Charles Manson's Epic Answer has been added as a related post - related requested by silvercord on that post.

Bobby Knight Channels Charles Manson has been added as a related post - related requested by silvercord.

True but the Atheist also holds the "belief" that there is not GOD. So which belief is more correct? For me to get into a biblical debate with you and the atheist sift community would be pointless. It's like the saying you can bring a horse to water but you can't make him drink. So this makes me search the web for other ways to argue the point. Here is 1 of them.

Mathematically speaking evolution falls flat on it face..
Lifted from site: http://www.freewebs.com/proofofgod/whataretheodds.htm



Suppose you take ten pennies and mark them from 1 to 10. Put them in your pocket and give them a good shake. Now try to draw them out in sequence from 1 to 10, putting each coin back in your pocket after each draw.

Your chance of drawing number 1 is 1 to 10.
Your chance of drawing 1 & 2 in succession is 1 in 100.
Your chance of drawing 1, 2 & 3 in succession would be one in a thousand.
Your chance of drawing 1, 2, 3 & 4 in succession would be one in 10,000.

And so on, until your chance of drawing from number 1 to number 10 in succession would reach the unbelievable figure of one chance in 10 billion. The object in dealing with so simple a problem is to show how enormously figures multiply against chance.

Sir Fred Hoyle similarly dismisses the notion that life could have started by random processes:

Imagine a blindfolded person trying to solve a Rubik’s cube. The chance against achieving perfect colour matching is about 50,000,000,000,000,000,000 to 1. These odds are roughly the same as those against just one of our body's 200,000 proteins having evolved randomly, by chance.

Now, just imagine, if life as we know it had come into existence by a stroke of chance, how much time would it have taken? To quote the biophysicist, Frank Allen:

Proteins are the essential constituents of all living cells, and they consist of the five elements, carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen and sulphur, with possibly 40,000 atoms in the ponderous molecule. As there are 92 chemical elements in nature, all distributed at random, the chance that these five elements may come together to form the molecule, the quantity of matter that must be continually shaken up, and the length of time necessary to finish the task, can all be calculated. A Swiss mathematician, Charles Eugene Guye, has made the computation and finds that the odds against such an occurrence are 10^160, that is 10 multiplied by itself 160 times, a number far too large to be expressed in words. The amount of matter to be shaken together to produce a single molecule of protein would be millions of times greater than the whole universe. For it to occur on the earth alone would require many, almost endless billions (10^243) of years.

Proteins are made from long chains called amino-acids. The way those are put together matters enormously. If in the wrong way, they will not sustain life and may be poisons. Professor J.B. Leathes (England) has calculated that the links in the chain of quite a simple protein could be put together in millions of ways (10^48). It is impossible for all these chances to have coincided to build one molecule of protein.

But proteins, as chemicals, are without life. It is only when the mysterious life comes into them that they live. Only the infinite mind of God could have foreseen that such a molecule could be the abode of life, could have constructed it, and made it live.

Science, in attempt to calculate the age of the whole universe, has placed the figure at 50 billion years. Even such a prolonged duration is too short for the necessary proteinous molecule to have come into existence in a random fashion. When one applies the laws of chance to the probability of an event occurring in nature, such as the formation of a single protein molecule from the elements, even if we allow three billion years for the age of the Earth or more, there isn't enough time for the event to occur.

There are several ways in which the age of the Earth may be calculated from the point in time which at which it solidified. The best of all these methods is based on the physical changes in radioactive elements. Because of the steady emission or decay of their electric particles, they are gradually transformed into radio-inactive elements, the transformation of uranium into lead being of special interest to us. It has been established that this rate of transformation remains constant irrespective of extremely high temperatures or intense pressures. In this way we can calculate for how long the process of uranium disintegration has been at work beneath any given rock by examining the lead formed from it. And since uranium has existed beneath the layers of rock on the Earth's surface right from the time of its solidification, we can calculate from its disintegration rate the exact point in time the rock solidified.

In his book, Human Destiny, Le Comte Du nuoy has made an excellent, detailed analysis of this problem:

It is impossible because of the tremendous complexity of the question to lay down the basis for a calculation which would enable one to establish the probability of the spontaneous appearance of life on Earth.

The volume of the substance necessary for such a probability to take place is beyond all imagination. It would that of a sphere with a radius so great that light would take 10^82 years to cover this distance. The volume is incomparably greater than that of the whole universe including the farthest galaxies, whose light takes only 2x10^6 (two million) years to reach us. In brief, we would have to imagine a volume more than one sextillion, sextillion, sextillion times greater than the Einsteinian universe.

The probability for a single molecule of high dissymmetry to be formed by the action of chance and normal thermic agitation remains practically nill. Indeed, if we suppose 500 trillion shakings per second (5x10^14), which corresponds to the order of magnitude of light frequency (wave lengths comprised between 0.4 and 0.8 microns), we find that the time needed to form, on an average, one such molecule (degree of dissymmetry 0.9) in a material volume equal to that of our terrestrial globe (Earth) is about 10^243 billions of years (1 followed by 243 zeros)

But we must not forget that the Earth has only existed for two billion years and that life appeared about one billion years ago, as soon as the Earth had cooled.

Life itself is not even in question but merely one of the substances which constitute living beings. Now, one molecule is of no use. Hundreds of millions of identical ones are necessary. We would need much greater figures to "explain" the appearance of a series of similar molecules, the improbability increasing considerably, as we have seen for each new molecule (compound probability), and for each series of identical throws.

If the probability of appearance of a living cell could be expressed mathematically the previous figures would seem negligible. The problem was deliberately simplified in order to increase the probabilities.

Events which, even when we admit very numerous experiments, reactions or shakings per second, need an almost-infinitely longer time than the estimated duration of the Earth in order to have one chance, on an average to manifest themselves can, it would seem, be considered as impossible in the human sense.

It is totally impossible to account scientifically for all phenomena pertaining to life, its development and progressive evolution, and that, unless the foundations of modern science are overthrown, they are unexplainable.

We are faced by a hiatus in our knowledge. There is a gap between living and non-living matter which we have not been able to bridge.

The laws of chance cannot take into account or explain the fact that the properties of a cell are born out of the coordination of complexity and not out of the chaotic complexity of a mixture of gases. This transmissible, hereditary, continuous coordination entirely escapes our laws of chance.

Rare fluctuations do not explain qualitative facts; they only enable us to conceive that they are not impossible qualitatively.

Evolution is mathematically impossible

It would be impossible for chance to produce enough beneficial mutations—and just the right ones—to accomplish anything worthwhile.

"Based on probability factors . . any viable DNA strand having over 84 nucleotides cannot be the result of haphazard mutations. At that stage, the probabilities are 1 in 4.80 x 10^50. Such a number, if written out, would read 480,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000."
"Mathematicians agree that any requisite number beyond 10^50 has, statistically, a zero probability of occurrence."
I.L. Cohen, Darwin Was Wrong (1984), p. 205.

I see an future in academia.
-Hope his speech impediment is correctable and he doesn't scare the breeders off with his "nature of time,space, and matter" date openers!

Look OUT! It's Charles Xavier!!

*vintage

Young Prince Charles!

Charles Darwin - Evolution Song (Horrible Histories) has been added as a related post - related requested by Fantomas on that post.

@bobknight33

Jan. 21 2012, St. Charles Illinois; A gun owner with a concealed carry permit accidentally shoots a man through the chest after a night fundraiser at St. Patrick Catholic Church.

May 24 2011, Orlando Florida; A concealed weapon accidentally discharges in the lobby of a restaurant injuring 4 people injured, including a 4 year old boy and the gun owner. The owner had a concealed weapon permit.

November 9, 2012; Colorado University - a woman accidentally shoots a co-worker on the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical campus. The woman, who has a concealed carry permit, told police she bought the gun because of neighborhood concerns and recent campus thefts.

July 7 2009, Tampa Florida; While squatting down to use the toilet, the handgun of a woman with a concealed weapon permit falls out of her holster, hits the ground and discharges, shooting the woman sitting in the next stall.

January 24 2012, Dallas Texas; A 23 year old with a concealed carry permit accidentally drops his weapon while in line at a Walmart, injuring himself and 3 others, including 2 young children, when the weapon discharges.

We can do this all day. That's 1 google search and a few minutes of copy pasta.

How can we have a substantive conversation if you're not willing to put in any effort to actually understand the subject matter, either for or against? If you're content with your blind faith in whatever scientists tell you, then you're just as dogmatic as you accuse me of being.

You, as a devoutly religious person, trying to reframe my flippant attitude as dogmatism is like a child playing at being a police officer talking to a real police officer and going, "Wooooo woooooo woooooo I'm a police officer! I caught a hundred bad guys today! I'm taking you to jail!" You can't expect me to take you seriously. Every paragraph you write shows your lack of scientific understanding and unwillingness to honestly seek truth. If I saw some scientific thinking or efforts on your part to see things from my point of view, I'd gladly continue to make the extra effort, as I did for many months (was it years?). Consider I've spent most of our conversation time trying to understand your point of view, but you have never once inquired about mine. And then you accuse me of being "incurious".

As you can plainly see, Charles was scheming to deceive the church into accepting his uniformitarian theories even though he knew they contradicted scripture. He wasn't interested in a scientific investigation of the facts:

"... the physical part of Geological inquiry ought to be conducted as if the Scriptures were not in existence"

He had an agenda and his bias is plain to see.

This is the nut of it for me with you. This illustrates your perfect failure to understand science. If you can't see why just from reading it, I don't have the skill to show you.

On Oct. 1, 1997, Luke Woodham, 16, part of a satanic cult, stabbed and bludgeoned his mother before driving her car to Pearl High School in Pearl, Miss., where he shot dead two students and wounded seven others with a rifle he made no attempt to conceal. He then got back into his mother’s car and planned to go to Pearl Junior High School to kill some more. But assistant principal Joel Myrick retrieved a .45-caliber pistol from the glove compartment of his truck and subdued Woodham.

On Jan. 16, 2002, Peter Odighizuwa, 43, of Nigeria, went to the Appalachian School of Law campus in Virginia with a handgun and killed three and wounded three others. At the sound of gunfire, two other students – both police officers – retrieved guns from their cars. Meanwhile, another police officer and former Marine jumped Odighizuwa and disarmed him by the time the other officers got to the scene.

On Aug. 23, 1995, a band of crack cocaine addicts entered a store in Muskegon, Mich., with a plan to kill everyone and steal enough cash and jewelry to feed their habit. One member of the gang shot store owner Clare Cooper in the back four times. He still managed to grab his shotgun and fire on the gang as they fled. They were all apprehended.

On Dec. 9, 2007, a 24-year-old gunman named Matthew Murray launched an attack on the congregants of the New Life Church in Colorado Springs that left two victims dead. A former police officer, Jeanne Assam, a member of the security team for the church, shot Murray 10 times, killing him, as he was shooting at her. Murray had killed four others at a church 70 miles away earlier in the day.

On July 24, 2012, Richard Gable Stevens rented a rifle at a shooting range in Santa Clara, Calif., and herded three employees out the door, saying he intended to kill them. One of the employees, however, was carrying a .45-caliber handgun and shot the assailant.

On Dec. 17, 1991, two men armed with stolen pistols herded 20 customers and employees of a Shoney’s restaurant in Anniston, Ala., into a walk-in refrigerator and locked it so they could rob the establishment. However, one customer was armed with a .45-caliber handgun hidden under a table. He shot one of the gunmen dead. The other robber, who was holding the manager of the restaurant at gunpoint, began firing at the customer. But he was wounded critically by return fire, ending the incident.

On July 13, 2009, an armed man entered the Golden Food Market in south Richmond, shooting and wounding a clerk while firing at store patrons. He was shot by another customer who had a concealed-carry permit, likely saving the lives of eight other people in the store.

On July 29, 2012, Charles Conner shot and killed two people and their dogs at the Peach Tree RV park in Early, Texas. Vic Stacy got a call from one of the neighbors, got his .357 magnum and shot Conner as he fired upon the first police officer to arrive at the scene. Stacy was credited with saving the life of the officer.

The truth is that every single day mass murders are averted by armed civilian

Yet, every time there is a horrendous slaughter like we saw at the Sandy Hook Elementary School, there is a knee-jerk outcry for stricter control of guns.

taken from http://www.wnd.com/2012/12/how-to-stop-the-slaughter-of-the-innocents/#oA9kiFClUvLJ8gIK.99

How can we have a substantive conversation if you're not willing to put in any effort to actually understand the subject matter, either for or against? If you're content with your blind faith in whatever scientists tell you, then you're just as dogmatic as you accuse me of being. The video I provided is very good and it chronicles the history of deep time, as well as the science behind it, in exacting detail using the methodology of geologists. You could watch 10 minutes of it, and if you decided you didn't like it, you could turn it off.

As far as the paradigm shift goes, here is a quote from the father of uniformitarianism, Charles Lyell:

I am sure you may get into Q.R. [Quarterly Review] what will free the science from Moses, for if treated seriously, the [church] party are quite prepared for it. A bishop, Buckland ascertained (we suppose [Bishop] Sumner), gave Ure a dressing in the British Critic and Theological Review. They see at last the mischief and scandal brought on them by Mosaic systems … . Probably there was a beginning—it is a metaphysical question, worthy of a theologian—probably there will be an end. Species, as you say, have begun and ended—but the analogy is faint and distant. Perhaps it is an analogy, but all I say is, there are, as Hutton said, ‘no signs of a beginning, no prospect of an end’ … . All I ask is, that at any given period of the past, don’t stop inquiry when puzzled by refuge to a ‘beginning,’ which is all one with ‘another state of nature,’ as it appears to me. But there is no harm in your attacking me, provided you point out that it is the proof I deny, not the probability of a beginning … . I was afraid to point the moral, as much as you can do in the Q.R. about Moses. Perhaps I should have been tenderer about the Koran. Don’t meddle much with that, if at all.

If we don’t irritate, which I fear that we may (though mere history), we shall carry all with us. If you don’t triumph over them, but compliment the liberality and candour of the present age, the bishops and enlightened saints will join us in despising both the ancient and modern physico-theologians. It is just the time to strike, so rejoice that, sinner as you are, the Q.R. is open to you.

P.S. … I conceived the idea five or six years ago [1824–25], that if ever the Mosaic geology could be set down without giving offence, it would be in an historical sketch, and you must abstract mine, in order to have as little to say as possible yourself. Let them feel it, and point the moral.”

As you can plainly see, Charles was scheming to deceive the church into accepting his uniformitarian theories even though he knew they contradicted scripture. He wasn't interested in a scientific investigation of the facts:

From a lecture in King’s College London in 1832

I have always been strongly impressed with the weight of an observation of an excellent writer and skillful geologist who said that ‘for the sake of revelation as well as of science—of truth in every form—the physical part of Geological inquiry ought to be conducted as if the Scriptures were not in existence

He had an agenda and his bias is plain to see. He completely excluded the testimony of scripture apriori before he even began. That is the beginning of why there was a shift in geology as the intelligentsia embraced his theories and began to teach it at Universities. There was no spectacular confirmation of any of this; in fact the evidence he gave about Niagra Falls to supprt his theory has been completely falsified.

130 years ago, the assumption in the Western world (where all the science was getting done) was the the Bible was correct. There was no geological scientific evidence either way. Then geological evidence started coming out that the biblical number was way, way wrong. That evidence was challenged and yet survived, so the accepted value of the age of the Earth changed. That's how science works; you change your mind in the face of evidence. That's how intelligence works, in fact.

It's the same evidence. There isn't creationist evidence and secular scientist evidence. They're both looking at the same evidence and interpreting it different. And there is plenty of geologic evidence of the flood. Recently, scientists have started to embrace catastrophism over uniformitarian because the evidence of a worldwide disaster is undeniable.

The evidence that was initially advanced for long ages by Charles Lyell was based on either misinterpretation or outright fraud. He claimed that Niagra Falls was eroding at the rate of one foot per year. He then made the leap that since the gorge was 35,000 feet long it was 35,000 years old. Very scientific. It has been confirmed however that the gorge erodes at 4 to 5 feet per year which means it is most likely under 7 thousand years old.

The "evidence" is obtained by making assumptions about the past that can't be proven, and you can't date the rocks without these assumptions. If you change the assumptions then you come up with much different dates.

It's like quantum physics. Everybody just assumed that all matter was made of solid matter that has definite speed and location, but it turns out that all matter is made up of things with probabilities only. No matter how much Einstein wanted to believe that all matter was solid all the way down, he had to agree that the evidence for quantum physics was undeniably accurate and that matter is composed of chancy waveforms. Anyone who studies it will have to come to the same conclusion. Same goes for what we're talking about.

Everyone who studies it does not come to that conclusion. The hard evidence you have for quantum physics does not exist for deep time. You can test quantum physics; you can't test deep time. All there is a pile of circumstantial evidence all based on the same unprovable assumptions.

"Any evidence...discarded" is misleading. If there's a single outlier result once, it may get some attention or it may be ignored. If there's repeatable experimentation that yields the same contradictory results again and again (dual slit experiment), or a theory that fits all evidence better than current models (quantum physics), it will stir controversy and get a lot of attention. Again, that's how science works.

Every time they measure the age of the rocks they get a range of dates, and then they discard the ones that don't agree with their assumptions as "anomalous". I think I've said this before..bif the evidence were there I would believe it. I used to believe it, but when I found out the extremely flimsy and weaknature of the evidence and realized I would have to put more faith in the scientists than I would the bible, so I decided to believe the bible instead. The whole thing stinks to high heaven but this is a religious proposition to many people. To them, they are satisfied with its explanation of reality and use it as an excuse to deny God. Take note of the awe and reverence and love people pay to the Cosmos and "mother Earth" because it is a religious experience you are witnessing They are seeing Gods glory in creation but they make naturalism their religion instead of acknowledging Him, and worship the creature rather than the Creator.

Psalm 19:1-2


The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.

Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge.

*promote
Born Arthur Charles Farrington (Art Clokey)
October 12, 1921
Detroit, Michigan, U.S.
Died January 8, 2010 (aged 88)
Los Osos, California, U.S.

The Philadelphia police officer who was captured on video punching a woman in the face will be fired.

Police Commmissioner Charles H. Ramsey said today that he had issued a direct-action dismissal, an immediate step that commissioners can take if they have evidence that an officer has violated departmental policies or the law.

Lt. Jonathan Josey, 39, is a decorated 19-year veteran of the department who has been praised by some colleagues even after the video emerged. He declined to comment. As of Thursday, he is suspended for a month with the intent to dismiss.

Ramsey had previously said he was "deeply troubled" by the now-notorious video.

"From what I saw, it's difficult to justify the actions that took place," Ramsey said Tuesday.

Josey's punch to the woman's head, which knocked her to the ground and bloodied her face, appeared to be a case of excessive force being used to make an arrest, Ramsey said.

The woman, Aida Guzman of Chester, was arrested Sunday for disorderly conduct at a celebration in North Philadelphia following the city's Puerto Rican Day parade. Police said they thought she was throwing liquid at a group of officers, which led Josey to target her.

District Attorney Seth Williams said today that charges against Guzman have been dropped.

Ramsey said police still have not been able to interview Guzman, despite several attempts. He made a public request that she speak to police in order to help move the investigation forward.



Philly officer who sucker-punched woman will be fired

Sunday's incident took place on North 5th Street, near Lehigh Avenue, during what police described as a street party that takes place after the annual parade.

The department had no immediate comment on the video, which depicts a police officer hitting the woman while she is walking away from a group of officers. The officer apparently thought the woman threw beer at police.

City Councilwoman Maria Quinones Sanchez, a central organizer of the parade, said she spoke with Police Commissioner Charles H. Ramsey this morning, and that Ramsey was particularly upset because the incident involved a commanding officer.

"He was very concerned," Sanchez said. She noted that this year's parade theme was "The Puerto Rican Woman."

The lieutenant will be assigned to desk duty while the incident is investigated, police said.

Sanchez said she had met with police commanders before the parade in the hope of avoiding conflicts between police and paradegoers.

"It's unfortunate that this happened because we just talked about it before the parade," said Sanchez.

The woman, who is not identified, is shown falling to the ground, her face bloodied. In the seconds before the punch, the woman had been walking around a group of people and police officers. Someone near her in the crowd can be seen throwing some liquid into the air, toward the officers.

It appears in the video that she had sprayed silly string from a can.

The woman was taken into custody and issued a citation for disorderly conduct, police said, then released.

http://www.philly.com/philly/news/20121001_Video_shows_Philadelphia_cop_punching_woman_at_parade.html

I think it may be partial nonsense, luck always plays a role in everything, that said I do believe he was a skilled leader and a shrewd businessman, but some people act as if Christ just died again.
It's funny how someone could be an abject failure and also be a pompous gasbag and at the end people will remember you as a pompous gasbag, but if you're successful it's as if people will forget all the gasbaggery and you just become someone who was successful. For me, personally, I don't care if they made dollar or a bajillion dollars during their lives, at the end they were still a pompous gasbag.

>> ^xxovercastxx:

>> ^00Scud00:
What is that supposed to mean exactly? When I hear that he was really good at what he did I'm not sure just what it is that I'm supposed to be getting from that statement, am I supposed to respect him for that? Charles Manson was really good at getting other people to commit murder for him, should he get my respect too? After hearing more about Edison I think that it's a pretty good comparison, they both hired a lot of smart people to work for them and then they both took all the credit for themselves, although it's probably partially our own fault as well, as a society we do love putting people on pedestals.

My only point is that all the arguments that amount to him being in the right place at the right time, as if he had nothing to do with his or Apple's success and just stumbled into a pile of talent and went along for the ride, are nonsense.
Watch something like Triumph of the Nerds and you'll see those supposedly exploited Apple employees praising him for bringing out their best. Was he a pompous gasbag? Yes. Did he have a way of inspiring and driving people to new heights? You bet your fucking ass, he did.
You don't have to respect him but to pretend that being a leader like Jobs isn't a skill... well, if it's not, why aren't you surrounded by geniuses who make you rich?