Yanks better convert to Islam, or bad things will happen (AlQaeda)

[Robert]

Originally posted by Odin
Cyber-Shy, you obviously know jack sh*t about what Atheism is and your coments come across as downright bigoted.

Geez dude, chill. Did someone step on your toes or something? You react like a fundamentalist, not like a sane rational person.

I DO NOT worsphip myself, I DO NOT worship ANYTHING.

It's a pitty that you're that limmited in your imagination on what 'worshipping' is.

You are confusing worship and reverence, reverence doesn't necessarily have religious overtones, I have reverence for the natural world, that doesn't mean I worship it.

Firstly, I never said 'you' worshipped yourself, I talked about atheists in general. I can't speak about all branches of atheism neither can I speak about all forms of atheism, that would be quite a post if I would try, won't it? So get real and understand the figures people use to speak and understand that we can only talk about general things. When does the poly community FINALLY understand that it's plain obvious that generalistions MUST be made in this kind of dicussions? Are you not able to have a normal debate? Geeez man, I try to discuss some rational things which you may disagree a million times but at least TRY to understand first what is being said and react to it in a normal way. WHY IS IT THAT DIFFICULT to discuss with atheists and do they start yelling that easily? Arrogance?

Now to come back on your comment, atheists IN GENERAL are like: "don't tell me what to do, I do what I like best, I'm in charge of my life, it's my life, I don't do things that harm me."
That's what I call self-worshipping. No, not in the Incan way or in the Jewish way or in the Hindu way or the christian/muslim/budhist/confucionist, taoist, animist, wicca,etc. way but in the atheist way. Atheism comes with atheistic forms of worshipping. But it's still worshipping.

And comments like "you obviously know jack sh*t " etc. make no sence at all. I'm studying theology on a secular university, teached by atheists, christians, agnosts, etc. professors and I may be a million times wrong but to claim out of the blue that "you obviously know jack sh*t" is really really really the ultimate form of arrogance. You do know everything, right? Not to mention the fact that you totally miss my point and don't understand me and only yell at me because you just projected YOUR INTERPERTATION of what I said on me. Don't blame me for you being unable to understand what I say.

Modern Science is not "Atheistic,"

I never said that.
I said that atheism uses modern science, not visa versa.
An apple is fruit but fruit is not an apple.
C'mon dude, be able to understand those basics before you start yelling at others.

theological questions are OUTSIDE the scope of science. Modern Science and Theology are totally unrelated fields

1. what does that have to do with atheism?
2. so what? there are many religions without theology. Your idea on what religion is is a little bit limmited. You're sure what you're talking about? Or is 'christianity' and 'muslim faith' the only religion you factually know?
3. BTW, modern science and theology are totally not unrelated. There's REALLY MUCH scientific research on theology and I'm actually currently doing scientific study after theology, religion, etc.

Religion is irrelevent to Modern Science just as much as the life Alexander the Great is irrelevent to the life cycles of stars.

So, why do you say this? What does this have to do with our debate? Why are you suddenly all talking about science? What does that have to do with atheism?

But I'll be a nice guy and explain you what you are missing that obviously:
ie.
There's a village, in that village there are 2 groups of people, those who want to eat the horse and those who want to ride the horse, they're in a big debate.
An unknown man enters the village and speaks about long term profits and short term profits, and how it's important to concider if a short-term profit is big enough to take away the possible long term proffits. He says that it's most probably better to ride the horse for a long time and eat strawberries from the forrest. Then the man (who can't ride horses nor likes the taste of horses) leaves again.

The 2nd group now claims that they were right about riding and not eating the horse. They base their speach on what the stranger told them.

Well, in this story the stranger wasn't a horse rider. But the horse riders could use the words of the stranger to back up their opinion.

Likewise is science (stranger) being used by atheists (horse riders). Like the stranger could become a prophet for the horse riders and they keep on using his words and teachings, science could be a prophet for atheists. The scientific method can be a dogma for the atheists.

You understand it? I can't make it much easier than this. Thus if you don't understand it you'd better start yelling at me again, after all I'll be to blame for that.

Paleontologist Simon Conway Morris is a devout Christian, geneticist Richard Dawkins is an Atheist, neither's theological views have any impact on thier research.

Also, Darwin was not an Atheist, he was an Agnostic. the idea that Darwin was anti-religious is Creationist propaganda.

If you're fine I'm going to ignore the rest of your totally irrelevant remarks. Thanks for yelling at me though!

[Arrian]

Isn't redefining terms to make our arguments work FUN?

-Arrian

[Robert]

Come with arguments mr. Know All.
We're not redefining any terms.

[Odin]

Originally posted by Arrian
Isn't redefining terms to make our arguments work FUN?

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by CyberShy
When does the poly community FINALLY understand that it's plain obvious that generalistions MUST be made in this kind of dicussions? Are you not able to have a normal debate?

Generalizations can well be fine in a debate, but they aren't always.

For a generalization to be acceptable, we have to think it is representative of the large majority of the people you're generalizing about (example: "Commies generally oppose a free-market system").

A generalization like yours on atheists not only refers to only a portion of atheists (instead of an overwhelming majority), and doesn't even use words indicating that you're generalizing.

As such, don't be surprised that atheists, who are targetted by your wrong shot, jump on what appears to be BAM.

[Sandman]

That's what I call self-worshipping.

And nobody else does.

[Arrian]

Originally posted by CyberShy
Come with arguments mr. Know All.
We're not redefining any terms.

Actually, from my vantage point it appears you are the one claiming to know it all (about atheism and atheists, generally speaking).

You are, in fact, defining terms such as worship and God/gods in such ways as to make your argument work. You've stretched them beyond their recognizable meaning, in my opinion. That, to me, is "redefining terms to make your argument work."

You've been doing this for some time, and as I noted, it's a rather successful troll of atheists (calling them religious). I can only suspect that you really *want* to believe that atheists worship themselves and are just immature, selfish brats (just as you really *want* to believe in God), but I cannot say for sure, as I don't know you nearly well enough.

As an agnostic/soft atheist myself, I find your arguments both silly and irritating (if I allow myself to take them seriously). You are generalizing about a group of people who actually have very little cohesion at all. The only thing required for a person to fall into the category of "atheist" is that they do not believe in God (either specifically rejecting the existance of God - "hard" atheism, or simply lacking the belief, while acknowledging that God's existance has not been disproven and is therefore possible - agnostic/soft atheist). Beyond that... nada. There is no unifying set of principles/beliefs, no hierarchy, no dogma...

I'm sure you could google some famous atheist and dub him or her the "High Priest(ess) of Atheism!" but it would be laughable on its face as yet another redefinition of a term.

-Arrian

[lord of the mark]

So did you hear about the atheist and agnostic who got divorced?

They couldn't agree on what they didn't believe in.

[lord of the mark]

What if everything is an illusion and nothing exists? In that case, I definitely overpaid for my carpet.


Eternal nothingness is O.K. if you're dressed for it.


Not only is there no God, but try getting a plumber on weekends.

[Arrian]

Originally posted by lord of the mark
So did you hear about the atheist and agnostic who got divorced?

They couldn't agree on what they didn't believe in.

That's cute.

-Arrian

[Robert]

Arrian, I'm not redefining, I'm using very well accepted definitions of gods and religion. Of course not 21th century western world definitions but global-all time definitions. Not all gods are Allah-Jahweh alike gods. Not all religions are christian-judaistic-muslim religions. And no, I never said that self worshipping is "immature, selfish brats", those are your words, which just proves again that you just read my posts with a pre-definited idea of what I want to say.

[Spiffor]

Let's see:

Now to come back on your comment, atheists IN GENERAL are like: "don't tell me what to do, I do what I like best, I'm in charge of my life, it's my life, I don't do things that harm me."
That's what I call self-worshipping. No, not in the Incan way or in the Jewish way or in the Hindu way or the christian/muslim/budhist/confucionist, taoist, animist, wicca,etc. way but in the atheist way. Atheism comes with atheistic forms of worshipping. But it's still worshipping.

So, basically, atheists "worship" themselves in a way that is completely different to what religious believers do. From what I read, the only reason you use that particular word, for a meaning completely unrelated to the one generally accepted, is because you want.

I have an idea. I'll call the "don't tell me what to do etc." behaviour vomit. Clearly, atheists vomit themselves. Not like the way drunkards, gluttons, or pregnant women vomit, but in the atheist way. Atheism comes with atheistic forms of vomiting. But it's still vomiting.

[Whoha]

there are atheists that aren't relgious atheists and there are prosyletising atheists that are. Like any religion where there are varying degrees of observance.

[Robert]

So, basically, atheists "worship" themselves in a way that is completely different to what religious believers do.

Spiffor, christians worship Jesus in a completely different way then muslims worship Allah. Jews worship JHWH in a completely different way then the old egyptians worshipped Rah.

So far you guys have given reasons that all come down to: "We are not religious because we're not like christians". True, you're not like christians, but most religious people in the past and in the present were like christians and even among christians there are 1000 ways to be religious.

Please try to undestand what I say, you guys have gods and you guys do worship. Just in a different way, but all religious people have gods and worshipping in different ways.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by CyberShy
Please try to undestand what I say, you guys have gods and you guys do worship. Just in a different way, but all religious people have gods and worshipping in different ways.

Give me an adequate definition of "worship", and I might see your point. For the time being, you have only hurled the word and applied it to atheists, without defining it. So excuse us if we tend to understand the word the way it is widespread in our own cultures.