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On 26/07/2014 23:38, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Sat, 26 Jul 2014 07:13:39 +0100, Stephen wrote:
>
>> On 26/07/2014 00:31, Jim Henderson wrote:
>>> On Sat, 26 Jul 2014 01:19:55 +0200, clipka wrote:
>>>
>>>> Actually, reading Stephen's posting more carefully: Maybe no. Germany
>>>> /has/ more churches than hospitals, but whether more /new/
>>>> churches are being built than hospitals is difficult to tell.
>>>
>>> Hmm, fair point.
>>>
>>> I think right now in the Seattle area, though, there aren't any new
>>> hospitals being built, but I'd be surprised if there weren't any new
>>> churches being built.
>>>
>>> Jim
>>>
>>>
>> As you know it was also a metaphor.
>> Churches, hospitals. Apples, oranges.
>
> Well, yeah, but it's an interesting question as a non-metaphor.
True. But that is how we are distracted.
>
>
> I've reached the point of being an atheist with the point of view that
> "if there is a supernatural world, and a deity that judges you when you
> die, then if that deity's judgment is based not on you being a good
> person but based on how much you worshiped the deity without evidence -
> well, fuck 'em."
>
How childish and trivial for a supernatural being to put worship of them
self above everything else. (Gives you real confidence in the afterlife.)
> I'd rather be a good person than waste my life worshiping something just
> to have a shot at beating Pascal's Wager.
>
Yes, I'll live by my conscience and let others play with those who have
nothing else to do but think about the number of angels that can dance
on the head of a needle.
On the other hand. The mythology opens up boundless opportunity for stories.
Have you read any of Charles Stross's Laundry series?
Where his protagonist is not the BOFH but the Sysop fighting the forces
from Hell. Quite funny and the Tech bits don't jar.
>> Bitter! Moi?
>
> Nah, I'm not seeing you being bitter *at all* about it. ;)
>
But I am Jim. I am.
--
Regards
Stephen
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On 27/07/2014 08:18, Thomas de Groot wrote:
> On 26-7-2014 16:56, Stephen wrote:
>> On 26/07/2014 15:25, Thomas de Groot wrote:
>>> Not Robert Burns imho.
>>
>> Correct.
>>
>>> I go for Walter Scott.
>>
>> Whatever. It is a free world. ;-)
>>
>>
>
>
> Now you have lost me. But not to worry :-)
>
I don't. It was a sexual innuendo and you passed the test. :-)
--
Regards
Stephen
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Am 27.07.2014 07:51, schrieb Warp:
> Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospam com> wrote:
>> It's a question of making beliefs be private or "none" becoming the
>> norm. That's something that's going to take some time over here.
>
> That reminded me of this. It's not completely inaccurate.
>
> http://satwcomic.com/the-easy-way
Damn - of all people, _you_ shouldn't have posted that link... not only
have I spent hours already browsing those comics, but now I just can't
help but associate you with that green tassled knit cap, and knife in
hand... >_<
http://satwcomic.com/art/nordic-morning.jpg
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On Sun, 27 Jul 2014 08:07:48 +0100, Stephen wrote:
> On 26/07/2014 23:39, Jim Henderson wrote:
>> On Sat, 26 Jul 2014 09:11:04 +0100, Stephen wrote:
>>
>>> It is a form of Juju that gives them a righteous feeling.
>>
>> What's more, it's a form of Juju that gives them power.
>>
>>
> That is the name of the game.
> IMO That is what organised religion is all about. Keeping the masses in
> their place.
Yep.
Which is why my reaction these days to people who say they believe is
generally one of surprise, especially people whom I consider to be
intelligent.
Jim
--
"I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and
besides, the pig likes it." - George Bernard Shaw
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On Sun, 27 Jul 2014 08:26:11 +0100, Stephen wrote:
>>> As you know it was also a metaphor. Churches, hospitals. Apples,
>>> oranges.
>>
>> Well, yeah, but it's an interesting question as a non-metaphor.
>
> True. But that is how we are distracted.
It happens. Squirrel! ;)
>> I've reached the point of being an atheist with the point of view that
>> "if there is a supernatural world, and a deity that judges you when you
>> die, then if that deity's judgment is based not on you being a good
>> person but based on how much you worshiped the deity without evidence -
>> well, fuck 'em."
>>
> How childish and trivial for a supernatural being to put worship of them
> self above everything else. (Gives you real confidence in the
> afterlife.)
Bingo. :)
>> I'd rather be a good person than waste my life worshiping something
>> just to have a shot at beating Pascal's Wager.
>>
> Yes, I'll live by my conscience and let others play with those who have
> nothing else to do but think about the number of angels that can dance
> on the head of a needle.
Yep. As long as they're not affecting the lives of others around them in
a negative way, I generally don't care. The problem is that a lot of
these nitwits *do* affect the lives of others around them in a negative
way - like insisting that science classes "teach the controversy" of
evolution vs. creationism - as if creationism is anything like science.
Or that anyone other than nitwits like Ken Ham think that creationism
*is* a valid theory of how the world works, especially young earth
creationism.
If they want to believe that, fine. But when they're people who sit on
the Texas Board of Education (which for reasons of scale ends up deciding
what's in science textbooks across the United States), then I have a HUGE
problem with them.
> On the other hand. The mythology opens up boundless opportunity for
> stories.
True, and mythology recognized as mythology is a pretty cool thing. But
I wouldn't dream of thinking that the Arthurian mythos are a basis for
defining a morality. They're pretty good, especially when retold by
Monty Python (just came back from watching that in the cinema, in
fact). :)
> Have you read any of Charles Stross's Laundry series?
I haven't, but I think I might have to. :)
> Where his protagonist is not the BOFH but the Sysop fighting the forces
> from Hell. Quite funny and the Tech bits don't jar.
*Definitely* have to check it out. :)
>>> Bitter! Moi?
>>
>> Nah, I'm not seeing you being bitter *at all* about it. ;)
>>
>>
> But I am Jim. I am.
You are? It's not really coming through. ;)
Jim
--
"I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and
besides, the pig likes it." - George Bernard Shaw
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On 7/26/2014 11:40 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> The thing that's particularly disturbing, though, is that in our
> "representative democracy," when you disagree with your elected official
> on something and take the time to write them, they generally *don't* say
> "thank you for sending me your thoughts - there were things you said that
> I hadn't considered, and I will take your feedback and incorporate it
> into my thinking." They might not change their mind, but you might feel
> that they were actually listening.
>
Yeah, been there, done that, told them when one of their pushers (i.e.,
telephone BS spreaders) called up later the same week that there was no
way in hell I would listen to, never mind support, liars and never to
call me again. But, you nailed the real issue straight on. The only time
they change their opinions, only, not really, is if they think it might
somehow damage their chances of being reelected. Ironically, the right,
at the moment, seem to have either convinced themselves, or are trying
really hard to do so, that **we** the voters just need to see their side
of things, and stop listening to bad advice, and its thus entirely our
confusion and misunderstanding about how much more reasonable they are,
which is hurting their chances to get votes.
In other words, not only are they 100% right, we 100% wrong, but this is
solvable only by making us all, somehow, change our minds, not by them
getting their heads out of their asses and recognizing that its 2014,
not like.. 1714 (or, in their case.. maybe 1614).
But, the fact is that the differences are not enough any more imho. The
Democrats have let the right drag the overton window so far at this
point that if we where discussing the best thing to have for breakfast,
for example, they would both be stuck on whether or not Bran Flakes, or
Coco Puffs where the best selection, while most of the damn public was
busy either crying about the artificial colorings in both (the crazy
left), or asking why the hell we can't just go to Ihop and forget the
damn cereal. The arguments have, in short, devolved into a state where
actual progress is nearly impossible, because every discussion is,
almost always, about how to either return us to some imaginary state,
which never existed, or to preserve some prior state that wasn't
working, instead of actually bloody fixing anything. I would, for
example, give Obama much greater credit, if the only damn thing he did
manage to do, i.e. health care, wasn't a) a Faustian deal and b)
something that both parties have been saying we need, since the bloody
Nixon administration (or around there). We are supposed to praise the
Democrats for, on one hand, managing to finally do one thing, which
people have talked about, but never gotten done, for decades, while
shrugging at stupidity like the internet de-neutrality disaster, extra
domestic spying, and a dozen other things, which they didn't just not
appose, but actually, in many cases, helped along, all of them things
that it would have, in the past being "Republican" ideas?
How far do they have to drag the terms "liberal" and "progressive" up
onto the rocks, before we call them on the claim that they are
**either** of those things?
--
Commander Vimes: "You take a bunch of people who don't seem any
different from you and me, but when you add them all together you get
this sort of huge raving maniac with national borders and an anthem."
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On Sun, 27 Jul 2014 16:34:10 -0700, Patrick Elliott wrote:
> But, you nailed the real issue straight on. The only time
> they change their opinions, only, not really, is if they think it might
> somehow damage their chances of being reelected.
Yep.
It's like the phrase "representative democracy" means "our constituents
represent our views" (hence gerrymandering) rather than the other way
around.
Jim
--
"I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and
besides, the pig likes it." - George Bernard Shaw
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On 7/26/2014 11:30 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Sat, 26 Jul 2014 21:48:04 -0700, Patrick Elliott wrote:
>
>> On 7/26/2014 3:34 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
>>>> That would probably be the best, but then, perhaps people would vote
>>>> for the one candidate who praises God all the time?
>>>
>>> It's a question of making beliefs be private or "none" becoming the
>>> norm. That's something that's going to take some time over here.
>>>
>>> Jim
>>
>> Yeah. Mostly its one side trying real hard to not offend anyone, while
>> babbling about god and refusing to stop patently insulting crap like the
>> national day of wishful thinking, while the other side spends almost as
>> much time claiming that everyone else isn't going to hell, while trying
>> to claim that, no, in fact **they** pray more, or are more godly, etc.,
>> than the other guy running, including their own party members, when
>> running against them.
>
> What we need to do, I think, is instill the idea that actions speak
> louder than words in the youth.
>
That is what lawyers, smear campaigns, public image consultants and
keeping your own life as private as possible, while digging up someone
else's as much as possible, are for, right?
> Someone who's all in favor of "family values" but is actually a serial
> cheating scumbag can be judged based on what they do, not what they say
> they believe.
>
Snort.. Well, first of, I don't buy, myself, into the BS idea that the
nuclear family is anything but a fiction, that people don't cheat a lot,
and just fail to get caught, that relationships are some magic thing
that last forever, or a long list of other things that would be required
for the term "family values" to even mean a damn thing in the first
place. Whether or not someone cheats on their wife, even serially
doesn't say a damn thing about anything else they do. I would,
personally vote for a bloody swinger, polyamorist, etc., if their ideas
where not complete bullshit. The problem is, in a nutshell, that "family
values" are nothing more, in reality than the low hanging fruit. They
are the means by which some ass can convince the gullible, who think
that having the pretense of holding such values, somehow extend those
values into the rest of everything else they do, and can therefor be
"trusted". There are people that I know would never break those rules,
but whom I wouldn't elect to be bloody dog catcher, because their self
righteous tendencies, which let them adhere to such tendencies in the
first place, make them unfit to make dynamic, variable, spur of the
moment, decisions, based on the information available, instead of
defaulting back to some stupid dogmatic solution, which failed the last
5,000 times, but is "acceptable, and traditional, and adheres to their
personal faith/ideals about how the world really functions."
Yeah, they should be judged by what they do, depending on whether or not
what ever they did has jack shit to do with what ever the problem really
is. The real problem isn't whether or not they are a cheating scumbag -
its whether or not they hide it, them lie about it, while claiming to
believe in the fiction of "sanctity of marriage". Because, if they are
willing to do that, then they will cheat at other things, hide the fact
they are doing it, and then lie their asses off, when caught, just like
with their sex lives.
Like I said - I have no problem, at all, with an honest swinger (and to
be factual, there are many cases where that honesty has allowed
marriages to survive, where hiding it from the spouse **always** fails
to work), than someone that claims their whole entire existence is based
on **never ever** doing such things, and gets caught doing it anyway.
It would be really refreshing to deal with adults, instead of people
that instantly become petulant 6 year olds, the moment someone is caught
playing with someone else's toy. But, instead, what we get is a bunch of
six year olds, with a range of views from, "I am taking my toys and
leaving!", to, "It wasn't me, someone else did it!", to ,"Mine, mine,
mine!", to, "I am going to tell on you!". Even when it gets as far as a
divorce, its more 6 year old behavior - what matters isn't the kids, and
what its doing to them, its who gets to keep the toys, and whether or
not that is sufficient a bargaining chip to let the other one keep the
kids instead. Where the F are the adults in any of it?
There certainly is never one single scrap of honestly, or mutual respect
involved, or the other person in the relationship would be the first one
to find out, not the press, and the outcome would be based on a sane
discussion, not a hissy fit.
But, yeah, this is par for the course. And, like I said, its the "low
hanging fruit", which is why its the #1 thing all the smear tactic
people look for. Too much of a public is much more concerned, or can be
made to be concerned (like with Clinton) with whether or not something
got kept in someone's pants, or who they showed it to, if it wasn't,
than whether or not they actually ***did*** anything with their time in
office. Its like watching kids on a playground pick who they will
associate with, and seeing some poor kid get kicked to the side, because
the school's "in crowd" got there first and declared, "She has
cooties!", causing most of the whole class to shun them.
Again, where the hell are the adults in the room? "Family Values" is a
lie right from the start, almost nothing they say when talking about it
isn't against women's health, or women's rights, or gays, or life
choices they don't like, or anything else they can lump into the thing.
Its all about what people shouldn't be, and jack to do, save by a very
convoluted and paranoid course, with anything involved the well being of
families. But, when its used as a weapon against and opponent, over some
"choice" they have made... it always becomes a) school yard bullshit,
and b) a sort of glaring hypocrisy. But, since the whole concept is a
nest of delusions in the first place, the second effect is hardly a
surprise.
--
Commander Vimes: "You take a bunch of people who don't seem any
different from you and me, but when you add them all together you get
this sort of huge raving maniac with national borders and an anthem."
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On 7/26/2014 11:35 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> The point at which it's a problem for me is when someone's imposing their
> beliefs on someone else. I despise SCOTUS' recent decision allowing a
> corporation to hold religious beliefs (say what?) and to impose those
> beliefs on their employees (in the form of not allowing their corporate-
> provided health care plan to cover certain forms of contraception,
> because the 'corporation' believes - inaccurately, I might add - that
> those drugs are 'sinful' because they cause abortions (which they don't)).
>
And, of course, despite the supposed "limited scope" of this, it took
the lawyers less than 10 seconds to expand that to include every
bullshit lawsuit currently in the works that involves a company having
to accommodate **anything** hey didn't like, and SCOTUS less than 24
hours to not only approve of at least some of those expansions, but to
create one of their own.
But, its like.. limited, so, we don't really need to worry, and stuff..
--
Commander Vimes: "You take a bunch of people who don't seem any
different from you and me, but when you add them all together you get
this sort of huge raving maniac with national borders and an anthem."
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On 7/27/2014 4:43 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Sun, 27 Jul 2014 16:34:10 -0700, Patrick Elliott wrote:
>
>> But, you nailed the real issue straight on. The only time
>> they change their opinions, only, not really, is if they think it might
>> somehow damage their chances of being reelected.
>
> Yep.
>
> It's like the phrase "representative democracy" means "our constituents
> represent our views" (hence gerrymandering) rather than the other way
> around.
>
> Jim
>
So, how long do you think it will be before "representative" comes to
mean, "We frame a copy of a constitution, as a 'representation' of what
we imagine the country should be like, but put a caption some place on
it that says, 'Actual model may not reflect plans.'?" lol
BTW, interesting fact from Arizona. Seems they have decided that an ID
needs to be updated to be valid, for someone that is 21, regardless of
which state issued it. So, as of June 24th, in Arizona, it doesn't
matter if you have an ID, or license, which shows that you are 21 now,
if you showed up from, say NY, with 4 year old ID, but which is still
valid until, say 2015, which said you turned 21 yesterday, you have **no
right** in Arizona to purchase alcohol, because your ID, is deemed
"invalid" for that purpose, since there is more than a 30 day difference
between the issuance date, and the time you turned 21.
Yep, you can't get a new one, short of going home, you have the right,
based on the law, to purchase, but you can't without the ID, which is
now deemed invalid, due to you not updating it, which you didn't know
you needed to do, before coming to the state..
Rights? Oh, those are those things that they say you have, but you
don't, unless they say they will let you have them, or have paid the
right fee for? Got it...
--
Commander Vimes: "You take a bunch of people who don't seem any
different from you and me, but when you add them all together you get
this sort of huge raving maniac with national borders and an anthem."
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