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Religion v atheism
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Religion v atheism
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thelastman
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Religion v atheism
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Reply #20 on:
09/11/2008 20:50:41 »
Dr. Beaver, while I'm on a roll, I'd like to comment about your initial thread: ". . . and then a bunch of everything magically rearranged itself for no reason what so ever into self-replicating bits which turned into dinosaurs". I think you wrote that in jest right?
Of course nothing could be further from the truth. I wish to present to the court "Complexification" by J. Casti, "At Home in the Universe" by Stuart Kauffman, "Self-Organization in Biological Systems" by Camazine, "Perspectives of Non-Linear Dynamics" by E. Atlee Jackson and one of my favorite quotes by Rene Thom:
"All creation or destruction of form, or morphogenesis, can be described by the disappearance of the attractor representing the initial form, and their replacement by capture by the attractor representing the final form".
. . . the reason is dynamics and the attractors inherently present in sufficient complex systems. A long time ago I use to look outside my window and wonder why about a lot of things. Then I started studying non-linear dynamics. I no longer wonder why about a lot of things.
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DoctorBeaver
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Religion v atheism
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Reply #21 on:
09/11/2008 23:02:54 »
I didn't write either of them. I just came across them & thought they were amusing. My version would be even more simplistic to match my brainpower. [
]
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DoctorBeaver
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Reply #22 on:
10/11/2008 11:05:42 »
Found these too:-
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DoctorBeaver
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A stitch in time would have confused Einstein.
Religion v atheism
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Reply #23 on:
10/11/2008 20:24:42 »
Just found this quote by Steven Weinberg - "With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion."
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Make it Lady
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Religion v atheism
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Reply #24 on:
10/11/2008 21:34:26 »
How do you get evil people to do good things then?
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DoctorBeaver
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A stitch in time would have confused Einstein.
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Reply #25 on:
10/11/2008 23:14:42 »
Quote from: Make it Lady on 10/11/2008 21:34:26
How do you get evil people to do good things then?
Shipman was a doctor. Don't doctors do good things? And was Shipman evil? Certainly his actions were; and if you take the view that we are defined by our actions, then he was evil.
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_Stefan_
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Reply #26 on:
11/11/2008 01:35:15 »
It could be that they do good things if it is in their own evil interest to do so...
The point of that quote is that ideologies can make people do things that they wouldn't otherwise do.
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Stefan
"No testimony is sufficient to establish a miracle, unless the testimony be of such a kind, that its falsehood would be more miraculous than the fact which it endeavors to establish." -David Hume
Make it Lady
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Reply #27 on:
11/11/2008 18:43:26 »
I'm about to play a baddy in a Panto. I'm a bit of a method actor. So your telling me in order to play someone that does truely evil things, I need to give my character faith! Well blow me down.
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JnA
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Religion v atheism
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Reply #28 on:
12/11/2008 01:01:06 »
Do evil people think they are doing evil things?
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_Stefan_
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Reply #29 on:
12/11/2008 04:41:45 »
People like religious suicide bombers probably believe they are doing good for themselves and their religion. They aren't evil themselves, but their actions are. The religious leaders who mentor them though might be a different story.
Make It Lady: that's just acting...
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Stefan
"No testimony is sufficient to establish a miracle, unless the testimony be of such a kind, that its falsehood would be more miraculous than the fact which it endeavors to establish." -David Hume
BenV
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Reply #30 on:
12/11/2008 09:46:27 »
I don't think anyone really does something that they think is evil - they will justify it one way or another. Most, if not all, of us will have done something that made someone else suffer, but we always think it's justified at the time. I think this generally occurs in school, while we're still learning who we are and how to act, but that "he deserved it" feeling is strong at the time - it's only afterwards when we evaluate our actions from a different perspective that we feel it was the wrong thing to do, and so our definition of justification adapts.
Any ideology can be used to justify 'evil' actions, it's not limited to religion - misplaced nationalism (which can lead to racism, xenophobia etc) is one example, vigilante justice is another.
Hitler, often held up to be a paragon of 'evil', no doubt felt his actions were justified, perhaps for the good of the German people, perhaps just for the good of the Arian race, or just for the good of his own family or peers. This isn't to say that what he did was right, but that
he felt it was justified
.
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_Stefan_
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Reply #31 on:
12/11/2008 10:02:36 »
Well said, Ben.
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Stefan
"No testimony is sufficient to establish a miracle, unless the testimony be of such a kind, that its falsehood would be more miraculous than the fact which it endeavors to establish." -David Hume
DoctorBeaver
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A stitch in time would have confused Einstein.
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Reply #32 on:
12/11/2008 14:05:58 »
Good & evil are just facets of societal norms.
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