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New Atheism And The Burden Of Proof
First off, let's play nice, ya hear? No flaming, and that's an order :-)

Brett asked me to "prove my belief that a superbeing does not exist".

Well, here's a couple of things to mull over.

Firstly, he who asserts that something *does* exist has the burden of proof. I think it's fair to say that every religion does assert that their particular brand of deity does actually exist. Apart from the Buddhists, maybe, who have difficulty asserting that anything, even themselves, actually exists :-)

Secondly, don't be assuming that just because someone says they are an atheist, they believe that there are no gods. Broadly speaking there are two schools of atheist thought - weak atheism, and strong. Weak atheists lack belief in gods. Strong atheists believe that there are no gods. This is a subtle but fundamental difference.

Naturally, there are people who fall somewhere in between. Some agnostics don't know whether there is a god. Others maintain that there is a god but it doesn't matter. Yet others maintain that there *might* be a god but again, it doesn't matter because pan-dimensional beings just can't interact with humans.

To convince either type of atheist of the existence of Mr Supernatural All-Powerful Dude you will need to bring actual scientific evidence ("God Was Here" written on the far side of the moon in letters of fire, a mystical, omnipresent Jesus FM radio station, "Believe in me, suckers" encoded in all languages of the world in the Fraunhofer lines of sunlight, etc etc) to the table. Further, the bible doesn't count as proof of anything at all.

Finally, if you (the theist reading this) just want to say "look, I *know* I can't prove any of this, it's all a matter of faith", then that's fine, too - it's only the theists asserting that god is some kind of scientific fact who have to do the donkey work here :-)
Peter
Shill^WAtheist For Hire
[link|http://www.kuro5hin.org|There is no K5 Cabal]
New Personal experience.
So then, it is your personal experience that a thiestic belief is without purpose to you. Do I read you aright?

Wade.

"All around me are nothing but fakes
Come with me on the biggest fake of all!"

New Sorta.
I'd add that I also lack belief in gods, and will remain in that state until evidence for their existence is forthcoming.


Peter
Shill For Hire
[link|http://www.kuro5hin.org|There is no K5 Cabal]
New Logic Chopping
God is not captured in any religion, ever. All the current religions are complete failures. I renounced my Christianity on 9/12.

But...

If you can't sense him, you are already two-thirds dead. If he does not speak to you, I feel sorry for someone so completely alone in himself. If he does not live in your heart, you may as well be a machine. And if his plan is not clear to you, then you are little better than some automatic simple thing like a maggot, a mayfly, or a paramecium, and wil be as little missed.

You have lots of company, Moslem and Jew, Christian and Buddhist, Shinto and shaman. You are all wrong, and none of you supermen will quit until you have destroyed everything, including your hubris-soaked selves.
New Says *you*.



Peter
Shill For Hire
[link|http://www.kuro5hin.org|There is no K5 Cabal]
New Indeed, sez I. God is personal.
New Why 9/12?
Human inhumanity to man has been around as long as humans have existed.

Why 9/12? Why not when the Rowandans massacred each other? Why not Bosnia? Why not Somolia? Why not the African AIDS statistics?

One of the problems with the concept of a good and caring God is why He permits suffering to happen. Every church has wrestled with this problem (and none really successfully answer it.)

What was it about 6000+ New Yorkers dying at the hands of a couple dozen fanatics that did it for you?
I say that not as a card-carrying Christian, but as one who is cynical about most (OK, all the ones I'm familiar with) major religions. If there is an afterlife, I think it'll be more like Spider Robinson's Life House rather than clouds, 70 virgins, and/or choirs of angels. But if you *are* a believer, nothing that happened on 9/11/2001 should turn you one way or the other. Senseless events have happened before and will happen again.
Who knows how empty the sky is
In the place of a fallen tower.
Who knows how quiet it is in the home
Where a son has not returned.

-- Anna Akhmatova (1889-1966)
New Simple
These are crimes (NOT war acts) in God's name.

Not my God. Piss on everyone, Christain Jew Moslem and whatever the fuck else. You all deserve what you will get, which is annihilation.
New Don't forget
to also add in the aethiests to that lot.

'Religion is poison'
Ray
New Data Point
I parse "9/12" as "The ninth of December", and spent a moment or ten wondering what on earth happened on that date.

It might be better for all on ZIWT if we spell out dates.


Peter
Shill For Hire
[link|http://www.kuro5hin.org|There is no K5 Cabal]
New It's been (un)done
Did you want to go through the ontological proof of god One More time? or calculate e to about 500 places with a Monroe calculator?

See also: phenomenology.

You're just reiterating the POV actually uttered by an early guy who'd adopted (some sort of scientism) maybe before Dalton:

if it can't be measured, it doesn't exist.

Still waiting. Please prove the existence of:

love
pain
sorrow
etc.

What? you say you 'feel' that, so it exists? HTF can I be sure you aren't lying? No, your screams don't count either. Too bad - your proof failed.

If you want 'proof' - try math. Only place it isn't a laughable idea :-\ufffd

BTW, what ever gave you the nutty idea that the "rules of science" about the world of physics - peer review, reproducible experiments etc. .. ever produce more than a current working theory? (Or did you imagine the results were: Truth for all time?)

Just wondering, 'cause all That stuff's been dispensed with, over past few hundred years of kicking it around. C'mon.. next you'll be insisting that the Universe is logical - and so is consciousness (!!)


Sorry - tilt.


A.
New Science can measure anything
Or, more completely, Science can measure anything that Science can measure.

Years ago, the concept that magnets could tell if you had a disease would have been ludicrious.

Now we accept MRI.

As our ability to measure things increases, we MIGHT be able to find more things to measure.

Love

We know it.
We need it.
We seek it.

But we have no test to show whether someone is in love or not.

There is more to existance than can be measured.
New Faith...
...is believing in the existence of something that we cannot prove exists.

Many people don't realize what an incredible leap of faith we take every day by trusting that the world around us is actually the world around us. Prove to me that you all exist, and that I am not just a disembodied brain in a vat, being fed stimuli and responses that simulate a real world...

Faith is different than Faith in God. We all have Faith at some level. What we have Faith in is where the arguments start.
"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." - Friedrich Nietzsche
New "Take the red pill..." :-)

"All around me are nothing but fakes
Come with me on the biggest fake of all!"

New You know, I'm really beginning to hate that movie.
I mean, it was a great action flic, and it had some neat concepts, but a lot of people (not necessarily here) have started to blow it all out of proportion, as if it was the modern equivalent of "Thus Spake Zarathustra."

Of course, it may very well be - which speaks sadly of our times that the best anybody can come up with is to rehash some really old universal ideas, throw in some Zen buddhism, and call it "philosophy."
"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." - Friedrich Nietzsche
New Sad but true.
Hate to say it, but that's our current level of development.

Depth is not a virtue.

Shallow and flashy will win everytime.
New I know what you mean.
I helped a friend of mine at church (he's the youth pastor) edit together some clips from it for a sermon series. The basic message was a conventional evangelical one, but using analogies from The Matrix was a new twist. I thought he kept the separation well, making sure the borrowed concepts stayed entirely within the movie's framework without trying to find "hidden" meaning in it.

I tend to stay away from those who insist on reading more into it - besides, Evangalion is much more fertile ground for that! So they aren't really trying, are they? :-)

Wade.

"All around me are nothing but fakes
Come with me on the biggest fake of all!"

New *SMACK!*
Evangelion was even worse in some ways, although it sure had a lot to say about relationships. I would say it had a lot to do with the nature of human interaction, but not much to do with the nature of humanity.
"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." - Friedrich Nietzsche
New I didn't say I *agreed* with doing that!
I just said Evangelion was more fertile ground - being longer, mostly - for those who wished to to delve into such speculation. I continue to treat it as entertainment that makes asks some interesting questions within the aegis of its own framework (which happens to look a lot like our own, but now I digress :-).

Wade.

"All around me are nothing but fakes
Come with me on the biggest fake of all!"

New DeSmacking.
And no, DeSitter, this thread has absolutely nothing to do with you. Fnord.

Oops, misread that. Neeever mind. Fnord again.
"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." - Friedrich Nietzsche
New Not here to 'save" you what you are or believe is up to you
Having given myself the freedom to be free with no encumberances except what I accept then how can I deny you the freedom to believe or not to believe?
thanx,
bill
why did god give us a talleywhacker and a trigger finger if he didnt want us to use them?
Randy Wayne White
New I assert that pwhysall does not exist.
And don't say it's self evident that he exists. Every post purporting to come from "pwhysall" may conceivably be some sort of fluke involving cosmic radiation and delicate computer cicuitry. Or maybe a hoaxer. I don't know. I suppose somebody could show up claiming to be him. But that person could be a liar or even deluded. And we all know IDs can be faked. There may even be people who claim to have met the alleged pwhysall, but they too could be liars or deluded, or simply mistaken. Been seen in groups? Could be mass psychosis, or maybe the groups are lying, or simply mistaken identity again. Hearsay is hearsay, after all.

Note that I'm not asserting any one interpretation of events here, merely pointing out that alternative explanations can be conceived of. I've made a negative assertion, that pwhysall does not exist. Anyone care to argue the opposing position?

Now where'd that burden of proof get to?
[link|http://www.angelfire.com/ca3/marlowe/index.html|http://www.angelfir...e/index.html]
Expand Edited by marlowe Oct. 3, 2001, 11:51:04 AM EDT
New spent 10 hrs with a certified psycho doing the same thing
sitting next to him he wanted me to prove I existed. The argument is like teaching pigs to sing. Annoys the pigs and you get all sweaty for nothing.
thanx,
bill
why did god give us a talleywhacker and a trigger finger if he didnt want us to use them?
Randy Wayne White
New The burden of proof lies where it always does
With the person making the assertion.

If you assert that I do not exist, feel free to show the evidence for that assertion.


Peter
Shill For Hire
[link|http://www.kuro5hin.org|There is no K5 Cabal]
New Just want to make sure I understand your POV
You're saying, then, it doesn't matter whether you're asserting the positive or negative case (ie - whether "God" or "no God")--what matters is assertion or no assertion.

Right?
That's her, officer! That's the woman that programmed me for evil!
New Yep.
That's exactly right. You'll also notice that I never assert that there is no god.

I simply state my lack of belief in gods, and my incredulity at the actions of my fellow man in the name of something that's less self-evident than Elvis Presley.

"Ah slay thee in thuh name of Rawk'n'Raahl, uh huh!"
Peter
A two thirds dead maggot, and feeling quite chipper for it.
[link|http://www.kuro5hin.org|There is no K5 Cabal]
New I think I see the confusion. Maybe?
What I think you are saying is that maybe there is a God but you've seen so many cruel acts in the name of peoples "GOD" that it tends to make you dis-believe in a God.

(Whew! That was tough to get out!)

If so then we are not that far apart. I am disgusted in what people can justify in the name of their Lord, and these horrific terrorist attacks are no different. Committing suicide and cold-blooded murder in the name God is absolutely despicable.

Here's the flip-side: The Bible, the Koran, etc are filled with wonderful words of wisdom and peace (and history) if people would only follow them instead of contorting them for evil purposes.

Bible: Love thy neighbor as they self, don't steal, lie or bear false witness against others, etc.

Koran: Do you think you can enter the garden of bliss without facing the trials and tribulations of those before you?

People just need to mature a bit and learn from the mistakes of our ancestors. Either we do it now or blow ourselves up with nuclear weapons soon. Remember the Drake equation. Compassion, religious tolerance and erradication of religious radicalism are just three things that may improve the chances that we will achieve World Peace before we achieve World War 3.

Lastly, I do not have any proof that God exists. Being schooled as an engineer I never could comprehend how God could really exist until about 3-4 years ago when I discovered I could not scientifically determine that the universe created itself prior to the big bang. After that, I have no problem seeing how evolution progressed to our current stage in humanity. I also see how humanity has progressed far enough to destroy itself if things don't change course. Maybe that's why I cling to the hope that religion teaches?

Anyway, I'll not be disturbing you anymore since I sense that I may be annoying many people here.

Peace be with you.
Expand Edited by brettj Oct. 4, 2001, 08:52:50 PM EDT
New Nothing here 'annoying'
Nor do I notice anything even er 'simplistic' in your observations here of: what might work -- were homo-sap just now wise enough to disassemble ALL the &*%*)&%-isms, save the core essays on "how not to behave like an Ass" -- and utterly vaporize the BS about "lakes of fire" along with: "70 virgins if you ___".

But, you see (you do, don't you?) we *aren't* wise - least not enough.. not often enough.. We're still adolescents and playing with fire and peddling archaic ignorance along with neutron-enhanced transistorized whatevers.

You will *never* obtain 'proof' that God exists -- as limned-out by the organized er 'scriptures'. It just doesn't work that way. (Trust me on this or don't) 'Proof' is a construct/idea applicable to (only certain hghly circumscribed parts of) mathematical theory. Really (!)

Gripes directed at you seem to be not about, "Is there God?", but a certain style, familiar to many - whereby it is tacitly presumed that key Christian concepts: are obviously True\ufffd, and it may be assumed that any 'person' must share these (like Satan et al). It is not re your (form of) 'belief' whatsoever. IMhO. (If you really *don't* know "what it is that is profoundly annoying, in the oft-presentations of Christians" (??) drop me a line. me with a b on the end jps dot net.)

As to whether there "is someThing er Higher" than what appears in daily visual displays of earth, fire & water [?] Welcome to the club. To put it as delicately as I can.. fucking-A right! there's a lot more 'going on' than our dulled perceptions ever stop flitting around long enough to.. *notice*.

(What I'm much clearer about - are the numerous 'things' It Ain't!) You may guess what numbers among that long list.

Stick around - you aren't an idiot and CRC doesn't actually Know Fucking Everything (why there are things inside a Vincent Black Shadow he's never heard of - but *I* OTOH have the actual P/Ns!)

Cheers,

ashton

New Nah, that's not it.
I think there aren't gods. Hence, I lack belief in them. However, I don't state flat out that they don't exist. And I wouldn't worship them if they *did* exist.

Yes, the Bible and Koran have some nice words. They also have some very nasty ones - all the stuff about killing babies and raping virgins, stoning women to death for adultery, killing homosexuals, killing babies again, etc etc.

That's fightin' talk. You need a [link|http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/cruelty.html|link]. Not knowing the Koran nearly as well as I do the Bible, I cannot speak about it from person experience, so I won't. :-)

Now, I don't think it's right to accept all the fluffy bits of the bible without taking on board the vicious bits, too - after all, this stuff is supposed to be the Werd Of Gawd, right? (If I was YOUR god, and the bible was MY holy book, and you lot starting only reading and obeying the bits you liked, then I'd be in ass-kickin' mode and I'd dust off the old smitin' stick and come down and teach you what being a god is really all about.)

I know the moral objectivists have a habit of crawling out of the woodwork whenever an atheist dares to put his head above the parapet. Cleverer people than I have thunk long and hard about this, and there's a good [link|http://www.atheists.org/Atheism/ethics.html|essay] on the American Atheists [link|http://www.atheists.org|web site].


Peter
Shill For Hire
[link|http://www.kuro5hin.org|There is no K5 Cabal]
New The Bible.
Now, I don't think it's right to accept all the fluffy bits of the bible without taking on board the vicious bits, too - after all, this stuff is supposed to be the Werd Of Gawd, right?


I guess that's fair enough. There's a lot of sorry and sordid human histroy recorded in it. I usually think that showing the failings of people like Jacob, Samson and King David in the Bible - and some of them were pretty horrific failings - help make it harder to literally worship them as godlings.

Putting aside the Bible for the moment, what you do think about the historical evidence for Jesus? I'm curious.

Wade.

"All around me are nothing but fakes
Come with me on the biggest fake of all!"

New Re: The violence in the OT
That was something that bothered me too. It was explained to me but I can't remember the meaning of the parable. I didn't realize how angry God could get when people violated the 10 commandments handed down to Moses.

Isn't there something in the New Testament that affected this condition?

Any help here would be appreciated.
New The alleged pwhysall shifts his ground.
This is what appeared under that name: "Firstly, he who asserts that something *does* exist has the burden of proof"

But now, suddenly, it's:

The burden of proof lies where it always does
With the person making the assertion

Say, didn't Bertie Russell once pull this trick after he flipflopped on nuclear warfare? Pretended he'd always been against it?

[link|http://www.angelfire.com/ca3/marlowe/index.html|http://www.angelfir...e/index.html]
New What ARE you talking about?
Remember, I'm not asserting *anything*.

If you want to play silly semantic games with the difference between these two sentences:

"He who asserts that something does exist has the burden of proof"

and

"He who asserts has the burden of proof"

then feel free. But as far as I'm concerned, you're talking to the hand.


Peter
Shill For Hire
[link|http://www.kuro5hin.org|There is no K5 Cabal]
New You're asserting things all over the place.
Oh, and by the way, "I'm not asserting anything" makes three assertions so far.
[link|http://www.angelfire.com/ca3/marlowe/index.html|http://www.angelfir...e/index.html]
New So you're saying the burden of proof exists for those who...
assert that something exists?

Prove it! And no circular reasoning.
[link|http://www.angelfire.com/ca3/marlowe/index.html|http://www.angelfir...e/index.html]
New Scientific reason you dont believe
You are missing the god gene. Some human mutations have this and it affects the brains core emotion processing. Some humans mutations do not. Wether this mutation leads to a dead end for the sub genus or not is yet to be determined. :)
thanx,
bill
why did god give us a talleywhacker and a trigger finger if he didnt want us to use them?
Randy Wayne White
New s/gene/meme
That's her, officer! That's the woman that programmed me for evil!
New Heh.. you may be as close as any come
Ever notice how *few* wanna spend even 10 minutes er contemplating ~"What the Fuck AM I, anyway ???", get batteries recharged at local meeting house.. and not worry pretty little heads?

And how few.. suffer the agonies of recursive introspection, tilt at large windmills without scale or relativity and: worry about the umm 'result' ??

(And then there's those with the merchant gene predominant: hey.. I could start a church! hmmm. I get to make up the rules!)

Might indeed be genetic. Oh well - 'free will' has a nice ring to it - far more compelling than 'the % nitrosamines in the spinal fluid'..




Ashton God-maker and breaker
..nobody fucks witk Paul Lazzaro
New gladly ripped off idea couldnt remember who to
attribute to. Dunno, I think that my investigation of berkleys other product when it was legal, my serious study of (all in the interest of acedemia of course) eastern herbal remedies and western pharmaceuticals. Occult studies with the intention of getting strange and ending up deprogramming people stuck in same. Using physical skills against different cultures and countries for profit and National Interest. Interest in mind manipulation, how it works and why, and now peeling apart comms equipment fore fun and profit have come to the conclusion that some people got it Some dont and some people have a hard time distinquishing the difference.
thanx,
bill
What is a user? You mean userid isnt the same as uid?, gid? whats that? I dont understand "ask the requestor to send a non formal email request for ftp access? whaddya mean dean?
Halp Iam drowning in Bovine Fecal Matter!!!!
Bill
New Do ants understand their position in the universe?
("

A friend of mine asked me that when I mentioned our little debate here.

Does the analogy apply to human beings?
Expand Edited by brettj Oct. 4, 2001, 09:24:28 PM EDT
New they are as certain as we are
What is a user? You mean userid isnt the same as uid?, gid? whats that? I dont understand "ask the requestor to send a non formal email request for ftp access? whaddya mean dean?
Halp Iam drowning in Bovine Fecal Matter!!!!
Bill
New Ants can be regarded as cells, an ant colony as an organ.
An interesting discussion of this is in chapter 11, "Prelude...Ant Fugue" of 'The Mind's I" by Hofstadter and Dennett. They specifically compare ants to neurons and an ant colony to a brain.

pp.183-184:
Anteater: There occurred an incident one day when I visited with Aunt Hillary [an ant colony] which reminds me of your suggestion of observing the symbols in Achille's brain as they create thoughts which are about themselves.

Crab: Do tell us about it.

Anteater: Aunt Hillary had been feeling very lonely, and was very happy to have someone to talk to that day. So she gratefully told me to help myself to the juciest ants I could find. (She's always been most generous with her ants.)

Achilles: Gee!

Anteater: It just happened that I had been watching the symbols which were carrying out her thoughts, because in them were some particularly juicy-looking ants.

Achilles: Gee!

Anteater: So I helped myself to a few of the fattest ants which had been parts of the higher-level symbols which I had been reading. Specifically, the symbols which they were part of were the ones which had expressed the thought "Help yourself to any of the ants which look appetizing."

Achilles: Gee!

Anteater: Unfortunately for them, but fortunately for me, the little bugs didn't have the slightest inkling of what they were collectively telling me, on the symbol level.

Achilles: Gee! That is an amazing wraparound. They were completely unconscious of what they were participating in. Their acts could be seen as part of a pattern on a higher level, but of course they were completely unaware of that. Ah, what a pity -- a supreme irony, in fact -- that they missed it.


As such, your question can be regarded as being similar to asking whether a neuron is aware of its place in the universe.

:-)

Cheers,
Scott.
New Are you implying that we are merely neurons on the internet
... making up a collective brain?

Duh ")

Communication is a powerful tool.

It can turn mountains into mole hills.
(Every mountain and hill brought low.)
Expand Edited by brettj Oct. 5, 2001, 02:01:44 AM EDT
New After re-reading your last statement ...
"As such, your question can be regarded as being similar to asking whether a neuron is aware of its place in the universe."

The neuron may not be aware if isolated, but if connected it has a much greater chance of gaining awareness, does it not?

(whatever awareness means .)
New The null hypothesis...
Peter,
I'm pretty much with you all the way. Although, when arguing with atheists (which I've never had the pleasure of doing until I found these fora :-) ), I actually had a bit of a gestalt/epiphany/etc... I was basically in the realm that those particular atheists were almost professing a "belief in science... big bangs and whatnot" and it finally occurred to me that the true question that us poor carbon based ignorant life forms should be concerned with as far as math and science is concerned (since you can't very well reproduce the "creation" and none of us were here to witness it) is something like this...

"What is/are the probabilty/odds that life on earth in all it's forms evolved from random chaos"?

Before a knee jerk response, really think about it. Pretty damned miniscule odds/probability is my hypothesis... I don't pretend to have any of the "answers"... never have, but at least, this agnostic has the questions...

One more thing to consider as you venture in this realm, "since it's improbable for any human being to determine the existence/nonexistence of a creator/supreme being... what if the Jews or Muslims or the Christians (representing belief systems that are at least 8,000/2000/1400 years old) are actually right... Improbable maybe, but what if?

The short answer to your question about the burden of "proof"... it's individual and who the f*(k cares what you or I think? AND the burden of proof only applies to the person/thing/entity that desires it... :-)
Just a few thoughts,

Screamer

"Putting the fun back into funatic"
     Atheism And The Burden Of Proof - (pwhysall) - (44)
         Personal experience. - (static) - (1)
             Sorta. - (pwhysall)
         Logic Chopping - (deSitter) - (6)
             Says *you*. - (pwhysall) - (1)
                 Indeed, sez I. God is personal. -NT - (deSitter)
             Why 9/12? - (wharris2) - (2)
                 Simple - (deSitter) - (1)
                     Don't forget - (rsf)
             Data Point - (pwhysall)
         It's been (un)done - (Ashton) - (9)
             Science can measure anything - (Brandioch) - (8)
                 Faith... - (inthane-chan) - (7)
                     "Take the red pill..." :-) -NT - (static) - (6)
                         You know, I'm really beginning to hate that movie. - (inthane-chan) - (5)
                             Sad but true. - (Brandioch)
                             I know what you mean. - (static) - (3)
                                 *SMACK!* - (inthane-chan) - (2)
                                     I didn't say I *agreed* with doing that! - (static) - (1)
                                         DeSmacking. - (inthane-chan)
         Not here to 'save" you what you are or believe is up to you - (boxley)
         I assert that pwhysall does not exist. - (marlowe) - (12)
             spent 10 hrs with a certified psycho doing the same thing - (boxley)
             The burden of proof lies where it always does - (pwhysall) - (10)
                 Just want to make sure I understand your POV - (tseliot) - (6)
                     Yep. - (pwhysall) - (5)
                         I think I see the confusion. Maybe? - (brettj) - (4)
                             Nothing here 'annoying' - (Ashton)
                             Nah, that's not it. - (pwhysall) - (2)
                                 The Bible. - (static)
                                 Re: The violence in the OT - (brettj)
                 The alleged pwhysall shifts his ground. - (marlowe) - (2)
                     What ARE you talking about? - (pwhysall) - (1)
                         You're asserting things all over the place. - (marlowe)
         So you're saying the burden of proof exists for those who... - (marlowe)
         Scientific reason you dont believe - (boxley) - (3)
             s/gene/meme -NT - (tseliot)
             Heh.. you may be as close as any come - (Ashton) - (1)
                 gladly ripped off idea couldnt remember who to - (boxley)
         Do ants understand their position in the universe? - (brettj) - (4)
             they are as certain as we are -NT - (boxley)
             Ants can be regarded as cells, an ant colony as an organ. - (Another Scott) - (2)
                 Are you implying that we are merely neurons on the internet - (brettj)
                 After re-reading your last statement ... - (brettj)
         The null hypothesis... - (screamer)

I should have blown up.
235 ms