Bohemian's Waterfall
While I think it's delusional to insist that we were attacked because they "hate freedom", or because of who we are, but I think the video is pining the tail on the wrong donkey.
The fact is, 15 of the 19 Hijackers, were from Saudi Arabia. Why is that? Saudis were upset with the a foreign military presence (infidels) in a holy land (Arabia). Bin Laden interpreted the Prophet Muhammad as having banned the "permanent presence of infidels in Arabia". Following the Iraq invasion of Kuwait, there has been a strong U.S. Military presence in Saudi Arabia. This is one of the three reasons Osama cited as his motivation for the September 11 attacks.
The other two reasons being American Support for Israel and U.S. sanctions against Iraq. 2 of the 3 reasons are explicitly religious in nature, but all 3 reasons are the result of U.S. foreign policy. Interestingly enough, the Iran Coup was not cited by Al Qaeda as a reason for the attacks. None of the Hijackers were Iranian.
Also a point for correction, the mujaheddin and the Taliban are not the same group. The Taliban was a radical splinter group, with the majority of the former Mujaheddin becoming part of the Northern Alliance, which has been the principal opposition to the Taliban and to Al Qaeda. The Northern Alliance has been largely incorporated into the New Afghan National Army.
So yes, there are a lot of things the U.S. could have done differently, but a large part of the problem is that Al Qaeda is just fucking crazy. I agree with Ron Paul's foreign Policy. To assert that Isolationism caused WW2 is absolutely asinine. The notion that not getting involved in other nation's wars, somehow causes more war is completely ludicrous.
That's strange because I don't remember you giving any proof when you made the statement to begin with. What is asserted without evidence can be dismissed without it. But i'll bite:
You are making a categorical claim, essentially claiming that all English belongs to the category of "Queen's English" which is false. American English doesn't nor does Old English, in fact some forms of British English wouldn't either.
Most of the animals I see are not gay
What relevance is that? We are talking about all animals on earth, some of which have displayed homosexual tendencies. This is not even a matter of opinion. Some animals show homosexual behavior, this is a fact. It has been observed. There are documented cases of it. I could provide a dozen or more credible scientific sources which will all confirm precisely what I have already stated. Our conversation cannot progress any further until you recognize this fact.
Wikipedia is full of false information about it has high vocabulary
Actually studies have shown that Wikipedia is incredibly accurate. See links below:
http://news.cnet.com/2100-1038_3-5997332.html
http://arstechnica.com/old/content/2006/
In cases where Wikipedia isn't accurate generally it is from vandalism, which is both apparent and easily correctable. The high vocabulary of it's article authors only lends more credibility as it demonstrates a higher level of general understanding and subject matter expertise.
Animals have got it into there brain that they need the opsite gender.
For the most part, however gay animals are the exception to that.
How are the same gender of penguins going to reproduce?
In many cases they don't. Do you have any other questions?
Actually homosexuality has been observed in animals with a fair amount of frequency. There are many recorded cases of this occurring. Humans are not the only ones to display homosexual behavior. In the article above it has been observed in Penguins. To say that there are no gay animals is blatantly false. There seems to be some underlying biological or environmental cause.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/
If this doesn't read like a spaceship landing on top of Mt. Sinai, I don't know what does
I would say nothing does.
Mount Sinai was covered with smoke, because the LORD descended on it in fire. The smoke billowed up from it like smoke from a furnace, and the whole mountain trembled violently.
Sounds more like a volcano eruption.
Don't believe me? See for yourself:
http://www.faireconomy.org/files/images/tax_gdp.gif
http://www.faireconomy.org/files/images/tax_emp.gif
Warren Buffet explains that Trickle-down economics hasn't worked:
I said not all wealthy people own businesses, and you rendered this statement as no rich people are part of businesses. Do you know the difference between owning something and participating in it? Owning something means you can dictate the price. Not all wealthy people can dictate the price of the industry they are in. Stockholders, bankers and investors for example. Do you honestly think that if for example we raise taxes on an oil tycoon he is going to raise the price of gas for everybody? Of course not the amount of money he loses from the tax increase would pale in comparison to the amount of business he would lose for raising gas prices unnecessarily. Since when have market prices ever been determined by personal income taxes, ever? Prices are determined by supply and demand. Income tax has been lowered on the rich consistently over the last 20 years or so and it has never resulted in a better economy. The only thing we can safely say it has accomplished is to make the rich even richer.
The policy your talking about has been the justification for stratifying the American people. The gap between the rich and poor has consequently grown over the years as a direct result. It is to their benefit to make you believe that this benefits me and you, but it doesn't.
What if we are the product of one of those advanced civilizations? Would that make them Gods to us?
Are you saying you think this actually happened, that extraterrestrials are the basis of all world religions, or is this just a hypothetical question?
No, it's a personal income tax, not a business tax. First of all, not all wealthy individuals own businesses. Secondly, the only costs that do get handed down to customers are increases in business expenditure. Products and services are going to remain at whatever price allows them to make the most profit, if the cost of running a business has not increased and the demand for the given products and services has not risen, then it makes no business sense to increase prices. Most wealthy business owners operate their businesses based on profit and not on their own personal income. For these reasons personal income taxes do not translate well into market prices, and this has been the excuse for giving wealthy undue advantages, that in many cases is not even asked for.
I'm saying there is no land the Jews can rule that won't upset the local population already living there. This isn't so much a statement about Jews, but a statement about people in general. People generally don't like foreigners coming in and taking control of their government.
I'm a little bit confused by that as well...I think maybe what he means is that if the U.S. had set aside some land for a Jewish state, some of the current violence could have been avoided. Although arguably that may just create anti-semitism in whoever is already living there.
Having full faith does not guarantee you are in the correct religion, remember that Muslims, Jews, Sikhs, Jains, Wiccans and all other manner of religions also claim to have absolute faith in their beliefs as well. Therein lies the problem. Obviously they cannot all be correct and all of them assert faith, so it seems pretty naive to assert that your religion is the "one true religion".
As far as evidence, at least the kind of evidence we can confirm "empirical evidence" is not possible for supernatural or metaphysical claims. What claims religions do make about the physical world are often contradicted by science, thus this war between science and religion.
Sins are an invention of the Abrahamic faiths and don't exist outside of those religions. It is sometimes said that sin is a fictional disease, for which the fictional solution is to adhere to those religions. Most religions don't acknowledge the existence of "sins", so it would be senseless to look for the solution to it in other religions.
Not so much as we should choose that which is most internally consistent, leads to happiness, and best explains the facts of the world. If there truly is a Benevolent God he would not punish myself or anyone else for following where our reason leads us.
That's not the extent of my claim.
Yes it is. You've asked me to present evidence that something didn't happen.
My claim is that I believe what I read in the Scriptures based on faith FIRST, but if someone would provide evidence against what the Bible teaches/claims, then I would disbelieve the circumstance in question.
First of all, that you have faith in no way supports the veracity of your belief, nor would it constitute a good reason for others to believe it. One may have faith in literally any unfalsifiable implausible claim, and it would still be no better or worse than any other faith claim. There is no relationship between what is believed upon faith and what is actually true. None whatsoever.
Second of all, that you believe it on faith tells me that you WOULDN'T disbelieve if evidence were actually presented, because faith is not an evidence-based belief.
You, on the other hand, when it comes to the Bible, but undoubtedly not many other writings, including news reports, etc., feel a need to initially disbelieve it's accounts because there is no way for it to be proven?
Because of the extraordinary and supernatural nature of biblical claims, the burden of proof would be much higher than for non-extraordinary and non-supernatural claims. Nevertheless good reporting and journalism often contains an evidential source. Not to say I have never believed in a news story without examining the evidence, I am quite certain that I probably have rushed to conclusions without first examining the evidence, and I am quite certain you have as well. Having said that I am arguing that this is what you have done in regards to the Bible.
What is proof to you anyway?
This is a very good question. While proof and evidence are used interchangeably in colloquial usage I am more or less just referring to evidence and I think there is an important distinction to be made between proof and evidence. The simplest explanation is that evidence unequivocally supports one explanation over another and evidence can range from being very poor evidence to very strong evidence, whereas proof conclusively rules out all contrary explanations.
So to answer your question, what in my mind would constitute good evidence would be independent reliable sources which corroborate each other.
Eyewitness? Well, Jesus Christ was an eyewitness, and the writers were eyewitnesses, so that doesn't suffice for you.
The eyewitnesses are only spoken of through the bible itself and do not exist independently from biblical texts. To date no independent accounts or testimonies have been found except for the biblical texts themselves. Why not, if said events were as miraculous as claimed?
The first writings about the life of Jesus do not appear until some 70 to 80 years after the fact, this alone should raise some serious doubts. What other historical personage or historical event relies on uncorroborated texts written almost a century after the fact? Jesus himself didn't write a single word of the bible. Why is that? Are we to believe the son of God is illiterate?
Tell us what evidence could possibly be presented to you about creation? About the global flood, and Noah's Ark, and the parting of the Red Sea, and such, exactly WHAT evidence would you personally require, since all people have differing requirements on what and how they believe?
Different claims have differing burdens of proof depending on the extent of their claims.
If I claimed to have a friend with heterochromia (Two different colored eyes) the burden of proof would certainly be lower than if I said I had a friend with natural glowing red eyes. Perhaps just submitting a picture of my heterochromia friend, but if I sent in a picture of my friend with glowing red eyes, you would be more inclined to say it was a photoshop and would demand more evidence...perhaps seeing this person face to face.
I have often insisted that finding a universal layer of silt across the globe within the geologic would constitute evidence of a global flood. Egyptian records corroborating the red sea splitting, since they would not be motivated to corroborate a story that makes them look bad, I think would offer decent evidence of such an event. But by no means is evidence limited to my imagination.
Just because you haven't experienced God's spirit, does that mean you don't believe Him?
I am not in a habit of believing things which are impossible to see, hear, taste, touch, smell or measure in some way.
Some of us have experienced the Holy Spirit of God in our lives
And for you this may be compelling reason to believe, but for others it is not. Personal anecdotes of things which cannot be objectively tested or verified, are incredibly susceptible to cognitive and social biases and thus are incredibly unreliable. People often overestimate their own objectivity.
Your lack of evidence doesn't negate the reality of God.
The "reality" of God has not yet been established, only presumed.
Do you believe that Abraham Lincoln existed? Why? Eyewitness reports, records, pictures, a monument? But, you didn't experience him in the flesh, and touch him, and talk to him, nor did you hear his voice. "Abraham Lincoln" could be a deceptive ploy carried out by some world organization meant to bring down slavery.
If the existence of Abe Lincoln was just part of a massive international cover-up, this claim would require even greater evidence than if it weren't true and he was a real person. In that sense it is diss-analogous to the statement that some of the claims of the bible may be false or exaggerated.
LOL. So, what you're saying is that there are perfectly unbiased scientists who study creation/big bang/evolution, etc?
I never claimed that. However the scientific method if followed properly is designed to filter out biases, this is why we have double-blind studies for precisely this reason. When religious doctrine prevents you from accepting or investigating evidence which may contradict that doctrine, then you fail to follow the scientific method.
ICR says "This is true, I will try to prove it"
Science says "This might be true, I will try to refute it"
Your science gods who believe in the big bang and evolution are some of the biggest Godhating people on this earth, and they are full of deceptive scientific practices, leading to fabricated conclusions.
I emphatically disagree. There are many scientists who believe in God, but in a God more consistent with scientific findings. Dr. Ken Miller, for example. Even for the scientists who don't believe in God, it can hardly be said that they hate something that they personally don't believe exists. Even if they did, that would not in any way refute any scientific discovery made by them.
This is an ad hominem. Argue the science not the scientists.
Granted. Sorry. Your argument against evidence and ultimate truth and belief is totally fallacious, as well.
You nor anyone else posses "ultimate truth" and to insist that you do is very naive. Also would you mind pointing out specifically what fallacy I have committed?
King James Version says "Unicorn", not OX.
Follow the link here:
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/
It is terrible reasoning because you are claiming that something is true because there is no disproof. This is an argument from ignorance.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
The problem is that the burden proof rests on the person making the affirmative claim (i.e. you). There are a potentially infinite number of claims which cannot be disproven, this does not give them good reason to be believed. In my example, we have yet to disprove the existence of invisible moon bears, so would you say we should believe that invisible moon bears exist?
But, why wouldn't one believe that the accounts happened?
In regards to how true it may be, it doesn't really matter why someone does or doesn't believe in something. This is an appeal to motive.
Many, many people believe in the literal Genesis account of God's creation
Many people also think Justin Beiber is a good singer. Many people once believed that the earth was flat.
btw, the intelligent design scientists are offering all kinds of new evidence in support of it (www.icr.org)
The Institute for Creation Research (ICR) is not a scientific organization. Setting out to prove what they have stated that they already believe, is in direction opposition to the scientific method. Their doctrine prevents them from finding any evidence that would contradict their 'mission'. Most of their "research" was conducted in their own libraries, and most of these researchers are not scientists but christian apologists. If you can find any ICR researcher that has an accredited degree in biology, geology or astronomy I would be very surprised. Those wishing to join ICR must sign a statement of faith.
and if one believes in the Genesis account, what the heck is so hard to believe about God raining fire and brimstone from heaven down upon the immoral towns?
Noting, if you believe in the Genesis account.
If you want to wreck people's faith you really need to offer infallible and conclusive evidence against the stated claims of the belief.
Infallible evidence is neither possible nor necessary, in fact no evidence at all is necessary until the affirmative claim first provides supporting evidence and then and only then can counter-evidence be requested. What is asserted without evidence can be rejected without evidence.
However my intention is not to "wreck" anyone's faith, I am merely making arguments and your argument was particularly fallacious.
