Energy existing is a terrible explanation, a it was created in the big bang, b because it violates all laws (no perpetual motion machine), c because there is no impetus for creation in an eternal continuim (it would have to stable), etc..if you want to say it is infinite, well..if if it is then it couldn't exist..if you take infinitity to its conclusion you have something which contridicts its own existence..if you want to say there are infinite universes again you'll inevitably have a universe which destroys all other universes or something to that effect.

since you couldn't bothered to think for yourself, i couldn't be bothered to individually debunk them myself, but its easy to see that right off the bat many of them are just patently false

http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=810540

as far as the egyptians go, they were responsible for quite a bit of baby murdering..400 or so years worth of it..and God punished them for it as a nation..I don't see a problem with a sovereign God exercising his control over life and death..He could have killed hitler off but He didn't..he lets man reap with he sows, even if it means that "innocents" will be punished for it..ultimate justice is certain in every case..and if you don't want to obey God its your own choice, just as its your choice to reap the consequences of your actions>> ^RedSky:
@<A rel="nofollow" class=profilelink title="member since January 21st, 2011" href="http://videosift.com/member/shinyblurry">shinyblurry
There never was nothing, that's the entire point. Either "someting" is eternal, or you couldn't have anything. If time and space began at the big bang, the cause of the Universe is immaterial and transcendent. You have the idea of nothing never existing which means the ultimate cause is eternal. So between those two things you have a match to God, who is immaterial transcendent and eternal. A Creation is indeed the simpliest explanation for this.
Energy existing is a much more simple explanation. Let's be clear too, you're not just proposing an eternal being existed. You're proposing what you conveniently ommitted from replying to:
Not to mention that not only must there be an all knowing, all powerful and all seeing god to you but he must be the judeo Christian god which assumes an almost endless list of events and facts from the bible, many of which we know to be false.
Like what?
How about we start with the parts it can't make it's own mind up on:
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/jim_meritt/bible-contradictions.html#guilt
Not that numbers prove anything, but Christianity is the worlds biggest religion. I would think that the true God would have the #1 religion. Don't forget that 4/5's of the world disagrees with your conclusion that there isn't a God in the first place.
This was a throaway line really.
But anyway, I feel like this argument will continue until forever so let me give you my take. As far as I'm concerned arguing over the existence/non-existence of God is meaningless. If you want to address the Christian god specifically, even if I had proof that he existed, I would not willingly worship a being like this or adhere to its religion for the endless list of cruelty that he has supposedly perpetrated. Take the murder of the firstborns of Egypt for the actions of others as but one example. To me worshiping such a god were it to exist would be no different to worshiping a tyrannical dictator or abiding to an abusive parent.

@shinyblurry

There never was nothing, that's the entire point. Either "someting" is eternal, or you couldn't have anything. If time and space began at the big bang, the cause of the Universe is immaterial and transcendent. You have the idea of nothing never existing which means the ultimate cause is eternal. So between those two things you have a match to God, who is immaterial transcendent and eternal. A Creation is indeed the simpliest explanation for this.

Energy existing is a much more simple explanation. Let's be clear too, you're not just proposing an eternal being existed. You're proposing what you conveniently ommitted from replying to:

Not to mention that not only must there be an all knowing, all powerful and all seeing god to you but he must be the judeo Christian god which assumes an almost endless list of events and facts from the bible, many of which we know to be false.

Like what?

How about we start with the parts it can't make it's own mind up on:

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/jim_meritt/bible-contradictions.html#guilt

Not that numbers prove anything, but Christianity is the worlds biggest religion. I would think that the true God would have the #1 religion. Don't forget that 4/5's of the world disagrees with your conclusion that there isn't a God in the first place.

This was a throaway line really.

But anyway, I feel like this argument will continue until forever so let me give you my take. As far as I'm concerned arguing over the existence/non-existence of God is meaningless. If you want to address the Christian god specifically, even if I had proof that he existed, I would not willingly worship a being like this or adhere to its religion for the endless list of cruelty that he has supposedly perpetrated. Take the murder of the firstborns of Egypt for the actions of others as but one example. To me worshiping such a god were it to exist would be no different to worshiping a tyrannical dictator or abiding to an abusive parent.

http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/Pages/Quran-Hate.htm

"Peaceful" Muslims who disavow the commands to violence
against infidels in their holy books (or have not read them) are enemies of Islam.

transcript:

Dear Benny, hi, how are ya? Love the hat by the way.

You may not have noticed but I've been absent for awhile,
I wanted to tell you why and how I've been finding my own style.
A new way of looking at the world beyond the errors of the past.
You see I've read all of your teachings and cant see how they'll last.
Where angels feared to tread has now become the beaten track
but for every step that we took forward, the church took two steps back.

It took you four hundred years just to pardon Galileo,
while the murderer of Hypatia still enjoys his saintly halo.
It was these hypocrisies of the church, that drove me from the flock
though I still clung to the ideas and kept some belief in stock
that Jesus really loved me and god was close at hand
and the day was fast approaching when we'd find the promised land.

When people could stand together and colour wouldn't mean a thing
but i slowly began to realise, thats not the message that god brings.
He constantly plays favourites setting nations against each other
tearing apart families, pitting brother against brother.
The jew and the gentile, the muslim and infidel,
the terrorist gaining heaven while their victims go to hell.

This god isn't worth my worship or the thanks that he demands,
and things have gotten so much better now the powers in our own hands.
Life expectancy has tripled, smallpox has been made extinct.
Our eyes pierced the veil of heaven and what was hazy is now distinct.
A cacophony of symphonies all composed in mathematics,
a ballet of matter and energy performing cosmic acrobatics.

Why didn't your book tell me I was born of a supernova.
Instead demanding belief in what an ancient madman told ya.
Houses can't catch leprosy, epilepsy's not possession
and when it comes to sex what the fucks with your obsession
with what grown men and women do in the privacy of their own home.
Why do you care where they put it? You've got problems of your own.

You let suffer the little children while the paedophiles protected,
the people wanted a shepard but its a wolf that was elected.
You spread disease and misery with every denial of tested science
so people remain upon their knees out of terror and compliance
so please excuse my harshness after breaking religions spell,
and if by chance your god is real, I'll save you a seat in hell.

>> ^shinyblurry:

Yes, 6000 years. Don't take my word for it..look up the artifacts he mentions. The bible says that before the flood humans were quite advanced..and this is evidence for it. Can our understanding of history account for ancient batteries that generate electricity? How about a computer that can do addition subtraction multiplication and division? Models of modern airplanes? Heiroglyphics of helicopters? Obviously we have it wrong if any of those things existed. Wake up, you're being lied to.
>> ^kulpims:
shiny, you christians are total idiots. you advocate that the Earth, universe, everything is like, what - 6000 years old? and now you come up with this bullshit ...



The age of the Earth is 4.54 billion years (4.54 × 109 years ± 1%).[1][2][3] This age is based on evidence from radiometric age dating of meteorite material and is consistent with the ages of the oldest-known terrestrial and lunar samples.

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

Can you show me scientific , peer reviewed paper or study that invalidates all the methods used that currently point to the age of the earth being well over 6k years old ?

Don't u think that the whole universe is under 6 k years old as well ?

Also there is no way to know that the bible is the word of god or not just something made up by man. So you are basing your whole motivation and argument of a book that contains fictional stories , incosistancies , has been edited over the years , no real direction as to what is Allegory or what is meant to be read as factual / literal.

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/jim_meritt/bible-contradictions.html

Just in case you don't know , you realize there is nothing stopping creationists gathering actual evidence and putting together scientific theories that are better than the current ones and as a result proving that the earth is 6k years old if it in fact was ?

He would have shown more moral character by not getting into this situation to begin with. He only came out with the truth because more proof of his infidelities were becoming known. I asked my wife if sending a pic of my member and having sex based conversations with other women would constitute cheating. Her answer was "Yes, and if you ever do it, I will kill you." Now he may have a different arrangement with his wife, but since he felt like he had to hide it and keep it from his wife, I think she and my wife may feel the same way. So he knows he was cheating, otherwise no guilt - hence no moral character.
My guess is that he knew it is wrong and got off on the fact that he was doing something that carries great risk. I also think that the writhing in quilt and the punishment is something else he secretly enjoys and once it is all said and done, and he has gotten away with it, he will repeat all his transgressions.
>> ^bareboards2:

And he showed his moral character by coming clean on the incident. Took him awhile, but 10 days? I'll give someone 10 days to writhe in guilt at getting caught.
So you should be proud of him, right?

>> ^My_design:
The problem that people seem to be missing is that he cheated on his wife and knew it was wrong. He felt guilty and lied about it. This is important in that if it had not become public his indiscretions could have been used to manipulate a US Congressman. That is why MORAL CHARACTER is actually something that we should use to evaluate our representatives. Lord knows Illinois could learn that lesson. When you put someone into a position of power that lacks moral character, such a Bill Clinton or Blagovich, you wind up wasting time and tax payer money when their indiscretions eventually comes out.
If you don't use moral character in evaluating a politician you risk their being found out and causing an uproar as is the case here or far worse they become open for manipulation by corporations, organizations, or other countries.
How do you think Soviet Russia managed to manipulate many of their sources? Hell the oldest cliche in the book is to take a morally questionable US representative, or military official, out on your corporate yacht/plane/resort with a bunch of hookers, drugs and high end liquor. Before you know it you've got a Kennedy in your pocket and a ton of grainy black and white photos.
The problem is how do you determine that someone is actually moral? Because I liked Weiner and thought he had moral character. Tricked again.

Pfft, everybody hates infidelity but come on, its not exactly out of the ordinary. I reckon more Americans have cheated and lied to their significant other than have not and yet we somehow expect our politicians to be saints. I feel bad for his family, I hope they can work it out, but I also feel bad for him, because unlike almost every other person on the planet when he makes a terrible error in his personal life he not only has to account to those close to him, but also any random joe.

I think its a shame it matters to anybody but his wife and family.

Your ignorance is sadly typical, but perhaps curable. There's no need to 'lie' about islam and the quran, they are their own worst enemies.

The Quran contains at least 109 verses that call Muslims to war with nonbelievers. Some are quite graphic, with commands to chop off heads and fingers and kill infidels wherever they may be hiding. Muslims who do not join the fight are called 'hypocrites' and warned that Allah will send them to Hell if they do not join the slaughter.

http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/Quran/023-violence.htm

You are presently duped into defending a pedophile warlord and the defective and inferior civilizations that are the best islam can produce. More studying on your part is required.


>> ^9547bis:


>> ^quantumushroom:
by its own "holy" book, islam demands one of 3 choices for faithful muslims encountering infidels: kill, convert or enslave. A fourth option is to pretend to assimilate into a society, until the muslim minority becomes a majority. Then, enact sharia law.
islam = freedom fail

Exactly! Which is why Muhammad invaded everyone. Ho, wait, the Muslim expansion wasn't during his lifetime.
But yeah, after that they choked all other faiths. Ho wait, it was actually forbidden to convert for two hundred years. Anyway, after that they sure enslaved all those infidels. Well except the Jews. And the Christians. And, erm, the Mazdaists.
Ha damnit, I have to give it to you QM, I can't lie as well as you do (-:

>> ^quantumushroom:

by its own "holy" book, islam demands one of 3 choices for faithful muslims encountering infidels: kill, convert or enslave. A fourth option is to pretend to assimilate into a society, until the muslim minority becomes a majority. Then, enact sharia law.
islam = freedom fail


Exactly! Which is why Muhammad invaded everyone. Ho, wait, the Muslim expansion wasn't during his lifetime.
But yeah, after that they choked all other faiths. Ho wait, it was actually forbidden to convert for two hundred years. Anyway, after that they sure enslaved all those infidels. Well except the Jews. And the Christians. And, erm, the Mazdaists.

Ha damnit, I have to give it to you QM, I can't lie as well as you do (-:

by its own "holy" book, islam demands one of 3 choices for faithful muslims encountering infidels: kill, convert or enslave. A fourth option is to pretend to assimilate into a society, until the muslim minority becomes a majority. Then, enact sharia law.

islam = freedom fail

From wikipedia:

Gingrich has been married three times. In 1962, he married Jackie Battley, his former high school geometry teacher, when he was 19 years old and she was 26.[105][106] In the spring of 1980, Gingrich left Battley after having an affair with Marianne Ginther.[107][108] Battley told the Washington Post in 1984, "He can say that we had been talking about [a divorce] for 10 years, but the truth is that it came as a complete surprise ... He's a great wordsmith ... He walked out in the spring of 1980 and I returned to Georgia. By September, I went into the hospital for my third surgery. The two girls came to see me, and said Daddy is downstairs and could he come up? When he got there, he wanted to discuss the terms of the divorce while I was recovering from the surgery ..." [109] Gingrich has disputed that account.[88] In 2011, their daughter, Jackie Gingrich Cushman, said that it was her mother who requested the divorce, that it happened prior to the hospital stay (which was for the removal of a benign tumor, not cancer), and that Gingrich's visit was for the purpose of bringing the couple's children to see their mother, not to discuss the divorce.[110]

Gingrich has two daughters from his first marriage. Kathy Gingrich Lubbers is president of Gingrich Communications,[111] and Jackie Gingrich Cushman is an author, whose books include 5 Principles for a Successful Life, co-authored with Newt Gingrich.[112]

Six months after the divorce from Battley was final, Gingrich wed Marianne Ginther in 1981.[113][114][115][116]

In the mid-1990s, Gingrich began an affair with House of Representatives staffer Callista Bisek, who is 23 years his junior. They continued their affair during the Lewinsky scandal, when Gingrich became a leader of the Republican investigation of President Clinton for perjury and obstruction of justice in connection with his alleged affairs.[117] In 2000, Gingrich married Bisek shortly after his divorce from second wife Ginther. He and Callista currently live in McLean, Virginia.[118]

In a 2011 interview with David Brody of the Christian Broadcasting Network Gingrich addressed his past infidelities by saying, "There's no question at times in my life, partially driven by how passionately I felt about this country, that I worked too hard and things happened in my life that were not appropriate."[115][116]

Staggering that this serial adulterer and hypocrite of the first degree is STILL doing the "Return to Family Values" schtick and equating religion with morality.

I would similarly credit the celebrations here as being more for a major victory against terrorism than pure blood lust reveling in someone's death. Hitler's death wasn't the end of the war either. It continued on for some time before Japan surrendered as well.

I think you're wrong. I think it IS blood lust. I think it's retaliatory because they saw "the enemy" do it on 9/11.

Of course not. That's why I already said as much too, calling this merely a 'big step'.

I agree, I think it is a big step in the right direction but, far from over and not nearly cause for the type of celebration happening now.

Which is just about all that I'm trying to say. I didn't feel like running naked in the streets singing either, but I'm accustomed to other people being less inhibited than me when they think something good has happened.

Oh, I thought you were trying to say me denouncing people running in the streets cheering about Osama's death was a bad thing. Anyway, your 2nd sentence I can understand to a degree. If your son or daughter scores the winning point in a game or you win the lottery, sure, run down the street and scream all you want. If your son or daughter comes home from the war unharmed, live it up! But, if your son or daughter died in that war and you found out the man that killed them was dead, I honestly don't think your reaction will be cheerful.

Additionally, as I pointed out before I suspect a great deal of the celebrating crowd isn't there to celebrate death and vengeance, but a significant victory over terrorism and blow to their ability to kill more innocents.

And I'll say it again, I think you're wrong. Celebrating death and vengeance is EXACTLY what it is.
And it won't effect terrorists ability to kill anyone, it will just give them the fortitude to go on with their plan to rid the world of infidels.

And lastly, to be totally irrelevant, I wonder how many of those cheering people are "good christians"...

Matthew 5:44 - But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;

It seems to me that there are two main ways people approach moral reasoning.

For some people, it's about adherence to a list of inflexible and absolute rules. For some people those rules come from the church, for some those rules come from our government's justice system, and for some they come from some philosopher. Where they come from is immaterial, the basic moral reasoning is the same: right and wrong is solely determined by whether an action is in accordance with their comprehensive doctrine on human behavior.

For other people, myself included, the moral value of an action is ultimately about the an action's impact on human welfare generally. Most of the time, this means supporting a society with laws and rights, and courts. But that's because it improves human welfare to have society's expectations about human behavior be upfront, enforced, and equally applied. It's not because the law is the word of God, or the full and infallible description of morality. It's because doing so has beneficial consequences for human welfare.

This seems to me to be the fundamental difference between right-wing and left-wing thinking about issues. The right tends to approach moral reasoning through the first lens (deontology), while the left tends to approach moral reasoning through the latter (utilitarianism).

To tie this back to Osama bin Laden's assassination, there are people who say this was an immoral act because it violated international law, or because it violated his legal rights, or simply because killing is always wrong. There are also people who say this is an unquestionably moral act, because the Bible says an eye for an eye, or because they think all Muslims are infidels, or because they think anyone who declares war on our country deserves to die.

For me, I think international law is a force for good in the world, so are legal rights, and so is respect for human life. But I also think Osama bin Laden was a big source of suffering in the world, not just for Americans, but for everyone everywhere. I say killing him is better for human welfare on the whole than the long-run negative impact of our violating international law, and way better than letting him live out his life in freedom.

I think people who want to argue that killing him was somehow immoral have a bit of an uphill climb. They either need to make the case that Osama bin Laden was not guilty of crimes warranting death, and didn't pose any meaningful threat to humanity in the future; or they need to make the case that killing him in this way will somehow substantially change the conventions of international law, criminal jurisprudence, or our general understanding that killing people is wrong.

What isn't sufficient is some vague hand wringing about legal rights, or specious invocations of the Constitution.

Is it so very important that everyone here love Hitchens and read his books and laugh at his quips? When you post a Hitchens sift or any other sift you agree to weather comments both positive and negative.

shinyblurry may or may be not out to ruffle feathers. I believe s/he is sincere. According to recent studies, supposedly atheists know more about religion then the religious. So why is atheisift 'shocked' that a Christian critiques atheist Hitchens according to Christian values? According to a Muslim's values, Hitchens is an infidel to be converted, enslaved or killed.

Any my original statement is true, whether you or I accept it or not. Evil governments have attempted to eradicate religion. Instead they were eradicated.

Viva Santa!

>> ^BoneRemake:

>> ^quantumushroom:
Hitchens: soon to be forgotten.
Jesus: less so.

Quantumushroom : Soon to be forgotten.
Chris Kringle/Santa Claus: Less so.

@quantumushroom

I do enjoy that you took the time to step through each argument made in the video.

>>> Thanks to all who wrote similar sentiments.

Some of your interpretations seemed mildly redeeming to the statements that made
the people look so foolish. I think they probably fall in the middle of our perspectives.
I think they are morons, you think they are making well argued points.

>>>> I didn't say their points were well-argued. They were brief responses and gut reactions. You'd get the same brief 'talking points' if you asked a roomful of leftists about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (It's about oil, lies, war crimes, etc.)


Showing such obvious fear of Obama being Muslims is pretty silly. Then to say his religion is liberalism, the most intolerant religion of all. Well that is now clearly conflicting. (I agree here I think he does care about equality more than religion. Making him one of the few people who actually represent what this religion thing is supposed to be about).

>>>> There is a rational argument why Obama being an actual Muslim (unlikely) or Muslim sympathizer (a case can be made this is so) is dangerous. That argument is Muslim Sharia law and Western-style Republics are incompatible. It makes little sense to me that a liberal would adopt a "live and let live" attitude towards Islam, when Islam--per the Quran--demands conversion, enslavement or death to infidels. In "functional" countries under Sharia law such as Saudi Arabia, women are 2nd-class citizens, about as far from the left's much-vaunted equality as you can go.

These
people are so obviously looking for things to blame Obama for its sad. I respect your position a
lot more now that you tried to reason it out. Sadly the source material your working with is
such a handicap even envoking good arguments leaves you with little traction. They will hate Obama
no matter what.

>>>> Well, didn't the left hate Bush no matter what? Yet during his reign, Bush promoted and rubber-stamped all of the government programs the left loves, plus crap like Medicare 'D'.

I'm looking at the whole picture when it comes to Obama. I don't see a leader, only a collection of gaffes. Despite his own book sales, I don't see a capitalist or supporter of free markets, I see a guy who feels he has a right to manipulate others' wealth to promote his own brand of 'social justice'. Ignoring Constitutional questions about power and giving him the benefit of a doubt about his intent in establishing more FDR-like socialism, when the numbers are crunched on Obamacare, they don't add up. It is of great concern then, why he earns blind support from the left, regardless of negative results.

As much as the left dislikes FOX news, you would think it would ask itself 'Why is FOX alone in questioning Obama's authority?' Well?