Posting:

Due to the current troll infestation we will be requiring you to sign in to leave a comment. Also, please note that we will be very nice in the regular posts, but we will not be gentle in the Sunday Blaspheme posts. You will be expected to back up any ideas with facts.

I am always happy to answer any questions I can:)

New Rule! Staff reserves the right to cuss you out and post your correspondence if you send us annoying emails.

Best!

Brett

Sunday, March 13, 2011

This Sunday, lets hear it for reason!



Found here. A little bit of inspiration for us non believers.

An interesting thing I found about morality.

And then this awesome Christian Science Test. I know it's not real but it is real funny!

I tried to watch Angels and Demons last night. I did sort of like the first one of these movies. But this I turned off after the first hour. I was rooting for the bad guys! I'm still not sure how I was supposed to think the Church were the good guys in this... I don't condone killing, but those asses in the Vatican sort of had it coming, and then they didn't evacuate the city!?! And then there was that whole we know the TRUTH thing... that's when I shut it off. I was annoyed that the Tom Hanks guy thought having religion was a virtue... but the Church was going to let all those people die. Oh the hypocrisy!

OK, back to work 2 pages left of 56.

Best!

Brett

17 comments:

M.O.R said...

Nothing wrong with personal faith, but as you point out, the movie shows the evils of one organisation, and then goes on to say "But they're not so bad".

I read that post on CupCakeAtheist, and it just goes to show that no matter what one believes, whether it is in God/ Mohammed/ Vishnu/ Thor/ Darwin/ Dawkins/ The Beatles/ The Rolling Stones/ Joe Pesci etc, that without an inquiring mind,without a state of mind that is desperately trying to understand how this world works, and why it works, why this happens, why that happens, the individual may never, ever make progress in their life.

I mean, the poster on CCA, Jeremy,
is a believer, like myself, in a deity. But he does not dissasociate himself from people who do not share his faith. No, he wants to know and understand the different belief systems of others, whatever they do or do not believe in.

I honestly feel that, no matter what belief systems the world chooses to embrace, we will always find something to fight about, whether it is oil, gold, metal, or even sports teams. We are an irritating species, because even if it came down to the very last rock on our planet, we would fight about that. Sad thing about us is that we never learn.

Fatboy73 said...

I honestly feel that, no matter what belief systems the world chooses to embrace, we will always find something to fight about

Have to agree with you on that one,I think south park kinda hit the bullseye with the "Go god go" episode
were in the future religion is gone(thanks to Dawkins) and we end up waring over who's science is right.
And I think Robert Langdon is being facetious when he calls faith a "gift he yet to receive."
The character is written very much as a man of science and would no more consider faith to be a "gift" or a virtue than he would consider concentration camps to be a "much needed vacation for hard working Jews"
For me the movie is worth watching because if your going to kill a couple of hours,why not do it by adding great history lessons with some intriguing fiction and shake vigorously til well mixed. Mmmmmmmm...Tasty ;)

M.O.R said...

Cannot stand Dawkins. Hitchens I like, because he is somewhat sympathethic to those who have faith, but Dawkins decrives those who stand at an altar and preach, while he...stands at an alter and preaches.

I also feel that Hitchens has points to raise outside of the "Atheism/ Theism" debate, and his points are well founded and well researched. Dawkins is a one trick pony, and it's a boring trick too. And worst of all, he is a terrible writer. I mean, for all one's education, surely being able to write is important.

Going back to Angels and Demons, having watched the first movie (tho my brother read the book) I have to ask, didn't the last film pretty much state that Langdon was a theist? I mean, he talked about it in relation to him falling down a well as a child which caused his claustrophobia, and saying that he felt he was not on his own at the time. I distinctly remember that from the film.

Fatboy73 said...

Dawkins can come off as a bit arrogant and unlikeable at times,
But I've heard a lot of people say the same thing about Hitchens.Personally I'd rather listen to Rick Gervais,but that's just me :D
I read both books and saw both movies but I don't remember any allusions to Langdon being a theist,All I remember is he was raised Catholic but no longer has any faith.My guess is he used to believe because that's what he was told he believed as a child,but no longer does.
But that's just an opinion since Robert is a fictional character.I guess if you really want to know you have to ask Dan Brown.

M.O.R said...

I remember that bit at the end of the movie, where he is talking to that chick from Amelie, the hot french one. He talks about that time he was trapped in a well or somewhere, as a child (whatever caused his claustrophobia) and he mentions that when he was in the well, he felt there was something there with him (referring to a deity). If Angels and Demons has him going in the atheistic direction, than that is just bad writing on Dan Brown's part. Not that I am saying that whatever faith he has is bad writing, but rather that he is not consistant. It's like when Kevin Smith made Matt Murdock Catholic. What if, say 12 issues down the line, he abruptly, without explanation, made him an atheist, or vice versa. Fans would cry foul. (Actually, there were recent instances where that did happen, where a hero was mentioned as atheist, and then some other writer wrote him as theist. Happened in the comic books, but the result was really jarring.)

Fatboy73 said...

Actually Frank Miller made Matt Murdock a Catholic.

Daredevil was apparently not overtly identified as a Catholic character when he first appeared. It seems likely, however, given Daredevil/Matt Murdock's family background and name, that Stan Lee and Bill Everett generally thought of the character as Catholic when they created him in the 1960s

Frank Miller during his influential runs on the series, overtly identified Daredevil as Catholic and more frequently portrayed him in Catholic religious settings and situations. Frank Miller once said, "I figured Daredevil must be Catholic because only a Catholic could be both an attorney and a vigilante."

Sorry I'm a pretty big Comic History and Trivia geek

steve said...

Brett is finally working at DC on some major career expanding titles. This is stuff I’ve hoped and prayed for my friend for a long time. I know he feels compelled to respond to my posts on here, but out of sensitivity to his deadlines I’m going to refrain from entering into long debates as best as I can. I don’t think it was well received and it was counter productive. Its Brett’s blog, not mine.

I will simply post this, the top of this blogs states:

“You will be expected to back up any ideas with facts.”

So the ball is in your court Brett, science has been unable to back up the values showcased in this video with sociological or biological facts to support a belief in hope, love, to care, etc. (not that they don’t recognize them, they just can’t find a “first cause”) All of these are traits defined in the Bible as coming explicitly from God, nature shows no evolutionary pathway for these traits, it also can not explain why we would value them universally as being good, or why we struggle, fail, and look down upon those who don’t practice them.

All hypotheses to do with herd instinct or self-sacrificing altruistic genes have failed at the academic level to be adequate explanations. The best evolutionists have been able to muster is Dawkins selfish gene theory, but this creates more problems than it solves. At best it would allow for an occasional altruistic act, but an overarching moral framework should still take a back seat to natural survival of the fittest traits. If a monkey kills another monkey, we may feel bad, but it is never viewed as morally wrong. Even self defense killings by humans are based off of a moral framework –if in self defense I kill a Nazi I am a hero, if a Nazi kills me in his self defense- I am still the hero. (This raises the argument; but not to the Nazis their view will always be the Nazi is the hero-which is an excellent observation and requires a lengthy explanation which I could give, but I think it is fairly obvious)Sociologists always end up tracing these traits back to religious origins, and the central themes from this video go back to Judaism and Christianity which valued these traits in historical contrast to the societies around them. So do you have any facts which help explain a better understanding since science, history, and personal experience have come up short?

What this video is really saying; is we want all God gives: life, love, happiness, etc., but we don’t want you God. We’ll take your world and your creation but not you God. Nothing new, pretty much the same form of hedonism which has existed from the dawn of recorded time.

M.O.R said...

Don't be sorry for knowledge. That is something we should all be proud of, our knowledge. Instead, we have people being ridiculed, vilified and shoved aside for actually knowing and wanting to know stuff about the world.

Thanks for the clarification. Had thought that it was Kevin Smith who was responsible for the CAtholic stuff. Glad to be corrected. Not much of a fan of Smith either, to be honest. Comes across as too much of a Star Wars fanboy to actually have a critical opinion about a series that George Lucas has drained every last drop of credibility out of.

Fatboy73 said...

Never really kept up with his comics work but I dig his movies and the evening with Kevin Smith series is hilarious.So if you have the time and inclination rent them...watch them...and then bow down to the awesome acting juggernaut that is Ben Affleck.Who "could play ANY role,even the f$#@ing shark in Jaws...YES! the f$#@ing shark in Jaws."Bwahahahahahahahaha!

Brett said...

Since it's a movie it's possible that the adapter made the changes and Dan Brown is innocent;) But from what I've read in the book, Angels and Demons was before the Davincci Code.

Best,

Brett

M.O.R said...

Jeez, hard to know who did what.

@Faceboy I have seen some of those Kevin Smith vids. I find some of his opinions insightful, and others are a crock of pure rubbish. I mean he condemns the LOTR trilogy, but he praised all the new Star Wars episodes, despite them all being a steaming pile of sewer sludge. Still, I could watch his story about Superman all day. That is just ridiculous.

Find it sad how many people seem to worship him, though, because they go to see the blockbuster films he likes, but negate the classics like The Cabinet of Dr Caligari, among others (that film is awesome. A rewarding film, that a whole host of artists/ animators/ filmmakers etc recommend due to the stylish approach, and the sheer volume of analysis one could do on the film, and still feel inadequate).
I also feel that SMith is very much a one trick pony ie Jay and Silent Bob and Clerks. When he strays away from that, he misses the target completely.
Maybe he should stop smoking cannabis and actually work on being creative. He can do it when he applies his mind to it, especially seeing how he lost all that weight.

steve said...

Hey, where'd my post go?

Fatboy73 said...

Blogger probably ate it Steve,I noticed she hasn't fed lately and she's probably hungry. ;)

Brett said...

I have give Blogger the Heimlich maneuver. For some reason it was in spam?!?!? No idea why. I knew there was a post from Steve, I could have sworn I saw it in my email but when I went to actually read it, I found nothing...


But there you go. I'll check it out tomorrow as I need to get this cover done and the dogs need a feedin'!

Best!

Brett

MadPowerBomber said...

you made it further than i did. i couldn't get past tom hanks saying the word "illuminati" in such a serious tone in the trailers and tv spots.

Brett said...

I finally got some free time... Not enough to actually waste my time looking up stuff but enough to poke a very large whole in your argument Steve.

Steve, all those thing the 'bible' tells you are human traits are derived from animals. This has been documented, love is a chemical reaction for pair bonding being nice to others gets you protection from the bad animals that are trying to kill you.

How do you explain this. I've actually seen this on TV several times, a young monkey beats up and takes over the harem of females. He's not a nice leader like the old one, he's mean he's violent. The females band together and beat the crap out of him and put the old leader back into power. Sounds AWFULLY human to me. I find it funny you make murder out to be something humans should never do, but your book commands you to do it all the time! Apes morn their lost buddies. I've seen a group of chimps fight off the keepers who were trying to remove a dead chimp in the enclosure. You need to stop thinking in absolutes, the devil as they say is in the details. You so want to be special you miss all the things that make you part of something larger and great, the natural world. You need to stop reading the christian sites and read the science sites. Most of what you ask has actually been answered.

We are still learning were we came from. Yet you say you have all the answers in a book that has provided nothing but oppression and xenophobia. Your books only answer is god did it yet you have no evidence than the book to back anything you say up!

I do want to know, if you're bible is the moral code for all of us, then why are we still here? Humans have been around FAR, FAR longer than your book, or your religion, YET we are still here. And what about the other religions, you know the ones older than your book? Or the ones that were never exposed to your religion until recently? If you book is so good, why is the Christian run world called the dark ages? And when we stopped using your book called the age of enlightenment? Your religion offer you nothing but promises it never has to deliver on!

And Steve... Were is this soul you love to talk about? It doesn't exist.

Best!

Brett

Brett said...

Oh, and it does say YOU and not I;)

Best,

Brett