Bob,

Here's where we agree on something.

I came from amazing wealth, like total top .01%, then lost everything and ended up in absolute poverty. I taught myself a valuable skill and kept building and building on it. It started with shit jobs, but I kept learning and doing more and never stopped believing in myself or in my ability to better my circumstance. I went to college and learned how to learn more efficiently. Even now, I'm improving my skills on a daily basis. 40 years later, now I'm in the 1%.

This is America to me, one part of it: that in America, you at least have a chance -- however small, however improbable -- to better yourself through your own skills, drive and determination. It's not a 100% guarantee, but I honestly haven't seen another country that fosters this attitude.

For the nb, did I have a leg up? Definitely. I was born with an extraordinary mind into a hyper-affluent family. As a child I went to the best public schools in America during a time when education was valued above all else. By the time my mom and I were basically on the street, I had enough base knowledge to build on what I'd already learned. I also took advantage of community college when it was all but free ($50 a semester) and was able to take pretty much any class that interested me. I was also able to afford a computer when they were very expensive and complicated.

Finally, I was born a white male and caught innumerable breaks because of that. I have zero doubt that I am where I am in part to this accident of birth, because I was told by cops, teachers and employers, sometimes quite openly and sometimes in coded language, that I was preferred over non-white people.

For all America's sin -- and many be thy score -- the nucleus of true capitalism is still alive.

You're just illustrating my point. That program was designed and coded by a mind. It is the coded digital information which makes it possible. It is the same story for DNA, and there isn't any naturalistic explanation for where the digital information came from; rather we know that information comes from minds, just if we see a message written in the sand we know a mind was behind it.




>> ^dgandhi:
>> ^shinyblurry:
Take DNA, for instance. DNA is a complex coded language which contains grammar, syntax, phoenetics, etc There is no naturalistic explanation that can account for it; DNA is information, and information only comes from minds.

You claim that mutation/selection can't account for information, please run this http://boxcar2d.com/ for a few hours and explain where the resulting vehicles design comes from.
This shows, to anybody willing to watch, that the process popularized by Darwin addresses both your concerns. This is well established, has not been seriously challenged.
Please refrain from trying to make Scientific claims unless you spend the time to become scientifically literate.

>> ^shinyblurry:

Take DNA, for instance. DNA is a complex coded language which contains grammar, syntax, phoenetics, etc There is no naturalistic explanation that can account for it; DNA is information, and information only comes from minds.


You claim that mutation/selection can't account for information, please run this http://boxcar2d.com/ for a few hours and explain where the resulting vehicles design comes from.

This shows, to anybody willing to watch, that the process popularized by Darwin addresses both your concerns. This is well established, has not been seriously challenged.

Please refrain from trying to make Scientific claims unless you spend the time to become scientifically literate.

The best evidence is just filling in the gaps in science.

I'll have to disagree with you here. To say the evidence for a creator is just filling in the gaps isn't true when it is a better explanation for the evidence. Take DNA, for instance. DNA is a complex coded language which contains grammar, syntax, phoenetics, etc There is no naturalistic explanation that can account for it; DNA is information, and information only comes from minds. The medium doesn't matter. Just as a message transcends the paper and ink it is written in, and just as you can write that message in the sand and has no loss of data, DNA is transcendent of its medium. A designer is a better explanation for the existence of DNA. Check out this article:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/3040594/The-Linguistics-of-DNA-Words-Sentences-Grammar-Phonetics-and-Semantics

What happened before the Big Bang? I don't know. "God did it" isn't evidence, it isn't rational or logical. "God did it" used to be the explanation for the shape of the Earth and the movement of the stars, when that was questioned, the questioner was threatened with death. However, by continuing to question, we now know a lot about the solar system, enough to put satellites into orbit and photograph distance planets.

That is just a fallacy, though. Just because people used "God did it" as an explanation for things we know understand in more detail is not evidence against the existence of God. It is just evidence for the ignorance of people. Christians aren't against science. I am against things which aren't science, like things which have never been observed and are untestable, like macro evolution.

Scientific theories are indeed interpretation of facts and in many cases, it involves jumps because we can't explain everything. This is what the word "theory" means in this context, rather than the meaning the Fox News's of the world use when they pretend it means that science is guessing. That's why there is always doubt, always questions to be asked and answers to be listened to. The important thing is that it is interpretation and extrapolating data, i.e. it is based on what we can prove.

Science does a lot of guessing. This is why theories have changed so many times in the last few centuries. Not too long ago, science was certain the Universe was static and eternal. It was one of the evidences that atheists would use against Creationists. Now, we know the Universe had a definitive beginning. The scientist who discovered said that there is no other theory which lends itself so well to the creation account in Genesis.

My main point is that science has nothing to say about the existence of God. It is not anything it can prove or disprove. God is a spirit, and a spirit is an immaterial being. There is no empirical evidence for something immaterial.

However, some answers have been listened to and fallen short. For example, Intelligent Design. This has been discussed and no rational, logical or empirical evidence have been put forward. This is why it has been rejected, by me and by the scientific community: not because we don't want to hear but because it's been talked to death, causes distracting controversy and frankly, it's clearly bullshit. I wouldn't want my child taught it in school because if you teach one unsubstantiated load of nonsense, where does it end? I want rational and logical things taught to my children. If I want my children to believe in the Flying Spaghetti Monster, I will teach them myself and when I struggle to explain the dinosaurs and radiocarbon dating that they learnt about in school, I should take a long hard look at myself.

Again, intelligent design is a better explanation than natural selection by random mutation for a number of things. When darwinian theory was created, the cell was thought to be a simple ball of protoplasm. We now know the cell is more complex than the space shuttle, by an order of magnitude. There is no naturalistic process which can account for the existence of this complex and intricate nano-machinery. Just because you consider it "bullshit" doesn't make it so. The Universe has the appearance of design. There are 30 or so factors in physics which have to be precisely calibrated for the Universe to even form correct, let alone for life to develop. The odds of this happeneing by chance are beyond calculation. Instead of admitting that and changing the theory, scientists then postulate multiple Universes to make the design features in this one seem plausible as happenstance.

Here is a nice video on the complexity of the cell:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSasTS-n_gM&feature=related

If you want to talk about radiocarbon dating, this again is something which is an interpretation of evidence based on a number of unprovable assumptions. It presumes that radioactive decay rates have remained constant in the past and that there was no contamination over periods of millions or billions of years. Check out this article:

http://biblicalgeology.net/blog/fatal-flaw-radioactive-dating/

I do rely on empirical evidence, we all do. You are relying on what you see too, what you see written on the pages of the Bible. Short of Descartes' "I think therefore I am" philosophy, everything we think exists is empirical. If we can't believe what we see or what we consider to be self evident, how can you believe what you think you are reading from what you think is a Bible?

I am relying on my own experience, and in my experience I have observed that the material reality is a veil, and behind that veil is a spiritual reality which encompasses it. I have seen the evidence of a higher power working in the world, who relates to us on a personal level. I believe the bible because my experience confirms it, not because I just assume it is true.

Is believing my own eyes and my own mind what you want to call my religion? That seems to be to be very different to religion as I know the word.

When you have faith in metaphysical claims, and that faith informs your entire worldview, that is indeed like a religion. What you are seeing is through the lens of that worldview..

>> ^Quboid:
I haven't seen any good evidence for Christianity. I haven't seen any good evidence for the existence of God. The best evidence is just filling in the gaps in science. What happened before the Big Bang? I don't know. "God did it" isn't evidence, it isn't rational or logical. "God did it" used to be the explanation for the shape of the Earth and the movement of the stars, when that was questioned, the questioner was threatened with death. However, by continuing to question, we now know a lot about the solar system, enough to put satellites into orbit and photograph distance planets.
Scientific theories are indeed interpretation of facts and in many cases, it involves jumps because we can't explain everything. This is what the word "theory" means in this context, rather than the meaning the Fox News's of the world use when they pretend it means that science is guessing. That's why there is always doubt, always questions to be asked and answers to be listened to. The important thing is that it is interpretation and extrapolating data, i.e. it is based on what we can prove.
However, some answers have been listened to and fallen short. For example, Intelligent Design. This has been discussed and no rational, logical or empirical evidence have been put forward. This is why it has been rejected, by me and by the scientific community: not because we don't want to hear but because it's been talked to death, causes distracting controversy and frankly, it's clearly bullshit. I wouldn't want my child taught it in school because if you teach one unsubstantiated load of nonsense, where does it end? I want rational and logical things taught to my children. If I want my children to believe in the Flying Spaghetti Monster, I will teach them myself and when I struggle to explain the dinosaurs and radiocarbon dating that they learnt about in school, I should take a long hard look at myself.
I do rely on empirical evidence, we all do. You are relying on what you see too, what you see written on the pages of the Bible. Short of Descartes' "I think therefore I am" philosophy, everything we think exists is empirical. If we can't believe what we see or what we consider to be self evident, how can you believe what you think you are reading from what you think is a Bible?
Is believing my own eyes and my own mind what you want to call my religion? That seems to be to be very different to religion as I know the word.

Tags for this video have been changed from 'Saul Williams Def Poetry Jam Coded Language SLAM Poet' to 'Saul Williams, Def Poetry Jam, Coded Language, SLAM Poet' - edited by EndAll

Your video, Def Poetry - Saul Williams (Coded Language), has made it into your personal Highest Rated Videos listing. Congratulations on a job well done. For you contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

Feel the music
Son, we got you programmed like a beat
When I press snare, yo, guard your grill
Press kick, you move your feet
You can’t compete
I got my hydrants parked on every street
I’m federal, nigga, son of sun
Come close and feel the heat
I am the streets
The white lines only separate me from me
You hydroplane in false gods name and still crash into me
Sign and tree, mountainside, guardrail, into the sea
They thought they stole you from my arms then carried you to me
Here’s the key
DNA encoded in a beat
White rocks in a vial, nigga, ain’t got nuthin’ on me
Bitch I’m free
Ask these editors at MTV
Far as they know they’re publishing some new school poetry
Let it be
‘Cause even that will do to turn the key
Doorways into other worlds
The truth shall set you free
You are me, I am you, but also I am he
Shepherd of a bastard flock that grazes in the streets
Feel the beat, nod your head
Lean back, yo, touch your feet
Let me see you pop that thang right there girl in your seat
Feel the heat
Count this page amongst your whitest sheets
Comfort in my every word
Slide under, countless sheep

Hail Mary, Mother of God
Got the whole host of angels shuffling in my iPod
Niggas learned to raise their voices when I lowered my rod
Staff of Moses, Pharaoh knows this
Son, my word is my bond
Tune my heart with mind
Speak my nature, divine
Callin' shit into existence back in '79
With the future in my pocket tightly gripped like a 9
Keep my finger on the trigger waiting for the right time
Ancient niggas align
Path of Cosmic Design
Blood of kings ‘cause Saturn’s rings don’t need no diamonds to shine
Yes, the reason for the season
Ornamented divine
Coded language of the mystics with my fist in the sky

Keep your head up
We represent The Real, my nigga, dead up
Book of the Dead, history bled
This nigga fed up
Led us to despair, some into prayer, and they won’t let up
until they got us worshipping them false gods instead of
The Realness
God of the streets, my niggas feel this
We nod our heads and worship through beats
Go ahead and kneel
It’s the love that makes the cipher complete
And it’d displayed through the way the bass line marries the beat

Hail Mary, Mother of God
Got the whole host of angels shuffling in my iPod
Niggas learned to raise their voices when I lowered my rod
Staff of Moses, Pharaoh knows this
Son, my word is my bond
Tune my heart with mind
Speak my nature, divine
Callin' shit into existence back in '79
With the future in my pocket tightly gripped like a 9
Keep my finger on the trigger waiting for the right time
Ancient niggas align
Path of Cosmic Design
Blood of kings ‘cause Saturn’s rings don’t need no diamonds to shine
Yes, the reason for the season
Ornamented divine.
Coded language of the mystics with my fist in the sky

Keep your head up

Whereas, breakbeats have been the missing link connecting the diasporic
community to its drum woven past
Whereas the quantised drum has allowed the whirling mathematicians to
calculate the ever changing distance between rock and stardom.
Whereas the velocity of the spinning vinyl, cross-faded, spun backwards, and
re-released at the same given moment of recorded history , yet at a
different moment in time's continuum has allowed history to catch up with
the present.

We do hereby declare reality unkempt by the changing standards of dialogue.
Statements, such as, "keep it real", especially when punctuating or
anticipating modes of ultra-violence inflicted psychologically or physically
or depicting an unchanging rule of events will hence forth be seen as
retro-active and not representative of the individually determined is.

Furthermore, as determined by the collective consciousness of this state of
being and the lessened distance between thought patterns and their secular
manifestations, the role of men as listening receptacles is to be increased
by a number no less than 70 percent of the current enlisted as vocal
aggressors.

Motherfuckers better realize, now is the time to self-actualize
We have found evidence that hip hops standard 85 rpm when increased by a
number as least half the rate of it's standard or decreased at ¾ of it's
speed may be a determining factor in heightening consciousness.

Studies show that when a given norm is changed in the face of the
unchanging, the remaining contradictions will parallel the truth.

Equate rhyme with reason, Sun with season

Our cyclical relationship to phenomenon has encouraged scholars to erase the
centers of periods, thus symbolizing the non-linear character of cause and
effect
Reject mediocrity!

Your current frequencies of understanding outweigh that which as been given
for you to understand.
The current standard is the equivalent of an adolescent restricted to the
diet of an infant.
The rapidly changing body would acquire dysfunctional and deformative
symptoms and could not properly mature on a diet of apple sauce and crushed
pears
Light years are interchangeable with years of living in darkness.
The role of darkness is not to be seen as, or equated with, Ignorance, but
with the unknown, and the mysteries of the unseen.

Thus, in the name of:
ROBESON, GOD'S SON, HURSTON, AHKENATON, HATHSHEPUT, BLACKFOOT, HELEN,
LENNON, KHALO, KALI, THE THREE MARIAS, TARA, LILITHE, LOURDE, WHITMAN,
BALDWIN, GINSBERG, KAUFMAN, LUMUMBA, GHANDI, GIBRAN, SHABAZZ,
SIDDHARTHA,
MEDUSA, GUEVARA, GUARDSIEFF, RAND, WRIGHT, BANNEKER, TUBMAN, HAMER,
HOLIDAY,
DAVIS, COLTRANE, MORRISON, JOPLIN, DUBOIS, CLARKE, SHAKESPEARE,
RACHMNINOV,
ELLINGTON, CARTER, GAYE, HATHOWAY, HENDRIX, KUTL, DICKERSON, RIPPERTON,
MARY, ISIS, THERESA, PLATH, RUMI, FELLINI, MICHAUX, NOSTRADAMUS, NEFERTITI,
LA ROCK, SHIVA, GANESHA, YEMAJA, OSHUN, OBATALA, OGUN, KENNEDY, KING,
FOUR
LITTLE GIRLS, HIROSHIMA, NAGASAKI, KELLER, BIKO, PERONE, MARLEY, COSBY,
SHAKUR, THOSE STILL AFLAMED, AND THE COUNTLESS UNNAMED

We claim the present as the pre-sent, as the hereafter.
We are unraveling our navels so that we may ingest the sun.
We are not afraid of the darkness, we trust that the moon shall guide us.
We are determining the future at this very moment.
We now know that the heart is the philosophers' stone
Our music is our alchemy
We stand as the manifested equivalent of 3 buckets of water and a hand full
of minerals, thus realizing that those very buckets turned upside down
supply the percussion factor of forever.
If you must count to keep the beat then count.
Find you mantra and awaken your subconscious.
Curve you circles counterclockwise
Use your cipher to decipher, Coded Language, man made laws.
Climb waterfalls and trees, commune with nature, snakes and bees.
Let your children name themselves and claim themselves as the new day for
today we are determined to be the channelers of these changing frequencies
into songs, paintings, writings, dance, drama, photography, carpentry,
crafts, love, and love.
We enlist every instrument: Acoustic, electronic.
Every so-called race, gender, and sexual preference.
Every per-son as beings of sound to acknowledge their responsibility to
uplift the consciousness of the entire fucking World.
Any utterance will be un-aimed, will be disclaimed - two rappers slain
Any utterance will be un-aimed, will be disclaimed - two rappers slain

I hope this does slightly better then my Sift a month ago.

My favourite lines:

We stand: as the manifested equivalent of three buckets of water; and a handful of minerals,
thus realising: that those very buckets turned upside down,
supply the purcussive factor of forever.

If you must count to keep the beat: then count,
find your mantra: and awaken your subconcious,
clockwise circles: counter-clockwise,
use your cipher: to decipher,
Coded Language - man-made laws...