I couldn't even make it to the full minute mark. I think the video posted and related where Sean Carroll responds to the idea of a fine tuned universe is a good response.

This video is likely made by the same sort of people who once argued that "just a few feet in either direction and life on Earth couldn't exist". Of course the Earth doesn't have a circular orbit, and our Sun's Goldilocks zone extends from just past Venus (Earth side) to past Mars. Leaving both Earth and Mars well within the habitable zone.

My bigger problem with the video is you are trying to get to point Z, and saying it had to go through A-Y first in specific order. This is an argument used frequently against Evolution. The huge odds you'd have to go through to get to a modern human in the time allowed is greatly against modern humans forming when they did. Problem is you are working from the end result back, rather than the starting point and going forward, and it you are also discounting some other forces of nature. I used to quote the mathematical problem myself when I was a Creationist, though an Old Earth one as I was long of the opinion that Young Earth Creationist make Christians look stupid.

I may be an atheist, but I have no problem with a God of the Gaps if people want to believe that. I however don't believe that Jehovah is that God (there's too much evidence against Him, such as the fact He couldn't or wouldn't reveal himself beyond a tiny little backwater tribe, not to people in the Americas or Asia or Europe, but to one tiny group of people, either He's a Racist, which makes Him unworthy of serving, or He's not any more real than any of the other so called Gods). Whatever, or Whomever may have kick-started the Universe into existence didn't do it for some divine plan for mankind. The arrogance that it takes to assume the Universe in all it's glory was created just to awe man, or for whatever other reasons related to man and our involvement with Jehovah is arrogance beyond belief.

EDIT: Perhaps the better related video would have been http://videosift.com/video/Pure-Imagination-1

Has a underlying "taxes are theft" theme hidden inside. It also totally sidesteps a lot of important steps needed when large number of people live inside finite space, infrastructure, order, sustenance. It all needs to be managed, otherwise we are back to tribes instead of nations. We are free but responsible, if nothing else than to our fellow humanbeings. Being totally free also means freedom to kill, maim, destroy. And we are all a bit evil, selfish, enough so that taxes are not voluntary.. It is so easy to say that taxes enslave us when you don't give out any alternatives that would work.. Anarchy does not work, it's the power of the strongest, anarcho-capitalism is a horrible idea. It is about as equally terrifying as Ayn Rands ideas.

There's something bittersweet (no pun intended) about seeing people who are tasting chocolate for the first, and probably last, time in their lives, considering that it probably wouldn't exist without people like them...

Reminds me of living in New Guinea when I was a kid, simple things like lighters were quite literally inexplicable magic to the more remote high land tribes. The pidgin name for helicopter is "mixmaster 'im belong Jesus Christ". It's almost a childlike naivete, and probably explains why they are dirt poor and exploited so that the west can give itself diabetes...

Great sift!

The nation of Islam is not Muslims. Its a cult, they believe Elijah Mohammed is a messiah whose real name is Wallace D. Fard Muhammad who faked his death and came back as Elijah Mohammed.

They believe blacks are the lost tribe of Israel. That Arabs are not true Muslims. And white race was created by Lucifer.

They also have a suicide pact as well as they are organized crime lime mafia and have performed many assassinations.

Ice they assassinated Malcolm who was "2nd" they replaced him with Louis Farrakhan who has admitted he killed Malcolm.

don't these people watch sci fi? Any time some planet implements some sort of "racial purity" plan, they always end up coming up against some disease that wipes them out and they would have survived because the species they wiped out had some sort of genetic resistance to it so had they integrated and inter-married, they would have survived.

joking aside though. We're just seeing remnants of tribalism here, in the grand scheme of things, equal rights is still a VERY relatively new thing, so old ideas just take a long time to die. Each new generation is going to be less racist then the last one. Sure, racist parents will try to teach their kids to be racist, but the odds of that teaching sticking will be less and less.

racism just isn't sustainable over the long term. when tribes were divided by large land masses and large oceans and we didn't have fast means of travel, it was easy to maintain the illusion that your group was superior to everyone else. but now that the planet is a much smaller place, it's harder and harder to delude yourself.

in any case, economic discrimination will overtake racial discrimination soo n if it hasn't already. won't matter if you're white or black, but by how much is in your bank account.

OK, if you KNOW there's no good reason for it and do it to your child anyway, that's more barbaric. If you believe, because of misinformation, it's a good thing for the child and is safe, to me it's much less barbaric. People do harmful things all the time trying to do the right thing, intent and level of understanding should be considered when judging others, that's all I'm saying.
and in your analogy, I would be semi OK with that (if there's a male equivalent so it's not just sexist mutilation) because the social issues of not being accepted are far worse than having only one nipple, totally OK with it if it's by choice at the accepted age of choice or 'adulthood' (even if the other choice is leave the tribe).

EDIT: same hypothetical, is it OK if it's explained that they have to remove the nipple because otherwise they can't use the tools available needed to hunt without constant, often deadly bloody and infected hardcore nipple chafing, and so they would either likely starve or would likely be killed at birth because the tribe couldn't support them?

I'm 100% OK with the rituals of the 'alligator people' in Africa that cut themselves to look like they have alligator skin, done in adolescence or later by choice as I understand it, and that's certainly 'barbaric' by most standards.

Okay, I'll bite, how would a society without any rulers or leadership of any kind function? What's to stop just anybody from stepping up and taking power for themselves or their religion / tribe / knitting circle / whatever.

The issue then becomes, if we start accepting scientific facts like the big bang and evolution, that moves stories like Adam and Eve, the flood, tower of babel and the like become parables. Which I am fine with, I was fine with that when I was a Christian as that is the most likely scenario, the problem is where do we draw the line at what is parable and what is literal? Why did the creator of the universe make himself known to only one tiny tribe of people in a backwater part of the world some 6,000 years ago, and not to all of humanity around the world, why not have prophets all over? It is either a local deity, like Odin,Athena, Ra and the like, or a racist jerk.

No science will never probably answer what was there before the big bang, time itself didn't exist... That is perhaps the only valid "gap" for a god to fill. We understand how the universe came to be in its present state fairly well, with a few odd issues like dark matter/dark energy to be resolved but those are filling in. Abiogenesis is early enough in the its understanding of life origins to be a small gap, but that is filling, and the process of biological evolution is fully understood and well mapped out.

In the end the problem is that there seems to be no god actively moving on the universe or people's lives. We don't see properly documented limbs growing without science. We don't see a consistent result from praying to only the Christian God compared to praying to some Hinu god to get results (praying itself is slightly better than not, but it doesn't matter to whom is prayed, praying to the flying spaghetti monster is just as effective as praying to Yahweh or Kali). If there is a God, then he is ineffective, and that in the end is a problem for religion... and ultimately what is the point of worshiping a god that only wants people to praise and worship him while giving us nothing in return? Wohoo I believed in God (Yahweh) and now get to spend eternity praising and worshipping him full time with no distractions like work and having fun with the family...basically I get to do the same thing the angels do (and they apparently have a choice in the matter since 1/3rd of them followed Lucifer in praising him over Yahweh)... what's the point of that? To avoid the hell he created for those who chose not to end up being his praise slave 24/7 for eternity? Let me see evidence, let me see him do something for me in my life here and now, then I'll believe.

Cross-hybridization is one thing. Patenting a cow you found in Africa and then suing the life out of the original tribe is the Monsanto way. Or, changing one gene and then claiming ownership of all corn in the US and then suing small farmers when their crops get contaminated (and of course, denying it) is GMO. The fight against GMO isn't always a "health" concern about wanting to stay truer to our millions of years of evolution and cohabitation with certain foods. It's also about fighting against mega-corperations that unfairly target small farmers with regulations such as requiring white painted walls . . . yearly, or requiring an office and bathroom for a health inspector to use once a year that no one else can use ever, or so many laws and regulations that a small farmer can inadvertently break the law, steal someone's intellectual property and be sued out of existence all while doing the same thing their family has been doing for over 100 years.

When we plant crops of only one variety over large swathes of land we invite disaster. It's already happen numerous times. Hell, no one remember deadly spinach killing around 50 people with no way to trace the origin? Mad Cow? Or the destruction of economies in their world countries because Monsanto requires only their crop to be grown and subsistence farmers into the ghetto's of India so that more High Fructose Corn Syrup can be made.

Or worse . . . the US Farm Bill . . . *shivers*

So no, it's not always about health. It's about staying true to the roots of a society that worships our farmers as life-givers, essential to our health and economy and free of unknown risk that could catastrophically damage the world as we know it all while ending a giant untouchable monopoly that refuses to let even the tiniest bit of oversight oversee it's operations so it can continue to "own life."

It is true that native Americans are as diverse as white Americans in their opinions. There are many many reservations here in the Pacific Northwest. One of the reasons it took so long to finally abandon "Redskins" in our high school is that there were local tribe members who didn't have a problem with it.

If the native tribes weren't monolithic in their response, why should the white people abandon their "heritage"?

I do wonder if we can hear the final sentence of this differently. It may be that some natives are fine with their local high school mascot, for the same reason our local high was -- it is tradition.

But what the vid says is -- we don't call OURSELVES that. And that may be a monolithic truth.

Probably not, though. Humans can be pesky to paint as black or white ... or red.

Enough native Americans are pissed about it. We don't need 100% agreement.

Nonsense. Without government, the 'big guys' are just whichever warlord / king / gang / tribe / corporation can monopolise resources by force.

Source: the entire history of mankind.

Good - if that's the right word - post. What is wrong with humans!!?? Ethnicity, religion, left, right, extremist, etc. etc. We have learned nothing from the history of "them and us." We, instead, have increased our hatred, fear, and loathing of those not affiliated to our particular "tribe." Those waiting gleefully for the apocalypse will, I fear, not have to wait too much longer. But it will not be what is hoped for. An apocalypse yes, but not one brought on by a god, one brought on by the ignorance and stupidity of humans.

I think I understand you, but correct me if I'm wrong. You're saying it's powerful not for what she's saying, but because of the context of her being a female activist for education in an area of the world with typically extreme patriarchal resistance to these ideas. Yeah?

Context is important, I suppose. It's just that talking about peace and education isn't new. And I wonder if in twenty years from now if some woman raised in a primitive tribe in the bush stood up and said "peace and education!" will we, Westerners, all again be awestruck like Jon Stewart in this video? It just seems ridiculous to be shocked and "speechless" over something so pedestrian and accepted in our culture.

About 4 minutes was just repeat and trying to come to a punchline that we all realised.. and then it never came.

To Chingalera: Slaves are slaves, it is and always has been wrong no matter how well you treat them. The point of this story is not slavery but inequality that's inherit in the Old Testament and it's many stories.. Men were not created to be equal, according to bible but simply who ever told the story was superior and had Gods given rights to be superior, no matter what they did to other tribes, it was justified. Kind of like.. well.. christian countries do: be equal and fair towards the people inside your country.