christopher hitchens on the morally disgusting religious practice called circumcision

christopher hitchens on circumcision:

there are things no morally normal person would THINK of doing, if it wasnt for that they believed in religion or divine instruction. take a transcendent experience that i'm sure a lot of you have had, i've had it 3 times: take a newborn baby in your hands...so here's this bundle, you look at the little indentations in the ear lobes, etc, and THEN you should be getting on with parenting, but NO, first let's find a sharp stone or knife and start hacking away at the genitalia! because it turns out that the design isnt that great and in a crucial feature too! it needs to be sawed away, a lot of it .... no morally person would do such a thing if it wasnt for superstition...

why cant ex-mormons just "leave the church alone"? =)

from "larry" lawrence pratt:

During much of the 20th century, hundreds of thousands of individuals
escaped from living under totalitarian regimes such as Communism and Nazism
to seek lives elsewhere. Although free from oppression, these people
continued to seek justice for those still under the influence of dictatorial
and personally destructive systems.

when asked this question, i like to respond with the question "why cant the mormon cult leave the *world* alone?" =)

see also: http://latterdaymainstreet.com/2011/08/19/ex-mormons-angry-and-questions-part/

evidence that joseph smith knew about engraved plates during his time--apologists panic =)

Mike Reed Drops Bomb on Metal Plates

a good definition of "religion"

from the wikipedia religion page:

The word religion is sometimes used interchangeably with faith or belief system, but religion differs from private belief in that it has a public aspect. Most religions have organized behaviors, including clerical hierarchies, a definition of what constitutes adherence or membership, congregations of laity, regular meetings or services for the purposes of veneration of a deity or for prayer, holy places (either natural or architectural), and/or scriptures. The practice of a religion may also include sermons, commemoration of the activities of a god or gods, sacrifices, festivals, feasts, trance, initiations, funerary services, matrimonial services, meditation, music, art, dance, public service, or other aspects of human culture.

rational thinking vs religion

http://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=2324005980922&id=1272787049

main post by ED:
Is god all powerful, in that he can do anything he wanted to? If so, then he can create a plan where all his children could return to live with him WITHOUT having to murder one of his children to make it possible. Christianity FAIL. Reason wins.

Nick Humphrey: and what kind of "loving father" lets his kids rape and murder each other? i dont know of any. i usually step in and stop my kids' from fighting when it gets violent. i am really forgiving too and certainly wouldnt ban them from ever being in my presence again if they were to deny the existence of an invisible spirit. =)

TB: So E, let's say "Christianity fails, reason wins". Now what?

Nick Humphrey: ‎TB "Now what?"
* tell your friends =)
* lobby for teaching of rational thinking, skepticism and logic starting in the public elementary education level
* study to build your own repertoire of rational arguments to use in debate with theists
?

TB: What makes you think that reason alone, or empirically justifiable beliefs alone, can ever serve as a substitute for religion, Nick? Haven't you met any of your fellow humans? They don't operate that way. Your war is a war against humanity itself, because humanity is innately religious.
Besides, there is no historical basis for assuming that cold, hard reason cannot itself be made into an idol and worshipped, with its worshippers acting as wickedly as any religious believers. The French Revolution is only one example.
The bloodletting there was orgiastic, and was done entirely in the name of reason and atheism.
If I could have told my friends in France 220 years ago anything, it would have been to continue on as believing Catholics, because they were much better as believing Catholics than as atheists.


Nick Humphrey: ‎TB "What makes you think that reason alone, or empirically justifiable beliefs alone, can ever serve as a substitute for religion, Nick?"
you incorrectly assume at least 2 things:
1) that humanity needs to replace religion with something, instead of just doing away with it.

maybe *you* personally need to "establish contact with a perceived higher power". i dont.

2) that religionists are completely DEVOID of rationality.

they at least put it aside when it concerns their views of the existence of supernatural entities and interpretation of sensory perceptions and coincidences.

your argument is a straw man.

"They don't operate that way. Your war is a war against humanity itself, because humanity is innately religious."

this is known as the "naturalistic fallacy", but what IS does not imply what OUGHT to be. if homo sapiens are inclined towards religion, it doesnt mean we *should* be religious.

"there is no historical basis for assuming that cold, hard reason cannot itself be made into an idol and worshipped with its worshippers acting as wickedly as any religious believers."

this behavior IS *religious* just without an extra-terrestrial deity. assuming that rational thinking alone leads to such behavior is simply fallacious.

falsifiability of the mormon lds church cult "truth claims"

an interesting thread:
http://www.mormondialogue.org/topic/43632-which-lds-truth-claims-are-falsifiable/

possible candidates to falsifiability of "truth claims" (one person stated the importance of the definition of that term):
book of abraham fascimilies
native american dna
plan of happiness <-- lol! =)

"Mormons practice polygamy". myth? technically, no.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/five-myths-about-mormonism/2011/08/03/gIQAyIhTwI_story.html
this is technically not a myth. ask mormons if they believe in eternal plural marriage? i.e. can a mormon man today be eternally married to more than one woman? (answer: yes. if a man's wife dies, he may be married for "time and all eternity" to a new woman, *in addition to his dead wife*). "eternal" polygamy is still practiced. joseph smith is btw sealed/married to more than 200 women. one of them women is 169 years older than him and another was born 15 years after he died! (source 1: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nickleus/4960128084/ ) (source 2: new.familysearch.org)

ansvar vs årsak og forsvare vs forklare

when talking about the ABB case in norway, arne tumyr said:

«det politisk korrekte Norge må ta sin del av skylden for den rystende terror-tragedien»

some good points were made about the difference between responsibility and cause, and defending vs explaining.

‎"No cure for pedophilia has been developed."

‎"No cure for pedophilia has been developed."

i remember before when people thought that homosexuality could be "cured" =) it's interesting that homophilia used to be classified as a mental/psychiatric disorder (paraphilia), as pedophilia still is today. today, homophilia is no longer classified as a paraphilia.

self defense in norway

Inne på et arrangement på Facebook som kaller seg "Ingen rasister i våre gater" planlegges det demonstrasjoner mot SIAN's arrangementer. I den anledning vil jeg minne SIAN om at man med hjemmel i norsk straffelov §48 helt lovlig kan forsvare seg dersom man føler seg truet av slike "antirasister". Oppfører folk seg truende kan man hevde nødvergerett og man kan til og med foreta sivil pågripelse med hjemmel i straffeprosessloven §171-176.

norway's done doing a good job killing people in libya

"Det norske bidraget har høstet meget gode tilbakemeldinger for den jobben som vi har gjort..."
...ved å drepe andre mennesker =)

"Ingen skal få bombe Norge til taushet"

nei, det er norges oppgave.

"vi står sammen mot terror"

no shit!

"Heldigvis har reaksjonene etterpå vist at det norske demokratiet og den norske rettsstaten er sterkere enn noe våpen"

med unntak av krigen i libya.

"For hatet, ekstremismen og intoleransen er uvanlige organismer...Den beste måten å stanse dem er gjennom en åpen debatt og med argumenter."

og f-16 jagerfly og bomber.

"mer åpenhet, mer demokrati"

og mer avanserte jagerfly til 800 millioner per stk.

heia jens stoltenberg. stem arbeiderpartiet og deres hyklersk, politisk "talking out of both sides of your mouth".

hippocrates, 400+ years before "jesus" casts out the "demons", understands that epilepsy is an illness

thanks to Rob Hogue for this quote:

"Men think epilepsy divine, merely because they do not understand it. We will one day understand what causes it, and then cease to call it divine. And so it is with everything in the universe." - Hippocrates 400 BC

now look at the next quote, ca. 400 later on in history:

In the Gospel According to Mark (9:14-29), Jesus Christ casts out a devil from a young man with epilepsy: "Teacher, I brought you my son, who is possessed by a spirit that has robbed him of speech. Whenever it seizes him, it throws him to the ground. He foams at the mouth, gnashes his teeth, and becomes rigid. I asked your disciples to drive the spirit out, but they could not." (NIV) 70 AD

=)