Sunday School

[Reg the Fronkey FarmerModerator]

Race, Generations and American Religion in 2023 and which States are the least religious?

Rep. Maxwell Frost calls out “racist, violent, and dangerous” Christian Nationalism.

The FFRF reminds a school in Mississippi not to violate the Constitution while Louisiana’s ‘In God We Trust’ law tests limits of religion in public schools. In WV, a school district has passed a policy mandating annual religious freedom training as part of a lawsuit settlement.

Spanish Catholic clergy sexually abused more than 440,000 children. The only sorrowful mystery is why good people remain members of such a vile criminal cult. Can anyone explain to me what is going on here as it just looks like an open asylum one hour after pill time to me.

Is the new Christian Nationalist House Speaker only committed to minority rule? Can you lose liberty without losing hope? Mike Johnson’s Christian nationalist track record isn’t a mystery — it’s a tragedy. Not a single Republican found it objectionable to vote for a guy was central to the white-shoe side of the insurrection.

I’m an atheist and a conservative. My politics is informed by skepticism, not faith. Hmm, maybe rethink your last few paragraphs?

World of Woo: CVS will ditch common cold meds because they are useless but will continue to sell bogus homeopathic products.

Environment: 15,000 scientists – “We are afraid of the uncharted territory that we have now entered.”

Why it’s normal to believe in the paranormal and is there a problem with Skepticism?

A solution to a complex light problem shows that Time can only go forward.

What is the shape of space itself?

Is it ethical to experiment on octopuses?

AI neural network captures ‘critical aspect of human intelligence’.

Deaf since birth, some children in China can hear after gene treatment.

Long Reads:  You can be pro-Palestinian or pro-Hamas but you cannot be both. Scientists are paying a huge personal price in the lonely fight against anti-vaxxers. Naked beneath our Clothes. Are our short attention spans really getting shor? Cosmology’s crisis challenges scientific realism. Digging for answers in a cave filled with Neanderthal skeletons.

Sunday Book Club : White Holes — Carlo Rovelli takes us on a flight into space and time.

Some photographs taken last week.

While you are waiting for the kettle to boil……

Futureproof Podcast: Does Free Will exist?

Coffee Break video:  TedTalk – The danger of a single story. Brian Cox: ” The Universe Existed Before Big Bang”. Overtime with Bill Maher.  Always Look on the Bright Side of Life – North Korean Edition.

[Reg the Fronkey FarmerModerator]

Have a great week!!

[StregaModerator]

Thanks, Reg 🙂

[TheEncogitationerParticipant]

Reg,

World of Woo: CVS will ditch common cold meds because they are useless but will continue to sell bogus homeopathic products.

The War On (Some) Drugs probably also drives this silly decision also, since the Jackboots at the DEA and State agencies put limits on the quantities customers can buy of many cold medicines that can be used to make meth.

If Government just got out of the business of saving adults from their own folly, maybe pharmaceutical companies could be free to research and invent drugs that really do cure the common cold and also kill pain without killing people and heighten mood without heightening the chance of death.

I’m an atheist and a conservative. My politics is informed by skepticism, not faith. Hmm, maybe rethink your last few paragraphs?

Those last four weren’t the best. I encounter people like that in another Forum all the time. And they say things like, “I’m Atheist and a Skeptic, but send my kids to religious schooling for the morality and discipline. I always think: “Why can’t your kids have the Skepticism and independent thought that benefitted you??? There are other curricula and learning methods out there that can be taught in either Secular private or Secular homeschools!”

[jakelafortParticipant]

Enco,

You are not reading me. I did not say anything about Israeli v. American citizens. I am opposed to banning arms for citizens. But to do it without regulations? That is just plain stupid. It is also stupid to treat the US constitution as though we were all devout theists and its words were inerrant guidance from above.

My position on Ukraine and Russia is/was cede the Ukrainian land that is more Russian in ethnicity and culture. Foster/encourage cooperation between the nations in the massive undertaking of moving Ukrainians to and from Donbas. Inform Putin privately that if Russia takes aggressive actions against other eastern European interests he will be signing on for the destruction of mother Russia. I was against the inevitable loss of life, war crimes, risk to all of humanity and consequences foreseeable and unforeseen. I did not and do not buy the argument that is understandable about placating a bully and the go-to historical analogy of Chamberlain and the Nazis.

Hamas did well. Taking hostages. Brutally murdering Israelis in a surprise attack. Knowing the world wide reaction that would ensue against Jews and Israel given the antisemitism that is both overt and latent.

[—Participant]

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:

Is it ethical to experiment on octopuses?

What if we go eye for an eye and give the octopuses some human subjects for them to experiment on?

[Reg the Fronkey FarmerModerator]

What if we go eye for an eye and give the octopuses some human subjects for them to experiment on?

Yes. Whoever wins the arm-wrestling competition gets to pick the first test subjects.

[PopeBeanieModerator]

When I clicked on the podcast link, the page asks you to sign up. I didn’t try that. Using the website’s search for “free will” did the same thing, but a google search for “free will” for that site returned a result that gets you there:

https://www.goloudplayer.com/episodes/does-free-will-exist-Y2QxNjE3NDM2NTRhNmExODE4YWEyNTJhMmViZWZmZWY=

I recently listened to another interview with the same author, but it’s maybe four times longer, and a bit too meandering. The one suggested above is only 20 minutes and much more succinct; I recommend it.

[TheEncogitationerParticipant]

Jake,

Enco,

You are not reading me. I did not say anything about Israeli v. American citizens. I am opposed to banning arms for citizens. But to do it without regulations? That is just plain stupid. It is also stupid to treat the US constitution as though we were all devout theists and its words were inerrant guidance from above.

You were mocking U.S. Citizens fed up with crime and corrupt, oppressive government for upholding their both Constitutional and, yes, individual human rights, to Self-Defense and ownership of the means of that Self-Defense. Yet you would not dare do that with Israelis and have very rightly defended Israel and it’s Citizenry’s right to Self-Defense.

And when I called you on the carpet for this cognitive dissonance and brazen hypocrisy, you back up and say you’re just Mister Reasonable. Sounds like a Mott-And-Bailey shifting of goalposts if you ask me.

And The only mention of God in U.S. Constitution is in the dating of the document and there is no mention of religion except for the right to freedom of religion and the forbidding of an Establishment of a religion. I don’t know what drivel they might teach in law schools anymore, but any literate layperson can tell you all that.

My position on Ukraine and Russia is/was cede the Ukrainian land that is more Russian in ethnicity and culture. Foster/encourage cooperation between the nations in the massive undertaking of moving Ukrainians to and from Donbas. Inform Putin privately that if Russia takes aggressive actions against other eastern European interests he will be signing on for the destruction of mother Russia. I was against the inevitable loss of life, war crimes, risk to all of humanity and consequences foreseeable and unforeseen. I did not and do not buy the argument that is understandable about placating a bully and the go-to historical analogy of Chamberlain and the Nazis.

Well, here is how Vladimir Putin relates to Israel and it’s enemy Hamas:

If Putin is going to first make some moral equivalence between Israel and Hamas and then subsequently welcome and back Hamas, you can best believe that Putin cannot be trusted to be a just dealer regarding Ukraine, and vice-versa. Putin will not stop at the Donbass any more than the Hamas and Hezbollah he supports will stop at Gaza and The West Bank. In both Ukraine and Israel, all calls for cease-fire only aid the aggressor in regrouping and resupplying to aggress yet again.

Hamas did well. Taking hostages. Brutally murdering Israelis in a surprise attack. Knowing the world wide reaction that would ensue against Jews and Israel given the antisemitism that is both overt and latent.

And Putin backs Hamas and Hezbollah, so Putin and Hamas and Hezbollah are all in together against Israel, the U.S., and The West in general, including us Atheists. Wake up and smell the Sodium Pentothal!

[UnseenParticipant]

jakelafort wrote:

Hamas did well. Taking hostages. Brutally murdering Israelis in a surprise attack. Knowing the world wide reaction that would ensue against Jews and Israel given the antisemitism that is both overt and latent.

Israel and its kneejerk supporters hide behind the antisemitism that rears its ugly head along with the legitimate criticism of Israel’s flaws to try to subvert that criticism and club people expressing legitimate criticism with the implication or accusation that they must hate Jews.

• This reply was modified 10 months, 2 weeks ago by  Unseen.

[UnseenParticipant]

TheEncogitationer wrote:

You were mocking U.S. Citizens fed up with crime and corrupt, oppressive government for upholding their both Constitutional and, yes, individual human rights, to Self-Defense and ownership of the means of that Self-Defense. Yet you would not dare do that with Israelis and have very rightly defended Israel and it’s Citizenry’s right to Self-Defense.

Crime is a problem in large part because of the easy availability of guns. In fact, even the crimes committed using stolen guns (gotten during home, business, and car burglaries one must assume) would happen far less frequently if the burglars found guns far less often.

Once again, I ask “How many in the sad gun death toll were bad guys shot shot by the famous ‘good guy with a gun’? Got any stats on that?

A gun for self-defense is based on a picture from the old western movies of a shoot out. Basically, unless you are the first to bring out a gun (which is probably illegal), you are more likely than not to be the one getting shot if the other person is armed. On the other hand, if they get the upper hand from the start, you are likely to end up losing your gun along with your wallet and stand some chance of being killed with it.

The idea that carrying a gun may save your life is almost the definition of “pie in the sky.”

What government “corruption” has risen to the level that democratic processes can’t rectify it? or is it a welcome prospect that perhaps an armed mob or militia can provide a better government than the one our democratic republic can provide, imperfect as it is?

Israel arms its citizen soldiers for national defense not personal self-defense. I’m not sure you can draw a meaningful comparison with the U.S. where people want to carry a weapon for defending themselves against a very unlikely possibility.

Far more people could be saved by a home defibrillator than by a gun in the drawer next to the bed. In fact, 15 times more people die of heart attacks than gun shots, but almost nobody exercises their legal right to buy one. Why is that? Could it be the paranoia about crime pumped out by the NRA and repeated constantly by Republican officials?

[jakelafortParticipant]

Enco,

Correct me if i am mistaken…am assuming you are recovering from a medical procedure and in pain.

I was mocking knuckle dragging, country music listening, Trump supporting, god fearing, NRA manipulated know nothing about the 2nd amendment or much else but have unwavering support for unlimited access to all weapons.

Again i would not take away all arms. Just regulate arms.

There is other stuff i might indite but i will leave it at that.

[Author]

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