Lyrics-
Tuning out of star-light, the innocent lifetime flickers and flashes onto a canvas. But no, nobody seems worth it

And while the feeling's sophisticated, the view is so restrained. The past is nearing closer, and closer I fear.

So let's just cut the bullshit, and tell me who's independent. Thumbs twiddling' and your life's escaping your mind

Keep In mind, well the air ain't as free as it used to be but that's quite alright while you're still eighteen

It seems, to be, and i'll tell you who's over-rated. What's a beautiful person with some hideous dreams?

And while the lining isn't silver, we're verging on the side of the road, that'll take us home.

The edge of us is getting weighed, read about your life in your local papers.

Realize, the end of us is getting near, you're just a droplet of paint trickled off your canvas.

Delirious, illusions flowing backwards through the river of colour while we analyze to try to see it clearer. Secretly appealing to a lonely prisoner. Now what's your vision?

Initiate your shading, blend the universe together in time it only gets a little easier. Suddenly you piece yourself back together. Now what's your vision?

And I don't wanna have to give a damn about you or your inhibitions.

After all, you're the one who taught me love was not for every body.

However, I'm starting to see this world in the right light, yet still gets darker.

You see, it's just a simple symphony, or a painting? Whatever

This unnatural path, it spans infinitely, but my world is crumbling.

Let it collapse into the abyss, in the midst of summer it won't exist.

This emptiness, it's just a blank slate, waiting for a painter to interfere.

It's quite complex, but what do I know?

Very interesting, but I disagree with one aspect of what she is saying:

Yes, we're all sort of ignorant blank slates at that age (college entry). But she is suggesting that professors / instructors / parents / etc. are or should be responsible for curing us of that. I think that is bunk. Life itself, and in particular being responsible for one's own life, is what cures us of that ignorance.

Society tells all these kids that they cannot and will not accomplish anything without having a college education -- WAY more than it ever did in the past. A big percentage take that to heart, and therefore stay under the sheltered wing of their parents longer because they feel that they MUST.

I think once they get out into the real world, that ignorance and idealism will get quickly tempered with a dose of pragmatism. Being hyper-PC seems less important when you've got to work a double shift to pay your rent or buy luxuries like food. ...Or pay off staggering amounts of student loan debt.

I stand corrected.
I do recall reading that he did say, at one point, that aside from 'putting God above all else', the golden rule (treat others as you would have them treat you) is the most important thing to learn from religion...this seems to be at odds with supporting the bigotry and hatred of the 'law' (of god), although as I read it (what little I've read of it) the bible should be for telling the reader how they should act, not how they should force everyone else to act. I guess I ignored those parts that said you have to stone the infidels and such. :-)

There are three parts to the Old Testament law, civil, ceremonial and moral. The civil and ceremonial laws were given to nation of Israel only, not to Christians. The ordinances God gave to Israel regarding civil judgments, food and drink and the like are not applicable to Christians.

EDIT: And what happened to 'he died to absolve us of our sins'? If that's supposed to work, then there's no sin after the crucifixion, no? Is that something else I'm mistaken about, or was it a one time absolution only for those present at that time, with everyone else still hosed? If sin is gone, why care if your son is 'doing it' wrong, he'll still go to heaven, right?

Jesus provided what is called the "substitutionary atonement". Meaning, that Jesus took your place (and mine) on the cross and received the punishment for sin that we both deserve. He took the entirety of the punishment on Himself and through His sacrifice we can receive forgiveness for sins. He suffered and died vicariously for us, and through faith in Him we receive a blank slate and attain a perfect standing before God. His righteousness is credited to our account as if it were our own, though there is nothing we could do to earn it; It is only received through faith.

Jesus provided the atonement for all sin, but it isn't universally applied; It must be received by faith. When you stand before God and account for your life, you will be judged for your sins in one of two ways; either by your righteousness or Christs.

Honestly, it's not that all news is bullshit, it's that most (all?) news outlets commit the same fallacious and detrimental information practices as always will happen in any system when experience is posited as "truth".

In the business world we are almost always working to change our perspective on how data flows and how best to store and distribute info; setting our educational bias aside when need be. One particular failed practice that does NOT get enough high level analyzing due to the nature of the bias in which the problem itself creates: Information siloing.

In this case, we have the American people silo'd (and if we don't have them silo'd, we actively seek to silo these "undecided" minds) as either liberal D or conservative R. Once you're silo'd, you now have the ability to be fed limited information, based upon limited experience, as the Truth. This is called a hook. A hook is exactly what you think it means and is not bad of itself, because hooks exist in all systems for better or for worse. Otherwise birds of a feather would not flock together. (They flock together because of hooks in their code and the world aka science around them which helps facilitate that hook.)

Now that the hook is in, we have separate news organizations that cater to the data bias you signed up for. You're a human with a blank slate, so don't you dare argue that your opinion is anything but inconsistent, even after education; because you assume that the patterns of existence taught as theoretical and scientifically posited "truth" scale in a reality based upon butterfly flaps of causation. Just accept it: You are fallible and the defects are inherent at every step of our civilization. (Algorithms of usefulness to engineers are only useful if they lessen the load on the user, otherwise we'd all be typing 1s and 0s; so the logic of simplicity suggests our systems are fucked and holding to them is an anarchy unto itself, where ultimate complexity becomes entropy -- LESSEN THE COMPLEXITY. That should be a rule for all government and economy.)

Liberals claim they cater to all sides and conservatives complain that if it wasn't for Fox, there would be no objectivity in the news. This further complicates the matter, but is itself a red herring because it's an argument that essentially says "YOU MUST GET YOUR NEWS FROM A MAJOR NETWORK." If you actually believe that these media giants are the end all be all to gaining information from the "truest" perspective possible, you are a dummy and you need to WAKE UP.

If you never made a thought pattern along these lines, you also need to wake up but I'm not mad at you. Information that deviates from a human's factory defaults (early family and life experiences in the form of fear induced bias) is difficult to objectively analyze. I fault you not, but your call to awaken is noted and will be remembered at the end of all (if you believe in any sort of karmic ending, Christians included). If you don't believe this, then your inability to rule the boundaries of your mind in the present is damning enough. Fuck you. And fuck your offspring. Subjective fear consume thee as your desperate and once nurturing stride for survival is abstracted into selfish, power seeking nihilism.

Information siloing creates tribal knowledge (which is information held by a select group, and then touted as negative patterns like nationalism and corporate thuggery), and tribal knowledge creates boundaries based upon a skewed perception of what the truth is; which in turn, creates subjective and often intangible competition within a system that should be making strides to improve its process via iteration.

MUD SLING AWAY. Or join me in narrowing the argument to its lowest common denominators and then objectively analyzing the system, starting at a generic starting point and building up to a truer understanding.

Republicans like to put charismatic blank slates at the top of the ticket: Reagan, Bush 2 and Romney.

They seem to run into more problems when they put thinkers at the top of the ticket: Nixon, Bush 1, Dole and John McCain.

>> ^VoodooV:

I think Bill Maher is exactly right. He wants to be the first Mormon president...that's the long and the short of it.
Governing? whatever
bipartisanship? whatever
It explains perfectly why he is able to shift positions so drastically. HE DOESNT CARE! He's not a republican, he's not a centrist, he's not a democrat. He just wants to be able to say he was the first mormon president.

To get true statistics on how well something does, they need something that is a blank slate and normally has zero appeal. This way they know how well or poorly their marketing spots work or fail.

I'm not at all a scholar of the bible. I've read parts, I've been to
Sunday school before i was confirmed (age 14) and I have at times had
fun reading it.

Well, I would encourage you to try to understand it. Every conversation I've ever had with an atheist about the bible either brings up the same five things from the old testament or their doubts about who wrote the bible..and that's it. I've never actually spoken to an atheist, and I've spoken to many atheists, who even understood the basics. I think that if you're going to criticize something, you should at least try to understand it at a basic level..maybe that's just me. Although, the lack of understanding matches what the bible says, that the truth is spiritually discerned. Without the Holy Spirit, the atheist is going to find it fairly impossible to comprehend.

Arguing from authority is not a strong argument. Just because "the
intellectual scholarship" is much greater than I understand, doesn't
change what the book says. And since new evidence is not uncovered, it
is what it is, you are forced to "interpret new evidence" and that's
not the way the world works.

What you, and many others try to imply, is that what is the bible is simplistic, and for people without any intellectual standards. The truth is that what is in the bible is complex, and it takes a real intellect (supplanted with godly wisdom) to be able to understand it. The intellectual scholarship is vast because the bible is inexaustible. It functions as a cogent whole, and address all the deep questions that human beings have. It is not simple by any stretch of the imagination.

1) Personal evidence cannot be verified. What things were revealed to
you before you ever read or understood them? How were they revealed,
what was revealed, how did you later understand them / where did you
read them?

I would like to understand your thought process, which is why I ask.

Is it possible that you already had a forgone conclusion when you read
X, and therefore you interpreted X the way you wanted?

God had revealed to me through signs that He is a triune God, and that He has a Messiah, someone whose job it is to save the world. So when I finally read the bible, those signs are what initially confirmed it to be true. I didn't have any foregone conclusions about the bible before I read it. I had no actual idea what Christianity was all about.

What happened? How has your life improved, what did you do before,
what do you do now? How can you tell that it happened supernaturally?
Is there any difference from that to just having a profound change of
heart. If you are talking about addiction, it is possible to fill the
void of that addiction with other things - some people exchange
cigarettes with food, why not religion/faith? Does your faith take up
as much of your time as "the unhealthy things" you did before?

Before I became a Christian I was a theist, and before I was a theist I was an agnostic. When I became a theist my bad behavior didn't change. I was like Enoch, in that I believed that none of the religions were true, or that all of them just had pieces of who God is. I believed in a God that loved you the way you are and didn't particularly enforce any kind of behavior upon you, as long as your heart was in the right place. I would think that God, knowing me intimately, and knowing my good intentions, was very understanding if I did something which was out of line. Of course God is very patient with all of us, but the point is that I had plenty of faith in God at the time, and spent my time thinking about Him and pursuing the truth. The difference is that once I accepted Jesus into my heart as my Lord and Savior, everything changed.

It was only when I became a Christian that my behavior changed, and much of that practically overnight. When you're born again, you are spiritually cleansed and start out with a blank slate. You become like new. I had addictions, depression, anger, pain, sadness, and other issues that left me in short order. Some of those things I never thought I would give up, some of them I never wanted to give up, but I immediately lost the desire for them. It was a change of heart; God gave me a new one. It was supernatural because as I said, I didn't do any work. People spend their entire lives in therapy or counseling and spend tens of thousands of dollars or more to get rid of just some of these problems, and often don't see any results. I lost almost all of my baggage in just a few short months.

3) Not really. It only accounts for a visual interpretation of how men act. The writers of it has observed how people act and guessed at reasons why that is. Some are close to reality, some are way off. Which human behaviors does it predict? How and where does it describe in finite detail how those behaviors are created? I'm looking for actual citations here, because this is complete news to me.

It predicts all kinds of human behaviors by describing the mechanisms which motivate them to act. It shows the fundemental dichotomy of the heart of man. As an example:

James 3:3-10

When we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we can turn the whole animal. Or take ships as an example. Although they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are steered by a very small rudder wherever the pilot wants to go. Likewise the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole person, sets the whole course of his life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.

All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and creatures of the sea are being tamed and have been tamed by man, but no man can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.

With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in God’s likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers, this should not be. Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring? My brothers, can a fig tree bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water.

and

Matthew 12:34

O generation of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.

A good man out of the good treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things: and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things.

and

Matthew 15:19-20

But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart; and they defile the man.

For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies:

4) I disagree. It describes a point of view. The morality of the God of the bible is hardly any good morality. We have an ingrown moral compass, I can agree on that, it's been naturally selected against because it helped our ancestors to survive and procreate. "His moral law" is atrocious, if the bible is any indicator.

If everyone followed the morality that Jesus taught us, this planet would be as close to a utopia it could possibly get. He taught us to love one another, to forgive as a rule, to do good to even those who hate you, to help everyone in need, and to follow the moral law. Your idea of Gods morality being atrocious is plainly false. The passages that you feel are atrocious have an explanation, its just whether you want to hear them or not. As far as natural selection goes, all it cares about is passing on its genes. That is the only criteria for success. This doesn't explain noble behavior in the least, such as sacrificing your life for someone else. That's a bad way to pass on your genes.

5) Which prophecies have been fulfilled? You don't think Israel chose their currency based on the bible instead? Which captivities have been prophecied down to the year and where in the bible?

http://www.khouse.org/articles/2004/552/


6) This is hardly uncontested. There are parts of the bible that seem to be true, but because some of it is true, does not mean that all of it is. http://www.theskepticalreview.com/tsrmag/982front.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bible_and_history#Historical_accuracy_of_biblical_stories

It's positive evidence in the bibles favor when it is verified by archaelogical evidence. There are many things in the bible that historians denied were true in the bible, like the hittite civilization, until archaelogy proved the bible correct.

7) Citation needed. Saying that the universe has a beginning is hardly proof of anything. That's the easy way to say it, anyone apart from earlier theories said that, so of course they did it in there too. In actuality the bible claims that God is eternal, which there is no basis for.

These claims are just claims, there is no basis for saying them in the bible. Blood clotting could be found by trial and error back then, ocean currents can to a great extent be measured by fishermen even back then. Scientists who believed in an eternal universe have since changed their mind, when evidence discredited the theory. It's all about being able to back up your claims. the bible just claims.

This guy discovered and mapped the ocean currents, and he did so being inspired by psalm 8, which is the one that mentions the "paths of the seas"

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

Abraham didn't learn from trial and error. They were doing circumcisions on the 8th day from the beginning.

You must think something is eternal, unless you believe something came from nothing. So your problem isn't really with eternal things, just an eternal person.

Here is a list of them

http://www.inplainsite.org/html/scientific_facts_in_the_bible.html

8 ) How did you experience the holy spirit?

It's really impossible quite impossible to describe since it effects every level of your being at the same time, but experientially you could say it's like going from 110 to 220v. It's like you lived all your life being covered in filth and suddenly you're washed off and sparkling clean. It's like being remade into something brand new.

>> ^gwiz665

i am loathe to respond in bullet form,maybe because i find it the weakest and laziest form of debate in a text format,but let me address a glaring misconception you seem to have concerning the occupy movement.you seem to be under the impression that its driving force is against rich folk.

now lets put that aside for a second and i shall not deal with just how utterly inaccurate that statement is because what REALLY intrigues me is this: how did you formulate that opinion when so much information is already out there revealing a totally different animal?how did you derive this conclusion and by what information did you base it on?
now THAT is a far more interesting conversation.

Its driving force is against the powers that be. "They". They say money runs the government, and they are right. Money is at the root of all evil. Who controls all the money? The "1 percent", although it's really more the ".001" percent. So it is essentially against the rich and powerful, the income divide they have engineered, and the entrenched power structure they orchaestrate.

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

Occupy Wall Street (OWS) is an ongoing series of demonstrations initiated by the Canadian activist group Adbusters which began September 17, 2011 in Zuccotti Park, located in New York City's Wall Street financial district. The protests are against social and economic inequality, high unemployment, greed, as well as corruption, and the undue influence of corporations—particularly that of the financial services sector—on government. The protesters' slogan We are the 99% refers to the growing difference in wealth in the U.S. between the wealthiest 1% and the rest of the population.

you also put forth that your main premise was that the students were warned that they would be removed,by force if need be.
maybe i am misunderstanding your thinking but it appears that if there is an announcement then any use of force is justified.
yet in your previous paragraph you stated you understood the necessity to disobey then turn around and become an apologetic for police force.
these two premises are in conflict.

I was merely countering the assertion that they were sprayed without warning, which was a lie. I do believe police have the right to use force, however, I think they could have handled that situation a little better. I do believe we should disobey authority when it runs contrary to what God has commanded, but then and only then.

then in the next paragraph you continue with a verbal denigration of the people of occupy using tried and true tactics of any powerful institution.you literally have just regurgitated state propaganda and i dont think for a second you even realized that fact.do you even know what a marxist,anarchist or socialist actually is? i ask that sincerely not as a slight towards you,because it doesnt appear that you do.

I am not on the side of the state, I am on the side of God. Governments tend towards corruption and unless they adhere to biblical principles they will fall into decay and injustice will be the normative state of the land. So I do not prefer the state at all, but neither do I favor removing it, at least until Jesus returns. It is, as the founders believed, a necessary evil.

Yes, I know what they represent, and their positions are often interchangable. They were out in force waving their communist flags, talking about income redistribution and private property rights, distributing their anti-capitalist propaganda. Here is a quick portrait:

http://www.lookingattheleft.com/2011/11/zuccotti-utopia-portraits-of-revolutionaries/comment-page-1/#comment-22376

They even had maoists:



again i find your premise in conflict.
on the one hand you agree and are aware of the corruption gnawing at our democracy and then turn around and dismiss those who are protesting that VERY corruption you just acknowledged as somehow being unworthy.
i even posted the playbook that powerful institutions use and you fell into lock step with that message.

then lastly you again use a perjorative to describe the occupy movement with obvious disdain and then chastise me for comparing occupy with the civil rights movement.
either you dont understand my point or didnt think it through.
i was not comparing them as being similar in intentions.i was comparing them to how the power of the people are the ONLY way to enact change.
and if you truly agree that this government is corrupt and has been purchased by corporations who use their immense wealth to further their own profit margin at the expense of the average american citizen then i do not understand why your premise is so diametrically opposed in thought and in reason.

your argument is a contradiction.

The fundemental disagreement is this. What I recognize is the corruption gnawing at all of mankind. Everyone is looking at this catastrophe called civilization and thinking "how can we rearrange this so a utopia emerges?" Some people think the inequitable distribution of resources is the source of eivl, and believe that if we just set up a system to share the resources equitably then all goodness will follow from that. Other people think that just having a system is the source of corruption and want to eliminate it altogether and live without any central authority. The issue is that these schemes are all predicated upon the assumption that human beings are generally good. The reality is, human beings are generally sinful and tend towards corruption and not goodness. It isn't the system, or lack thereof that is the problem, it is the human heart:

Jeremiah 17:9

The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?

If you wiped out everything and started with a blank slate, putting the population of the world into an instant utopia, it would only be a matter of time before the whole thing was rotten to the core. The problem isn't the system, it is us. The only solution to this problem is Jesus Christ. Humans are incapable of governing themselves equitably. The founders recognized this, which is why they instituted checks and balances into the constitution, to try to offset mans sinful nature. They knew no man could be trusted with power. In the same way, to switch systems we would simply just be trading one polished turd for another. When Jesus returns and sets up His kingdom, only then will there be peace upon this Earth.

one last thing and while i hope you know .i shall state openly here.
what i am about to ask i ask in all sincerity and humility.
where do you think jesus would be sitting on this issue?
would he be on capitol hill with the plutocrats and corporate lobbyists?
think about it.

What Jesus is interested in is our salvation. Neither the plutocrats or the protesters are doing anything to reach or to further His Kingdom. They both outside of His will and are following man-centered doctrines and philosophies which glorify themselves and give God no acknowledgement what-so-ever. Jesus wouldn't be happy with any of them.

Luke 11:28

But he said, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it!”

Luke 18:8

I tell you that he will avenge them speedily. Nevertheless when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?

>> ^enoch:
>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:
Making a foray into politics?

so it appears and not a very impressive one.
@shinyblurry
i.

@dystopianfuturetoday

1a. Social stratification is increasing in every country around the world. It's due to globalization and automation, not to domestic policy. People who work smart and hard doing 21st century work are contributing more to society every year, and people who prefer work that can easily be automated are contributing less to society each year. Resistance to that is just the luddites burning down loom machines all over again.

1b. My lazy collectivist friends who grew up with more advantages than I did all contribute hardly anything to society, whereas large numbers of consumers enjoy the results of my labor. Economics is multi-sum by definition because unless both parties benefit, no trade can be completed. Trade creates value all around.

Some regulation is reasonable.

2. Problems in the US are generally due to (1) inevitable globalization (only 21st century labor is valuable now) and (2) to population replacement. (We're in the process of replacing a high education white/jewish/asian society with a low education non-Asian minority society. That's why California went from being one of the most well-off states in the country to being literally #50 out of #50 on some measures, despite having very liberal policies on education spending, teacher salaries, etc.)

3. Read the NYT article that was linked, and then wonder why virtually all liberal academics will lie about that article and about HBD (human bio-diversity) in general if you ask them about it. Reading Pinker's Blank Slate is a good start.

4. A free society means you don't have to cover the costs of your stupid neighbors who are exercising their right to be stupid and to reject your sound advice. Arguments counter to that are just an excuse for liberals to avoid pursuing their human potential and working smart and hard. My productivity already subsidizes my lazy friends that I grew up with... it's weird to try to increase subsidies for stupid ideas.


It appears to be the case that even if we assume voting liberal is best for society, holding liberal beliefs in your private life greatly reduces your ability to contribute to society, because liberalism makes its adherents think of smart hard work and careerism as slavery rather than contribution and personal development.

I watched some of your video..I may finish it at some point. I have to give it credit, it's quite a sophisticated attack vehicle for atheism. It attempts to decontruct the mechanisms for faith but so far it has some glaring errors. In the video covering prayer in the deconstruction process, it has a fundemental misunderstanding of Gods omniscience and the purpose of prayer. While it is true that God knows our needs before we ask

Matthew 6:8

Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

it isn't true that God has already decided a matter before we ask about it.

Genesis 18:17-25

Then the Lord said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do? Abraham will surely become a great and powerful nation, and all nations on earth will be blessed through him. For I have chosen him, so that he will direct his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing what is right and just, so that the Lord will bring about for Abraham what he has promised him.”

Then the Lord said, “The outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is so great and their sin so grievous that I will go down and see if what they have done is as bad as the outcry that has reached me. If not, I will know.”

The men turned away and went toward Sodom, but Abraham remained standing before the Lord. Then Abraham approached him and said: “Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked? What if there are fifty righteous people in the city? Will you really sweep it away and not spare the place for the sake of the fifty righteous people in it? Far be it from you to do such a thing—to kill the righteous with the wicked, treating the righteous and the wicked alike. Far be it from you! Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?”

The Lord said, “If I find fifty righteous people in the city of Sodom, I will spare the whole place for their sake.”

Then Abraham spoke up again: “Now that I have been so bold as to speak to the Lord, though I am nothing but dust and ashes, what if the number of the righteous is five less than fifty? Will you destroy the whole city because of five people?”

“If I find forty-five there,” he said, “I will not destroy it.”

Once again he spoke to him, “What if only forty are found there?”

He said, “For the sake of forty, I will not do it.”

Then he said, “May the Lord not be angry, but let me speak. What if only thirty can be found there?”

He answered, “I will not do it if I find thirty there.”

Abraham said, “Now that I have been so bold as to speak to the Lord, what if only twenty can be found there?”

He said, “For the sake of twenty, I will not destroy it.”

Then he said, “May the Lord not be angry, but let me speak just once more. What if only ten can be found there?”

He answered, “For the sake of ten, I will not destroy it.”

When the Lord had finished speaking with Abraham, he left, and Abraham returned home.

Now this is a special case, but Abraham negotiated with God and He decided what to do based on that negotiation. It is the same with prayer. The Lord may be set to do one thing, but may change His mind based on intercessory prayer done by one or several Christians. He may impart a blessing upon someone that normally wouldn't have received it if no one had asked about it.

Prayer is more than just asking for things, it is about communion and growth. Your friend made the mistake of making the Lord completely impersonal, by thinking he was just receiving commands from the master control. Ironically, he thought this was bringing him closer in his personal relationship with God when it was actually driving him apart. This is what happens when people think they know better than God.

1 Thessalonians 5:17

Pray without ceasing.

Luke 6:28

bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.

etc

I feel bad for him, specifically because of this scripture:


Hebrews 6:4-6

For it is impossible, in the case of those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, if they fall away, to be brought back to repentance, because to their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace.

It is quite shameful what he has done, and I can tell you there is more to this story than he is saying. It's not that I doubt the essential truth of his story, that he was once a devout Christian. That much was obvious to me the first time I heard him speak and looked in his eyes. There is just another spirit at work here which doesnt match the atheistic mindset. It's hard to say what his agenda is but it's not pro-atheist. It's pro-something else, but whatever it is, it's anti-christianity. The pretense of respect he is giving God is just a subterfuge..he doesn't have any respect for God what so ever..it's just to make the medicine go down smoother. The repetitive music is another clue to the disingenuousness of the presentation.

As for me, I don't fit any of his criteria. I was once just like you. Blind to the spirit, a strict materialistic, and suspicious of all religion and all supernatural claims. I rejected most of it as outright nonsense. I grew up that way and saw no reason to change.

One day God tapped me on the shoulder and let me know He was there. Your guess is as good as mine as to why. It's not as if I deserved to know. If I had to guess it would be that I was honestly interested in what the truth was, and I was willing to change my ways if necessary. It was more important for me to know the truth than to be right.

To convince myself God isn't there I would have to give myself a lobotomy. I would have to gouge my eyes out and pour superglue in my ears. I would have to do it deliberately, in spite of Him..meaning, I would have to deliberately deceive myself but I am fairly certain He wouldn't let me forget.

In reference to your scenerio, I think you make a mistake about Gods omniscience as well. God doesn't have absolute foreknowledge in this scenerio. For instance in Gen. 15:13-18 God predicts that the fourth generation of israelites will reach Cannan. But it is actually the fifth generation that reaches it because of disobedience. This means His prediction was based on probability.

For a being to truly have free will, their actions must to a certain extent be unpredictable to God. After God had Abraham prove his loyalty to Him by going through with sacrificing Issaic, God said "Now I know you love me". The verse suggests that until that moment, God didn't know that for sure.

This isn't to suggest God doesn't have foreknowledge at all. He obviously does, since He prophicies about things hundreds or thousands of years away and they come true. It is to suggest that God limited Himself for our sake. We have evidence of this in the person of Jesus Christ. Though He was God, He put aside His power and capability and knowledge to be fully submitted to the Fathers will. He depended on the Father for everything. Not just as an example, but for His mission to be accomplished through His revelation of the Father to the people.

It goes to the ontological argument, of what is the greater being. The one who cannot do anything original because everything he could do has already been done in His mind, or the one who can craft something even He couldn't fully anticipate. I go for option 2. It doesn't make sense for God to get mad at someone for doing something He already knew was going to happen.

My theory is the scenerio itself is certain. It has a beginning, it has an end. What is inbetween He may have certain ideas about, but obviously open to modification. He may plan for every possible scenerio but never quite know which will unfold because He has given us a measure of unpredictability.

So in this scenerio..

God creates a perfect world, giving man a blank slate for good or evil

Man chooses evil, God enforces the rules, death comes into the world and creation falls

Man is corrupted from sin and does continual evil that God is always trimming back and correcting

God works within the evil man creates, but it reaches the point of no return..

God is ready to give up on humans but finds one human he can work with

God resets the world, gives man another chance through Noah

Man is up to his old tricks but God sends His Son into the world this time to redeem Creation

Jesus imputes His righteouness and sinless nature into humanity, restoring them, takes our just punishment onto Himself and dies on the cross for our sins

He rises again breaking the power of death over humanity (which came from sin) and giving everyone the way to eternal life

God sets a date to judge the world, and will send His Son back when the church has spread the gospel to the four corners..

Jesus returns, comes back for His church and destroys the kingdom of the antichrist.

God judges the world and repays each according to their deeds
After the judgement, God destroys the corrupt creation and remakes it entirely new, and this time it will be permanently perfect. Thanks to Christ, the ones who believed in Him will have perfected natures and will sin no more and live forever in paradise

If you want to talk about greed and self-interest that is fine. I am a student of the human nature, and have many logical proofs I can offer even from a secular perspectives. My communication can always use fine tuning, however, I endevour that people should know the truth, because though they may stubbornly reject it at this point, will at some point need it, and more than that, just plain need to hear it. You discount the power of God completely, but I know He is always at work and the truth will facilitate that every time. I also appreciate that you noticed the unfair treatment I am receiving from other sifters. There is no reason to downvote these videos. They are well made and aren't masquarading as anything other than what they are. It's not as if they're in danger of becoming popular. They sin when they do this, and this is written about them:

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident [b]within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, they did not [c]honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:
I do dig Ecclesiastes - easily the most raw, human and cynical chapter of the good book.
http://videosift.com/video/Scorpion-vs-Black-Widow-Intense-sheesh?loadcomm=1#comment-290039
In short, here is why I think the main, overarching plot of the Bible is silly.
Summary:
God creates flawed humans.
Flawed humans do flawed things.
God punishes all present and future humans because of the flaws in his prototypes.
After many generations, God drowns 99.9% of his land dwelling creatures save two of each. (not sure why the fish get off so easy)
Despite this massive genocide, humans are still flawed.
God impregnates a human virgin woman - in a committed relationship - without consent - who gives birth to a human/God hybrid son. (Kinda weird and rape-y to be honest)
The son is tortured and 'dies for our sins'. (What does that even mean, couldn't God just forgive us without this cruel theatrical charade that so few people of the world are physically able to witness?)
Jesus comes back from the dead (which isn't really that big of a deal, considering he is a part God).
Finally, after all of this violence and suffering, God decides to destroy the world, and take those who believe in him to heaven, and to punish those with skeptical or scientific minds with eternal suffering.
I mean, I guess I can understand mass murder, if God thinks so little of us that our destruction is no more tragic than Atari burying thousands of copies of E.T. in the desert. But if we are insignificant ants, then why the strict moral code that forbids murder? Are we unique and special creatures, or just crash test dummies to be toyed with?
None of the actions of God seem wise for a being of such knowledge and power. The Bible sounds like mythology. It sounds like a combination of campfire stories, moral parables, juicy pulp fiction, dirty jokes, political posturing, medical advice and pre-scientific speculation. It sounds like an anthology of the best of the best literature of early human civilization.
If God were real, why doesn't he just openly and clearly communicate it? Why all the rites and rituals? "Hey, dft, this is God you atheist schmuck.... or should I say ex-athiest schmuck. Put down the pork and put on your beanie!" That would be clear and to the point, and if done convincingly, would add a pretty decent guy to the ranks of his faithful.
Also, his followers are so hung up on pride, that they miss a good chance of making a connection. I told you that I don't believe in Satan, but that I do oppose the greed and ruthless self interest that your Satan seems want to champion. If you cared more about the principles of the bible than the principals in the Bible, wouldn't you be serving your lord better? Shouldn't you nurture the things we have in common and downplay the stuff I think is absurd? Baby steps. Religionists have no strategy or common sense when it comes to apologetics. You argue with me as if I believe in God and Satan.
Anyway, I've made these points so many times, and they just bounce off the framework of faith, just as your points bounce off my framework of reason. There will be no headway because our criteria for belief run so contrary. I think it's cool that you fight for what you believe in so passionately, and wish people wouldn't downvote your videos to the point that they are killed. I do think you could come up with more productive styles of argument.
I'd be curious to get your opinion on this video: http://videosift.com/video/Why-I-am-no-longer-a-Christian-Must-Watch

>> ^GeeSussFreeK:
End result of captured regulators and centralized planning you mean. I walk into my kitchen or my bathroom and I am FILLED with industries that never really strike me as evil or corrupt by your, what I would consider, hasty generalization of capitalism. I look at my CD-rs, my desk, my toilet paper, my bathmat. I get a good price at the exact quality I want of them. The big problems, the ones where we see the most corruption and unfairness are those industries usually associated with heavy government regulation or finite resources.
The more a government gets involved with the mode and means of production the more bad laws get passed to benefit few at the cost of everyone. Looking back, I think everyone would agree that the legal monopolies that exist on phone and cable TV held us back technologically and culturally. As a result of these controls people pay higher prices to these companies. As the government gets more involved the need for companies to both protect and influence government officials for their unfair advantage. The government monopolies on things aren't any better, like the postal system, but that is really a topic for a different conversation.
So the idea that you point out of "Unless you spend a great deal of constant effort on monitoring it, your government -will- be corrupted by the ultra-rich who can offer benefits far beyond those available from any other source." is absolutely correct. The solution then, isn't MORE government regulations and oversight on the private economy.
The solution in my opinion is my like a recent sci-fi concept my friend told me about for his film school project. The best cure for a villain, is another villain. The villain in this case would be businesses. Being that the most effective person to fight large power corruption is people after that same power. Given the same resources and lack of meaningful unfair advantages, over time they mill each other out to an even level. At certain times people might get a little less for their money when companies use their established reputation to sell one over on people (I'm looking at you Toyota), but the public out lash when this is brought to light is swifter than any type of technocratic bumbling you would get from non-industry people on capital hill.
Capitalism isn't pretty. The evils of capitalism are all to clear. Someone can risk it all, and loose it all. A man could work all his life an perhaps never get ahead. Such is the risk. But the truth of the matter is capitalism is a driving force for great wealth for a great deal man more people than any type of managed economy.
The real and hardest questions I think stem from intellectual and property rights limits and restraints as it is hard to find a purely rational limit on what those should be. But ultimately, the principles of libertarianism are based in reason and not emotion or personal value. When making a system, you have to bench notions of good and bad, those are personal values of which there are 7 billion flavors. You have to start with reasonable, or unreasonable...a completely opinion-free, logical arrangement or arguments free from notions of morality or religion.


unregulated capitalism is retarded.

The fact is the more money you have the easier it gets to make more money so the ritch get richer and the pore get poorer.

Because of the way capitalism works for the rich to get richer they esentualy have to grab the wealth from the less wealthy.Because its easier for rich to make money than for the pore to make money u end up with 2% of a population being super rich and the rest with pore to average wages.


If you want a democratic safe clean caring society you will need to regulate capitalism , Tax the super ritch and do projects that help educate the pore or those with less money , esentualy redistabute the welth.

alternatively you would have to fundamentally change capitalism which ultimately would be regulation again.

Pure capitalism could only ever work if everyone started from a blank slate and a equal footing and in reality that would never happen.

Funny, she says "we didn't try to ban them from speaking" (so it's not freedom of speech issue), as if preventing him from speaking by storming the stage is somehow better.

This reminds me of university student mobs described on Pinker's "Blank Slate." One biology researcher (Herrnstein) was misquoted in pro-racist literature and then found that he could no longer speak about his research specialty, learning in pigeons, because wherever he went the lecture halls were filled with chanting mobs.

Even Ahmadinejad was able to give his speech uninterrupted at Columbia university, is this guy so much worse?

Psh, this is pretty jaded to a dying idea...that we are a blank slate created in whole by our experience. This quaint idea has been dying more and more each day. In truth, nature and nurture are locked together in a great struggle for the dominance in the fore of our mind. Just changing social norms and such doesn't change the underlying aggression seeded in us. Just look around you to non-humans for this. The male is almost always the main aggressor for mating, territory. This video also raises a false dichotomy between violence and emotional sensitivity. It is possible to be a violent person and emotionally complex and/or fragile.

Where as I do agree that violent urges are a detriment to us all, I question his evaluation of it being so superficially based, the counter to that is just to overwhelming to even go into.

I too saw this a while back. I like that people are exploring new ideas but I personally wouldn't use it. Right now I barely use my desktop. It is just the blank slate that I start with.

What I think I'd like as far as desktop enhancements is something similar to what Google has done with their web browser Chrome. When I launch Chrome, the start page is primarily filled with a 3 by 3 grid of the most commonly visit websites, which is maintained and updated automatically by the browser. This gives me quick, and easy access that covers about 80% of my web surfing habits. For a desktop, this grid could be populated with my most used programs.

I'm not looking for spiffy visual effects or cool ways to organize things on my desktop. I use Windows Explorer for organizing my files. What I'm looking for in desktop enhancements is for the desktop to be smarter about organizing the access points to my most commonly used applications and files without me having to do a bunch of manual work to get the same effect.

imstellar28: "I mean literally, he is asserting that there is a genetic predisposition to a person's political affiliation--is that not extremely offensive to you?"

This seems to me to be a "moralistic fallacy," as described above.


As someone who is a fan of every book you list on your profile, let me say I think you're missing out right now on some of the intellectual joys of genetics.

Haidt flashes in this video Steven Pinker's iconic book the Blank Slate, which changed the course of the intellectual community's understanding of the human sciences.

If anyone hasn't watched the following video, it's eye-opening:

http://www.videosift.com/video/Identical-strangers-twins-separated-at-birth