WasatchMan

Whether or not religious behavioral dictates have good or bad outcomes, they should not be considered morality, because: 1) They are not derived using a valid ethical framework (i.e. they are not logical) 2) They are enforced through threats of physical force or exclusion from eternal life (or some other bribery mechanism) I have a thread that goes into this in more detail https://board.freedomainradio.com/topic/43567-can-we-create-moral-choice-through-lies-about-ethics/ As far as this goes: Lets look at the 10 commandments: You shall have no other gods before Me. You shall not make idols. You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Honor your father and your mother. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. You shall not covet. To be generous, 4 of these commandments do happen to be moral propositions. Two are neutral propositions based on aesthetic preferences. The other 4 are bat shit crazy propositions, and for some reason are also the first four. So this makes the 10 commandments 40% correct, 20% neutral, and 40 bat shit crazy. I can hardly see how we could make the case that the "morals that religions profess are mostly correct" because just this simple analysis shows that they are as much correct as they are crazy. And for this claim: Yes, engineers use models that are approximations and are not always fundamental representations of reality. However, they are not even close to the same as religious "morals". Physical models that engineers use are based on reality. They take ideas found to be true (like gravity accelerates on object at 9.81 meters per second per second towards the earth given a somewhat close proximity to sea level no matter what its mass) through empirical observation and represents them in mathematical relationships to get a answer that is found close enough for something designed to actually work in reality. Religious "morals" take what someone claims to be the word of god and threatens people with hell (or some equivalent) if they do not obey. If religious "morals" were analogous to engineering models it wouldn't be called religion, it would be called utilitarianism.

I don't understand your point in sending me this definition... Atheism still does not fall under this definition for atheism is a lack of a belief in god, and not a fundemental belief in anything. If atheism could be considered a religion, than everybody would have to be considered to belong to thousands of religions. Every religion that you lacked belief in would become a new religion.

Mike, y u tease

As I have already explained to you: So you still think you can point to one thing that may have some subtlety to it and think you can overthrow a well established scientific theory? Where is your competing theory with explanatory power? Sounds like you are still nitpicking a theory that has fossil evidence illustrating that life has in fact evolved over time which proves that the predictions of evolution are true. Occam's Razor would say that it is more likely that there is an explanation to your bacteria claim than the fossils we have, that show life evolution, is wrong.' Or you could have taken my advice to do a quick Google search and found scientific explanations such as this one:

Don't get me wrong, I appreciate your questions. I also would like to take this opportunity to applaud you for your diligence to seek truth and not just accept base arguments and others beliefs, in what I observe as a genuine manner. Stefan has put out a lot of great arguments against participation in state activities in order to reform the state - for this topic I would recommend you seek out call in shows about Ron Paul's presidential campaign (2008 and 2012) where this issue was heavy on people minds. I can't claim to be able to present them all (and as elegantly) in this format, but can only indicate the shape of the arguments. It sounds like you are on the right (and only) track to determine the truth or falsehood of certain propositions: a dedication to determine where logical consistency leads you.

I think this statement is true, so then ask yourself, if it doesn't change why participate? You are making the claim that your participation can slow the growth of government, however I already gave you an argument of why this is a fools errand, because it doesn't work. ("Atlas Shrugged is one of the most popular books ever written and probably one of the best artistic arguments against the state ever conceived, and that was in 1957 when the state was much smaller than it is today. There has been a libertarian movement for decades, and the state has only seemed to accelerate. In other words, "Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Albert Einstein.") Do you have examples of something like the US government, with probably the most liberty conscious people on the planet due to its history, slowing its growth due to political activism? I don't think more libertarianism is going to help. It is not like the little bit of libertarianism did some, and if only they had more support they could do more. The government has accelerated under huge libertarian movements, so there is no empirical data that tells me all we have do is get more libertarianism activism and the government will start to shrink. The data just doesn't support this claim. Again the governments purpose is not to shrink due to political activism, it is a tool for those who seek to dominate people. More libertarianism is not going to remove as tool the ability to legally initiate force from those who want to seek power over others. All you do by participating in libertarianism is legitimize the role and idea as the government being for the people.

So atheism is a concept "applied to skepticism of a category called "religious claims."" (which you claim to accept), and not a description of a group of people. Whether or not people who identify as atheist could be considered as having faith or being religious (which I think is vapid accusation), does not change the concept of what atheism is meant to connote or whether or not it is the correct stance to hold. Even if people self identifying as "atheists" all started worshiping a spaghetti monster and completely destroyed the original meaning "atheist", that would not remove the need for a concept in the human language know as English to connote ""applied to skepticism of a category called "religious claims."" All that would happen is a new word would be created to fill the vacuum left by the destruction of the previous concept that atheism used to fill as utility in the English language. You can't destroy this concept by pointing at people. It must logically exist, so I would deal with it and not just try to fog around it by complaining about people.

So the state is fundamentally immoral. It just does not happen to be immoral due to outside circumstances (differing ideologies, flawed politicians, non-perfect constitutions, money in politics, etc.). It exists so some people can initiate force against others to get their way. It does not empower those who wish to limit it, it is a tool for those who want to wield it. A great argument that Stefan has created in response to this question is, would you join the mafia in order to make the mafia a free market enterprise from the inside? If not, then I don't expect you can join the biggest mafia with expectations of reforming it from within. Also, as a practical question about the smaller tumor, I would say no. Like most tumors, states don't tend to get smaller they only tend to grow. I would rather have the tumor grow bigger and bigger and kill the beast as quick as possible so people can (hopefully) learn from mistakes of the past and start new societies that rely on the initiation of force. Atlas Shrugged is one of the most popular books ever written and probably one of the best artistic arguments against the state ever conceived, and that was in 1957 when the state was much smaller than it is today. There has been a libertarian movement for decades, and the state has only seemed to accelerate. In other words, "Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Albert Einstein.

Yeah, I don't care to. It is pretty easy to research on your own, if the research and arguments available by a simple Google search aren't compelling to you, then I don't really care to waste my time explaining something as easy to understand and as well documented as the fossil record. I really don't care if you want to be scientifically illiterate.

I don't think they are mutually exclusive. I think they both may point to an identity crisis issue due to a break down in philosophy in current society. However, I don't think you are necessarily obligated to endorse transracial theory if you support transgender. This is because it is not a proven fact yet that someone cannot necessarily have issues in their brain that makes them feel like a gender that is opposite from their genitalia. However, this is not the case with race, or even the context of race. Race is a description of your genetic lineage that actually happened. I know we all came from Africa at one point in time, however race definitions account for a single lineage with other definitions to describe branches from that lineage. In other words, you cannot claim to have have a genetic lineage that did not happen because it did not objectively happen, however you can claim to have a feminine brain and a penis because it has not been proven that this is not possible.

The fossil record.

Do you really expect me to defend myself against all these mealy mouthed accusations? I have a better idea. I am done interacting with you MMX. Take care. P.S. It was satire. Joel told me himself. So much for the always right about everything MMX.

But it itches DAMMIT!!!

No, but Joel's argument is that upvoting "is not useful at all" in its current state. Your argument is that people should provide feedback with their upvotes so that they are more useful. See the difference? One is a universal statement about upvoting providing absolutely no value, the other one is an aesthetic preference for how to optimize the benefits of the upvoting system. These two are miles apart, because in order to optimize somethings utility, it has to have the ability to provide utility in the first place (like in math 0 times anything is still 0). Also, your exchange does not account for the fact there is 9 upvotes on a post saying the upvoting system in its current state "is not useful at all". If you agree that upvotes "are not useful at all" I wonder why you would upvote someone. EDIT: It appears I may have misunderstood the context of this thread to be satire. So possibly the upvotes are people who did get it and appreciated the humor (which I do now see). Poes law in action.. haha.

Something to ponder... Why does a post saying that upvoting system is not useful now have 9 upvotes? If you agree with this sentiment, what was your point in upvoting? If your point was "I agree with this and I want others to see that this is an agreeable sentiment, so I am going to upvote to show that others do in fact agree with this" then you have just proved the idea of the upvoting system as being useless wrong. When you use the upvoting system as a utility to communicate your agreement with someones idea, you are saying that the upvoting system was of useful to you to help communicate support of someone else idea that you share. I would expect support for a thread against upvoting to have no upvotes and a bunch of posts just quoting the original thread and saying "I agree with this". OR are people upvoting this thread because they disagree with the sentiment? This would be odd, but at least logically consistent in my mind. EDIT: It appears I may have misunderstood the context of this thread to be satire. So possibly the upvotes are people who did get it and appreciated the humor (which I do now see). Poes law in action.. haha.

I cannot speak for the rep system on Roosh - I have not expedience it. So what if people get a good reputation for having a sense of humor that others can empathize with - that sounds like a pretty good reflection of the real world. To say "The FDR Forum equates the serious and helpful truths with the merely funny" is a pretty large conflation, if you don't mind me saying. This aspect is only a small part of the reputations system in my experience. I don't think that I make an abundance of silly jokes on here (probably more serious than I should be for the most part), and somehow have got a fair amount of reputation points.

I disagree... Money doesn't provide commentary either, but it provides a tremendous amount of information. I don't know why a philosophy that is trying to aim at a free society which would be made possible through ostracism of those against freedom would be against a popular contest. Are you saying that the popularity of people with high reps is unearned? I sure don't think so.

I don't see a problem with FDR's thumbnails. I see other channels sometimes that have misleading ones and get kind of annoyed when I click on it to find I have been duped **COUGH TYT COUGH**. But I have not experienced this with FDR, and I actual feel like they are creative with trying to sell the content of the video in a single image. I am curious if you have tried to find out where this annoyance is coming from. I experience annoyance to be usually something that I have not processed myself. Are you embarrassed for Stef? Are you jealous of Stef? Do you feel it is below you intellectually?

Ok thanks. I have nothing substantive to add to this, but I did feel that these questions were helpful (at least for me personally) to better understand your position.

So are you advocating for something akin to a Masculine King (analogous to Plato's Philosopher King) , who can save women from themselves? OR are you just advocating men protect themselves while still being able to get sex?

Thanks MMX, that was a really straight answer. I do appreciate you humoring my curiosity in a format I can easily digest. Given the perspective of women being able to choose, do you think PUA helps women in growing a desire to choose virtue or exploits their historical momentum to be hypergamous?

I obviously suspected that, but non the less I dared tread that water. I think MMX needs to be clear on his position on determinism when making these claims.

MMX, I am curious, do you believe in determinism? Do you believe women are intrinsically deterministic? OR do you just believe that they are deterministic when it comes to their sexuality? I would request a simple answer, but obviously, you do not have to appeal to my preference in this request.

So the parody was in response to someones fallacy. I think you are trying to act like the word parody itself is somehow an argument against me. The point of the parody was to show it was not an argument, because it can just as easily be turned back the other way. So for you to say I was making a fallacy is wrong because I wasn't making an argument for or against creationism, I was making an argument showing the original argument was fallacious through analogy. This is why I say context matters, and am for some reason having to say it again. As for me responding to arguments not addressed towards me but about my arguments... I am a real person, I know what my arguments were, so when I see someone addressing my arguments and not directing it at me I can't pretend that they weren't counter arguments towards arguments I originated (especially when they even try to attack my style of underlining a word). Sorry. The first one could be considered an argument from authority... but whatever, strike it out if you wish, it is true to say that people who study it don't think that there is a problem with the fossil record. I don't see why there would a problem with making that statement. It is not iron clad, but it is pretty good. The second one definitely is not an argument from authority. That statement is true, and in the language that science would use. I am not sure where creationism and biblical creationism differ. I guess the OP could have defined what he was talking about better. The OP had not brought up tree ring data at the time, and the one below him wasn't shown yet, and even if it was it is not my job to address every single point anyone makes on this thread, I was addressing the question of the OP... Anyway, the point of bringing up tree ring data is that the earth is younger than we think, and I provided a quick way that anyone can verify without going and cutting their own redwood trees down and counting the rings. I don't see why I have to address something that as convoluted as redwood tree ring data, when anyone can look up in the night sky, see stars billions of light years away, understand that the speed of light is constant, and deduct that the universe is at billions of years old. Our galaxy is 110 million light years across, and we can see all of that. This is not a "classic fallacy" The theory of evolution explains complexity. It is not random, it is survival of the best traits. Being able to see is a good trait for survival, hence it exists. As I have said, "Natural Selection via evolution is the best explanation/model that the human species has been able to construct. If you wish to overthrow it, you have a mountain of evidence to explain. If you are whetted to the idea that we have it wrong, you have a lot to overcome. However, give it your best, if you think that science has it wrong, we can only benefit from continued scientific exploration into this topic." What this statement means is that evolution is the most consistent model with the best explanatory capability for the diversity of species that we see. You are coming in and trying to poke holes in the most complex parts of a huge theory, but if you really wanted to overthrow it you would have to develop a competing theory with the explanatory power of evolution, not just complain that you think that eyes are "hard to imagine" or "very unlikely". This is nitpicking at its finest. I wasn't name calling. I realized you weren't the one that made the "I can't imagine" argument so you were not a hypocrite. If you had made that argument, and then told me I was being fallacious for turning it around on you, you would have been a hypocrite. I saw my error and corrected it.

Religion obviously exists, however God is an impossible entity, and is therefore not provable. If you have proof of God I would start there since this is a huge claim that even some of the most zealous believers do not make (because they can't prove it), and not waste time with your opinions about Atheist and Theist debates or your perceived irritations with atheist arguments. Just so you know, I find your walls of text almost void of any meaning, they come off as long ramblings of someones opinion with no substantive arguments. Like creating the strawman of an atheist in a debate, do you really think that would mean anything to someone who was an atheist? Do you think making up a scenario of some caricature of an atheist in a debate would somehow come off as an argument? I would recommend you review Stef's argument for god being an illogical construct: