Well, I guess I’ll throw my 2 cents in. I was raised as a Catholic b/c of the schools I attended even though my parents did not really practice it. It never did much for me then when I was in 9th grade I had a fundamentalist for a religion teacher and I, like most timid little kids, was inlfuenced by what he had to say. But as I got older my faith seemed to crumble like a house of cards. It was weird for me in the sense b/c when I was going to church on Sundays my whole life seemed to be doing better than ever. My parents had recently divorced and I had a hard time dealing with it. But for the whole year I felt better about that, my grades were the best they had been to that point in my life and I just generally felt good about everything. Afterwards, I picked up a little more knowledge and now I would call myself non-denominational. I most definitely believe in a higher being but I refuse to adhere to any organized religion. Some people make jokes about it but the clashing of organized religions have caused more death than just about any other atrocity in our history. That said some people need religion. Its just not for me. Changing topics, I was discussing evolution with a biology teacher of mine(atheist) and he told me little idea that is intriguing. The Catholic Church cannot accept evolution b/c it refutes the story of Creation and if that story is gone then so is the beginning of original sin. If there is no original sin then Jesus came and died for nothing. So if evolution is accepted then it throws a big monkey wrench into the basic foundation of the whole religion. Do any of you guys have any thoughts about that? I tell it to people but I don’t hold steadfast to it. Basically, I think what it all boils down to is this: any group of people arrogant enough to believe they have got it figured out and arrogant enough to condemn every other religion is a group I do not want to be around. Come to think of it that was alot more than 2 cents.
atheist. Would join militant anti-god group if there was one. Religion is responsible for more death and pain than anything else i can think of. “My ghost in the sky is better than yours, so have some C4, motherfucker!”
Kuri,
Mike Royko was a genius, many T-folks compare my particular brand of humor to Dave Barry or Andy Rooney…I would be forever flattered to be compared to the late, great Mike Royko who I believe to be a fine blend of the two aforementioned writers much like a Deep and Robust Cabernet/Sauvignon.
Somewhere, Mike is slaying them still, I am sure.
“Slaying sacred cows makes great steaks”
~ Dick Nicolosi
kjohnson - the little idea of your athiest’s is a little limited. It also depends on how literally you take certain parts of the Bible. I think the Bible does an excellent job of explaining the creation of our universe to a pre-industrial society.
huck - Personally, I see religion as a very powerful tool, and I think way too many men have been given control that they couldn’t handle. I do agree, though, that religion has caused an inordinate amount of damage to the earth, along with its (religion’s) own cause.
Huck, that is the funniest shit! You have the ability to be succinct in the most creative ways… Think I am going to quote you in my sig line!
DanC: What I’m asking is this: do you believe in absolutes?
ZEPPELIN: The more I go through life, the less I believe in absolutes. Murphy`s Law and randomness have a way of humbling anybody who defies the Law of Large Numbers for far too long.
Works both ways, from the top or from the bottom ;0)
huck: are you thinking of any particular religion, when you say it has caused more death and pain than anything you can think of?
I worship Smurfs
– Yea though I walk through the valley of the Smurf
– I see no Gargamel
– I hear no Gargamel
– I speak no Gargamel
I too was raised a Catholic. I was fortunate in that I was taught by some very forward thinking Franciscans in high school, as well as some excellent priests. The nun who taught biology actually taught evolution. The most significant thing I learned from her was that the story of creation does not conflict with evolution. A pre-industrial society could not begin to understand evolution, so the creation story is an allegory that earlier civilization could understand. On the other hand, they wanted us to understand that evolution was in fact guided by God’s hand. The priests seemed to agree. Does this conflict with the main church’s teaching? I don’t know, but it was pretty well tolerated in our diocese.
Probably what really turned me off was the horrible behavior of certain sects within the church. I can never get over seeing our principal (an Ursuline nun) slap a kid in church for some unknown indiscretion. And other atrocities committed by so-called men and women of the cloth. (No, not sexual stuff, mainly physical and mental abuse.)
I guess I have the Franciscan nuns to thank for my education, and the Ursuline nuns to thank for driving me out of the church.
Atheist, without a doubt in my mind.
Curiously nobody here yet mentionned the Necromicon. Ive heard its a classic.
DanC: What is the law of large numbers? And how does one tell the difference between right and wrong?
ZEPPELIN: Some Genius called Jacob Bernouilli respectful wink defined it far better than me and englobes my answers to your questions.</font colort>
Jacob Bernouilli`s theorem for calculating probabilities a posteriori is known as the Law of Large Numbers.
Suppose you toss a coin over and over. The Law of Large Numbers does not tell you that the average of your throws will approach 50% as you increase the number of throws; simple mathematics can tell you that, sparing you the tedious business of throwing the coin over and over. Rather, the law states that increasing the number of throws will correspondingly increase the probability that the ratio of heads thrown to total throws will vary from 50% by less than some stated amount, no matter how small. The word vary is what matters. The search is not for the true</font color> mean of 50% but for the probability that the error between the observed average and the true average will be less than</font color>, say, 2% – in other words, that increasing the number of throws will increase the probability that the observed average will fall within 2% of the true average.
That does not mean that there will be no error after an infinite number of throws; Jacob explicitely excludes that case. Nor does it mean that the errors will of necessity become small enough to ignore. All the law tells us is that the average of a large number of throws will be more likely than the average of a small number of throws to differ from the true average by less than some stated amount.</font color>
Caution
The Law of Large Numbers is not the same thing as the Law of Averages. Mathematics tell us that the probability of heads coming up on any individual coin toss is 50% – but the outcome of each toss is independent of all others. It is neither influenced by previous tosses nor does it influence future tosses. Consequently, the Law of Large Numbers cannot promise that the probability of heads will rise above 50% on any single toss if the first hundred, or million, tosses happen to come up only 40% heads. There is nothing in the Law of Large Numbers that promises to bail you out when you are caught in a losing streak.</font color>
In closing…
Jacob does not use the expression “moral certainty” lightly. He derives it from his definition of probability, which he draws from earlier work by Leibniz. “Probability,” he declares, “is degree of certainty and differs from absolute certainty as the part differs from the whole.”
But Jacob moves beyons Liebniz in considering what “certainty” means. It is our individual judgments of certainty that attract Jacob`s attention, and a condition of moral certainty exists when we are almost completely certain. When Liebniz introduced the concept, he had defined it as “infinitely probable.” Jacob himself is satisfied that 1000/1001 is close enough, but he is willing to be flexible:“It would be useful if the magistrates set up fixed limits for moral certainty.”</font color>
Gotta love the guys work and thoughts. Ill take precise and testable statements like these anytime over faith based books. =0)
Anybody ever thought of why there were 2 versions of the Testament? Was the Old one too hard (with a harsch God) and flopped out, therefore forcing an upgrade to a more user friendly version of the Testament? I doubt they revised their way of writing in the best interest of accuracy in mind…
DanC: “…probability is a degree of certainty and differs from absolute certainty…”
So it seems that you don’t believe in moral absolutes. Correct? Does that make you a moral relativist?
I suppose I’m not having trouble with the coin toss example but what I want to know is how does the Law of Large Numbers tell the difference between right and wrong? Or how do you?
ZEPPELIN: I won`t get into that (right/wrong) debate. Two million people. Two million startpoints and answers. A debate IMHO worthless because the premises are not even fixed. By extension, the logic cannot be better.
The only thing people in the same country have in common on these matters is the Law. Everything else is subject to debate and does not get enforced or get into jurisprudence. Worship Law. Your chances are better ;0)
Really?
But what are the laws based on?
In some cultures they love their neighbors and in others they canniblize them. What is your preference and why?
Because their are many different viewpoints does not disprove absolutes.
Two billion people may have a different answer for the equation 2+2 but that doesn’t disprove the answer is 4.
I read over some of your earlier posts and I want to make some comments and ask you some questions.
I can’t type very well so I’ll only write the beginings of your statements.
Nueral networks that are somehow guiding people. So what grounds would you have for seeking justice against someone who has murdered your family?
If your family was murdered would they just be victims of some helpless causality?
Peoples lives are pre-programmed by outer forces…
Where do these outer forces come from?
yorik
some interesting reading.fyi
http://petragrail.tripod.com/megalith.html
ZEPPELIN : Whats your profession ? Its rare I get a verbal chess match that detailed and long. Just curious.
As for your questions, I was stating alternative viewpoints that, while fully possible, scare the heck out of the average citizen and consequently not very popular.
LAWS : In my short definition, laws are relics of what was cherished by those in power in a certain time far away and that are auto-updating to adapt/reflect changes in popular (ideal) viewpoints and/or obscure points written in legalese that advantage only those who write them. Sad but true.
The law system that I would want to see existence is very simple. It has only two premises. A) Every person is fully responsible for whatever happens to him and never has a right to forcibly interfere in the lives of others. Should a forcible intervention in another`s life be done, the initiator can expected to receive publicly (as a warning to others) an amount of punishment equal to what he used against the victim. (In short, an eye for an eye for transgressors). B) No exception will ever exist to this rule. Tit for tat, retaliatory law.
Please note that this, in no way, prevents one from protecting himself by all means possible, whether through insurance, weaponry, knowledge, or otherwise that are available to the person. I would expect social unrest at start, but like any ecosystems and population systems, an equilibrium would eventually be a reality, based on the survival of the fittest theory. And also, however you see it, it forces people to think before ticking off someone if you anticipate that a folly of your part could get you killed. Anyway, it`s an ideal, and I realize it will never happen. Dream on, eh ?
ABSOLUTES :
Whereas the mind has a formidable capacity for imagination and invention of all types of systems (numerical, scientific, etc), earthly reality reminds us daily that resources are scarce, nature has many forces, physics impose limits, etc. etc. and therefore whatever theory we define, in the end, must prove itself to be useful or fill a real need if it wants to survive. Theorize about the biology of digestion and alternative theories all you want, there comes a day when you will stop thinking and go to eat to insure your survival. IMHO, usefulness is the ultimate judge. In your example, whatever the conscensus (or lack of) for the 2+2=4 equation, whether 2+2 does equal 4 or not will depend on your situation. If you are a caveman, it is at best a past-time. If you are an engineer or in whatever profession where a stable number system is the basis of all developments, well, you need 2+2=4 as a constant. It`s all dependent of your context. As a citizen of North America, I am quite content of the developments of math, sciences and similar systems as the basis of our knowledge base and teaching systems and their results. This does not negate other ways of living that are potentially equal or better to the one I live in, but I do not know them too much, and even if I did, I need to use terms understood and accepted by the populace near me to efficiently survive now (current context known to all, culture in place).
ONE`S OWN REALITY AND MURDER :
Since reality imposes limits on my person, there are tons of things I do not / cannot know or do. I have to deal myself with my own realities (genetics, background, environment, upbringing, past choices, etc) , which implies responsibility. This includes limits about that which I can change and what I cannot. Some realities I cannot change, but I can change my way of interpreting them. Since I expect no one to cater my survival needs, I also need to take care of myself. A certain amount of selfishness and restriction of possibilities is also needed to insure one`s survival. But where does it start and end ? Lets take an example.
What happens if some gang of thugs (or force of nature) kill dear ones ? First of all, whatever the cause I attribute to it, theyre dead. Would I wish justice ? You bet ! Can I bring justice by myself ? Depending on the source, and however I see it, society where I live forces me to restrict my options. In the case of thugs, I could be my own judge, jury and executioner, but the law system will not allow me and put me in the same category as the thugs. Since I cannot overpower the system, I have to live with the options it gives me. Obviously, where you live is the main determinant. If law enforcement is near inexistent, I will have very few dis-incentives to prevent me from serving justice William Wallace (Braveheart) style. In a big city, unless I use alternate channels (hitmen), I better think about it if thats what I really want. You get the idea.
As for the cause/interpretation, like I said, whatever sense I give to it will not raise the dead. Thats one of the reasons why I try not to pass to much time on theory : it does not change reality. I will surely not forget the dead significant ones, but the cycle of life and death is a reality for all humans, and I must move on if I do not wish to finish like them too soon (grieving myself to death). Since I cannot change the effect on me and others, I have to focus on how to keep on living (accepting/adapting) when it does happen and plan accordingly if I deem it so.
Whew. Hope this answers some of your questions. More later, maybe. Your mileage may differ.