SauerKraut537 on September 29, 2011 at 12:01 PM

You believe. I believe. That’s all that matters. PS. You needed to post something before midnight.

hawkdriver on September 29, 2011 at 11:15 AM

MY point is to get you and others to NOT see him as anything, just accept that one or more MAY exist and leave it at that, because when people are SURE of their beliefs that’s when trouble rears its ugly head…

I can’t find an exact article on it and I know I’m mangling the actual studies findings but I saw a documentary on the TV and there was a study recently where they scanned people’s brains with PET machines to track thought processes… It’s called brain mapping, and what they find is that when people talk about themselves, their feelings, and morality, et al, a certain part of the brain lights up with neurological activity.

When they ask these same people to discuss god and religious dogmas and whatnot, the exact same area of the brain lights up.

What this implies is that “god” is within us, not in a literal sense as in he inhabits or is contained within a specific part of the brain, just that god is a thought in our brain and we confuse god with our own sense of morality

Interesting stuff, and neuroscience which is a “new” science is really starting to get down to the nitty gritty of how we humans and other animals interact with each other and think/operate.

SauerKraut537 on September 29, 2011 at 9:37 AM

As long as you believe. There is a God. Many people see him as different things. He hears us all when we pray to him. He consigns that many of us has an improper concept of him. That is my rationale and that of my Muslim and Jewish friends who have told me is as such.

Why are you not a Christian – Bertrand Russell.

You should hear his answer to the second question in that video…

“Do you think there is a practical reason for having a religious belief?

“Well there can’t be a practical reason for believing what isn’t true, (garbeled) At least I rule it out as impossible. Either a thing is true, or it isn’t. If it is true you should believe it and if it isn’t you shouldn’t. If you can’t find out whether its true or whether it isn’t (which is the case with all religions), you should suspend judgment, but you can’t… It seems to me a fundamental dishonesty, a fundamental treachery to intellectual integrity to hold a belief because you think it’s useful and not because you think it’s true.. .”

wait for it for now. hopefully it shows up.

SauerKraut537 on September 28, 2011 at 9:17 PM

Doesn’t look like it did. What was the crux of the last one you were sending?

Or maybe I think I would prefer to just stop with you telling me that you do believe in a diety. It is confusing to understand that you’ve gone back and forth so. The finer points about what you believe are of course for you. But really, you’re no different than a Christian friend I have that has many other interpretations of The Bible than I. Let’s just say that we both believe and are tolerant of what the other’s concept of religion is.

wait for it for now. hopefully it shows up.

Here’s what I’ll give you, and you think about the rest. Don’t be a pansy either, and run off saying you won because NOBODY ever wins in a debate. Please just TRY to be fair for a minute and think about it. A thoughtful response would be nice (I’m trying to play nice for a second, so lets see how you react)

What I WILL concede is that atheists may have won the “battle” in the 20th century when it comes to numbers of people killed, but that’s PURELY because humans got better at killing. Also, it wasn’t like their armies were made ENTIRELY of atheists either, I mean religious folk always brag about how many people there are who believe right?! Surely there were a lot of conscripted religious folk “in the mix” who got away with trying to eliminate rival belief systems in the process. In fact, Stalin used western raised Russians to control people in eastern Russian, and vice versa. What this does is use those people’s already present prejudices in a judo like move to control everything by playing ethnic groups against ethnic groups. But I digress… It’s CLEARLY NOT because atheists are somehow better at killing than religious people.

You’re also going to have to exclude Hitler from the list of atheists, because he CLEARLY wasn’t one. (if you even said he was I can’t remember all thats been said over the last few days!)

Look, these assholes of the 20th century didn’t do what they did BECAUSE of their atheism. As I said, history is replete with examples of religious bigotry, and even among “like kinds”, ie denomination vs denomination. “Those damn Danbury Baptists” or how about a more recent example, http://www.godhatesfags.com – the home of the Westboro Baptist Church in Kansas. The HEART of the bible belt, and a church which preaches that only IT has the correct interpretation of the bible!

Religion on religion violence is a matter of history, and no amount of rationalizations is going to get you out from under that fact hawk.

As for my projection? I’m well aware of all of the mental pitfalls of humans. My minor was psychology in college and I stay abreast of it to this day, and I majored in computer science. I KNOW I’m as susceptible to these mental challenges as you are hawk, but knowing of them helps to inure one’s self to it, ir knowledge is power. What do the AA people always say about admitting they have a problem? Once you admit you have a problem you can THEN find a solution to it? If one recognizes something like cognitive dissonance in themselves, it’s easier to combat.

I’ve GONE through that in my life in regards to religion. Everyone treads a different path in life, but we all cross a lot of the same bridges. I’ve been where you are now, and I finally decided that enough was enough with kidding myself.

NOBODY knows for sure there is a god or gods, you just don’t know. So you probably latched onto the first explanation for existence that was out there, what mom and pops believed. It fits dude! It’s what kids do! In response, most parents shower their kids with love bombs for being such a good little boy or girl, and the community at large reinforces the belief, until it’s set in your mind that it’s the truth and you just go with it… Of COURSE one grows in their faith and comes to understand a lot more, and probably/hopefully learns not to take it so seriously but GO with that a thought a second will you?

Don’t take it so seriously. Fine, believe that a god exists, I kind of do as well, but stop kidding yourself that bronze aged Bedouins and shepherds had any more understanding of our place in the universe than we do today.

Divorce morality from religion and you might start to get it.

I’ll pray for you bro.

SauerKraut537 on September 28, 2011 at 1:47 PM

Obviously, you can’t believe you’ve won even a piece of this debate. Me thinks you suffer from most of what you project.

I’m a conservative atheist dipstick, and you’re not handing my ass to me. You just can’t see me handing yours to you because as I said, you’re denser than lead and you suffer from the Dunning-Kruger Effect.

In case you’re incurious enough to know what that means…

The Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which unskilled people make poor decisions and reach erroneous conclusions, but their incompetence denies them the metacognitive ability to recognize their mistakes.

SauerKraut537 on September 28, 2011 at 1:09 PM

yeah, that’s me. I’m a liberal atheist who keeps coming back to a Conservative website to have my azz handed to me. I’m denser than lead. (And my faith is as weighty)

Remember, tomorrow and the next day.

You’re comparing apples to oranges when you do that hawk.

It’s NOT the same.

These dictators of the 20th century didn’t do what they did because of the dogma of atheism (which has no dogma and ONLY says that there are no theistic gods), they did it because of the dogma of communism, collectivism, and because they wanted to control the masses. And one of the best ways to control the masses is through fear of retribution FROM said dictator, or his lackeys.

SauerKraut537 on September 28, 2011 at 12:11 PM

Oh, you make argument now with what you think I’m implying? Does that make it easier for you to actually believe what you say?

Again, like a parrot. Their atheism wasn’t the deciding factor in what they did to their people… It was the dogma associated with Communism, that is all.

And as I said, the kings throughout history and their subjects were Christians, and Muslims, and Hindu’s, and other religious affiliations, and they killed millions of people in the names of their religions and countries… so what?

But the distinct difference between them all was that the people who were religious did it because their religions said they should (spread the word by peaceful means and if those fail by force if necessary.)

Where atheism and religion diverge is that religion can be interpreted by some to back up their bad behavior where an atheist just acts badly. These dictators didn’t do what they did BECAUSE of their atheism bro.

SauerKraut537 on September 28, 2011 at 11:30 AM

What else can I say. The leading murderers in justt he last century were atheists. That was my point and I proved it. What else do you need. Picture books. I have to go to work, but at this point, I need you here tomorrow and the next day, k? Then you can do whatever you want.

As I said in my example earlier…

IF I’m an atheist and I decide I hate my wife because she screwed around on me and I decide to kill her, I didn’t kill her because I’m an atheist. I killed her because I hated her and I’m an idiot for resorting to killing her. Atheism didn’t motivate me to kill her, my anger at her actions did. The God of Atheists didn’t tell a follower to write down that if my wife screws around on me that I’m allowed to stone her to death. That’s something your own religion does.

Since you won’t concede that point there isn’t much more to say now is there?

But you DIDN’T win bro!

Keep deluding yourself.

I’ve had fun hawk but I tire of your inanity and ignorance of history, and inability to process information correctly.

You can’t hang on for just two more days for me?

SauerKraut537 on September 28, 2011 at 9:01 AM

Finally got it? F<cking moron, it was my original argument and it was I that had to convince you that. Do you forget what you write?

And you're the f<cking idiot that likes to make the points that Christians are bad because you claim multitudes have suffered under them. I'm just following you brilliant line of reasoning. Atheists are worse even if one of your stories about Christians were true.

Loser. Denying loser. Pathetic and insane.

Man I LOVE psychology sheephawk! You’re nothing but a prime example of a person stuck in a confirmation bias. Confirmation biases contribute to overconfidence in personal beliefs and can maintain or strengthen beliefs in the face of contrary evidence. Hence they can lead to poor decisions, like your ignoring the evidence put forward by me.

You’re guilty of belief perseverance, for example when beliefs persist after the evidence for them is shown to be false, and you’re guilty of illusory correlation, in which people falsely perceive an association between two events or situations, ie your claim that Stalin and Pol Pot did what they did because they were atheists

You HAVE to deny all that I say because if you even give an inch you know you’ve lost. THUS all the bluster on your part and claims that I’ve written a fantasy that goes against history.

Have fun in your delusions believing I’m a burger flipper. It has about as much truth to is as your belief in your god. ;-)

I’ve had fun hawk but I tire of your inanity and ignorance of history, and inability to process information correctly.

Some people just can’t be reached, but I knew that going in.

Brilliant! BUT, the common theme is that none of them did what they did BECAUSE of their atheism or theism… right?

F*cking moron. Thanks for proving my point.

You lost.

lol

I’m winning.