Matt

[Matt]

I’m inclined to agree with her. I can’t help my sexual tastes, and I don’t think anyone else can either. So why should someone else’s tastes (that they can’t control) be of any concern to me?

To be clear, the issue I have with pedophilia is that the child is unable to consent to it. Likewise with bestiality and necrophilia… the real issue (for me at least) is that there is not, and can never be, informed consent.

Today’s computer graphics is so realistic (and will be getting even better) that it can be impossible to tell synthesized from real. The point being that perhaps if they had pornographic masturbation material that satisfied their urges their urge to act out would be reduced.

That’s not technically a question, but I’d have no problem with it. Why? No ones consent is violated.

[Matt]

Personally, there’s alot about AZ that’s worse (imo) than TA was. The biggest of which is the lack of threaded conversations. It makes replying to people a much less precise activity and it has really put a big damper on my activity on the site. Mostly, I just come for Reg’s Sunday School these days.

[Matt]

It’s a scientific theory (not “just a theory”), with mountains of evidence supporting it. Some people might call that “a fact”, but that really does it injustice.

Why do you ask, Unseen? Just stirring the pot?

[Matt]

Sorry to derail back to page 1, but pointing at pi, the Fibonacci series, and fractals and saying “what about those!??!” is, aside from begging the question, on par with creationists pointing at the vast number of species on earth and saying “how could evolution do this!??!”, or pointing at the apparent fine-tunedness of the universe and saying “this couldn’t happen by chance”… they’re all ass-backwards.

 

Pi is the ratio between a circle’s circumference and its diameter. It’s interesting to us because of that! Otherwise it would just be another irrational number. It’s only relevence is that it describes something in reality, and if reality was different, we would be interested in some other number instead.

 

Likewise with the Fibonacci series, it ends up describing a ratio which is found frequently in nature due to it being an optimal ratio in designing stuff and evolution is design optimisation engine. It’s interesting to us because it is found in nature. If nature was different, it wouldn’t be interesting anymore, and some other series would be interesting instead.

 

Basically, what I’m saying is that it boils down to the anthropic principle… Our mathematics describes the reality in which it was created, precisely because it was created in that reality (to describe that reality), and not the other way around.

[Matt]

I disagree with the premise of the question…

If there’s something someone might say about reality that is almost trivially true3, it’s that it’s all so mathematical.

This is fundamentally backwards. A better thing to say would be that if there’s something someone might say about mathematics that is almost trivially true, it’s that it’s all so derived from reality.

As an example, let’s start with something basic: one banana plus one banana equals two bananas. We can then notice that this holds true for all physical objects, and abstract it to a more general formula: one plus one equals two. The mathematics merely describe the reality in which they were formed. If one banana plus one banana equalled an apple (i.e. if reality were fundamentally different), our mathematics would also be different, to reflect this.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 2 months ago by Matt. Reason: Add in a missed word
• This reply was modified 8 years, 2 months ago by Matt. Reason: Remove extra "be"

[Matt]

reasonable religious belief

How’s that for an oxymoron?

[Matt]

My advice is this: just go along with it and pretend until you are independent enough to no longer need your parent’s support. It’s not worth the potential trouble to “come out” to unsupportive parents. I’d also recommend you not use your real name (particularly your first and last name together) or photo on the internet (your mum might find it), and if your parents are particularly tech savvy, only access atheistzone and other “controversial” media through an https proxy, vpn, or tor (to make it practically impossible for anyone but a nation state to track your activity online). Let us know if you need to know more about this and someone will be able to help you out.

 

Don’t forget to clear your browser history after accessing “controversial” media, or just use your browser’s private mode to do this automatically at the end of the session.

[Matt]

To my understanding, you’re entirely missing the point. The pro-brexit side has never claimed the UK will be better off after leaving the EU… just that it will remain an independent country. The alternative they believe they are voting against, is effectively becoming a state in the EU. Border control is just a visible wedge issue which illustrates this to many people.

 

Full disclaimer: I’m not a UK citizen, this is just what I’ve gathered from listening to various UK speakers around the time of the brexit vote. Personally, I would of done a whole lot more research before casting my vote.

[Matt]

But it is still okay to do this to women because ultimately they are worth less to some men.

No, it’s not “okay”… It’s illegal.

And the sole fact that they might get pregnant in the future justifies an insanely vicious salary reduction.

I took the liberty of removing the irrelevant, and emotive, portion of this… and it sounds a bit more reasonable. Whether or not it justifies a reduction in salary (happy to discuss that later), can we avoid using terms like “insanely vicious” without at least quantifying what that means?

women are systematically discriminated against

I honestly don’t know where people get this from. The law is pretty egalitarian, so what “system” is doing this discrimination? (In case it isn’t clear: system discrimination is discrimination in/from a system, and I don’t accept that this exists in first world societies at present)

the men make more. That’s pointless discrimination.

Is it? Or is it that the women present more risk to the organisation and are paid less accordingly?

Consider this: Let’s ignore gender and look at hiring someone for a position in our company… The two applicants have identical age, education, dedication, etc… except one of them presents an extra risk that they may need a significant time off work (with significant risk that they won’t come back at all), with little flexibility in timing, at some undetermined time in the future. Which one is worth more to the company (remember we’re ignoring gender for this thought experiment)?

It’s a case of 50% of the planet getting more money than the other 50% because SOME people in the other 50% MIGHT have maternity leave

Oh, so you do understand! In the absence of good knowledge about an individual, we can use statistics to determine an appropriate pay cut for people in the group who present additional risk.

 

TL;DR… it’s not about gender, it’s about value added to the employer.

 

the other 50% has an ingrained bias against them and are less likely to give them the jobs they need to get experience.

How on earth did our species manage to propagate for so long when one half of it has “an ingrained bias” against the other half? I find this allegation ridiculous.

[Matt]

Absolutely disgusting… How about the church just pays its taxes and leaves the health care to the doctors. It’s outrageous that THIS is sort of thing they do with their tax free dollars.

[Matt]

I was then accused of being a follower of “liberal secularism”

Sounds like a pretty reasonable position to take… Liberal as in promoting and supporting freedom, secularism as in equal treatment of all religions and separation of church (and mosque) and state. It’s truly quite bizarre that these people thought this was some sort of counter argument or insult.

[Matt]

Absent fathers is the root of the problem.

That’s a pretty bold claim… I think you would have a hard time proving that absent fathers is the root of the mass shooting epidemic in the US. More likely the problem is some combination of the following:

• Extremism bred in echo chambers
• Disenfranchisement with “the system”
• Easy access to firearms

Absent fathers can certainly contribute to the first two, but to say they are the root of the problem is a bit inaccurate.

[Matt]

Seems like I’m at 3/10 so far, but like Strega, I don’t think merely doing/using these things is what makes someone a sheeple… just that there’s lots of sheeple doing/using these things.

 

For what it’s worth: I say “google it”, have a facebook account, and watch Game of Thrones

 

also…

Signs your you’re a Sheeple

Fixed your title for you.

[Matt]

1. Build an audience (without an audience, you’re just another person writing words that no one will read)
2. Advertise (Blogger is made by google and has good integration with google’s ad services)
3. Participate in paid events (motivational speaking, conference panels, etc)

Basically, you can’t just start blogging and expect to make any money from it… you have to pour your heart and soul into it to build a large, loyal audience, then add advertising on top to monetise the blog.

[Matt]

@Unseen WHY ARE YOU SHOUTING IN ALL OF YOUR RECENT POST’S TITLES?

 

When does a life begin?

Interesting question, consider this: There is an unbroken chain of living beings from our earliest common ancestor to us. To reproduce, a living sperm and a living egg come from living parents and produce a living child. So, when does a life begin? When life begun!

[Author]

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