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Topics on this page:
#191 - References? - Apr 22, 2006, 01:26 PM
#192 - What can anthropology teach us? - Apr 30, 2006, 11:41 AM
#193 - Elusive evil - May 06, 2006, 12:12 PM
#194 - Farewell...for now - May 06, 2006, 12:29 PM
#195 - Catching up - Jan 15, 2007, 12:47 PM
#196 - Atheism versus Christianity - Apr 28, 2006, 07:52 PM
#197 - Who said 'opiate' first? - May 07, 2006, 02:47 PM
#198 - Disassembling our instincts - May 14, 2006, 11:54 AM
#199 - What's in a meme? - May 26, 2006, 09:58 AM
#200 - Consciousness - May 30, 2006, 10:04 AM
#201 - Can an atheist be a prophet? - Jun 02, 2006, 11:47 AM
#202 - 10 rounds with the big guns - Jan 16, 2007, 08:58 PM
#203 - Nuts - Jun 08, 2006, 07:37 AM
#204 - How to contribute to BetterHuman.org? - Jun 10, 2006, 07:55 AM
#205 - Will BetterHuman.org submit to irrefutable proof of a god? - Jun 16, 2006, 08:34 AM
#206 - Lust and greed - Jun 17, 2006, 12:17 PM
#207 - The pretty colors of a smoke screen - Jun 17, 2006, 12:18 PM
Click here to see next weblog page...
#190 - Dangerous seeds - April 15, 2006, 01:31 PM |
Mr. Matget wrote back:
> I admire your tireless efforts with the book, the website, and the weblog.
Thank you very much for the kudos my friend. I really wish it was tireless work but the reality is that the weblog is all-consuming.
> Regarding the Christians in the Chinese Universities, you have to understand that there exists a huge, huge shortage of foreign English teachers at all levels of education in China.
I do understand that, but again, would the Chinese allow a heroin dealer to teach their children? I would argue that there's much more potential for damage from religion than drug abuse; it's just more difficult to immediately see the ramifications of religious teachings because virtually everyone's already an addict and can't see outside the same box.
> I know for sure that he teaches from Proverbs and salts Christianity in his lectures. I really doubt that he'd give a fire and brimstone lecture.
It isn't necessary to give a grossly dramatic sermon in order to accomplish a comparable degree of 'infection'. One of the things that struck me as a child when I was being programmed by the religious meme-virus is the intensity in which I perceived that which was often presented as ordinary mundane topics (which were actually quite cleverly placed fear-'bombs' in typical conversations). Nobody ever came to me and said, "Sean, prepare yourself, because here are the consequences of not believing..."; no, my ethereal education was always facilitated by the sordid mind-game of "Great weather today, huh? Oh and by the way, those other people over there are going to suffer for eternity because they didn't follow our rules. Did you see my new watch?"
It seems a common tactic of religions to express these monumental concepts (e.g., going to hell) in very casual ways, almost to give a 'matter-of-fact', 'already been proven' portrayal of credibility to these statements. The result of someone hearing these kinds of casual statements for the first few times is that they will have a 'huge' internal reaction of fear, and also a quick 'reaction' of blind acceptance of it in order to parallel the apparent calm and 'wisdom' of the person delivering this incredibly important information. Despite the perceived magnitude of this information, people will suppress their outward reaction of fear to avoid exposing that fear and how close they came to nearly missing this 'obvious' point that 'everyone' else already knows.
This method of 'shock' teaching (which shocked me to my core) profoundly plants the fear of ethereal punishment into one's persona because they virtually 'witness' (via hearsay) the full-blown enactment of said punishment. Hearing statements like these not only plays on one's intellectual insecurities ("I should have known that; how could I be so stupid?"), but removes any opportunity to be objective about these ideas because they are presented as an 'already being witnessed' fact. The sheer magnitude of these casual and apparently 'harmless' statements when perceived by children, cannot help but parallel the net effect of the more dramatic 'fire and brimstone' portrayals that tend to ensnare older people.
There is no acceptable level of tolerance of ethereal invasion, just as there's no such thing as an acceptable dose of heroin. What may seem as a very slight and easy-to-overlook indulgence by your religious co-workers in planting the seeds of religion, isn't being appreciated for the colossal damage being done to the impressionable young minds that they teach. Fear of ethereal punishment is the 1000-lb gorilla that these children will remember when they go home at the end of the day, and this is what eventually grows and festers into full-blown ethereal addiction, especially with the continued assistance of what appears to be seemingly innocent and subtle (tolerated?) prodding by the religious right.
> At the national level, China has to appear to be pluralistic and not stir the pot on religion. Kicking Christianity is like kicking a beehive
This 'stirring' will be an inevitability. Over the eons, religions have accumulated a fortress-like presence in our world and taking it apart will be very destructive, but, like a cancer, the treatment is sometimes much worse than the disease, but that doesn't justify letting the cancer persist.
> (the educational institute would) really scream if they were to lose a foreign teacher. The easist thing is just to ignore it unless he's really out of line, I'm not sure how much latitude they give the Christians, but I'm sure it's a lot.
A very misguided and unfortunate compromise, at the expense of the mental welfare of their children.
Thanks again, my friend, for your support,
Sean Sinjin
{All letters from this contributor: 14.184, 15.190}
#191 - References? - April 22, 2006, 01:26 PM
Mr. Sumbliss wrote:
> (at the age of 12 as I recall) started to question the existence of god and the meaning of religion. As of the age of 16, I was confident that the idea of the christian god was no better than any elaborate fairy tale.
You have a keen mind my friend. Congratulations for seeing through the ruse of religion.
> I'm not really that far from being an atheist (like 99.9%), but I still think that hard atheism is too presumptuous and absolute, to satisfy me. My argument is, that human senses are by nature, too unreliable to derive any absolute, non-relativistic truth. On that basis, some form of supreme-intellect (not a creator, but a different, "higher" form of life) may exist as a multi-dimensional being.
There are many things that keep one from totally accepting atheism (e.g. many years of religious programming, misinterpreting of the G.O.D. instinct, a lack of completeness in scientific explanations, etc.) so I completely understand the inability to convict oneself entirely. I too took many, many years to shake off that last 0.1% of 'what if I'm wrong', utilizing the many shortcomings in science to justify not holding a 100% atheistic stance, and of course having to confront the horrible ramifications of eternal damnation should I be wrong; that's the religious meme-virus at work. What finally pushed me over the top occurred when I retraced religion back to its roots, as demonstrated by the story of Glack, in Meme. Once I 'truly' understood that humans created the notion of ethereal beings, and also created all the mental traps that perpetually kept me hanging on to even the smallest thread of ethereal possibility, I finally became purely atheist. Mythology is simply not logical, it is a product of wishful thinking, and the absolute lack of proof for it, is the exact amount needed to disprove it.
> I would like to address some issues about determinism. Quantum physics has questioned the alleged deterministic nature of the universe, yet you seem pretty certain of it. Can you give me a list of books that helped you reach that conclusion (and meme in general)?
There are a few reasons I subscribe to a deterministic perspective of the universe, 1) it is a natural extension of my bether theory, 2) if randomness did really exist, I believe that by super-symmetry we should see large scale examples of randomness being exhibited, which we don't, 3) I believe that the interpretation of witnessing quantum 'randomness' can also be explained with unaccommodated parameters, and 4) my intuition tells me randomness is impossible. (I also have many weblog entries that tackle this randomness issue, please give them a read). Of course, none of this is 'proof' of my position, but much like others' theories of non-determinism, I would also never state my position on determinism to be anything more than a theory.
As for third-party documentary support of determinism, well, my bether theory is new and entirely my creation, upon which the deterministic nature of the universe is inherently defined, so even though there may be some support for determinism out there, obviously there will be no supporting documentation that is relevant to the reasons for my deductions. The bether theory is the root of all of my perspective, so it makes more sense to challenge that, than to challenge the logical extensions of it.
As for Meme's references in general, there are an uncountable number of reference points that I have assimilated over my entire life to forge what you witness as Meme. A tidbit here, a paragraph there; all of it adding up to my overall perspective. It would be senseless to even attempt to itemize every single resource utilized in my reality self-education over a lifetime, especially in the light that I had no idea I would be putting it all together in a book some day and for the most part have 'forgotten' those sources. In the end, I decided to label Meme as a work of fiction (since there's no such thing as a genuine fact anyway) to avoid the necessity of procuring this mammoth and relatively useless list of references, as well as to streamline the writing, and also to allow me to seamlessly interject my own theories where there are currently gaps in science.
It may seem an ungrateful dismissal to the authors of those resources, but I'll counter that idea on a few points, 1) I'm fairly certain those authors themselves learned from another, and so ultimately credit isn't due to them, 2) out of respect for their possible discord with BetterHuman.org, I would need their permission to put their names (or company name, or website) in Meme as it is a very controversial book that they more than likely would 'not' wish to be associated with, 3) I never plagiarized any material, 4) most of the material I've assimilated is ubiquitously available so it makes no sense to point to a single reference that may expire over time (e.g. website), and 5) the ultimate result of not having these itemized resources will 'force' the curious reader to challenge/vindicate my writing by doing their own research, which I believe produces a much better and unbiased result than would be accomplished by 'channeling' them to the exact location that would only serve to support my position. I don't want people to use my references, I want them to come to the same conclusions as I, of their own accord.
Hope I've been helpful,
Sean Sinjin
{All letters from this contributor: 15.191, 16.214, 16.216, 17.243}
#192 - What can anthropology teach us? - April 30, 2006, 11:41 AM
Mr. Loophost wrote back:
> Logic also dictates that the masses of people who believe in evolution over ride the logic of the minority. Which means that those of the masses view the few as insane, one then needs to understand what logic means.
I think what you are trying to say here is that the 'majority' perception is what dictates the 'minority' perspective to be 'insane', thereby defining 'insanity' as something that is 'relative' to something else. This is quite incorrect on a couple levels. The first being that it doesn't matter whom you ask, whether majority or minority, everyone believes that everyone who 'doesn't' share their perspective is insane (perhaps not using the exact terminology, but definitely implying it). However, simply viewing someone as insane does not mean that they 'are' insane.
Secondly, BetterHuman.org defines insanity as:
"One whose knowledge is founded upon incorrect information and who therefore cannot accurately perceive reality, rendering them largely incapable of manifesting rational thoughts or actions".
By this definition, it doesn't matter who holds the majority or minority perspective; if one does not perceive reality for what it is, then to some degree they are insane, no less insane than believing a magic bunny rules the universe.
Also worth mentioning is that there are a vast majority of people that subscribe to an ethereal perspective, meaning that it is actually the 'majority' of people that are insane.
> Your paper lacks the logic to prove your thesis.
My friend, you haven't read my book so how can you possibly make that assumption? Not to mention that it is 'your' perspective which is entirely founded upon blind 'faith'; the very antithesis of logic. Though I cannot absolutely and conclusively 'prove' the validity of the atheistic perspective, the major difference between your beliefs and ours is that we do not propose our perspective to be anything more than a theory. So (while we are so carefully scrutinizing the application of logic), would you care to be the first to 'logically' describe your ethereal perspective as a theory?
> With this in mind, has the use of the word logic been shrouded to mean that because more people believe in something then it must be logical and thus right.
Again my friend, running with assumptions. The majority does 'not' subscribe to evolution or logic, in fact, quite the opposite holds true; the 'majority' believes in ethereal creatures. There is virtually no credibility added from 'strength in numbers'. There was a time when everyone believed the world was flat, but did that make it flat?
> And that through a logical method of deductive reasoning you have come up with your view that there is no God and that you before you started your search you had an unbiased view. Because if you did not, then you're whole process would be tainted and in its self would be illogical.
Good point, but in my defense, I actually started on the opposite side of the coin. I used to be a full-blown ethereal addict, and in trying to 'prove' my beliefs in the ethereal, I inadvertently cornered myself by logic and ended up 'disproving' my beliefs. My ego took a pounding.
I would also like to disagree that the whole process would be rendered 'illogical' if there was bias, simply because bias does nothing to invalidate supportive evidence. The only negative role that bias can play would be in its selective presentation and/or dismissal of counter-evidence. As well, bias is virtually impossible to escape.
> I to would ask has your book been submitted to any scientific study to prove its observations to have substantial bases of truth.
You have it backwards; Meme is actually a 'product' of much scientific study, with very few additions that I added to fill in known gaps, such as gravity and magnetism. All material is presented for what it is: theory; and most of it is quite substantiated by a myriad of easily-locatable scientific documentation.
> The morals and values, which we live by today, have only been passed down from generation to generation. These you would say have been refined but this still doesn't make them absolute in any way.
They are absolute, though cultural interpretation of these influences can vary widely. Take 'stealing' for example, everyone on the planet instinctually knows it is wrong, but the global punishments for said act range from a slap on the wrist, to a death sentence. The lack of consistency in level of punishment, however, doesn't change the ubiquitous and 'absolute' instinctual knowledge that it is wrong.
> If there is no Creator who made us and laws that we live by, all our morals and ideas of how we view right or wrong are simply subjective, what we ourselves decide
Again, this is not true. We have a basic set of built-in instinctual morals that Mother Nature provides us that cannot be altered (stealing is wrong, altruism is right, senseless killing is bad, love is good, etc.) The enactments/punishments of these instincts are subjective, but the underlying moral fiber is always the same. For example, there's no person in the world that likes to have their possessions stolen, nor would anyone want to suffer because nobody would help them, nor would they like to be killed, etc. Because of humankind's ability to 'empathize' (feel another's emotions), we are able to understand when our actions impart 'pain' upon another. We feel their pain, and this is the reason we wish to instinctually pursue 'right' from 'wrong' since we don't want to feel this pain, even if it's mostly suffered by another.
As a side note, you should also know that even 'your' religious morality is defined upon these very instinctual moral foundations. Yes, your religion is but another example of a cultural 'interpretation' of the innate morality we are given by Mother Nature.
> We can see this in sex before marriage, having children out of marriage lawlessness and relative morality.
Why is sex before marriage wrong? Why is having children out of wedlock wrong? Marriage is nothing more than a piece of paper. There are many unmarried people that are more in love and more responsible as parents than a lot of married people. Marriage does absolutely 'nothing' to increase the caliber of a relationship, of a family environment, or to purify sexual acts. My friend, your antiquated perception of marriage is quite unjustified in today's modern world, and unjustly oppressive to those that decide not to pursue the tradition of marriage.
> We can see further change through abortions
How is someone else's abortion your business?
> and the increase of homosexual rights for example.
How are homosexual rights your business? Can you explain to me how granting homosexuals equal rights (e.g. gay marriage) in any way affects your life?
> Evolution is a blind concept built on chance random events, with no purpose other than, supposedly, to benefit the propagation of one's genes. It does not know the end from the beginning. It incorporates the ideas of survival of the fittest, and the weak dying out or being exterminated to make way for the strong to survive.
What you are describing above 'only' applies to simpler lifeforms. Our huge brains have afforded us unique talents that increase our social complexity such that the above simplistic model cannot fully encompass all the parameters that compose 'human' natural selection criteria. Though it is much too broad of a topic here, Meme, covers a great deal of this anthropological/psychological evolution model; please give it a read.
> They suggest that, since mankind now knows his true origins as a product of chance in an impersonal universe, we can guide our own evolution.
I totally agree with this, and we are already currently doing this, as we always have been. We are not under the direction of some master plan, and so we are subject to 'ourselves' in how we evolve. This is the very reason that the G.O.D. instinct even evolved in the first place, because of eons of humankind's persistent misguided belief in the ethereal. Absolutely, we do form our own evolutionary path.
> And man is of sufficiently high moral character, they say, to set the rules by which we measure compassion, love, altruism, ethics. But what is moral character anyway? And why is one person's opinion of what is right or good any more right or relevant than another's?
Historically, it has always been 'might is right', meaning that whoever was in power was the 'interpreter' of this instinctual morality, and they defined the lines and consequences of right and wrong. Ultimately though, we all agree on what is 'fundamentally' right or wrong, we just can't perpetually agree on where the lines are in terms of definition/punishment/reward for those instinctual motivations.
A good example of a 'cloudy' moral interpretation lies in the 'abortion' issue. It is very difficult to draw a line of 'when life begins' that has a consensus among most people. Some choose conception, some choose second trimester, some require birth before calling it life. With all this subjective interpretation, it becomes difficult to define the lines of morality that surround it. However, I don't think there's a single person alive that believes abortion isn't 'unfortunate' under any circumstance, and this discomfort is produced by the immutable and ubiquitous instinctual morals that we evolved to 'protect' another. This isn't learned, we are born with this protection instinct, and you can witness the influence of this instinct in virtually every type of animal when they protect their young from harm. Nobody had to teach them a thing.
> The Quran came from Mohammed. The Book of Mormon came from Joseph Smith. But the Bible is unique among the many sacred books in the world. One person did not write it. Rather, the Old and New Testaments were written by 40 different authors, located in Asia, Africa and Europe, over a 1600-year time span.
The above overlooks the fact that 'science' has millions of contributors from over a 'much' greater timespan than your religion has even existed. Why doesn't 'science' register in your 'credibility' exposition above?
> Archaeology cannot prove that the Bible is God's written Word to us. However, archaeology can (and does) substantiate the Bible's historical accuracy.
Forgive me for removing a great amount of your text, but it all boiled down to support of the above statement, which even if true, does nothing for adding credibility to the existence of ethereal beings. As I've stated quite a few times before, my friend, please understand that a high degree of historical accuracy in your religious text does 'not' in any way prove there are magical creatures in the sky.
> Homosexuality, like all other types of fornication, has no place in the family of God. ... This life style is unacceptance from a biblical point of view, which, comes from its "absolutes".
What exactly guarantees that your Bible is correct in defining homosexuality as immoral? Is it because your Bible tells you so? This makes as little sense as stating that everything in my book, Meme, is absolute fact, if Meme says it is so.
> From a Christian viewpoint we are to love the person but not approve of what they do. Is this oppression?
Yes it is. 'Oppression' is a very broad term, but in this context, you are unjustly socially oppressing their right to freedom of sexual expression. This 'passive' oppression manifests in many obscure but injurious ways (e.g. homosexual hate crimes, banning gay marriages, etc.) so don't for a second believe that your 'opinion' of their lifestyle being unacceptable is in any way harmless.
> You say that people who believe in God must be illogical; on what grounds do you judge them?
The grounds that there are no magical creatures in the sky. Believing in something that doesn't exist is inarguably illogical. The fact that they don't need concrete proof of their ethereal entity and rely instead entirely upon 'faith' to justify their beliefs, is also, illogical.
> Would you say that Isaac Newton is a logical person or illogical? He believes in God so that would make him what ...?
Excellent point my friend, and I'm quite amazed that you're the first to really tackle the religious-scientist angle. Between you and I, our conversations thus far have been mostly geared at the application of logic 'against' the existence of ethereal beings. Though Newton excelled in applying logic in mathematics and physics, it's doubtful that he spent much effort applying this same logic 'against' his ethereal perspective. Also, there was virtually no concept of the 'theory of evolution' in his time and so it would've been difficult for him to confront his beliefs with a viable alternative. His understanding of his own discoveries was merely that he was exposing the inner-workings of his ethereal universe. He thought he was looking into the mind of his god.
Was he illogical, well, no, he just didn't have enough information to be able to see the shortcomings of his perspective, much like people logically used to believe the world was flat, until more information became available. Newton applied logic correctly using the limited information granted him. To be absolutely clear: it's not having an incorrect perspective that makes one illogical, it's hanging on to a incorrect perspective by rejecting credible information to the contrary that's illogical. This is not to be confused with being 'insane', for if you believe in ethereal creatures, whether you are aware of the theory of evolution or not, you are still insane.
> Your reply to instinctual morality is again unproven as there is no morality in evolution as there is no need for it.
My friend, you fail to understand how instinctual morality plays a very vital role in social evolution. If nature's motive was, as you implied, 'only the fittest shall survive', then our species would have the social structure more akin to lonely individualistic bears, than to the intimate and very socially active humans we see today. Our moral instincts have provided the foundation for social harmony for eons.
One can easily witness these same moral instincts at work by observing chimpanzees cooperating with each other to achieve common goals. Sure they are selfish at times, but quite social and altruistic at others. This social harmony allows them to band together, allowing all of them to benefit from a 'strength in numbers' advantage to natural selection. If it was truly 'every chimp for themselves', then there'd be no sharing, no altruism, no love, and only one survivor. Instinctual morality is one of the 'most' important survival instincts we have, and we couldn't survive without it.
> The term Instinctual is to broad and cant work, one tribe of people in one part of the world would have vastly different instinctual morality to those on the other side of the world.
Incorrect, we all have the same instinctual moral foundation. Stealing is wrong no matter who you ask or where they're from; no human anywhere wants to be hurt, killed, or enslaved by another, altruism exists ubiquitously, etc. Again, interpretations of these instincts are often culturally skewed, but you'll never see a culture that forbids helping another, or generally promotes stealing, or purposeless killing, etc.
> Neanderthalensis man pithecanthropus Ramapithecus Australopithecus Africanus Hesperopithecus Sinanthropus (Pekin man) Eoanthropus (Piltdown man) Homo habilis (debunked)
> These are all debunked evolutionary missing links (above), which show our development as to date there is still no clear evidence that shows our evolution from ape to man.
There have been many unfortunate attempts at fraud in the evolutionary-science circles, but these shysters shouldn't be taken as representative of the whole of scientific men and women that pursue this noble discipline. It would be just as much a crime to allow their crimes against anthropology to reduce the credibility of all the others' work.
As for 'clear evidence' of a common ancestor, the first thing I'd like to point out is that we didn't evolve from modern apes, no, instead we share a common 'ancestor' with modern apes (that is, we have the same great-great-great-great-great-great-great etc grandparents as them). It is very easy to determine virtually the 'exact' point in history that our lineage separated from our cousin ape species. This is done by comparing our DNA to theirs, calculating the percentage of congruency, and extrapolating back the amount of time necessary to accumulate said amount of changes. We are very closely related to chimpanzees. Would you believe that our DNA is ~97% the same as theirs?
That aside, your understanding of anthropology is quite outdated. There is much recent 'missing link' evidence that is surfacing daily, so I would encourage you to search the Internet for 'missing link Ethiopia' to see what I am talking about.
> One of the fundamental problems facing life scientists is the extraordinary variety and complexity of life on Earth-there is just too much to comprehend especially in the Plant Kingdom. After all the recent study on: plants, flower, and ferns. There is no definite connection from one to the other, as one would expect in a "supposed evolutionary tree." The evidence suggests that all plant life is unique and all had separate parents to begin with.
The above is absolutely incorrect. There is a high degree of DNA congruency between any and all plants. One of the most notable shared attributes for most plants would be chlorophyll (the 'green' in plants). Also, all plants are formed from a type of cell called a 'Eukaryote', as are all animals, including ourselves. Meme explains this in very great detail.
> Modern textbook tell that human embryos have gills like fish (pharyngeal clefts), which in evolutionary terms tells us our close relation to fish (evolutionary progress). But this to has been debunked as these glands turn in to our thymus glands.
Mother Nature is the great re-inventor. Not that I subscribe to the interpretation of embryonic thymus glands to be primordial gills, it is however a common tactic of evolution to 'change' a biological trait to instead perform another function. An example would be how the gills of ancient fish slowly changed over time to become the 'ears' of land-animals that evolved from these fish, or how fish 'scales' evolved to become hair 'follicles'; and don't forget about our 'tailbone' remnant that we still bear today, reminding us of the full tail our ancestors had in our ancient tree-climbing days.
> Throwing energy at amino acids will not create delicate chain molecules, just as putting dynamite under a pile of bricks won't make a house'.
Correct, we are not going to emulate the process of life's beginnings in a laboratory because it takes an incomprehensible amount of time for these types of chemical reactions to begin the chain reaction we know as life. Any attempt to 'force' the evolution of life from base chemicals merely demonstrates a complete lack of understanding of the mechanics of evolution. A 'much' better analogy would be to put a large number of slightly magnetic (yet separated) pieces into a box, and then shake the box for hundreds of thousands of years until some of them end up connected in a meaningful pattern. This is a much more accurate analogy than your instantaneous manifestation of complicated structures from pure chaos.
Many people frequently make the mistake of assuming that life evolved in massive steps, but this couldn't be further from the truth; all evolutionary steps are quite miniscule. What makes this path so hard to perceive is the phenomenal (and I mean quite incomprehensible) amount of time required for these changes to occur. It can take upwards of 'millions' of years to even begin to 'see' evolutionary advances at a macro level.
> You see before blindly following others and their views on evolution one to needs to see how credible and true it is. Evolution has such a long way to be a credible avenue for our existence. Logically speaking evolution doesn't work.
In your own words...You see, before blindly following others and their views on religion, one needs to see how credible and true it is. Religion needs concrete evidence before it can be a credible avenue for our existence. Logically speaking, there are no ethereal creatures.
> Evolution would state that we progressed through many types of "ape man" our levels of skills would of course naturally follow this slow progress taking millions of years. Early man has said to live in caves, use stone tools and paint on cave walls ect. But is this view of mans evolution credible, is there evidence to show that early man was more advanced then what we thought and if so what evidence has been found
My friend, I cannot imagine how you are so removed from what is being discovered in the real world. From television programs, to museum exhibits, to news stories, and especially all the information that is easily available on the Internet. All you have to do is step back for a minute from your agenda of persistent denial, and actually take the time to read/watch/visit the 'thousands' of resources that can feed your mind with all this information. You frequently bring up the topic of 'logic', well, does it seem logical to 'not' expose yourself to the possibility that the evidence you claim doesn't exist, is actually out there? They're not going to call you personally to let you know, it's up to you to get out there and find out for yourself.
One of the worst assumptions that many people (religious or not) tend to make is that they will be somehow 'notified' if their assumptions are proven untrue. This is absolutely not the case, in fact, there are still people on the planet that insist the world is flat (seriously). Education is a proactive pursuit, not a passive one. Every single year that passes produces a mountain of information and it's practically guaranteed that at least some of it pertains directly to your perceptions of the world. Don't ever assume that what you learned even last year, will always remain true.
> Fifty years ago, the then Director of the Baghdad Museum, Wilhelm Konig, reported the discovery of an electric battery 2,000 years old. You had not heard about this sensational discovery? We can tell you why. It did not fit in with the established viewpoint, and most archaeologists did not want to know about it. They hoped it would go away.
I'm not sure why you feel a 2000 year old simple battery is in any way beyond the capacity of human serendipity. I'm sure looking at today's modern battery would make it seem too complex for our recent ancestors to assemble, but that fails in understanding the very basic chemistry that goes into a battery. For certain, the inventor did not understand the physics, or infinite possibilities of this battery assemblage, but people do tend to invent the most unlikely of things without intending to. Quite likely the original inventor was experimenting and just randomly put together a rather plain battery (they're simpler to create than you might be aware of, just iron, copper, and probably used grape juice as an electrolyte) and by tasting it, discovered a little 1 volt 'shock'. Further experimentation probably led to the discovered final model of your aforementioned battery which theoretically could have been used to electroplate metals together. A very simple invention well ahead of its time, but still found a purpose even in those days
> For example the June 1851 edition of Scientific American reported that a beautiful metallic vase had been blasted out of solid rock in Dorchester, Massachusetts. The vase was adorned with six flowers and was inlaid with silver, but the rock was considered to be millions of years old.
Found in 15 feet of sedimentary 'pudding' rock, your aforementioned 'pot' was guessed to be 100,000 years old, though estimates were quite subjective given the dating technologies of the time. Unfortunately (conveniently?) the pot has since disappeared so its true age will never be verified with modern age-testing techniques.
> The author draws attention to the Atoka Pillar at the Kutb Minar in Delhi, India. It is a 10-metre high iron pillar weighing six tonnes, and has been standing there since AD 413 at the latest, yet it shows only the minuets trace of rusting. It has taken modern technology a long time to come up with stainless steel.
You should be aware that stainless steel is nothing more than iron mixed with a little chromium. Not much magic in that.
> In reality, there is plenty of evidence to show that people in the 'Stone Age' were highly intelligent, with an advanced culture. Their stone plates, bowls and vases were skilfully made and the artistic designs on them reveal a sophisticated art form. Robert Silver berg wrote, 'The cave paintings are upsetting to those who prefer to think of Quaternary man as little more than an ape' (Man Before Adam, p. 191). How then is it possible for so called early man to be so clever and advanced?
Why is this amazing? I don't believe that cave paintings or pottery were beyond the intellectual capacity of early man. It seems perhaps that some people think 20,000+ years of evolution is much more significant that it really is. To put it into context, it may help to understand that we diverged from chimpanzees around 5 million years ago (250 times as long ago). When those paintings and potteries were manufactured, it was 'much' more recent and we were 'considerably' more evolved so these products were 'well' within our abilities at the time they were created. It is, however, a serious error to compare the intellectual capacity of humans 2000 years ago, to that of 'early man' (20,000 years or more ago). You will never find a 20,000 year old battery, of this I'm sure.
The intellectual evolution that has occurred during the past 20,000 years, however, is significant enough, and continues to exponentially accelerate. Even since 2000 years ago, there has been a strong trend towards intellectualist natural selectivity due to the continuously increasing complexity of our social structures. Take even the past 100 years for example, and you will witness the emergence of a flood of technologies (nuclear physics, space transport, medicines, etc.) that is unparalleled by any other time in history.
We are learning at a phenomenal rate, but that doesn't mean we were just cavepeople a mere 2000 years ago. In fact, the Egyptians were building pyramids 5000 years ago, so it's important to recognize the capacity for intelligence was there for quite some time, even if we didn't have all the information necessary to feed it. It should come as no surprise that things like simple 'batteries' or 'alloys' pop up in our long history of great intellectual capacity.
> The bible has clear answers are you up for it logically speaking of course?
There will always be mysteries to solve my friend. The worst thing we can do is to cover up those mysteries with an easy default mythological answer, which really isn't an answer at all, but only a diversion to an end of questioning. It's important to realize that some mysteries will remain unsolvable, and that you must learn to live without some answers. Mystery will always form the better part of reality; and the lack of accepting unsolvable mystery is nothing short of an obstinate ego reaction.
True reality may seem frightening and confusing, but better to face this disorientation head on than to deny and shrink-wrap an ethereal veil over it, for by doing so you severely wound yourself intellectually, and open yourself up to manipulation. Don't hide in your cocoon of blind faith; come join us in reality. Conquering fear of reality is the greatest challenge anyone can face, and surmounting this challenge is the greatest reward possible.
My brother, please be safe and enjoy life.
Much respect,
Sean Sinjin
{All letters from this contributor: 6.73, 6.80, 7.86, 7.94, 8.103, 8.116, 9.124, 9.129, 10.139, 11.148, 11.157, 12.168, 13.172, 14.188, 15.192, 20.288}
#193 - Elusive evil - May 06, 2006, 12:12 PM
Mr. Helmroot wrote back:
> The religious and the atheists get their morality from the same place: life experience.
Not quite my friend, life experiences 'shape' the boundaries of said morals, but these morals have an inherent instinctual foundation to them. This isn't to say that these instincts cannot be overwhelmed by training, but it does mean that our natural inclinations are to mature into a disposition that is reflective of these instinctually-defined morals. If you were able to extricate a subset of very young people from the influences of our modern world, I believe that every last one of them would mature into a loving, generous, and gentle human being. Unfortunately, the pollution in our meme-pool (religions, capitalism) severely skews the resultant persona that most of us become, so it is difficult to see this underlying instinctually-defined morality, especially when so many others (religions, culture) claim to be the sole providers of such.
The easiest way to understand and perceive instinctual morality is to simply observe chimpanzees in action. Watch their social activities and see the moral programming I'm talking about. Sure they'll be selfish and aggressive at times (as are we), but there will be plenty of demonstrations of instinctual morality, and I don't think I have to point out they weren't taught this behavior.
> The Bible says nothing about abortion. It indirectly says that abortion is not murder because fetuses and children under one month old are not yet people (it often seems that females were not considered people either, just nameless, thoughtless baby-makers). Num 3:15 (and 3:40) "Count the sons of Levi according to the household of their fathers, by their families. You will count every male from a month old and upward." See also Num 18:15-16, 26:62.
This is a great example of the cultural 'skewing' of instinctual morality that I'm speaking of; the moral lines are arbitrarily drawn from 'guesstimates'.
> The 2nd proof that opposition to abortion is not biblical is Exo 21:22 "If men fight and hurt a pregnant (harah) wife, so that her fruit departs, and yet no injury follows, he will be surely punished, according to what the woman's Baal [husband?] will lay on him. And he will pay as the judges [determine]." Pay! In other words, it was considered a property crime to cause a miscarriage, not accidental homicide!
As this demonstrates, the instinctual morality surrounding 'death' of the infant is not in question. Our 'm/paternal' instinct would be aggravated by this death under any definition, and this is what I mean when I say the base moral instincts are immutable, because you will never find a human being that feels 'pleasure' at the thought of suffering a miscarriage. However, the resultant negative reaction of this 'm/paternal' instinct leads us to necessarily create a subjective punishment for such, and this is where the 'flakiness' is introduced, as in someone actually has to decide how to handle the 'wrong' identified by this moral m/paternal instinct. Mother Nature only tells us that something bad happened, not how to correct it.
So, as demonstrated in your example above, an attempt at quantifying the 'wrong' (the miscarriage) was made, and a punishment determined. Now, by our standards, a monetary fine seems rather paltry considering our modern interpretation of manslaughter, but this merely demonstrates that our values today are much different than theirs were, but that doesn't necessarily make our modern moral definitions more correct. To demonstrate my point, these days, some crimes of corporate embezzlement carry a much stiffer penalty than killing someone. If that isn't the most ridiculous perversion of our instinctual morality imaginable, then I don't know what is.
> But I must disagree that we all fundamentally agree on what is right and wrong. Take a couple extreme examples. Is patriotism right? How about in Nazi Germany? Stalinist Russia? How about in a country that sends agents around the world kidnapping people and torturing them? So is patriotism right or wrong or does it depend on whose patriotism you're talking about?
Patriotism (an extension of our 'communion' instinct) is typically a good thing, but only when the government of the country in question is acting in altruistic fashion. What you are identifying above is not 'real' patriotism, but rather 'compulsory' patriotism, which isn't really patriotism at all. Patriotism comes from the heart, and if you love your country and believe in its virtues, then it is genuine. If instead, you have a dictatorship that threatens the population with serious punishments for not expressing their 'patriotism', well, all you really have is a lot of scared people pretending to love their country. I seriously doubt that the majority of Germans believed they should be taking over the world, killing millions of innocents along the way. Patriotism is also quite often fed from misleading propaganda, so the citizens are just as much victims as others.
It's important to understand the difference between the 'instinctual' morality, and the 'cultural interpretation' of this instinctual morality. When I stated that we all 'fundamentally' agree on what is right or wrong, I was speaking of the most base-level of rights or wrongs, upon which the more culturally-abstracted rights or wrongs are founded. For example, we know that embezzling money from a company is wrong because it is founded upon the instinctually-recognized 'base' wrong of 'stealing'. We also know that war is fundamentally wrong because it is founded upon the instinctually-recognized 'base' wrong of 'murder'. As well, we know that providing emergency rescue services are right because it is founded upon the instinctually-recognized 'base' right of 'altruism'.
So you see, our primitive moral code is 'extrapolated' into the much more complex social structures we see in today's world. This makes it quite easy to believe that our moral code is 'entirely' driven by the creativity of humans, but it's important to never lose sight of the underlying moral instincts that drive the root piety/impiety of any moral definition. We may have some sketchy interpretations of these morals, but you will never see these instinctual morals interpreted in their opposite (e.g., random killing is good, stealing is legal, etc.)
> Many people fundamentally disagree on what is right in the most important issues.
It would be more accurate to say that most people disagree on the 'interpretation' of what everyone 'agrees' is right. For example, there's nobody that believes we should just plain-out destroy our planet. So, saving the Earth is not in question, however, how and when to go about it 'is'. Some people don't believe the Earth is in that bad of shape, some people are screaming that the 'sky is falling'. Who's correct? Impossible to tell. That doesn't change the underlying ubiquitous 'agreement' that we shouldn't kill our planet.
> The anti-environmentalists are not just deluding themselves. At least some of them are intentionally lying about scientific findings in order to continue making profits from their polluting ways. They know they're destroying many species forever and hastening global warning; they just think their profits are more important. I fundamentally disagree.
These corporate opportunists are willing to bring the Earth to the brink of destruction (but not beyond because even corporate execs know that if the Earth dies, so do they) in order to fulfill their bottom line. And yes, there are many companies like this. Don't for a second though, believe that the corporate execs don't share your instinctual love for the planet; they may just not see it in as dire straits as some would have us believe it is. These companies believe that if the Earth was really that bad, then the government would step in and shut them down; which is fair enough given that the government should ultimately bear this responsibility. If you feel that some companies are hitting the Earth too hard, consult with your local government officials and see what can be done. No sense talking to the companies themselves because they do not trust the judgment of people crying 'the sky is falling'.
> There are a few people (and they have many cheerleaders) who think the best thing they can do with their life is blow themselves up along with a busload of tourists (another faith-based initiative). I fundamentally disagree.
This is the most perverse form of the 'cultural skewing' I speak of. Terrorists have been programmed to believe that it is the desire of their god for them to perform these unimaginable acts. They have also been taught to believe that their victims are pure evil and need to be eviscerated from Earth. With this kind of programming in their head, it is easy for them to 'perceive' their acts as something 'noble'. They believe that they were ethereally ordained for this role (displacing the responsibility for killing onto something else), that the victims are not 'real' humans (subduing/eliminating the 'protection/mercy' instinct's influence), and are also able to usurp their own fear of death/suffering because of their belief in an immortal afterlife.
None of their 'base' instinctual morality is different than ours, they've just had their minds programmed over a lifetime to 're-wire' their perceptions such that these instincts are not violated, and are in fact supported, by said acts. They actually believe they are doing a 'good' thing. It's almost impossible for us to imagine this perspective, but this is the power of religion to incite insanity, practically entirely counteracting the natural intention of the moral instincts. This isn't to say the instinct itself was reversed in function, it means that their brainwashing can effectively feed their moral instincts positive information when performing severely immoral acts.
If you had the opportunity to witness the upbringing of these terrorists, you would find that there's a lot of love among them and their peers, a lot of morality, and much conviction. It is this 'conviction' that was harnessed by their religions at a young age that allowed agenda-driven tyrants to manipulate these youths (via their religiously skewed perception of piety) into perceiving blowing themselves up as a 'moral' act. It's important that we all understand these 'terrorists' are inherently 'good' people whom have been victimized by religious tyrants, and are not 'evil' by any definition. All these suicidal martyrs ever wanted to do was the 'right' thing, they were just lied to about what the 'right' thing was. They are the greatest victims of religion, and have no advocates, only a merciless world that absolutely hates them.
They pay the ultimate price for the insanity of religion...and I pity them.
Thanks for writing,
Sean Sinjin
{All letters from this contributor: 11.153, 12.162, 12.169, 15.193}
#194 - Farewell...for now - May 06, 2006, 12:29 PM
Hello friends of BetterHuman.org,
It is with a heavy heart that I bring to a close the 'reconnaissance' phase of the BetterHuman.org mission; the weblog is now to be suspended indefinitely. It has been a long and yet fascinating year of candid and passionate dialogue from both sides, and I believe the original goal of flushing out the majority of perceptions and misperceptions about both reality and religion, have been met.
When I set out on this mission, I truly believed I was going to be heavily opposed, consistently and vehemently berated, and largely discounted. That didn't happen. Instead, the vast majority met me with respect and kindness, even if BetterHuman.org philosophies were in direct opposition to their beliefs. For this generosity of spirit, I thank those that found the strength to treat me with respect, even in the face of my persistence in trying to expose their affliction to them. The most valuable thing I personally will take from this entire experience is that love begets love, respect begets respect, and therein lies the bridge between our two worlds.
Thank you kind friends for your many invaluable submissions; I'm certain that 'many' people will benefit from your thoughts, questions, and suggestions. I know you share with me the fantastic feeling of success for all that was accomplished, and the strong glow of altruism that comes from helping others in a setting of mutual respect. I cannot predict where BetterHuman.org will lead from here, but trust in that I will continue to do my part in liberating humankind from ethereal addiction, and I ask for your help in doing same. We are all brothers and sisters, so together let's remove the artificial lines of religion that separate us from reality, and each other.
Please take care and always remember the true purpose in life...find happiness.
Sean Sinjin
#195 - Catching up - January 15, 2007, 12:47 PM
Hi all,
Over the past 9 months I've been extraordinarily busy, yet I've found time here and there to address some of the ceaseless incoming emails, and as well to foray out into the uncensored Internet forums. Some of these exchanges were very educational and so I've forced myself to take some time and enter those submissions in the weblog, and backdated them appropriately. I hope you enjoy them.
Regards,
Sean Sinjin
#196 - Atheism versus Christianity - April 28, 2006, 07:52 PM
Hello,
I found this particular newsgroup 'Atheism vs Christianity' that was mulling the option of changing their newsgroup name, so I volunteered my opinion:
Atheism vs Christianity
Regards,
Sean Sinjin
#197 - Who said 'opiate' first? - May 07, 2006, 02:47 PM
Mr. Downlight wrote:
> I did not notice any credit given to Karl Marx (not really my hero) for his appraisal of religion: "Religion is the opiate of the people."
I haven't directly quoted him on the website, but be assured that if I did, I would've granted him due credit. That being said however, I separately evolved my perception of religion being akin to drug addiction before I even understood the words of Marx. My many references to 'opiate' indirectly pay homage to his keen observation that was made in a much more challenging period in history for beholding such a concept, but ultimately, my words are my own.
> In this, though I don't shut mysticism out as definitely as you appear to from what I've read so far, I concur.
I can only hope the remainder of the weblog can make a dent in that lingering hesitation, my friend.
Enjoy,
{All letters from this contributor: 15.191, 16.214, 16.216, 17.243}
{All letters from this contributor: 6.73, 6.80, 7.86, 7.94, 8.103, 8.116, 9.124, 9.129, 10.139, 11.148, 11.157, 12.168, 13.172, 14.188, 15.192, 20.288}
{All letters from this contributor: 11.153, 12.162, 12.169, 15.193}
{All letters from this contributor: 15.197, 15.198, 15.200, 17.245, 18.249, 18.252, 19.270, 19.275, 20.282, 21.292, 21.302, 22.313, 23.328, 23.338}