Me dumb, no get it

>> ^rottenseed:

finish the song! "...nagila!"

Does his shirt say "Sabbath bloody sabbath"? Awesome.

I like his basic utilitarianism, but I think he's off a bit in the terms he's maximizing. I'd say that an ethical choice maximizes the fulfillment of weighted preferences among involved parties. Why preferences? Some people like suffering. Some people may not like suffering, but may choose suffering (for example, they might choose to lose a leg to save a tree.. or something). I believe it's ethical to allow them that choice, that preference. In another case, some people would object to, say, having to take a happy pill, even if it truly made them happy and satisfied. I don't think there's any reason they should have to. It's a small quibble, but important in some cases, I think.

And, to be clear, pretty much everyone is a utilitarian when it comes to an actual ethical dilemma. Jesus recommended pulling an ox out of a mire on the Sabbath. This is a utilitarian resolution to a conflict between rules. Pretty much anyone who claims to be, at root, deontological (such as someone who follows a religious code) is going to fall back to utilitarianism when a conflict arises. It's natural and, in my mind, right. And if you use utilitarianism to resolve conflicts, I think it's the "real" system.

On the flip side, while you can believe in utilitarianism as the true root of ethics, you can't effectively live that way because there are too many decisions and too many consequences to predict. Maybe punching a hobo is just the thing that will get him back on the road to life satisfaction. Maybe stealing a stapler and donating it to a charity is a net good. But you can't effectively live like that, and a society based on everyone making decisions in that way is not going to work - so you need to find personal rules of thumb that lead to a "good" (though not likely best) standard of ethics, and you need societal laws and norms that allow humans to interact in positive ways (while also allowing for exceptional actions when those actions will lead to better outcomes - like speeding to the hospital). So, for example, we have a rule of thumb that says "don't kill people, except in circumstances x, y and z" - and we live that way and don't have to further consider ethical questions about whether we should be killing people on a day to day basis. Unless we're the President. Or Dexter. But I suppose he has the code.

The other sad part is that this basic utilitarianism fails to address many of the ethical questions we actually have. For example, take abortion. The terms we're talking about - preferences, suffering, happiness - when do they kick in? I have my own thoughts on this, but we're out of the realm of "obvious philosophy people should be able to agree on". Similar problem with, say, terminating those in vegetative states. Who's preferences do we count, and how much? What does it mean to "be happy" for someone with minimal brain function?

But anyways, good thoughts in the video, even if I do think he took his time in getting to them.

\m/_\m/
>> ^DerHasisttot:

>> ^schmawy:
promote

Thanks! :-)

>> ^schmawy:

promote


Thanks! :-)

You have a schitzophrenic faith, my friend. I would call you my brother but it doesn't appear that you know our Lord. It appears that in your picture you are ashamed of your Lord. So allow me to enlighten you for your edification:

The six day creation is literal, it is not allegory. You can tell this simply by the grammar and syntax used. The word for day used is "yom", which appears over 400 times in the bible and only ever refers to a day as a 24 hour period. You may recognize this from "Yom Kippur". Do jews celebrate the day of atonement for millions of years?

The literal account of the 6 day creation also is integral to the ten commandments. We have the Sabbath day as a day of rest because God rested on the 7th day. Do we rest for millions of years on the Sabbath? So already you've called God a liar, you've made the commandments to no effect, which undermines the messiah prophecies..and the entire thing is turned on its head.

We have confirmation from Jesus Christ Himself, that the account is literal. He refers to a literal creation, adam as the first man, the flood and many other OT accounts as fact. You reject that and you reject the testimony of our Lord. If you don't believe in a literal 6 day creation then you should throw your bible in the garbage because that is what the theory of evolution has filled your head with.

You have the gall to impringe on my witness and imply im crazy..hey, at least im internally consistant. You've had to twist your mind into a pretzal to believe what you do. You've fallen into apostacy because of your lack of faith. Evolution is a stumbling block for you, and will remain so until you trust in the Word of God. Here's my Word for you:

21 Not everyone who says to Me, "Lord, Lord," shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven.
22 Many will say to Me in that day, "Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?"
23 And then I will declare to them, "I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness."






>> ^burdturgler:
It's only writing God out of your picture, not mine. The bible is a lot of things, but one thing it was not meant to be was a scientific accounting of anything. I am still perfectly able to love and worship God and yet still understand and accept evolution, so .. you're wrong.
I made my post under the assumption that you were capable of rational thought, but you've proven that that's not the case. I never said anything happened without God, I said understanding what DID happen gives me greater appreciation for God.
Well .. that's two posts now, see you in 2013.

Wow. You're so ridiculously stubborn that you are actually going to defend your indefensible viewpoint. Fine, it's your funeral. Don't say I didn't warn you.

Did you know that Cyrus freeing of the slaves confirms the bible is true? It was prophecied that the jews would go into exile and be freed at the exact time Cyrus freed them:

"Jeremiah predicted Israel’s second captivity would last 70 years for every year they had not observed the Sabbath year rest of the land. "And this whole land shall be a desolation and a horror, and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years." (Jer 25:11) The Babylonian army conquered Israel in the spring of 606 B.C. Confirmed by history as well as the Bible, Israel’s captivity in Babylon ended exactly 70 years later in the spring of 536 B.C., in the Jewish month Nisan. As was predicted, the Persian King Cyrus freed the Jews to return to their land (Ezra 1:1-3)."

You're right, there is also historical confirmation outside of the bible of what Cyrus did: it comes from the 1st century roman historian Titus Flavius Josephus. The same historian who confirms that Jesus was a historical figure and affirms His life death and resurrection. This agrees with modern historians, almost none of which make the ridiculous claim that Jesus never existed.

So lets review..so far your position confirms the accuracy of bible prophecy and the existence of Jesus as a historical figure. I really couldn't have said it better myself. So yeah..any other evidence you'd like to present to prove my case?
>> ^dgandhi:
>> ^shinyblurry:
lol!! wow this is truly classic.
Maybe you should actually read the articles you're providing as evidence from your desperate google search to disprove me.
Do you know what slaves he freed? The Jews. That's right, Gods chosen people.

Sooo...that means he was a Christian? Do you understand the concept of moving the goal posts?
>> ^shinyblurry:
How do we know this? The bible. Getting a sinking feeling yet?

I have never claimed that the bible does not reference historical events/places/people, but it can not by any objective measure be considered historically accurate itself. Cyrus, unlike Moses and Jesus, is not a construction of the biblical authors, if the bible had never existed we would still know of Cyrus and have a general understanding of what he did.

I like that they used Black Sabbath rather than, you know, Justin Bieber.

Which is the chicken, and which is the egg?


In reply to this comment by enoch:
sabbath rips off spinal tap.
or spinal tap rips off sabbath?
you decide:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J95ym62k68U

Kalle -

I would discourage your mocking use of my "magic book" to support your arguments unless you actually understood what's in it.

You shall not kill/murder is number 6, for starters. This is also a commandment of personal conduct. The very same section of the Bible outlines various capital crimes, almost none of which carry the penalty of death in this day and age. I'm just pointing out that the sixth commandment does not preclude capital punishment. I should not personally seek revenge through a crime of passion, but society was granted recourse at that level. See also Romans 13, particularly verse 4. Governing authorities have not been given "the sword for no reason."

Please, dispense with the shrill atheistic arguments of breaking the Sabbath being a capital crime. The whole point of the law, from the Christian perspective, is to illustrate that we all fall short of it. The penalty for sin...all sin...is death. You're talking to someone who has been spared from the death penalty through the sacrifice of my savior. I am not a "hang 'em high" proponent of the death penalty. In all cases, I would prefer grace.

You managed to completely circumvent the entire point of my argument. Instead of addressing the injustice of killing innocent life, you chose to dilute the need to punish criminals to normalize the difference between the two.

Yesterday, I missed Irma Thomas' birthday. Today is the birthday of Tony Iommi, John Frankenheimer, Nicolaus Copernicus, Smokey Robinson, Karen Silkwood, Jeff Daniels, Falco, and closer to our generation, Justine Bateman. My queue is full, so you should do something about these 2/19 births.

So wait... are we stoning Jews for not working Saturdays (since their sabbath is that day, not Sunday), or are we stoning wal-mart workers on Sunday? While you all were arguing I went out and got a bunch of rocks for us all.

[redacted]

"The LORD then gave these further instructions to Moses: 'Tell the people of Israel to keep my Sabbath day, for the Sabbath is a sign of the covenant between me and you forever. It helps you to remember that I am the LORD, who makes you holy. Yes, keep the Sabbath day, for it is holy. Anyone who desecrates it must die; anyone who works on that day will be cut off from the community. Work six days only, but the seventh day must be a day of total rest." (Exodus 31:12-15 NLT)

I can't find the spot where it says they should be stoned to death at the moment. Is killing them enough to satisfy you?

>> ^Mcboinkens:

>> ^Drachen_Jager:
If all of your morality comes from the bible, why aren't you out stoning the cashiers who work at Wal-Mart on Sundays? That's what the bible tells you to do after all.
If you question it, or make up your own mind then your morality doesn't really come from the bible at all does it?

As Toshley said, that is a pretty poor attempt. I don't have the Bible memorized to know what quote or implied idea you are talking about, but I'm pretty sure cashiers were never intended to be stoned. Not to mention the complete difference in the old and new testaments.
I do, however, disagree with morality comes from God. Here are the two possibilities that seem plausible to me: Morality was an evolutionary occurrence, as in creatures and animals had to make decisions that would further them among a species. Naturally as animal societies grow more complex so do choices, and as such you often have a "moral" and "immoral" choice to make. The second one is that morality was a result of sin entering the world. Naturally, if sin had not entered the world all would be perfect, and as such no choices would need to be made because it would be the only instinctive choice. However, when sin corrupted the world it opened up the ability to make "immoral" choices.

In fact, I'm really interested to hear why you think the Bible "tells us" to stone Wal-Mart cashiers.

Thank you. That would be my point. Plus, it'd be nice to know what rules he's making; the rules or laws being: good and evil. Both are very contrived definitions and even in the course of the bible the definition changes (which was once a strong point in my understanding of God and being Mormon; you would need a prophet or relay to update "the rules" as time changes, otherwise "the works" would be forever outdated).
But, more to the point on a very simple design layer. What rules in Gods world (this was one I couldn't counter in my Mormon days) are below or above God. Good and Evil seem to be at a priority level above God, as they are "obvious". But, if God made them and controls them that negates ANY reason to have them in the first place, because as I said before they would be contrived values. Which would force me "morally" to not follow God as he seems to blame people on some sort of whimsical basis (Isiah is full of it, for the religious; the old testament is a living breathing example of this in action--constantly). As you said it seems he's schizoid or sociopathic, or both (could have multiple personality disorder, which explains A LOT). On the believing side and from a "Devil's Advocates" view; God seems to have possibly "made up" the Devil. There is very little information on the Devil and Hell. The one reference we have to punishment in Hell talks of burning lakes. The devil himself is almost never described, or attributed; the same as Hell. There's half as much information about the "bad guy" as their is about Jesus. We never even get a quote for or from him, post angelic contributions.
Anyway if evil is a "given" value, even as simple as: doing the opposite of what God wants. That means evil and good are laws on a level above God's control, although he can manipulate it. That shows that even on a fundamental "physics" or "architecture" setup, there are things that are already more powerful than him (such as any law that runs heaven, hell, Earth, God's "nature" (if you can describe it or he can, then it already shows that language is at a higher level as it cannot be communicated otherwise).
Anyway, none of this is factual proof, but a lot of these type of things should be sufficient enough to put the whole idea or question of God of to the side for this life. It should also make you realize that even if you run into a God later on, you should still question ALWAYS; or least you may follow the Devil...


Okay, well, in our ealier discourse I was wondering what bible you were reading since you didn't seem to understand the fundementals. Now, I know..you were reading the mormon bible. Try reading the New Testament sometime, because everything you're talking about is covered there.

First, good and evil are not rules which God is constrained by. They are not some sort of higher (higher than God) principle that dictates Gods behavior. There isn't anything above God. He is the uncaused cause, the eternal cause. There is no one that is a God to Him. He created everything, and not a thing exists that was not made by His will. Good comes from God. The bible says that every good gift is from above, from the Father of Lights. There is no other model or conception of what good is except what God is. The bible says there is no one good, not one. Meaning that all fall short of Gods grace, that all are sinners. Being perfect, nothing could be added to God to make Him more perfect. So, He is the ultimate good of all things. If God did not exist, there would be no such thing as good.

You say you're not sure about what rules we're supposed to live by. Well, we don't need an update for that one. God already told us what rules we should by when He gave us the Ten Commandments. Now, there is a question about the Sabbath, how Christians should observe it, but it still applies. The rules are His law. Being a moral and just God, He created rules which would lead to living a moral life. God Himself is not under His own law, and only sinners would need a law in the first place. There was no law before the fall. Evil is committing a sin. Sinning is defying Gods will.

Now you say there is nothing direct about Devil in the bible. Untrue. The Devil speaks for himself several times in both the Old and the New Testaments. That is why I suggested you read at least the NT. I don't know what is in the Mormon bible but I can assure you that as far as this matter is concerned, it is wholly inaccurate. Now, I also see you accusing God of being evil, or crazy or both. I think, if you have any respect left for God, that you should choose your words with more care. It says in the bible we will account for every idle word that we speak. Do you want to have to explain why you said these things about God to His face? I know I wouldn't..