Actually, I'm an atheist because my local pastor was a cool guy who used to play table football and billiards at my grandmother's pub. And when he realized that many of us couldn't take the stories of the Bible seriously, he never pushed any of his beliefs onto us. So you might say it never took root with me.

The humanistic education of a German gymnasium did the rest. When the internet came along at the turn of the century, with its ready access to the likes of Bertrand Russell and, much later, Hitchens, Dawkins, Harris, deGrasse Tyson, it merely pushed my attitude from not caring about organized religion into open confrontation with it. Though to be honest, I prefer not to bring up religion in a discussion, ever. It has the uncanny tendency to derail any conversation.

That said, science, specifically my training as a computer scientist, had no part in it. I was a passive atheist long before I took any of my education seriously, aka university.

@newtboy
"i know you are but what am i i"?

that had me cackling like a loon.bravo my friend.

please understand guys my comment is in reference to this particular thread,not any previous private or otherwise.

my commentary was also tongue-n-cheek and not to be taken too seriously.
i was poking the hornets nest...like a boss..who also happens to be a dick.

please forgive.

as for conflicting private to public messages.
well..that would infuriate me as well newt.you wont get an argument from me on that point.
that speaks to a persons character and integrity and explains a ton in regards to your attitude towards @chingalera.

our integrity is all we have.
when you take away everything,the only thing left we have to trade is our word.
our honor.
our respect for another human being.
when we lose that trust....we lose everything.

i do not know the particulars on how you all conversed in private.its none of my business and not my place to judge.

but if what you are saying is true newt (and i have no reason to believe it isnt.there is a past precedent in that regard) then i have to ask @chingalera why?

why say one thing in private and then another in public?
that is so disengenuious and un-necessary my man.
you make good solid points..often,and often i agree with them.
so why would invalidate them by interacting with such duplicity?

you cant call out newt for disregarding or dismissing your points because it was YOU who invalidated those points by your interactions with him.

and you know this.
dont act like you dont because i know your smarter than the average bear.so dont insult my intelligence by feigning innocence.

you owe newt an apology.period.

and dont prove @VoodooV right.we both were there when you flamed out and it was ugly.
and you made it ugly by taking it personal.
i never judged you for that..still dont.
but that does not mean i condoned how you played that closing scene out.
real people had real feelings hurt...including you.

now i realize this thread is destroyed and i dont even know who i need to apologize to.
so...
to the original poster:i am truly sorry for this tragic hi-jacking of your thread.

but it appears necessary.

@chingalera i realize that much of what you do is to shock people out of complacency.
to get them to perceive a situation with different goggles.
many times the weapons you use are confrontational language and a persistence that rivals the most glorious case of OCD.

those intentions are noble.
i agree and am of a similar mindset.this is probably why i can read choggie-speak with little trouble.

i understand what you are trying to do.

but how can you expect someone like @newtboy to listen to anything you have to say when you cant keep even basic correspondence open and honest?
it invalidates everything you attempt from then on out.
your words have to have the weight of your integrity behind them for them to have ANY impact.
you lose that and your words become dust.

sounds like you will have to work to gain the respect from @newtboy.i wish you well in that endeavour.

please understand i consider you a friend @chingalera and hearing this has upset me a great deal.

and @VoodooV,
you may be right brother.i do not know what the future brings.hopefully ching will prove you wrong.i know he could if he wanted.

but i disagree with keeping the riff raff out.
i dont mind confrontation or arguments.in fact i LOVE them and @chingalera has a talent for poking the hornets nest and shattering the monotone-vanilla-circle-jerk-clones into a frenzy.

and that my friend..is a good thing.

@chingalera keeps the locals buzzing,constantly challenging pre-concieved notions and ideologies and i love that fucker for that.he keeps this site interesting.his antics bring lurkers to actually comment/post and others who usually side-line to jump in.

all good things.

but...
i cannot abide the darker side.
the hurtful side.
maybe i am being naive'....i always see redemption for those who the entrenched masses see as unredeemable.i always feel i can save those who are truly lost.

i always see the human first and the actions last.

so you may be right.i just hope you are wrong.
maybe this thread will impact my friend and remind him we are all humans.

i dont know.........
i hope though...
i hope.

@ChaosEngine again,as i told newtboy,no argument here.
hopefully this derailed thread has cleared some air and brought the things to the table that needed to be discussed.

which from my viewpoint is about integrity.
you cant admonish people for being egocentric and then turn around and be egocentric yourself.
it weakens the very position you were trying to make in the first place.(ching,not you CE).
it is hypocritical.

i am a dissident.
a radical.
a subversive.
even to the church i am an apostate.
so i understand @chingalera on a certain level.he has never treated me other than a friend and compatriot.so it pains me to see how he deals with those he disagrees with,and just how far he will take a story to a painful conclusion.
this does not give be joy or pleasure.

he is a righteous dude.passionate,sensitive and creative and has soooo much to offer.
im sorry ya'all didnt get to see that side of him.
but maybe thats on him,because you all should.

there is a reason he has been invited back multiple times and its not because he whined about it but rather he truly is an exceptional human being.

maybe he should show that side more.
takes honesty and courage,but that boy has a huge capacity for that.

@chingalera
balls in your court brother.
what ya gonna do?

*note* for all those who read to this point.
cookies and milk will be served in the back storage room.
free fondlings for the ladies.
dont forget to tip your bartenders and waitresses!

@enoch, just for the record, let's be clear about the timeline in this thread. There were a few posts then ching made a post complaining about the video, and making an irrelevant ad hom on Darwin. Some people down voted him for it, and that seems fair to me in that it wasn't a useful or interesting comment. Personally, I didn't, because I know that's what he wanted.

He then got all defensive, and posted more pseudo-philosophical persecution complex bollocks, which I then called him on. It wasn't even a very harsh comment, but then he decided to respond and just kept digging.

Unsurprisingly, other people took umbrage at this.

my problem with @chingalera is not his use of flowery language, but just that he's so bad at it. I can wax eloquent with the best of them and if the situation warrants, I have a positively egregious vocabulary of verbose verbiage in my arsenal of debating devices, argumentative arms and combative communications, but frankly, it's just not needed most of time, and invariably simple language communicates better.

The main issue I have is it's just so pointless. His language is always vague, and I'm increasingly convinced this is deliberate, merely so he can pick and choose how to be offended.

So mission accomplished, another thread derailed, and chingaleras narcissism quotient for the day is filled.

I have fan boys? Awesome!!

Fan boys... bring me beer!

hmmm... still waiting. Clearly if I do, they are slackers.

I had you on ignore for a while, but you do have the occasional gem in the midst of the nonsense. Besides, you derail threads to such an extent that ignoring you is pointless.

It's kinda like a black hole. Even if I personally couldn't see you, I'd still observe the effect.

Believe it or not, I don't actually have a personal problem with you. Very occasionally, you're funny or interesting. But you seem to revel in disruption just for the sake of it, and I still don't know if you genuinely don't get that you communicate in a way that makes you difficult to understand or if it's a deliberate affectation designed to make you appear intellectual. Pretty sure I'm not alone in this.

One would imagine the train engineer can see this very clearly and has to react. I'm not saying this could cause a derailment or anything, but slamming on the brakes in any vehicle has side effects (falling luggage, whatever). At the very least, stopping the train to check on the immobile human they just traveled over will put the train behind schedule and/or block the track. Trains can't easily pass each other. Dumb stunt all around.

Jesus Christ and the gun-bashing bandwagon is leaving the station. My ramblings lost in the ether regardless of facts or fucking figures (death stats by firearms or violence), become mute when you consider that more Germans die of complications from their annual Bratwurst intake than from violent crimes. MY POINT was to pooh-pooh quadrophonic who turned the thread in the direction it went with a simple comment.

Then comes the bandwagon, which I attempted to derail, and now everyone wants to jump in and whine about their take on issues surrounding firearms in the United States, like they are some fucking problem. The problems' with criminals being created by a broken criminal justice system, the fear mongering fomented by news organizations and the cunts proposing legislation whenever some imbecile snaps, and the lackeys that feed on their output like pablum.

All stats, all anger directed at senseless crimes committed by the uncommitted with guns (mass shootings), and all dumb assess who feed on news organization's and their editorializing on sensible laws for guns (that we don't already have) in order to justify more laws become IRRELEVANT when you consider, that by design disarming partially or completely the average citizen is the goal of any fascist.

Most of you who UP-voted ASMO's comment without this explained context or with it, are pretty much the lay-down-and-fuck-me types who, should some fascist regime pop-in and tell them what and how to do things now, would enthusiastically succumb, especially if the offer were candy-coated and the statistics looked good, and you could keep things like groceries and your fucking car.
(and yeah, I up'ed quad's comment...I love to jump head-first into threads hi-jacked by passionate fools)

Or, you simply live in another paradigm (being in a country who has not systematically programmed their inhabitants with violence, fear, and race-tensions) and have no reference for the consternation of a sane, reasonable person surrounded by minions of dutiful robots.

i figured it best to bring the convo to your page.
i have derailed enough threads this past week alone.
would be impolite and rude to keep tramping through the china shop willy nilly.

i think i am starting to understand where you are at.
of course i am presuming,but im gonna go with frustration.
anger and outrage to what is being done to the people of syria.

i can relate to that.it is an outrage.
it is heartbreaking.

we disagree on how to proceed.
i am not here to change your mind.

i am here to talk to you as a man.
to maybe help you understand how your passionate posts may be perceived.
your last one i found impertinent,insulting and rude.

if i had to paraphrase this is how i read your last comment on the raytheon post.
"how can you all be so fucking blind?are you all a bunch of fucking pussies?dont you SEE what that man is doing?and you fucking pansies want to talk? you are all retarded,stupid and have no idea what is going on!"

i deleted half my commentary because it really was just me ripping you apart.
and that would not be fair to you and it would be just as insulting.
your post really pissed me off.
but we have talked before.
we disagree more than agree but we have always been civil and i appreciate the time you take to respond.

so the point of me coming to your page is to point out that you are talking to actual humans.
you called me a pussy.
you implied that this situation only bothers you and anybody who came to a different conclusion in regards to how to proceed in syria was not getting the plot.
was that your intent?
did you actually MEAN to imply that anybody who disagreed with a military resolution was a pansy?

well..i dont think so.
i think you are just really passionate about this and frustrated that nothing is being done.
outraged at the violence being perpetrated upon innocent people.

i feel ya.i truly do.
and i would be willing to bet the very people you chastized as being weak in their approach feel you as well.

the first thing we need to address is the fact we are all armchair quarterbacking.we have no influence nor power to dictate what happens in a country on the other side of the planet.
so basically all our bickering and arguing is a cathartic release for a situation that is horrid,horrifying and complicated.

the second is really just questions i would like to ask (and you could promptly tell me to go fuck myself).

1.how would a limited strike upon assads regime change anything that is happening on the ground?

this is really the only question you have not answered and to me it is pivotal in understanding your logic.

i have my suspicions but i await your answer.
and my apologies if i cam across snarky.
i was angry at the time.
till next time.
namaste.

@CaptainPlanet
thats not a fair assertion.

@Yogi is opinionated and passionate,as am i.
so if i took your comment at face value,i would have to include myself.

and i dont think i am unreasonable.
i can be passionately opinionated.
my comments can be aggressive,confrontational and bombastic but i tend to not direct them at specific people..unless they direct a personal attack on me.

i have had many discussions with yogi and all of them have been reasonable.
i find him/her to be extremely intelligent,witty and funny.

do i agree with yogi all the time?
oh hell no but if you are going to argue or debate with yogi you better bring your A-game or he/she will make you pay for not doing your homework.

and isnt that how it should be?
i will never understand or subscribe to the notion that somehow if we dont challenge a persons assertions,arguments or opinions that somehow we are disrespecting that person..personally.

i mean,think about it.
if i put forth an opinion or argument that is using flawed or incomplete information,why would you allow that opinion to stand?
to not hurt my feelings?
would you let me walk through the food court with my wanker hanging out?
or let me flirt with a girl with a huge booger hanging out?

i may get embarrassed.
may feel a tad foolish..but in the end i am better for it.way better.

to shy away from causing someone embarrassment has more dire consequences than calling them out and exposing the flaw in their argument.

you do that person a disservice and it reduces the conversation to vapid platitudes.nobody wins..everybody loses.

and really.yogi is a blast to argue with.
just sayin....
/derailed

@carnivorous
let me first start by apologizing to @pumkinandstorm for derailing her thread.i always seem to do it to her posts.poor thing must hate me.

as for @carnivorous, i usual dont respond to any other posts after i rant (unless its shinyblurry) but i feel you are worth the time.i have read many of your comments and i sense you are a decent sort.

and though i am loath to do it i shall form my response in bullet form,more for expedience than laziness.(bullet responses are a lazy form of argument in my opinion).

1.my comment was not directed at you specifically,hence my generalizations and the use of the open-ended pronoun of "you".though you were certainly included in that use of "you".if i had issue with YOU i would have formed my comment in that manner addressing YOU..specifically.

my problem with some of the comments was not with a moral conflict but rather:presumption and ignorance.your commentary displayed both.

this is not an attack on you nor is it a reflection of how i feel/think/react to you.
it is just a statement based on your commentary.
i was hoping that my rant would possibly illuminate that fact for you (and others).

please reread your commentary in regards to @shang.
notice anything?
presumption.
you presumed to know and understand @shang 's intentions,even when he stated the opposite.
unenlightened.
or ignorant.you decide.because your whole premise is based on how YOU feel/think about a certain activity and you projected that morality onto @shang and found him lacking.
self-righteous.
because @shang participates in something you find abhorrent,it appears by your commentary this gave you the right to chastise and judge him,based on YOUR morality.

2.i do not think you are a bully.i think you were being presumptuous and self-righteous.read your commentary.

3.your rebuttal was no rebuttal at all but rather a conflation.the family you used as your example as "hunters"were not hunters.we have a name for people like that "sadistic psychopaths".appears they made it a family affair.
but to conflate those sick individuals and hunters is obscene and reveals an utter lack of understanding in regards to actual hunters.

4.i respect a man who stands up for what he believes in and i would never ask you to apologize but thats not what my commentary was addressing.

i was addressing the presumptions you were making about @shang based on pretty much nothing.
and while he was responding in a decent fashion you kept sniping at him from the bleachers.

its all trumpets and parades for standing up for what you believe in but how about a little bit of respect and appreciation for someone taking the time to respond to your questions?
especially in regards to something you obviously know next to nothing about?

you cant demand respect for your morals and beliefs and then turn around and deny anothers right for the very same thing.

i mean,think about it man.
you missed out on an opportunity to understand the mindset,motivations or passion for an activity that is alien to you.

your understanding has not moved an inch because of a pre-conceived notion based on what?
a childhood memory?
a few anecdotal experiences?

what a wasted opportunity.
would you have still disagreed?
yeah..most likely.
but at least you would have understood more.
and this practice is also known as empathy.

ah well...
i hope you read this is the context it was written.
with humanity and not an attack on you.

@alien_concept

Thanks! I was struggling to come up with a username, and then I just decided to accept my true nature.

And this is a timeless issue that I think we've all run into at times. A woman comes to a man to talk about her emotions. The man sees that she has a problem, and tries to help her solve it. This frustrates the woman - she only wanted to share her troubles with him, and she feels insulted that he would assume she is incapable of solving her own problems. This, in turn, frustrates the man; after all, why would she come to him if she won't accept his help? He's sincerely doing his best, and he feels that she is being unfair and overly emotional.

A fight ensues, and neither party understands how it even happened, or how to find a way out of it.

And as I have a VERY emotional mother and VERY rational father, I've been on both sides, as well as in the middle, of this conflict many times.

As for Assange, he once said that Sweden is the "Saudi Arabia of feminism," and having grown up here, I can vouch for the veracity of that statement.

It has gotten to the point here that most guys are just too afraid to stand up to even the most obvious acts of bigotry because the one-way sexism has become so widely accepted. We're only left with three choices; we either accept the abuse and join in it ourselves, or we simply give up and take it with a sort of hopeless resignation.

Since I can't stand to be victimized, I favour the third option; pointing out the bullshit and then riposting with facts, logic and righteous anger.

But I've had some utterly INSANE examples of sexism happen in the classroom, including a teacher derailing a lecture right at the beginning of it and instead spending her entire hour to essentially claim that all men are either rapists or potential rapists, and as a guy, it's just difficult to know what to do in that situation.

It's also very hurtful, as I find rape to be one of the most despicable acts imaginable.

And... that's why my reaction to this guy's poem was so strong. It's like he's been abused for so long that he's begun to think that it's actually true.

You gave your son a very good answer! Men and women are different from one another (though this isn't entirely set in stone), and I think that anybody who claims otherwise simply prefers ideology or fantasy (same thing, really) over reality.

And for what it's worth, I think those differences are pretty freaking valuable. I love women, and part of the reason for that is the fact that they aren't men.

*brain

charliem - you've exactly hit on the problem with this "moral question", though in a way I believe most folks would never think of.

I remember the first time this I heard this about twenty years ago. My immediate reaction was yes on 1, no on 2, because if I flip the track switch there is an overwhelming likelihood the train will follow the secondary track and kill one person, but in the second scenario, there is no such guarantee. Every time I've pointed this out to the questioner, they try some hand-waving physics to convince me that it will work, but ultimately fail. And I'm convinced that the vast majority of people also understand this - that there really is no guarantee of derailing the train by pushing a fat person onto the tracks - and that is why most people respond the same way.

This is a very old "moral dilemma" question designed to elucidate human nature, but as charliem points out, it is completely false and thus completely invalid.

The questions are invalid in terms of interpreting the answers of respondents. On the other hand, using it as a means of probing the neurological basis of morality with fMRI is probably useful, since the relevant systems will likely be engaged regardless of the physical anomalies.

I have this book on hold at the library. I hope to read it soon. I liked his interview on the Daily Show the other night.

This wasn't a terrible interview, but he seemed a little overly defensive. He's on Fox, so can't really blame him.

Maybe he was just being really good at cutting her off at the pass, because she really derails the whole thing at the end. Fox sure didn't disappoint in representing their ignorance though! It was pretty clear it was an interview held by someone who'd read their talking points instead of the book by the author they were interviewing.

Tags for this video have been changed from 'train, derail, tankers, oil, explosion, lac Megantic, Quebec' to 'train, derail, tankers, oil, explosion, fire, Lac Megantic, Quebec' - edited by calvados

Story about the explosion.

@bareboards2
my comment was not really directed at you my dear.i painted my premise with a broad brush that expanded from this thread and addressed something i have found to be more and more practiced on the sift.

you posted your reasons why you used the ignore.
to get rid of the "rabble" and make it easier to read posts you enjoy.
now if that means posts that you agree with or dont find offensive ..well..that is kind of my point.

and you are so right.we all have a right to our opinion and in my opinion to sequester posts you disagree or find offensive is intellectually weak.

@VoodooV you literally just made my entire point by your post and i dont know if that was on purpose or by freak accident.

while i agree with your assertion that @shinyblurry tends to wade in the copy/paste waters and he dwells in circular logic land.you have to give the boy props for lending a perspective of a christian fundamentalist on a mainly secular left site.

that boy can rile you all up like a stick to a hornets nest.which is endless entertainment for me.

but lets change that paradigm shall we?
why dont you head down to your nearest baptist church and hand out fliers concerning evolution to the congregation and tell them god doesnt exist.

then maybe you would know what it feels like to get blasted by all sides at once.while shiny lacks in clear debate skills.you gotta admire his courage.

as for @chingalera seeking attention.
i dunno.
maybe you are right.
but the real question is how did you come to that conclusion?
by what means did you discern his intentions?motivations?
crystal ball? black magic? a little fairy come by and whisper in your ear?

no.
you used your OWN subjective understanding.your OWN experiences to presume the motivations of another sifter.
thats weak sauce and you better than that.

and then..finally..you ask for a daddy to come in straighten out the people who you:disagree with.argue in a way you dont find constructive (but may be they do).derail threads that maybe you would have enjoyed more if those pesky kids hadnt messed everything up.

the world dont revolve around you so get over yourself man.for fuck sakes!

i was sincere when i said i love your commentary because i truly do.
smart,witty and you usually have something to say.i ADORE your commentary but you are being self righteous on this thread.

i did something very similar last week to @renatojj and he called me out.he was right and i was wrong.

stop trying to impose your ideals of what constructive participation is based solely on your own and limited understanding.
this is not your sift but rather OURS and things will become chaotic at times.

the sift is organic.
allow it to metamorph into whatever it will become.
we do not need a big daddy to direct where it goes and thats the beauty of this site.

the irony in all this exchange between you and i is that i feel you have something to say and have always admired that about you.
allow other people to have their say as well.