Choe has a short lived series on Netflix called "Thumbs up", where he hitchhikes around the country, and tapes it. Interesting dude.

http://youtu.be/QRLeHPRnu3Q?t=1m8s

If you're familiar with the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, the first 30 seconds might put a smile on your face.

Hitchhiker's quote FTW!

Thanks. Those must be Vogons then.

>> ^dag:

Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

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

Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.>> ^Samaelsmith:

>> ^entr0py:
It makes you wonder if it might not have been less expensive to replace animatronic seal, chipmunk, and swimming girl with the real thing. I can only guess hes very good at negotiating contracts. Still, incredibly impressive.

Yeah, I didn't understand the point of the swimming girl either. By the way, does anyone know what that last film was?

Overall, this is how I summarize your arguments: (A) Life without God is meaningless, and (B) a meaningless life would sometimes be difficult to tolerate, therefore (C) God exists. We pretty much agree on A, and we do agree on B, but C does not follow from A and B. You can correctly conclude that (C) life without God would be difficult to tolerate at times. So? That still doesn’t mean that God exists. I believe that God doesn’t exist, so I conclude from A and B that life is difficult to tolerate at times. Which is true.

My overarching point is to demonstrate the cognitive dissonance inherent in your position. While you have correctly concluded that life without God is meaningless, and I commend you for being intellectually honest to admit this, the point is that you certainly will not live that way. You will actually live as a Christian does, believing that human beings have value and dignity, and that there are good things we should do and bad things we shouldn't do. The problem is, in a meaningless Universe, you have no rational justification for any of these things. You're drowning in a sea of relativism, where a justifies b and b justifies c and c justifies d, and this goes into an infinite regress. You have nowhere to stake a claim, and this is why your atheism becomes a sinkhole which is pulling you down directly into nihilism. In the end, a bag of stardust has no rational justification for morality, or any kind of value. If you are an atheist/agnostic you have to admit you have no value, no dignity, and no basis for good or evil.

Fair point. They may not have ever had the philosophical conversation with themselves about whether their lives have meaning, so it never occurred to them to be upset about it. I agree that it could be a very difficult thing to face, and I think that’s why the human species developed a proclivity for religion. Elsewhere here I’ve suggested we developed metaphysical faith because we’re intelligent and inquisitive, and it freed our minds from the obvious nagging questions of our existence with a one-stop catch-all answer: “Because God”. From an evolutionary perspective, it makes sense. If believing you have a purpose in the grand scheme of things makes you feel better and gives a higher community bond, then it conveys higher survivability to you and your genes. It may be (or once have been) helpful for us to believe that a god exists (any god/gods, mind you, or even a non-deity-based faith system like Buddhism), but this still is not an indication that any god exists.

People worship because they're made to worship. Go around this Earth and you will find people worshiping all manner of Gods and created things, the sun the moon and the stars, celebrity, money, power, themselves. 1 Romans says that God has made Himself evident to people in the things He has made. So, rather than people worshiping because they wanted to avoid meaninglessness, they worship because it the most natural thing for them to do which matches their experience. People don't naturally conclude life is meaningless; they know from their experience that it is very meaningful. They are taught it is meaningless through philosophy and the ennui that comes from modern life. You will never find a population of natural atheists anywhere on the planet.

I’m going to be blunt here: you don’t have a clue what depression is. You’re starting with your conclusion, and applying it to whatever pop psychology you’ve picked up. You’re like a North Korean telling me what democracy is, and concluding that Kim Jong Un therefore is the greatest person on Earth. I know what depression is for me, for my family members and my friends who have suffered from it, and I have done private research on it beyond that. Reducing depression to the factor of “hope” is incorrect, and presuming to know something because you’ve got Yahweh on your side is arrogant. You don’t know us, you don’t understand our condition, so please don’t assume to speak for us. You can guess, and you can ask me, and I’ll tell you what I feel, what I have experienced, and what I have learned. Then if it fits your argument, you can let me know.

I can speak on depression because I used to be depressed. I know what it is like, and having come out of it, I am qualified to speak on what I can clearly see as being the number one issue; hopelessness. A person who depressed is carrying burdens in their life which tell them that tomorrow will not be better than today, in fact it will probably be worse. People who are depressed often times see no reason to carry on at all. This could be for a number of reasons; living situation, health, low self-esteem, loneliness, finances, abuse, or perhaps all of the above. In the end, it all boils down to a lack of hope that whatever they are depressed about will ever change or get better, or that it would matter if it did. People who have hope are happy and not depressed.

Your first sentences are close enough I’ll just agree. The last one is your own fantasy straight out of nowhere. That aside, so what? We’re close to killing ourselves. I don’t know if humanity will survive another 100 years. I hope it does, but I can’t know. It’s hard to face, and very frustrating to watch our so-called leaders (who all leverage claimed faith in God, mind you) pissing it all away for money and power. No other age has had to face the possibility of the destruction of civilization. It’s hard. You said your point was that there’s nobody in the driver’s seat. I agree. What’s your point? How do you figure Yahweh’s “in the driver’s seat”?

So, I suppose the point is that it is hopeless. Not only is a life without God meaningless, but if this world is not under the sovereign control of God, it is doomed to destruction. This is what I mean when I have said in the past that in all of our history human beings have made absolutely no progress what so ever. All of the knowledge in the world doesn't count for anything if you don't have the wisdom to use it. All of our learning is simply hubris when you take a look at the condition of the world today. It is actually more wicked at this time than any other time in history. I believe God is in absolute control because He has shown me this is true. I'll give you an example:

One time I had to hitchhike across country. This was just before I became a Christian and I wasn't sure about Jesus. I was kind of scared having never really hitchhiked before, so I prayed and said: "Jesus, if you are the Son of God, and I need to know you, please help me through this. I can't do it on my own so I am going to trust you to help me". After I prayed this prayer, everything was lined up for me as if it was programmed. Money, food and rides all came to me at the right time in the right place. For instance, I would meet someone in one spot and they would help me, and then 800 miles away in a different state on a different day I would meet them again. This happened to me 3 times. Two of them I met in the same place within 20 minutes apart, and they both were met in different states many hundreds of miles away. The timing of all of this was practically impossible. Only God could have arranged me to keep meeting the same people when they were going in opposite directions across the country and on different routes, at the same time. Even if they were going in the same routes and directions it would still be improbable. Not to mention they were in small windows of time where I was in the right place at the right time to see them.

Separate from those people, let’s imagine there’s a group of people who feel they’re experiencing the same bliss you feel in your numinous experiences, but they feel it only when they hurt or kill people. Now, I’m asserting that these people probably don’t exist, but if they did, people behaving according to the principles of what’s “good” (which I’ll get to later) would have to restrain them from hurting other people, and with a heavy heart, would probably imprison them. And while they were in prison, compassionate people on the outside might be researching ways to help the inmates self-realize – within the limits of their confinement, like they do in the Swedish penal system.

Actually, one of the defining characteristics of being a psychopath is the ruthless manipulation of others for pleasure and short term gain.

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

You can say your bliss is better and more noble than their bliss but you would have no justification in doing so. There is actually no reason in your worldview to say that psychopaths aren't normal and you are abnormal.

The reason we’re having this conversation, or at least the reason I am, is because we both already have a sense that some things are right and other things are wrong. That is primary. We both agree that we have this sense, and that for us it feels important to follow it. So for me, the fact that I have this feeling that some actions are good and others aren’t is all the “ought” I need. I don’t need anybody’s permission or orders. I ought to do things that I feel are good things to do. So, whether my conscience comes from human DNA (my position) or from an external entity (your position) doesn’t matter because we have both already decided to follow it, and so has just about every human on Earth.

Yes, we both have that sense, but the difference is you have no basis for saying your sense of right and wrong is any better than the psychopath, or that yours should be preferred. If someone feels it right to hurt and steal from you, who are you to tell them that they ought not to do that? According to what you've said here, that would make you a hypocrite.

There’s nobody who’s going to judge my soul when I’m dead, so in that sense, once I’m dead, it won’t matter to me in the least what I do now once I’m dead because I’ll be dead.

You say this with certainly but I think you have to recognize that this is your hope. I wonder where this hope comes from? Since you've never been dead before to see what happens, what makes you so sure about it? Could this information about life after death exist in the 99.9999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999 percent of things that you don't know?

What I want to do at any given time is what feels good to me, and that’s the same with almost everyone, in spite of what religions teach people about their wicked “fallen” souls and how not to trust themselves (except when they paradoxically teach us to trust ourselves).

You're absolutely right about that. The scripture says when there is no King every man does what is right in his own eyes. It also says that there is a way that seems right to man, but the end of its ways is death. Also, interestingly, this philosophy matches the only rule of Satanism "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law"

Christianity teaches that we should trust in God with all of our heart and lean not on our own understanding.

I don’t feel I’m wasting any time navigating any landscape. I hardly think about morality at all, since to me, it’s quite easy. Jesus knew it; he just claimed that his father had made it up. I think it’s human nature. It gives me immense joy to see people in love getting married. That extends identically to same-sex people too. See? It’s not complex. Taking what I can when I can in the malevolent sense feels awful, and I don’t want to do that.

Right, but not doing things because they make you feel bad isn't the question. Unless there is an absolute morality, these are just chemical reactions in your brain. Your mind is deluding you into thinking something is bad by secreting a certain chemical which makes you feel guilty when you steal, and secreting a certain chemical that makes you feel good when you don't do it. These things aren't really bad, they are just how your brain evolved. So, why be a slave to chemicals? I would also ask how you think the brain understands the complex moral scenarios we find ourselves in and rewards or doesn't reward accordingly? Doesn't that seem fairly implausible to you?

I agree completely (except where you said I think it’s out of ignorance or automatic function, which I didn’t say). You say it’s about people getting carried away or being enticed. What I was explaining is when that happens and why. It’s not relevant anyway. People are the only ones who can be held responsible for their own actions, and they should be, but not because they are bad people who need to be punished, but because their behaviour hurt someone and as a member of society, they need to understand this, make amends, and hopefully change their behaviour moving forward.

What makes someone a bad person?

But I would have had to already accept Yahweh to think that’s true. And I don’t, so it’s not. Nothing in me tells me that the bible is a holy book or that following it has anything to do with what is good, so I don’t need to follow any religious dogma.

Do you think this could have something to do with the fact that the bible says you should do things you don't want to do, or that you should stop doing things you don't want to stop doing?

It involves accepting one assertion: Harris’ definition of “bad”. If you accept that, and you accept that “good” is its opposite, then moving away from something bad must be good. I think your problem with my argument is that there’s no argument for a metaphysical morality. That’s because I don’t believe in one. As I said above, this whole conversation, for me, is based on our shared feeling that there are right and wrong things. That’s it. If I kick someone’s dog, no matter who they are or what their religion, they’re going to know without consulting any authority that I did a horrible thing. I don’t really know why, and I don’t care. I do know that humans share this sense, and I’m keen to live with respect to it.

Well, there you go. You have no justification for right and wrong, and you admit that. You don't know why, and you don't care, so you go by your feelings. This is the cognitive dissonance I was talking about at the beginning of the post. You know intellectually that a meaningless Universes gives you no basis for morality, but you don't live that way. You live as a Christian does, judging what is good and evil and acting as if life has meaning and value when you know that it doesn't. You are fooling yourself into ascribing meaning to what you know are just chemical reactions in your brain. There is analogy made to the brain being like a soda can..you shake it up and it starts fizzing, which is just like the chemical reaction in our brains. One is fizzing morally and the other is fizzing immorally. What's the difference?

Your atheism leaves you in the position of not being able to tell me that something like child rape is absolutely wrong. In your world, there is no such thing, and if everyone thought it was right, it would be.

Yahweh’s morality is nowhere near as simple as a secular morality. Where in those two commandments of Jesus does it say that using condoms or allowing same-sex couples to marry is wrong? In fact, saving lives, preventing unwanted pregnancies and allowing all loving couples to get married are ways to love your neighbour, and they’re exactly what I would want my neighbour to do or advocate for on my behalf.

God wrote His commandments on our hearts, which is the reason your feelings tell you what is right and wrong. It's very easy for everyone to understand Gods laws because we already know them. The problem is that people suppress the truth about God, and so people are deceived about what is good and evil are just doing what is right in their own eyes. I didn't understand growing up that fornication was wrong because society said it was okay, but now that the deception has been lifted my heart is in agreement with it. I know that is wrong, not just because Gods law says it is, but because it is written upon my heart.

First, you’re talking in circles. If Harris’ model of morality is arbitrary, then so is Jesus’ model of “do unto others…” because they amount to pretty much the same thing, and what one person wants his neighbours to do may not be the same as someone else’s, etc. At some level, we’re going to have to determine for ourselves what’s right and what’s not.

We have the freedom to obey or disobey God. The one thing God will never do is make you obey Him. In that sense, you have to determine whether you will do what is good or evil.

Second, you can’t possibly make the argument that “better for people” and “makes the world worse” are arbitrary concepts. They’re not perfectly defined, but that doesn’t mean arbitrary. As for the torturing babies example, according to Harris’ morality, it’s bad because babies are people, and torture causes misery. Where’s the ambiguity?

The ambiguity comes in when you assert these things with no rational justification. You admitted earlier that you have no ultimate justification for right and wrong, so why do you think Harris somehow does?

Third, do you picture a world where everyone suddenly agrees that torturing babies is OK? Do you really believe that without religion people have absolutely no internal direction whatsoever, and will accept torturing of babies as acceptable? I don’t. So, no, Harris’ moral system does not allow for the possibility of torturing babies.

This is really an argument from incredulity. I'm sure no one pictured an entire society could be convinced that killing millions of jews is a good thing, but it happened. People can and have agreed to do some extremely wicked things. The point is that if morality is based upon what people agree on, and people can potentially agree on anything, then you have a moral system that could call the same thing good or evil depending on what the opinion was at that time. That is no basis for morality.

But yours does. Whatever else you address, please answer this: I believe –and forgive me if I’m putting words into your mouth– somewhere on the Sift you agreed that if God commanded you to do something people think is horrible (like torture an infant/rape your own son/etc.), that you would do it. Is that true to say? If so, then by your own witness and a test you came up with, it’s your system that allows for the possibility of absolutely any vile act, and it’s time for it to go.

I don't recall saying this. There is the divine command theory which states that whatever God commands is ethically good. For instance, although God commanded us not to kill, He used the Israelites to judge the Canaanites after giving them 450 years to repent. This though was a unique situation because God ruled the Israelites directly as His own kingdom. The only other example I can think of is Abraham and Issac, and of course God didn't want Abraham to kill Issac.

These days, though, we're under a new covenant, and Gods Spirit dwells within His people. There is no example of God telling us to do anything contrary to His word in the NT, and therefore I see no basis for agreeing that I would either.

If you think I’m being ridiculous, what do you think is more likely: that a society somewhere will suddenly realize that they feel just fine about torturing babies, or that a society somewhere will get the idea that it’s their god’s will that they torture babies? Human instinct is much more consistent than the will of any gods ever recorded.

What about all of Pagan societies throughout the ages that sacrificed their children to demons?

If this were true, there would be no need for courts, judges, prisons, or police officers. There are also laws which may make some people miserable but are necessary for the greater good.

True. Your point?

"a conscience precludes the need for an external set of laws."

The point is, without enforcement a person is free to violate their conscience as freely and as often as they choose without any consequences. A conscience doesn't preclude the need for an external set of laws because most people willfully ignore their own conscience.

It’s not arbitrarily invented. Religion is. I must be misunderstanding you. By my reading, your argument is that the connection between reducing people’s misery and doing good is arbitrary. Is that right? You don’t think that wanting to help people who are suffering is normal and good? If you agree that there is a connection between the two, that’s all you need. If you don’t agree, then your morality system really sucks, and I don’t know who I’m talking to.

Christianity wasn't arbitrarily invented, it is revealed truth. I've also already covered this throughout the reply. According to you, unless you appeal to an authority, you have no basis for right and wrong, and neither you or Harris have any authority to appeal to in a meaningless Universe. You're content to just follow your feelings and not think about it, which I pointed it is cognitive dissonance.

The fact is, in a meaningless Universe you simply can't prove anything without God. That is the proof that God exists in the middle of all of this. You are living like a Christian while denying God with your atheism. You actually have no basis for logic, rationality, morality, uniformity in nature, but you live as if you do. If I ask you how you know your reasoning is valid, you will reply "by using my reasoning". That would be the same as me saying that God exists because He exists. It is a viciously circular argument that you would never accept from me. I can point to a transcendent God who reveals truth, and tells us what is right and wrong, and is the source for the uniformity in nature. I can justify these things, but you cannot.

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/06/29/half-german-teens-dont-know-hitler-dictator_n_ 1636593.html

I take it you didn’t read the article yourself. There’s no mention of Americans, anyone of college age, nor anyone who can’t identify Hitler. It’s about German high school students who didn’t know that Hitler was a dictator, etc. Please take better care with your arguments. It’s disrespectful and a waste of my time.

Sorry. I can't remember what I was thinking of, or if I wasn't just confusing one thing for another. Perhaps I was thinking of this:

http://videosift.com/video/Ray-Comfort-Teaches-about-Adolf-Hitler

>> ^messenger:

stuff

>> ^Lann:

Not exactly easy if you are low income and don't have an independent form of transportation. I don't think she was making this video to bitch about it only for herself. She made a point of how long it would take someone to get to one of the 13 clinics with public transportation. If someone is dependent on public transportation, they are not likely going to have an easy time moving to another state.
There are sometimes situations that make fucking moving impossible.
>> ^Yogi:
Fucking Move.
I know I know there's reasons and principles and shit but if I was in a place that sucked nothing could keep me there. Fucking move everyone, lets all just move somewhere where you're treated right.
Ok story time. My brother is sort of weird and effeminate. Not really gay, just kinda goofy and girly. My family moved to North Carolina, cause there was a job for my dad. The kids at the private school were utter fucking dicks. Always mean, backward little fucks. So they picked up and moved again, this time to Iowa. They couldn't be happier, tons of nice people about and a school where my brother is accepted.
So yeah, you don't like some place, or some place doesn't like you well this is America.
Fucking Move.



No there isn't. People hitchhike, or walk. They leave war torn countries everyday. Leaving and starting over is never impossible, it's just hard.

>> ^serosmeg:

I went on a manhunt once. I just got back from Nam. I was hitchhiking through Oregon. Next thing I know there's a bunch of cops chasing after me through the woods! I had to take them all out, it was a bloodbath!


That must have been so stressful! I recommend holidays in Vietnam, Afghanistan and Burma.

I went on a manhunt once. I just got back from Nam. I was hitchhiking through Oregon. Next thing I know there's a bunch of cops chasing after me through the woods! I had to take them all out, it was a bloodbath!

Interesting. Side note- it's 34 years ago today (March 8 ) that The Hitchhiker's Guide premiered on BBC radio.

After realizing what I'm missing out on currently am reading The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy which is one of those books making me cry laughing.
Hitchen's God Is Not Great is definitely worth the read for his articulate mind alone.
And I can't really say I'm finished reading The Wheel Of Time while the last book is still missing.
For all the fantasy-junkies out there: Robert Jordan.
I came across a lot of critics that his books are boring and slow paced, which is absolutely, mind bogglingly deranged to say in my opinion.
For what I know of the fantasy world one of the most interesting and best thought out universes in existence.

I would never allow a stranger into my car, and while it's terrible that a situation can arise where you can't lend a helping hand to a stranger in need in fear for your own safety, that's the reality for most of us. If someone had their car break down and asked me for help, the least (and incidentally the most) I would do is help arrange for a tow truck. If you did stop, offer a lift and get robbed, everyone would say that you have nobody to blame but yourself, that it's common sense not to pick up strangers on the road at night. Hitchhiker criminals have ruined it for everyone.

20 years ago or more, as a child, I predicted that meat would be grown ready to eat on shop shelves, for reasons of convenience and freshness. Perhaps I was inspired by the Dish of the Day in the Restauarant at the End of the Universe in Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

In 2002 they engineered chickens with no feathers, but now they are seriously talking about growing meat http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-15402552. The reason isn't for convenience or freshness, but due to the resources required to raise animals and the pollution caused.

Better yet, pull it into an orbit that also passes mars, ride it to Mars. Hitchhike a comet or something to get back to Earth.

>> ^Sagemind:

Move on already..., My daughter just finished reading The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy now so I'm hoping to get her moving on to other stuff - Many never will read another book series ...


I agree that Hitchhikers should be considered a gateway book because reading it after reading some seriously good Science Fiction is disappointing...kinda like Snow Crash. Yeah I said it.