From: Michael M. Butler (butler@comp-lib.org)
Date: Sat Feb 17 2001 - 20:06:03 MST
Dear sir, you may be right. *PLONK*
Steve Nichols wrote:
>
> Date: Fri, 16 Feb 2001 09:44:18 -0800
> From: "Michael M. Butler" <butler@comp-lib.org>
> Subject: Unkill God, was Re: Why we must kill God
>
> Steve Nichols wrote:
> > >Rock on, Mr. Nichols. Direct frontal assaults on belief systems always
> > >work. Err. Don't they?
> >
> > Interestingly, yes!
>
> >You can't mean that part. Ever hear of Falun Gong? Ever hear of the
> >Roman Empire's actions toward Christianity in the first few centuries
> >CE? Evidently imprisonment, torture and public execution aren't direct?
>
> Christianity was enforced at the point of a sword by Romans.
> Heresy was illegal until a couple of 100 years go. The conquisdors
> and missionaries used bribery & violence, not argument. Xianity is
> unsustainable by intellectual argument alone, this is where it is
> vulnerable .. by direct argument, and scientific refutation wherever
> possible.
>
> > Why should the voices of truth be silent?
>
> >Do what thou wilt. I'm for aikido, myself. I'm also an agnostic, since
> >"God/god(s)" is a squirmy concept with a lot of wiggle factor.
>
> Wiggle all you like .... but there is not a scrap of evidence for any of
> the gods .... or do you have a way of verifying such mythology and lies?
>
> > Young children in particular will believe whatever is told to them,
> > particularly by an adult, and even older folks will subconsciously
> > accept what is told to them, at least til their critical and analytic
> > faculties have time to kick in.
>
> >And young people will often appear to rebel, and then fall back on the
> >faiths of their fathers (or whatever their model of it is).
>
> Are you just a human-era conservative apologist then? I am an
> unashamed agent for change and extropian/post-human progress.
>
> >Why kick the
> >props out from under them? Why, for instance, try to deprive a terminal
> >cancer patient of her epiphany/notion that the world has a plan?
>
> Better to offer them the real prospect of cryogenics and of a
> cure for cancer than delusory religious blather!!!!!
>
> > But sure, what are your suggestions for a "sneak attack" on Xian
> > fundamentalism?
>
> >I have no master plan, just a bunch of heuristics. You, on the other
> >hand, have a master plan.
> >I hope to pay attention to what works. You and I appear to have
> >different attentions. This is OK; a sheaf of strategies is probably a
> >good idea. One-size-fits-all fits few. Things got the way they are
> >because people have been the way they have been.
>
> Human supernaturalist beliefs systems are obsolete my friend.
> Your agnostic stance is doomed to failure .... if you are going to
> succeed in self-hypnotising yourself into religious ecstasy you
> at least have to suspend critical faculties and disbelief in order
> to throw yourself fully into the delusion.
>
> >I have, in years past, sometimes thought that the final battle, if it
> >comes, will not be between good and evil, but between the forces of good
> >and the forces of good-and-evil-at-the-same-time. See Sowell's
> >"constrained" vs. "unconstrained" visions.
>
> "Final battle", armageddon, religo-garbage gobbledegook. Also "good"
> "evil" ultimate value judgement psychobabble ... get real. I won't see
> Sowell, he sounds a loser.
>
> > www.steve-nichols.com
> > MVT ... the all-conquering philosophy!
>
> >Umm. Right. I have delusions of _adequacy_, myself.
>
> All-conquering ... reductionist ... because true. Or are you
> prepared to dispute with me? Ha! Your delusions of adequacy
> are wholly unfounded unless you have a stronger view than MVT.
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