear family - an institution invented by the low countries and whose hold there today is so strong that even gay couples want it. Furthermore, it became customary in the Netherlands much earlier than elsewhere for young people to choose their own spouses - the bidding of Pope Gregory IX in 1234, that people should marry by consent, not parental coercion, was quickly taken to heart in Catholic Holland."
Double BINGO! "Catholic Holland" oh my..
Sure enough, the book was part parody (though well researched), but the reactions it provoked were telling, especially those in the feminist vein of: Dutch women are lazy parasites, not working full time jobs. Wearing stress and exhaustion like some badge of honour, while all these liberated rat-racers have really added is more serfs to the welfare system, just some extra taxpayers controlled by the state. Women's lib was all about creating added tax paying dupes, and many bought it as "liberation". It must be the Progressive way ;-)
Kind regs from Amsterdam,
Sag.
I have encountered legitimate objections to my construct's use of the term "benevolent", as that word is suggestive of an agent or agentive volition.
Please reconsider the following edition: (If "benign" is still too agentive for you then please use only its definition as: "Tending to exert a beneficial influence; favorable".)
Given: The universe is, for the most part, benign
Given: That benign aspect enables the existence of life
Given: Life does not manifest in the absence of energy
Given: The regular and persistent patterns of life are positive
Given: These patterns only emerge as a result of energy flow
Given: These flow patterns may not be an intrinsic property of matter
Given: The dualistic property of energy endows it with polarity
Given: Matter does not readily exhibit a similarly dualistic physical property
Given: Energy exerts an organizational influence upon matter
Given: That organizational property is, at least temporarily, enthalpic
Given: Energy’s enthalpic property tends to self-reinforce
Given: This feedback loop tends to reinforce more positivistic energy
Given: That which benignly continues life is the most positive
Given: This positivistic energy is a direct manifestation of a benign universe
Given: Positive energy is of value or worth to non-human and human life
Given: Behavior which increases the flow of positive energy is worthy
Given: Increasing the flow of positive energy is generally beneficial to life
Given: Many values that generally drive life can be mapped onto human existence
Given: Selection of the most utile values forms a catalogue of functional behavior
Given: Adopting functional behavior increases chances of life and overall lifespan
Given: Increasing ones chances of life and lifespan is beneficial to ones DNA
Given: DNA benefits best from benign organizations of positive energy flow
Given: Overall quality of life thrives more on benign activity than the opposite
Given: Worthy behavior is most conducive to positive energy flow
Given: Worthy behavioral modes that enable functional patterns of life are truisms
Given: These truisms can be aggregated into a value structured catalogue of functional behavior
Given: The prioritization of such a value structured catalog of functional behavior is useful
Given: The most useful and life promoting functional behaviors are components of moral conduct
Ergo: Morals can be derived from consistent and observable patterns of benign, universal energy flow that is conducive to life.
Zenster --
(Part 1)
I don't have any problem with your logic as such. The issue here is your premise, with which I basically agree: the universe is benevolent (or benign, in the new wording; see Part 2).
But this premise does not lie within the postulates normally recognized by an atheist or an agnostic. Just look at the word "benevolent" -- "bene", good, plus "volent", from "voluntas", will. If there is good will, there must be something willing the good. In other words, the concept is necessarily agentive.
A Christian calls that something "God"; a Buddhist calls it by another word. But an atheist or an agnostic cannot even recognize its existence. An agnostic thinks it might exist, but has not yet reached a final judgment. Therefore he cannot use its existence as a premise.
My conclusion is that you are not in fact an agnostic, but a believer. Your belief system just hasn't formed properly yet into a coherent whole that can be recognized as such by yourself. It is -- dare I use the word? -- inchoate.
Under the tenets of formal logic, a logician reasons based on premises -- "entities" as described by William of Occam -- and then follows the rules scrupulously to reach conclusions.
Your premises are not faulty; they are simply unrecognized as such by yourself. That's a common problem with a lot of arguments nowadays: unacknowledged premises.
Your unrecognized premises include the existence of a benevolent being, force, presence, or consciousness that lies outside the natural order of the physical universe. You can wave your hands all you like, but this is plainly the case. If it's not plain to you, then there's probably no point in our arguing it any further.
The logical flaws are there, and they are unavoidable. But the only problem is the unexamined premises. Everything else looks reasonable, as far as I can tell.
(Part 2)
"Benignity" and "benevolence" are synonyms. The new word presents the same problem as the old one: there must be a benign presence of some sort. Benignity and malignity do not exist in the physical world itself.
"Conducive to life" is fine, as long is there is no moral dimension. The universe is obviously conducive to life, because life is here. But there is no inherent value in that, good or evil, if you do not accept as a premise a transcendent moral order.
You simply cannot deduce it from first principles when those principles are restricted to the Big Bang, the laws of physics, and random processes from which biological life emerged.
It can't be done, not logically. It requires the famous "leap of faith".
Still it would all be the result of an accident and accidental not purposeful benignity, thus any morality drawn from it would simply be utilitarian and wisely expedient but not absolute and subject to arbitrary change.
I love such paradoxical somewhat Gnostic thinking and cognitive penetration. Zenster is a believer! Lol, probably a high Calvinist. I was thinking amusingly the other night that Zenster and others including the Baron would have been fierce preachers teachers and theologians in another age
Hi Sagunto: I absolutely believe that women should raise their own children.
In my experience, the women that I know would LOVE to stay home with their kids in the main - AND work at meaningful part-time employment during the time that their older kids attend school.
Unfortunately, the work world has NEVER adapted to the needs of the family sandwiched between caring for children and senior relatives.
Ideally, ALL people would work part-time - men and women - but retire far later in life. :)
Sagunto, I'm glad to see that Dutch women can have what they want. Since I believe in equal rights, I hope the option to work part time is equally available to men.
To me, there is no such thing as one size fits all feminism. My brand of feminism is permissive, i.e., this or that is available, not, you have to do this. It's wonderful that Marine Le Pen was allowed to attend law school and become a politician, things that were not available to most women in the past. If Le Pen had preferred to stay home and raise children instead of saving France, that would have been fine from the standpoint of individual rights, maybe not so fine for France.
Zenster, philosophy isn't my thing, but your idea that morality supports life reminds me of so many exceptions. I'm especially reminded of the image of the Godfather, who dies of old age happily tending his tomato plants.
A few years ago, I saw an HBO movie about a real life godfather, made by his filmmaker son. After the movie, the godfather himself, in his 90's, sums things up. He said, in heavily accented English, that he had a "good conscience." He was a radiant person, I would never have taken him for a retired mobster.
I'll leave this to the philosophers, but maybe health has something to do with power, not morality.
Bonanno: A Godfather's Story (1999)
Latté -
The typical thing is, that this is the Dutch way, like the statement in the NYT says, fully opposed to state intervention. Not that them politicians have stopped trying to remodel Holland into the depressing situation elsewhere in the West (the book by the psychologist was called "Why Dutch women don't get depressed"). Strangest thing is that a number of Christian parties, some of which most of us would rather see disappear, have prevented (on the most despicable notions, like the woman's place in the household, particularly behind the sink, and so on) progressive politicians of all stripes ("left" and "right") to use state power to seduce - or coerce, women to work.
My main problem that I sometimes have with some feminists is not about their view on women (that's another problem) but with the fact that oftentimes, as is the case with other special interest groups, they seek to use the power of the state to press their issue.
Women should have equal rights, not because they're part of a "disadvantaged group" (that's beside the point), but because as individual human beings, they should have equal rights, or there are no such things as "rights". Moreover, the welfare state should not be the "redistributor of rights".
I therefore would like to see feminism "defeminized", if you know what I mean ;-)
I'd also caution people not to follow the Dutch lead. Many times in history, the seeds of deterion where planted, when other nations followed the Dutch example, as Americans did with the Dutch multiculturalism - that worked! - in New Amsterdam, or as the Jews did, following the example of the Dutch (Bataves) revolt against the Flavian Roman Empire (a revolt that succeeded), mentioned in Publius Tacitus' "Annales" (or was it "Historiae"?).
Hmm, think I really should write a piece on Dutch supremacism one of these days ;-)
Kind regs from Amsterdam,
Sag.
"Show me a godless society worth living in. Indigenous members of godless societies (Muslim, Communist, etc.)"
BZZZT! Thank you for providing proof that a) your conclusion is false (Islam is the ultimate case of religion demanding complete unreasoning devotion to the whims of its concept of God) and b) that your argument is just special pleading for Christianity. You actually argue for humanism, whether you realize it or not.
Jefferson wrote in a letter to Baron von Humboldt, 1813: "History I believe furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government. This marks the lowest grade of ignorance, of which their political as well as religious leaders will always avail themselves for their own purpose." Islam, with its rejection of reason and criticism for blind obediance, is the ultimate example of this. Catholicism's centralization of authority in an "infallible" Pope, and the corruption which results from the destruction of accountability, shows that Islam is only different in degree, not in kind.
See the quote from the letter to Spafford for more food for thought.
As for a "benign" universe, the weak anthropic principle states that if the universe were hostile to life we wouldn't be here to marvel at it. It's possible to conceive of forms of life to which our universe is hostile, and we have no evidence that they exist (of course, we've explored precious little of the universe yet). We do have reason to believe that e.g. silicon-based life does not exist, based on chemistry. There are places (e.g. gas giant planets, the galactic core) and times (early in cosmic evolution, late after G-type stars have all burned out) which are quite hostile to our kind of life too. They may be amenable to other types, though, and it's easy to see how they might be just as exquisitely adapted to their environments as we are to ours.
The universe is neither benign nor malign. It is indifferent.
Hi Engineer-Poet: Your Ah-ha! moment is anti-climatic - and inaccurate to my main point as expressed in my original post:
Belief in God is the only way to create a society worth living in - particularly for your particular wife and children. Ensuring that your progeny are members of a stable society increases the chances of your genetic survival for longer than your lifetime.
P.S. Both Muslims and I label Allah as a different entity than God, so everyone here can avoid citing Islam against me. Indeed, Islam proves my point that a society living without God is vicious to women and children.
NOTE: You are the person talking about religion. I am talking about God who entirely supersedes religion. Granted, the Western idea of God is a God of Christian conception, but both Catholics and Protestants have influenced Western thought about God that enabled the United States to become "One Nation Under God" because "In God We Trust." :)
Baron Bodissey: "Conducive to life" is fine, as long is there is no moral dimension.
There need not be any moral dimension to life but, without such an aspect, the adjectives "short" and "brutish" start coming into play rather abruptly.
As you have already noted to some degree, I have removed, to the greatest extent possible, any suggestion of agentive influence that might infer willful intervention.
Is it totally impossible to attribute a non-conscious yet "agentive" role to energy itself? If not the energy itself, then, perhaps, those parameters which control events in our physical universe. Towards that end, I will use a familiar example that most readers readily comprehend and serves quite well the purposes needed to maintain my case.
You, yourself, have referred to the concept of Tao often enough whereby it needs no detailed introduction. At its most basic, the Tao refers to an overarching equilibristic arrangement that regulates a construct of energies ― possibly including matter ― blended in their most harmonious and productive state. According to Chinese lore the Tao is unchanging. This would seem to eliminate any candidacy for it having an agentive character.
Simultaneously, the Tao clearly provides a template or schematic for how and in what paths energy will flow. Yet, it is not the energy, nor is it the path. I would liken it to be far more akin to the set of mathematical equations that are frequently used to define physical reality. Examples would be the speed of light, Planck’s constant, the gravitational constant and so forth.
It is absolutely vital to keep in mind that the state of reality described by the Tao is not entirely neutral. It describes a healthy configuration or constellation of energy and matter which then interact to produce the vibrant, productive universe that surrounds us.
Given the nature of that fecund and life-sustaining environment which the Tao produces or guides these physical elements towards, is it impossible ascribe functionality or utility to it? This thread repeatedly mentions an excess of yin. That automatically implies how a balanced degree of yin is both more desirable and, more specifically, healthy.
Health is a very desirable human condition. It can rather easily be ascribed with the term “positive”. To call healthiness “negative” is clearly, not just counter-intuitive, but lacking in functionality. Given that the Tao best describes conditions which promote or facilitate the healthiest configuration of physical and energistic conditions, is it not also possible to declare it as being utile?
Despite the Tao being immaterial, that does not preclude it being utile. Many concepts such as the process of fire starting are essentially immaterial. The flint and striker can sit alongside each other forever without creating any spark being created. The bow, drill and plaque will not generate a calorie of heat without the guiding meme. The meme almost transcends those physical components in utility.
Can we not then describe the Tao as being utile? It demonstrates a balanced and healthy configuration of forces and influences despite being immaterial in and of itself. Moreover, the balanced interplay depicted constitutes a useful frame of reference for behavior with respect to conducting oneself in harmonious interaction.
I’m sure that there are those who are tempted to compare the Tao with God. However, there is a crucial difference. The Tao arises out of the intrinsic interplay of universal physical constants. There is every possibility that the Tao does not so much control them as embody their equilibristic state. The parameters may well create the Tao which then goes on to symbolically represent the most enharmonic state of those factors.
[to be continued]
This is important because no agentive force has been evoked. Energy flowing through the system has organized the system and because those primordial factors were not inimical, a stable manifestation of reality managed to evolve from them.
It is quite possible that the universe we currently inhabit is not its first or only iteration. This reality may have been preceded by a sequence of less successful or imbalanced events whereby the improper value of any number of parameters made that iteration succumb to overwhelming and conflicting forces beyond its ability to overcome.
Many here are aware of how “The Anthropic Coincidences” (recommended reading), demonstrate that shifting any number of different fundamental universal constants by even one millionth of their value will cause our entire universe to summarily wink out of existence.
It is equally, if not more, possible that instead of our universe being a single event of intentional or agentive creation, it is one among an untold number of iterations that was ― in this particular case ― inordinately successful due to a precise and vitally important set of parameters being in exact coordination. What’s more, any number of parallel universes could all be forming at this same instant according to these same laws without any conflict whatsoever.
This explanation of reality requires far less inductive reasoning than any form of existing creation myth. Nor does this construct preclude the existence of a Supreme Being. If anything, it is the clockwork mechanism by which a Deity might best utilize His time in maintaining reality.
Through this construct of reality, I also seek to suggest that the Tao, as an embodiment of energistic principles in their most healthy balance and scheme may serve as a template of functional behavior that is most utile for humans seeking to prolong their lives ― and that of their DNA ― in the most optimal manner.
In this way, empirically observable events in our universe may be reduced into modes of conduct that provide moral guidance.
"Belief in God is the only way to create a society worth living in - particularly for your particular wife and children.
P.S. Both Muslims and I label Allah as a different entity than God"
You don't understand what special pleading is, do you? You certainly don't grasp that you're doing it.
Neither Japan nor China are Christian societies. Arguably, both are worth living in (though not as good in some ways as e.g. mid-20th century USA). Both are doing a much better job of preventing Islam from taking root than the USA. As a matter of fact, it's the misguided tolerance of Christians which enables Muslims (and masses of third-worlders in general) to colonize the West. Ergo, the Christian concept of God is as much or more of the problem as the Muslim one.
"I am talking about God who entirely supersedes religion."
You postulate a contradiction. Of course, once you've done this in your postulates, you can "prove" anything.
Engineer-Poet: Neither Japan nor China are Christian societies. Arguably, both are worth living in (though not as good in some ways as e.g. mid-20th century USA).
This argument continues to crop up here at GoV and I feel compelled to dispute it at every turn. The qualification of "mid-20th century USA" is a cute twist but does not slither out from under the boot that both China and Japan (to a lesser extent), have had on the neck of their collective populations.
The more common comparison is drawn to modern day Russia and how it is supposedly doing more to preserve its citizens from Islamic colonization. These arguments patently ignore the tremendous number of terrorist attacks and profound losses of life that have occurred on Russian soil. Nor do they ever tend to address how Russia’s oligarchic elite are draining the very lifeblood from that nation in a constant assault upon journalistic free speech and economy-numbing corruption. The death spiral of negative population replacement birth numbers and endemic alcoholism just as often go unmentioned as well.
China, to a much lesser extent, experiences Islamic terrorism. However, the Chinese pay a terrible price for such ostensible safety in the form of this world’s most comprehensive police state, complete with its own Orwellian “Ministry of Truth”. Imagine being stopped by a police officer who can then use a personal data agent to review the last five emails you have sent. Like Russia, China’s Politburo elite continue their Champagne and caviar existence even as they are grudgingly obliged to throw the population a few scraps from their table every so often.
The cost of such “safety” manifests in a thousand deadly ways. They appear as poisoned waterways, death trap coal mines, vehicles with all the crash-worthiness of Tonka toys and a command economy that continues to line the pockets of Sino-plutocrats even as it cannibalizes the world’s industrial base through currency manipulation and institutionalized theft of intellectual property.
Out of the twenty worst polluted cities in our world, sixteen are in China. Its ongoing genocide of female infants proceeds largely unchecked. From among 178 countries rated, Transparency International ranks China as a lowly number 78, superseded by such cesspits of corruption as Rwanda or Ghana and barely nosing ahead of narco-terror state Columbia and the world’s current economic laughingstock, Greece.
I wonder exactly how many of us Americans and Europeans would honestly call China a place “worth living in”.
[to be continued]
Japan is a much more complex issue. Their standard of living is ranked ninth, quality of life at eighth but Japan’s cost of living routinely places as the highest in the entire world. Financial aspects are just the iceberg’s tip. Japan’s culture is extremely racist and xenophobic, making immigration almost impossible and the assimilation of foreigners marginal at best. Conformity is an almost stifling necessity in order to preserve social continuity.
While America may have an alarming high school dropout rate, neither do American parents commit suicide if their child does not pass the SAT tests. Suicide rates are high with groups committing “suicide-by-charcoal” becoming an increasing trend. As Japanese traditions erode there has also been an increase of crimes related to overcrowding. None of this addresses the institutional misogyny and overall low status of women in Japanese culture.
Similar to China, independent thinking, critical analysis and innovation have traditionally been frowned upon with drastic effects upon creativity and individual expression. Like Britain, Japan has extensive CCD camera surveillance now operating in public places and on its highways, all with relatively strong citizen approval.
If these are descriptions of a places “worth living in”, you are welcome to them. For all of its faults, America still has many taken-for-granted freedoms that a lot of other nations have yet to enjoy.
In fact, these freedoms are so taken for granted that we are now in danger of losing them precisely because so many people do not even realize how precious they are. All said and done, being at risk of losing freedoms is a far better place to be in than one of never having had them in the first place.
Engineer-Poet:
She said with a wry grin, "The only "Special Pleading" that I am making here is that you research and help me ascertain the true threat of RFID chips to humanity (over time)."
As pertains to the "Principle of Relevant Difference," Christians and Muslims are CRYSTAL CLEAR that God and Allah are two different entities with unique theologies, calls to action, and resulting cultures. The vast difference between God and Allah is WHY Allah per Mohammed commands Muslims to either re-vert or eliminate ALL non-believers and apostates in the whole world by any means possible.
To quote Zenster:
"Chinese Proverb: The beginning of wisdom is to call things by their right names."
Egghead: … "The only "Special Pleading" that I am making here is that you research and help me ascertain the true threat of RFID chips to humanity (over time)."
Egghead, what really needs to be addressed here is not RFID chips, which are but one way ― particularly convenient though it may be ― of monitoring the location, biometric and informational disposition of individuals.
The real issue is ensuring that people who wish to impose this sort of intensive societal control are kept from power.
If it isn't RFID chips, it will be some other sort of method, most likely nano-technology from all indications.
Those über-nanny state types who adore this sort of Big Brother control need to be discredited and exposed as the Stalinist-type totalitarians that they really are.
You would be far wiser to direct your formidable talents towards that sort of goal than seek to defeat a technology which will definitely enter the marketplace at one level or another, as it already has.
Politicians can be voted out of office. It is far more difficult to dislodge effective technologies. RFID has its purposes and meets them quite well, otherwise it would not be enjoying widespread adoption by the marketplace.
The same cannot be said for elected officials who advocate for "Total Information Awareness". They must be pruned from our political system root and branch. It is these sort of ultra-elite that pose the greatest danger and not some infant technology.
Hi Zenster: Thanks for your comments about China and Japan. Exceedingly gracious of you!
I also appreciated and considered your input about Total Information Awareness.
As I see it, there are two distinct issues: human tracking and human access. I watched the first few minutes of the link - will enjoy it later - and it seemed to focus on human tracking by referencing I.D. cards and on-street cameras.
Zenster, you're both bringing up irrelevant examples (Russia) and making a lot of argument over my caveat of "arguably". Stating the fact that the political situations in China and even Japan aren't up to USA standards of human rights ignores that Islam and its perpetual state of offense at everything un-Islamic is being used to rachet ours down. Also, "multi-culturalism" and the social maladies it produces are not problems there. Life is certainly worth living in Japan.
If you contrast China and India, the latter has similar levels of pollution but a lot more Islam (and crowding). Life may be more worth living in China (again, arguably).
China vs. Zimbabwe or Egypt? China, no contest. US-educated Chinese are going back to make their fortunes. That says something.
You're right that we are at risk of losing our freedoms. This gets back to Egghead's claim that we can't live without (her concept of) God; it's that same concept and the mistakes grown from the dogma which lead to our tolerance of the very things that may destroy what we value most. The Christian idea of a charitable and tolerant God is leaving us unable to fight the Islamic concept of Allah.
The reason that I am concerned about RFID chips is their potential to completely control human access to ALL resources.
As I understand it, RFID chips might be used to allow or prevent people to enter or leave buildings and/or roads. Thus, the entire civilized world becomes a prison.
This is WHY I believe that the New World Order is utterly unconcerned about - and indeed totally 100% committed to - forcing mass Islamic immigration on the West.
After 1) indigenous Western citizens have been subdued (i.e., submitted to greatly decreased human and civil rights due to Islamic terrorism and violent crime), and 2) RFID technology has been perfected on endangered animals, pets, prisoners, senior citizens with dementia, children, and soldiers, then the New World Order will simply implant everyone - starting with Muslims - and pull back the leash, declare religion dead in favor or science, and tax the heck out of everyone justified by science - making every human slaves of the state - which is, really, whoever controls the New World Order.
For me, Hesperado's theory of PC MC is only relevant to explain a limited portion of the thought and behavior of Western-educated masses who are fed a steady societal diet of George Orwell's doublespeak. I read somewhere that Orwell was aware of the New World Order "plan" and wrote his books to warn the Western masses.
It is unrealistic of Hesperado to think that he (and a few of we) are the only people smart enough to see and understand the danger of Islam. Really, do we all think that much of ourselves - and that little of the most powerful people - who are incredibly competitive, incredibly smart, and have everything to lose if Islam reigns supreme?! Really?!
A much more sensible and believable theory is that the most powerful people in the world are conspiring against the Western masses and democracy - for "their" own good (whose good we shall all see eventually).
After all, as Thomas Jefferson explained - to which Islamic leaders agree and mass Islamic immigration shall prove, “A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine.”
Yet, as has been shown time and again, using terrorism and violent crime, our Muslim invaders (ahem citizens) can eliminate infidel democracy with far fewer than 51% of the population.
Hi Engineer-Poet:
"...Egghead's claim that we can't live without (her concept of) God...."
Au contraire, clearly humans can and do live without the Western concept of God; however, where the Western concept of God is absent, then human quality (and often duration) of life will be worse.
Given the chance, where will the majority of all immigrants freely chose to live: the God-filled West, Communist Russia or China, Taoist East, or Allah-filled countries?
One expert said that, as much as Palestinians claim to "hate" the United States, the majority of Palestinians would "give their left arm" to live here. Well, looks like they have their big chance now courtesy of Obama....
Engineer-Poet: Life is certainly worth living in Japan.
As with Egghead's attempt to separate God and religion, so are you seeking to distinguish between Japan and Japanese culture. It is not an option. Either you recognize the tremendous limitations imposed by such a rigidly structured society or accept that the absence of Islam and terrorism in Japan comes at a very high price.
Russia was mentioned only because it is a preexisting example of another country that has often been thrust forward as an example of this same sort of thing.
If you contrast China and India, the latter has similar levels of pollution but a lot more Islam (and crowding). Life may be more worth living in China (again, arguably).
Ask yourself, is it an argument worth making? All the while, try to remember that it is China (along with Russia), that fuels Islam's global jihad with weapons, materiel and logistical support.
US-educated Chinese are going back to make their fortunes. That says something.
Other than that we are absolute idiots, what? Those Chinese "fortunes" are made strictly at the leave of that country's political elite. Those who rise into the upper ranks do so by becoming enemies of the people. There is almost no other way. That says "something" as well.
Even Japan plays a role in all of this by being one of Iran's larger petroleum importers. Untold trillions of Yen go towards the arming of Hezbollah and Hamas.
It is crucial to keep Russia and China under the magnifying glass. They continue to triangulate against American and Western interests by destabilizing the MME (Muslim Middle East). Tragically, we rise to the challenge instead of simply crippling these MME tyrannies and realigning the entire oil distribution framework.
The Christian idea of a charitable and tolerant God is leaving us unable to fight the Islamic concept of Allah.
I would ask that you qualify such a statement to distinguish between historical Christianity and the perverted, suicidally altruistic lunacy that has risen to supplant it. Try to recall how it was Christian Crusaders that first sallied forth to crush Islam in the first place.
Egghead: A much more sensible and believable theory is that the most powerful people in the world are conspiring against the Western masses and democracy - for "their" own good (whose good we shall all see eventually).
Egghead, you continue to dilute the strength of your message by stirring this conspiracy rubbish into it. In the scenario you cite, the reality is that the world's corporate elite have increasingly put in place a set of rules and laws that enable them to be foremost among the looters.
That's it.
No vast New World Order conspiracy.
Just a bunch of tuxedo-clad thugs robbing us with fountain pens instead of six guns. All they need to do is obtain a legal consensus on how to set about it and then it's every looter for themselves.
As an acrid aside, I am also obliged to note how your ranting about RFIDs does very little to propel the major gist of this thread. It would be far more on topic to address the motivational structure of those Stalinesque bastards who relish the idea of "Total Information Awareness" than to continue squealing about a single technological solution to this issue.
I did my best to demonstrate how people have been led away from the possibility of rationally deriving a moral code from observable reality. If that ― for lack of a better term ― sort of "Taoistic" balance was better recognized and upheld, the destructive feminization (i.e., excessive yin aspect) of modern culture might be held in check to a greater degree.
Zenster: Win some, lose some. :)
We ostensibly disagree about the existence of God (mayhaps - Baron posits that you are actually a closeted-from-yourself deist [and I tend to agree - if I got that right?]), the New World Order and its plan for a One World Government (they're heee-ear....), and RFID chips (being used to stop Muslim aggression in the long term). So what?! Time will tell.
Except, boy do I hate that phrase, "destructive feminization (i.e., excessive yin aspect) of modern culture." I could do with NEVER hearing that again. You all have practically ruined the concept of the Tao for me - except that I reject your interpretation - as with some of your other ideas.
In any case, live and let live. May the force be with you! You know, the Godly force. :)
Deism
Egghead: Except, boy do I hate that phrase, "destructive feminization (i.e., excessive yin aspect) of modern culture." I could do with NEVER hearing that again.
Then please articulate a well-reasoned response as to why that term is inappropriate and what you would substitute in its stead.
If modern network television isn't a near-continuous landscape of gays, overly headstrong women and wimped out guys (read: over-feminized), then I don't know what is. The Home and Garden Network is so effing gay, it even lights up my rarely used gaydar like a Christmas tree.
If America's Federal government isn't totally ovulatory with Pelosi and her estrogen laced political hen party calling the shots (read: over-feminized), then please tell me what the Hell is going on.
Like I said, come up with something better and I'll be happy to use it instead.
Egghead: (mayhaps - Baron posits that you are actually a closeted-from-yourself deist [and I tend to agree - if I got that right?])
You are grasping at straws and it ill suits someone like yourself who can do so much better.
KNOW THYSELF.
In 1711, Alexander Pope wrote a poem entitled 'An Essay on Man, Epistle II,' which begins "Know then thyself, presume not God to scan, The proper study of mankind is Man."[27]
In 1831, Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote a poem entitled Γνώθι Σεαυτόν, or Gnothi Seauton, (in English 'Know Thyself') on the theme of 'God in thee.' The poem was an anthem to Emerson's belief that to 'know thyself' meant knowing the God which Emerson felt existed within each person.[28]
In 1832, Samuel T. Coleridge wrote a poem entitled 'Self Knowledge' in which the text centers on the Delphic maxim 'Know Thyself' beginning, 'Gnôthi seauton!--and is this the prime And heaven-sprung adage of the olden time!--' and ending with 'Ignore thyself, and strive to know thy God!' Coleridge's text references JUVENAL, xi. 27.[29]
Know Thyself
Zenster: Insults aside please. :( Civility should reign. Saying that you believe in God is a COMPLIMENT to you. Only the best of us do! :)
The universe is neutral. To posit any type of goodness or positivity also posits intention. Intention indicates the presence of God. :)
Did you read about deism? It fits you to a T. :)
Many elements of the biosphere, large and small, want to eat us or take our food from us. We're in a constant state of competition and warfare for our existence. That's not "benevolence". We're a lot better at the competition nowadays (having co-opted e.g. fungi for antibiotics for the microscopic threats and invented guns for megafauna on down), but it hasn't gone away.
The parts of the universe which are benevolent to humans are mostly human. In other words, your logic supports the conclusion that WE are God, or maybe some strain of pantheism. (If the words "If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him" aren't ringing in your ears, you need to advance your knowledge of philosophy beyond the level of an engineer who hated "humanities" classes because they were tedious.)
Hi Engineer-Poet: I find your comment to be relevant with several jumping off points.
As the Black Death Plague proved, even a microscopic germ (and the rat it rides in on) can change the course of human history. Nothing at all benevolent about the rat, flea, or plague....
Black Death Plague Transmission
With the human-total-stupidity-caused resistance of bacteria to antibiotics, humans are about to re-experience some pretty nasty competition for resources from invisible foes that we blithely assume are long conquered.
Just as germs are ever-present and ready to exploit weakness, so evil (or selfish - if you prefer a more neutral term) humans share that competitive drive.
Thus, it greatly puzzles me that Hesperado is willing and able to identify the absolute evil (or selfishness) in 100% of Muslims over 1,400+ years of Islam - while simultaneously categorically refusing to admit that modern Western leaders might have EQUIVALENT evil (or selfish) motivations to past or present Arab leaders.
The song may be modern, but the idea is old: "Everybody wants to rule the world."
Egghead: Saying that you believe in God is a COMPLIMENT to you.
Only because you believe in God. If you knew the huge number of "excuses" I could long, long ago have made to myself to suddenly "find" God and all of the opportunities it would have created for me, maybe then you might understand why your statement is so offensive.
For now, I'll leave out any exploration of how smug, smarmy and exclusive your statement comes off as.
For me to "become" religious without the full force of my personal conviction and true belief in it would make a complete mockery of both my own faith and religion in general.
If I am to become a believer, it will be due to God having spoken to me personally. If God is omnipotent, He can easily find time to speak with me. If He is too busy, all well and fine but he gets no faith from me.
Only the best of us do! :)
Smilie or no smilie, intentionally or not, you must be incredibly opaque not to understand the sort of offense that such a statement can give to someone who is sincere about the nature of their quest for enlightenment.
The universe is neutral. To posit any type of goodness or positivity also posits intention. Intention indicates the presence of God. :)
Baloney! If the Tao and universe are interchangeable, at least at the parametric level, then there are both ethics and morals which can be extracted from them. That has been my point all along and I continue to maintain it.
I have done my best to withdraw any attribute of intention or agentive aspect regarding the universe. That does not exclude the energy which flows through and that tends to organize the system within which we live.
The organizing effect of that energy has every appearance of being both wholesome and good in its effect upon life and continues to impress upon me a benign and life-giving force that would be most ungracious to call "neutral" or without character.
What Zenster said.
"With the human-total-stupidity-caused resistance of bacteria to antibiotics"
Hogwash. Bacteria and fungi have been locked in chemical warfare since probably before there was multi-cellular life on Earth. Adaptation to antibiotics is natural. What's stupid is humans knowing about evolution since the late 19th century, but not applying the lessons properly.
Selected, customized and purified antibiotics are a human invention. We didn't get them because we were blessed by God or touched by His noodly appendage, we got them because someone with enough intelligence noticed the effect of fungus on bacterial growth and pursued the resulting knowledge to a useful result. We are the God we've been looking for. We have been all along, we just denied it. Those phenomena which come from will and design... they are almost exclusively ours (giving credit to animals where due), at least on this earth.
Zenster: You do NOT need to find God because you (give the distinct impression that you) already believe in God (with God defined as distinct from religion - but inherent in the universe). You just call God a fancy scientific-sounding name like "benign (kind) and life-giving (creating) force ('physical power or strength possessed by a living being')" - a 'kind creating universally powerful living being' that you are greatly offended to think is neutral or without character ('moral or ethical quality; integrity'). :)
Zenster: God does indeed speak to people ALL the time - through all sorts of channels - one being nature in all its glory - and another being other people who are quite often inspired by God. :)
As with doubting Thomas, God WILL "speak" to you personally in time - perhaps at your passing from this life into the next. But, again, God may "speak" to you through an overall impression via a brilliant white light that will permeate through your soul searching out your goodness to combine with God's universally good energy.
A really fabulous website that I highly recommend is
Near-Death Experiences and the Afterlife
Under NDE Research Conclusions, in the Religion section, midway down the page, the author talks about atheists who had near-death experiences, but the entire site is great! :)
Zenster: For someone who "questions" the existence of God, you are awfully committed to the Tao idea - which has NO more proof than the idea of God. Strange, no? Maybe you were Chinese in another life?! :)
In any case, if you are so certain that your philosophical construct is agnostic or atheist in nature, send it along to an atheist site or organization and ask THEIR honest opinion of its relevance.
In any case, perhaps another atheist has already "invented" what you seek to invent and would share it with you.
Engineer-Poet: "We are the God we've been looking for."
Vain much? I read a great article about atheism that posited exactly what you just said - that, without God, atheists invent morality in their own image. Each individual atheist with penultimate vanity posits, "Good is what I think good is."
Engineer-Poet: Your response to my germ comments seemed unrelated to the point that I was making. Namely, the universe is a very competitive place where humans face a variety of competitors including invisible competitors.
So bacteria and fungi are locked in an eternal chemical battle that pre-existed - and will probably post-date - humans? So what? Humans will use antibiotics until some humans ruin their efficacy for other humans and those humans die.
Clearly, the germs do NOT care. The germs are neutral.
It is humans - and God - who care.
Egghead: You do NOT need to find God because you (give the distinct impression that you) already believe in God …
I will ask that you cease projecting your religiosity upon me. It is a repugnant practice that I have witnessed all too often among believers and plays a distinct role in my continued Agnostic skepticism.
… God defined as distinct from religion
Good luck with that one. Engineer Poet has already taken you to task for making your special pleading about a "God who entirely supersedes religion."
You just call God a fancy scientific-sounding name like "benign (kind)…
Will you please pay attention? I have gone to great lengths in order to remove agentive or intentional connotations from my language. The word "benign" is used strictly in the sense of being "conducive to life". Vitamins fall into that category and, it is relatively safe to say, are uncontaminated by any transcendent spiritual agency.
… and life-giving (creating) force ('physical power or strength possessed by a living being')…
Ummmm … no. Dirt is "life-giving", yet it entirely lacks "physical power or strength possessed by a living being". You continue to project your own belief structure onto mine. PLEASE STOP IT!
- a 'kind creating universally powerful living being'-
Again, quit with putting words in my mouth. I do not infer any sort of "Gaia" syndrome with respect to the universe, so please refrain from attributing any such action to me.
- that you are greatly offended to think is neutral or without character ('moral or ethical quality; integrity').
I am grateful that flowers exist. Does that confer upon them any sort of consciousness?
I am equally grateful for the universes' life-giving properties yet, do my best to refrain from layering upon it a projection of my own consciousness.
As Montaigne observed:
"Man is quite insane. He wouldn't know how to create a maggot, and he creates Gods by the dozen."
Egghead: God does indeed speak to people ALL the time - through all sorts of channels - one being nature in all its glory - and another being other people who are quite often inspired by God.
That is your opinion and you are entitled to it. I have been making a marked effort to stay in the realm of the observable. Your choice not to do so seriously erodes your ability to make meaningful contributions to this exchange.
As with doubting Thomas, God WILL "speak" to you personally in time - perhaps at your passing from this life into the next.
Fine, then a deathbed conversion it is.
But, again, God may "speak" to you through an overall impression via a brilliant white light that will permeate through your soul searching out your goodness to combine with God's universally good energy.
My brain has generated such waves of multi-hued energy many times in the past. If there is such a thing as “God's universally good energy”, my own good energy merged with it long ago. It is why I do not fear being judged by God at any point in my life. As to God being displeased with my lack of belief, I’ll close with this Bertrand Russell quote:
And if there were a God, I think it very unlikely that He would have such an uneasy vanity as to be offended by those who doubt His existence
Egghead: For someone who "questions" the existence of God, you are awfully committed to the Tao idea …
My proposal of the Tao as a useful model was strictly due to the Baron having used it in numerous previous references he has made with regard to the much discussed "imbalance of yin" that is the topic of this thread.
Please recall that my introduction of it included the following words:
"Towards that end, I will use a familiar example that most readers readily comprehend and serves quite well the purposes needed to maintain my case."
I could almost as readily have employed a model based upon a subset of parametric universal values and, in fact, made direct reference to them with my link to "The Anthropic Coincidences".
The Tao has a singular advantage in vividly portraying a universe in simultaneous balance and healthy order. There is little difference between that Taoistic state and one in which the universe is within its parametric tolerances. The Taoistic model is simply more accessible to a larger number of people.
- which has NO more proof than the idea of God.
That is clearly disputable. While the Tao is held as unobservable, its "shadows" are projected into reality much as with Plato's cave analogy.
You may think that it is an equally simple matter to attribute those projections upon reality to God's dandy little hand shadow puppet show but, like the subset of universal parametric values, the Tao is far more easily and logically derived than the existence of God.
The Tao may be considered as supra-natural but it is most definitely NOT supernatural. Any postulation of the supernatural requires a far greater leap of inductive thinking than that of the Tao or a subset of universal parametric values.
Maybe you were Chinese in another life?!
I have been told that by more than one native Chinese person. It might have something to do with studying Asian culture for nearly my entire life.
Approaching the 400 mark. C'mon people, you can do it!
Sag
Well, I suppose we must take our victories where we find them and count ourselves as being ahead in the game for nearly a dozen posts by Egghead with not a single murmur about RFID chips.
Zenster -
"Well, I suppose we must take our victories where we find them and count ourselves as being ahead in the game for nearly a dozen posts by Egghead with not a single murmur about RF** chips."
Forgive me for slightly censoring your quote and thus preventing the "RF"-word from being uttered again. I think Egghead might be teasing a bit about chips and religion. Still like her style though (she's not the "lecturing" kind) and I think she's a good sport.
Meanwhile I'm waiting for @Latté to respond to my suggestion about "defeminizing feminism", which is another way of saying that I'm in favour of universal instead of "equal" rights. Problem with all this "equality"-speak is that it sounds like universalism, but it is always effected through state power and govt. interventionism. I resent and resist that.
In that sense, freedom might very well prove to be totally different from "liberation". This is a general point about language and action, that I learned when interviewing Patrick Moore as a young biology student during a congress about genetic modification, still called "manipulation" back then (he had already left Greenpeace, btw): his point was that progressives - being at war with (human) nature - will always use "synthetic language" which mimics that of common folk, injecting into the natural sentiments of public discourse a political agens, known as hubristin (TM). We talk about nature, they say "environment". We think of growth, they push "progress" into our minds. We dream of a free society, they speak of "liberation".
I've tried to convey the real life consequences of this progressive linguistic mimicry to Hesperado, where it might pose some problems for his pristine but overly schematic PC MC thesis (politicians/power elites sharing same convictions as general public, i.e. we are guilty ourselves. Bit too Calvinistic toward the general public and apologetic of political elites for my taste), but it seems I might have failed, for now.
The tradition of universal natural rights has endured sustained attacks from all sides, particularly from those "liberators" and secular saviours who - for various doctrinal reasons, have fallen for the idea of the "common good" and the "Religion of Humanity". I think Egghead would understand my point of view, not only with regard to feminism, but on many issues concerning universal "rights", being that it is derived from Natural Law philosophy (which springs from many sources, combined in the great medieval Christian tradition, that was still firmly rooted in Roman and Greek antiquity)
Also warming up for an article on the much overlooked evils of "Dutch supremacism", where I'll try and trace the roots of feminism, multiculturalism, free market capitalism and religious toleration all the way back to its Dutch origins in Amsterdam, old and "New". The historical evils that followed in the wake of this Dutch conspiracy will make that of the you-know-what chip look like a picnic in the Vondelpark ;-)
Kind regs from Amsterdam,
Sag.
Sagunto: Meanwhile I'm waiting for @Latté to respond to my suggestion about "defeminizing feminism", which is another way of saying that I'm in favour of universal instead of "equal" rights. Problem with all this "equality"-speak is that it sounds like universalism, but it is always effected through state power and govt. interventionism. I resent and resist that.
It was immediately apparent that your approach towards "universal rights" had nothing in common with the Leftist Trojan horse of "Universal Human Rights".
I, too, have long maintained (since high school days), that when men learn which corner of a baby to pick it up by and women figure out which end of a screwdriver to grab, we'll all be a lot better off.
This was my own way of saying that "women's rights" meant nothing if they did not display identical concern for the rights of men.
Of course, the rise of feminism somehow neglected to remember this key principle and the insane imbalance of legal preference that modern women enjoy is a prime mover in the destruction of Western civilization.
Women alone are not wholly responsible for this in that many men had to buy into this sham for it to succeed. But succeed it has and the destructiveness of it is as wholesale as it is widespread.
A prime example is the silence of modern feminists about shari'a law and Islam. A direct reflection of this is their culpability in the election of Islamophile Obama.
The empowerment of women to make these almost suicidally bad choices is something that needs careful examination.
A comparable issue, though much less fair in some respects, would be how inexpensive and widely distributed oral contraceptives have enabled women to avoid the normal repercussions of dallying with dangerous types of men.
This has seen the rise of an entirely unwholesome fascination by women with "edgy" or "rebel" types who just as often are only inches away from being thugs and lowlifes if they are not, in fact, already so.
The concomitant rejection of decent mates by these empowered women has propelled an existing societal tailspin into a death spiral of divorce, spousal abuse and countless other toxins that are fatal to a functional culture.
Sagunto: Your sense of humor is what I like best about you. :)
Zenster: I saw a welcome glimmer of humor in your comment about my not mentioning RFID chips recently. Humor is much better.... :)
All: I post ideas in multiple posts because I labor under a severe word limit imposed by the evil cabal at Blogger. You should have to post Haiku-length comments and see how fun it is. NOT!
Sagunto: I do indeed like to use a teasing tone (which is much more fun when people tease back), but I also "generally" stand by the content of my comments (that should give me wiggle room). :)
Zenster: I repeat, "If you are so certain that your philosophical construct is agnostic or atheist in nature, send it along to an atheist site or organization and ask THEIR honest opinion of its relevance."
Civilization
Cannot spring from destructive
Feminization
Thnx Eggy -
Beware though, the following will be an attempt at dispensing some dead-serious advice to you. And I'll take you through it, step by step.
Advice on how to exorcize the malevolent Blogger-daimon
Step 1)
Write your comment in notepad
Step 2)
Visit the GoV article as it appears on the page, do not click on the article's title link or the "read more" link.
Step 3)
Click on "comments" (indicated by number) right away and go to the Blogger pop-up.
Step 4)
Assuming you're not logged in yet, send a test preview of a few random characters and sign in.
Step 5)
It might be that the Blogger ghost starts with obstructive actions now. No daimon likes to be driven out. Just click the cross and make the whole thing vanish.
Step 6)
Switch back (Alt + Tab) to the GoV page and make the Blogger comment screen pop-up again, like in step 3.
Step 7)
You will notice that you're signed in now. Paste your comment into the window and click "preview". Most of the time, the Blogger bug accepts defeat already and you can publish.
Step 8)
If not, just temporarily accept that the Blogger-bug is only weakened. Try again the other day, and you'll see that in the end, all opposition will melt away. Except for those comments with embedded links. These will be gladly ;-) scooped up by the Baron and liberated from the mandatory spam-"filter" anytime.
Good luck!
Sag.
Zenster: Since the beginning of human relations, men have exercised an near-exclusive male personal and legal prerogative to engage in spousal and child abuse - physical and sexual abuse with far worse consequences when women had ZERO voting and educational rights or options to divorce and work outside the home.
In point of fact, men have always had the option to de facto divorce women because men exercised near total control of money. Through history, men who took mistresses were practicing de facto polygamy or divorce to the great detriment of their families.
For women: Voting secures women the right to divorce, and divorce keeps men honest because women can leave abusive men (who often try to maim and/or kill them anyway) - although the children are generally stuck in bad situations due to an INSANE idea of progressive social services that guarantees a father's right to see children over his children's right to safety.
Here I reference the case of the father who molested and raped his daughter who became pregnant and bore a girl child. The father/grandfather served his time in prison for the molestation/rape and, once free, attempted to secure unsupervised visitation with his new daughter/granddaughter.
Of course, the state argued on behalf of the father who had served his time for his crime and "deserved" that chance to "know" his daughter/granddaughter. ARGH!
"Led by the Anti-Saloon League and the Women's Christian Temperance Union, the dry forces had triumphed by linking Prohibition to a variety of Progressive era social causes. Proponents of Prohibition included many women reformers who were concerned about alcohol's link to wife beating and child abuse and industrialists, such as Henry Ford, who were concerned about the impact of drinking on labor productivity."
Prohibition (1920s)
Sagunto: Thanks for the tip. I will try it much later tonight. I am out for now. :)
Sagunto, I didn't realize I was supposed to reply. I was in general agreement about defeminizing feminism, if I understand that expression correctly. Do you mean, to remove the identity politics part of rights? Sign me up, or rather, I've never had any other position.
Also, even though I agree that men and women are different, on average, and have different abilities, that doesn't mean that outliers should be prevented from using their talents. If a few women are called to be electrical engineers instead of nurses, and if a few men would rather stay home with the kids than climb the corporate ladder, they should absolutely do so. Not only is it better for people to have access to paths that suit them, the people they serve (children, clients) are also happier, because love is both more fun and more effective than coercion. (I'm only referring to work and family life, not war, in which case, coercion can be more appropriate.)
Oh, and I'll briefly point out that the invention of the Pill wasn't the only cause of some women's irresponsible behavior nowadays. The elites of many societies throughout history have been as wild as people are today. It's just trickled down to the masses more lately.
I'm not a social historian, so I'm not the right person to go into detail about all this, but I have to object to this "The Pill caused everything" meme, because even knowing a little history and literature, I can see it's as true as "The Jews caused everything."
Read Dangerous Liaisons. Read anything--it's all there. They didn't have the Pill, but lots of people were making mistakes and getting rid of the kids in ways that were a lot more morally questionable than the Pill, which I don't have a problem with morally, except that it's a health hazard for many women and was marketed irresponsibly.
Just recently, I learned the Pill is still prescribed by some doctors to very young girls, as young as twelve, not for contraception, but to make their period more regular. So, why blame women for using the pill? The medical establishment is pushing it on children for no particular reason.
latté island: Oh, and I'll briefly point out that the invention of the Pill wasn't the only cause of some women's irresponsible behavior nowadays.
Please note the all important qualifier contained in my introduction of that example:
"A comparable issue, though much less fair in some respects, would be how inexpensive and widely distributed oral contraceptives have enabled women to avoid the normal repercussions of dallying with dangerous types of men."
Also, in the realm of better late than never, I would like to echo Engineer Poet's applause of Nilk's observations in comments #62 & 63.
Zenster:
Good on you
for your haiku:
Civilization
Cannot spring from destructive
Feminization
Here's my reply:
Civilization
Springs from the well of peaceful
Feminization
Female nature is
Stronger to nurture than to
Injure weak others
Male war destroys man
And child who cry out, "Mother!"
To tend the wounded
Birth, death, in-between
Life eternal given
By women to men
Feminization
Unappreciated by[buy,bye]
Uncivilized men
:)
Sagunto: Thanks! I tried your method, but Blogger is resisting....
I will keep trying. :)
Egghead, not all men are disconnected from their internal yin counterpart.
I'm so in touch with my feminine side that it filed a restraining order against me! [rimshot]
Sagunto: Thanks so much! Persistence paid off for me. Your method has worked, and I am free to ramble at length again! :)
Baron: If you are following this thread, I have seen MANY of your commenters complain about the Blogger bug. So, you might want to let your readers know that Sagunto's Blogger bug fix WORKS.
As I recall, you have to save your initial comment somewhere because you will lose it when you exit the initial preview screen. Then, try to submit the comment with the same process once or twice, and Blogger will be magically fixed. After Blogger is fixed, you do not need to preview anymore. Just submit the full-length comment.
Baron: Oops! I spoke too soon. Blogger is giving me trouble again and refuses to accept a preview for a longer statement. In other words, Blogger is giving me the same error message to see a preview as to post a comment. I will keep you posted on my progress.
Zenster: Did you mean badum-CHING - or I-Ching? Ha! :)
According to the Urban Dictionary, a rimshot is "that badum-CHING thing they do on a drum after a joke."
Now, the interesting thing about the I-Ching is that - drumroll please - the Chinese believe that the I-Ching was divinely inspired!
"Fu Xi or Fu Hsi (Chinese: 伏羲; pinyin: fúxī; aka Paoxi (simplified Chinese: 庖牺; traditional Chinese: 庖犧; pinyin: páoxī)), mid 29th century BCE, was the first of the Three Sovereigns (三皇 sānhuáng) of ancient China. He is a culture hero reputed to be the inventor of writing, fishing, and trapping."
"According to legend, the land was swept by a great flood and only Fu Xi and his sister Nüwa survived. They retired to Kunlun Mountain where they prayed for a sign from the Emperor of Heaven. The divine being approved their union and the siblings set about procreating the human race."
"It was said that in order to speed up the procreation of humans, Fu Xi and Nüwa found an additional way by using clay to create human figures, and with the power divine being entrusted to them, they made the clay figures to come alive.[1]"
"Traditionally, Fu Xi is considered the originator of the I Ching (also known as the Yi Jing or Zhou Yi), which work is attributed to his reading of the He Map (or the Yellow River Map). According to this tradition, Fu Xi had the arrangement of the trigrams (八卦 bāgùa) of the I Ching revealed to him supernaturally."
From Wikipedia
"In Chinese cosmology, Yin and Yang (see a picture) are two opposite but complementary principles that regulate the functioning of the cosmos. The repeated alternation of Yin and Yang provides the energy necessary for the cosmos to sustain itself. Their continuous joining and separation is at the origin of the rise and the disappearance of all phenomena."
by Fabrizio Pregadio
"According to a famous statement, which is found in one of the appendixes to the Book of Changes (Yijing), "one Yin and one Yang, this is the Dao." This sentence refers to the Dao that first determines itself as Unity (or the One), and then gives birth to the two complementary principles. As each of these stages generates the next one, Yin and Yang are ultimately contained within the Dao itself. At the same time, the phrase "one Yin and one Yang, this is the Dao" alludes to the continuous alternation of Yin and Yang within the cosmos. When one of the two principles prevails, the other yields, but once one of them has reached the height of its development, it begins to recede--and in that very moment, the other principle begins its ascent. This mode of operation is especially visible in the time cycles of the day (alternation of daytime and nighttime) and of the year (alternation of the four seasons)."
by Fabrizio Pregadio
"There is a perception (especially in the West) that yin and yang correspond to evil and good. However, Taoist philosophy generally discounts good/bad distinctions and other dichotomous moral judgments, in preference to the idea of balance. Confucianism (most notably the philosophy of Dong Zhongshu, c. the 2nd century BCE) did attach a moral dimension to the idea of yin and yang, but the modern sense of the term largely stems from Buddhist adaptations of Taoist philosophy.[2]"
From Wikipedia
"It is impossible to talk about yin or yang without some reference to the opposite, since yin and yang are bound together as parts of a mutual whole (i.e. you cannot have the back of a hand without the front). A way to illustrate this idea is to postulate the notion of a race with only men or only women; this race would disappear in a single generation. Yet, men and women together create new generations that allow the race they mutually create (and mutually come from) to survive. The interaction of the two gives birth to things.[3] Yin and yang transform each other: like an undertow in the ocean, every advance is complemented by a retreat, and every rise transforms into a fall. Thus, a seed will sprout from the earth and grow upwards towards the sky – an intrinsically yang movement. Then, when it reaches its full potential height, it will fall."
From Wikipedia
Zenster: My primary, and I think relevant to the spirit of the Dao, objection to the term DESTRUCTIVE feminization is that, in clearly being a pejorative term, the term contracts the message of the Dao which is that life ebbs and flows in HARMONY.
However, the men on this site who quote the Yin and Yang of the Dao and predict (and await!) the fall of feminism give the impression that those same men would like to "punish" women for their role in accepting Islam into the West.
This characterization of women is dismaying because it relies on several faulty premises including 1) a fundamental misunderstanding of Yin and Yang and the Dao (and I dare you to ask a Buddhist expert about the Dao), 2) the idea that women are MORE responsible than men for encroaching Islam whereas HUMANS (especially Muslims!) are responsible in totem, 3) women exercise MORE power in politics and culture than men (other than a few recent figureheads, seriously, folks?!), and 4) that women would deserve to be "punished" by taking away their natural rights (whereas men who have exclusively screwed things up from the beginning of time until now would deserve to "punish" the women). Yeesh!
The issue of transexuals being mainstreamed in showers, dormitories & restrooms is a red herring. It's not so much an issue of, the gays and trannies are forcing us to... as, a specific case of the general problem of lack of freedom of association.
First, I'll state that I don't want to share any private space with any transgendered person, whether MTF or FTM. I do, however, think free adults have the right to choose their gender. Sometimes people's rights are in conflict. This is not specific to gay issues, it's a universal issue. It's similar to other zoning, land use and property rights issues.
Here are some examples of similar issues, where the parties are different. For instance: as a woman, I am often put off by women who bring their male children into women's restrooms. Of course it's necessary, to protect the boys from the predators they could meet if they go alone to the men's room. That's why I've never complained. Women have no choice, but to allow their male children to violate the privacy of women using restrooms.
Occasionally, the boys are so old, that they are obviously getting off on it. I feel as if I'm being used as sex education for boys at the awkward age when they are starting to have sexual curiousity about women, but are still not safe by themselves in the men's room.
You mentioned college dormitories. Well, there was that recent case where that gay freshman was videotaped making out in his college dorm, by his straight roommate. He jumped off a bridge.
This is not an example of why straight people shouldn't be allowed in college dorms. It's an example of what can happen to anyone, for any reason, when they don't have privacy and freedom of association.
The roommate thing is something I don't understand. Even among straight people or gay people, one roommate may be noisier than the other. Whenever you have people sharing space who haven't picked each other, one will be at a disadvantage.
To use transexuals as an example of this general principle, and then forget the principle, but only get worked up about the trannies, is some kind of bad rhetoric there's probably a name for, it's so common. (Scapegoating?)
I don't have a solution to the tranny problem, but it would help in every case, if society were more careful about privacy rights in general.
Hey, what about nursing homes and hospitals? Can anyone top this one: a friend of mine was dying of cancer in a hospice, and his roommate blasted the tv constantly. I complained, but the nurses sided with the offender, because he was big and black.
Does this mean black people shouldn't be allowed in nursing homes? No, it means people in nursing homes have the right to privacy, across the board. Same as the tranny thing. It's a very big issue.
latté island: I understand your opinion, but the cart blanche issuance of "rights" to gays and lesbians sets a clear precedent for transsexuals as everyone - pro and con - is all too aware.
In fact, it is my understanding that gay groups have instructed transsexuals to stay low-key about their "rights" until gays achieve their "rights" - and then....
In any case, I agree with you that the rights to privacy and freedom of association would help mitigate issues.
However, now that gays (and friends) are a "protected" class, it will be hard to deflect claims of sexual discrimination and human rights violations when "normal" people claim their right to pick their own roommates and associate with other "normal" people.
"Whenever you have people sharing space who haven't picked each other, one will be at a disadvantage."
In my opinion, there is a much greater disadvantage when young college students - who are often required to live in campus housing for at least one year - are forced to share dorm rooms and bathrooms against their will with a gay, lesbian, or transsexual person.
By the way, "family" restrooms (now found at Target and Wal-Mart) are a great solution to help solve the problem of mothers bringing older boys into the ladies restroom. :)
Egghead, why do you describe the dilemma of "college students" who are forced to share with gay, etc.? Are you assuming that all college students are straight, and also that in the case of gay/straight room assignments, the straight person is the one who is at a disadvantage?
Do you think the late Tyler Clementi had a right to attend college and not be spied on and publicly humiliated by his roommate?
Could this type of situation be avoided by giving choice to all students, straight,gay and trans?
Why put the blame on one type of person, when in fact, every type of sexual orientation, music preference, attitude toward doing chores, etc. etc. can be unfair to other people.
I think it would be more honest on your part to state upfront that you want gay and trans people to not have rights to be in public, just because. Hey, that's kind of how I feel about black people, but I know that won't hold up logically, so I always take responsibility for my views and say, black people have rights, but I also have the right to avoid them.
This is the honest way to deal with prejudice. Not to pretend to be logical, when anyone reading this exchange can see that reason is on my side. You only have the right to avoid gay people, not take away their rights, just because you don't like them.
Haven't I made it clear I also want to avoid trannies? But I don't kid myself that they don't have rights. They pay taxes and are citizens, the ones who do and are, so they do have the right to go to college and vote and everything, and even to go to the bathroom in public buildings.
The way to solve this problem is for everyone to be honest. Whether the solution is to divide facilities into three categories instead of two, or some other idea, I don't know, but I do know that discriminating against people because their personality and appearance is different, isn't sustainable in a free society.
To sum up, people in the CJ need to consider how some of their arguments would sound to uncommitted potential allies. If people here are not ready to see that there is a middle ground between rights and affirmative action, that's what will make 50% of the West sit this out.
Latté -
Thnx for the clarification and summary. You wrote:
"If people here are not ready to see that there is a middle ground between rights and affirmative action [..]"
This contrasts unfavourably with what you said earlier in your reply to me, when I pointed to universal individual instead of "equal" group rights.
If one truly supports universal natural and individual rights, then it is easy to see that there's no middle ground here. This is about the sanctity and sovereignty of the person, nothing else.
Kind regs from Amsterdam,
Sag.
Sagunto, you're right. When I wrote "middle ground," it was a bit hazy. This isn't the first time you've been my copy editor.
Latté -
:)
Let me try to rise above that rather depressing level of editor.
You'd have to totally reinvent "affirmative action" to find any semblance of ehm.. common ground with Natural Law philosophy and universal rights. The affirmative action as it is known among the general public was never about that, but always about group rights, enforced by state intervention.
Sag.
latté island: You are in error when you label me as prejudiced. Indeed, you sound like the people who label me as a "Nazi" because I am against Islamic immigration and the Muslim "lifestyle" choices.
As is obvious to those with eyes and soul, some "lifestyles" ARE more pernicious than others.
To be clear, I agree that gays, lesbians, and transsexuals should have the same constitutional rights as others.
I disagree when gays, lesbians, and transsexuals attempt to force a redefinition of marriage from a union of one man and one woman into a union between two (or more) people of any sex.
I disagree when gays, lesbians, and transsexuals attempt to require society - particularly Christian religions - to give false equivalence to gay, lesbian, and transsexual sexual practices by forcing society and Christian religions to perform gay, lesbian, and transsexual "marriage" ceremonies.
I disagree when gays, lesbians, and transsexuals attempt to force schools - whether public or private - to teach children mandatory sex education that promotes gay, lesbian, and transsexual lifestyles and explains gay, lesbian, and transsexual sexual practices.
I disagree when gays, lesbians, and transsexuals attempt to force a redefinition of gender from the sexual identity that a person is born with via DNA to a sexual identity that a person perceives via personal decision.
I disagree when gays, lesbians, and transsexuals attempt to require society - particularly Christian religions - to give false equivalence to gay, lesbian, and transsexual sexual practices by forcing society and Christian religions to recognize perceived genders as actual genders.
I disagree when gays, lesbians, and transsexuals attempt to force schools - whether public or private - to allow students to use restrooms and to assign students to dormitories based on perceived genders instead of actual genders.
As is obvious, gays, lesbians, and transsexuals already possess the same constitutional rights as everyone else.
In reality, gays, lesbians, and transsexuals seek mandatory legally-enforced societal and religious (really moral) acceptance of and deference to their personal sexual decisions and lifestyles.
latté island: Your intellectual arguments are significantly weakened when you heave heavily-loaded PC MC insults at someone who disagrees with you.
Rather than offering articulate arguments based on reason, you unilaterally declare yourself to be the reasonable party - and me to be prejudiced, illogical, and discriminatory (an attempted stab at the Western PC MC heart).
As with our fellow commenter Hesperado, if you have to declare yourself "right" instead of hearing other people declare you to be so, then that may be your first clue that you need to re-think - or at least re-phrase - your premise, your arguments, and your expression of those.
The best action that everyone who comments here to take is to think a little LESS of themselves and truly LISTEN to other commenters.
Egghead: my most recent comment was disappeared by Blogger, but it doesn't matter. Just as you've accused me of not listening to you, I don't think you've even bothered to reply to any of my points about how gays can be just as inconvenienced from mainstreaming as straights, and how gays do not have the same interests as trannies WRT freedom of association and restrooms.
Do you really think Christian churches are being forced to do anything by gays? If some Christian churches have revised their policies, is this not voluntary on their part, and are there not still Christian churches that haven't changed their policies, which is their right?
What's wrong with saying I'm right and you're wrong? Isn't that the basis of most political discussions? But I have read and addressed your comments, while you've ignored mine. This is, or I hope it is, my last comment on this thread.
I can't resist adding that I stopped liking Auster when I read his take on the Tyler Clementi incident. I want to thank my parents for not burdening me with homophobia, which lowers the IQ, not to mention common decency, of otherwise smart people.
Egghead -
"As with our fellow commenter Hesperado, if you have to declare yourself "right" instead of hearing other people declare you to be so, then that may be your first clue that you need to re-think - or at least re-phrase - your premise, your arguments, and your expression of those."
Bingo!
Keep it up Eggy, still like your style and I'd like to second all of your last postings. Sorry that the Blogger-tip didn't work out for you. Keep trying and you will prevail. He's a nasty bugger ;)
Sag.
latté island: (From the News Feed thread) Egghead, gay extremists =/= people who support human rights for gay people. Ordinary gay people are fairly put off by the tranny stuff. It varies. There is no position on transexual issues among gays as a whole, although there probably is a position held by the most visible and extreme political types in the gay community.
The same applies to the gay community as it does to the feminist and Muslim communities as well.
SPEAK UP!
This silent routine is no longer acceptable. If gays want to come out of the closet, they had damn well better find a collective voice with respect to condemning their extremist counterparts.
From all that I am able to see, no such thing is happening.
Gays will find themselves and their rights thrown out with the extremist bathwater unless they begin to distinguish themselves from the hard core types who have it out for us "breeders".
latté island: I thought about your posts today, and what I wonder is WHY you care so much about the gay, lesbian, transsexual issue?
As far as I can tell, and quite the opposite from your contention that gays, lesbians, and transsexuals need YOUR help because they are incapable (you posted a former comment to that effect).
Indeed, I find gays, lesbians, and transsexuals to be QUITE capable of furthering their own interests - especially using the bully power of unelected judges to overturn public referendums and also "make" gay-friendly law from the bench.
I particularly thought of you today because I was in a hospital with public restrooms that were bi-sex restrooms.
In other words, two single restrooms that were marked for EITHER males or females to be allowed to use - large enough to fit a couple extra kids if necessary.
Having bi-sex restrooms is a good solution to the transsexual issue. However, this solution will "cost" everyone else something.
Bi-sex restrooms would cost a lot of money to retrofit into existing buildings. Thus, businesses would have to pay more money, and people might find there to be fewer restrooms as a consequence. Cross your legs now at a sports stadium.
Meanwhile, men would get to see what it feels like to wait FOREVER in a long line to use a restroom. And, women would suffer less clean restrooms (sad but true).
I absolutely know that Christian churches are being forced to adapt to gay, lesbian, and transsexual demands.
For example, the introduction of gays and lesbians into the military WILL cause a crisis of conscience for Christian clergy who WILL be forced to accept (and thus promote) the gay and lesbian lifestyle or be court-martialed for sexual discrimination and booted from the military.
Military Chaplains Face Court Martial
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