1. Karma comedians

Comment #186775 by leviticus on May 31, 2008 at 9:47 am

If Sharon Stone doesn't really believe in karma and just throwing and shot at the Chinese government it would still be in bad taste, China has actually been as far as anyone can tell very responsive and good to it's people in the wake of an unavoidable tragedy. That said i saw her little spiel on the news and this whole well she was asking a question excuse doesn't add up to me. The question was merely a posture, not a real question. It was haha f*** you China coming right out her lips to me. The question was posed with all the bravado and arrogances often found in speeches from the ultraconservatives like the for mentioned Pat Robertson.

I don't actually know if Sharon is a practicing Buddhist or not, as some have speculated above. To me the garbage that comes out of this new age mumbo jumbo is exactly the same as the old religions in their potential danger to society. The only difference in the power the major faiths have over a large part of the population. I'd back up my claim that they are all potentially equal in danger with the fact that even the most vile faiths such as Islam or Christianity are all simply toned down or invigorated with hate and ignorance by their users. Alone they are simply equal opportunities for ignorance, to be molded by their users(followers)to explain away the realities they do not wish to face.

2. Teacher tortures, kills boy

Comment #186758 by leviticus on May 31, 2008 at 9:12 am

Zoron

Anyway I don't feel sorry for the kid because, after all, they all come out of these "schools" as lunatics, just one less dead lunatic of Islam.

I think if we are to really have any real moral value we must feel sorry for this kid and those like him. As a human i feel ashamed that anyone could live and die in such conditions at such a modern time. I also have a great deal of sympathy for all the young students who are or are about to be brainwashed by their faith. Imagine if this boy was smart enough to "see", as one said earlier. As in see through the bullshit, and this is why he was killed what an awful reason and way to die. Finally i think we must feel sorry for children like this. If we don't we are take the way we now live for granted.

3. 1968 Supreme Court case of Epperson v. Arkansas

Comment #185774 by leviticus on May 28, 2008 at 1:39 pm

I hate how this thing logs you out if you take to long to post your comment f***** annoying, and something that should be addressed elsewhere is suppose.

I watch the video and came to the conclusion that nothing new was really discussed. I agree with LaurenceH86 that Edward Sission is either in if for the money or maybe he just wants to undermine the foundations of biology for his only religious reasons and is merely disingenuous about his motives. Again the video is an hour long discussion with the usually group of caller argument about gaps in the fossil record and no real evidence for evolution garbage.

Sission makes the same old pathetic claim that intelligent design does not necessarily postulate the existence of a god. Even if he doesn't not personally hold these beliefs it should be noted that the men who came up with the Intelligent Design movement did infact intend to place not only god but their god into the role of the intelligent designer. This was proven in the Dover trial by Barbara Forest evidence and is discussed in great detail in the her book with Paul R. Gross Creationisms Trojan Horse (a book I'd only recommend for those very interested in Intelligent Designs dirty history, it was very good to me, but some find it too long and dry).

4. The Neural Buddhists

Comment #180406 by leviticus on May 14, 2008 at 8:04 pm

Hello Richard, I'm kinda new here and haven't heard about your religious experience and was wondering if it was the actual Jesus you experience in revelation or mystic moment or whatever you want to call it?
I have more questions about your experience but i'd like to wait to here about it first perhaps you could e-mail send me a message about it or link or something, before i ask more questions.

"For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith, and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God"

I will however take a shot at this. Probably stuff you hear before but I'm in the mood to take some very basic counters to such a claim.

1) If your god(my former delusion) saved us with his grace, why not save us all? By this anyone who knows anything about the biblical god knows he was not world renowned and billions upon billions of people lived and died without any knowledge of his saving grace.

2)God doesn't simply wish to save us. He wants something in return --> Our faith and obedience. This seems more as curse than a blessing especially knowing how many people he decided to leave out of the loop. And why would an all omnipotent good god create man ask him to believe in him give him no evidence and then damn them to eternity in hell if they don't. Doesn't sound like a very loving God to me.

5. 'Spiritual' dentist fined $10,000

Comment #180168 by leviticus on May 14, 2008 at 10:17 am

"The patient leaves feeling different and knowing that they have been touched by Jesus Christ,"

Wow i think Jesus is touching us in to many public and inappropriate places these days, and he has a particular fondness for the children and mentally ill.

Luckily it seems as if this board took this issue very seriously and it sounds like if Dr Gardner keeps up these antics he won't be a dentist much longer.

6. The Neural Buddhists

Comment #179792 by leviticus on May 13, 2008 at 6:42 pm

To these self-confident researchers, the idea that the spirit might exist apart from the body is just ridiculous.

These self-confident researchers seem to be quite logical to me. The idea of a spirit apart from the body raises more ridiculous questions and problems that it could ever solve and seems highly improbable in the first place.

Q. Where do these spirits come from? Does God put them in us. Or do they exist in the gametes that join to form us.

A. A Personal God doesn't exist, and sperm and eggs apparently couldn't possible contain souls. If they did billions of souls would perish every day due to the death of sperm alone. One might suggest that the soul develops as the living being develops. This would be a logical error. Material object developing into a non material spiritual soul.

In unexpected ways, science and mysticism are joining hands and reinforcing each other.

I think not, and if science goes this way it'll drown in new age mumbo-jumbo.

Life is material, that doesn't mean we loose anything. It doesn't make life any less beautiful.

7. On Fitna, the Movie

Comment #179032 by leviticus on May 12, 2008 at 12:18 pm

Esuther. I agree with Peacebeuponme with the take on Islamic Countries but i would also like to suggest that you take another look at the current situation in Turkey, i agree with you're assessment of your Turkish friend and i would also be willing to believe that many people in her country are like her. That said Turkey is in the midst of a takeover of religious zealots taking political office. Yes they were elected. But their constant stance on the importance of Islamic law is quickly taking one of the most west friendly middle east states and turning it back into your metaphorical smoking gun "Islamic State", minus the metaphor of course. And FYI the election in Turkey was big news and has secularists in Turkey as well as many other people quite worried. For example most all of the pork industry has been ran off since the election because the law according to the Koran and pork apparently don't get along.

8. Open Letter to a victim of Ben Stein's lying propaganda

Comment #177610 by leviticus on May 9, 2008 at 11:03 am

To - Layla Nasreddin

Just a note. -- "Darwin's Blind Spot: Evolution Beyond Natural Selection" by Frank Ryan had nothing to do with creationism or Social Darwinism as it seems you post implies, it is about symbiotic evolution (symbiogenesis), which is a topic i find interesting, although i found Mr. Ryans book to be one the driest books on the topic. The idea originated with Russian scientists, Konstantin Mereschkowsky. Dr. Lynn Margulis book aquiring genomes was an interesting read although there were many printing errors (color diagrams with no color) and the tone is sometimes a bit snively complaining about neo-darwinist ignorance of the topic I'd still recommend the book as something that could enrich one's understanding of biology and evolution even if you do not agree with some of the claims.

Good Day,
Leviticus, Levi J. Morris

9. $271 Million for Research on Stem Cells in California

Comment #177576 by leviticus on May 9, 2008 at 10:21 am

Well thank goodness California has found a way to help bring the U.S. back up to par in stem cell research, as we have fallen far behind not only Canada but the many Asian countries that already have established stem cell programs.

10. The List: The World's Worst Religious Leaders

Comment #159263 by leviticus on April 11, 2008 at 7:30 pm

Bonzai your comments sound like nothing other then classic religious apologetic rhetoric. First play down the importance of the people or events that could look bad for religion then distance religion from these people by saying things like

If they are somehow used as representatives of religion then indeed most believers can justifiably say "these are not our gods".

Also I can't believe that you can downplay the importance of a person like Joseph Kony as a "nobody" of little importance with a limited local influence as if the murder of at least 100,000 people is no big deal and the abductions of over 60,000 children to turn into soldiers and sex-slaves is unimportant. And I also suppose that: The Taiping Rebellion, The Mountain Meadows Massacre, The Thirty Years War, The Spanish Inquisition, St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre, and the Crusades were all also "not in the name of your gods".

I also agree with Shaden Pat Robertson would make a strong candidate for this list.

11. Beware the Believers

Comment #151907 by leviticus on March 29, 2008 at 4:38 pm

Found it to be rather weird myself. I don't think it'll have the appeal to the youth as a science promotion, as some have discussed because it's too ambiguous and weird to really make a point.

12. Police: Girl Dies After Parents Pray for Healing Instead of Seeking Medical Help

Comment #150013 by leviticus on March 26, 2008 at 11:55 am

Double Bass Atheist's avatar does say a great deal about how and why tragedies such as this happen. Things like this eat away and my tolerance for belief in any nonsense(religious or not), if you tolerate a little crazy your bound to end up with those who indulge in the delusion to extremes such as this. Sadly this will not even be close to the last time a child will die because of the delusion of faith.