Yeah, you kinda do. However, I think that calling ALL religious people stupid and ignorant is stupid and ignorant, so I suppose I'm just as bad.

Now that we've made up, allow me to make you mad again. No, please don't get mad. I sincerely hope that the following doesn't offend. It is pretty didactic, so please forgive me.

I want to mention that Atheists do not earn respect by being unpleasant, aggressive, and self-satisfied. The most acceptable religious people, I think you would agree, are the type who believe in something and do good with it, who are well-informed and AT LEAST attempt to incorporate science and logic into their religion, who are tolerant of all other people, and who do not force their religion upon anyone who doesn't want it. Many Atheists I have encountered are just the opposite. They are intolerant of the beliefs of others and are more than happy to lump all religious people into one "stupid and ignorant" category. They are determined to enlighten the world. Most Atheists see a difference between pushing Atheism and proselytizing (ex. They would see a problem with door-to-door missionaries but not door-to-door Atheists) when there is really very little difference.

I believe that the best kind of Atheists realize that Atheism is the belief that God does not exist, not just a non-belief. They are tolerant of other beliefs, and they do not make broad, scathing generalizations about theists. I am religious, obviously, but I am probaly just as baffled and horrified by the goings-on of most Christian denominations as you are. But you will never catch me calling them all stupid and ignorant. Many or most are, yes, but not all. Have you ever bothered to discover religions who DO believe in evolution? Have you ever thought about the possibility that theism and logic could coexist? I'm not asking you to believe that they can, but never to have considered or thought about any of these possibilties...is kind of ignorant, isn't it? To stamp an "ignorant and stupid" label to every theist's forehead, especially around here, is exceedingly easy and doesn't require as much thinking for yourself as many seem to believe.

Just some food for thought. Please don't flame me.

>> ^mefa:
No hard feeling from me either. I see your point.
Though I have to say I actually wouldn't be slightly indignant if I read that. I would just think they were as stupid and ignorant as I think every religious person is and just ignore their opinion as it would hold no weight coming from a stupid person anyway.
Wow, I sound like an awful person. =/
>> ^thepinky:

>> ^jmzero:
I find it odd that they wonder at the origin of the taboo on criticizing religion. To me, it's clear where this came from: thousands of years of wars started by religions being unable to co-exist.

A couple points. First, there wouldn't be wars started by religion unless it was already taboo to criticize religion.

Second, it's not really true that there have been thousands of years of religious wars. The phenomenon of the holy war is really only found in monotheistic faiths. The Romans certainly didn't start wars with people because of religion (though they certainly found all sorts of other reasons). The Greeks didn't. Hindus, Buddhists, and Jains have peacefully coexisted for thousands of years. Buddhism spread peacefully into China, Japan, and Korea.

Monotheistic faiths haven't really had the political power to engage in religious wars until about 1500 years ago, when Christians really locked up rule of the dying Roman Empire--and they really started ratcheting up as the Catholic Church took political control of Europe and Islam unified the Middle East.

^democracy doesn't coexist with capitalism.

Only corporatocracy.

In my own exposure to statistics, statisticians are keenly aware of the difference between causation and correlation. It is often the case that an initial study will find a correlation, and the people behind the study will use that correlation as a basis for further study. That is exactly what was said in this interview. The fact that the paper doesn't claim a causation is purposeful.

So in the comments here, I am observing people leaping to the conclusion that religion = bad society (which is not what the paper is saying... merely that those two conditions tend to coexist), and someone saying the paper is useless because it doesn't show a causation... which is also untrue. This scientist is essentially saying "Hey guys, I noticed something interesting... These two conditions tend to happen together. Let's look into it further."

It just so happens that the two conditions are things that set a lot of people off, so you will see a lot more emotion injected into the commentary than you would if the two conditions were things like 'smooth rocks tend to exist near water," or something.

>> ^quantumushroom:

>>>>Saddam is gone, but...
>>>>Iraq had free elections, but...
>>>>The Surge worked, but...
Do you ever get tired of being wrong?


I dunno i only count 1 true thing in there, saddam is gone. and that was illegal.

free elections do not coexist with death threats and occupying armies.

the surge worked in what way? on TV?


dude if anyone is tireless about being wrong around here....it's...

I think issues here are being conflated. Culture is an outgrowth of the process of chemical evolution; it cannot be considered alongside it. All cultures are systems of behaviors resulting from the nature of chemicals. Culture as it stands is a solution--developed by trial and error--to a problem. The problem WE have comes from the coexistence of two conflicting facts: 1) humans must in be the same places for extended periods of time in order to procreate at the maximum sustainable rate (we are an altricial species who invest much in offspring); and 2) humans have developed a subsistence strategy to maintain survival to a reproductive age that requires management of limited resources. Getting to the point, our brains/minds spend more and more time on aesthetic pursuits because we've come to a point where the products of these pursuits benefit the cohesion of societies, keeping us sanely together, sharing resources, making babies and not killing each other at rates that would destroy the genes our bodies so dutifully protect. The best use for the brain, I think we all agree, is to uncover the hidden keys each brain holds to unlock the answer of how to keep us all alive, making babies, for ever and ever, RAmen.

Nice piece of propaganda.

I'm sure Mexicans coming here also think that they already own the land they're entering, have much higher technology, and have a worldview focused on property and conquest, compared to our obviously open and communal society.

We're being so totally screwed by "hugs with trees." The fool thinks there can be peaceful coexistence, mutually beneficial trade, and cultural exchanges.

Don't even get me started on those "yes we can" saps.

We'll be totally safe if we just build a 2,000 mile chain link fence. No one can get past chain link fence.

*politics
*animation
*parody
*fear

>> ^chilaxe:
>> ^jwray:
[...] 2. He insists that his interracial rags-to-riches story could not have happened in any other country. This is blatantly false. America is neither the least racist country nor the most socialy mobile country. Similar things could happen in most countries. [...]
People of African descent from countries like France come to the U.S. and say they see African Americans having an influence on the culture in a way that they don't see in their home countries.
The point is mainly just that the U.S. has had much more diversity (and ethnic tensions) for a longer time than most countries, so there is a stronger and wider trend of members of minority groups rising to influential positions.


Let's counter this claim with some specifics:

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohammad_Al_Amoudi

2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Lee-Chin


3. Norway seems to be much less racist than the USA:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/1161853.stm
The same thing happens more frequently, with less protest, in the USA.
Also, nearly 50% of Norway's parliament is female, and half of Norway's population growth is from immigration.

6. In Indonesia, three races coexist, each with at least 30% of the population. There isn't much racial strife there (though there is religious strife)

7. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aliko_Dangote (Nigeria is extremely diverse. There is no majority ethnic group, only a plurality) See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Nigeria_Benin_Cameroon_languages.png http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Nigeria#Ethnic_groups

8. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masayoshi_Son

CaptainPlanet420, I won't sit up here and skewer you like the rest. I know when someone is ribbing us, and that appears to be what you're doing. You're going to be labeled the Andy Kaufman of the VideoSift if you keep it up.

I don't care for bigots, personally. I don't like it when someone labels someone with intended malice. I'd love for all of us to coexist without hate in our hearts. But, what a terrible world it would be if all of our good words like queer, fag and homo were taken away from us because we were afraid of bigots using them. Sometimes the use of those words isn't necessarily meant to be hate speech. They're perfectly good words.

I still believe that people and fish can coexist.

Have any of you read about Pope Benedict's explanation of how creationism and the theory of evolution can coexist? I'm glad that someone influential finally started pushing this idea. It not only promotes the undeterred teaching of evolution in schools, but it promotes environmentalism. I believe in God, but I can see that evolution is the real deal just as well as anyone. I also believe that God created man in His own image. How can these things coexist? Read some of the pope's literature. He's a smart guy. P.S. I'm not Catholic so don't go knocking the Catholic church. It won't hurt my feelings.

Galloway is another Neville Chamberlain.

This same spinelessness was also evident during the Cold War, when 'useful idiots' in the West tried telling us the Soviets only wanted to "coexist peacefully".

You can only have peace when your enemies fear you. The Iranians don't have the proper fear of extinction they should at the moment.

. . . . It's painful to read that site. My heart sinks when I think that people really believe that dinosaurs and humans coexisted only 6,000 years ago and that dragons are real (didn't know dinosaurs breathed fire) and that evolution is debunked because my kid didn't pop out as a new species or that monkey's aren't giving birth to 6 foot tall humans. Or, yes, that the asteroid had NOTHING to do with the decline of dinosaurs even though they admit that the period afterwards shows a serious decline in fossils but I guess it shouldn't matter because technically, most of them don't believe in carbon dating. But hey, I don't believe in popcorn.

written by Krupo in that thread. (unless you've got it bookmarked you wouldn't know the thread was updated )

Good in '71 Bad in '72. It's a short track record. I'm not saying he was perfect, but have you considered that external governments could also try and screw with Chile and their currency? I haven't done extensive research into it, but it *is* a threat these days - IMF/WTO spook the global markets (because money is all about perception rather than reality), and the country in question is SCREWED.

And although the regime was accused of various things, those are accusations rather than convictions. I'm sure Chile has an impeachment process like any other country. Why should you get the military involved immediately, if at all? There's a reason you have elections - to foster an orderly handover of power. I'm sure millions of Americans would be pleased if some F-16's attacked Dubya, but that's not the way you do things.

In an effort to add a bit more depth, I poked around a bit more. Turns out you need a 2/3 majority for the resolution you refer to to have legal force. So using the word "passed" is a bit misleading - that's a 63.3% margin, close, but not legally binding (source is WikiTalk, but I'll buy it unless someone has evidence to the contrary).

Do check out that Wiki-talk page, looks like there's some lively to and forth on the topic.





In reply to this comment by reason:
Why not address these facts?

On August 22, 1973 the Christian Democrats and the National Party members of the Chamber of Deputies passed, by 81 to 47 votes, a resolution entitled "Declaration of the Breakdown of Chile’s Democracy", which called upon the military to "put an immediate end" to what they described as "breach[es of] the Constitution… with the goal of redirecting government activity toward the path of Law and ensuring the constitutional order of our Nation and the essential underpinnings of democratic coexistence among Chileans."

The resolution declared that the Allende government was seeking "...to conquer absolute power with the obvious purpose of subjecting all citizens to the strictest political and economic control by the state... [with] the goal of establishing a totalitarian system," and claimed that it had made "violations of the Constitution" into "a permanent system of conduct." Many of the charges came down to disregarding the separation of powers and arrogating the prerogatives of both the legislature and judiciary within the executive.

Among other particulars, the regime was accused of:

* ruling by decree, thus thwarting the normal system of adopting legislation
* refusing to enforce judicial decisions against its own partisans and "not carrying out sentences and judicial resolutions that contravene its objectives"
* ignoring the decrees of the independent General Comptroller's Office
* various offenses related to the media, including usurping control of the National Television Network and "applying ... economic pressure against those media organizations that are not unconditional supporters of the government..."
* allowing its supporters to assemble even when armed, while preventing legal assembly by its opponents
* "...supporting more than 1,500 illegal 'takings' of farms..."
* illegal repression of the El Teniente strike
* illegally limiting emigration

The resolution finally condemned the "creation and development of government-protected armed groups which... are headed towards a confrontation with the Armed Forces." Allende's efforts to re-organize the military and police, which he could not trust in their current forms, were characterized as "notorious attempts to use the Armed and Police Forces for partisan ends, destroy their institutional hierarchy, and politically infiltrate their ranks."


And as for the economic boom?

In 1972, the monetary policies of an increase in the amount of currency, which had been adopted by the Minister of Economics, Pedro Vuskovic, led to a devaluation of the escudo and to renewed inflation, which reached 140% in 1972.

I appreciate these opinions about Chile in 1973, which helps to give more information on the issue.

While informative, the information you've provided is absolutely no reason or justification for our country (CIA) to use its resources to help overthrow another country.

With the specifics you've brought up, please take a look at your list and notice the similarities to what our own government has been doing.

In addition, I would suggest citing your information.

thx

In reply to this comment by reason:
Why not address these facts?

On August 22, 1973 the Christian Democrats and the National Party members of the Chamber of Deputies passed, by 81 to 47 votes, a resolution entitled "Declaration of the Breakdown of Chile’s Democracy", which called upon the military to "put an immediate end" to what they described as "breach[es of] the Constitution… with the goal of redirecting government activity toward the path of Law and ensuring the constitutional order of our Nation and the essential underpinnings of democratic coexistence among Chileans."

The resolution declared that the Allende government was seeking "...to conquer absolute power with the obvious purpose of subjecting all citizens to the strictest political and economic control by the state... [with] the goal of establishing a totalitarian system," and claimed that it had made "violations of the Constitution" into "a permanent system of conduct." Many of the charges came down to disregarding the separation of powers and arrogating the prerogatives of both the legislature and judiciary within the executive.

Among other particulars, the regime was accused of:

* ruling by decree, thus thwarting the normal system of adopting legislation
* refusing to enforce judicial decisions against its own partisans and "not carrying out sentences and judicial resolutions that contravene its objectives"
* ignoring the decrees of the independent General Comptroller's Office
* various offenses related to the media, including usurping control of the National Television Network and "applying ... economic pressure against those media organizations that are not unconditional supporters of the government..."
* allowing its supporters to assemble even when armed, while preventing legal assembly by its opponents
* "...supporting more than 1,500 illegal 'takings' of farms..."
* illegal repression of the El Teniente strike
* illegally limiting emigration

The resolution finally condemned the "creation and development of government-protected armed groups which... are headed towards a confrontation with the Armed Forces." Allende's efforts to re-organize the military and police, which he could not trust in their current forms, were characterized as "notorious attempts to use the Armed and Police Forces for partisan ends, destroy their institutional hierarchy, and politically infiltrate their ranks."


And as for the economic boom?

In 1972, the monetary policies of an increase in the amount of currency, which had been adopted by the Minister of Economics, Pedro Vuskovic, led to a devaluation of the escudo and to renewed inflation, which reached 140% in 1972.