jeffgreen wrote:

This is my last post to you because it is not ignorance from which you speak since I have told you time and time again.  Since you have been made known that what you are saying is wrong and you still speak it then I would say it is plain stupidity.

Christianity DOES NOT teach violence and I have asked for specific scriptures that teach violence.  None has been provided.  I have informed you of what Christianity is yet you ignore it so that you can bash religion.  All one has to do is look at the New Testament and the life of Christ to know that it does, in fact, teach peace.

If you are still unable to speak truthfully on the matter, it is on you.

The Christianity you proclaim teaches peace, has been shown by history to be a fairly violent practice.  You can make just as valid a claim for every other religion I know of.  They all teach a method that allows their members to live peaceful lives.  The problem is that it is a rare person of faith that doesn't get into a my God is better than your God argument at some point in time.  Human nature is to fight for what one believes, even when that fighting is against the teachings of the religion you are trying to defend. 

As stated before, if you wish to pick and choose which parts of the bible you are going to say are the true Christian parts, you are offending all Christians that claim biblical truthfulness.  You can't have it both ways.  Either you are the one perfect Christian with the rest being wrong, or you are wrong and Christianity is as violent a religion as are most other religions.

If you get to choose only the New Testament of the bible as being important, then there is no need to teach any creation myth from the unimportant part you claim isn't the basis for Christianity.

jeffgreen wrote:
First he does not speak for me or any Christian that I worship with throughout the entire country and world.  So I would change your sentence to "he had a following of over 2.5 million "Christians" because I believe that those who follow him are not truly following Christ.  How can you follow two people?  But in the article you linked to he did not say that we should stone UFO enthusiasts.  He did acknowledge that God, in the Old Testament, called for the stoning of those who brought about worship to another God.  His point, IMO, is not to stone them, but to show just how much of an importance God placed on having no other gods before him.  But if it were me, I would have said it much difference in order to ensure there was no confusion.

You are right in your last sentence.  We wouldn't have Christianity without the Old Testament.  It was Moses law, or the "Old Law" that paved the way for the "New Law" of Christ.  The Old Law has been done away with as you can read MANY places throughout the New Testament though so we are not under the Old Law.  Did it serve a purpose?  Yes.  Does it still?  Yes, but not for us to live by, but for us to gain an understanding of how important God considers some issues.

God. ID. Two dieties, apparently.

2 Kings 17:41  As it turned out, all the time these people were putting on a front of worshiping GOD, they were at the same time involved with their local idols. And they're still doing it. Like father, like son.

Habenero Photography wrote:
They all teach a method that allows their members to live peaceful lives.  The problem is that it is a rare person of faith that doesn't get into a my God is better than your God argument at some point in time.

Well, God does state that He wants us to worship no other god's.  He also calls on us to preach to all the earth.  The problem with your argument is that you are equating me teaching to others that God is THE true God with me killing those who believe in some other god.  That is a false comparison.

As stated before, if you wish to pick and choose which parts of the bible you are going to say are the true Christian parts, you are offending all Christians that claim biblical truthfulness.
If you get to choose only the New Testament of the bible as being important, then there is no need to teach any creation myth from the unimportant part you claim isn't the basis for Christianity.

And yet someone else who refuses to listen.  Christianity is the believing that Jesus Christ is your Lord and Savior.  That His teachings are what we must follow.  It is not to say that the Old Testament isn't important because that would be wrong.  The Old Testament is very important because it gives us the History of the earth from Creation to the Intertestament period.  It tells us how we got to where we are today and it shows us how the Old Law flows right into the New Law... Christ's Law.  If we, as Christians follow the Old Law and live by it we are Jews (Not that there's anything wrong with that[thanks to Jerry Seinfeld!]).  I do not pick and choose which parts of the Bible I am going to follow, I just follow what Christ has told me to through the Bible.  Read it some time.

jeffgreen wrote:
Tim,
re: Your link that you gave on the theory of evolution http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/sectio … theory.asp

"Since mutation is a random process, changes can be either useful, unfavorable, or neutral to the individual's or species' survival. However, a new characteristic that is not detrimental may sometimes better enable the organism to survive or leave offspring in its environment, especially if that environment is changing, or to penetrate a new environment—such as the development of a lunglike structure that enables an aquatic animal to survive on land (see lungfish ), where there may be more food and fewer predators. "

First question is this: Evolutionists, do they believe that all beings are one species?  If not, then what I was saying from the beginning is accurate in that evolution teaches that species evolve into other species.  Every time I would say that you would tell me that I need to educate myself on what evolution actually is.  I knew what it is but went ahead and read the link you gave me and it reenforced my understanding.  That is evident by the last sentence I quoted.  To grow lungs to survive on land means that an aquatic animal now becomes a land animal thus becoming a different species.  How am I incorrect here?

Second question is this: Where are the evolving beings now?  Evolution is the gradual, continuous change from existing previous forms.  Since it is gradual and positive or negative changes can occur in evolution then there would be some "in between" stages at all times.  All things can not evolve at the same time.  This would indicate that there would be no "missing link" because somewhere (especially since evolution has been researched for 3 centuries now) there would be an existing "misssing link".  As long as we have simple celled organisms we will have them evolving into something else and so on.  We SHOULD have fish that walk.  We should have different evolved animals, both aquatic and land and air.  So the claims of "missing links" (which I *think* has been abandoned now) seem lacking as there should be living evidence especially, as I have said, since scientists have been searching for 3 centuries now!

I guess to answer my first question, I'll quote from the definition of "evolution" from the same site you linked me to:

http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/e1/evolutio.asp

We do have fish that walk. Research 'lung fish'.  /tim

Link: http://www.neosys.ne.jp/neo/english/HG01.html

Tim Baker wrote:
2 Kings 17:41  As it turned out, all the time these people were putting on a front of worshiping GOD, they were at the same time involved with their local idols. And they're still doing it. Like father, like son.

I'm confused as to your point with the above.

jeffgreen wrote:

Habenero Photography wrote:
They all teach a method that allows their members to live peaceful lives.  The problem is that it is a rare person of faith that doesn't get into a my God is better than your God argument at some point in time.

Well, God does state that He wants us to worship no other god's.  He also calls on us to preach to all the earth.  The problem with your argument is that you are equating me teaching to others that God is THE true God with me killing those who believe in some other god.  That is a false comparison.


And yet someone else who refuses to listen.  Christianity is the believing that Jesus Christ is your Lord and Savior.  That His teachings are what we must follow.  It is not to say that the Old Testament isn't important because that would be wrong.  The Old Testament is very important because it gives us the History of the earth from Creation to the Intertestament period.  It tells us how we got to where we are today and it shows us how the Old Law flows right into the New Law... Christ's Law.  If we, as Christians follow the Old Law and live by it we are Jews (Not that there's anything wrong with that[thanks to Jerry Seinfeld!]).  I do not pick and choose which parts of the Bible I am going to follow, I just follow what Christ has told me to through the Bible.  Read it some time.

Bible? Read it? I have; do. Nice stories. It would be nice to find someone who doesn't believe the Grinch stoled Christmas. /tim

jeffgreen wrote:

I'm confused as to your point with the above.

1) God - first idol; 2) ID, a second idol. /tim

Tim Baker wrote:
We do have fish that walk. Research 'lung fish'.  /tim

Link: http://www.neosys.ne.jp/neo/english/HG01.html

Might I say fish that evolved?  fins to walk is mighty impressive...
Let's say that this IS an example of evolution... where  are the other examples?  This is the closest thing evolutionists can claim so they stick to it and point to this every time because it's all they have.  The lung fish is impressive but not proof.

Tim Baker wrote:

1) God - first idol; 2) ID, a second idol. /tim

Oh I see.  How about answering the evolution questions I  posed?

jeffgreen wrote:
Might I say fish that evolved?  fins to walk is mighty impressive...
Let's say that this IS an example of evolution... where  are the other examples?  This is the closest thing evolutionists can claim so they stick to it and point to this every time because it's all they have.  The lung fish is impressive but not proof.

Actual evidence. I see. How about Sea Lions and Whales? And where is your physical evidence that the Bible is correct?

Like I said, before, if God or ID wants to drop a dinosaur into my back yard, then I will believe ...

/tim

jeffgreen wrote:
Let's say that this IS an example of evolution... where  are the other examples?  This is the closest thing evolutionists can claim so they stick to it and point to this every time because it's all they have.  The lung fish is impressive but not proof.

Actually the lung fish isn't even all that impressive when you compare it to the wrist and hand bones in the flippers of dolphins and whales.  Or the fingers of bats.  Or the embryonic development of humans.

raveneyes wrote:

Actually the lung fish isn't even all that impressive when you compare it to the wrist and hand bones in the flippers of dolphins and whales.  Or the fingers of bats.  Or the embryonic development of humans.

Indeed. But we can't let physical evidence preclude our fiction of biblical teachings.  That just wouldn't be fair.

jeffgreen wrote:
This is the closest thing evolutionists can claim so they stick to it and point to this every time because it's all they have.

I'm not an evolutionist, any more than I am an oxygenist. I'm a factualist.

It's not all "they" have. It was just one answer to one question: "Show me a fish with legs." It's hardly rhetorically fair to ask that question, get an answer, and then say, "Oh, that's all you got."

jeffgreen wrote:
Let's say that this IS an example of evolution... where  are the other examples?

Obviously, you haven't been reading the entire thread. There was a rather exhaustive discussion of bacterial evolution as well as speciation in fruit flies and plants. Of course, since that argues against your position, you'll say it doesn't count.

mjr.

jeffgreen wrote:
I do not pick and choose which parts of the Bible I am going to follow, I just follow what Christ has told me to through the Bible.  Read it some time.

You're obviously more of a scripturalist than I am.

Can you tell me where in the bible "christ" says anything?
Can you tell me where in the bible it says "this superceeds the old testament"?
Can you tell me where in the bible christ says "all that stuff we said in leviticus no longer applies"?

I've read the bible a couple times and never seen anything like that. Maybe you're reading a different version.   And can you explain how "christ says this" and "christ says that" when we're dealing with a document that originates hundreds of years after at least one of his deaths.

Christ has clearly got L. Ron Hubbard completely aced, in terms of post-mortem authorship!! Or... wait... isn't the theory that it was mortal men who wrote all that stuff but they were "inspired" by the divine spirit?? That's a pretty good theory but - wow - let's hold that one up to a standard of "proof" like you're asking for from evolution. Can you give us some practical evidence of divine inspiration of the bible?

mjr.

jeffgreen wrote:
I just follow what Christ has told me to through the Bible.  Read it some time.

I have read the Bible (Catholic, King James, Gideons's) many times.  It contains the best collection of pornographic stories a kid can get his hands on!  If you read it with a critical eye, you will see how the context changes depending upon the prevailing politics at the time of writing, and those in effect at the time of its translation.  I've also read translations of the Torah and Koran.  I have taken the time to read a lot about most of the major religions, and many minor ones. 

That's how I came to realize that the core values of each of them allow their adherents to live in peace within that group.  Each one works well for its practioners as long as they don't encounter a group with a different religion, or flavor of the same religion.  When that happens, because of man's nature, it becomes, my god must want me to beat you up because you don't worship him like I do. It's the Lack of consistancy between teaching peace and living in peace that gives Christians a bad rap.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
Can you tell me where in the bible it says "this superceeds the old testament"?
Can you tell me where in the bible christ says "all that stuff we in leviticus no longer applies"?

I got these two...all that christian upbringing was good for something.

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?bo … text=verse

Hebrews 10:1
The law is only a shadow of the good things that are coming—not the realities themselves. For this reason it can never, by the same sacrifices repeated endlessly year after year, make perfect those who draw near to worship.

The bible says a few times that faith in Jesus' sacrifice replaces the old laws.

raveneyes wrote:
Hebrews 10:1
The law is only a shadow of the good things that are coming—not the realities themselves. For this reason it can never, by the same sacrifices repeated endlessly year after year, make perfect those who draw near to worship.

Just for fun, I asked it to give me the King James version, which has already been translated in an attempt to render it more coherent:
For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect.

Which, I submit to you, is utter gibberish.

I thought, perhaps, to enlighten myself by reading the commentaries attached, namely:
The apostle having shown that the tabernacle, and ordinances of the covenant of Sinai, were only emblems and types of the gospel, concludes that the sacrifices the high priests offered continually, could not make the worshippers perfect, with respect to pardon, and the purifying of their consciences. But when to God manifested in the flesh, to blank became the sacrifice, and his death upon the accursed tree the ransom, then the Sufferer being of infinite worth, his free-will sufferings were of infinite value. The atoning sacrifice must be one capable of consenting, and must of his own will place himself in the sinner's stead: Christ did so. The fountain of all that Christ has done for his people, is the sovereign will and grace of God. The righteousness brought in, and the sacrifice once offered by Christ, are of eternal power, and his salvation shall never be done away. They are of power to make all the comers thereunto perfect; they derive from the atoning blood, strength and motives for obedience, and inward comfort

I don't see anything in this that says "there's going to be a new testament that superceeds this old testament."   In fact, I see nothing in any of this that is discernably coherent to a rational mind. What is this drivel?? Do people really base their lives on this junk?

If god is all-powerful, and can create a Shakespeare why the heck didn't he get someone of Shakespeare's writing ability to author this stuff?? This reads like it was written by someone barely literate who was tripping on shrooms.

mjr.

Nihilus wrote:
This is one big inflated argument from ignorance. Ruling by power and warmongering is also a human precedent (both biologically and in reference to early civilization). That something has accompanied the human species in the birthing centuries of organized groups and lack of technological and scientific knowledge does no make it logical or sensible (necessary, is perhaps another issue...but that is more psychologically based, concerning myriad emotion-based issues with personality types).

Incorrect. Ruling by power and warmongering is observable in other species, so calling it 'a human precedent' is extraordinarily feeble-minded. And hand-waving it all away with yet another artificial construct (psychology) is... well, that's a complete non-argument.

Nihilus wrote:
Anyhow...that this encompasses all humanity or not is irrelevant. You are arguing against a point not even brought up by Pigliucci. Because the parallel of Soviet scientific decline due to ideologies replacing critical scientific endeavor is not erased because you're trying to make it sound as a prerequisite for being human (which IS inane...unless you care to start an argument on why I, or any other non-theist, isn't human).

Sentence one: avoidance. The point IS relevant, and I have showed you why. You can put your head back in the sand if you want, but you have said nothing to refute the relevance of the point.
Sentence two: And? Such silliness...
Sentence three and accompanying run-on sentence: a response based on lack of reading comprehension skills (I am not arguing that non-theists are non-human; I am pointing out how people who choose to ignore the existence of a creative source are intentionally forfeiting an aspect of their complete humanity).

Nihilus wrote:
This is a vacuous statement. Your sole support for this nonsense, apparently, is:

"Well look at all the people in history that have had a god concept. It must be true."

That's not a valid rebuttal; it's nothing but a laughable tantrum from someone who is clearly upset by their lack of a reasonable counter-argument to a valid premise.

Because the same could be said about THIS "nonsense":

"Well, look at all the scientists who agree that evolution is a reliable foundation for other sciences. It must be true."

Nihilus wrote:
Which makes no sense because most thinking atheists aren't concerned with an imaginary being who was made to 'appear' in a puff of (flawed) reason.

Then why are most athetists some of the most sheepish and naive consumers and regurgitators of dogma, and so threatened by this so-called 'imaginary' being? If atheists were truly rational people, they would relish their secret knowledge and not waste their time with fruitless attempts at disproving the concept of a creator.

Nihilus wrote:
Truthfully, though, I could deconstruct the entirety of the deity concept to it being either a subservient quality in the believer, an immature status of personal imagination or an inability to come to grips with emotionally detrimental parts of their life. But that's best not done here.

IOW, more smoke from that flaccid flame of frustration, by the lack of any sustainable counter-arguments on your part. Nothing but empty bluster. No problem. Your shortcomings are tolerated here.

Nihilus wrote:
Again, I think you're missing his point or taking it to a further step that isn't in his essay.

So, is extreme literalism your counter-argument? I'm still trying to fathom why you bothered to post...

Nihilus wrote:
The zealous right-wing mentality in this country is not something to be taken lightly.

On this we do agree. In fact, both the zealous right-wing mentality and the passive, brain-dead leftist mentality are both extremely dangerous to our nation's well-being.

Nihilus wrote:
We'd like to think that a civilized mindset and more 'upgraded' set of modern ethics and sensibilities are part of this self-fluffing nation, but it's the very presence of things like ID making its way into classrooms that shows quite the contrary.

Well, that, and short-sighted, smug rationalists who've essentially bought into a boatload of fallacies, flawed assumptions, and other forms of human waste disguised as 'knowledge', and are delusional to the point that they see their indulgent inertia as 'civilized' and 'ethical', and worse, are infecting future generations with this disease of intellectual sloth.

Tim Baker wrote:
I'm wrapping my IDmas presents ... but wanted to say, very well said.  Happy IDmas ... /tim

Miracles do happen! One post, two fishes!!!

jeffgreen wrote:

I agree with this statement. /tim

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
I am an atheist. Are you saying I'm incapable of having morals?

I don't think he intended to imply any such thing. A self-described atheist does, however, have the burden of proof that he or she isn't simply brainwashed!

RStephenT wrote:
I have a question:  What role do many of you feel that spirituality (not necessarily a specific religious viewpoint) has in the development of mankind and people in general, or should we rely completely on the scientific approach to discover the complete nature of our world (i.e universe)?

I would say that the wealth of evidence indicates that spiritual (NOT necessarily religious) awareness is an observable hallmark of culturally and scientifically progressive civilizations, while the UNbalance thereof (either extreme theo-centric ideologies blocking scientific observation and analysis, or dogmatic rarified ---often politically/economically subsidized--- 'reason' trying in vain to 'disappear' the spiritual human core) is a sign of a creatively and intellectually stalled (at best) civilization, if not potentially regressive.

Melvin Moten Jr wrote:
Spanish Inquisition anyone?  Those people were very spiritual.  So spiritual that they arrested, tortured, exiled and/or executed anyone they even suspected didn't share their spirituality.  At least if you don't like Vegas [I hated the place], you can just leave...It's hard to walk away when you're staked to the top of a burning pyre.

And don't get me started on Salem...More proof that spirituality and public administration just don't mix.

Actually, these are not examples of spirituality. In fact, they are examples of the complete opposite: they are examples of institutionalized dogma. You in fact stated it in your follow-up example: Salem was an example of dogma acting on its own principle (in this case, the Catholic church attacking and eradicating an alternative view-point to preserve their monopoly on a very lucrative business model). Salem is proof that spirituality has nothing to do with any of it; it's an example of a corporation trying to rub out an older, more venerable Mom-n-Pop chain so they can have the customer base all to themselves!

kickfight wrote:
A self-described atheist does, however, have the burden of proof that he or she isn't simply brainwashed!

Nope; morality/ethics, whatever, are really simple for us atheists. We choose whatever values we want to hold. If it makes us more comfortable to have reasons for them, that's great (i.e.: the greater good for the greater number, or whatever). But if not, that's fine, too. If an atheist decides that his morality is going to be based on the behavior of the characters on "Friends" - well - so be it. It's just as solid a basis of a system of morals as some hodgepodge of mystical writings from the past. Maybe better.

I think, in fact, that everyone's value systems are derived from a mixture of social norms (literally, society's "average" behaviors) parenting, personal preferences, and other influences. You could probably call the social norms aspect of it "brainwashing" in fact. As we know, human societies have found a very wide range of behaviors acceptable and normal including infanticide, human sacrifice, cannibalism, ritual mutilation, theft, ritual murder (duelling) etc.

An honest atheist will probably tell you that the derivation of his/her value system is more complex than they can probably understand. Even the existentialists were far more adhering to social norms than they'd like to admit. Yes, it's brainwashing, but there's an element of picking and choosing that's important, as well.

mjr.

kickfight wrote:

Actually, these are not examples of spirituality. In fact, they are examples of the complete opposite: they are examples of institutionalized dogma.

Now you're hiding behind semantics. Both dogma (institutionalized belief) and spirituality (belief) are rooted in the same thing - belief. They cannot be opposites because one of them is the cause of the other.

Spirituality causes dogma, dogma causes the inquisition. Therefore, spirituality is contributority to the inquisition.

By the way, I'll accept as highly likely that the inquisition was motivated by other factors as well as spirituality* -- however, the inquisition was a religious movement, initiated by a religious leader, for the purposes of religious self-regulation and expansion.

mjr.
(*The inquisitors got to keep their "patients'" worldly goods. Many of the individuals who were turned over to the inquisition were political opponents of the powerful; it became a convenient mechanism for executing political purges. There is also a likelihood that some of the inquisitors were sexual sadists who were simply having a good time. Money, sex, and power - what religion is really all about.)

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
Money, sex, and power - what religion is really all about.)

Indeed



"I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People For the American Way, all of them who have tried to secularize America. I point the finger in their face and say 'you helped this happen.'" Falwell, pastor of the 22,000-member Thomas Road Baptist Church, viewed the attacks as God's judgment on America for "throwing God out of the public square, out of the schools. The abortionists have got to bear some burden for this because God will not be mocked." God did not return our phone calls."

Jerry Falwell -










"The mission of the Christian Coalition is simple," says Pat Robertson. It is "to mobilize Christians -- one precinct at a time, one community at a time -- until once again we are the head and not the tail, and at the top rather than the bottom of our political system." Robertson predicts that "the Christian Coalition will be the most powerful political force in America by the end of this decade." And, "We have enough votes to run this country...and when the people say, 'We've had enough,' we're going to take over!" --Pat Robertson

Rolex anyone?

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
Now you're hiding behind semantics. Both dogma (institutionalized belief) and spirituality (belief) are rooted in the same thing - belief. They cannot be opposites because one of them is the cause of the other.

No, you're narrowing your comprehension to suit your beleifs. Dogma and spirituality are not rooted in the same thing at all.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
Spirituality causes dogma, dogma causes the inquisition. Therefore, spirituality is contributority to the inquisition.

Again, incorrect. Dogma is caused by overzealous adherence to knowledge, be it intuitive or 'retail' (i.e. learned). The premise that spirituality is contributory to the inquisition is a fallacy.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
By the way, I'll accept as highly likely that the inquisition was motivated by other factors as well as spirituality* -- however, the inquisition was a religious movement, initiated by a religious leader, for the purposes of religious self-regulation and expansion.

The Inquisition was the enforcement branch of a political system which leveraged a form of religious dogma to sell itself. It did not 'trade' in spirituality since spirituality is not transactible.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
(*The inquisitors got to keep their "patients'" worldly goods. Many of the individuals who were turned over to the inquisition were political opponents of the powerful; it became a convenient mechanism for executing political purges.

Which evidences that its primary objective was political, and had very little to do with religion, and nothing to do with spirituality at all.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
There is also a likelihood that some of the inquisitors were sexual sadists who were simply having a good time. Money, sex, and power - what religion is really all about.)

Pretty much the motivators of any legitimate human endeavor, as history reiterates time and time again!

Tim Baker wrote:
Indeed

See you, and raise you one:

How'd you like to run into that in a dark alley?

Have you ever noticed that the first thing religious leaders do is ask for sacrifices - usually in the form of money, food, or property? You know, so they can carry on their important work - namely, saving you from having all that extra cash and food.

mjr.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
Nope; morality/ethics, whatever, are really simple for us atheists. We choose whatever values we want to hold. If it makes us more comfortable to have reasons for them, that's great (i.e.: the greater good for the greater number, or whatever). But if not, that's fine, too. If an atheist decides that his morality is going to be based on the behavior of the characters on "Friends" - well - so be it. It's just as solid a basis of a system of morals as some hodgepodge of mystical writings from the past. Maybe better.

Hm. Morality/ethics seem to be the most difficult areas of abstract thought for humans. I would have reservations about anyone who considered morality/ethics a 'simple' part of their lives. It sounds like you are more thoughtful in that respect, Marcus, and it isn't really 'simple' at all (there have been a lot of 'simple' posts on this thread, though! )

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
I think, in fact, that everyone's value systems are derived from a mixture of social norms (literally, society's "average" behaviors) parenting, personal preferences, and other influences. You could probably call the social norms aspect of it "brainwashing" in fact. As we know, human societies have found a very wide range of behaviors acceptable and normal including infanticide, human sacrifice, cannibalism, ritual mutilation, theft, ritual murder (duelling) etc.

No argument there. Atheism then seems to be the deliberate removal or rejection of certain common values for the purely experimental fun of it. I can see the appeal, then, if it is purely a transitory state.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
An honest atheist will probably tell you that the derivation of his/her value system is more complex than they can probably understand. Even the existentialists were far more adhering to social norms than they'd like to admit. Yes, it's brainwashing, but there's an element of picking and choosing that's important, as well.

OK, a fair and sober assessment, and one that parallels what I consider to be my experience of faith: more complex than can be understood, but clearly detectable, observable, and discriminating (in the benign sense of the word... i.e., selective).

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:

See you, and raise you one:

How'd you like to run into that in a dark alley?

Have you ever noticed that the first thing religious leaders do is ask for sacrifices - usually in the form of money, food, or property? You know, so they can carry on their important work - namely, saving you from having all that extra cash and food.

mjr.

Holy Crap!

kickfight wrote:
Dogma and spirituality are not rooted in the same thing at all.

Oops, sorry, I was going by Websters' dictionary definition of "dogma" and "spirituality" -- I guess your version of the English language superceeds theirs.

kickfight wrote:
Again, incorrect. Dogma is caused by overzealous adherence to knowledge, be it intuitive or 'retail' (i.e. learned). The premise that spirituality is contributory to the inquisition is a fallacy.

That's a ridiculous assertion. There are plenty of contemporaneous accounts of the inquisition that describe the deep sincerity and faith of the inquisitors. I haven't dug into that particular cesspit of human history for a long time (wrote a paper on it in college a zillion years ago) but many of the descriptions of the inquisition are autobiographical. I suppose you can assert that they were all lying, and that the whole thing was 100% motivated by earthly desires but that's a hell of a stretch.

kickfight wrote:
The Inquisition was the enforcement branch of a political system which leveraged a form of religious dogma to sell itself.

Ah, I see what you're doing. You're defining the papacy, and the entire catholic church, as a "political system" rather than a religious system.

I think there's a heck of a lot of catholics who'd disagree with you.

Not merely content to adopt your own version of the English language, you're now adopting your own version of political history and religious history, as well. That's a very effective debating tactic, because, as you say "whatever I believe is real" then you never have to admit you're wrong, either.

I prefer to deal with the here and now. You impress me as a smart but insufferably glib character who's content to hold any position as long as it's contrary, and to twist words to whatever extent you need to in order to score your point. After reading a lot of your postings and admiring your cleverness, I no longer feel you're particularly sincere. Frankly, a sincere, deluded, believer is a more worthy foe because at least he's got some skin in the game. I'm not interested in measuring swords with you as to who's the bigger master debater.

So let's just agree that since you have your own vocabulary, and are talking about your own revisionist history of the world, we have no further basis for discussion.

mjr.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
Oops, sorry, I was going by Websters' dictionary definition of "dogma" and "spirituality" -- I guess your version of the English language superceeds theirs.

Hm. I guess your version of Webster supercedes the published one, which makes NO reference whatsoever to spirituality. In fact, it reiterates my interpretation of dogma, which states that dogma can imply religious or secular zealotry.


Main Entry: dog·ma
Pronunciation: 'dog-m&, 'däg-
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural dogmas also dog·ma·ta /-m&-t&/
Etymology: Latin dogmat-, dogma, from Greek, from dokein to seem -- more at DECENT
1 a : something held as an established opinion; especially : a definite authoritative tenet b : a code of such tenets  c : a point of view or tenet put forth as authoritative without adequate grounds
2 : a doctrine or body of doctrines concerning faith or morals formally stated and authoritatively proclaimed by a church

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
That's a ridiculous assertion. There are plenty of contemporaneous accounts of the inquisition that describe the deep sincerity and faith of the inquisitors. I haven't dug into that particular cesspit of human history for a long time (wrote a paper on it in college a zillion years ago) but many of the descriptions of the inquisition are autobiographical. I suppose you can assert that they were all lying, and that the whole thing was 100% motivated by earthly desires but that's a hell of a stretch.

Sorry, but nope, it's not ridiculous at all... The 'deep sincerity' and 'faith' of the inquisitors is one of the most inhrently suspect claims in all of recorded history. Their actions are in fact glaring evidence that their adherence to purely dogmatic corruptions of religion were contradictory to the practice of the religion itself. Autobiographical accounts of the practice would in fact be the MOST questionable of all sources, due to the nature of the practice (who would be stupid enough to write a heretical autobiography?)

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
Ah, I see what you're doing. You're defining the papacy, and the entire catholic church, as a "political system" rather than a religious system.

We have an excess of historical evidence that substantiates that very fact. To think otherwise is to ignore centuries of reliable data.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
I think there's a heck of a lot of catholics who'd disagree with you.

I'm sure they would! As an atheist, you can't really say that's a problem, now is it?

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
Not merely content to adopt your own version of the English language, you're now adopting your own version of political history and religious history, as well. That's a very effective debating tactic, because, as you say "whatever I believe is real" then you never have to admit you're wrong, either.

So, being firmly entrenched in your own dogmatic ditch, you're only left with lobbing ad hominem attacks as a simulation of discourse, especially when your own dogmatic approach to 'the English language' has caused you to misinterpret the meaning of a word as defined by the dictionary How sad. It would be interesting if you could prove that my assessment is incorrect, but that doesn't seem to be something that you are able to do. I can see why, as the dictionary (when properly understood) and school-board-safe history books are the Bible in your world. Dogma seems to be a prerequisite of pedantry, then. Fair enough!

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
I prefer to deal with the here and now. You impress me as a smart but insufferably glib character who's content to hold any position as long as it's contrary, and to twist words to whatever extent you need to in order to score your point.

I respect your opinion, Marcus, because I think you have learned, known, and (more importantly) understood a great many things, which is more than I can say for a number of posters on this thread. On the other hand, you clearly have a lot of dogmatic investment that you resent having threatened, especially when they are framed in a logical manner. I can accept that.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
After reading a lot of your postings and admiring your cleverness, I no longer feel you're particularly sincere. Frankly, a sincere, deluded, believer is a more worthy foe because at least he's got some skin in the game. I'm not interested in measuring swords with you as to who's the bigger master debater. So let's just agree that since you have your own vocabulary, and are talking about your own revisionist history of the world, we have no further basis for discussion.

So, you're going to pretend to gracefully exit, with an apparent semblance of dignity, for the sake of your own ego. Because you'd rather dishearten a believer than deal with someone who has a balanced viewpoint. Well, that's a shame, but it *is* a cheaper, easier endeavor, especially for someone more content with simple  regurgitation rather than thoughtful analysis.

We'll agree that you're well-educated but lazy, somewhat naive when it comes to your acceptance of what constitutes 'history', and, in the end, not much of a 'master debater' after all, despite your unquenchable desire to keep the thread alive with more of your 'insight'

kickfight wrote:
Atheism then seems to be the deliberate removal or rejection of certain common values for the purely experimental fun of it.

I think it's impossible to grow up in a society without encountering situations in which "values" are offered (that's probably not the right word but I don't know a better one) for one's consideration. Regardless of the source of those values, we encounter them and choose to adopt or reject them. Some, in fact, are so strongly presented by society that we have little choice but to accept them. For example, in most of the 1st world/"civilized world", we have a variety of notions of "property rights" that axiomatically define "wrongs" such as "theft" and "vandalism" etc. But it starts from the moment that a caregiver spanks a child's backside for taking its sibling's toy, or whatever -- well before rationality or language are developed. If you don't believe me, spend a few weeks with a couple of 3-year-olds and (if you survive with your sanity intact) you'll know what I'm talking about.

So, speaking for myself, I had to do a lot of wading through "values" and thinking about them. As you say, a certain amount of that process required consciously imagining what kind of person I'd be if I chose to reject a particular "value." It doesn't require religion, in the long run, to realize that, well, killing other people is nasty and impolite, because you'd be really annoyed if someone did it to you. And taking other people's stuff ("stealing") is improper because when someone steals from you it makes you hurt and angry. Philosophically, the hardest hurdle for me to jump was the principle of reciprocity ("if you think X would annoy you then you shouldn't do it to others because it'll annoy them") - but that's actually pretty easy to adopt simply by watching how other people behave. Again, one can test this empirically by kicking Mike Tyson in the nuts.

If one can't affirm reciprocity then things get weird. You can come up with moral philosophies based entirely on the self, i.e.: "it is OK for me to steal, but I will get very upset if someone steals from me."  Personally, I suspect there are a lot of people who have adopted such values; they simply aren't aware of it. I consider such lack of awareness to be a failure of introspection and a failure of logic, but that's my own values speaking, there. (By the way, that's a pretty fair roundabout definition of a "sociopath" - someone who has adopted a set of values that are so far outside of society's norms that they are effectively estranged from society, yet still exist within it)

I don't think I'd say I "rejected" values - but I did spend a lot of time questioning them. In fact, I think it's very important to do this, and it was this train of thought, in fact, that led me to become an atheist at an early age. I concluded that attempting to bulk-load values onto a child is more likely to be damaging than the (moderate) risk that they may grow up a sociopath if they make their own decisions on values and come out too far out of line with society's. But it's this process of testing and re-affirming society's values that lead mankind into making really interesting leaps of reasoning. For example, it was a "fact" to most people in North America, prior to 1800, that black people were inferior. That was a "value" and society's values (indeed, even financially) incorporated that "fact." A child growing up in that era was presented with a load of experiences that reinforced that "fact" in their values. Until, finally, enough people began to test that particular value and began to reject it.

One of the places where religion/dogma fails us is by encouraging wholesale acceptance of value systems at an early age. It is no coincidence, in my opinion, that religious teaching is focused on the very young and impressionable, and the very old and afraid of death. This is why I am personally so concerned with religion's destructive effect on human society. It doesn't take a whole lot of "smiting and slaying" of infidels and heretics to make a large impression on a young mind. In fact, I think it serves to muddy the water! Why waste our time force-feeding value systems that need to be challenged and require significant repair(*) - it would be simpler and healthier to develop a sensible "science of values" and work at it rationally and humanely. The phrase "science of values" is, of course, a mis-use of the word "science" but I do not know a better term. As scientists have established a framework for reasoning about, proposing, attacking, and validating theories and experiences, we could develop a similar framework for discussing beliefs and feelings. Perhaps what I am describing would fall under the rubric of "political science" as the root word of "political", "polis" is the ancient Greek for "group of people"/"town"/"society".  Social science, as we teach it today, is more concerned with observing the results of our half-assed experiments with socialization, and political science at present is more concerned with who is crapping on whose head right now, and why.

Sorry about the long-winded answer. But - yes. I believe humans are capable of thinking far more clearly than we do. We just have too many self-imposed obstacles in our path. It's silly that we keep putting obstacles in our own path; life is hard enough, don't you think?

mjr.
(* An example of what I mean by "repair" is the way in which some christians downplay the intolerance and cruelty of the old testament in order to gain a degree of moral comfort that their belief system is not, in fact, repugnantly violent. Or that many muslims choose to subconsciously edit out the passages describing the special rewards in the afterlife that await those who slay infidels. In psycho-babble terms, it's an attempt to deal with the cognitive dissonance of religions that assert peace but have histories of warfare.)

kickfight wrote:
So, you're going to pretend to gracefully exit, with an apparent semblance of dignity, for the sake of your own ego.

No, I'm going to stop arguing with you - watch!

mjr.

Tim Baker wrote:

I'd believe in god if he'd give me a nice diamond-studded Rolex like that one!!

mjr.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
I think it's impossible to grow up in a society without encountering situations in which "values" are offered (that's probably not the right word but I don't know a better one) for one's consideration. Regardless of the source of those values, we encounter them and choose to adopt or reject them. Some, in fact, are so strongly presented by society that we have little choice but to accept them.

unless we apply reasonable judgement to them. Then, we can see them as the contemporary dogma, as the status quo. No mystery there.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
For example, in most of the 1st world/"civilized world", we have a variety of notions of "property rights" that axiomatically define "wrongs" such as "theft" and "vandalism" etc. But it starts from the moment that a caregiver spanks a child's backside for taking its sibling's toy, or whatever -- well before rationality or language are developed. If you don't believe me, spend a few weeks with a couple of 3-year-olds and (if you survive with your sanity intact) you'll know what I'm talking about.

Actually, the example of spanking a child's behind for 'stealing' is in fact a human construct to hang 'consequences' around a concept that exists in all nature: someone will take, and someone will be without. We agree that progress can only be accomplished through the tacit understanding that "ownership" is defined in a common manner, and that there are "consequences" to the violation of that common definition.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
So, speaking for myself, I had to do a lot of wading through "values" and thinking about them. As you say, a certain amount of that process required consciously imagining what kind of person I'd be if I chose to reject a particular "value." It doesn't require religion, in the long run, to realize that, well, killing other people is nasty and impolite, because you'd be really annoyed if someone did it to you.

Understood, and yet we can observe in nature that the prospect of 'killing' is not... well, unnatural... at all. In fact, the taking of another creature's existence for the purpose of sustenance, or for the reinforcement/realignment of a hierarchy, or to secure held territory, is one of the most natural processes in nature. Humans understand that acceptance of certain values is an arbitrary and artificial means of exploiting our greatest gift or tool: reason. While chaos is not evident in the animal kingdom due to the absence of 'values', we also detect no progress in the animal kingdom either. Common values are one of the necessary foundations for progress.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
And taking other people's stuff ("stealing") is improper because when someone steals from you it makes you hurt and angry. Philosophically, the hardest hurdle for me to jump was the principle of reciprocity ("if you think X would annoy you then you shouldn't do it to others because it'll annoy them") - but that's actually pretty easy to adopt simply by watching how other people behave. Again, one can test this empirically by kicking Mike Tyson in the nuts.

Totally agree.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
If one can't affirm reciprocity then things get weird. You can come up with moral philosophies based entirely on the self, i.e.: "it is OK for me to steal, but I will get very upset if someone steals from me."  Personally, I suspect there are a lot of people who have adopted such values; they simply aren't aware of it. I consider such lack of awareness to be a failure of introspection and a failure of logic, but that's my own values speaking, there. (By the way, that's a pretty fair roundabout definition of a "sociopath" - someone who has adopted a set of values that are so far outside of society's norms that they are effectively estranged from society, yet still exist within it)

Again, I agree. It is at this stage that we can see how the idea of needing a certain set of common values may have been corrupted into the forcing (or marketing) of a larger number of values (for money, sex, and power).

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
I don't think I'd say I "rejected" values - but I did spend a lot of time questioning them. In fact, I think it's very important to do this, and it was this train of thought, in fact, that led me to become an atheist at an early age. I concluded that attempting to bulk-load values onto a child is more likely to be damaging than the (moderate) risk that they may grow up a sociopath if they make their own decisions on values and come out too far out of line with society's.

Fair enough, although I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with rejecting certain values if they have been found wanting under scrutiny. On the other hand, a sociopath could easily be someone who has spent *too* much time questioning values, to the point where the majority of values have been found wanting under scrutiny.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
But it's this process of testing and re-affirming society's values that lead mankind into making really interesting leaps of reasoning. For example, it was a "fact" to most people in North America, prior to 1800, that black people were inferior. That was a "value" and society's values (indeed, even financially) incorporated that "fact."

Absolutely. And during that period, we have clearly documented proof that a number  of people, despite the common "values", or "scholarship" (as this "fact" was often reinforced by what seemed to be actual science, or at least "science-for-hire"), found, with no other basis but what they knew in the core of their being, that this "fact" was wronger than any fact has been.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
A child growing up in that era was presented with a load of experiences that reinforced that "fact" in their values. Until, finally, enough people began to test that particular value and began to reject it.

Well, I'd rephrase that to say that a child growing up in that era was presented with a load of experiences that were framed in an environment that served to reinforce the "fact" in their values.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
One of the places where religion/dogma fails us is by encouraging wholesale acceptance of value systems at an early age. It is no coincidence, in my opinion, that religious teaching is focused on the very young and impressionable, and the very old and afraid of death.

Again, agree completely. Religion and dogma are the commercial exploitation of something that all humans share and which all humans find difficult to describe: faith.
The interesting thing is that religious teaching actually succeeds when it secures its true target audience, which are the very wealthy and the very powerful and the very influential, often the same people. The very young and impressionable and very old and afraid of death aren't very lucrative.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
This is why I am personally so concerned with religion's destructive effect on human society. It doesn't take a whole lot of "smiting and slaying" of infidels and heretics to make a large impression on a young mind.

Agreed. The 'smiting and slaying' is impressive to the chief stockholders of the religious product (kings, queens, regents, caliphs, emperors, presidents, and CEOs).

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
In fact, I think it serves to muddy the water! Why waste our time force-feeding value systems that need to be challenged and require significant repair(*) - it would be simpler and healthier to develop a sensible "science of values" and work at it rationally and humanely.

Well, because science, by necessity, cannot abide absolutes. And the very issue we are discussing is the definition of absolutes. Because, as we have established throughout this post, without certain absolutes, we are subject to the forces of nature. Not necessarily and inherently a bad thing, granted, but certainly not a stage for progress. In essence, science requires these values to be in place in order for it to exist at all. 

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
The phrase "science of values" is, of course, a mis-use of the word "science" but I do not know a better term. As scientists have established a framework for reasoning about, proposing, attacking, and validating theories and experiences, we could develop a similar framework for discussing beliefs and feelings.

Now THERE's a premise!

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
Perhaps what I am describing would fall under the rubric of "political science" as the root word of "political", "polis" is the ancient Greek for "group of people"/"town"/"society".  Social science, as we teach it today, is more concerned with observing the results of our half-assed experiments with socialization, and political science at present is more concerned with who is crapping on whose head right now, and why.

Agreed. As a matter of fact, IMHO, the Greeks were the first civilization that seemed to balance reason and faith without the need to devise an artificial contradiction in that balance (that, of course, did come later...)

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
Sorry about the long-winded answer. But - yes. I believe humans are capable of thinking far more clearly than we do. We just have too many self-imposed obstacles in our path. It's silly that we keep putting obstacles in our own path; life is hard enough, don't you think?

No, I really liked your points, and I agree with your overall premise, that we have toiled to complicate things in the process of setting up the basic foundations for progress. And while I can see how it happened, it always comes back to the same things: taking something valuable, pure, and universal, and exploiting it to make short work of progress, to devise a shortcut directly to power and success. It happens both with religious and secular exploitation, and it's perhaps the most lamentable faux pas in human development.

Marcus J. Ranum wrote:
No, I'm going to stop arguing with you - watch!

mjr.

Really? we'll see...

Unless you're implying that you're going to start agreeing with me, which, honestly, I'd find a tad less invigorating...

kickfight wrote:
Actually, the example of spanking a child's behind for 'stealing' is in fact a human construct to hang 'consequences' around a concept that exists in all nature: someone will take, and someone will be without. We agree that progress can only be accomplished through the tacit understanding that "ownership" is defined in a common manner, and that there are "consequences" to the violation of that common definition.

Yup. And those common definitions might be discussed rationally and built upon.  You just described one of the properties of "ownership"; namely that, with physical objects, ownership is a zero-sum proposition:
If you take my thing, I no longer have my thing.
We could then move on to evaluate the meaning of "ownership" applied to ideas, or things that do not have the properties of physical objects. A society might agree that ownership of ideas has lower value than objects, because:
If you take my idea, I still have my idea.
We could then reason about the economic consequences of "ownership" in that context, and so forth.

(That's a deliberately chosen example. Many societies/countries appear to have decided that "software is free" and many young people appear to have decided that "ownership" of music is not a zero-sum game, and are in the process of upsetting the applecart of a whole lot of "values" as a consequence!)

Anyhow, I don't think we'll ever be able to reason about "values" or societal norms with the same kind of clarity as mathematicians reason about numbers, but I think we humans could do a whole lot better than we do. You appear to feel the same way.

kickfight wrote:
It is at this stage that we can see how the idea of needing a certain set of common values may have been corrupted into the forcing (or marketing) of a larger number of values (for money, sex, and power).

Here I think we're both cynical enough to suspect that the majority of values that get downloaded onto people are for the convenience of the empowered class, and not much more than that. Oh, crap, am I paraphrasing Marx or what?

My dad's an academic (that's where I got my gene for my long-windedness!) and his "thing" is the history of revolutions and the rise of absolute monarchy. So I grew up with this floating zietgeist of the notion that there has been a two-thousand-plus-year-long struggle between church and state as to who's in the driver's seat. It's no coincidence that Stalinist dictatorships try to suppress their #1 competitor, the church, as vigorously as possible. Etc. Those of us who are "just plain folks" are the territory that's being fought over, and we have about as much say in what happens as the soccer ball in a world cup game has over who wins. My view is that eventually, as religion continues to lose out to science, the battleground will shift increasingly towards purely political means of control. When I'm feeling particularly paranoid and cynical I suspect the US' "two party" system is a scam that locks people into a choice between two "rival" systems that aren't really rivals, at all.

kickfight wrote:
Fair enough, although I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with rejecting certain values if they have been found wanting under scrutiny. On the other hand, a sociopath could easily be someone who has spent *too* much time questioning values, to the point where the majority of values have been found wanting under scrutiny.

I think we're in agreement, there. By "question" I do not mean "automatically reject" - merely the process of trying to see what those values are based on, and to give them the "stink test" to see if the reek of B.S. is too strong. And, yes, I'd say that a type of sociopath could easily arise in which, for whatever reason, a highly rational person concludes that the values of society just don't apply to them.

I've actually had the non-privilege of meeting a person like that, before, and that's part of the reason why I am hyper-sensitive on the topic of individuals adopting private vocabularies. Language is one of our most important shared "values" if you will, and when someone decides that they won't share it, things rapidly get weird. The guy I'm thinking of literally (as far as I could tell) defined "good" as "what I want" and "evil" as "annoys me." What was particularly scary was that he is capable of telling what you or I might consider lies without a flicker, because to him they're just sounds he's making with his mouth. After spending a little while talking to someone like that, you realize how thin language really is.

kickfight wrote:
I'd rephrase that to say that a child growing up in that era was presented with a load of experiences that were framed in an environment that served to reinforce the "fact" in their values.

I'll buy that. There's also the problem of self-fulfilling prophecy. When women first wanted to operate cars, there was considerable resistance to the idea on the basis that women weren't physically or mentally capable of such a difficult task. And, of course, there was some actual evidence that could be pointed to as "proof" of this proposition because, well, it's hard to drive well if nobody's willing to try to teach you. And, of course, the slaves were "of inferior intelligence" because they were uneducated, etc.

kickfight wrote:
Again, agree completely. Religion and dogma are the commercial exploitation of something that all humans share and which all humans find difficult to describe: faith.

You might enjoy the chapter in Sam Harris' "The End of Faith" that tries to deal with this topic. He tries really hard and eventually resembles a 4x4 driving through a pit of rubber cement.

kickfight wrote:
The interesting thing is that religious teaching actually succeeds when it secures its true target audience, which are the very wealthy and the very powerful and the very influential, often the same people. The very young and impressionable and very old and afraid of death aren't very lucrative.

I'd argue that the powerful/wealthy/influential are the "hard targets" for religion and more often represent "the enemy."  Those with temporal power are usually too familiar with the tricks of the trade, know how power works, and are hard to fool.

My reference to the old/afraid of death was motivated by a thing that happens around here a lot. When someone who hasn't got relatives/heirs is old and getting ready to kick off, the preachers come 'round, offering solace - and hoping the church will be remembered in the dying person's will. I find this practice disgusting but entirely predictable.

kickfight wrote:
As a matter of fact, IMHO, the Greeks were the first civilization that seemed to balance reason and faith without the need to devise an artificial contradiction in that balance (that, of course, did come later...)

I completely agree. I'd say that the war for political control between priests and kings probably began in Greece. It appears that most pre-hellenic societies embodied political control in an office of priest-king; it was the Greeks who thought to separate philosophy from religion and politics from prayer. Arguably, the Greeks invented "political science" in the process. I still remember how amazed I was, as a kid, when I learned that The Oracle of Delphi aligned against Greece when the Persians tried to invade, because Athens wasn't taking the oracle seriously enough. ...And Leonidas marched to Thermopylae in spite of what the oracle said to do...

kickfight wrote:
And while I can see how it happened, it always comes back to the same things: taking something valuable, pure, and universal, and exploiting it to make short work of progress, to devise a shortcut directly to power and success. It happens both with religious and secular exploitation, and it's perhaps the most lamentable faux pas in human development.

Yes; it's the old problem of "how do you overcome short-term thinking, when it takes time to demonstrate long-term gains?"

mjr.