Speaking only for myself, I don't put STUpid on ignore because it's incredibly amusing to watch him incessantly make a fool of himself
similar to my views. I found the previous iteration of stu entertaining.... I may lose interest in this one. this new one goes of the troll without any substance too often. I think he or she has less fire power.
You poor boys are in denial. Not a one of you can hang with stu in a debate. Tao always says he likes a detailed ongoing discussion with those with opposing views, that is until stu worked him over. Jem you have a pass since you're a religious nut it's understood that you will be blind to all views except your own. And as usuall 666 is a clown. Good job stu.
once again we have rabid crazed et theist with a logic problem. you guys give atheists a bad name. Please show us one scholar or one dictionary or one treatise which supports these 2 statements from stu... 1. that Natural Law is inconsistent with a Creator. 2. that the founders did not use the word God in the Declaration of Independence.
lmao! I hate to agree with stu- so I won't, but it seems to me that the writers of the DOI got it all wrong too. Don't get me wrong, the Declaration is a fine piece of work, meant to inspire and set forth new laws and ideology- and that it did- but let's face it, it's every bit as much a pipe dream as Thomas More's 'Utopia', albeit perhaps less flawed and seemingly more attainable. "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." "All men are created equal"? Exactly how is this supposed to be interpreted? Just a quick look around in this forum alone and it should be painfully obvious that it just ain't so. "that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness." I implore you self-titled Christian, to ask yourself this: If God gave each and every last one of us an unalienable right to Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness, Why then did Christ say in John 16:33 "there will be suffering in this world." ? He never said, "gee, I hope someday- maybe in a millennium or two- that we can all have what God wants for each of us, which is: Life Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. LOL! Hell no he didn't say that because he knew better than to be so damn arrogant to think that is what God has in store for each and every man, woman and child. He said ther'd be suffering and by God he was right. Don't let yourself be fooled into thinking some wig wearing democratic-republicans had the faintest clue what God's intention for each and every human will be. Inalienable rights my ass. LOL! BTW, Stu, when they inserted the word "Creator" into the text, I seriously doubt they were talking about your mama's cootchie.
I hate to break it to you, Jem, but If your splitting hairs, Stu is correct. How is this? Because if an omnipotent God, even the hypothetical one in Stu's brain, did create or set forth immutable laws, he, it, or what ever it is could just as easily change or do away with those immutable laws. After all, why would you ever consider a God who couldn't remove unalienable rights to be omnipotent? And If the God you refer to is not omnipotent, then it has no more authority as a "creator" than Stu's mother's womb.
Just because Man may be purposely or even innocently ignorant of a greater authority and teacher, doesn't necessarily mean that Man is without God. It may just mean that Man is ignorant. Perhaps the reason Atheists can be moral absolutists, stems from what their creator has endowed them with...
Actually, inalienable rights can be God given, and can also be taken away by God. I think what the old boys were referring to was rights that couldn't be taken by other men. I'd like to try to answer this one for you too. It seems to me the founders did believe in God, that is to say they believed in a higher being that is responsible for not only their existence, but also their moral integrity. That is why they first say "Natural Law", then follow up with "Nature's God". They are saying there are rights given to men by the laws of nature, but there are also rights given to men from God (who created nature), and these rights are not to be taken away by man. So if they were to elaborate I think they might say that Man has natural needs- food, water, air, shelter, etc. But that Man also has spiritual needs- to serve their God and seek to have a relationship with God in the hopes that they may attain the entire fulfillment God wants for them. The founders also believed that they should not give a certain name for God, as one of the key principles for the foundation of America was freedom of religious beliefs. They, like you Stu, understood that each and every one of us may have a different idea of What or Who God is. As they didn't want to Alienate the masses from the Declaration, they chose to use the term "their Creator" instead of God, Jehovah, Jesus, Baal, etc. Where I believe they, and so many others have misunderstood is: What exactly are our rights? Let's face it, we don't have the right to anything but to die, and not one of us even has full control of our fate. Perhaps we have the right to seek our God's wisdom, comfort etc while we are here, but this is a far cry from Life and Liberty. On the most important day of Jesus' life, he received Imprisonment and Death. Can you imagine how many people would have turned their cheeks and ran if they heard something like "Man also has the right to imprisonment and death, if that's what God wants for you." ?
Oh, I didn't put him on ignore myself, I just suggested that Jem could do so since it would appear he gets all fired up on this stuff. Between this subject and global warming, it's really quite boring - of course, that's just my opinion.