The main problem I have with people like Alex is that they are in the way, and I'm not convinced who they are working for. That's one aspect that never seems to occur to the conspiracy theorists. If someone did have something to hide a great way to hide it might be to turn the whole subject into a joke, don't you think? Isn't that what Alex and his type accomplished by crying proof every time they had what the rest of us might call a question or suspicion?

There were real problems and questions concerning some of the things he went on so much about and as far as I can tell he's one of the biggest reason nobody ever looked into them past the 9-11 commission and such, and they probably never will. What real questions there were just got lost behind the cries of "proof" that nobody else saw until the whole thing became a joke. If he's working for us we could do without the help.

Same here, ancient (should be in a museum) computer with Ubuntu and Firefox, works fine here.

"Do atheists recognize a difference between belief and faith?"

I think you missed the point I was going for. Do people who don't believe in Santa Clause all have any particular trait in common, other than the lack of belief in Santa? They can be good or bad, smart or dumb, aggressive or passive, and so on.

Atheist just means they don't believe in God. Nothing more or less. They might be realistic about faith and belief or they might as I pointed out in the note you quoted from confuse their own lack of belief with proof in the same way the the religious sometimes do. For those I already said I think they kinda missed the point, I'm not sure exactly what else you're looking for.

They are just people who don't believe in something, where that something isn't relevant they'll vary the same way the rest of us do. The only common thread is lack of belief in God. "Atheists" don't do, believe, or act a given way any more than those who don't believe in Thor can all be said to be the same in any other way.

I know you asked that of someone else but I want to offer two things real quick, cindercone, then I'll leave you to them since I don't want to jump in the middle.

First of all this is why you should care if you're a Christian. This is the damage being done, this is the source of too many crisis of faith, this is your enemy. Not atheists. The roots of a crisis of faith.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0L5bo50zwrI

And this is an argument that one atheist made when defending a theist he tends to hate but who had just been suspended from Youtube for hate speech against Islam. This comes closer to why I care.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnC7Nwqw5Dg

The problem in part is that we've got a movement based on lies, on distortions of both reality and of the truth, and that movement has been doing all too well and has more power than it should have ever got. Look around you. How much of that actually functions without a base of educated scientists to keep it working and to develop new technology? Where does the next generation of them come from when we intentionally distort and deny reality and what science says? Other nations have pitched themselves into a dark age of sort and we can too, even if we don't realize it.

Why Sam cares he'd have to explain but there's plenty of reason for all of us to care. It's not an us and them situation. It's a we situation. Everyone but the liars themselves. They are hurting all of us even if we sometimes don't realize it yet.

Back to your regularly scheduled program, sorry for the interruption

Part of the problem is that people expect "atheist" to mean something to people. It's not a belief system, it's a lack of belief.

If you believe in God Does your lack of belief in Thor, Zeus, Apollo, or any of the other Greek Gods have any impact on your life or is it simply incidental and you go on with your life without another thought about it? It's not a belief system and for those who try to approach it as if it is that's probably why it doesn't make sense to them. They are looking for something that isn't there.

We're all atheists about 1000+ Gods, some of us just added one more to the list and it's about as meaningful in day to day life as your lack of belief in Thor is to you. Not much. If it wasn't for the far religious right and the outright lies about the most basic aspects of what science even says it's a debate I wouldn't care the slightest about. The militant or "evangelical" atheists kinda miss the point I think, they too often push their negative belief with the same fervor that the religious push their positive belief and it never occurs to them that they are both pushing belief in the end.

Let's see. He helped to take down Crossfire, he gets one high level candidate after another on his show, he says something and the news media picks it up, sounds like a serious commentator to me.

The mistake we too often make is to confuse the way someone makes a living with who they are. Jon did the same thing Olbermann did a few years ago. He decided that someone with a platform should probably say something, then he realized he was someone with a platform. If the real news would do real news then comedy shows wouldn't be known for some of the best political analysis out there these days. As long as the so called "news" is doing what they are doing, then someone needs to say it.

Playlist fixed, parts were reversed

To make sure I was right here I did a quick bit of research. Aron had it right best I can tell.

Hindu. Multiple gods each with different aspects or roles, the role of Brahma (not to be confused with Brahman) was the creator God. lots of variation within the religion though and some Hindus are considered to be atheist. Second link covers that part.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brahm%C4%81
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hinduism

Sikhism. Sikhs believe that before creation, all that existed was God and his hukam (will or order).[9] When God willed, the entire cosmos was created. From these beginnings, God nurtured "enticement and attachment" to māyā, or the human perception of reality.[10]

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

There are others as well but rather than write a book I just wanted to point out what he was probably considering when he said that. We're not all that familiar with some of these, but yes, they are there. And others besides.

On the first point, HadouKen24, the script is linked from the video page itself so we can read it. The reference I find says the following.

Creationists may side with western Abrahamic religions, (being the Judeo-Christian/Islamic mythos) in which there are conflicting versions of the same tales. Or creationists may belong to one of many eastern religions where the sacred stories of creation are much older, completely different, and dedicated to other gods and pantheons. But in every case, the proposed "creator" is supernatural, meaning that it is not a part of perceptible reality.

As far as it being endemic to eastern religions I don't know, but I'm not sure he says they have to be endemic so much as there, that's where the roots go for some. For most the roots are in the Abrahamic religions which are the joint roots of the Judeo-Christian/Islamic mythos. Maybe I missed the part you mean but I don't see a problem there.

On the second point you'd have to visit the link I posted in the description which describes what the particular segment is intended to argue. In this case it was "My personal rant against one of foremost falsehoods of the creationism movement; the idea that accepting evolution is tantamount to declaring atheism, or that one need be creationist to be Christian".

He never suggested they were all like that, in fact the whole point of the video is that they are NOT. Each video confronts a specific aspect of support for creationism. It's not an attack on religion itself. The fact that other aspects of the Christian religion don't support creationism isn't a mistake he made, it supports his point. You can be Christian and still think that's all nonsense.

Like this one does. http://www.youtube.com/user/djarm67 Check out his playlist collection. The reason a lot of us care isn't to take a wack at religion, it's because of things like the following video try to explain.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnC7Nwqw5Dg

It isn't sifted so if anyone wants it I don't care.
Post edited slightly for punctuation and to remove irrelevant rant

Personally I feel I owe the place, more now than before. The last few days have been a challenge to everyone I'd guess and I didn't deal with parts of it as well as I should have, it was important but more so to me than to others and I should have slowed down a bit and recognized that. It was all but fixed a short time later anyway.

Now the "all but" part is gone too, I'm not sure who I have to thank for that but... Thank you. I was happy enough with the fix before but that was a damned nice gesture and I do appreciate it. Giving anything hurts, activism and income aren't a good combination, but in this case it's worth a little bit even if it's just a gesture.

I'm no fan of Cramer and I haven't seen the viral clip yet but I'd hope there's more to it than this. Best I can tell he was explaining how something could be manipulated, not saying that he had. The markets need attention but unless they have more than that I'm not sure how it makes him the focus of anything.

Oh, as a quick BTW. For anyone who is concerned about the effects of smoke on the air passages there's a simple solution to the vast majority of it which medical marijuana users make use of on a regular basis. Vaporizers.

Cheap ones are pretty much worthless but you can get quality ones starting at about $120 to $150 or so, they go up from there but you should be able to get good quality for that. If anyone needs pointers let me know, I will not suggest specific brands or places to buy from since it depends too much on your preferences and who has a good sale right now but I can point you to a place or two that have good forums on the subject and where you can ask users about them and what style might suit you. Bag, whip, or whatnot.

One thing I will warn about though, avoid the cheap imports. Some are known to use cheap construction and metals which when heated can leach toxins. This is one case where the name brands are worth the few extra bucks and a little time shopping can be worthwhile.

I probably should have left this one for someone else to sift I'd guess. Great video but I never did have the knack with catchy descriptions and titles that some have, this could have and should have done a lot better.

An old saying that I'm fond of is "maybe, might, and possibly are not valid scientific conclusions".

Dr Tashkin was the source of many maybes that the press and the government found it convenient to take as certainties. Some never were certainties though and on the ones he couldn't answer he kept looking until he found answers.

It's about 40 minutes in all and you do have to watch for the maybes, he'll tell you what indicators he had of problems and concerns then conclude in some cases that the concerns didn't bear out. Easy to miss that if you don't pay attention.

In other cases, such as with bronchitis, the concerns are valid enough. It's not harmless either and with all of the disinformation out there about it this could be useful if you've got the time for it to help tell the difference for yourself.

As far as pot and lung function I'll answer that with a video post in a few minutes, it'll be from Dr Tashkin of the UCLA medical center, the same Dr Tashkin who is the source for most marijuana and lung function research in the US over recent decades.

As far as change it's been in reach for years, it's just hard to get people involved and get them to care. We always wonder how such a minority as the far religious right got to be so powerful but it's pretty damned simple actually. They started at the local level. They took over local political organizations, most are starved for volunteers and as their numbers grew so did their influence. That allowed them to first control who was elected at the local level then later who appeared on the ballots for primaries and so on.

Very few vote in off elections compared to normal ones but other than President everyone else is still on the ballot and that's half of where the nation is run from. Those who get involved in the off years have a MUCH larger voice than those who join the crowd in the busy ones. Stay home and they make the choice for you.

Real change takes time, but it also takes being there. We've got to quit asking when the politicians are going to do it and stop asking why we don't have better choices. If we want better ones we've got to put them there ourselves.