There is a slim chance that there is life after death

[alal...@gmail.com]

I hope that myself, and my friends, followers, and allies find happiness in the afterlife if there is one. Wether through rebirth or in heaven, or whatever happens in reality.

Abhinav Lal
Writer & Investor

[malkinm...@gmail.com]

Followers? Is this aaa posting through an Indian ISP? He said he was moving
back to the US, but did he?

[Oko Tillo]

On Sunday, December 30, 2018 at 11:25:42 PM UTC-7, malkinm...@gmail.com wrote:
> On Sunday, December 30, 2018 at 10:46:55 PM UTC-5, alal...@gmail.com wrote:
> > I hope that myself, and my friends, followers, and allies find happiness in the afterlife if there is one. Wether through rebirth or in heaven, or whatever happens in reality.
> >
> > Abhinav Lal
> > Writer & Investor
>

===

> Followers? Is this aaa posting through an Indian ISP? He said he was moving
> back to the US, but did he?

Clearly you don't understand spiritually and philosophically and
self-evidentally and common sensically and because-I-said-so-ally.

Naw, it isn't -- see where he says "if" and "whether" and "whatever"?
Nothng in "aaa" world is uncertain or contingent. Or sane.


Oko

[alal...@gmail.com]

I am only about 95% atheist. There is a chance of life after death. I hope that I have an eternal soul, and find happiness wherever and whenever I am. The same for my friends, followers, and allies.

[Christopher A. Lee]

On Sun, 30 Dec 2018 23:27:14 -0800 (PST), alal...@gmail.com wrote:

>On Monday, December 31, 2018 at 11:55:42 AM UTC+5:30, malkinm...@gmail.com wrote:
>> On Sunday, December 30, 2018 at 10:46:55 PM UTC-5, alal...@gmail.com wrote:
>> > I hope that myself, and my friends, followers, and allies find happiness in the afterlife if there is one. Wether through rebirth or in heaven, or whatever happens in reality.
>> >
>> > Abhinav Lal
>> > Writer & Investor
>>
>> Followers? Is this aaa posting through an Indian ISP? He said he was moving
>> back to the US, but did he?
>
>I am only about 95% atheist. There is a chance of life after death.

How so?

> hope that I have an eternal soul, and find happiness wherever and whenever
>I am. The same for my friends, followers, and allies.

Why even consider one?

And what friends? You ere whining that you don't have any.

What followers?

What allies?

Atheist/theist is binary. Either you believe in gods or you don't.
That's what the "a-" prefix does.

[bil...@m.nu]

On Sun, 30 Dec 2018 19:46:51 -0800 (PST), alal...@gmail.com wrote:

>I hope that myself, and my friends, followers, and allies find happiness in the afterlife if there is one. Wether through rebirth or in heaven, or whatever happens in reality.

Actually there is NO chance at all that there is an afterlife. Only an
idiot would think that there is.

[bil...@m.nu]

On Sun, 30 Dec 2018 23:27:14 -0800 (PST), alal...@gmail.com wrote:

Wow has it gone down from 99% in a few days, wow those theists must be
doing a number on you. Either that or you are still lying because
people who lie tend to not remember what they lied about previously.

Anyone that has the slightest bit of knowledge about the human body
knows that there is no harry potter magical soul that resides on the
human form. When the ingestion of foods ceases and the chemical
reactions stop inside the body, which happens in the brain, "life" as
we know it will cease to exist, in other words death occurs. When
these chemical reactions have stopped death is in fact complete. These
chemical reactions require three things. Air, fuel, and a medium to
combine in. The loss of any of these three will result in death. So
there is no magic about it. There is no way for there to be a soul.
Not when how a person is alive can be so easily explained. Just
because the theists that invented gods and religion did not know this
they made up words like soul and afterlife. This has been so ingrained
in your brain that you have this incredible fear. This is why you lie
so much. You are in fact 100% theist. If you were, as you relate, 99%
atheist you would still be 100% theist.

Stop with the lies and bullshit. If you want attention just talk to us
WITHOUT using the bullshit of gods and magic. Bring up a topic and
then discuss with everyone this topic WITHOUT making any references to
a god or gods, magic, and other forms of hocus pocus.

Engage our minds and test out intelligence, challenge our wit and
knowledge, not discuss what form of magic is best to follow.

[malkinm...@gmail.com]

What 'followers' does Alal have? What 'friends and allies'. He's been
moping about not having any friends, just acquaintences. His delusions
are similar to aaa's , even if he isn't him.

[mitchr...@gmail.com]

Maybe for you that chance is slim...
Don't talk for the rest of us.

[Malcolm McMahon]

Life after death and God are really two separate propositions. One does not imply the other.

[malkinm...@gmail.com]

On Wednesday, January 2, 2019 at 3:51:16 AM UTC-5, Malcolm McMahon wrote:
> On Monday, 31 December 2018 07:47:17 UTC, alal...@gmail.com wrote:
> > On Monday, December 31, 2018 at 11:55:42 AM UTC+5:30, malkinm...@gmail.com wrote:
> > > On Sunday, December 30, 2018 at 10:46:55 PM UTC-5, alal...@gmail.com wrote:
> > > > I hope that myself, and my friends, followers, and allies find happiness in the afterlife if there is one. Wether through rebirth or in heaven, or whatever happens in reality.

> > > Followers? Is this aaa posting through an Indian ISP? He said he was moving back to the US, but did he?
> >
> > I am only about 95% atheist. There is a chance of life after death. I hope that I have an eternal soul, and find happiness wherever and whenever I am. The same for my friends, followers, and allies.
> >
>
> Life after death and God are really two separate propositions. One does not imply the other.

Some Christians might disagree with you. They act like they think and fear it is all connected. And, they can't think past this mind trap known as the box.

[Kevrob]

On Wednesday, January 2, 2019 at 3:51:16 AM UTC-5, Malcolm McMahon wrote:

The pattern of activity that is one's mind, supported,
when one is living, by one's brain,* could theoretically
be captured and saved in some hyper-complicated physical
structure as a replacement of one's dying body, BUT......
No one has any practical idea how to do that. Survival
of consciousness after physical death would need energy,
and just where would that come from? Are we to believe
that entropy wouldn't act on that disembodied mind?

Supernatural explanations for life after death wave hands
and things like the brain/mind connection disappear, as do
entropy and energy needs of the likes of ghosts or spirits.
Concepts of heaven, nirvana, Elysian fields, etc were
arrived at largely without scientific knowledge. With the
exception of atomists of the likes of Leucippus and Democritus,
who were precursors of those of us with a naturalistic view of
reality, there was no real distinction made between the natural
and the supernatural. Ghodz and other "mythological" beings
were considered to have physical form, if ones that were
more powerful then that of mortals. When Christianity comes
on the scene, we get references to "glorified bodies" and
the resurrection the body, not just living on in spirit.

There was also belief in reincarnation, of course, which
many still believe in. I see no reason for that.

* If not the entirety of the body's systems, regarding,
at the least, sensory inputs, if not more.

---
Kevin R
aa #2310

[Your Founding Fathers Erred]

On Monday, December 31, 2018 at 2:10:44 AM UTC-5, Oko Tillo wrote:
> On Sunday, December 30, 2018 at 11:25:42 PM UTC-7, malkinm...@gmail.com wrote:
> > On Sunday, December 30, 2018 at 10:46:55 PM UTC-5, alal...@gmail.com wrote:
> > > I hope that myself, and my friends, followers, and allies find happiness in the afterlife if there is one. Wether through rebirth or in heaven, or whatever happens in reality.
> > >
> > > Abhinav Lal
> > > Writer & Investor
> >
> ===
> > Followers? Is this aaa posting through an Indian ISP? He said he was moving
> > back to the US, but did he?
>
> Clearly you don't understand spiritually

WHAT DO YOU KNOW ABOUT SPIRITUALITY?


>
>
> Oko

[Your Founding Fathers Erred]

Wow...! Jesus conquered death and gave us a sample resurrection. He is the ruler of the two worlds. NOTHING YOU CAN DO ABOUT IT.
Now get lost!

[Your Founding Fathers Erred]

On Wednesday, January 2, 2019 at 3:51:16 AM UTC-5, Malcolm McMahon wrote:

Jesus said it does.... Read the Gospel not the species of Darwin

[Oko Tillo]

Clearly you do not comprehend your "aaa".


Oko

[Oko Tillo]

===

> Now get lost!

Speaking of getting lost, why are you still hanging around a country
you despise?



Oko

[Malcolm McMahon]

You were lost long ago

[default]

On Sun, 30 Dec 2018 19:46:51 -0800 (PST), alal...@gmail.com wrote:

You really need to belong to a religion.

[default]

This idiot seems to be just another religious troll and thinks he's
being clever about it.

95% atheist indeed!

[Kevrob]

I don't see anything wrong with putting a confidence level
on one's opinion. "I'm 95% certain that ghodz are baloney"
would be something I'd say. i have put myself at 6.99999...
(repeating decimal) on the "Dawkins scale" of atheism, aka
the "Spectrum of theistic probability."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrum_of_theistic_probability

I am confused about "I don't believe in a ghod, but I hope
I'm wrong." Sometimes one hopes for cosmic justice one has
no confidence will ever exist. I've used, "There's no hell,
but for guys like (Hitler, Stalin, Mao, etc) we should build
one and send them there." It's not a serious wish.

I wish I were immortal, but I also wish the Guardians of the
Universe would pick me to be the holder of the battery and
power ring for sector 2814. That's not going to happen, either.

Much of the problem atheism has in appealing to people is its
insistance on dealing with reality without crutches like an
afterlife and final judgment of people's lives. We have no
expectation of "well done, thou good and faithful servant."
We die, case closed.

---
Kevin R
a.a #2310

[Christopher A. Lee]

On Thu, 3 Jan 2019 09:26:46 -0800 (PST), Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com>
wrote:

Why even give them a thought?

But atheism per se is still binary - either one is a theist or one
isn't.

But it would never occur to me to say that "ghodz are baloney" except
possibly in response to what some theist says to me - and what I would
say depends on what the theist said.

Because to me, they're merely somebody else's wacky belief - and I
wouldn't know how wacky if they had the intelligence to keep them
where they belong.

Theists like to "define" us according to what they imagine we would
say, but they don't put it in context - we don't say it unprompted.
And they imagine this is the be-all and end-all of our POV with
respect to something that has no relevance outside their religion.
It's a form of quote-mining.

It's like opening a conversation with "I don't take cream or sugar in
my coffee".

When this troll keeps bringing it up, it's clearly important to him,
and he wrongly imagines it is for the rest of us.

>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrum_of_theistic_probability
>
>I am confused about "I don't believe in a ghod, but I hope
>I'm wrong." Sometimes one hopes for cosmic justice one has
>no confidence will ever exist. I've used, "There's no hell,
>but for guys like (Hitler, Stalin, Mao, etc) we should build
>one and send them there." It's not a serious wish.

He's stuck in a Christian-monotheist type of god-belief. Not even the
Hindu one that you might suspect from his name and the country of his
ISP. Let alone any of the other equally unjustified types.

And he imagines we should know exactly what he means, which one and
what its attributes are.

>I wish I were immortal, but I also wish the Guardians of the
>Universe would pick me to be the holder of the battery and
>power ring for sector 2814. That's not going to happen, either.
>
>Much of the problem atheism has in appealing to people is its
>insistance on dealing with reality without crutches like an
>afterlife and final judgment of people's lives. We have no
>expectation of "well done, thou good and faithful servant."
>We die, case closed.

Most theists can't get their minds around this. So they imagine we
have the same concerns that they were brainwashed to have, which the
religion they were brainwashed to believe conveniently answers.

[Kevrob]

Same here. My "baloney" response is usually used when someone
else demands I account for the possibility that ghodz exist,
because "You can't prove there's no ghod."

I can't prove the room I'm sitting in won't, in the next 10
seconds, have all the atmosphere in it evacuate into the hallway,
so that we all suffoccat, either. From what we now about the
ohysics of gasses, that's exceedingly unlike;y, though.

> Because to me, they're merely somebody else's wacky belief - and I
> wouldn't know how wacky if they had the intelligence to keep them
> where they belong.
>
> Theists like to "define" us according to what they imagine we would
> say, but they don't put it in context - we don't say it unprompted.
> And they imagine this is the be-all and end-all of our POV with
> respect to something that has no relevance outside their religion.
> It's a form of quote-mining.
>
> It's like opening a conversation with "I don't take cream or sugar in
> my coffee".
>

I've brought this up several times in the group:

[quote]

Ignosticism or igtheism...

the idea that the question of the existence of God is meaningless
because the term god has no coherent and unambiguous definition. It may
also be described as the theological position that every other
theological position (including agnosticism and atheism) assumes too
much about the concept of god and many other theological concepts.

[/quote]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignosticism

Growing up in a Catholic family in he mid-late 20the century USA,
the ghod-idea permeated society, so that, for the majority, it was
a "default condition," even though, philosophically speaking, it
ought not be.

> When this troll keeps bringing it up, it's clearly important to him,
> and he wrongly imagines it is for the rest of us.
>
> >https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrum_of_theistic_probability
> >
> >I am confused about "I don't believe in a ghod, but I hope
> >I'm wrong." Sometimes one hopes for cosmic justice one has
> >no confidence will ever exist. I've used, "There's no hell,
> >but for guys like (Hitler, Stalin, Mao, etc) we should build
> >one and send them there." It's not a serious wish.
>
> He's stuck in a Christian-monotheist type of god-belief. Not even the
> Hindu one that you might suspect from his name and the country of his
> ISP. Let alone any of the other equally unjustified types.
>
> And he imagines we should know exactly what he means, which one and
> what its attributes are.
>
> >I wish I were immortal, but I also wish the Guardians of the
> >Universe would pick me to be the holder of the battery and
> >power ring for sector 2814. That's not going to happen, either.
> >
> >Much of the problem atheism has in appealing to people is its
> >insistance on dealing with reality without crutches like an
> >afterlife and final judgment of people's lives. We have no
> >expectation of "well done, thou good and faithful servant."
> >We die, case closed.
>
> Most theists can't get their minds around this. So they imagine we
> have the same concerns that they were brainwashed to have, which the
> religion they were brainwashed to believe conveniently answers.

Much of that early conditioning can re-emerge, if one has a trauma,
or is under sedation, and your conscious mind is pushed out of the
"driver's seat." I'm afraid all who were raised like I was are in
danger of reverting, should dementia kick in. If I'm calling for
a priest on my deathbed, that will probably be why.

[Christopher A. Lee]

On Thu, 3 Jan 2019 10:04:57 -0800 (PST), Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com>

Which is a dishonest copout, because we only ask for it in the vein of
"put up or shut up" after they talk about it as fact.

Do they seriously imagine that does either?

>I can't prove the room I'm sitting in won't, in the next 10
>seconds, have all the atmosphere in it evacuate into the hallway,
>so that we all suffoccat, either. From what we now about the
>ohysics of gasses, that's exceedingly unlike;y, though.
>
>> Because to me, they're merely somebody else's wacky belief - and I
>> wouldn't know how wacky if they had the intelligence to keep them
>> where they belong.
>>
>> Theists like to "define" us according to what they imagine we would
>> say, but they don't put it in context - we don't say it unprompted.
>> And they imagine this is the be-all and end-all of our POV with
>> respect to something that has no relevance outside their religion.
>> It's a form of quote-mining.
>>
>> It's like opening a conversation with "I don't take cream or sugar in
>> my coffee".
>>
>
>I've brought this up several times in the group:
>
>[quote]
>
>Ignosticism or igtheism...
>
>the idea that the question of the existence of God is meaningless
>because the term god has no coherent and unambiguous definition. It may
>also be described as the theological position that every other
>theological position (including agnosticism and atheism) assumes too
>much about the concept of god and many other theological concepts.
>
>[/quote]

I don't like the word, because as soon as you start trying to define
different atheist positions, you will end up with almost as many as
there are atheists.

Part of the problem, is that the stupids can't grasp that it's simply
a demographic description sating that we're not something that a lot
of people are.

But they don't have a problem with other a- words constructed the same
way - asynchronous, asymmetric, apolitical, amoral, etc.

>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignosticism
>
>Growing up in a Catholic family in he mid-late 20the century USA,
>the ghod-idea permeated society, so that, for the majority, it was
>a "default condition," even though, philosophically speaking, it
>ought not be.

I had something like that in the 1950s. My parents were atheist, and
on one side it went back to before Darwin went on his voyage. They
simply never mentioned religion. and it never occurred to me why some
of the kids I played with in the park weren't there on Sunday (one or
two on Saturday).

I was eight when the subject was first introduced, and I still
remember trying to explain to my stupid teacher why "who created all
this, then" was a ridiculous question which rested on the presumption
that it took somebody to do it - because it had never occurred to me,
and she could not justify it using my life experience.

It would never occur to me because I didn't have that conditioning.
When I was close to death with a critical lung condition in the 2000s,
my main concern was that I would never see my loved ones again -
family, Special Lady who lived on the other coast and whom I'd fly to
see her regularly, cats (they're people too), etc.

It totally pissed me off when people said I should thank the god of
somebody else's religion, when it was the skill of the doctors and
nursing staff, coupled with modern medical technology.

[Kevrob]

If I had been raised like you, and someone had asked me "do you
believe in ghod?" I imagine I'd have had to ask them to define
their terms.

That's what makes the idea, if not the name, of ignosticism
interesting to me. It defies the commonly accepted notion that
everyone has an idea of ghod, and enough in common to discuss it.
When i took philosophy in school, one thin they drummed into us
was that terms had to be nivocal withing an argument. Equivocation
is a fallacy. If two people are discussing "god" and they use two
definitions that are different enough, they aren't talking about the
same thing, at all. The yahooey of the Jews, the Christian trinity,
the Hindu major trio and assorted minor ghodz, the Olympians, "the
ground of being, the Muslims' Ollie, the Deists' disinterested ghod -
these are all wildly or just subtly different.

I'd be happy if the religionists spent a feew thousand years hashing
out the issue of which ghod(z) "really" exist, and their actual qualities,
before they bothered us non-belivers about the one(s) they can agree on.

Thousands? Who am I kidding. They won't get that done before the
heat death of the universe. :)

> >Growing up in a Catholic family in he mid-late 20the century USA,
> >the ghod-idea permeated society, so that, for the majority, it was
> >a "default condition," even though, philosophically speaking, it
> >ought not be.
>
> I had something like that in the 1950s. My parents were atheist, and
> on one side it went back to before Darwin went on his voyage. They
> simply never mentioned religion. and it never occurred to me why some
> of the kids I played with in the park weren't there on Sunday (one or
> two on Saturday).
>
> I was eight when the subject was first introduced, and I still
> remember trying to explain to my stupid teacher why "who created all
> this, then" was a ridiculous question which rested on the presumption
> that it took somebody to do it - because it had never occurred to me,
> and she could not justify it using my life experience.
>

I take it this was in a public school, just before the Supreme
Court struck down prayer organiozed by such units of local government?
To this day their are public school teachers who don't get that
"witnessing" isn't part of their job description.

> >> When this troll keeps bringing it up, it's clearly important to him,
> >> and he wrongly imagines it is for the rest of us.
> >>
> >> >https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrum_of_theistic_probability
> >> >
> >> >I am confused about "I don't believe in a ghod, but I hope
> >> >I'm wrong." Sometimes one hopes for cosmic justice one has
> >> >no confidence will ever exist. I've used, "There's no hell,
> >> >but for guys like (Hitler, Stalin, Mao, etc) we should build
> >> >one and send them there." It's not a serious wish.
> >>
> >> He's stuck in a Christian-monotheist type of god-belief. Not even the
> >> Hindu one that you might suspect from his name and the country of his
> >> ISP. Let alone any of the other equally unjustified types.
> >>
> >> And he imagines we should know exactly what he means, which one and
> >> what its attributes are.
> >>

I have joked, when invited to Protestant worship services, that
I'm an ex-Catholic, and it makes me uncomfortable to be proselytized
by the 'heretics." The "true church" to not go to is the RCC! :)

> >> >I wish I were immortal, but I also wish the Guardians of the
> >> >Universe would pick me to be the holder of the battery and
> >> >power ring for sector 2814. That's not going to happen, either.
> >> >
> >> >Much of the problem atheism has in appealing to people is its
> >> >insistance on dealing with reality without crutches like an
> >> >afterlife and final judgment of people's lives. We have no
> >> >expectation of "well done, thou good and faithful servant."
> >> >We die, case closed.
> >>
> >> Most theists can't get their minds around this. So they imagine we
> >> have the same concerns that they were brainwashed to have, which the
> >> religion they were brainwashed to believe conveniently answers.
> >
> >Much of that early conditioning can re-emerge, if one has a trauma,
> >or is under sedation, and your conscious mind is pushed out of the
> >"driver's seat." I'm afraid all who were raised like I was are in
> >danger of reverting, should dementia kick in. If I'm calling for
> >a priest on my deathbed, that will probably be why.
>
> It would never occur to me because I didn't have that conditioning.
> When I was close to death with a critical lung condition in the 2000s,
> my main concern was that I would never see my loved ones again -
> family, Special Lady who lived on the other coast and whom I'd fly to
> see her regularly, cats (they're people too), etc.
>
> It totally pissed me off when people said I should thank the god of
> somebody else's religion, when it was the skill of the doctors and
> nursing staff, coupled with modern medical technology.

It is such an insult to call the results of all that study, training
and skill "a miracle." It would be a "miracle" if the result was
achieved WITHOUT all that very real human effort. Yahooey and
Josh are credit hogs - "All Glory To God." When I was in school, kids
were encouraged to head their papers with initials such as "JMJ" for
"Jesus, Mary and Joseph" or AMDG, which is "Ad maiorem Dei gloriam"
a Latin tag translated as "For the greater glory of God." That's
the Jesuit motto.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_maiorem_Dei_gloriam

If I were 8 years old again, I'd head my papers ESCH:
Ego sum humana cogitandi - I am a thinking human.

[Davej]

On Sunday, December 30, 2018 at 9:46:55 PM UTC-6, alal...@gmail.com wrote:
> ...find happiness in the afterlife if there is one.

Your posts continue to be semi-religious in nature, and then you
pretend to wonder why atheists here find you annoying.

[default]

On Thu, 3 Jan 2019 09:26:46 -0800 (PST), Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com>
wrote:

Until someone produces a god, I plan to stay with reality and leave
the occult and fantasy to those who need those things. Humans
shouldn't have gods (real or imagined IMO) since we don't how to
relate to a god. We use god when we want to shirk responsibility, and
justify evil. That's a very poor track record IMO.

I don't for one second believe that "Abhinav" (BTW definition:
young/clever) is anything but a religious troll and is far more clever
than honest.

If there were gods or a god, I am convinced he'd (it) would be nothing
at all like the gods we have invented, and could find a better use for
his talents than fretting over our tiny problems. We would be beneath
the notice of a god.

[Kevrob]

On Thursday, January 3, 2019 at 2:50:09 PM UTC-5, default wrote:

>
> Until someone produces a god, I plan to stay with reality and leave
> the occult and fantasy to those who need those things. Humans
> shouldn't have gods (real or imagined IMO) since we don't how to
> relate to a god. We use god when we want to shirk responsibility, and
> justify evil. That's a very poor track record IMO.
>
> I don't for one second believe that "Abhinav" (BTW definition:
> young/clever) is anything but a religious troll and is far more clever
> than honest.
>
> If there were gods or a god, I am convinced he'd (it) would be nothing
> at all like the gods we have invented, and could find a better use for
> his talents than fretting over our tiny problems. We would be beneath
> the notice of a god.

I always say, show me a non-Homo Sapiens Sapiens thinking being of
any knd, then we can decide what it is: not as advanced as we are,
our peers, or beyond us. Even if they are more advanced, they would
not necessarily be "ghodz."

Find the thng, then name it, is how biologists usually go about it.

[Christopher A. Lee]

On Thu, 3 Jan 2019 11:13:35 -0800 (PST), Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com>

As far as I'm concerned, it's just plain rude to talk about religious
doctrines as if they were fact, and as if they applied to people they
know don't believe in the first place - whether it's their
god/Jesus/etc or their strictures on matters of conscience.

>That's what makes the idea, if not the name, of ignosticism
>interesting to me. It defies the commonly accepted notion that
>everyone has an idea of ghod, and enough in common to discuss it.
>When i took philosophy in school, one thin they drummed into us
>was that terms had to be nivocal withing an argument. Equivocation
>is a fallacy. If two people are discussing "god" and they use two
>definitions that are different enough, they aren't talking about the
>same thing, at all. The yahooey of the Jews, the Christian trinity,
>the Hindu major trio and assorted minor ghodz, the Olympians, "the
>ground of being, the Muslims' Ollie, the Deists' disinterested ghod -
>these are all wildly or just subtly different.

Even among different denominations of the same religion.

>I'd be happy if the religionists spent a feew thousand years hashing
>out the issue of which ghod(z) "really" exist, and their actual qualities,
>before they bothered us non-belivers about the one(s) they can agree on.
>
>Thousands? Who am I kidding. They won't get that done before the
>heat death of the universe. :)
>
>> >Growing up in a Catholic family in he mid-late 20the century USA,
>> >the ghod-idea permeated society, so that, for the majority, it was
>> >a "default condition," even though, philosophically speaking, it
>> >ought not be.
>>
>> I had something like that in the 1950s. My parents were atheist, and
>> on one side it went back to before Darwin went on his voyage. They
>> simply never mentioned religion. and it never occurred to me why some
>> of the kids I played with in the park weren't there on Sunday (one or
>> two on Saturday).
>>
>> I was eight when the subject was first introduced, and I still
>> remember trying to explain to my stupid teacher why "who created all
>> this, then" was a ridiculous question which rested on the presumption
>> that it took somebody to do it - because it had never occurred to me,
>> and she could not justify it using my life experience.
>>
>
>I take it this was in a public school, just before the Supreme
>Court struck down prayer organiozed by such units of local government?
>To this day their are public school teachers who don't get that
>"witnessing" isn't part of their job description.

It was in England, where the laws are different.

The only way to get the CofE on board the 1947 Education Act was to
make CofE religious assembly and education mandatory unless parents
opted out - which they did if they were Jewish, Catholic, etc.

There wasn't actual religious assembly in my primary school for the
first few years, just "hands together, eyes closed" which I thought
was a silly game, which got me into minor trouble and I never
understood why. Also silly stories which meant nothing to me. It
wasn't until I was eight that I had a teacher who made a fuss about
expecting these to be taken seriously.

And that's when Realised that some adults, even teachers, were
complete idiots and not to be trusted. To me, everything was just
"school" and I couldn't tell the difference between being expected to
believe her god stuff and anything else.

So I went from being the class prodigy to the disruptive one who kept
asking questions to see if she knew what she was talking about. Which
she didn't in too many areas, and earned me visits to the educational
psychiatrist - who told my parents that he sided with me and
understood completely why I'd reacted the way I did.

When the rest of the class trooped off to assembly, I was "excused" it
and went to a room where there was a very interesting teacher who
discussed interesting things. The same thing happened with the
religious instruction classes.

I didn't like being "excused" when I hadn't done anything wrong - to
me "esc use me" was what you said after you farted, to ask people's
forgiveness and I hadn't done anything that needed forgiving.

>> >> When this troll keeps bringing it up, it's clearly important to him,
>> >> and he wrongly imagines it is for the rest of us.
>> >>
>> >> >https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrum_of_theistic_probability
>> >> >
>> >> >I am confused about "I don't believe in a ghod, but I hope
>> >> >I'm wrong." Sometimes one hopes for cosmic justice one has
>> >> >no confidence will ever exist. I've used, "There's no hell,
>> >> >but for guys like (Hitler, Stalin, Mao, etc) we should build
>> >> >one and send them there." It's not a serious wish.
>> >>
>> >> He's stuck in a Christian-monotheist type of god-belief. Not even the
>> >> Hindu one that you might suspect from his name and the country of his
>> >> ISP. Let alone any of the other equally unjustified types.
>> >>
>> >> And he imagines we should know exactly what he means, which one and
>> >> what its attributes are.
>> >>
>
>I have joked, when invited to Protestant worship services, that
>I'm an ex-Catholic, and it makes me uncomfortable to be proselytized
>by the 'heretics." The "true church" to not go to is the RCC! :)

Like the old joke about Northern Ireland.... "but are you a Catholic
atheist or a Protestant atheist".

Which was a bit like something that my Lady friend was asked. She's a
Catholic, dark-skinned Indian whose mother was from Kerala at the
Southern tip and whose father was from Uttar Pradhesh (North of Delhi)
where people are lighter, and she inherited her mother's colouring but
not as dark...

"Are you black or white?"

"I'm Indian. We don't have black and white."

"But are you a black Indian or a white Indian?"

Incidentally, she, her family and her friends give the lie to the
accusation here that I hate all things religious when theist trolls
cannot address responses.

It's a variant of the survivor syndrome. The sample is seriously
skewed because only the people who get to survive could say or think
that.

And you never hear anybody say "Thank God he killed all those other
people".

>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_maiorem_Dei_gloriam
>
>If I were 8 years old again, I'd head my papers ESCH:
>Ego sum humana cogitandi - I am a thinking human.

:-)

I used to respond to a Catholic poster who would end his posts with
Latin church saying, with "Dominos pizza cum pepperoni et anchovisque"
to take the piss.

But I did five years of Latin between eleven and sixteen. At that time
it was a requirement for Oxford and Cambridge, possibly a few other
top universities as well, so that any kid who planned on going to
university took it.

Even though it's a dead language, it has been very useful in
understanding several modern languages even if I don't speak them, not
to mention the "archaeology" and migration from a common Indo-European
ancestor tongue and an even earlier proto- Indo-European language that
has been theorised and even back-tracked from modern and historical
ones.

Its strict grammar has also meant that I spoke more grammatical
English, although I am getting a bit slack these days.

[Don Martin]

His mental capacity limits his despising over any distance greater
than 3 inches.

--
aa #2278 Never mind "proof." Where is your evidence?
BAAWA Chief Assistant to the Assistant Chief Heckler
Fidei defensor (Hon. Antipodean)
Je pense, donc je suis Charlie.

[Kevrob]

I wouldn't mind such discussions among _intimate_ friends.
Any Joe Blow (or Bloggs) who asked that would merit a "that's
a bit personal,. isn;t it buddy/mate?"

> >That's what makes the idea, if not the name, of ignosticism
> >interesting to me. It defies the commonly accepted notion that
> >everyone has an idea of ghod, and enough in common to discuss it.
> >When i took philosophy in school, one thin they drummed into us
> >was that terms had to be nivocal withing an argument. Equivocation
> >is a fallacy. If two people are discussing "god" and they use two
> >definitions that are different enough, they aren't talking about the
> >same thing, at all. The yahooey of the Jews, the Christian trinity,
> >the Hindu major trio and assorted minor ghodz, the Olympians, "the
> >ground of being, the Muslims' Ollie, the Deists' disinterested ghod -
> >these are all wildly or just subtly different.
>
> Even among different denominations of the same religion.
>

Oh, yes.

See Emo Phillips on this issue:

https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2005/sep/29/comedy.religion

> >I'd be happy if the religionists spent a feew thousand years hashing
> >out the issue of which ghod(z) "really" exist, and their actual qualities,
> >before they bothered us non-belivers about the one(s) they can agree on.
> >
> >Thousands? Who am I kidding. They won't get that done before the
> >heat death of the universe. :)
> >
> >> >Growing up in a Catholic family in he mid-late 20the century USA,
> >> >the ghod-idea permeated society, so that, for the majority, it was
> >> >a "default condition," even though, philosophically speaking, it
> >> >ought not be.
> >>
> >> I had something like that in the 1950s. My parents were atheist, and
> >> on one side it went back to before Darwin went on his voyage. They
> >> simply never mentioned religion. and it never occurred to me why some
> >> of the kids I played with in the park weren't there on Sunday (one or
> >> two on Saturday).
> >>
> >> I was eight when the subject was first introduced, and I still
> >> remember trying to explain to my stupid teacher why "who created all
> >> this, then" was a ridiculous question which rested on the presumption
> >> that it took somebody to do it - because it had never occurred to me,
> >> and she could not justify it using my life experience.
> >>
> >
> >I take it this was in a public school, just before the Supreme
> >Court struck down prayer organiozed by such units of local government?
> >To this day their are public school teachers who don't get that
> >"witnessing" isn't part of their job description.
>
> It was in England, where the laws are different.
>

US First Amendment prohibitions on teaching religion, organized
prayer and bible reading were not fully in effect until a series
of 1950s and 1960s court cases put a (theoretical) end to it in
government schools. ("the public schools," colloquially.)

There are still folks trying to reintroduce it, one way or
another.

> The only way to get the CofE on board the 1947 Education Act was to
> make CofE religious assembly and education mandatory unless parents
> opted out - which they did if they were Jewish, Catholic, etc.
>

That was Norn Iron, then?

I learned that watching Dave Allen on US TV in the 1970s.
I loved that guy.

My people were from places like Roscommon, Longford and Kerry.

> Which was a bit like something that my Lady friend was asked. She's a
> Catholic, dark-skinned Indian whose mother was from Kerala at the
> Southern tip and whose father was from Uttar Pradhesh (North of Delhi)
> where people are lighter, and she inherited her mother's colouring but
> not as dark...
>
> "Are you black or white?"
>
> "I'm Indian. We don't have black and white."
>

The Brits who ran the place so long certainly brought that
prejudice with them.

You do still hear "they were hit with that disaster" or "that plague"
as a "punishment from ghod."

> >https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_maiorem_Dei_gloriam
> >
> >If I were 8 years old again, I'd head my papers ESCH:
> >Ego sum humana cogitandi - I am a thinking human.
>
> :-)
>
> I used to respond to a Catholic poster who would end his posts with
> Latin church saying, with "Dominos pizza cum pepperoni et anchovisque"
> to take the piss.
>
> But I did five years of Latin between eleven and sixteen. At that time
> it was a requirement for Oxford and Cambridge, possibly a few other
> top universities as well, so that any kid who planned on going to
> university took it.
>
> Even though it's a dead language, it has been very useful in
> understanding several modern languages even if I don't speak them, not
> to mention the "archaeology" and migration from a common Indo-European
> ancestor tongue and an even earlier proto- Indo-European language that
> has been theorised and even back-tracked from modern and historical
> ones.
>
> Its strict grammar has also meant that I spoke more grammatical
> English, although I am getting a bit slack these days.

I did 2 years of Latin in Catholic high school, then switched to
Spanish. I did win a prize for best translation of Caesar at
the county classical society contest after my second year. In a
county of a million people, there were probably 10 schools still
teaching Latin, so not too much competition! My school used to
require all new students take 1 year of Latin. The discipline
of dealing with a declined language would hold you in good stead
when switching to something like Spanish or French later, even
if you didn't take anymore Latin. Freshmen (and -women) didn't have
to worry about conversation and accent, the downfall of most first-
year students in the other Romance languages. My class was one
of the first for whom Latin was not required. We were also the
last to graduate, before the school closed for good.

it's been over 45 years, and I can still remember that "Gallia est
omnis divisa in partes tres..." :)

[Ted]

I've always enjoyed reading your posts, Christopher. Thanks for sharing
them with us.

[Christopher A. Lee]

<blush>

[Kevrob]

+1!

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

On Sun, 30 Dec 2018 19:46:51 -0800 (PST), alal...@gmail.com wrote:

>I hope that myself, and my friends, followers, and allies find happiness in the afterlife if there is one. Wether through rebirth or in heaven, or whatever happens in reality.

actually there is no chance of a life after death. Unless you can
explain to me how the energy from a chemical reaction can continue
even after the chemical reactions have stopped. Or perhaps you can
tell me where the energy for this magical after life originates, dark
energy perhaps???

Face it you are a moron that believes that fairies are real.

>
>Abhinav Lal
>Writer & Investor
>

--

____/~~~sine qua non~~~\____

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

On Thu, 03 Jan 2019 12:03:53 -0500, default <def...@defaulter.net>
wrote:

yeah I called it on its bullshit on like its second post that I read
from it.

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

On Thu, 03 Jan 2019 11:46:52 -0600, Christopher A. Lee

Chris why can no one but you and I see this? why do people not realize
that if they are 99.99999999999999999999999 atheist it means that
they are still 100% theist.

[default]

I know what you mean. In every post it seems he is professing to be
an atheist and then there's a "but."

Which might seem like a clever way to manipulate someone into doubting
what is reality in favor of a paranormal belief. Blatant, transparent
attempts at manipulation are very insulting IMO.

He's not quite as clever as he'd like to believe.

[Kevrob]

On Thursday, January 3, 2019 at 10:56:13 PM UTC-5, Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl wrote:
> On Thu, 03 Jan 2019 11:46:52 -0600, Christopher A. Lee
> <c....@fairpoint.net> wrote:
>
> >On Thu, 3 Jan 2019 09:26:46 -0800 (PST), Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com>

> >>I don't see anything wrong with putting a confidence level
> >>on one's opinion. "I'm 95% certain that ghodz are baloney"
> >>would be something I'd say. i have put myself at 6.99999...
> >>(repeating decimal) on the "Dawkins scale" of atheism, aka
> >>the "Spectrum of theistic probability."
> >
> >Why even give them a thought?
> >
> >But atheism per se is still binary - either one is a theist or one
> >isn't.
>
> Chris why can no one but you and I see this? why do people not realize
> that if they are 99.99999999999999999999999 atheist it means that
> they are still 100% theist.
>

I think you are being much too strict. Someone who is _almost_
100% sure there are no ghodz, and "rounds up" and call himself an
atheist is not a "theist."

You don't have to be absolutely sure there are no godz to be an atheist.
You have to be unconvinced there are any: that's all.

I won't always say "there are absolutley no ghodz," but I will say
that there aren't any, for all practical purposes, just as I won't
say "Russel's Teapot" can't exist, thought it almost certainly doesn't.

> >But it would never occur to me to say that "ghodz are baloney" except
> >possibly in response to what some theist says to me - and what I would
> >say depends on what the theist said.

I imagine you are a "hard 7" on this scale.

> >>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrum_of_theistic_probability

Dawkins put himself at 6.9. Are you calling him a theist?

Now, if and when (probably, never) the Sufficiently Advanced Aliens
show up, I'm not going to call them ghodz, and will chip in for
the necropsy for the first one who drops dead here, so we can figure
out just what they are. But any non-human intelligence might be confused
with ghodz, per Clarke's Third law. Thing is, we have never encountered
one of those, try as the theists might to claim we have. They have
no convincing evidence of ghodz, angels, etc.

[quote]

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

[/quote] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarke%27s_three_laws

Not everyone agrees with that, of course:

https://io9.gizmodo.com/technology-isnt-magic-why-clarkes-third-law-always-bug-479194151

OR

https://outline.com/j7bsPC

We do have human evidence of things like Pacific island
cargo cults, though.

You can still be an atheist and have an "open mind,"
but it isn't open like leaving all the doors and windows
of your house flung open. It just means you are willing to
look at NEW evidence. Of course, our PRaTT-repeatng trolls
rarely present us with anything new.

[Christopher A. Lee]

On Fri, 4 Jan 2019 08:04:44 -0800 (PST), Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com>
wrote:

>On Thursday, January 3, 2019 at 10:56:13 PM UTC-5, Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl wrote:
>> On Thu, 03 Jan 2019 11:46:52 -0600, Christopher A. Lee
>> <c....@fairpoint.net> wrote:
>>
>> >On Thu, 3 Jan 2019 09:26:46 -0800 (PST), Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com>
>
>> >>I don't see anything wrong with putting a confidence level
>> >>on one's opinion. "I'm 95% certain that ghodz are baloney"
>> >>would be something I'd say. i have put myself at 6.99999...
>> >>(repeating decimal) on the "Dawkins scale" of atheism, aka
>> >>the "Spectrum of theistic probability."
>> >
>> >Why even give them a thought?
>> >
>> >But atheism per se is still binary - either one is a theist or one
>> >isn't.
>>
>> Chris why can no one but you and I see this? why do people not realize
>> that if they are 99.99999999999999999999999 atheist it means that
>> they are still 100% theist.

Bollocks.

>I think you are being much too strict. Someone who is _almost_
>100% sure there are no ghodz, and "rounds up" and call himself an
>atheist is not a "theist."

There are actually two issues here...

He claims he is an atheist.

He hopes one particular god doesn't exist.

And this second part is what I don't understand.

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

On Fri, 4 Jan 2019 08:04:44 -0800 (PST), Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com>
wrote:

>On Thursday, January 3, 2019 at 10:56:13 PM UTC-5, Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl wrote:
>> On Thu, 03 Jan 2019 11:46:52 -0600, Christopher A. Lee
>> <c....@fairpoint.net> wrote:
>>
>> >On Thu, 3 Jan 2019 09:26:46 -0800 (PST), Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com>
>
>> >>I don't see anything wrong with putting a confidence level
>> >>on one's opinion. "I'm 95% certain that ghodz are baloney"
>> >>would be something I'd say. i have put myself at 6.99999...
>> >>(repeating decimal) on the "Dawkins scale" of atheism, aka
>> >>the "Spectrum of theistic probability."
>> >
>> >Why even give them a thought?
>> >
>> >But atheism per se is still binary - either one is a theist or one
>> >isn't.
>>
>> Chris why can no one but you and I see this? why do people not realize
>> that if they are 99.99999999999999999999999 atheist it means that
>> they are still 100% theist.
>>
>
>I think you are being much too strict. Someone who is _almost_
>100% sure there are no ghodz, and "rounds up" and call himself an
>atheist is not a "theist."

I will give you another analogy, this should clear it up....

Atheism is as Chris said IS binary.. it is a yes or a no question. It
is not something that can nor should be handed out in various stages
or levels. Either you are and you know there is no god or you are not
and there is a god.

The analogy is this. There is life and there is death. if you are
alive then you are alive, life meaning your brain sustains the
chemical reactions that store and reproduce memory. Death is when
these chemical reactions stop and there is no way to recover them. If
you are 99.999999999999% dead then you are still 100 % alive. Your
health may be poor and you may die any second but there is always a
chance that you may recover so you are still 100% alive. When you are
declared brain dead then there is no way to recover.

Atheism is like death and theism is like life in this analogy.

Being atheist is absolute, the only middle ground is agnostic or maybe
even pantheism, agnostic know that the existence of a god can not be
proven and it actually says nothing about belief. So an agnostic can
be either theist or atheist. If the agnostic says they may be a god
then that would mean that no matter what they say they are theist. If
an agnostic says there are no gods but its existence can not be proven
either way then that agnostic would be atheist. Pantheist is a little
harder to explain, I feel though that it can still be a atheist or
agnostic thing though. The universe is a pantheists god, but if that
pantheist worships an idol as representing the universe then they are
a theist. If that pantheist know that there is no idol or
consciousness to this universal god then they would be an atheist.


The pantheist views I expressed here are just my opinionated views.

>
>You don't have to be absolutely sure there are no godz to be an atheist.
>You have to be unconvinced there are any: that's all.

If you are not absolutely sure that there are no gods then you don't
fit the given definition of an atheist.

a暗he搏st
/'aTHe?st/Submit
noun
a person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or
gods.

If you think there may be a small chance there is a god then you do
not lack belief.

>
>I won't always say "there are absolutley no ghodz," but I will say
>that there aren't any, for all practical purposes, just as I won't
>say "Russel's Teapot" can't exist, thought it almost certainly doesn't.
>
>> >But it would never occur to me to say that "ghodz are baloney" except
>> >possibly in response to what some theist says to me - and what I would
>> >say depends on what the theist said.
>
>I imagine you are a "hard 7" on this scale.
>
>> >>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrum_of_theistic_probability
>
>Dawkins put himself at 6.9. Are you calling him a theist?

DO I believe dawkins is a theist? No I do not. Do I consider dawkins a
person that does not really know what he is trying to even say? Hell
yes. I have read and own the god delusion and vaguely remember reading
that. But I do not remember what was before or after to put it in
proper context, and I really do not feel like reading the entire book
again since it is a hard back and I believe a first edition and it is
rather lengthy.
In any case I sent a few emails to his foundation with hopes that the
email will eventually get to him. Then I will get back with you about
this if I ever get a response.

[Kevrob]

> atheist
> /'aTHe?st/

> noun
> a person who disbelieves

[quote]

disbelieve VERB [WITH OBJECT]
1 Be unable to believe.

"he seemed to disbelieve her"

1.1 [no object ] Have no religious faith.
"to disbelieve is as much an act of faith as belief"

[/quote]

https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/disbelieve

> or lacks belief in the existence of God or
> gods.
>

Now, is the first you, an atheist, and the second me, and somehow
NOT an atheist?

We are both atheists.

I think the dictionary definitions are not on point.
They are supposed, nowadays, to report on the meanings people
give words, rather than be prescriptive about how we are to use tehm.

{search on "prescriptivists v descriptivists" and read as much as
you can stand of the debate.}

> If you think there may be a small chance there is a god then you do
> not lack belief.
>

Hogwash. It just means that, like any scientist, you are able to
entertain the idea that you could be wrong, no more than that.

> >I won't always say "there are absolutley no ghodz," but I will say
> >that there aren't any, for all practical purposes, just as I won't
> >say "Russel's Teapot" can't exist, thought it almost certainly doesn't.
> >
> >> >But it would never occur to me to say that "ghodz are baloney" except
> >> >possibly in response to what some theist says to me - and what I would
> >> >say depends on what the theist said.
> >
> >I imagine you are a "hard 7" on this scale.
> >
> >> >>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrum_of_theistic_probability
> >
> >Dawkins put himself at 6.9. Are you calling him a theist?
>
> DO I believe dawkins is a theist? No I do not. Do I consider dawkins a
> person that does not really know what he is trying to even say? Hell
> yes. I have read and own the god delusion and vaguely remember reading
> that. But I do not remember what was before or after to put it in
> proper context, and I really do not feel like reading the entire book
> again since it is a hard back and I believe a first edition and it is
> rather lengthy.
> In any case I sent a few emails to his foundation with hopes that the
> email will eventually get to him. Then I will get back with you about
> this if I ever get a response.

I still think the serious position is, as I mentioned above:

[quote]

Ignosticism or igtheism...

the idea that the question of the existence of God is meaningless
because the term god has no coherent and unambiguous definition. It may
also be described as the theological position that every other
theological position (including agnosticism and atheism) assumes too
much about the concept of god and many other theological concepts.

[/quote]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignosticism

All the planted assumptions in the question "Do you
believe in ghod(z)?" can be called into question.

"You are asking the wrong question" is a good response.

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

On Fri, 4 Jan 2019 14:15:38 -0800 (PST), Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com>

well to be unable to believe implies that one is not physically or
mentally able to believe in gods
I am very much able as I was once a catholic and did believe.
so I that may be a definition of disbelief but it would not be one I
would use in any definition of atheist.

>We are both atheists.

If you are an atheist or not it is not an insult, I like you whether
you are either, we have great conversations and debates. What I mean
by I like you is I have no problem talking to you.

>
>I think the dictionary definitions are not on point.

I will fully agree there, each dictionary has something slightly
different. I sent a nasty feed back to google for using the word
disbelief in their definition of atheist, we will see if it has any
impact.

>They are supposed, nowadays, to report on the meanings people
>give words, rather than be prescriptive about how we are to use tehm.
>
>{search on "prescriptivists v descriptivists" and read as much as
> you can stand of the debate.}
>
>> If you think there may be a small chance there is a god then you do
>> not lack belief.
>>
>
>Hogwash. It just means that, like any scientist, you are able to
>entertain the idea that you could be wrong, no more than that.

I don't know about that.. You see a color lets say red. You know it is
red. There is no question that it is red or not. because you are a
scientist does that mean you must entertain the possibility that you
may be incorrect about it being red?

[Kevrob]

Same, here, but at some point belief becomes logically untenable.
In that sense, one is "unable," but many if not most folks are
quite able to push logical inconsistency aside.

> so I that may be a definition of disbelief but it would not be one I
> would use in any definition of atheist.
>
> >We are both atheists.
>
> If you are an atheist or not it is not an insult, I like you whether
> you are either, we have great conversations and debates. What I mean
> by I like you is I have no problem talking to you.
>
> >
> >I think the dictionary definitions are not on point.
>
> I will fully agree there, each dictionary has something slightly
> different. I sent a nasty feed back to google for using the word
> disbelief in their definition of atheist, we will see if it has any
> impact.
>
> >They are supposed, nowadays, to report on the meanings people
> >give words, rather than be prescriptive about how we are to use tehm.
> >
> >{search on "prescriptivists v descriptivists" and read as much as
> > you can stand of the debate.}
> >
> >> If you think there may be a small chance there is a god then you do
> >> not lack belief.
> >>
> >
> >Hogwash. It just means that, like any scientist, you are able to
> >entertain the idea that you could be wrong, no more than that.
>
> I don't know about that.. You see a color lets say red. You know it is
> red. There is no question that it is red or not. because you are a
> scientist does that mean you must entertain the possibility that you
> may be incorrect about it being red?
> >

One might have undiagnosed red/green colorblindness, and may
actually be looking at a different color.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_blindness#Red-green_color_blindness

Now, as I am in my sixth decade, and have rarely, if ever, had
any trouble distinguishing between the two colors, I would usually
trust I am not a sufferer of R/GCB. I could have acquired a defect
in my color vision, and yet be unaware of it:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26656928

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_blindness#Causes

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_blindness#Other_causes

A color-blind scientist could measure the color, absent
any inherent ability to perceive it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorimetry

---
Kevin R
a.a 2310

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

On Sun, 6 Jan 2019 12:34:04 -0800 (PST), Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com>

Not the point of what I was saying really.

>
>https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26656928
>
>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_blindness#Causes
>
>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_blindness#Other_causes
>
>A color-blind scientist could measure the color, absent
>any inherent ability to perceive it:
>
>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorimetry
>
>---
>Kevin R
>a.a 2310

[Robert Carnegie]

Oh yes.

See:
<http://www.archimedes-lab.org/color_optical_illusions.html>

Also, off the cuff:

You may be looking at an object that isn't red
but is lit by red light.

<https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/best-optical-illusions-viral-stumped-the-internet-12-top-pictures-funny-a7948921.html>
doesn't live up to billing for me, but includes
a plate of strawberries in a picture manipulated
to contain no red. But they are less un-red than
the rest of the picture, and anyway they /should/
be red, so... they look red. (And creepy.)

The object may not exist where you see it.
It may be an image in a mirror, or on television.
Refraction disguises the location of an object in water,
or of the sun in the sky at sunset:
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_refraction>
means you're seeing the sun's light reaching you
from below the horizon. And the sun isn't red.
A distant star may appear as a red giant when
actually it has ceased to exist, or rather has
exploded as a supernova and then become a white dwarf -
this happens suddenly, but after a long time by our
standards.

If you look at something green for a while - I once did
this unintentionally with an old-fashioned one-colour
computer screen - your eye cells which see green will
get tired. When you look away, anything else will
look red, because your red eye cells are still strong.
Don't quote me, because I'm saying this wrong,
but it happens.

[Rick Johnson]

Christ[...] wrote:

[...]

> Atheism is as Chris said IS binary.. it is a yes or a no question. It
> is not something that can nor should be handed out in various stages
> or levels. Either you are and you know there is no god or you are not
> and there is a god.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news here, but... an overinflated ego doth not qualify one as an atheist. Much less, _more_ of an atheist. Son, your ego is irrelevant.

> Being atheist is absolute,

Only Siths and the koolaide drinking foot-soldiers of ideological manipulators deal in absolutes. Which one are you?

> atheist

> /'aTHe?st/Submit
> noun
> a person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or
> gods.
>
> If you think there may be a small chance there is a god then you do
> not lack belief.

With such a close-minded perspective, i surmise you will find many kindred spirits in church houses and beer halls.

What you are doing here, under the intoxicating spell of your ego, is attempting to convert atheism into another absolutist religion. Well, no thanks! Please spend more time thinking, and less time blathering on as if you "know" everything. As they say: the empty can rattles the most...

[malkinm...@gmail.com]

My father said that all he remembered of Latin was 'Gallia es divisa en
tres partes'. I guess he didn't remember as much as he thought he did.
It sounded like he Anglicized it grammatically.

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

On Mon, 7 Jan 2019 15:41:21 -0800 (PST), Rick Johnson
<rantingri...@gmail.com> wrote:

>Christ[...] wrote:
>
>[...]
>
>> Atheism is as Chris said IS binary.. it is a yes or a no question. It
>> is not something that can nor should be handed out in various stages
>> or levels. Either you are and you know there is no god or you are not
>> and there is a god.
>
>Sorry to be the bearer of bad news here, but... an overinflated ego doth not qualify one as an atheist. Much less, _more_ of an atheist. Son, your ego is irrelevant.

Well first I am not nor would I ever want to be your son, second what
you just said about ego has NOTHING and I mean NOTHING to do with what
I said. So basically what you just said is irrelevant.

>
>> Being atheist is absolute,
>
>Only Siths and the koolaide drinking foot-soldiers of ideological manipulators deal in absolutes. Which one are you?

Well when you put it that way it MAKES NOT A FUCKING bit of sense
because you are talking about fantasy and fiction. Stick to the real
world buddy and it may help you out in the future.

>
>> atheist
>> /'aTHe?st/Submit
>> noun
>> a person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or
>> gods.
>>
>> If you think there may be a small chance there is a god then you do
>> not lack belief.
>
>With such a close-minded perspective, i surmise you will find many kindred spirits in church houses and beer halls.

If you do not understand what was said then I would suggest that you
not respond to it, otherwise you just sound like a 6 year old kid that
has failed kindergarten

>
>What you are doing here, under the intoxicating spell of your ego, is attempting to convert atheism into another absolutist religion.

Actually I am not, I am simply defining what atheism means to me.

> Well, no thanks! Please spend more time thinking, and less time blathering on as if you "know" everything. As they say: the empty can rattles the most...

Wow, retarded much? are you so scared of your magical fairies that you
believe in that you must make yourself look like a moron when you get
offended by something that is obviously way above your station?

[Malcolm McMahon]

Yes, nothing, and I mean _nothing_ is 100% certain. At the extreme, maybe you're just a brain in a jar and everything you perceive is being fed to you from a computer simulation. "Red", for a start, is a cluster concept there are colours some people would describe as red, others might call "orange" or "magenta". (I hear that when oranges first arrived in the English speaking world they were described as "red" until "orange" became a colour word.)

Maybe you're seeing a white object illuminated by coloured light. Maybe your brain is playing up. You could be six nines certain of many things but that magic 100% certain is something you can only approach.

[nyi...@bellsouth.net]

Hi, Robert! I've been on a posting break from Usenet since just
before Christmas, but I'll be returning to sci.bio.paleontology
later this week, and perhaps also to talk.origins, though I might
postpone my re-entry there till next week.

They do not look red to me, in the doctored photograph. They look
brown with a hint of purple. I've seen a few strawberries that
actually looked like that, and immediately thrown them out.

My subjective experience of red is of a very specific and vivid
color that could not be mistaken for what I saw in the photograph.

Objectively speaking, a color-blind person could be trained to
pick out red objects a great deal of the time, and technology
could make his choices infallible if he could be provided with
an apparatus that analyzes wavelengths of light to the requisite degree.

But it seems, from all that I have read, that no color-blind person
could be artificially stimulated to subjectively experience "red"
the way I experience it.

I am even more confident that we will never be able to program
computers to have that experience. For one thing, our subjective
experience of "red" may be dependent on chemical reactions in our
brains, which are mostly non-metallic.

More importantly, physics by its present nature cannot give
evidence that we have succeeded in this task, even if we did
succeed. Subjective experience is an "emergent" property
which is completely different from the physical properties
with which physics is concerned.

> The object may not exist where you see it.
> It may be an image in a mirror, or on television.
> Refraction disguises the location of an object in water,
> or of the sun in the sky at sunset:
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_refraction>
> means you're seeing the sun's light reaching you
> from below the horizon. And the sun isn't red.

We are seeing a biased sample of the sun's wavelengths at
sunset. I hope Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl is not so
naive as to think otherwise.

> A distant star may appear as a red giant when
> actually it has ceased to exist, or rather has
> exploded as a supernova and then become a white dwarf -
> this happens suddenly, but after a long time by our
> standards.
>
> If you look at something green for a while - I once did
> this unintentionally with an old-fashioned one-colour
> computer screen - your eye cells which see green will
> get tired. When you look away, anything else will
> look red, because your red eye cells are still strong.
> Don't quote me, because I'm saying this wrong,
> but it happens.

Again, you are speaking in purely objective terms about
what is being perceived, rather than the subjective perception itself.


Peter Nyikos
Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
University of South Carolina
http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos/

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

On Sun, 30 Dec 2018 19:46:51 -0800 (PST), alal...@gmail.com wrote:

>I hope that myself, and my friends, followers, and allies find happiness in the afterlife if there is one. Wether through rebirth or in heaven, or whatever happens in reality.
>
>Abhinav Lal
>Writer & Investor
>

There is also a slim chance that harry pottter is alive and well
living in hogwarts. Right?

[Robert Carnegie]

I just remembered that unripe strawberries are green
anyway.

> My subjective experience of red is of a very specific and vivid
> color that could not be mistaken for what I saw in the photograph.
>
> Objectively speaking, a color-blind person could be trained to
> pick out red objects a great deal of the time, and technology
> could make his choices infallible if he could be provided with
> an apparatus that analyzes wavelengths of light to the requisite degree.
>
> But it seems, from all that I have read, that no color-blind person
> could be artificially stimulated to subjectively experience "red"
> the way I experience it.
>
> I am even more confident that we will never be able to program
> computers to have that experience. For one thing, our subjective
> experience of "red" may be dependent on chemical reactions in our
> brains, which are mostly non-metallic.
>
> More importantly, physics by its present nature cannot give
> evidence that we have succeeded in this task, even if we did
> succeed. Subjective experience is an "emergent" property
> which is completely different from the physical properties
> with which physics is concerned.

I disagree. If you're going to believe that human
beings are special and different then, in science,
you should prove it.

> > The object may not exist where you see it.
> > It may be an image in a mirror, or on television.
> > Refraction disguises the location of an object in water,
> > or of the sun in the sky at sunset:
> > <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_refraction>
> > means you're seeing the sun's light reaching you
> > from below the horizon. And the sun isn't red.
>
> We are seeing a biased sample of the sun's wavelengths at
> sunset. I hope Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl is not so
> naive as to think otherwise.

Actually, I wanted to be a pest when Christ said,
"scientific scepticism be damned, if I see the colour
red then obviously it is" - or, rather like that.

In most of these cases there is red to be seen,
I admit. Sometimes not.

> > A distant star may appear as a red giant when
> > actually it has ceased to exist, or rather has
> > exploded as a supernova and then become a white dwarf -
> > this happens suddenly, but after a long time by our
> > standards.
> >
> > If you look at something green for a while - I once did
> > this unintentionally with an old-fashioned one-colour
> > computer screen - your eye cells which see green will
> > get tired. When you look away, anything else will
> > look red, because your red eye cells are still strong.
> > Don't quote me, because I'm saying this wrong,
> > but it happens.
>
> Again, you are speaking in purely objective terms about
> what is being perceived, rather than the subjective perception itself.

I think it is subjective that you see red, or pink,
when your eyes are fatigued with green. (By the way,
my experience was with black print on a green background
screen, which even then wasn't usually done.)

I forget if anyone mentioned another case, of
"false colour" deliberately created in scientific
photography, where colour in a picture may represent
either non-visible radiation, or some other phenomenon
that isn't even about invisible colours.

Oh, and the British Empire, which on a world map
was coloured red. And Red States, and the Red Menace.

[nyi...@bellsouth.net]

I'm not suggesting human beings are any more special than
any other animal which consciously experiences qualia
like "red". In fact our conscious experience might not
include:

Whatever a bat experiences from its use of sonar.

Whatever a pit viper experiences of infrared waves.

Whatever a fish experiences from stimuli emanating from its lateral line.

Whatever colors a honeybee experiences from the ultraviolet.

Of course, the issue of which of these animals have subjective conscious
experience is an issue that needs to be addressed.
But physics seems powerless to address it.
Physics studies how certain objects influence others in
physical ways that do not hint at subjective experience.

Is it the cones in the eye that are fatigued, or is it the brain
cells that transmit signals from the cones to whatever
integrating complex that produces the virtual reality
within our brains of "objects out there."

"subjective" here seems to mean, "depending on the brain state of each
individual". So a person could say that he sees red when certain
neurons are "tired of firing."

> (By the way,
> my experience was with black print on a green background
> screen, which even then wasn't usually done.)
>
> I forget if anyone mentioned another case, of
> "false colour" deliberately created in scientific
> photography, where colour in a picture may represent
> either non-visible radiation, or some other phenomenon
> that isn't even about invisible colours.
>
> Oh, and the British Empire, which on a world map
> was coloured red.

Pink is what I would call the color that was usually used.

> And Red States, and the Red Menace.

I've often wondered why states that are more likely
to have talked about a "Red Menace" are now themselves
colored red. In older books of history and poli-sci, it is the states that
were solid Democratic that were colored red, and the ones
leaning Democratic that were colored pink.

A poli-sci textbook published only a few decades ago showed
a map of a Presidential election won by McKinley in
which the blue states were pretty close to what they were
in the 2012 election -- except that the blue states were
the ones that went for McKinley, and the red were the ones
that went for the Democratic candidate.

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
University of South Carolina

http://www.math.sc.edu/~nyikos/

[Mattb]

On Thu, 03 Jan 2019 10:24:25 -0500, default <def...@defaulter.net>
wrote:

>On Sun, 30 Dec 2018 19:46:51 -0800 (PST), alal...@gmail.com wrote:
>
>>I hope that myself, and my friends, followers, and allies find happiness in the afterlife if there is one. Wether through rebirth or in heaven, or whatever happens in reality.
>>
>>Abhinav Lal
>>Writer & Investor
>>

>You really need to belong to a religion.


Would reincarnation/rebirth require religion if it was possible?

[Robert Carnegie]

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persistence_of_vision>
thinks that both eye and brain are involved in
persistence-of-vision illusions, seeing what isn't
there. I gather that the eyes are wired straight
into the brain anyway, there isn't a good line
to draw between them. However, my experience
is of an illusory ghost that is off centre in the
eye, and when I try to look at it, it flies away;
in that case, it is in the eye itself, in the retina
I suppose, so that moving the eye just moves the
spectre away from where I'm looking.

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peripheral_drift_illusion>
is easier to think of as in the brain.

[nyi...@bellsouth.net]

On Friday, January 4, 2019 at 2:14:07 PM UTC-5, Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl wrote:
> On Fri, 4 Jan 2019 08:04:44 -0800 (PST), Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com>
> wrote:
>
> >On Thursday, January 3, 2019 at 10:56:13 PM UTC-5, Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl wrote:
> >> On Thu, 03 Jan 2019 11:46:52 -0600, Christopher A. Lee
> >> <c....@fairpoint.net> wrote:
> >>
> >> >On Thu, 3 Jan 2019 09:26:46 -0800 (PST), Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com>
> >
> >> >>I don't see anything wrong with putting a confidence level
> >> >>on one's opinion. "I'm 95% certain that ghodz are baloney"
> >> >>would be something I'd say. i have put myself at 6.99999...
> >> >>(repeating decimal) on the "Dawkins scale" of atheism, aka
> >> >>the "Spectrum of theistic probability."
> >> >
> >> >Why even give them a thought?
> >> >
> >> >But atheism per se is still binary - either one is a theist or one
> >> >isn't.
> >>
> >> Chris why can no one but you and I see this? why do people not realize
> >> that if they are 99.99999999999999999999999 atheist it means that
> >> they are still 100% theist.
> >>
> >
> >I think you are being much too strict. Someone who is _almost_
> >100% sure there are no ghodz, and "rounds up" and call himself an
> >atheist is not a "theist."

> I will give you another analogy, this should clear it up....

Not for me. You are using a definition of "theist" that I
don't think anyone else uses.

> Atheism is as Chris said IS binary.. it is a yes or a no question. It
> is not something that can nor should be handed out in various stages
> or levels. Either you are and you know there is no god or you are not
> and there is a god.

Mind if I mix an analogy with yours? Do you know there
is life on Mars, or do you know there is no life on Mars?

I am an "agnostic" on that subject, in the weak sense of
being in a state of suspended judgment about whether there
is life on Mars. That is the basis on which I call myself
an agnostic on whether there is some kind of god or no
kind of god.

> The analogy is this. There is life and there is death. if you are
> alive then you are alive, life meaning your brain sustains the
> chemical reactions that store and reproduce memory.

You are referring to a specific meaning of human life. But a
lot of your cells remain alive after you are dead in that sense,
and HeLa cells are continuing to reproduce long after the death
of the woman whose body they origniated from.

> Death is when
> these chemical reactions stop and there is no way to recover them. If
> you are 99.999999999999% dead then you are still 100 % alive. Your
> health may be poor and you may die any second but there is always a
> chance that you may recover so you are still 100% alive. When you are
> declared brain dead then there is no way to recover.
>
> Atheism is like death and theism is like life in this analogy.

Atheism is a belief about the nonexistence of certain entities.
Theism is a belief that at least one such entity exists.

Similarly, one can believe that there is no life on Mars,
or one can believe there is life on Mars.

At this point in time, a wise person says, "let's wait and see"
about Mars life.

The case of God is a little different. A believing Christian
will say, "let's wait and see until our deaths, and then
we will see there is a God."

An atheist, on the other hand, might disbelieve in supernatural
entities ("pixies" as you might call them) yet have a sinking
feeling in his stomach that maybe Epicurus was indulging
in wishful thinking when he claimed that death means total oblivion.

>
> Being atheist is absolute, the only middle ground is agnostic or maybe
> even pantheism, agnostic know that the existence of a god can not be
> proven and it actually says nothing about belief.

Right, I am in a state of suspended judgment, so I can't
say I believe nor can I say I disbelieve. And so I call
myself an agnostic.

> So an agnostic can
> be either theist or atheist. If the agnostic says they may be a god
> then that would mean that no matter what they say they are theist.

Like I said, you have a strange way of defining the word "theist."
Can you point to a dictionary that agrees with you?


<snip for focus>

> >You don't have to be absolutely sure there are no godz to be an atheist.
> >You have to be unconvinced there are any: that's all.
>
> If you are not absolutely sure that there are no gods then you don't
> fit the given definition of an atheist.
>
> a暗he搏st
> /'aTHe?st/Submit
> noun
> a person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or
> gods.

Those are two different concepts, linked with "or" rather than "and".
I don't disbelieve in the existence of God (or of life on Mars)
but I also lack belief in the existence of both.

>
> If you think there may be a small chance there is a god then you do
> not lack belief.

Ah, but belief IN WHAT? not in the actual existence, but only
in the possibility of existence.

> >I imagine you are a "hard 7" on this scale.
> >
> >> >>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrum_of_theistic_probability
> >
> >Dawkins put himself at 6.9. Are you calling him a theist?
>
> DO I believe dawkins is a theist? No I do not. Do I consider dawkins a
> person that does not really know what he is trying to even say? Hell
> yes.

I think it is you who do not know what Dawkins is trying to say.
And if you read what I wrote carefully, you will see why I think this.

<snip for focus>

> In any case I sent a few emails to his foundation with hopes that the
> email will eventually get to him. Then I will get back with you about
> this if I ever get a response.

If you get one, I think it will be worthwhile for you to start a whole
new thread about it.

Meanwhile, perhaps what I wrote above will help.


Peter Nyikos
Professor, Department of Math. -- standard disclaimer --
University of South Carolina
http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos/

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

You are giving consciousness a supernatural twist. Consciousness is
nothing more than chemical reactions inside the brain when a memory is
triggered that has been chemically stored inside the brain.

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

theist is the person that believes in a supernatural being or deity.
That is all

>
>
>> Atheism is as Chris said IS binary.. it is a yes or a no question. It
>> is not something that can nor should be handed out in various stages
>> or levels. Either you are and you know there is no god or you are not
>> and there is a god.
>
>Mind if I mix an analogy with yours? Do you know there
>is life on Mars, or do you know there is no life on Mars?

weather there is life on mars or not has nothing to do with the word
atheist.

>
>I am an "agnostic" on that subject, in the weak sense of
>being in a state of suspended judgment about whether there
>is life on Mars. That is the basis on which I call myself
>an agnostic on whether there is some kind of god or no
>kind of god.

I am talking about atheism not agnosticism

>
>> The analogy is this. There is life and there is death. if you are
>> alive then you are alive, life meaning your brain sustains the
>> chemical reactions that store and reproduce memory.
>
>You are referring to a specific meaning of human life. But a
>lot of your cells remain alive after you are dead in that sense,
>and HeLa cells are continuing to reproduce long after the death
>of the woman whose body they origniated from.

No there are no cells in your body that remain alive when you stop
breathing. Sure the cells may take a few minutes to die after
breathing has ceased but after a few minutes everything is dead.

>
>
>> Death is when
>> these chemical reactions stop and there is no way to recover them. If
>> you are 99.999999999999% dead then you are still 100 % alive. Your
>> health may be poor and you may die any second but there is always a
>> chance that you may recover so you are still 100% alive. When you are
>> declared brain dead then there is no way to recover.
>>
>> Atheism is like death and theism is like life in this analogy.
>
>Atheism is a belief about the nonexistence of certain entities.
>Theism is a belief that at least one such entity exists.

NO NO NO NO NO I don't know how many times I would need to say no, but
NO NO NO..

Atheism is the ABSENCE OF BELIEF in any deities or supernatural
beings. It sounds like I am just trying to play a game with words or
something. But to believe in the nonexistence and the absence of
belief are 2 totally different things. Theists use words like belief.
A belief requires faith.

>
>Similarly, one can believe that there is no life on Mars,
>or one can believe there is life on Mars.
>
>At this point in time, a wise person says, "let's wait and see"
>about Mars life.
>
>The case of God is a little different. A believing Christian
>will say, "let's wait and see until our deaths, and then
>we will see there is a God."
>
>An atheist, on the other hand, might disbelieve in supernatural

an atheist one the other hand has no belief in supernatural...

>entities ("pixies" as you might call them) yet have a sinking
>feeling in his stomach that maybe Epicurus was indulging
>in wishful thinking when he claimed that death means total oblivion.
>
>
>>
>> Being atheist is absolute, the only middle ground is agnostic or maybe
>> even pantheism, agnostic know that the existence of a god can not be
>> proven and it actually says nothing about belief.
>
>Right, I am in a state of suspended judgment, so I can't
>say I believe nor can I say I disbelieve. And so I call
>myself an agnostic.
>
>
>> So an agnostic can
>> be either theist or atheist. If the agnostic says they may be a god
>> then that would mean that no matter what they say they are theist.
>
>Like I said, you have a strange way of defining the word "theist."
>Can you point to a dictionary that agrees with you?
>
>
><snip for focus>
>
>> >You don't have to be absolutely sure there are no godz to be an atheist.
>> >You have to be unconvinced there are any: that's all.
>>
>> If you are not absolutely sure that there are no gods then you don't
>> fit the given definition of an atheist.
>>

>> a?he?st

[mitchr...@gmail.com]

The life after is real... spiritual ascending
to Heaven life and back into another body life.
That is a double life cycle... for the Earth
and Heaven forever...
God creates gravity.

Mitchell Raemsch

[nyi...@bellsouth.net]

Wrong. I am giving it a "view from within" twist.

Answer me this: if a bat is conscious of ultrasound like
we are of ordinary sounds, is its experience:

a. Something like our sight, like when we view sonograms
of developing fetuses?

b. Something like our hearing of sounds?

c. Something as different from anything we have consciously
experienced, as sight is from sound?

> Consciousness is
> nothing more than chemical reactions inside the brain when a memory is
> triggered that has been chemically stored inside the brain.

That is a statement that has been established less than two centuries
ago. Prior to that, people could only speak knowledgeably
about their own "view from within". You are talking about consciousness "from without". Your description conjures up the external view of the
brain as a bunch of gray matter. This is nothing like my internal
"virtual reality" of what goes on inside my brain, which seems to
be a whole world out there.

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Department of Math. -- standard disclaimer --

U. of South Carolina in Columbia
http://www.math.sc.edu/~nyikos/

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

On Tue, 15 Jan 2019 15:48:01 -0800 (PST), mitchr...@gmail.com
wrote:

You are coo coo for coco puffs....
Please never ever ever respond to me again you are a total nutjob

[default]

On Tue, 15 Jan 2019 12:48:36 -0800, Mattb <trdel...@gmail.com>
wrote:

I don't believe Abhinav Lal is honestly asking about an afterlife, his
agenda is more along the lines of trolling the atheism group, posing
as an atheist and introducing religious themes and ideas.

There's as much evidence for a god as there is for an afterlife, so in
that sense, a religion is required, because nothing in nature supports
the idea that there is an afterlife/reincarnation etc..

[Robert Carnegie]

We just do the atheism. It doesn't rule out an afterlife
of reincarnation, although I'm not expecting either.

The religious position on reincarnation (into the
current world) that I'm aware of, when a religion
includes it, is that reincarnation happens to you
whether you're religious or not, but you get a
better one if you're religious. I may be wrong;
I haven't looked into it much.

This is distinct, conventionally, from being
reincorporated after the end of the world, for
instance, as a version of your previous self,
as in Christianity, where everyone gets that too
but if you were a bad person then you are sentenced
and killed again.

[Kevrob]

On Tuesday, January 15, 2019 at 9:25:27 PM UTC-5, default wrote:
> On Tue, 15 Jan 2019 12:48:36 -0800, Mattb <trdel...@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> >On Thu, 03 Jan 2019 10:24:25 -0500, default <def...@defaulter.net>
> >wrote:
> >
> >>On Sun, 30 Dec 2018 19:46:51 -0800 (PST), alal...@gmail.com wrote:
> >>
> >>>I hope that myself, and my friends, followers, and allies find happiness in the afterlife if there is one. Wether through rebirth or in heaven, or whatever happens in reality.
> >>>

> >>>

> >>You really need to belong to a religion.
> >
> >
> >Would reincarnation/rebirth require religion if it was possible?
>
> I don't believe Abhinav Lal is honestly asking about an afterlife, his
> agenda is more along the lines of trolling the atheism group, posing
> as an atheist and introducing religious themes and ideas.
>
> There's as much evidence for a god as there is for an afterlife, so in
> that sense, a religion is required, because nothing in nature supports
> the idea that there is an afterlife/reincarnation etc..

There's atheism, and there is a wider a-supernaturalism: naturalism.

I'm a naturalist. I'm a-woo-woo of all types: reincarnation,
astrology, astral projection, remote viewing, dowsing, phrenology,
or any other unproven nonsense doesn't fly with me. There may be
intelligent life elsewhere in the universe, but there's no good
proof they have broken the lightspeed barrier and visited us.

One can be a non-believer in ghodz and still be taken in by some
form of woo.

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

On Tue, 15 Jan 2019 21:25:25 -0500, default <def...@defaulter.net>

wrote:

>On Tue, 15 Jan 2019 12:48:36 -0800, Mattb <trdel...@gmail.com>
>wrote:
>
>>On Thu, 03 Jan 2019 10:24:25 -0500, default <def...@defaulter.net>
>>wrote:
>>
>>>On Sun, 30 Dec 2018 19:46:51 -0800 (PST), alal...@gmail.com wrote:
>>>
>>>>I hope that myself, and my friends, followers, and allies find happiness in the afterlife if there is one. Wether through rebirth or in heaven, or whatever happens in reality.
>>>>
>>>>Abhinav Lal
>>>>Writer & Investor
>>>>
>>>You really need to belong to a religion.
>>
>>
>>Would reincarnation/rebirth require religion if it was possible?
>
>I don't believe Abhinav Lal is honestly asking about an afterlife, his
>agenda is more along the lines of trolling the atheism group, posing
>as an atheist and introducing religious themes and ideas.
>
>There's as much evidence for a god as there is for an afterlife, so in
>that sense, a religion is required, because nothing in nature supports
>the idea that there is an afterlife/reincarnation etc..

did someone forget to turn the mattb off? damn you guys have to
remember to click its off button so it will shut the fuck up

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

On Wed, 16 Jan 2019 02:42:22 -0800 (PST), Robert Carnegie
<rja.ca...@gmail.com> wrote:

>On Wednesday, 16 January 2019 02:25:27 UTC, default wrote:
>> On Tue, 15 Jan 2019 12:48:36 -0800, Mattb <trdel...@gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>> >On Thu, 03 Jan 2019 10:24:25 -0500, default <def...@defaulter.net>
>> >wrote:
>> >
>> >>On Sun, 30 Dec 2018 19:46:51 -0800 (PST), alal...@gmail.com wrote:
>> >>
>> >>>I hope that myself, and my friends, followers, and allies find happiness in the afterlife if there is one. Wether through rebirth or in heaven, or whatever happens in reality.
>> >>>
>> >>>Abhinav Lal
>> >>>Writer & Investor
>> >>>
>> >>You really need to belong to a religion.
>> >
>> >
>> >Would reincarnation/rebirth require religion if it was possible?
>>
>> I don't believe Abhinav Lal is honestly asking about an afterlife, his
>> agenda is more along the lines of trolling the atheism group, posing
>> as an atheist and introducing religious themes and ideas.
>>
>> There's as much evidence for a god as there is for an afterlife, so in
>> that sense, a religion is required, because nothing in nature supports
>> the idea that there is an afterlife/reincarnation etc..
>
>We just do the atheism. It doesn't rule out an afterlife
>of reincarnation, although I'm not expecting either.

actually it kinda does, because it does rule out the supernatural

>
>The religious position on reincarnation (into the
>current world) that I'm aware of, when a religion
>includes it, is that reincarnation happens to you
>whether you're religious or not, but you get a
>better one if you're religious. I may be wrong;
>I haven't looked into it much.
>
>This is distinct, conventionally, from being
>reincorporated after the end of the world, for
>instance, as a version of your previous self,
>as in Christianity, where everyone gets that too
>but if you were a bad person then you are sentenced
>and killed again.

[Kevrob]

On Wednesday, January 16, 2019 at 9:12:16 AM UTC-5, Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl wrote:
> On Wed, 16 Jan 2019 02:42:22 -0800 (PST), Robert Carnegie
> <rja.ca...@gmail.com> wrote:
>

> >We just do the atheism. It doesn't rule out an afterlife
> >of reincarnation, although I'm not expecting either.
>
> actually it kinda does, because it does rule out the supernatural

I agree that one ought to do that.

If there's real evidence for a thing, then it is part of nature.

How would you classify animists who don't believe in any ghodz?
Pantheists? Panentheists?

Broadly speaking, it is all theism.

[nyi...@bellsouth.net]

On Tuesday, January 15, 2019 at 6:48:00 PM UTC-5, Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl wrote:
> On Tue, 15 Jan 2019 13:27:41 -0800 (PST), nyi...@bellsouth.net wrote:
>
> >On Friday, January 4, 2019 at 2:14:07 PM UTC-5, Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl wrote:
> >> On Fri, 4 Jan 2019 08:04:44 -0800 (PST), Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com>
> >> wrote:
> >>
> >> >On Thursday, January 3, 2019 at 10:56:13 PM UTC-5, Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl wrote:
> >> >> On Thu, 03 Jan 2019 11:46:52 -0600, Christopher A. Lee
> >> >> <c....@fairpoint.net> wrote:
> >> >>
> >> >> >On Thu, 3 Jan 2019 09:26:46 -0800 (PST), Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com>
> >> >
> >> >> >>I don't see anything wrong with putting a confidence level
> >> >> >>on one's opinion. "I'm 95% certain that ghodz are baloney"
> >> >> >>would be something I'd say. i have put myself at 6.99999...
> >> >> >>(repeating decimal) on the "Dawkins scale" of atheism, aka
> >> >> >>the "Spectrum of theistic probability."
> >> >> >
> >> >> >Why even give them a thought?
> >> >> >
> >> >> >But atheism per se is still binary - either one is a theist or one
> >> >> >isn't.
> >> >>
> >> >> Chris why can no one but you and I see this? why do people not realize
> >> >> that if they are 99.99999999999999999999999 atheist it means that
> >> >> they are still 100% theist.
> >> >>
> >> >
> >> >I think you are being much too strict. Someone who is _almost_
> >> >100% sure there are no ghodz, and "rounds up" and call himself an
> >> >atheist is not a "theist."

You never contradicted this, "Christ..." [do you have any
preferences for how I address you?]

> >> I will give you another analogy, this should clear it up....
> >
> >Not for me. You are using a definition of "theist" that I
> >don't think anyone else uses.
>
> theist is the person that believes in a supernatural being or deity.
> That is all

Then I am not a theist, and Kevrob was right about "Someone who is _almost_

100% sure there are no ghodz,"

not being theists.


[Here, I've snipped your analogy, and you have completely
rejected mine.]

> >Atheism is a belief about the nonexistence of certain entities.
> >Theism is a belief that at least one such entity exists.
>
> NO NO NO NO NO I don't know how many times I would need to say no, but
> NO NO NO..

Once is enough, if properly explained.

> Atheism is the ABSENCE OF BELIEF in any deities or supernatural
> beings.

This seems to imply that anyone who is not 100% convinced that
there ARE supernatural beings should call himself an atheist.

> It sounds like I am just trying to play a game with words or
> something. But to believe in the nonexistence and the absence of
> belief are 2 totally different things.

Yeah, but to be "almost 100% sure that there are no gods" is
not the same as PRESENCE of belief in their existence.

Such a person might say "I believe in God" while making a
mental reservation that he means "I would follow God faithfully if,
by some miracle, I could come to believe that God exists."

But that is NOT the same as belief in the existence of God. Capice?

> Theists use words like belief.

So does almost everyone. But different people mean different
things by it.


> A belief requires faith.

What do you mean by the word "faith"?

>
> >
> >Similarly, one can believe that there is no life on Mars,
> >or one can believe there is life on Mars.
> >
> >At this point in time, a wise person says, "let's wait and see"
> >about Mars life.
> >
> >The case of God is a little different. A believing Christian
> >will say, "let's wait and see until our deaths, and then
> >we will see there is a God."
> >
> >An atheist, on the other hand, might disbelieve in supernatural
>
> an atheist one the other hand has no belief in supernatural...

Your use of "pixies" seems to indicate that you are the kind of atheist
that I am describing, not the broader kind of "atheist" that
you are describing.

> >entities ("pixies" as you might call them)
> > yet have a sinking
> >feeling in his stomach that maybe Epicurus was indulging
> >in wishful thinking when he claimed that death means total oblivion.

Are you familiar with Epicurus's essay to which I am alluding?
It was a real game-changer for me, making me realize that
oblivion is the next best thing to eternal bliss.

> >>
> >> Being atheist is absolute, the only middle ground is agnostic or maybe
> >> even pantheism, agnostic know that the existence of a god can not be
> >> proven and it actually says nothing about belief.
> >
> >Right, I am in a state of suspended judgment, so I can't
> >say I believe nor can I say I disbelieve. And so I call
> >myself an agnostic.

You didn't respond to this or to anything else I wrote below.
Can you see my point here?

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Department of Math. -- standard disclaimer --

U. of South Carolina
http://www.math.sc.edu/~nyikos/



> >

[Mattb]

On Wed, 16 Jan 2019 02:42:22 -0800 (PST), Robert Carnegie
<rja.ca...@gmail.com> wrote:

I thought the Buddhist believe you got a better one for being a good
person not if you are religious or not. Aren't many Buddhist atheist?

>
>This is distinct, conventionally, from being
>reincorporated after the end of the world, for
>instance, as a version of your previous self,
>as in Christianity, where everyone gets that too
>but if you were a bad person then you are sentenced
>and killed again.

Yes I have always considered it rather strange a god of love would
send someone that lived for 20 years and did not kiss a churches ass
to hell for eternal torture and then have that same church say god is
love.

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

CK is fine...

>
>> >> I will give you another analogy, this should clear it up....
>> >
>> >Not for me. You are using a definition of "theist" that I
>> >don't think anyone else uses.
>>
>> theist is the person that believes in a supernatural being or deity.
>> That is all
>
>Then I am not a theist, and Kevrob was right about "Someone who is _almost_
>100% sure there are no ghodz,"
>not being theists.
>
>
>[Here, I've snipped your analogy, and you have completely
>rejected mine.]
>
>
>> >Atheism is a belief about the nonexistence of certain entities.
>> >Theism is a belief that at least one such entity exists.
>>
>> NO NO NO NO NO I don't know how many times I would need to say no, but
>> NO NO NO..
>
>Once is enough, if properly explained.
>
>
>> Atheism is the ABSENCE OF BELIEF in any deities or supernatural
>> beings.
>
>This seems to imply that anyone who is not 100% convinced that
>there ARE supernatural beings should call himself an atheist.

quite the opposite, a person that is not 100% sure that supernatural
beings aka gods do not exist then they are theist... not 90% not 95%
not even 99.9999999

>
>
>> It sounds like I am just trying to play a game with words or
>> something. But to believe in the nonexistence and the absence of
>> belief are 2 totally different things.

>
>Yeah, but to be "almost 100% sure that there are no gods" is
>not the same as PRESENCE of belief in their existence.

So what you are saying is that if slavery still existed you would not
feel guilty if you only thought it was 99% wrong?

anyone that says they are almost 100% sure there are no gods is saying
they are almost 100% certain they don't believe in them

>
>Such a person might say "I believe in God" while making a
>mental reservation that he means "I would follow God faithfully if,
>by some miracle, I could come to believe that God exists."

Sorry that just does not make any sense

>
>But that is NOT the same as belief in the existence of God. Capice?

Wow... you just said

>Such a person might say "I believe in God"

let me ask you then how is that NOT the same?

>
>
>> Theists use words like belief.
>
>So does almost everyone. But different people mean different
>things by it.

I am using the sense of the word in relating to the belief in fairies,
nothing more nothing less

>
>
>> A belief requires faith.
>
>What do you mean by the word "faith"?

google is your friend

>
>
>>
>> >
>> >Similarly, one can believe that there is no life on Mars,
>> >or one can believe there is life on Mars.
>> >
>> >At this point in time, a wise person says, "let's wait and see"
>> >about Mars life.
>> >
>> >The case of God is a little different. A believing Christian
>> >will say, "let's wait and see until our deaths, and then
>> >we will see there is a God."
>> >
>> >An atheist, on the other hand, might disbelieve in supernatural
>>
>> an atheist one the other hand has no belief in supernatural...
>
>Your use of "pixies" seems to indicate that you are the kind of atheist
>that I am describing, not the broader kind of "atheist" that
>you are describing.

I am not the atheist you are describing. I am an atheist that knows
beyond the shadow of a doubt that fairies do not exist.

>
>
>> >entities ("pixies" as you might call them)
>> > yet have a sinking
>> >feeling in his stomach that maybe Epicurus was indulging
>> >in wishful thinking when he claimed that death means total oblivion.
>
>Are you familiar with Epicurus's essay to which I am alluding?
>It was a real game-changer for me, making me realize that
>oblivion is the next best thing to eternal bliss.
>
>
>> >>
>> >> Being atheist is absolute, the only middle ground is agnostic or maybe
>> >> even pantheism, agnostic know that the existence of a god can not be
>> >> proven and it actually says nothing about belief.
>> >
>> >Right, I am in a state of suspended judgment, so I can't
>> >say I believe nor can I say I disbelieve. And so I call
>> >myself an agnostic.
>
>You didn't respond to this or to anything else I wrote below.

because it is just repetition of things discussed, I have no wish to
rehash

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

On Wed, 16 Jan 2019 07:12:43 -0800 (PST), Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com>
wrote:

There are a couple of definitions of pantheism and they do conflict
with each other. But like spinozas "god" is not an actual deity
perhaps not even a supernatural power, I don't know for sure how he
would have classified it. His god was the universe itself.

talking about Panentheists is just semantics it is all the same damn
thing just different ways of saying it, sort of like all christians
and protestants are catholic because catholics created the entire
jesus christ story. But the baptists and mormons would disagree, even
though they would be wrong.

>
>Broadly speaking, it is all theism.
>
>---
>Kevin R
>a.a #2310

[Robert Carnegie]

A Buddhist doesn't have to worship gods. And not
worshipping gods is my definition of atheism.

On the other hand, a religion typically has a code
of conduct that isn't logically derived from first
principles. Some of this is good for society,
some actively isn't or is just religious for the
sake of it. If it's dictated by a god then it
seems to me that intentionally following the code
counts as worshipping the god, and accidentally doing
so - if that's possible - may do. But, as you say,
Buddhism doesn't come from gods. So, would you
be worshipping Buddhism, the philosophy?
Is the question important in that case?

[Robert Carnegie]

On Wednesday, 16 January 2019 14:12:16 UTC, Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl wrote:
> On Wed, 16 Jan 2019 02:42:22 -0800 (PST), Robert Carnegie
> <rja.ca...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >On Wednesday, 16 January 2019 02:25:27 UTC, default wrote:
> >> On Tue, 15 Jan 2019 12:48:36 -0800, Mattb <trdel...@gmail.com>
> >> wrote:
> >>
> >> >On Thu, 03 Jan 2019 10:24:25 -0500, default <def...@defaulter.net>
> >> >wrote:
> >> >
> >> >>On Sun, 30 Dec 2018 19:46:51 -0800 (PST), alal...@gmail.com wrote:
> >> >>
> >> >>>I hope that myself, and my friends, followers, and allies find happiness in the afterlife if there is one. Wether through rebirth or in heaven, or whatever happens in reality.
> >> >>>
> >> >>>Abhinav Lal
> >> >>>Writer & Investor
> >> >>>
> >> >>You really need to belong to a religion.
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >Would reincarnation/rebirth require religion if it was possible?
> >>
> >> I don't believe Abhinav Lal is honestly asking about an afterlife, his
> >> agenda is more along the lines of trolling the atheism group, posing
> >> as an atheist and introducing religious themes and ideas.
> >>
> >> There's as much evidence for a god as there is for an afterlife, so in
> >> that sense, a religion is required, because nothing in nature supports
> >> the idea that there is an afterlife/reincarnation etc..
> >
> >We just do the atheism. It doesn't rule out an afterlife
> >of reincarnation, although I'm not expecting either.
>
> actually it kinda does, because it does rule out the supernatural

Like I said, my "atheism" just means not worshipping
gods. You can have a soul and not worship gods,
I think. And Spiritualism evidently has one but
is hazy about the other.

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

On Wed, 16 Jan 2019 15:28:42 -0800 (PST), Robert Carnegie

soul to me is two fingers of a smooth bourbon while listening to a
trumpet and sax duo in a dimply lit room. Afterlife/reincarnation are
terms best used by Gandolf or maybe even harry potter. It simply does
not and can not exist. How would the energy from ones body be
transferred to another body or to a magical fairy land that what gets
its energy from nuclear power?? Where is the conduit for this transfer
of energy. How is the fairy land sustained because it would take a lot
of energy to sustain all the "souls" that have ever existed. So if
this fairy land is eternal then what happens when the last star dies
out and this universe is done? A soul is an human invention to put
fear into children or otherwise help alleviate the fear in the adults
that are about to die. It is all bullshit.

a soul in the respect that you mean is a supernatural magical power or
entity,

[Robert Carnegie]

Usually, yes. Traditionally, the "soul" is what
causes a living "animal" (ahem) body to move,
since no merely physical process to do this was
known. That's no longer the case, but the "soul"
also was and is the hypothetical location of
personal existence that persists when your body
inevitably eventually dies. I would argue with
people who believe that human beings have souls -
or are souls - with an interesting further career
after death. But I wouldn't quarrel with them.
And I wouldn't quarrel with worshippers of gods
unless it is making them, or other people, or me,
unhappy.

If a soul isn't an object made of normal matter
then it may not be limited by the finite processes
of the physical universe; and even if it is, well,
suppose that when we die we go to live inside the sun,
until in 5 billion years it stops working. That would
still be a bonus over about 100 years to live on Earth.

If a soul is not of ordinary matter, but still somehow
makes your brain and your body work, that does seem to
me to be "supernatural" by definition, from ancient
times to now.

[Mattb]

On Wed, 16 Jan 2019 15:22:25 -0800 (PST), Robert Carnegie

No worshipping gods is you def of atheism. Interesting.

>
>On the other hand, a religion typically has a code
>of conduct that isn't logically derived from first
>principles. Some of this is good for society,
>some actively isn't or is just religious for the
>sake of it. If it's dictated by a god then it
>seems to me that intentionally following the code
>counts as worshipping the god, and accidentally doing
>so - if that's possible - may do. But, as you say,
>Buddhism doesn't come from gods. So, would you
>be worshipping Buddhism, the philosophy?
>Is the question important in that case?

The only Buddhist I have known didn't worship so much as live a type
of life.

There are several types and personally haven't studied it.

[nyi...@bellsouth.net]

Thanks, CK.

> >> >> I will give you another analogy, this should clear it up....
> >> >
> >> >Not for me. You are using a definition of "theist" that I
> >> >don't think anyone else uses.
> >>
> >> theist is the person that believes in a supernatural being or deity.
> >> That is all
> >
> >Then I am not a theist, and Kevrob was right about "Someone who is _almost_
> >100% sure there are no ghodz,"
> >not being theists.
> >
> >
> >[Here, I've snipped your analogy, and you have completely
> >rejected mine.]
> >
> >
> >> >Atheism is a belief about the nonexistence of certain entities.
> >> >Theism is a belief that at least one such entity exists.
> >>
> >> NO NO NO NO NO I don't know how many times I would need to say no, but
> >> NO NO NO..
> >
> >Once is enough, if properly explained.
> >
> >
> >> Atheism is the ABSENCE OF BELIEF in any deities or supernatural
> >> beings.
> >
> >This seems to imply that anyone who is not 100% convinced that
> >there ARE supernatural beings should call himself an atheist.
>
> quite the opposite, a person that is not 100% sure that supernatural
> beings aka gods do not exist then they are theist... not 90% not 95%
> not even 99.9999999

OK, I'll try to remember how you are availing yourself of
the Humpty Dumpty prerogative of "theist" meaning exactly
what you choose it to mean -- no more and no less.

I use the word differently, and I believe 99.99% of other people
do, but I never like to get bogged down in semantics. And so,
I'll humor you in your use of the word and no longer try
to "convert" you to a different meaning.

Incidentally, you have (or had -- he's been rumored to have died)
a mirror image in Ray Martinez, a long-time regular in talk.origins
who would slap the label "Atheist" on anyone who did not believe
in the immutability of species.

Since all the Christians he argued with did not go that far in
the direction of creationism, all were stigmatized with that label,
including myself, an agnostic.

> >
> >> It sounds like I am just trying to play a game with words or
> >> something. But to believe in the nonexistence and the absence of
> >> belief are 2 totally different things.
>
> >
> >Yeah, but to be "almost 100% sure that there are no gods" is
> >not the same as PRESENCE of belief in their existence.
>
> So what you are saying is that if slavery still existed you would not
> feel guilty if you only thought it was 99% wrong?

Believing something to exist and believing something to
be morally wrong are two utterly different categories.

You even make different categories out of "believing something
to exist," when you rejected my analogy of "believing there is a god" to
"believing there is life on Mars." So you should have no
trouble comprehending the preceding paragraph.

> anyone that says they are almost 100% sure there are no gods is saying

> they are almost 100% certain they don't believe in them.

Now you are applying the Humpty Dumpty Prerogative to
"believe in them." I KNOW I don't believe there is life on Mars
because I know I am in a state of suspended judgment
about whether it exists or not.

>
> >
> >Such a person might say "I believe in God" while making a
> >mental reservation that he means "I would follow God faithfully if,
> >by some miracle, I could come to believe that God exists."
>
> Sorry that just does not make any sense

Well, I'm sorry you believe that it does not make any sense.
I'm beginning to get the impression that nothing I say
is making sense to you.

> >
> >But that is NOT the same as belief in the existence of God. Capice?
>
> Wow... you just said
> >Such a person might say "I believe in God"
> let me ask you then how is that NOT the same?

I told you the difference. If you can't make sense of it,
that can't be helped.

> >
> >> Theists use words like belief.
> >
> >So does almost everyone. But different people mean different
> >things by it.
>
> I am using the sense of the word in relating to the belief in fairies,
> nothing more nothing less

Thanks for the clarification, HD (excuse me, I mean CK). :-)

> >
> >
> >> A belief requires faith.
> >
> >What do you mean by the word "faith"?
>
> google is your friend

Sorry, that won't do: google is not YOUR friend where
the word "theist" is concerned. I want to know what
YOU mean by the word "faith".


Continued in next reply, to be done soon after I see
that this one has posted.

[nyi...@bellsouth.net]

On Wednesday, January 16, 2019 at 4:20:28 PM UTC-5, Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl wrote:
> On Wed, 16 Jan 2019 09:54:03 -0800 (PST), nyi...@bellsouth.net wrote:
>
> >On Tuesday, January 15, 2019 at 6:48:00 PM UTC-5, Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl wrote:
> >> On Tue, 15 Jan 2019 13:27:41 -0800 (PST), nyi...@bellsouth.net wrote:

<huge snip of things dealt with earlier>

> >> >Atheism is a belief about the nonexistence of certain entities.
> >> >Theism is a belief that at least one such entity exists.

<huge snip of statements that were made later>

> >> >Similarly, one can believe that there is no life on Mars,
> >> >or one can believe there is life on Mars.

You never responded to these statements as a whole. Are you having trouble
wrapping your mind around how they relate to each other?

> >> >At this point in time, a wise person says, "let's wait and see"
> >> >about Mars life.
> >> >
> >> >The case of God is a little different. A believing Christian
> >> >will say, "let's wait and see until our deaths, and then
> >> >we will see there is a God."
> >> >
> >> >An atheist, on the other hand, might disbelieve in supernatural
> >>
> >> an atheist one the other hand has no belief in supernatural...
> >
> >Your use of "pixies" seems to indicate that you are the kind of atheist
> >that I am describing, not the broader kind of "atheist" that
> >you are describing.
>
> I am not the atheist you are describing. I am an atheist that knows
> beyond the shadow of a doubt that fairies do not exist.

OK, in your case "might" can be replaced with "does". But I
was speaking of atheists in general.


But there is more to your use of "believe in pixies" than that.
Judging from one of your replies to the original post on this thread,
you even use it to refer to anyone who thinks that there may be
something in us of "dark matter" and not just "ordinary matter".
And so you think you KNOW that life after death is impossible.

You are not deterred by the general belief of astrophysicists
that there is at least five times as much dark matter in
our universe as ordinary matter (which includes ordinary energy).

> >> >entities ("pixies" as you might call them)
> >> > yet have a sinking
> >> >feeling in his stomach that maybe Epicurus was indulging
> >> >in wishful thinking when he claimed that death means total oblivion.

The existence of dark matter may well be the source of
such a sinking feeling in future generations.

> >Are you familiar with Epicurus's essay to which I am alluding?

No reply from you to this. It would seem that you ignore
everything you are unable to wrap your mind around.

> >It was a real game-changer for me, making me realize that
> >oblivion is the next best thing to eternal bliss.
> >
> >
> >> >>
> >> >> Being atheist is absolute, the only middle ground is agnostic or maybe
> >> >> even pantheism, agnostic know that the existence of a god can not be
> >> >> proven and it actually says nothing about belief.
> >> >
> >> >Right, I am in a state of suspended judgment, so I can't
> >> >say I believe nor can I say I disbelieve. And so I call
> >> >myself an agnostic.
> >
> >You didn't respond to this or to anything else I wrote below.
>
> because it is just repetition of things discussed, I have no wish to
> rehash

It wasn't discussed, actually. We are like two ships that pass
in the night as far as true discussion is concerned.


I've snipped the rest. It was characterized by me making one
attempt after another to initiate true discussion with you,
because almost nothing was ever resolved between us.

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--

University of South Carolina
http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos/

nyikos "at" math.sc.edu

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

The problem here is just in the wording. You have to be careful with
the word believe. In order to believe something is or is not you must
have faith either way. Faith that it does not exist or faith that it
does exist. Either way you are not committed to either the + or the -.
When I speak of atheism it is a Chris said before it is binary. You
either Know or you Don't Know that a god exists. If you don't know and
think there could be a god then a person is not an atheist. Atheists
KNOW with 100% certainty that there is no god. There is no question
to it. When you die you are dead, it is just like before you were
born. You did not know existence before and you will not know it
after.

That is the easiest and simplest way I can explain what atheism really
is.

belief in God or in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual
apprehension rather than proof.

>
>
>Continued in next reply, to be done soon after I see
>that this one has posted.

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

On Fri, 18 Jan 2019 11:21:20 -0800 (PST), nyi...@bellsouth.net wrote:

>On Wednesday, January 16, 2019 at 4:20:28 PM UTC-5, Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl wrote:
>> On Wed, 16 Jan 2019 09:54:03 -0800 (PST), nyi...@bellsouth.net wrote:
>>

>> >> >Similarly, one can believe that there is no life on Mars,
>> >> >or one can believe there is life on Mars.
>
>You never responded to these statements as a whole. Are you having trouble
>wrapping your mind around how they relate to each other?

I just do not wish to argue over semantic of the word believe.

<circumcision of unneeded stuff>

>> I am not the atheist you are describing. I am an atheist that knows
>> beyond the shadow of a doubt that fairies do not exist.
>
>OK, in your case "might" can be replaced with "does". But I
>was speaking of atheists in general.
>
>
>But there is more to your use of "believe in pixies" than that.
>Judging from one of your replies to the original post on this thread,
>you even use it to refer to anyone who thinks that there may be
>something in us of "dark matter" and not just "ordinary matter".
>And so you think you KNOW that life after death is impossible.

perhaps I don't even remember, but I do know that "dark matter" is non
existent, I never said it was in us or anything because I do not
believe it even exists. The only thing that the human body is composed
of is a few of the basic elements

Carbon
Hydrogen.
Nitrogen.
Oxygen.
Phosphorus.
Sulfur.

>
>You are not deterred by the general belief of astrophysicists
> that there is at least five times as much dark matter in
>our universe as ordinary matter (which includes ordinary energy).

There is that word belief again. Yes many scientists "believe " it
exists. But it does not. There is not one bit of proof that it exists.

>
>
>> >> >entities ("pixies" as you might call them)
>> >> > yet have a sinking
>> >> >feeling in his stomach that maybe Epicurus was indulging
>> >> >in wishful thinking when he claimed that death means total oblivion.
>
>The existence of dark matter may well be the source of
>such a sinking feeling in future generations.

nah

>
>
>> >Are you familiar with Epicurus's essay to which I am alluding?
>
>No reply from you to this. It would seem that you ignore
>everything you are unable to wrap your mind around.

well the thing about that is that Epicurus was a philosopher who was
believed to be the one with all the answers to life. He has several
"essays" so just picking one at random would be rather pointless. Then
you would have to specify what part of the essay you are referring to

<trimming foreskin>

>>
>> because it is just repetition of things discussed, I have no wish to
>> rehash
>
>It wasn't discussed, actually. We are like two ships that pass
>in the night as far as true discussion is concerned.
>
>
>I've snipped the rest. It was characterized by me making one
>attempt after another to initiate true discussion with you,
>because almost nothing was ever resolved between us.

I am still on the fence about who and what you are. You could be a
troll I don't know. What is the purpose of this discussion? What
motive could you have in wanting to discuss this with me? If you are
genuine and have questions that is fine I don't mind a debate or a
discussion about atheism, but I jut want to know with whom I am
discussing said topics.

>
>
>Peter Nyikos
>Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
>University of South Carolina
>http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos/
>nyikos "at" math.sc.edu

[Robert Carnegie]

I'm not sure which religions besides Christianity
call it virtuous to believe when there is no reason
to. It isn't a necessary element of religion
except when the priests need you to believe big
in something especially unbelievable.

Gods are, by report and by definition, interested,
or expected to be interested, in worshippers, people
who try either to please the god or to minimise the
displeasure that the grumpier gods feel because we
exist. The test of belief or atheism that they will
apply, and that I do too, is whether you believe
enough to be their worshipper, or, in fact, simply
whether you are a worshipper - whether you "believe"
in it or not.

When gods are much spoken of but very rarely seen,
both believers and atheists may suffer insomnia with
religious doubt. (Can someone confirm if Catholics
actually are required to have a dark night of the soul?)
It would be absurd for that in itself to earn you the
god's disfavour, so I am confident to say that actual
belief is not what it's about for them or for you.

[Robert Carnegie]

Dark matter is observed in the motion of galaxies
and of light traversing space, and in the highly
precise correspondence between the development
of the universe and a theoretical mathematical
calculation of it - when the calculation includes
dark matter (and dark energy). It has no known
practical effect on you and me, but it is reasonable
to understand the universe and our role and situation
in it. And of course we know about neutrinos but
it isn't those.

I predict you would regret engaging with Professor Nyikos
on a question of science; conversation will be much
more civil if you don't.

[Rick Johnson]

Kevrob wrote:

> There may be intelligent life elsewhere in the universe, but there's no good proof they have broken the lightspeed barrier and visited us.

Even if they could defeat the light-speed barrier, i suspect they would avoid this toxic rock at all costs. It'd be like asking a world-champion chess master to go play a match at the local daycare.

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

Oh but you jest, you must. I would in fact love to match wits with any
PhD any day about the absurdity of that which is named dark matter.
Dark Matter has not ever been observed in any context. Just because
they may not know the correct math yet or know the actual forces
acting on said galaxies does not mean a magical force that can not be
see or detected by any humanly means is responsible.

There be dragons, there......

[Alex W.]

Nobody would ask them to play a championship match.

But from a human perspective, the joy of teaching kids this exciting new
game would be enough, as would the basic impulse of curiosity.

[nyi...@bellsouth.net]

On Saturday, January 19, 2019 at 12:13:02 AM UTC-5, Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl wrote:
> On Fri, 18 Jan 2019 16:24:12 -0800 (PST), Robert Carnegie
> <rja.ca...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >Dark matter is observed in the motion of galaxies
> >and of light traversing space, and in the highly
> >precise correspondence between the development
> >of the universe and a theoretical mathematical
> >calculation of it - when the calculation includes
> >dark matter (and dark energy). It has no known
> >practical effect on you and me, but it is reasonable
> >to understand the universe and our role and situation
> >in it. And of course we know about neutrinos but
> >it isn't those.
> >
> >I predict you would regret engaging with Professor Nyikos
> >on a question of science; conversation will be much
> >more civil if you don't.
>
>
> Oh but you jest, you must.

About what Robert wrote in his first paragraph? Why don't you
challenge him on it?

> I would in fact love to match wits with any
> PhD any day about the absurdity of that which is named dark matter.

You aren't even trying to match wits with Robert.

And your use of "any PhD" makes me wonder how highly you
think of a mere PhD degree. Except in very rare cases, it's
nothing compared to decades of post-PhD research in an area
relevant to the issue under discussion/debate.

> Dark Matter has not ever been observed in any context.

"observed" in what sense? We don't see more than a tiny
fraction of the objects in our universe. Radio waves
and gamma rays are only "observable" via instruments that were
not in existence two centuries ago. Neutrinos are even harder
to detect, but their existence was hypothesized long before
we were able to detect them.

And we don't even see physical objects directly. What we see are
light rays emanating from them. How would you answer someone who
has never learned any science who says the following?

Don't be absurd. I only see light rays rarely, like when
there is a gap in a cloud bank through which the sun shines.
You can't prove to me that there are light rays coming from
that box over there. I see it because I'm looking at it,
and I'm not blind, and it isn't dark, and that's that.

And this talk about leaves being green because they absorb
most colors while they reflect the green rays -- I've never
heard anything more ridiculous in my life. How come I can't
see those absorbed colors when I cut the leaf open? It's
green all the way through!

> Just because
> they may not know the correct math yet or know the actual forces
> acting on said galaxies does not mean a magical force that can not be
> see or detected by any humanly means is responsible.

The "magical force" to which astrophysicists ascribe the things
of which Robert talks is commonly called "gravity."


Gravity is being detected all the time by Kepler's law of motion
acting on the earth. We attribute it to the sun, with minor modifications
for the lesser gravity of the moon, the planets, etc. That's in
a heliocentric frame of reference.

You assume ALL that gravity is from the kind of matter that gives
off electromagnetic radiation that is detectable by the instruments
we have [see above about radio waves and gamma rays]. Where's
your evidence for that?


>
> There be dragons, there......

And in the belief that the gravity of which Robert speaks
is either due to matter that we can detect in other ways in the
first two decades of the 21st century, or is just THERE with
no need for any explanation at all.

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
University of South Carolina
http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos/

Ph.D. Carnegie-Mellon University, 1971

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

On Mon, 21 Jan 2019 07:31:13 -0800 (PST), nyi...@bellsouth.net wrote:

>On Saturday, January 19, 2019 at 12:13:02 AM UTC-5, Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl wrote:
>> On Fri, 18 Jan 2019 16:24:12 -0800 (PST), Robert Carnegie
>> <rja.ca...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> >Dark matter is observed in the motion of galaxies
>> >and of light traversing space, and in the highly
>> >precise correspondence between the development
>> >of the universe and a theoretical mathematical
>> >calculation of it - when the calculation includes
>> >dark matter (and dark energy). It has no known
>> >practical effect on you and me, but it is reasonable
>> >to understand the universe and our role and situation
>> >in it. And of course we know about neutrinos but
>> >it isn't those.
>> >
>> >I predict you would regret engaging with Professor Nyikos
>> >on a question of science; conversation will be much
>> >more civil if you don't.
>>
>>
>> Oh but you jest, you must.
>
>About what Robert wrote in his first paragraph? Why don't you
>challenge him on it?

because there was nothing to challenge.....
Gravity is responsible for the motions of galaxies, that is it. Dark
matter is not at all needed and the rest of what he said, how did he
put it "theoretical"

>
>
>> I would in fact love to match wits with any
>> PhD any day about the absurdity of that which is named dark matter.
>
>You aren't even trying to match wits with Robert.
>
>And your use of "any PhD" makes me wonder how highly you
>think of a mere PhD degree. Except in very rare cases, it's
>nothing compared to decades of post-PhD research in an area
>relevant to the issue under discussion/debate.

Yes that was sort of my point.
Take for instance a MD. Every one thinks MD's are so intelligent and
so wise and know so much because they went through a lot of schooling.
Thing is they know very little outside of the medical field....

>
>
>> Dark Matter has not ever been observed in any context.
>
>"observed" in what sense? We don't see more than a tiny
>fraction of the objects in our universe. Radio waves
>and gamma rays are only "observable" via instruments that were
>not in existence two centuries ago. Neutrinos are even harder
>to detect, but their existence was hypothesized long before
>we were able to detect them.
>
>And we don't even see physical objects directly. What we see are
>light rays emanating

or mainly reflected

>from them. How would you answer someone who
>has never learned any science who says the following?
>
> Don't be absurd. I only see light rays rarely, like when
> there is a gap in a cloud bank through which the sun shines.
> You can't prove to me that there are light rays coming from
> that box over there. I see it because I'm looking at it,
> and I'm not blind, and it isn't dark, and that's that.

I would simply say can you see me? Then you see the light rays and/or
particles that have been reflected off of me.

>
> And this talk about leaves being green because they absorb
> most colors while they reflect the green rays -- I've never
> heard anything more ridiculous in my life. How come I can't
> see those absorbed colors when I cut the leaf open? It's
> green all the way through!

Have you not ever cut a leaf open? Sometimes you see sap <the white
milky substance> also called latex. Sometimes you see clear water..
sometimes you see green. You can also at times see a white powdery
substance that is fungus.

>
>
>> Just because
>> they may not know the correct math yet or know the actual forces
>> acting on said galaxies does not mean a magical force that can not be
>> see or detected by any humanly means is responsible.
>
>The "magical force" to which astrophysicists ascribe the things
>of which Robert talks is commonly called "gravity."

I was referring to dark energy

>
>
>Gravity is being detected all the time by Kepler's law of motion
>acting on the earth. We attribute it to the sun, with minor modifications
>for the lesser gravity of the moon, the planets, etc. That's in
>a heliocentric frame of reference.
>
>You assume ALL that gravity is from the kind of matter that gives
>off electromagnetic radiation that is detectable by the instruments
>we have [see above about radio waves and gamma rays]. Where's
>your evidence for that?

I try not to assume anything, this is why I don't just assume that the
reason for different astronomical event are dark matter or some other
form of magical energy or matter.

>
>
>>
>> There be dragons, there......
>
>And in the belief that the gravity of which Robert speaks
>is either due to matter that we can detect in other ways in the
>first two decades of the 21st century, or is just THERE with
>no need for any explanation at all.

uhhh... huh?

>
>
>Peter Nyikos
>Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
>University of South Carolina
>http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos/
>Ph.D. Carnegie-Mellon University, 1971

[Rick Johnson]

Alex W. wrote:
> Nobody would ask them to play a championship match. But from a human perspective, the joy of teaching kids this exciting new game would be enough, as would the basic impulse of curiosity.

Well, that'd be the idealist perspective going _into_ the match. But five minutes after the match begins, a "palm in the face" is the only perspective they will ever know!

The alien lamented: "Why me???... Why me!!!"

[Alex W.]

I reckon it all depends how much human television they watched before
arriving. An unremitting diet of Gilligan's Island, the Kardashians and
similar fare might give them a somewhat skewed picture of humanity...

[nyi...@bellsouth.net]

On Wednesday, January 16, 2019 at 7:55:21 AM UTC-5, Kevrob wrote:

> On Tuesday, January 15, 2019 at 9:25:27 PM UTC-5, default wrote:
> > On Tue, 15 Jan 2019 12:48:36 -0800, Mattb <trdel...@gmail.com>

> > wrote:
> >
> > >On Thu, 03 Jan 2019 10:24:25 -0500, default <def...@defaulter.net>
> > >wrote:
> > >
> > >>On Sun, 30 Dec 2018 19:46:51 -0800 (PST), alal...@gmail.com wrote:
> > >>
> > >>>I hope that myself, and my friends, followers, and allies find happiness in the afterlife if there is one. Wether through rebirth or in heaven, or whatever happens in reality.
> > >>>
>
> > >>>

> > >>You really need to belong to a religion.
> > >
> > >
> > >Would reincarnation/rebirth require religion if it was possible?
> >
> > I don't believe Abhinav Lal is honestly asking about an afterlife, his
> > agenda is more along the lines of trolling the atheism group, posing
> > as an atheist and introducing religious themes and ideas.
> >
> > There's as much evidence for a god as there is for an afterlife, so in
> > that sense, a religion is required, because nothing in nature supports
> > the idea that there is an afterlife/reincarnation etc..
>

> There's atheism, and there is a wider a-supernaturalism: naturalism.
>
> I'm a naturalist. I'm a-woo-woo of all types: reincarnation,
> astrology, astral projection, remote viewing, dowsing, phrenology,
> or any other unproven nonsense doesn't fly with me. There may be

> intelligent life elsewhere in the universe, but there's no good
> proof they have broken the lightspeed barrier and visited us.

No need to break the lightspeed barrier, if they are capable
of hibernating to the extent that tardigrades are. Not that
it's likely, granted.

I suppose by "us" you mean us humans, and if so I agree.

OTOH A lot could have happened in four billion years,
including our solar system coming within one-tenth of
a light year to ours. We humans have the know-how to
span that gap in less than a decade, although it would
take a concerted research project far more expensive than
Project Apollo to bring it off.

Google "Project Orion." It was mostly conceived in the
1960's for travel within our solar system, but Freeman Dyson
showed that it is also feasible for interstellar travel.
If we are content to send unmanned instrumental probes to
within 100 light years of us,
it wouldn't cost more than our current GNP. And if we
revitalize our space program and start mining the moon
and asteroids, we could increase that GNP many-fold.


>
> One can be a non-believer in ghodz and still be taken in by some
> form of woo.

Although I consider Dyson spheres to be a form of woo,
Project Orion was far from that. The only reason it was
shelved was the international agreement against nuclear
explosions in space. But if a sizable asteroid threatens
to crash into earth, that could be very quickly changed.

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Department of Math. -- standard disclaimer --

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

So you could hibernate for a very long time lets say 81,000 years to
get to proxima centauri at the current maximum speed. There is no
material that will last that long, granted they will last longer in
vacuum of space but 80,000 + years is pushing it. No energy source
would last that long, unless it could be replenished (see stargate
universe) but then for us 02 would run out...

Besides the longest a tardigrade has gone without water is supposedly
like 150 years or something and all it reportedly did was move its
leg, that could have been just dead tissue expanding from the
moisture.
That particular experiment has never been repeated.

>
>I suppose by "us" you mean us humans, and if so I agree.

that is only if the light speed barrier can be broken, it is not
supposed to, but there have been reports of it happening.

>
>OTOH A lot could have happened in four billion years,

In less than 1/4 of that the sun will be too hot to support life on
this planet, perhaps mars but not here

>including our solar system coming within one-tenth of
>a light year to ours. We humans have the know-how to
>span that gap in less than a decade, although it would
>take a concerted research project far more expensive than
>Project Apollo to bring it off.
>
>Google "Project Orion." It was mostly conceived in the
>1960's for travel within our solar system, but Freeman Dyson
>showed that it is also feasible for interstellar travel.
>If we are content to send unmanned instrumental probes to
>within 100 light years of us,

if we doubled the max speed we can achieve then it would still take
40,000 years to reach the nearest star.. Not much point in sending a
probe that far. besides there is no power source that we currently
have e that will last that long

>it wouldn't cost more than our current GNP. And if we
>revitalize our space program and start mining the moon
>and asteroids, we could increase that GNP many-fold.
>
>
>>
>> One can be a non-believer in ghodz and still be taken in by some
>> form of woo.
>
>Although I consider Dyson spheres to be a form of woo,
>Project Orion was far from that. The only reason it was
>shelved was the international agreement against nuclear
>explosions in space. But if a sizable asteroid threatens
>to crash into earth, that could be very quickly changed.
>
>Peter Nyikos
>Professor, Department of Math. -- standard disclaimer --
>University of South Carolina
>http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos/
>

[nyi...@bellsouth.net]

No, let's say more like 81 years once your fallacy here is
corrected:

> to get to proxima centauri at the current maximum speed.

The current maximum speed is a snail's pace compared to what
is attainable by ion drive, already tested and ready to go
under appropriate circumstances. And that is a snail's pace
compared to what Project Orion could achieve - more than
3% of light speed. Hence the 81 year figure above.

And so the rest of your paragraph is based on false premises:

> There is no
> material that will last that long, granted they will last longer in
> vacuum of space but 80,000 + years is pushing it. No energy source
> would last that long, unless it could be replenished (see stargate
> universe) but then for us 02 would run out...
>
> Besides the longest a tardigrade has gone without water is supposedly
> like 150 years or something and all it reportedly did was move its
> leg, that could have been just dead tissue expanding from the
> moisture.
> That particular experiment has never been repeated.

So what? One year of hibernation alternating with one week of
revival and replenishment works just jim dandy over 81 or so
repetitions.

> >
> >I suppose by "us" you mean us humans, and if so I agree.
>
> that is only if the light speed barrier can be broken, it is not
> supposed to, but there have been reports of it happening.

False. I get the impression that your knowledge of science
is taken from popular sources, and that you did not major
in any science more rigorous than political science -- which is
only a science in name.

> >
> >OTOH A lot could have happened in four billion years,
>
> In less than 1/4 of that the sun will be too hot to support life on
> this planet, perhaps mars but not here

I'm talking about the 4 billion plus years up to the present time.
Do you think we are the first technologically adept creatures in the
galaxy? Do you imagine that it is impossible for another such
civilization to have arisen, say, 4 billion years ago, when our
universe is more than 13 billion years old?

> >including our solar system coming within one-tenth of
> >a light year to ours. We humans have the know-how to
> >span that gap in less than a decade, although it would
> >take a concerted research project far more expensive than
> >Project Apollo to bring it off.
> >
> >Google "Project Orion." It was mostly conceived in the
> >1960's for travel within our solar system, but Freeman Dyson
> >showed that it is also feasible for interstellar travel.
> >If we are content to send unmanned instrumental probes to
> >within 100 light years of us,
>
> if we doubled the max speed

...then we would be humoring you. I'm talking about 1 to 4 percent of
light speed.

You didn't google "Project Orion," did you?


<snip blather that I'm not inclined to humor>


Oops, nothing left except what Kevrob I wrote earlier:

> >it wouldn't cost more than our current GNP. And if we
> >revitalize our space program and start mining the moon
> >and asteroids, we could increase that GNP many-fold.
> >
> >
> >>
> >> One can be a non-believer in ghodz and still be taken in by some
> >> form of woo.
> >
> >Although I consider Dyson spheres to be a form of woo,
> >Project Orion was far from that. The only reason it was
> >shelved was the international agreement against nuclear
> >explosions in space. But if a sizable asteroid threatens
> >to crash into earth, that could be very quickly changed.
> >
> >Peter Nyikos
> >Professor, Department of Math. -- standard disclaimer --
> >University of South Carolina
> >http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos/
> >
>
> --
>
> ____/~~~sine qua non~~~\____

A reasonable level of intelligence and scientific understanding
is a sine qua non for us continuing our lopsided discussion.
Do you feel up to it?


Peter Nyikos [additional information about me a few lines up]

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

I don't think that you realize that the ION drive is not quite there
yet. Perhaps in the next 20-50 years but not quite yet. Ion engines
still accelerate slow... And thusly will take an equal amount of time
to slow down as it will to accelerate. If it takes three months to get
to the max speed then it will take three months to get back to a slow
or stop.

>
>And so the rest of your paragraph is based on false premises:
>
>> There is no
>> material that will last that long, granted they will last longer in
>> vacuum of space but 80,000 + years is pushing it. No energy source
>> would last that long, unless it could be replenished (see stargate
>> universe) but then for us 02 would run out...
>>
>> Besides the longest a tardigrade has gone without water is supposedly
>> like 150 years or something and all it reportedly did was move its
>> leg, that could have been just dead tissue expanding from the
>> moisture.
>> That particular experiment has never been repeated.
>
>So what? One year of hibernation alternating with one week of
>revival and replenishment works just jim dandy over 81 or so
>repetitions.

I don't know where you are getting the 81 years from. There is nothing
that can go 1000x faster than the 51,000 MPH max speed.

>
>
>
>> >
>> >I suppose by "us" you mean us humans, and if so I agree.
>>
>> that is only if the light speed barrier can be broken, it is not
>> supposed to, but there have been reports of it happening.
>
>False. I get the impression that your knowledge of science
>is taken from popular sources, and that you did not major
>in any science more rigorous than political science -- which is
>only a science in name.
>

What do you mean false? you did not explain very well

>
>> >
>> >OTOH A lot could have happened in four billion years,
>>
>> In less than 1/4 of that the sun will be too hot to support life on
>> this planet, perhaps mars but not here
>
>I'm talking about the 4 billion plus years up to the present time.
>Do you think we are the first technologically adept creatures in the
>galaxy? Do you imagine that it is impossible for another such
>civilization to have arisen, say, 4 billion years ago, when our
>universe is more than 13 billion years old?

Do you really think it is only 13-14 BYO?

>
>
>> >including our solar system coming within one-tenth of
>> >a light year to ours. We humans have the know-how to
>> >span that gap in less than a decade, although it would
>> >take a concerted research project far more expensive than
>> >Project Apollo to bring it off.
>> >
>> >Google "Project Orion." It was mostly conceived in the
>> >1960's for travel within our solar system, but Freeman Dyson
>> >showed that it is also feasible for interstellar travel.
>> >If we are content to send unmanned instrumental probes to
>> >within 100 light years of us,
>>
>> if we doubled the max speed
>
>...then we would be humoring you. I'm talking about 1 to 4 percent of
>light speed.
>
>You didn't google "Project Orion," did you?

actually I had known a little about it already, such as it was first
brought up in the 60's or somewhere around there

[Kevrob]

> ....I get the impression that your knowledge of science

> is taken from popular sources, and that you did not major
> in any science more rigorous than political science -- which is
> only a science in name.

I have a "PoliSci" degree. Except for the use of mathematics and
statistics in fields such as public opinion polling, I would
agree that the disciple would be better described as "politics."
"Political economy" has been used in the past, and "political philosophy"
is a field that is studied both by PoliSci types and philosophers.

I never studied any science in school more advanced than the
two semester, non-lab, "Physics for Poets" courses I took to
complete my liberal arts distribution requirements for my BA.

I have been a lifelong reader of both SF and non-fiction
science articles. The SF mags always had columns treating with
science issues: Asimov's in F&SF, for example.

I know I read about Project Orion in analog.

Yup, here's a column:

https://www.npl.washington.edu/av/altvw56.html

"Cool idea" propulsion systems that are great in stories
frequently run up against problems undere further investigation.

Consideer the fate of the Bussard Ramjet.

https://www.tor.com/2018/07/30/when-ramjets-ruled-science-fiction/

[snip]

> > >Google "Project Orion." It was mostly conceived in the
> > >1960's for travel within our solar system, but Freeman Dyson
> > >showed that it is also feasible for interstellar travel.
> > >If we are content to send unmanned instrumental probes to
> > >within 100 light years of us,
> >
> > if we doubled the max speed
>
> ...then we would be humoring you. I'm talking about 1 to 4 percent of
> light speed.
>
> You didn't google "Project Orion," did you?
>
>
> <snip blather that I'm not inclined to humor>
>
>
> Oops, nothing left except what Kevrob I wrote earlier:
>
> > >it wouldn't cost more than our current GNP. And if we
> > >revitalize our space program and start mining the moon
> > >and asteroids, we could increase that GNP many-fold.
> > >
> > >
> > >>
> > >> One can be a non-believer in ghodz and still be taken in by some
> > >> form of woo.
> > >
> > >Although I consider Dyson spheres to be a form of woo,
> > >Project Orion was far from that. The only reason it was
> > >shelved was the international agreement against nuclear
> > >explosions in space. But if a sizable asteroid threatens
> > >to crash into earth, that could be very quickly changed.

Of interest to SF fans, and others:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_stories_featuring_nuclear_pulse_propulsion

[nyi...@bellsouth.net]

Now that I am talking to you, Kevrob, I am snipping a lot of what
CK wrote, to focus on your ideas.


<snip for focus>

> > > >I suppose by "us" you mean us humans, and if so I agree.

On the other hand, in the 4 billion or so years since earth began,
there is a chance that a planetary system with a technologically
advanced civilization got within one-tenth of a light year of earth,
and then the trip could have been made in much less than a decade
using nuclear propulsion, described below.

> > > that is only if the light speed barrier can be broken, it is not
> > > supposed to, but there have been reports of it happening.

> > ....I get the impression that your knowledge of science
> > is taken from popular sources, and that you did not major
> > in any science more rigorous than political science -- which is
> > only a science in name.
>
> I have a "PoliSci" degree. Except for the use of mathematics and
> statistics in fields such as public opinion polling, I would
> agree that the disciple would be better described as "politics."
> "Political economy" has been used in the past, and "political philosophy"
> is a field that is studied both by PoliSci types and philosophers.
>
> I never studied any science in school more advanced than the
> two semester, non-lab, "Physics for Poets" courses I took to
> complete my liberal arts distribution requirements for my BA.

That's OK. If you were at all interested in a few key details
in your reading of SF, you should have no trouble comprehending
the descriptions I give of two projects for interstellar travel.

> I have been a lifelong reader of both SF and non-fiction
> science articles. The SF mags always had columns treating with
> science issues: Asimov's in F&SF, for example.
>
> I know I read about Project Orion in analog.
>
> Yup, here's a column:
>
> https://www.npl.washington.edu/av/altvw56.html

Sorry, it does not talk about the kind of propulsion
envisioned in Project Orion.

Project Orion does not seem to call for anything in
advance of our current level of technology. It uses thousands of
atomic or hydrogen bombs, exploded a safe distance behind the
spaceship, to propel the ship forward in a series of manageable jolts.
The brunt of the explosions is borne by a thick, hemispherical "pusher
plate" at the rear of the ship, and giant shock absorbers connect the
plate to the main body of the ship.

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_(nuclear_propulsion)

A detailed analysis of the methods, and costs, of a *manned* Project
Orion interstellar probe is to be found in the following article by
Freeman J. Dyson:

"Interstellar Transport," Physics Today, October 1968, pp. 41-45.


There was a write-up of this and three other ways of sending
probes to the stars in the January 2013 issue of National Geographic.

One is solar sails -- too slow -- and another envisions
matter-antimatter annihilation -- way beyond reach -- but also
a more sophisticated form of nuclear propulsion than Project Orion.
Called "Project Daedalus," it is still not quite within
reach technologically.

It envisions a spaceship slightly larger than the Orion spaceship,
containing millions of pellets of a mixture of deuterium and helium-3,
exploded in a "combustion chamber" in a nuclear fusion reaction. The
fusion is triggered using electron beams of a high intensity -- but
perhaps not significantly higher than those currently available; some
of these have been around since 1958:

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


An esthetically pleasing, accessible place to start reading about
Daedalus is the various webpages of:

http://www.bisbos.com/space_n_daedalus.html

The Wikipedia entry on Project Daedalus is short but also
informative.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Daedalus

The one on Orion is longer but unfocused.

> "Cool idea" propulsion systems that are great in stories
> frequently run up against problems undere further investigation.
>
> Consideer the fate of the Bussard Ramjet.
>
> https://www.tor.com/2018/07/30/when-ramjets-ruled-science-fiction/

I never could be convinced that the whole idea was valid.
Anyway, it is very different in principle from Project Orion
and Project Daedalus, and both could easily take a technological
species the distance of one-tenth of a light year in well under
a decade.

> [snip]
>
> > > >Google "Project Orion." It was mostly conceived in the
> > > >1960's for travel within our solar system, but Freeman Dyson
> > > >showed that it is also feasible for interstellar travel.
> > > >If we are content to send unmanned instrumental probes to
> > > >within 100 light years of us,

<snip>

> > > >it wouldn't cost more than our current GNP. And if we
> > > >revitalize our space program and start mining the moon
> > > >and asteroids, we could increase that GNP many-fold.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >>
> > > >> One can be a non-believer in ghodz and still be taken in by some
> > > >> form of woo.
> > > >
> > > >Although I consider Dyson spheres to be a form of woo,
> > > >Project Orion was far from that. The only reason it was
> > > >shelved was the international agreement against nuclear
> > > >explosions in space. But if a sizable asteroid threatens
> > > >to crash into earth, that could be very quickly changed.
>
> Of interest to SF fans, and others:
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_stories_featuring_nuclear_pulse_propulsion

Looks like good stuff. Too bad I have so little free time
these days. I used to read a great deal of SF in my younger years.


Peter Nyikos

[Kevrob]

I might struggle with relativistic effects, but I've been clued
in about those since reading Heinlein's "Time for The Stars"
when I was a pre-teen.

> > I have been a lifelong reader of both SF and non-fiction
> > science articles. The SF mags always had columns treating with
> > science issues: Asimov's in F&SF, for example.
> >
> > I know I read about Project Orion in analog.
> >
> > Yup, here's a column:
> >
> > https://www.npl.washington.edu/av/altvw56.html
>
> Sorry, it does not talk about the kind of propulsion
> envisioned in Project Orion.
>

Cramer references orion here:

[quote]

Zubrin proposes to break out of this dilemma by going nuclear. His is
not the first such idea. Project Orion, a product of the swords-into-
plowshares theme of the late 1950s, proposed to propel a space vehicle
by using a series of nuclear bombs exploded behind a thick steel plate
to drive the space vehicle forward. Orion was rendered illegal and
canceled because of the Test Ban Treaty of 1963.

[/quote]

It backs up your point about the tech being restricted by treaty.

I wasn't able to source the earlier articles that mentioned Orion.
I know I probably ran across mentions before 1992, as there were
novels and stories using the idea from the 1950s on. {See the link
the bottom of my previous post.}

> Project Orion does not seem to call for anything in
> advance of our current level of technology. It uses thousands of
> atomic or hydrogen bombs, exploded a safe distance behind the
> spaceship, to propel the ship forward in a series of manageable jolts.
> The brunt of the explosions is borne by a thick, hemispherical "pusher
> plate" at the rear of the ship, and giant shock absorbers connect the
> plate to the main body of the ship.
>
> See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_(nuclear_propulsion)
>
> A detailed analysis of the methods, and costs, of a *manned* Project
> Orion interstellar probe is to be found in the following article by
> Freeman J. Dyson:
>
> "Interstellar Transport," Physics Today, October 1968, pp. 41-45.
>
>
> There was a write-up of this and three other ways of sending
> probes to the stars in the January 2013 issue of National Geographic.
>
> One is solar sails -- too slow -- and another envisions
> matter-antimatter annihilation -- way beyond reach -- but also
> a more sophisticated form of nuclear propulsion than Project Orion.
> Called "Project Daedalus," it is still not quite within
> reach technologically.
>

I have seen mentions that a pulse driven ship might use a solar
sail for braking, once in a new system. That might be wise, as
"the neighbors" might get tetchy about visitors setting off nukes,
willy-nilly. :)

> It envisions a spaceship slightly larger than the Orion spaceship,
> containing millions of pellets of a mixture of deuterium and helium-3,
> exploded in a "combustion chamber" in a nuclear fusion reaction. The
> fusion is triggered using electron beams of a high intensity -- but
> perhaps not significantly higher than those currently available; some
> of these have been around since 1958:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electron_beam_welding
>
>
> An esthetically pleasing, accessible place to start reading about
> Daedalus is the various webpages of:
>
> http://www.bisbos.com/space_n_daedalus.html
>
> The Wikipedia entry on Project Daedalus is short but also
> informative.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Daedalus
>
> The one on Orion is longer but unfocused.
>
>
> > "Cool idea" propulsion systems that are great in stories
> > frequently run up against problems undere further investigation.
> >
> > Consideer the fate of the Bussard Ramjet.
> >
> > https://www.tor.com/2018/07/30/when-ramjets-ruled-science-fiction/
>
> I never could be convinced that the whole idea was valid.
> Anyway, it is very different in principle from Project Orion
> and Project Daedalus, and both could easily take a technological
> species the distance of one-tenth of a light year in well under
> a decade.
>

Reading about the Bussard taught me that interplanetary and even
interstellar space are not "empty," as people are taught at the
simplest levels. Even in areas with no asteroids, comets or
microplentoids there's a lot of stuff, even if it is very diffuse.

The Stardust probe even brought some back!

https://www.nanowerk.com/news2/space/newsid=36946.php

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stardust_(spacecraft)#Sample_collection

>
> > [snip]
> >
> > > > >Google "Project Orion." It was mostly conceived in the
> > > > >1960's for travel within our solar system, but Freeman Dyson
> > > > >showed that it is also feasible for interstellar travel.
> > > > >If we are content to send unmanned instrumental probes to
> > > > >within 100 light years of us,
> <snip>
> > > > >it wouldn't cost more than our current GNP. And if we
> > > > >revitalize our space program and start mining the moon
> > > > >and asteroids, we could increase that GNP many-fold.
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > >>
> > > > >> One can be a non-believer in ghodz and still be taken in by some
> > > > >> form of woo.
> > > > >
> > > > >Although I consider Dyson spheres to be a form of woo,
> > > > >Project Orion was far from that. The only reason it was
> > > > >shelved was the international agreement against nuclear
> > > > >explosions in space. But if a sizable asteroid threatens
> > > > >to crash into earth, that could be very quickly changed.
> >
> > Of interest to SF fans, and others:
> >
> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_stories_featuring_nuclear_pulse_propulsion
>
> Looks like good stuff. Too bad I have so little free time
> these days. I used to read a great deal of SF in my younger years.

I spent 30 years working in bookstores, so I got to read just about
anything I could get my hands on, asn buy what I liked at discount.
In the first decade of the century I was "disintermediated" out of
that line of work. Now I sell stuff that, with some exceptions, I
don't really care about. [..and provide customer service to both
the customer side and the client side, for the websites and catalogs
they provide to the public.]

Even without being a scientist, one has to keep up with tech,
or one will be like my customers who don't dare to order online,
don't have a computer, or don't access the web on their phones.
I'm older than some of those folks, but they have no clue.
Oh, well. It keeps the paper catalogs in business.

[Robert Carnegie]

...I did warn you.

[Christ...@deathtochristianity.pl]

Sorry to cut in but this is the main problem I have with that.. It
sort of goes right along with the same problem of ION drives.... Lets
say you use the nukes to propel the ship assuming there are living
beings aboard and they can survive the g forces of sudden acceleration
then pray tell how the hell do you propose that they stop? Are they
going to flip the ship around and just do the reverse? If said life
was aboard then said faces or said life forms would be pasted all over
said bulkheads inside the craft. It is just not feasible to travel in
that manner, at least not with life. Then there is the no nukes in
space agreement between participating countries. Then there would be
severe weight constraints... that many nukes is pretty damn heavy.
Then you would have several nukes getting jostled and even banged
together as the ship suddenly accelerated. That just does not sound
like a safe alternative

[Malcolm McMahon]

See the film "Morons from Outer Space".