Posted on 07/24/2003 1:55:39 PM PDT by Mr.Atos
I was just lisening to Medved debating Creationism with Athiests on the air. I found it interesting that while Medved argued his side quite effectively from the standpoint of faith, his opponents resorted to condescension and beliitled him with statements like, "when it rains, is that God crying?" I was reminded of the best (at least most amusing)debate that I have ever heard on the subject of Creationism vs Evolution, albeit a fictional setting. It occurred on the show, Friends of all places between the characters Pheobe (The Hippy) and Ross (The Paleontologist). It went like this...
Pheebs: Okay...it's very faint, but I can still sense him in the building...GO INTO THE LIGHT MR. HECKLES!!
Ross: Whoa, whoa, whoa. What, uh, you don't believe in evolution? Pheebs: Nah. Not really. Ross: You don't believe in evolution? Pheebs: I don't know. It's just, ya know, monkeys, Darwin, ya know, it's a, it's a nice story. I just think it's a little too easy.
Ross: Uh, excuse me. Evolution is not for you to buy, Phoebe. Evolution is scientific fact. Like, like, the air we breathe, like gravity... Pheebs: Uh, okay, don't get me started on gravity.
Ross: You uh, you don't believe in gravity? Pheebs: Well, it's not so much that ya know, like I don't *believe* in it, ya know. It's just...I don't know. Lately I get the feeling that I'm not so much being pulled down, as I am being pushed.
Ross: How can you NOT BELIEVE in evolution? Pheebs: [shrugs] I unh-huh...Look at this funky shirt!!
Ross: Well, there ya go. Pheebs: Huh. So now, the REAL question is: who put those fossils there, and why...?
Ross: OPPOSABLE THUMBS!! Without evolution, how do YOU explain OPPOSABLE THUMBS?!? Pheebs: Maybe the overlords needed them to steer their spacecrafts!
Pheebs: Uh-oh! Scary Scientist Man!
Pheebs: Okay, Ross? Could you just open your mind like, *this* much?? Okay? Now wasn't there a time when the brightest minds in the world believed that the Earth was flat? And up until what, like, fifty years ago, you all thought the atom was the smallest thing, until you split it open, and this like, whole mess o' crap came out! Now, are you telling me that you are so unbelievably arrogant that you can't admit that there's a teeny, tiny possibility that you could be wrong about this?!?
Pheebs: I can't believe you caved. Ross: What? Pheebs: You just ABANDONED your whole belief system! I mean, before, I didn't agree with you, but at least I respected you. Ross: But uh.. Pheebs: Yeah...how...how are you gonna go in to work tomorrow? How...how are you gonna face the other science guys? How...how are you gonna face yourself? Oh! [Ross runs away dejected] Pheebs: That was fun. So who's hungry?
Banning the bible is already here, at least certain "offensive" passages, in some countries. This trend appears to be spreading. The next logical step is outlawing Christianity altogether, then martyrdom.
7 posted on 08/13/2003 6:12 AM PDT by Manic_Episode
fC ...
We have a whole group of these on the FR ... pampered too --- evolutionists !
crm ...
Secularism and Christianity cannot coexist. One has to exterminate the other. The world can be one or the other, not both.
Christians have been gradually marginalized. They will soon find themselves ... gradually being banned --- if they don't wake up.
3 posted on 08/13/2003 6:19 AM PDT by .cnI redruM ("Magna cum laude, summa cum laude, the radio's too laude." - Johnny Dangerously)
Nonsignatories that criticize signatories for breaking the agreement will be ignored, if said NONsignatory wishes to criticize, then they should agree to and sign on to the agreement.
I don't think it's necessary at this point. "The Willing" have agreed:
Effective August 9, 2003, we, the undersigned, freely and in good faith agree that henceforth we shall treat others on these threads as we wish to be treated ourselves.Aside from our obligations to other signing posters (that is, "complying posters"), I view that as obligating us to treat newbies who aren't aware of the agreement with a certain degree of courtesy, as we would hope to be treated if we ventured, say, into the Hobbit Hole. But when it comes to someone who has explicitly rejected the agreement, and who then goes around posting insults, provoking discord, etc., well, we should treat such a person the same as we ourselves would expect to be treated if we were guilty of such outrageous behavior. Simple.
If someone behaves like a vicious, trolling dirtbag, and if that is also someone who knows of the agreement, rejects the agreement, laughs at the agreement, and has already been warned about his conduct, we're not bound by the agreement to sit back and accept abuse from such person. The only restrictions on us in such a case would be our own sense of propriety and of course, Jim Robinson's general guidelines about the contents of our posts.
Personally, I think Virtual Ignore is best, unless his provocations become so insane that the abuse button becomes necessary. There is nothing quite so pathetic as a naked tractionless troll.
"The same is true of science. Although Christianity is often mocked as superstitious mumbo-jumbo, the reality is that everything in human history except for the Judeo-Christian tradition is superstitious mumbo-jumbo. Science, as we know it, was exclusively the invention of Christians. Aside from a few ancient Greeks - notably Pythagoras and Archimedes - science as an explanation for reality did not exist among the ancients."
"Islam produced a smattering of mathematical geniuses, but no great physical scientists at all. India and China were vastly wealthier and more ancient than Europe, but science simply did not exist in either of these ancient civilizations. The Amerindian societies of the Inca and Maya both achieved prodigious technological feats, but no science."
"More significantly - and this ties in directly to the complaints about Mel Gibson and The Passion - science arose exclusively out of Christian and not out of Judeo-Christian tradition. The mockery often made of medieval reaction to Galileo and Copernicus has produced a legend of intolerant Christians."
"It was rather specifically the tolerance of science, the tolerance of differences, the tolerance of those seeking fearlessly the truth of a loving God that made science the exclusive province of professing or at least nominal Christians. Galileo, Copernicus, Pascal, and Napier were all orthodox and serious Christians. Newton and Kepler were nominal Christians who were deeply concerned about religion. These men created science as we know it."
"The complete domination of science by Christians continued through the Middle Ages and well into the modern era. James Clerk Maxwell, arguably a greater scientific genius than either Newton or Einstein, was a profoundly serious Christian. Lord Kelvin, to whom we owe the law of entropy, chaos theory, the finite limits of thermodynamic activity (absolute zero), and most of the principles of thermodynamics, was equally pious."
"The immense and dramatic contribution of later Jewish scientists - Michaelson, Einstein, Bohr, Pauli and many others - did not come until long after Christians had created modern science. Medieval Judaism, like Islam and Hinduism and Buddhism and every other metaphysical system except Christianity, was hostile to science."
"Why does this matter?"
"Because one of the charges against Mel Gibson and The Passion is that reliance upon the Gospels is typical Christian hillbilly mentality - and yet this is the ... ... precise belief structure --- that created the vast majority of intellectual understanding of the modern world. Fidelity to truth, confidence that our truth is the shadowy outline of a loving Creator, and unprecedented genius which flowed directly from that confidence is the surest evidence serious Christians cannot be dismissed by serious critics as hayseeds or kooks."
traction less troll fest placemaker !
Personally, I think Virtual Ignore is best, unless his provocations become so insane that the abuse button becomes necessary. There is nothing quite so pathetic as a naked tractionless troll.
Hear hear!!
Happy Birthday Lindsey!
3 is a very cool age.
That is totally false and is in no way part of the agreement. You, I and all others who signed on to the agreement essentially agreed to become 2nd class citizens. Yes, we can be called on for breaking our promise. It is a promise you made, based on your honor so you are bound by it regardless.
The discussion was out of bounds, period. Jennyp broke the agreement by not just engaging in it, but by encouraging ALS to go on with it:
Pursuant to §8, please include your evidence in your accusatory posts.
2,016 posted on 08/09/2003 1:27 PM PDT by jennyp
As I said long ago the way to handle it was to say that was not a subject of discussion here. After 200 some posts ,which I refuse to read, is no time for crybaby acts and the blaming of one over the other for breaking 6a.
The same unjustly besmirched troll is not responsible for implying to jennyp that evos are marxists. Jennyp made him do it.
I've seen this kind of special pleading in regard to responsibility before. It's called the insanity plea. If I made it on behalf of a creo, I'd be violating the agreement by making belittling and demeaning insinuations about the opposition, sort of the mirror image of arguing that evos must be marxists.
So I won't do that. I'll just say that perhaps you have more of a point than you realize.
Congratulations! My grandaughter Shannon has her 13th birthday tomorrow (and she's been in my pool all week - what diabolical planning)!
No, that is not what I said or what occurred. They were engaging in mutual taunting. If you want to accuse one, you have to accuse the other. Further, it was you who was guilty of the absolutely unconscionable, and immoral act of publishing a personal e-mail - a day or so after signing an agreement that you would engage others in a civil manner. So, in fact, you are the guiltiest one in this whole affair and I hereby accuse you of being out of compliance with the agreement and ask to have you removed as being in compliance for not only acting in a totally despicable manner in releasing private e-mail but also for your trying to excuse your totally inexcusable behavior.
Further, as your actions have continued this discord which was in great part due to your behavior and whereas this discord had been healed amicably in posts# 2501 and 2503, I accuse you of trollish behavior and ask that all those who signed on to the agreement indicate their disapproval of your actions.
You have broken so many rules that I guess one more does not matter. I therefore hereby add the above to the charges made against you of trollish behavior and willfully breaking the agreement.
A "complying poster" is one who is compliance with this agreement.
Since he is not in compliance, he is not a "complying poster".
Lil' vadey retro is only in compliance with the peter principle.
Section 6a provides that ”We will not call evolutionists Marxists, atheists, Nazis, mass murderers, liberals or leftists;”
So unless jennyp was calling evolutionists Marxists (etc.) --- which I strongly doubt --- she is in compliance with the agreement under 6a. My understanding is that particular accusation came from a non-complying poster. There are no restrictions in the agreement for mounting a defense against such an accusation, but I would strongly recommend against replying at all directly to a non-compliant.
As a complying poster, we are all obligated not to bring an accusation against another poster without also showing the evidence of that accusation on the same post (Disclosure clause): ”We will not bring an accusation against another poster or his beliefs without also bringing, on the same post, the evidence for that accusation”
Thus, every accusation on this thread made by a complying poster without such evidence on the same post is of no effect whatsoever and should be ignored by all to avoid inciting anger. Unsupported allegations are meaningless.
Likewise any post made by a non-complying poster who has been given the polite warning and nevertheless refused to refrain from disruptive activity should always be utterly ignored.
Gore3000, you said:
Your and my obligation is first to the Creation/Intelligent Design side of the house, to keep our side of the house in order. If we start pointing fingers at the other side --- trying to police them --- without first having cleaned up our own, then they will be justified to point back and a flame war will ensue.
If we believe that the other side is failing in their responsibility on this clause but do not yet have our own side of the house clean, we ought to inform someone on the other side privately by Freep mail.
After all, the purpose of the agreement is to make and keep the peace!
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