Figleaf

... What a cruel and stupid comment. (from M.Dancer, I presume.) How many women and children does M.Dancer want killed? What's his body-count target of innocents to satisfy his bloodlust? But even as stupid as the idea of bombing Tehran is, does it compare to the stupidity of braying vicious foreign policy about a country you can't even locate? M.Dancer's title for this thread reveals an astonishing ignorance of geography -- HELLO! Iran is EAST of Iraq, not west. Oh, and HELLO, Iran is WEST of Afghanistan, not south. Wouldn't it be better for someone so ignorant of such simple basics to STFU for a change and let the grown-ups talk? He might even learn something. (...Okay it's a remote possibility, but it could happen.)

How much anger do you have? Enough to go out and rape and kill a native girl? 'Cause that seems to be part of the 'privileged status' the seem to have. That and the substandard housing, lack of medical care, legacy of being ripped of by officials, racist slurs, and residential schools. Yep, lots of 'privileges'. Bullshit. This the past, ... NOT bullshit, not the past. Your ignorance or denials notwithstanding, it's today. For example, housing: http://www.google.ca/search?hl=en&q=native...=cr%3DcountryCA For example, racial slurs: http://www.mapleleafweb.com/forums//index.php?showtopic=9110 For example, ripped off by officials (see paragraph about how the gov. got hold of Ipperwash lands): http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Features/2007/...214770-sun.html And while the residential schools are no more, the settlements are still not completed. So? Does that make it right? Yeah sure, unless the past is still relevant, which in this matter it is. Again, you can be pragmatic and live in today... It was a pragmatic question. You suggested that if native people abandoned their complaints then they would be 'left alone'. So I ask: How? FYI, how something will be done is generally considered a very practical question, in the real world. Ad hominem drivel. If your great uncle left a few million to 'his descendants', would you say the same thing and share it with me?

You think so? Why? Of the 22 seats that would be created, 10 would be in Ontario and a good portion of the remaining 12 would be in Liberal-friendly areas of British Columbia. The argument that this is some sort of scheme to give Conservatives an electoral edge seems awfully fragile. Your interpretation surprises me. The Conservatives are well known to have a preponderance of support in Alberta, and they often seem to think they can rely on BC for seats too. Accordingly it appears to their advantage to add more seats where their success is more assured. By taking deliberate and specific steps that expand and preserve that 'part of our system'. That 'part of our system' has been put their intentionally. Respecting that intention and the reasons behind it is not mischief. But you are simply making up the part about their intentions. Their stated intention is to REMEDY the imbalance that presently exists that you call 'part of our system'. And yet, they only intend to apply the remedy where it helps them most. Ergo, it's mischevious gerrymandering (-like). Misalignment implies misalignment, whether by mistake or on purpose. Oh really? You should check out the results of this poll. I refuse to. Sure, since they directly contradict your unsubstantiated comment. Do I feel refuted by your poll? Your feelings are irrelevant. Your statement is belied by the poll results.

Who decides if a human right is true? What happens when these conflict with each other? What happens when people start making up human rights to further their own economic agendas (e.g. the lawyers trying to claim that access to tax free legal services is a 'human right')? I fail to see how your questions are relevant to the point at issue there. Asking humans to agree on a set of human rights is the same as asking them to agree on a higher moral order. No, its not. * Ridiculous. We don't need precisely the SAME interests, we merely need to acknowledge that we all have self-interest at all. Okay. And? We haven't discussed MY beliefs. The reason I 'resist' your position is that it is nonsensical. You are attempting to equate opposites -- It's an absurdity. It's an affront to logic, reason and meaning. It's silly. Likely true, but it does nothing to help your argument. That's not true.* But it's also irrelevant. That comment confirms that your understanding of rationality is profoundly faulty. *There's a flat denial for your bald assertion.

How much anger do you have? Enough to go out and rape and kill a native girl? 'Cause that seems to be part of the 'privileged status' the seem to have. That and the substandard housing, lack of medical care, legacy of being ripped of by officials, racist slurs, and residential schools. Yep, lots of 'privileges'. How? By going back to Europe?

If natives were treated equally and not receive any special "status" from the govt then this "percieved" racism would end. What do you propose to offer native peoples to buy out the 'status' that you want to end? Remember, that 'status' is part of a set of agreements, and thus are not something for the government to unilaterally end.

Riiiiiiight. That's just so totally clear and obvious.

That sounds interesting. Do you happen to have a link?

With or without "free will", if omnipotent God created a poison humanity, then God created poison.

If it is in fact a sincere belief in God that is causing the effect, then no. In this case, it is perfectly rational to believe in a deity in order to cause the desired effect. Yes, but that should be impossible in River's view because the belief would rife with the cognitive dissonance of believing something that's not true just to secure the benefits.

What utter dreck. Look: "Muslims refer to their God by the term 'Allah'." What metaphysical belief did I state there? None. "Some Christian theology emphasizes that God is a trinity, comprising three equally divine entities or characteristics." What does that tell you about what I believe? Nothing. "If accepted, any definition of God that describes it as beyond human understanding, necessarily implies that all human efforts to conceptualize God are incomplete at best." Does that statement require a belief about God? Nope. Riverwind, your litany of absurd assertions on this topic is really quite astounding.

First, the example is not contrived. Millions - if not billions of people use prayer or meditation in similar ways every day and do get similar, tangible results from the activity. What is contrived about it is that the non-theist's method didn't work. Absolutely not. The results fail to exclude the possiblity/likelihood that the method works quite independently of its religious* connotations. (That problem should have been obvious to you. Your biases seem to very easily cloud your ability to apply reasonable methods of inquiry. ) An atheist would have rejected the alternative out of hand because of its theistic connections. SOME atheists might, but atheism would not require them to. You are guilty of either fallacious imputation there, or gross stereotyping. *Note, I use my definition of 'religion' and specifically repudiate yours.

That is an assertion - not an argument. That's not merely an assertion, it's an observation of facts and/or a conclusion of logic and/or a consequence of definition. Your rhetoric there confuses the issue (probably on purpose). But let's unravel it... there are two issues convoluted into your question -- 1. why should someone sacrifice their immediate self interest; and 2. why should someone sacrifice their self interest to assist others. Broken out like that, the answers are not too difficult: 1. To enhance their medium or longer term self interest. 2. They should not. But the question is, do they perceive their self-interests correctly?

The problems are: 1-the higher moral order may be false, inefficient, or not a net benefit; 2-it suggests that the 'higher moral order' is required for human rights, which might lead to (a) the suspension of the rights if the 'higher order' becomes discredited or out of fashion, and (b ) the characteristics of the 'higher moral order' might be imported (inappropriately) into formation of the characteristics of the rights. 3-it is unecessary, therefore possibly dilatory or distracting, to bother with a 'higher moral order' in establishing a sound regime of human rights. Yes, thank you, we know that's your opinion. We also know that your opinion has been shown, soundly and thoroughly, up and down this thread, to be seriously lacking in merit.

MM has probably gotten to this already, but I'll just note anyway ... no, there is no fallacy there, even IF the assumption is. That is to say, even if humanity has free will, if God created us with free will and we are poison then it's still on God. Without some concept of free agency the earthly motivations for religion are generally moot. Good thing you included the "If" there, I think.

If'n we is, so is Gawd wut made us. or if you prefer a more highbrow tone... And humanity be poison, such must be the Creator's will.

... The problem is that when you're playing defence you require an awful lot more of everything, including troops, weapons and discipline, than then guys playing offense. The Defence side has to protect all its assets - which is basically, when dealing with terrorists - everything, military and civilian, from govt buildings, to schools, to buses and markets. The attacking side lives in caves, picks one spot where it can attack, and overwhelm local opposition, and then get away. That's why they always have the advantage. Hm. I guess that seems sensible.

Constantine was the second major appropriator of the legacy of Jesus, the first being Paul. Paul took the person of Jesus and panegyrized him into God status, at the same time yoking him with Paul's personal hang-ups and fantasies. Constantine took the growing social influence of Paul's Christianity and converted it into an arm of Imperial government.

Consider the example of someone who frequently flies into a rage over insignificant things such as being cut off in traffic. This rage causes numerous social problems so the person needs a solution. His atheist friend advises him to breathe deeply and to think about the potential negative consequences. Unfortunately, he finds it impossible to think rationally once the rage starts. His theist friend recommends asking god for help. He thinks it is a ridiculous suggestion but he tries it anyway and discovers that repeating a prayer for help over and over again does allow him to calm down after the rage starts.This person uses the prayer technique over and over again an eventually comes to believe that there is a deity helping him. This belief is re-enforced by the fact that he can conduct an experiment (prayer when the rage starts) and get repeatable results (calming down). His experiments do not prove that there is a deity, however, the effects are real. That makes his beliefs completely rational. Absolutely not. In your highly contrived hypothetical, his expectation of the efficacy of the prayer method for helping his rage is experientially based and reasonable. However, the attribution of that effect to the action of a 'higher power' has no such basis. This phrase again, 'placed his faith in reason', is the problem. Rejecting an alternative out of hand because it has theistic connections may be 'placing faith in reason' if you want to define it so. But it is NOT applying reason. He applied reason by experimenting with the theist's suggestion.

I don't know what to make of this peculiar construct of yours "having faith in reason". One doesn't 'have faith' in reason, you APPLY reason (or you don't). Reason is not a philosophy, it is a method. As such, it has elements that if not present disqualify the effort from conforming with reason. As such it is entirely different from having faith in a deity, because having faith in a deity does not involve the same elements as applying reason.

See, I told you he'd have a private meaning for worship. This sort of nonsense would be funny, if it weren't so stupid.

Because Riverwind says so. Yep, having an idea is the very same thing as worshiping an idea. It's a mere quirk of fate that people don't say "I'm worshiping about leaving town for the weekend." or "What did you worship of that movie? I worshiped that the F/X were pretty good." Riverwind says so.

Folks, just ignore Riverwind. He'll no doubt have some totally idiosyncratic meaning for 'worship' that makes such a grotesquery 'true' in his mind. Also don't bother asking for an example or citation that supports his assertion. It won't be forthcoming.

So, I count at least four posters who recall the ejection of the mentally ill as the result of rightwing government actions. I wonder if the OP will either muster some support for his assertion in this regard, or admit his 'error'?