Posts by SickofLies

203

Opinion peice on Athiests

by SickofLies in

jw
friends

there seems to be a lot of hostility on the board toward atheists still and a lot of comments floating around like atheists are to preachy.

well i want to take a quick minute and deal with some of these issues.

to begin with, to make any statement regarding atheists in general would be false for several reasons.

You make some good points, I also consider myself a agnostic-atheist, meaning I am unsure about the existence of any god or gods, while I don't discount the possibility that an intelligent force could exist, I see no evidence for such an intelligence and so I live my life as though there were none. However, even if I were to assume for the sake of argument that an intelligent force created the universe that does not validate any of the modern day religions as you have already pointed out, each individual religion can easily be disproven by showing the mountain of evidence contradicting the so called 'holy books' that are out there in existence.

I am constantly dumb founded by these so called 'bible thumpers' who talk about Jesus as if he is their best friend, this is just sad, even religious people would admit the only source we have on the life of Jesus comes from literature. I'm not saying that falling in love with a fictional character isn't possible, it happens all the time. I've even grown strong attachments to characters in some books I've read and thought about them for days afterwards. But when you spend you whole life obsessed with a fictional character and refuse to even glance at the multiple lines of evidence that suggest Jesus’ character at best has been greatly embellished by the people who wrote about him and at worst a complete fabrication (which is what the strongest evidence supports).

When people come and try and argue that 'you cannot disprove god' the reason no one takes them seriously is because they are not trying to make an impartial statement about some possible unknowable being, they are in fact arguing for a very specific god with very testable claims about who he is and what he has done or can do. Yet these cowards are two afraid to come out and say what they really believe because even they know how idiotic it sounds.

40

ATHEISM - Better World When Christian Are Gone?

by writetoknow in

stereotypes and prejudicessynopsis.

genocide is the ultimate expression of hatred and violence against a group of people.

this chapter traces the steps by which a group becomes the target of prejudice, discrimination, persecution and violence.

SickofLies

PRO TIP: You can link to an article instead of posting it's entire contents in a thread.

PRO TIP(2): Read your message and use a spell checker before posting.

Have fun!

20

BLAMING GOD...

by writetoknow in

and blame which involves urges to punish either by asking punishing questions or by threatening punishments but then explaining away these urges away.

layer 2 blame.

here again, in theory, seeing this difference is simple.

SickofLies

As an atheist I don't believe in god, therefore I don't blame 'him' for anything.

Blaming god implies the following:

1. You accept that god exists.

2. You believe he personally intervenes in peoples lives.

3. That he has failed to act or acted in a way unfavourable towards you.

While I would not personally make it to number 1 on that list, if a person is able to make it all the way to number 3 then they need professional help.

203

Opinion peice on Athiests

by SickofLies in

jw
friends

there seems to be a lot of hostility on the board toward atheists still and a lot of comments floating around like atheists are to preachy.

well i want to take a quick minute and deal with some of these issues.

to begin with, to make any statement regarding atheists in general would be false for several reasons.

SickofLies

Baruch 6:66...They show the nations no signs in the heavens, nor are they brilliant like the sun, nor shining like the moon.
plus...The beasts which can help themselves by fleeing to shelter are better than they are. Thus in no way is it clear to us that they are gods; so do not fear them .
love michelle

Has any 'god' shown any signs to the nations that has been recorded in history? (BTW, the bible is NOT considered accurate history).

Actually the more I read the two sentences above the less I understand them, but regardless, if you are saying that you only believe in gods that can prove their existance than please share that proof with us.

15

The least attractive cities in Canada

by JK666 in

jw
friends

sweetface started a thread about the ugliest cities in the us.

i just commented that i thought sault ste.

marie was ugly on both sides of the border.. to my canadian/canadien friends, which cities do you find the least attractive?

SickofLies

Hamilton has got two be in the top 3.

When I was in the Navy I spent some time in Halifax and that place is pretty run down as well. Another place I couldn't stand was Saint John, NB, the weather never goes above about 25 Deg C, with the average being a high of 18 in the summer and its always cold out on the ocean (which is where I was working when I was there). It also smells like dead fish first thing in the morning and there is nothing to do there. Also, the people are way to damn friendly and it pisses me off.

122

Who on this Board would love to get rid of Organized Religion?

by restrangled in

jw
friends

imho....it all needs to go.

its influencing everything in this world every and anywhere.

from the saudies, to the people in irag, iran and anywhere else our sons will need to be sent.. our current president claims he is influenced along with the former prime minister of england by religious beliefs.. there is the huge evangelical influence that got bush and the mess he made who put them in to begin with.. we have the jw's causing absolute havic in anyone's lives connected with this stupidity.. it goes on and on and on.

SickofLies

I would like to see organized religion go away, but I would strong fight any attempts to force it to go away.

For better or worse the majority of people are religious in one form or another, although not to the extent as claimed by some people here. According to the most reliable survey's the top ten belief systems in the world are

Christianity: 2.1 billion
Islam: 1.5 billion
Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist: 1.1 billion
Hinduism: 900 million
Chinese traditional religion: 394 million
Buddhism: 376 million
primal-indigenous: 300 million
African Traditional & Diasporic: 100 million
Sikhism: 23 million
Juche: 19 million

I would not think to try and tell over 5 billion people how to live their lives. What I would like to see is a better system for educating people and teaching them about the source of these beliefs, that all these religions can be traced back to very human origins and that they were all influenced by earlier religions. (or at least christianity and islam are).

I would also like to change the way people think about religions, I would like to see religions viewed in the same light as psychics or astrologers. I don't think they should be exempt from taxes either.

That's my two cents.

14

Have JW's changed their tactics for talking with atheists?

by SickofLies in

jw
friends

i attended a meeting with mash (mcmaster association for secular humanists) the other day where we had an excellent guest speaker, a professor from the university of toronto who founded and runs talkorigins website.

for those that would like to see the lecture titled "evolution a theory and a fact" i will be posting it on-line in the next day or two and will post the link in this thread.. back to my question, after the speech when we took the speaker out for drinks we were all sharing experiences talking about how talkorigins helped us and the issue of jw's came up, people there were telling me that when jw's come to their door now if they state they are an atheists or don't believe in the bible they simply stop the conversation and go away.. is this an official change in tactics for the jw's?

it would be great if it were, i can think of only one reason for not wanting to try and preach to the new atheists out there, that being that people who do are getting persuaded by their arguments and leaving the church.. has anyone else heard anything like this?.

SickofLies

I agree with you kwin, it probably depends on the person.

Personally if a JW came to my door, asked me if I believed in the bible and after I said no they tried to walk away I would stop them in their tracks. I would probably say something along the lines of 'wait a minute, are you trying to tell me that the only people who you are trying to talk to our ones that already believe in the bible, you exclude all other religions like hindus, muslims and non-religious people like atheists? Are you that unsure of your beliefs that you only feel comfortable talking to those who share an identical world view as yourselves?'

Actually I'd like to hear more about what MikeA said to make those witnesses cry, to bad you didn't get that one on tape my friend.

203

Opinion peice on Athiests

by SickofLies in

jw
friends

there seems to be a lot of hostility on the board toward atheists still and a lot of comments floating around like atheists are to preachy.

well i want to take a quick minute and deal with some of these issues.

to begin with, to make any statement regarding atheists in general would be false for several reasons.

SickofLies

Produce one shred, one miserable pitiful scrap of empirical evidence that there are Universes other than our own. Go ahead. I DARE YOU. Otherwise you are deluded if you believe that.

There actually is some empirical evidence for this and it lies in quantum mechanics, go to a site like scientific american or something and type in multiple universes they have some really great articles about it. In any case, I wouldn't consider the multiple universe hypothesis a theory just yet, but it's an interesting idea.

Same could be said of belief in, oh, say...God.

Even if one were to assume for the sake of argument that there was some kind of intelligent force that started the universe and we were to call that god, that would only lead one to be a deist and does not justify specific beliefs that their is a god who wrote one of our books, forgives our sins, punishes us when were bad and rewards us when we are good. There is zero evidence for this, in fact there are volumes of evidence that can defiantly prove that the bible and quran were poorly written books that were only inspired by human greed and paranoia.

You can make conclusions, define analogies, defend and debate and argue - but it really comes down to a CHOICE to believe in a deity.

Is it really a choice? How many people become religion because the look carefully at all the evidence and say 'yep that's the one'. 99% of the people out there will say that they are a member of such and such religion because their parents were. Is that really a good enough reason to belong to any religion?

The Universe seems ordered, therefore someone must have ordered it...strikes me as a fervently, happily, myopic, humanistic point of view. "This is the only way things could be" gets boring. If things were different, they wouldn't be the same - that's all.

I agree with you, these kind of simplistic views come from two sources.

1. Ignorance of modern science

2. Liars, many people know the science very well, but they chose to twist and distort means of words like theory for their own purposes.

14

Have JW's changed their tactics for talking with atheists?

by SickofLies in

jw
friends

i attended a meeting with mash (mcmaster association for secular humanists) the other day where we had an excellent guest speaker, a professor from the university of toronto who founded and runs talkorigins website.

for those that would like to see the lecture titled "evolution a theory and a fact" i will be posting it on-line in the next day or two and will post the link in this thread.. back to my question, after the speech when we took the speaker out for drinks we were all sharing experiences talking about how talkorigins helped us and the issue of jw's came up, people there were telling me that when jw's come to their door now if they state they are an atheists or don't believe in the bible they simply stop the conversation and go away.. is this an official change in tactics for the jw's?

it would be great if it were, i can think of only one reason for not wanting to try and preach to the new atheists out there, that being that people who do are getting persuaded by their arguments and leaving the church.. has anyone else heard anything like this?.

SickofLies

I attended a meeting with MASH (McMaster Association for Secular Humanists) the other day where we had an excellent guest speaker, a professor from the University of Toronto who founded and runs TalkOrigins website. For those that would like to see the lecture titled "Evolution a theory and a fact" I will be posting it on-line in the next day or two and will post the link in this thread.

Back to my question, after the speech when we took the speaker out for drinks we were all sharing experiences talking about how TalkOrigins helped us and the issue of JW's came up, people there were telling me that when JW's come to their door now if they state they are an atheists or don't believe in the bible they simply stop the conversation and go away.

Is this an official change in tactics for the JW's? It would be great if it were, I can think of only one reason for not wanting to try and preach to the new atheists out there, that being that people who do are getting persuaded by their arguments and leaving the church.

Has anyone else heard anything like this?

203

Opinion peice on Athiests

by SickofLies in

jw
friends

there seems to be a lot of hostility on the board toward atheists still and a lot of comments floating around like atheists are to preachy.

well i want to take a quick minute and deal with some of these issues.

to begin with, to make any statement regarding atheists in general would be false for several reasons.

SickofLies

Lol, this thread has gotten more posts from people than when I did my JC.

It's good to see that the number of unbelievers has grown considerably since I left.

I'd like to encourage all of you who go through the pain of trying to argue with creationists / theists that it is making a difference. It seems there are more atheists on JWD that ever before.