I remember realizing how awful some nursery rhymes and kids songs were. Like the Three Little Kittens. They lost their mittens, as children do. That's life with kids. But they lose dessert privileges. And to compound it, the fact they were lucky enough to find their mittens suddenly erases their previous wickedness and they get to have dessert again. If that wasn't enough of a giveaway, it was first published in the U.S. in a book called, "New Nursery Songs for All Good Children"

And "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" has the same issue. Children who are unhappy are being bad and won't get presents. It doesn't say, children who don't steal, or who don't bully, or anything vaguely moral. No, it's whether you cry and pout or not that determines whether you get a little tin horn or a little toy drum. In fact, a strict reading of the lyrics shows this behaviour doesn't even determine whether you've been naughty or nice this year, but whether you in fact are naughty or nice inherently.

These two were written by failed parents, clearly.

Similarly, we can instantiate in enough physical rules to get the "chance" universe you describe going, and its rules could get it to the current state either determinalistically or with some element of randomness. I guess I understand how you're using "chance" here... but I don't know that it's terribly useful. Why should "what humans can predict" be of any relevance philosophically? And if we're using it that way, couldn't we similarly describe God's actions as chance? I mean, surely humans (or angels) can't predict everything he's going to do. Chance seems like a pejorative when applied to God.. and to me it seems like a pejorative when applied to the operations of the universe (except where, again, that operation is actually random).

However, again, I don't think this difference is terribly important. I think I understand what you're getting at, I just see things very differently.

The difference between chance and design is the most important distinction there is. If you don't like the word chance, I will use the word "unplanned", or "mindless". An unplanned Universe has no actual purpose; it is just happenstance. Meaning, your life is just a product of mindless processes, and concepts like morality, justice, and truth have no essential meaning. It means you are just some blip on a grid and there is no rhyme or reason to anything. It also means you will never find out what happened or why it happened because no one knows what is going on or ever will. This will *always* lead you to nihilism.

A designed Universe, on the other hand, does have a purpose. A purposeful Universe means that life was created for a reason. It means that there is a truth, a truth that only the Creator knows. Which means that all lines of inquiry will lead to the Creators doorstep, and that trying to understand the Universe without the Creator is completely futile. It is like looking at a painting with three marks on it..you could endlessly speculate on what the painter was thinking when he painted it. However, no matter how clever you were, you don't have enough information to be sure about anything. To refuse to seek the Creator would be to stare at that painting your whole life trying to figure it out when you have the painters business card with his phone number on it in your pocket.

I don't think you're phrasing this in a terribly fair way. Yes, many people assume there's a natural explanation for abiogenesis. This is partly because having another explanation introduces arbitrariness into the system. Say I'm a geologist and I discover Devil's Tower. It's really weird, but my inclination from the very start is that it was formed by similar processes to ones that have explained weird things in the past. Even if I can't postulate even a guess as to why it has those weird columns, I'm not crazy to guess that eventually we'll figure out an explanation that doesn't involve, say, new physical laws or aliens. (And it's certainly not helpful to say "maybe it was made in the flood").

The whole thing is arbitrary to begin with. Naturalistic explanations are assumed apriori, and then the evidence is interpreted through the conclusion. That isn't how science works. You come to the conclusion because of the evidence, not the other way around. I would also note that you would never accept this kind of reasoning from a creationist. Neither does a mountain of circumstantial evidence prove anything.

Abiogenesis is a bigger problem and it's also one that's "lost to time" a bit. It almost certainly requires a mechanism we have yet to identify (or a mechanism someone has guessed at, but hasn't provided good details or evidence for). But, like Devil's Tower, there's no reason to expect that mechanism won't be identified - or that it will require significant changes to our understanding of the rest of science. Again, there's plausible ideas already floating around, and I think we'll probably recreate the process (though likely not with the same actual process) within the next 30 years or so.

Anything sounds plausible, apparently, when you have billions of years to play with. As the earlier quote said, time itself performs the miracles for you. How do you know that the mechanism hasn't already been identified but you have rejected it?

http://creation.com/devils-tower-explained

No... that, I think, is probably our strongest point of disagreement. I'm very much OK with "I don't know", and literally everything I believe has a bit of "I don't know" attached (kind of similar to how everything you believe in has a bit of God attached).

I'm not worshipping ignorance or something - knowing IS better than not knowing. But I'm also not scared of not knowing things - and I'm certainly not just going to pick something and believe in it because I don't like having some of my answer pages blank.

For you, is Scientology better than "I don't know"?

The point I'm trying to make is, I don't know isn't a theory. What most atheists mean when they say "I don't know" is "I know it isn't the Christian God, but otherwise I don't know". The next thing they say is, you believe in God because you're afraid. That I "chose" God because I am scared of death, or because the Universe is too big and scary for my mind to handle the uncertainty of not knowing.

I have to say that this idea of a bunch of hokey. The Christians I know believe in God because they have a personal relationship with Him. It has nothing to do with making a choice..God chose us. He would chose you too, if you were open to Him.

Neither was I afraid of death when I was an agnostic, and I wasn't afraid of saying I don't know (that's why I was an agnostic, because I didn't know). I believe in God because He revealed Himself to me, and that is the only reason. If He hadn't, I would still be an agnostic.

It is credible to believe that the Universe was designed and created by God. We can see that whomever made the Universe is unimaginably powerful, intelligent, exists outside of space and time, etc. Scientology isn't credible and explains nothing. God can explain everything.

Also, thanks for using the big boy version of the Bible. I quite like the Bible artistically, but I can't stand some of the new translations (despite whatever benefits some parts may have in terms of clarity).

Most of the new translations butcher the scriptures. They remove entire verses, words, water down meanings, or just flat out mislead. I can't stand them either. The KJV is the best word for word translation that we have, and although the language is archaic, it is comprehensible with a little research.

>> ^jmzero

Reaffirms my belief that beat poems = shitty poems.

Sorry cliche'd pretentious phrases and forced rhymes strung together don't get me off.

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

Pleased to meet you- nope my rhymes aren't lame.>> ^my15minutes:

please, allow me to introduce myself
i'm a man of stealth and waste
been around for a long, long year
playlisted many a man's grohl and faith
...but ironically, not much of the stones...

you are welcome.
In reply to this comment by hpqp:
Many thanks!
In reply to this comment by lurgee:
*promote America's Best Christian! I love you Betty!!!

Many thanks!
In reply to this comment by lurgee:
*promote America's Best Christian! I love you Betty!!!

Dude, it's a financial news segment that covers the stock market. Calm down.

>> ^Boise_Lib:

"A couple of months ago everything seemed to be going great."
^--Fuckn' Douche!
Drive out of your gated community for once--you asshole!

Those were some inventive rhymes.

I heard a song this morning.

Said something about...I can't remember now.

Rhyming, from the center.

Up and down
Black and brown
Birds singing
Early in the morning

- So what you want Sage?
- To drop science in my rhymes!
- What you want Sage?
- To hug goats all the time!
- What you want Sage?
- To dis your party,
and my name up in lights: G-O-A-T

>> ^dzonny:

starts with an F and rhymes with "fake" (in my humble opinion)


Flake?

>> ^RFlagg:

I like how the boyfriend or whatever just stands there and films it and doesn't move to help even after getting the shot of her falling... then again, why is this person filming that guy filming her?


starts with an F and rhymes with "fake" (in my humble opinion)

Good morning! For those who want to sing along.

Now I rock a house party at the drop of a hat
I beat a biter down with an aluminum bat
a lot of people they be Jonesin' just to hear me rock the mic
they'll be staring at the radio
staying up all night
so like a pimp I'm pimpin'
I got a boat to eat shrimp in
Nothing wrong with my leg just B-boy limpin'
Got arrested at the Mardi Gras for jumping on a float
My man MCA's got a beard like a billy goat
oowah oowah is my disco call
MCA hu-huh I'm gettin' rope y'all
Routines I bust rhymes I write
And I'll be busting routines and rhymes all night
Like eating burgers or chicken or you'll be picking your nose
I'm on time homie that's how it goes
You heard my style I think you missed the point
it's the joint

Mike D Yeah?with your bad self running things
What's up with your bad breath onion rings
Well I'm Mike D and I'm back from the dead
Chillin' at the beaches down at Club Med
Make another record 'cause the people they want more of this
Suckers they be saying they can take out Adam Horovitz
Hurricane you got clout
Other DJ's he'll take your head out
A puppet on a string I'm paid to sing or rhyme
Or do my thing I'm
In a lava lamp inside my brain hotel
I might be peakin' or freakin' but I rock well
The Patty Duke the wrench and then I bust the tango
Got more rhymes than Jamaica got Mango Kangols
I got the peg leg at the end of my stump
Shake your rump

Full Clout y'all
Full Clout y'all
And when the mic is in my mouth I turn it out y'all
Full Clout

Never been dumped 'cause I'm the most mackinest
Never been jumped 'cause I'm known the most packinest
Yeah we've got beef chief
We're knocking out teeth chief
And if you don't believe us you should question your belief Keith
Like Sam the butcher bringing Alice the meat
Like Fred Flintstone driving around with bald feet
Should I have another sip no skip it
In the back of the ride and bust with the whippet
Rope a dope dookies all around the neck
Whoo ha got them all in check
Running from the law the press and the parents
Is your name Michael Diamond?
No mine's Clarence
From downtown Manhattan the village
My style is wild and you know that it still is
Disco bag schlepping and you're doing the bump
Shake your rump

The more fat cells you make the harder it is to lose weight and keep it off. Fat cells stay fat cells in your body even when they are not loaded with fat. Takes just as much discipline to get fat as it does to get un-fat.

Yoga can affect changes that seem miraculous (and they are) but anything one does to clear chi as a practice can do the same. Ever see what Pilates can do?? Volleyball? Swimming?

Oh hey, Rottenseed?? You are most likely already hermitized. You should simply stop watching TV with a view to actually getting any real information. News rhymes with lose and like this feel-good journal pimped-out to yoga-man it includes an over-abundance of adverts.

Incredibly cool story. More power to the man who blew out his knees and compacted his lumbar hopping out of transport planes for the empire! Reminds me of that scene from Starship Troopers where the mobile infantry recruiter without legs exclaimed with enthusiasm, "The mobile infantry made me the man I am today!"