>I find no more comfort in unfounded beliefs of naturalists than >those of religious zealots(well, yes I do...the naturalists aren't >killing each other) ** Is that so? You really ought to do just a little more investigation. >There is no big deal if one doesn't care about all the death and >destruction caused by religion vs religion Could you provide some kind of documentation, like names, places, dates, and numbers? It would really help if you could substantiate your vague generalizations and empty assertions. Here is a good web site with help for people suffering from ideological self-deception. http://www.gmu.edu/departments/economics/bcaplan/museum/musframe.htm Consider the following books: The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression Death by Government Both are available at Amazon. Here is the web page for the author of Death by Government http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/ From Publisher's Weekly, commenting on The Black Book of Communism: "Essentially a body count of communism's victims in the 20th century, the book draws heavily from recently opened Soviet archives. The verdict: communism was responsible for between 85 million and 100 million deaths in the century." http://www.polishlibrary.org/review/black_book_of_communism.htm From the web site above: "The Russian experience is thoroughly discussed starting with Lenin who impressed on his countrymen that the "kulaks" must be crushed without pity because they are rich bastards and blood-suckers who should be hanged. After all, some owned two samovars and were observed visiting churches much too often. Thirty categories were deprived of civil rights because they were ex-shopkeepers, ex-employees of private companies, ex-monks, and those who collected stamps or spoke Esperanto because they were potential spies. The law of 1934 took care of them: no legal representation, the dreaded so-called troika trial, no appeal, immediate execution This Great Terror caused 6 million arrests, 3 million executions and 2 million deaths in camps. Here are a few additional grim statistics of world communism: close to 100 million people were killed, half of them by the Soviets, the other half mainly by the Chinese. The preferred method was starvation, no matter the victim's origin, belief, or occupation. At one point Soviet luminaries began to disappear quickly: 3 marshals out of 5, 13 generals out of 15, 8 admirals out of 9, 50 army corps generals out of 57, and 154 division generals out of 186. As Andrei Vyshinsky shouted, "Shoot these rabid dogs." Jean-Paul Sartre said in 1952; "Any anti-Communist is a dog!" We also may recall that Molotov's wife was arrested and shipped to a camp and Stalins personal secretary's wife was shot in 1952. Both gentlemen served Stalin as though nothing of importance had happened. " So the naturalists aren't killing each other? You must have gone to public school. My, my, those poor naturalists, such benign, goodhearted and terribly misunderstood folks.
Me >There is no big deal if one doesn't care about all the death >and destruction caused by religion vs religion Slow: >Could you provide some kind of documentation, like >names, places, dates, and numbers? It would really >help if you could substantiate your vague generalizations >and empty assertions. If you need anything other than...Middle East, Africa, Europe, Asia and ...hmm...hmm...how about the US of A (or in the words of Darryl Worely..."Have you forgotten?") my direction isn't going to help you much. - and no Specul8r, religion was not the sole motive for 9/11. You could also start with the Bible and move forward all the way to Google - I know I'm vague and empty, but I'm sure you'll find something in there somewhere. >So the naturalists aren't killing each other? If you are naive and simplistic enough to believe that the communists atrocities were naturalists philosophically disagreeing with each other than I have a trading system to sell you. >You must have gone to public school. Not for a single day of my life. >My, my, those poor naturalists, such benign, goodhearted >and terribly misunderstood folks. And those are your words and have nothing to do with my thoughts whatsoever. Zealot inspired death is repulsive no matter what the inspiration. I despise the zeal for power, status, wealth and yes, religious and philosophical superiority that is strong enough to remove rights from others. JB
Ok, went out for dinner and while there had a couple thoughts regarding Slowtrends lashing. I think I perhaps understand where *part* of it came from. Me: >I find no more comfort in unfounded beliefs of naturalists >than those of religious zealots(well, yes I do...the >naturalists aren't killing each other) Slow, perhaps you assume from the contents of the parens that I hold the believe that only religious zealots commit atrocities. I can understand how it could be reasonably inferred from that statement. Nothing could be further from the truth, so I'll explain it further. Unfortunately, people kill for all sorts of lousy reasons -- anger, greed and jealousy just to name a just a few. Christians, atheist, jews, agnostics, muslims, naturalists, hindus, on and on kill for the above reasons and others. No one group anywhere seems to be immune in any way to this rotten behavior. There is one difference that I notice to be quite prevalent however -- you rarely find the science clubs killing each other over their theoretical scientific differences while the religion clubs seem to endlessly spawn the types that can't keep their steel, lead and gunpowder to themselves. From biblical times onward it's historical fact that religious philosophies often prove like oil and water even among themselves (witness the killings of rival clerics in Iraq recently). Actually fire and gasoline might be a better analogy. This does not imply that there are not LOTS of peace loving religious folk nor does it imply that there aren't raping and pillaging atheists. All it simply says that when you see a big dustup it isn't typically science vs science but it is often religion vs religion. Feel Better? JB PS (probably not)
Most of the rest of the world is religious. It's primarily the west that has a significant atheist population. Therefore any war that happens outside of the west will always have a religion attached to it in one way or the other. However, imo comparitively few wars (outside of militant Islam of course) are truly fought for religious reasons. Wars simply show that "absolute power corrupts". And human military history only proves that human nature generally cannot handle power (which shows the wisdom of our forefathers) and not that "religion is the root of all evil" as this thread suggest.
Give those science clubs access to several billion dollars and a military arsenal and they'll go the way of every other group on planet earth. I think it's naive to think that any group will not oppress, suppress and resort to violence to force its viewpoints given enough power. But that's just my opinion for observing history. Even the Romans, who forced "peace" on the earth, were brutal oppressors of all ethnic and religious groups that did not agree with them.
i am a huge fan of science and high tech, so please don't take the following comments as anti-science or progress---- can it be argued that science has killed more people than all the religious wars combined ? think of hiroshima, etc. massive death/ destruction directly linked to scientific discovery. technology turned into killing machines has killed way more than wild hoards during the crusades. any thoughts ? surfer
I agree with you that the fact that it can't be repearted in a lab setting points to the fact that is not something internal to the human spirit. We're actually in agreement by and large on that fact. Like you, I am extremely skeptical of "psychic powers", etc. But here's why I scoff. I don't think you guys are taking into account the fact that the supernatural may come from things external to the human spirit. I believe all the supernatural stuff we see comes from spiritual beings (or God of course) outside of us. As I've said, many times I find it bizarre that anyone would think you could force this in a laboratory setting. That's wrong with the Uri Geller, Amazing Kreskin thing. If there are demons and God, do you really think that a person can just snap their fingers and say please perform this in a laboratory setting? And, by the way, I believe with you that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. That's what I've been saying about "blind faith"...
SHOE: If there are demons and God, do you really think that a person can just snap their fingers and say please perform this in a laboratory setting? I would not expect this....BUT... and this is a huge BUT... You really need to come up with a VERY GOOD REASON why these demons and gods NEVER EVER EVER EVER dare show themselves or their powers in the presence of a scientist, or even a logically inclined person like myself. Isn't it curious that someone like me can walk into a situation and SUDDENLY, as if I have MORE POWER than god and demons *THEIR* powers suddenly disappears Why is that when skeptics are around, this shit NEVER happens? WHY?????? Maybe it has more do to with the people observing this stuff than the stuff itself hmmmmm?? Ugh yeah... Its bunk. Plain and simple. I studied the paranormal for years and all I got from the researchers were excuses like this. Your skeptical attitude cancels out the "PSI"....blah blah.. Yeah right... these supernatural beings cant handle the awesome canceling powers of my skepticism! LMAO peace axeman
Using this logic... automobile makers are responsible for the death of 50,000 americans a year. Pool makers are resonsible for thousands of children drowning. As the NRA would say: Guns dont kill, people kill. Science doesnt kill, people kill. peace axeman
>can it be argued that science has killed more people than >all the religious wars combined ? think of hiroshima, etc. >massive death/ destruction directly linked to scientific >discovery. technology turned into killing machines has killed >way more than wild hoards during the crusades. any thoughts ? Well, that's a discussion regarding method rather than reason so my thoughts wouldn't be related to our earlier discussion. To attempt to connect the two would only lead to the logical point that says "humans are responsible for all of it". Well, true, but not all people are bad, not all scientific discoveries kill people and not all religion is misused. But since you are have clearly stated that you are taking a devil's advocate position here I'll bite and take the other side... We'll just take the nuke argument for a moment. (It amazing that you brought that up as I was up until 2am this morning reading a really great book called "Fly Boys". It's the story of the WW2 fighter/bomber pilots. It a really good read, and it would be especially good for someone who the "god and country' type. Anyone who thinks this country is great *because* of "our" christian principles really should delve a little deeper into our history. I love this country but we have been involved in some horrendous atrocities of our own from time to time and we need to keep this in mind and learn from it. ) I digress...Oh yes, the Bomb. It can be argued quite well that dropping the Bomb actually saved Japanese civilian lives over the alternatives. Many forget that before the Bomb we were carpet bombing their cities with incendiary cluster bombs. This tactic was designed simply to burn their fire susceptible cities to the ground and force a surrender (there was no question as to the outcome of the war at this point on either side...to them it was just a question of how many americans they could kill before we overan them). Most would assume that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the two largest single killing days in human history, but they would be wrong. Hiroshima is the winner (by a very slight margin) but the Bomb on Nagasaki comes in third to the night hours of March 9/10 '45 where nearly a hundred thousand were killed from a single 2 hour and 40 minute fire bombing raid on Tokyo. These raids were being carried out as fast as the supplies and munitions allowed...and still no Japanese capitulation. There were serious conclusions among FDR and his advisors that it might take the annihilation of more than half of Japan's population before surrender talks would be entertained by the emperor. The Bomb did it's job...there would be no more "honor" in killing as many americans as you could before you died. Simply massive death from such a high altitude that inflicting damage upon the attacker wasn't possible. This forced the end of the war. So, there you go...best I can do on short notice (hey, it pays to stay up and read. LOL) On a more generic level I think it might be hard to argue that science hasn't also *saved* more lives than it has killed and also made those lives longer and more enjoyable. As always, there is no simply answer. Interesting point of exchange however...thanks for bringing it up Surf. It's very 'on topic' with the thread (far more so than other places we've gone) JB