51. Are Darwin's Theories Fact or Faith Issues?

Comment #122243 by NMcC on February 5, 2008 at 1:45 am

What, you mean he's a mass debater!

52. Are Darwin's Theories Fact or Faith Issues?

Comment #121919 by NMcC on February 4, 2008 at 11:13 am

Question for Professor Dawkins:

Richard, I have just watched a debate (of 8 separate segments) on YouTube. The subject of the debate was Evolution or Creationism (at least, I think this was the formal title). On the side of evolution was Miller, Scott, Ruse and Linn and on the other side was Berlinski, Johnson, Behe and Buckley.

As was predictable, the creationists had nothing of substance to bring to the 'debate' and were laughable (especially Buckley who looked and acted as if he'd emerged from a coma specifically to take part in the debate). Needless to say, your name was mentioned a few times. And, had you been there, it would have been even more of a blood bath than it was - if, indeed, that is possible.

Assuming that you've seen this 'debate', my question is do you not feel that taking these people on in public debate is not a better way of dealing with them than your present policy?

I understand your reasons for not taking them on as such in public debate and agree that you run the risk of giving them credence and unwarranted publicity. On the other hand, I feel that people like Miller and Ruse give them too much respect and in this way are already giving them credence.

You'd have completely wiped the floor with these dishonest clowns and, perhaps, in the process, would have made them think twice about venturing into public debates in future. As well as this, I think you'd have destroyed them to the extent that anyone watching who was 'undecided' would have seen them in a new light - a very unfavourable new light!

BTW, I have just realised that this 'debate' might be 'old hat' here since Ken Miller looks a lot younger than when I saw him only about a year or so ago. Apologies if I'm away behind with this.

Regardless, I'd be interested in whether you'd consider changing your 'no show' policy in light of this encounter with these people.

53. A Letter From Hell

Comment #116987 by NMcC on January 28, 2008 at 1:07 am

Double Bass Atheist

My last post was written in the context of assuming that your child was happy for you to pursue the matter with his school. It seems that this is not necessarily the case. If not, then my 'advice' would change to: under no circumstances go against your son's wishes as alienating or isolating him from his school chums in any way would be a hundred times worse than him being exposed to the ridiculous, self-defeating propaganda contained in this video.

54. A Letter From Hell

Comment #116861 by NMcC on January 27, 2008 at 4:37 pm

Paula Kirby writes:

".....I would be inclined to confront the child's parents. Though there might also be something to be said for having a quiet word with the child himself: explaining how upsetting this video could be for some people and asking him to show a bit more consideration."

With all due respect Paula, I think this is exactly the wrong thing to do in these circumstances. Especially the idea of 'confronting' the child. It doesn't take much imagination to percieve how such a course of action could be misconstrued and misinterpreted, and, moreover, deliberately so.

No, the best thing to do is the simplest: contact the Headmaster/mistress and tell them what's happened. Explain firmly that you consider this kind of thing to be as bad as if the kid had been showing pornography and demand that the school speaks to the parents of the child in question. It's essential for you to be firm and resolute and to leave them in no doubt that you and your child are the injured party and that you are demanding an apology from both the school and this kid's parents. Make it clear that should an apology not be forthcoming, you'll have no hesitation in contacting the print and electronic media.

Of course, only you, Double bass atheist, can decide how far you want to publicise the incident and how much negative publicity you wish to shower on the christians.

P.S. I read your article in the Free Inquiry magazine, Paula, it was excellent. Congratulations.

55. Gay Jesus play blasted by bishop

Comment #114050 by NMcC on January 21, 2008 at 9:24 am

A passage from the 'Secret Gospel of Mark' suppressed by the Christians:

"And going out of the tomb, they came into the house of the youth, for he was rich. And after six days Jesus told him what to do, and in the evening the youth comes to him, wearing a linen cloth over his naked body. And he remained with him that night, for Jesus taught him the mystery of the kingdom of God."

Yes! I'll bet he did!!

56. An Open Letter to Richard Dawkins

Comment #96837 by NMcC on December 11, 2007 at 2:06 am

Comment by Theocrapcy

"Btw, brilliant response by aticus, I highly recommend this be drafted as the official unofficial respnse."

I don't!! Especially since it's only a cobbled together version of his previous stupid posts.

Aticus's main concern is to make everyone think that he's ever so clever, so he uses terms like '...withering away of the state' and 'dictatorship of the proletariat'. Of course, this is only a cover so that when he uses stupid insults like 'commies' and 'Red China', it might appear that he knows what he's talking about.

In fact, he wouldn't know a 'commie' if one jumped up and bit him in the arse.

Just for the record, the dictatorships in Russia and China (and elsewhere) were and are the result of self-appointed would-be heroes trying to run capitalism through the agency of the state. They are state-capitalist dictatorships, in other words.

Why on earth take at face value the word of a pope or a priest when it comes to the writings of Marx? Contrary to what these liars and charlatans aver, Marx never advocated any form of religious suppression. Nor did he advocate minority led coups in backward, peasant countries of the sort that brought lunatics like Stalin and Mao to power.

The disasters in Russia and China owe more to the likes of erstwhile Trotskyists like Hitchens than they do to Marx.

What a joke that Hitchens is assuming the self-righteous mode in relation to Romney and his membership of a church that once excused racism.

Despite it's idiocy, to my knowledge the Morons have never engaged in mass murder, unlike Hitchens's hero Trotsky, the butcher of Kronstadt.

57. An Open Letter to Richard Dawkins

Comment #96570 by NMcC on December 10, 2007 at 6:05 pm

Richard

May I suggest a reply?

Dear Mr (no, you look nothing like my father) Morris,

Your contribution to the programme was pathetic. You are obviously as mad as a hatter. Please fuck off.

Yours etc.

58. Boy dies of leukemia after refusing treatment for religious reasons

Comment #93041 by NMcC on December 2, 2007 at 3:44 am

Russell Blackford

What on earth are you on about?

According to you this boy was old enough to take such a decision for himself. Was he? So, 14 year old kids should be considered old enough to make life or death decisions about themselves and, presumably, old enough to decide to drink alcohol, get married, join the army, have sex (with 50, 60, 65 year olds etc!), vote, serve on jurys and so on.

If this is not what you are saying, I'd like to know how you can support the right of a 14 year old to decide to end his own life without at the same time supporting the right of other 14 year olds to make decisions for themselves in regard to doing any of the above mentioned activities - or anything else for that matter.

Why have legal age requirements at all?

59. Boy dies of leukemia after refusing treatment for religious reasons

Comment #92515 by NMcC on November 30, 2007 at 4:55 pm

What is with all this talk about whether this boy was 'of sound mind'?

This boy was obviously way too young to be allowed to make such a serious decision for himself. The judge should have done whatever was necessary to enforce the tranfusions. Of course, in other circumstances, the judge wouldn't have had any problem deciding that the boy was too young to decide for himself whether to drink alcohol, have sex, to vote, to get married, live on his own, decide to forgo education, join the military, take drugs and so on, but, apparently, he was old enough to kill himself in accordance with a load of religious shit that his cunt of an aunt had brainwashed him with.

To anyone here who talks about this boy's 'rights', I would ask them to remember what it's like being 14. How many of us were not religious ourselves at this age? How many of us were able to overcome the indoctrination at this age? Very few I'd bet. Any of us could have been in this boy's position. I look at my own 9 year old boy and think, 'Jesus Christ, that wee lad was only 5 years older than my son'.

This is one of the most depressing things I've heard in a long time.

The aunt and the judge are a couple of fuckwits who should be charged themselves with child abuse and negligence.

As for this crowd of religious freaks, the next time they appear on my doorstep, I'll be replacing my customary good humoured response of "I didn't even know there'd been an accident" with "Why don't you fuck off you despicable crowd of bastards!"

60. Papal encyclical attacks atheism, lauds hope

Comment #92451 by NMcC on November 30, 2007 at 2:20 pm

Mr DArcy

Hear! Hear! Well said.

It was Engels who said that Marx 'disowned' the self-proclaimed French 'Marxists' and you are right, Marx would never have supported the undemocratic, minority led Leninist coup in backward Russia.

It's interesting that even Trotsky, before he became a Leninist, wrote that in Lenin's conception of the socialist revolution, the first to fall victim would be '...the lionised head of Marx'.

Marx argued for a democratically organised Socialist Party and Lenin argued that the majority of the workers were too stupid and needed to be led by the nose by people like himself.

Incidently, it's even a misnomer to describe Bolshevik Russia as 'Soviet' Russia since the Bolsheviks destroyed the original soviets which were simply democratic councils which sprang up without the help of the self-appointed dictators of the Bolshevik party.

61. Dogs Can Classify Complex Photos In Categories Like Humans Do

Comment #92394 by NMcC on November 30, 2007 at 12:16 pm

nancy2001

I do, he'd already seen it!

62. Judgement Day: Intelligent Design on Trial

Comment #88656 by NMcC on November 18, 2007 at 11:35 am

Brilliant stuff!! Extremely educational and informative. The graphic illustration of the similarity between the bacterial flagellum and the Yersinia Pestis, the bacterium that causes the bubonic plague, was superbly done and, at a stroke, demolished the entire 'case' for 'intelligent design'.

I'd recommend reading the typescript of the two interviews with Philip Johnson and Ken Miller.

Miller is excellent and provides his usual robust defense of Darwinian evolution. How this man is able to reconcile Roman Catholicism with his scientific knowledge is a total mystery to me…but…anyway…

Johnson is all over the place in his interview, and reveals his real motivations for all the world to see: basically, having become a christian in response to his mid-life crisis, he hates the idea that science doesn't start off with a belief in the existence of the supernatural and work from there. This is Johnson's main complaint, as far as I can determine, and all the rest of his 'case' as expounded here is just fluff and filler.

What about this for a most revealing sentence from Johnson:

"A philosophy of naturalism or materialism is what generates the Darwinian theory."

Really? Darwin started out with a 'materialist' philosophy did he, and simply 'discovered' (nudge nudge, wink wink) the evidence he wanted to find to bolster his nefarious machinations? And then, having discovered this evidence, inexplicably, decided to sit on his theory for the next twenty years – even though it backed up the 'materialist' philosophy he sought to bolster in the first place!!

Is it possible that a relatively well-educated 12 year old would make a more stupid comment on Darwinism? I doubt it.

And this from the Godfather of IDiocy himself!!

63. Religious scholars mull Flying Spaghetti Monster

Comment #88488 by NMcC on November 17, 2007 at 4:00 am

"You have to keep a sense of humor when you're studying religion, especially in graduate school," Van Horn said in a recent telephone interview. "Otherwise you'll sink into depression pretty quickly."

Priceless!!

64. Mind your manners

Comment #88484 by NMcC on November 17, 2007 at 2:43 am

crumbledfingers

Richard Dawkins, rightly, argues that, just because a question can be formulated in English, doesn't mean that it deserves an answer. Well, I maintain that just because someone comes to this website thinking that they're ever so rational and clever because they don't subscribe to religious hogwash, doesn't give them carte blanche to make egregiously stupid statements about politics, economics, history, social policy and so on. Nor does disbelieving in religious claims automatically mean that every pearl that falls from your lips deserves to be 'answered'.

Anyone with half a brain cell can see that this applies to MuNky82. Is it even necessary to point out that a person who makes such moronic statements, among others, as the economy of Victorian England was based on a 'caste system' doesn't deserve to be taken seriously?

And, when MuNky82 compounds his (perhaps her) ignorance with viciousness, by referring to 17 year old girls from working class areas in the UK who, it's claimed, deliberately get pregnant in order to acquire some hole of a council flat (MuNky82 is even too ignorant to know that this claim was simply a Tory party conference stunt, and, in fact, is a lie) he forfeits the right to be treated with good manners.

Incidentally, MuNky82, why the big concern with the 'morals' of the poor? What if 17 year old working class girls do deliberately get pregnant in order to get a place of their own, what of it? The 17 year old daughters of the rich don't have to use such a ploy to acquire accommodation simply because these members of the real scrounging, parasite class, can, of course, get mummy or daddy to buy them a place with the money they've thieved from the parents of the working class girls in question. That little 'morality' tale doesn't seem to excite your pretend sense of fair play. Why not?

If I wanted to read unsubstantiated, despicable right-wing propaganda, I'll go to a website that caters for stupidity and lies. There's a whole collection of right-wing freak shows on the web, MuNky82 doesn't have to come here to spout his ignorant drivel.

65. Mind your manners

Comment #88400 by NMcC on November 16, 2007 at 1:35 pm

arogop

Well, thanks for that! We'll all be able to sleep soundly in our beds tonight now knowing that you are not a big fan of a term you can't even spell let alone use in an intelligible sentence.

I'll bet, as an advocate of 'good old capitalism', you're poorer than a church mouse's church mouse and one step away from the workhouse - you dimwits normally are.

66. Mind your manners

Comment #88383 by NMcC on November 16, 2007 at 11:24 am

Henri Bergson


Is that a fact, genius?

Well, why don't you condescend to enlighten us, then, instead of just making pretentious and preposterous statements?

Which book do you recommend I should read?

What's the betting it isn't one written by Karl Marx?

67. Mind your manners

Comment #88334 by NMcC on November 16, 2007 at 3:57 am

MuNky82

"...I always think that Marx had a few things correct...."

If your two posts to this thread are anything to go by, I very much doubt that you are capable of giving any thought to anything.

I'll say the same as I said in relation to Henri Bergson above: and this website is supposed to be 'A Clear-Thinking Oasis' - Christ almighty!!!

68. Mind your manners

Comment #88239 by NMcC on November 15, 2007 at 2:13 pm

Rtambree and others

Is it even worth taking the trouble to respond to a statement like that made by Henri Bergson.

I mean, for ***k sake! He thinks that the present ruling ideology in countries like the UK and America is 'Marxism'!!!

And this is supposed to be 'A Clear-Thinking Oasis'.... Christ almighty!!

69. AAI 07

Comment #84739 by NMcC on November 3, 2007 at 11:58 am

phil rimmer

The point I was making is that it is obviously a problem for governments to decide which and at what level of taxes to impose. If they tax capital too much, then there will be less investment, less employment and the capital invested in a country with a high tax regime will migrate to one where there is a low tax burden. Consequently, there will be less and less for the government which imposed the high taxes to tax.

Since governments need money to fund health, education, the state, and so on, they are forever on the horns of a dilemma. And, since capitalism is inherently chaotic and unpredictable in the first place, it makes the situation all the more difficult for governments to know what to do for the best.

My main point however, is that I don't understand why supporters of capitalism (as I suspect the 3 or 4 contributors to this thread that I alluded to could be described) even bother discussing the ins and outs of which taxes and at what levels these taxes should be imposed since the obvious and simple answer to this 'problem' for a supporter of capitalism is: as little as possible if you want to encourage capital to expand and invest.

70. AAI 07

Comment #84724 by NMcC on November 3, 2007 at 10:41 am

epeeist

Thanks for that. The first quote was quite funny and, in fact, I couldn't agree more with your modified version of it. Indeed, like all serious subjects, the economics of capitalism and any proposed alternative are deemed by the vast majority to be too difficult and are mostly left untried. Soundbites and Big Brother are the order of the day at present I'm afraid.

The thing that I find the most baffling though is how obviously intelligent people like the three or four most recent contributors to this thread can waste their time on what I would consider an infinitely more difficult task: trying to organise the tax system so as to do away with the problems that are, in fact, endemic to the overall economic system.

Especially since the solution to the 'tax problem' from the point of view of supporters of capitalism should be glaringly obvious: absolutely the bare minimum of taxes possible, period.

71. AAI 07

Comment #84691 by NMcC on November 3, 2007 at 7:55 am

scooternyc

A sad time for you indeed. My condolences also.

72. AAI 07

Comment #84673 by NMcC on November 3, 2007 at 7:06 am

Here is my tuppence ha'penny worth:

Far from having 'ethical' or 'moralistic' objections to capitalism, genuine socialists who know their history and economics realise that capitalism has been a necessary part of social development, just as Marx and Engels pointed out as far back as 1847-48 in The Communist Manifesto. It has built up massive means of production, distribution and communication so as to make a society of general abundance possible. This has been the case for some time, but is especially true of today. The simple fact is that there is no need for anyone to be suffering any kind of material (or mental) poverty for any reason whatsoever today. No one can argue that we lack the means for solving the myriad problems that face us in 2007. Poverty, world hunger and starvation, under-development in Africa and South America, lack of medical care, poor and dilapidated housing around the world, a run-down NHS, environmental destruction and, in short, practically all of the problems that the 100,000s of charities throughout the world battle unsuccessfully with are all perfectly amenable to solutions given the resources and potential resources that now exist.

The reason why these resources are not used to eliminate the problems society faces, however, is because the market doesn't allow them to be. The mantra of the market is 'no profit, no production' irrespective of needs and wants. And, of course, it doesn't matter if these needs are the gold taps mentioned by logicel or the provision of a carer for a frail, lonely old person. The consequences of this ridiculous situation are there for all of us to see.

It seems to me that all of the measures mentioned by other posters are simply suggestions for tinkering with the system when history has shown that no matter how much you tinker with it, it never works in the interests of the majority of the world's population. It's simply inevitable that whatever 'solutions' to problems we might come up with, there will always be a down side. The case of the yachts that logicel mentioned is an excellent example. Some bright spark (a 'socialist', no doubt!) thinks that it's a good idea to prevent a handful of rich people from buying yachts by putting a high tax on their purchase, but, of course, what good is this to the 100s or 1000s who have lost their jobs? None whatever, it's simply a non-solution. And this is the thing with capitalism, solutions to its problems are invariably only bigger problems in disguise.

Some of the suggestions mentioned for dealing with the things that concern us (from scooternyc's personal hatred of the sick and the homeless to that of our collective hatred of religious extremism) are more serious than others. The example of the gold taps is a trivial one, but has interesting inferences. In a society in which we organised to produce and distribute material wealth on the basis of human needs rather than to be bought and sold as commodities on the market, the issue of whether to make taps out of gold would be an entirely practical one, and would be based on a desire to use the resources of the planet in as economical and as environmentally friendly a way as possible. Today, making taps out of gold is considered by some to be beyond the pale, because it has connotations of extreme wealth. But why shouldn't we make taps out of gold? For all we know it might be the best use for gold in a rationally planned economy. In such a society gold would have no value except as a useful metal.

It seems to me that there is practically no problem existing in society today, including that of religion, (which, for the vast majority of people at least, is only a reflection of people's material insecurity anyway, 'the sigh of the oppressed creature' as it's been phrased), that would not lend itself to a solution if we, as a society (not the state), owned and democratically controlled all the means of production, distribution, and communication that capitalism has built up and if we use these solely to meet our self-defined needs.

So OK, here's the rub; I call the society advocated above genuine 'Socialism' and contend that, far from having been a failure, it has never existed anywhere in the world at anytime. I can already hear the numerous objections, so I'll only list them here and comment further on them if anyone thinks it worthwhile:

It was tried and has failed in both its extreme forms (Russia, China etc) and in its more benign forms (Labour governments etc)

It would involve 'world government'

Human nature wouldn't allow it – people are basically lazy

It would curtail and even eliminate 'self-initiative'

The state would control all our lives

'Ideologies' in power always end in tyranny and dictatorship

We need the market to regulate production and distribution

And loads of others that I can't think of at the minute but I'm sure others will.

73. AAI 07

Comment #84567 by NMcC on November 2, 2007 at 2:25 pm

Yes. Go away.

74. AAI 07

Comment #84554 by NMcC on November 2, 2007 at 12:25 pm

notsobad

The 'stress' won't get the chance to kill me, I'll die laughing at your posts first!

Hilarious! Now I know you're a troll. First you give us the exact name of a long-titled, obscure book from the mid 1840s but attribute it to Marx, now, you quote, word perfect, Marx's Theses on Fuerbach but attribute it to Engels.

If you are not a troll, you've been spending too much time on Wikipedia and should get out more.

75. AAI 07

Comment #84549 by NMcC on November 2, 2007 at 11:31 am

thirdchimpanzee, epeeist and briancoughlanworldcitizen

Don't encourage that ignorant half-wit notsobad. I now believe that he's a troll.

The depth of his knowledge of the subject he's 'debating' can be gleaned from his last contribution: four statements and all of them demonstrably false.

Firstly, Marx, of course, wasn't 'after' any group. His analysis of capitalism had nothing to do with 'groups'.

Secondly, the British workers didn't say 'fuck off' to his ideas for the simple reason that they never heard of his ideas in the first place.

Thirdly, the Russian workers didn't welcome or embrace the ideas of Marx because the Bolshevik takeover in Russia was an undemocratic minority led Leninist coup in a backward, peasant country which had nothing whatever to do with Marx or his writings.

Fourthly, and here's the gem rattling around notsobad's empty head, the British workers didn't get 'much better during the years since he (Marx) wrote The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844' for the simple reason that Marx didn't write that book, it was written by Frederick Engels.

76. AAI 07

Comment #84535 by NMcC on November 2, 2007 at 9:44 am

Notsobad

How typical from a 'libertarian' supporter of unfettered capitalism: makes vacuous and spurious statements about all and sundry, then, when challenged to substantiate these views, after conspiculously failing to do so, crys about others making 'personal' attacks when this failure is pointed out to them.

Why don't you and scooter answer the points put to you and give over with the moaning? You big girl's blouse!

Jesus! And you are the people who go on about how the race is to the swift and the fight to the strong in capitalism's free-for-all!

Shall we take it for granted that you, at least, are one 'Libertarian' enamoured of capitalism's wonderful 'I'm alright Jack' ethos who is poorer than a church mouse's church mouse?

It would seem so since you don't appear to have the brains to be otherwise. Nor, it seems further, do you have the balls for the fight!

Blimey, what's a 'Libertarian' of your ilk to do!

77. AAI 07

Comment #84520 by NMcC on November 2, 2007 at 8:45 am

3legcat

If you want to understand 'my point' why don't you go back and read the posts I've made as I've already suggested to you. You don't have to go back more than 3 pages and you can also click the 'other comments' link.

You'll find that I have not simply stated 'by fiat' that 'profit' is 'a crime'.

BTW, I'm always amazed when posters start talking about contributions being 'off topic'. What on earth is this site for, for goodness sake, if not to discuss ALL of the issues in regard to religion and religiosity amongst people....surely the site dosen't just exist so that we can make endless repetitions of how wonderful Dawkins is, and so on.

78. AAI 07

Comment #84515 by NMcC on November 2, 2007 at 8:23 am

3legcat

I wasn't asking the question for the good of my health. It was in direct response to scooternyc who holds the view that everyone, regardless of their individual circumstances, should be left to their own devices to sink or swim so that he doesn't have to pay taxes. My question(unanswered by him despite being asked a number of times) was designed to show how this view of his was not only disgusting, but that it was stupid to boot.

As to your point about robbery not being robbery if it's consensual, especially if carried out at a distance etc: Yes, of course, everyone who works for wages 'consents' to do so. They merely forget that they're really loaded and don't, in fact, have to.

79. AAI 07

Comment #84505 by NMcC on November 2, 2007 at 7:50 am

windweaver

Brilliant quote from Chomsky. Nice one!

3legcat

'A transaction done at arms length is no robbery'.

Is it not? Post your credit card details on an unsecure website and let's see if you can be disabused of that notion!

80. AAI 07

Comment #84504 by NMcC on November 2, 2007 at 7:40 am

3legcat

Try going back over the last couple of pages as it will enable you to discern the context in which those statements were made.

In any event, it'll stop you making silly, pointless contributions. Perhaps it won't.

81. AAI 07

Comment #84497 by NMcC on November 2, 2007 at 7:18 am

Notsobad

Fantastic bit of argumentation there! Communism was crap and it was really state-capitalism anyway - a view endorsed by 'communists and socialists' alike.

Er....so you are now on my side then? Why call it 'communism' or 'socialism' if you agree that it was really state-capitalism?

I don't want to go back over 11 pages of posts so, tell me, are you the wonder-brain who stated that China was communist whilst being at the same time the most capitalist country on earth? Apologies if not. I suspect you'd agree with the nonsensical statement even if you didn't say it.

In regard to what Karl Marx might have considered a 'cheesy' statement: I couldn't give a fuck whether Karl Marx would have considered it in that way or not. Whether it's true or not is more important to me. And, since we're on the subject, Marx was quite fond of using religious analogies and terminology. He wrote numerous times in this vein. For example, Marx claimed that the Church of England would far sooner forgive an attack on one of its Thirty Nine articles of Faith than it would an attack on 1/39th of its wealth. Nothing 'cheesy' about that, methinks.

82. AAI 07

Comment #84485 by NMcC on November 2, 2007 at 6:38 am

scooternyc

I thought I had enlightened you in my first rather lengthy post. However, as the barrister said to the judge after he complained that he was non the wiser having listened to a lengthy explanation: 'No, my Lord, but you're much better informed'

Obviously your great decision for today is to decide to forgo reading anything before you decide to pretend to reply to it.

Here's the answer thicko: whilst you were deciding that your decision to decide to jack in and then take another of the numerous (how many did you list? 10? 12? 100?), obviously unsuitable (you appear to be quite useless at this decision-making caper, at least as far as employment is concerned, don't you?), jobs you've had over the years, I realised that capitalism was built on the exploitation of wage labour by means of the surplus value trick explained in my previous post. And I acted accordingly. I have already stated that wealth in the form of rent, interest and profits is legalised robbery. What of it? That is a statement of fact, not a moral judgment and reflects not one iota on the system or my actions.

Go back and read my previous posts, if you haven't already decided to decide not to.

83. AAI 07

Comment #84469 by NMcC on November 2, 2007 at 5:45 am

Notsobad and scooternyc

I'm tempted to ignore both of you as you are obviously a couple of clowns.....but.....

"So why did you buy a BMW and not a Honda instead? Surely a Honda would do you comparable service and cost (much) less. And the rest of the money could be used to show how 'emotional' you are."

If you follow that thought through to its logical conclusion, I'll think you'll find that buying the Honda would have been the emotional choice.

Here's a clue, since you appear to be clueless: loads of space for the kids, brilliant air conditioning, safety considerations, great music system, comfort considerations, reliability etc..etc..

"You can still make a trip to North Korea and some other countries to see how it worked out."

Christ almighty! Now I know how Dawkins feels when he's asked for the 100th time about:

Stalin and Hitler being atheists.

Darwinian evolution being based on pure chance.

Indoctrination of children with any religion being worse than any form of sex abuse.

Not being able to prove the non-existence of God.

Having a book with the title The Selfish Gene being an endorsement of selfishness..etc..yawn..yawn.

'Notsobad' can't even be original, he/she has simply replaced '...go and live in Russia!' with ...'go and live in North Korea'.

Just for your benefit, genius, North Korea is a fine example of how useless capitalism run by self-appointed state officials can get and has nothing to do with socialism. It's state- capitalism.

In fact, come to think of it, surely you should be applauding North Korea? Afterall, it's a society where a minority have things set up for their own benefit whilst the vast majority live in abject poverty and misery. In your and scootnyc's meritorious utopian fantasy, this is exactly how it should be: the powerful and strong live the life of Riley because they're powerful and strong whilst the majority are poor and downtrodden because they're a useless waste of space - and resources.

All I can say in relation to scooternyc's pathetic wriggling and attemps at amateur psychology (can't be bothered to check if that's the correct spelling), answer my questions:

Who are the real parasites? The rich who live off the holy trinity of rent, interest and profits or those who need a helping hand in society who have themselves or their families created all the wealth that this holy trinity represents in the form of bits of paper and metal tokens?

And:

Should parents be legally prevented from giving or passing on their wealth to their offspring? If not, why not?

I'm still waiting!!

Incidently, where exactly have you debunked easily and entertainingly anything I've said?

I can't see where you've even tried, let alone succeeded.

84. AAI 07

Comment #84441 by NMcC on November 2, 2007 at 3:46 am

scooternyc

"Yeah, that's not a question, that's a presupposition predicated on a thought process already indoctrinated masquerading as a question in order to manipulate the information or "answer" supplied."

Ooh!, get you! For goodness sake get over yourself.

"You already hate the rich; are victim to their choices or Darwinian fortune in life, so nothing anyone says to you would affect your high grand ideas of life."

Not really, since I'm pretty well off myself. In fact, I'm probably your ideal type of chap: started at the bottom through being born into abject poverty and am the first person in my family to have money and live in a big house in a nice area, drive a BMW etc etc.

The difference between you and me, however, is that I'm the kind of unemotional realist that you only pretend to be. I actually do look at the situation without emotional blinkers. I don't believe for a second that I 'deserve' wealth because I'm horrendously brilliant and talented, diligent and devastatingly gorgeous. I don't believe that just because I was able to escape poverty, everyone should be able to and that therefore capitalism's wonderful. Quite the opposite in fact. A thousand people's poverty isn't justified by one person's wealth.

No, unlike you, I have no illusions about how you get rich in capitalism; you exploit the poor by getting those who have nothing but their labour power to work for you and you then pay them less in the form of wages than the value of what they created whilst they were 'yours' as wage-slaves. It's called living off surplus value, i.e. the surplus created was legally stolen by me. That's how capitalism works! Or, as I'd assert, that's why it doesn't work.

You my friend, are simply full of idealistic and illusionary crap - on this subject at least.

Despite your bluster, my question(s) remains: Who are the real drain on society, the parasites who live off rent, interest and profits (the unpaid labour of those who work, in other words) or those who need a helping hand from society, the relatives of whom create all the wealth in the first place?

Since you are so self-regarding in your stated interest in facts only, read something like Karl Marx's pamphlets Value Price and Profit and Wage Labour and Capital, where you'll find ample non-emotional statements of fact. Except they will support the exact opposite of your arse-kissing of the rich and your stupid nonsense.

Incidentally, on a general note, in regard to all the other posts on this thread, I'm the kind of socialist who sees the state as something to get rid off. A genuine socialist society (not the state) will hold in common and under democratic control the means for producing and distributing the things that we need in order to live decent lives, free from material want. It will be up to local communities organised in as practical a way as possible to decide what kind of organisational infrastructure is required for this. Just as it will be up to individuals to find their own self-defined 'spiritual' (fuck, I hate that word!) fulfillment. I doubt if these communities will decide they need a political state for this purpose, or that individuals will decide to simply lie in bed all day as scooternyc might imagine.

This in fact was always the view of early socialists like Karl Marx and Frederick Engels. The 'socialism' that everyone refers to on this site isn't socialism at all, it's capitalism run by the state; state-capitalism in other words. This is what proved to be a total failure in Russia and China and in all of the other ghastly dictatorships. When these countries where taken over by Bolshevik type self-appointed dictators the first thing they had to do was to develop capitalism under the control of the state. State-capitalism dosen't work, however, and it had to be kept in power by those who had an interest in doing so.

Another erroneous idea is that 'socialism' means re-distributing wealth through the tax system. This is utter nonsense. No socialist theory I've ever grappled with has ever postulated such a ridiculous course of action.

In Marxian economic terms, for example, it's simply an illusion that wage and salary earners even pay tax. Tax is a charge on capital. How wages and salaries are determined is a complicated business, but one thing's for certain, just because tax appears to be deducted from your wage or salary doesn't automatically mean you'd get it for yourself if the state didn't take it!

But, of course, it's not wage and salary earners that scooternyc admires - it's the real thieves, layabouts and spongers on society that he has the hots for - those who are forced to give back a fraction of their ill-gotten gains through the tax system. Poor things. Poor scooternyc.

BTW scootnyc, I still need an answer to my last question: Should parents be legally prevented from giving or passing on their wealth to their offspring?

If not, why not?

85. AAI 07

Comment #84288 by NMcC on November 1, 2007 at 4:08 pm

scooternyc

There's a question for you at 471 above.

Just in case you didn't read my comments there.

86. AAI 07

Comment #84250 by NMcC on November 1, 2007 at 2:36 pm

Bloody typical.....I had stopped visiting this site about a month ago having been disillusioned slightly by contributors forever claiming that discussing politics was 'off topic'.

Now, I have a quick look in to see what's happening and discover 10 pages of discussion on socialism!!

I haven't been able to read all 10 pages of comments but have read a few in order to get a flavour of the debate.

Seems to me that there is an awful lot of nonsense being contributed, some of it despicable.

The bold scooter imagines himself to be ever so straight-thinking, logical, rational and non-emotional, so here's a question for him:

Who are the real scroungers? The majority who go out and create all the wealth or the minority of parasites who live off capitalism's holy trinity of rent, interest and profit?

You think that those with money are in that position because of superior abilities that they unfailingly have.

Of course, the real reason, is that these parasites live off their ability to get others to work for them. In most cases, that's all the ability they have.

Rather, I'll re-phrase that: in most cases the only ability these useless parasites have is their 'ability' to get born into a well-off family.

Far from the poor and destitute being a drain on society, it's these people and their relatives who create the wealth in the first place.

I might have missed it, so, if this question has already been asked, my apologies: tell me, scooter, do you think that it should be illegal for parents to pass on their wealth to their children? If not, you are undermining your own despicably stupid and ignorant opinions.

87. The Fleas Are Multiplying!

Comment #69672 by NMcC on September 12, 2007 at 6:22 am

Northern Bright

Great post.

You have highlighted exactly what I was talking about as far as contributers to this site describing the failed system in the old Soviet Union as 'communism' is concerned.

You rightly state that the East Germans themselves didn't even say that they lived under communism. You could have added that, for example, Lenin (and others) admitted it was state-capitalism, Hitchens' one time hero, Trotsky, said it was a 'deformed workers state' (ugh!!), and Breznev said in the 1960s that they wouldn't have communism until the 1980s.

In short, your question about evidence is a good one. But not simply as to why atheists and theists appear to differ on what constitutes evidence. Obviously, there's a discrepancy as to what different atheists see as 'evidence'.

In the context of this discussion, it's interesting that a lot of atheists are happy to call that which existed in the Eastern Bloc communism when even the people who lived there didn't and all the evidence points to it being capitalism run by the state. As some Amercians are wont to say, if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then perhaps it's a duck.

This topic is not that much off base here when it might be the case that most atheists talk about communism existing in places like Russia when there is no evidence for this in exactly the same way as the religious people claim God exists when there's no evidence for that either.

As you say, what is the nature of evidence?

88. The Fleas Are Multiplying!

Comment #69632 by NMcC on September 12, 2007 at 1:51 am

Mr DArcy


Well said. Great post which has hit the nail on the head.

Most people, if not all, who contribute to this site consider themselves to be independent thinkers and completely free from dogma. For the most part, they are, and fair play to them. They're the kind of people who never accepted that the now defunct German Democratic Republic was in the slightest degree 'democratic' for the simple reason that they have a fair idea as to what constitutes 'democracy', and they easily recognize that nothing of the kind ever existed in East Germany under the rule of the so-called communists.

Despite this skeptical frame of mind, however, practically everyone on this site falls hook, line and sinker for the lie that 'communism' existed in Russia (and other places) and that it has completely failed and been overthrown. They've simply accepted the views of those who wanted us to believe that 'communism' existed in places like Russia so that they can say 'look how crap it was, who'd want to live there?, capitalism is best' and so on, and they uncritically accept the equally fallacious views of those who actually were in control in Russia who promulgated the myth that they had communism there and that it was wonderful compared to capitalism. In other words, most people simply accept the lies of those who had a vested interest in spreading and maintaining the lie, even though the liars in this case are coming from two different directions.

But the fact is, there was never any real difference between the private capitalism of the West and the state-capitalism of the East. Anyone who reads anything about what it was really like in Russia, from 1917 onwards, can easily see this. 'A rose by any other name would smell as sweet.' And, in this case, a hideous capitalist dictatorship doesn't change its nature simply by sticking 'communist' onto it, regardless of whether it's the supporters or detractors who stick the label on.

As Mr Darcy has pointed out above, all of the recognizable features of capitalism existed in the so-called 'communist' countries and the only real difference was that, in economic terms primarily, private individuals run private capitalism and state bureaucrats run state-capitalism – but the result is the same: wage slavery for the many and the life of Riley for those at the top.

The next time anyone on this site wants to post anything about 'communism', I would simply ask them to first of all consider whether they would be just as keen to call the old East Germany the German Democratic Republic on the grounds that since it called itself that, and was called that in the West, it must have been 'democratic'. The analogy with so-called 'communism' works quite well, I think.

89. The Fleas Are Multiplying!

Comment #69393 by NMcC on September 11, 2007 at 4:58 am

NUCLEARMAN

As a matter of fact, genius, if you read all the posts between JemyM and myself, you'll see that we ended the thing reasonably amicably.

I'll not bother replying to all your silly nonsense, one thing I will say though, is that it's not very sensible to comment on the motivations of people you don't even know, especially, as in this case, when you are completely wrong.

What's that crap about me probably hating 'my nation'? Oh dear, you didn't read my posts at all, did you?

I'd take you more seriously if you had the common decency to check up on something before shooting your big mouth off.

Now go back and read all the posts and stop being a dickhead.

90. Review of Richard Dawkins' new book 'The Fascism Delusion'

Comment #69247 by NMcC on September 10, 2007 at 6:45 am

And what makes the whole 'fascism or communism' question even more 'ironic' is that your 'communism' wasn't communism at all, it was capitalism run by the state! So Lenin said, anyway. And he should know, he started it.

So, ironical laughs all round, I'd say.

91. The Fleas Are Multiplying!

Comment #68876 by NMcC on September 9, 2007 at 2:09 am

112. Comment #68849 by eric.malitz on September 8, 2007 at 11:45 pm

"could someone tell me who the faces are on the 'village atheist' book besides darwin and harris?"

It's a good question, eric.malitz.

At first glance I thought it was obvious that they were Darwin, Huxley (in old age) Marx, Stalin, Mao and Harris.

Looking at it again I'm not so sure. The whole thrust of the cover is bizarre, or, more likely, simply dishonest.

Why are all the figures except Stalin in colour, for example? Is there some kind of point being made that atheism, from whatever direction, leads to the grey horrors of Stalinism?

Why include Darwin, who wasn't an atheist, and Huxley (if that's who it's supposed to be) who not only was an agnostic, but was responsible for coining the term agnostic? Why include Marx in fact, who would have described himself as a materialist rather than an atheist? Is that the lunatic Mao, or his teenage sister?

Why is Dawkins missing? Where is Dennett and Hitchens and Grayling?

Nope, I think the inference is unmistakeable: atheism leads to the Stalinist gulag.

Or, as it should be inferred, there is no depths of dishonesty to which the lying for Jesus crowd will not stoop.

92. The Fleas Are Multiplying!

Comment #68770 by NMcC on September 8, 2007 at 1:44 pm

Dr Benway

Can't for the life of me see how any of your comments relate to me at all. "Elmer Fudd ire, like minded clones". Sorry, you've lost me.

Johnny O and JemyM

Both of you highlight the problem well: despite the names of the various organisations and parties you mention, have any of them ever attempted to do anything other than try and run capitalism better than their opponents?

The best you could say is that some within these organisations and parties imagine that you can have an island of socialism (production for use rather than for the market) within the sea of capitalism.

Of course JemyM you are right, most don't even pretend to do this any more. All that happens now is that the 'opposition' say to people 'vote for us, we'll not make as big a hash of running capitalism as the crowd in power at the moment'.

People, of course, sooner or later, fall for it and vote out one crowd of failures and replace them with another crowd - and so it goes on until the new crowd reveal themselves to be useless at running capitalism and then they get booted out. Meanwhile absolutely nothing of significance changes.

One main gripe JemyM with what you said: Tony Blair was a socialist and was the leader of a socialist party. You wont find many in the UK agreeing with that!!

93. The Fleas Are Multiplying!

Comment #68744 by NMcC on September 8, 2007 at 11:41 am

Dr Benway

OK you've rumbled me. I lose my temper and I can be harsh with my comments. I'll try to be more considerate in future like you.

P.S. - Are you the Dr Benway who first came to my attention on this website when you threatened to go round to The Wee Flea and "f*** his mother?" - just wondering.

JemyM

You are absolutely right: there are so many different organisations and groups calling themselves 'socialist' that it's difficult to understand what the term means.

My view is that practically all of these organisations have simply advocated that the state owns the means for producing wealth and for providing services and tries to operate these within capitalism and whilst under the dictates of the market. Or, if they try to ignore the market, they simply become a state-owned capitalist concern that loses money which has to be bailed out with tax revenues.

Capitalism run by the state doesn't work. Bolsheviks like Lenin, Trotsky Stalin et al have tried the extreme form and 'Labour' Parties have tried a less extreme form - and all of it has been a total disaster.

Keep trying with the 'Socialist Standard' magazine. You can get free copies ordered through the site you were on.

Regards

94. The Fleas Are Multiplying!

Comment #68733 by NMcC on September 8, 2007 at 10:48 am

Dr Benway

I'll defend your right to stick your oar in where it's not wanted or required under these circumstances:

1. You stick it into someone else's business rather than mine.

95. The Fleas Are Multiplying!

Comment #68729 by NMcC on September 8, 2007 at 10:18 am

JemyM

Thanks for your reply.

Yes, in each country there has been a reformist 'movement' which called itself, in most cases, 'socialist'. I have to disagree though that these movements were socialist in any real sense. In practice they were nothing more than fair weather friends of the view that capitalism should be run by the state rather than by private individuals. And it's this that they called 'socialism'.

You said that you are interested in philosophy and culture and different ideas etc. Why don't you type into Google 'Socialist Standard' and get some free copies of this magazine. Published since 1904, it has been consistently anti-Leninist (since early 1918) and pro non-market socialist (has never supported state-capitalism, in other words.) It also has always argued against religion.

Incidentally, your English in your last two posts is impeccable.

Regards

96. The Fleas Are Multiplying!

Comment #68721 by NMcC on September 8, 2007 at 9:23 am

coretemprising

There now, two posts in one day from you - and one of them sarcastic. Now get you jolly well stuck in in the future and see that you don't just sit there shaking your head.

97. The Fleas Are Multiplying!

Comment #68714 by NMcC on September 8, 2007 at 8:46 am

kraut

Thanks for that friendly attempt at enlightenment.

If you take Professor Dawkins's advice to one of his telephone callers and 'go away and read a book', I think you'll find that the terms socialism and communism were always used interchangably by the pioneers of socialist ideas and both mean a society in which the means of production and distribution are owned in common by society as a whole (not the state).

I think you are getting mixed up because you can't tell the difference between the state-capitalist views of people like Lenin and his (erstwhile) followers and the genuine socialist ideas of people like Marx.

Having been told off already today, I'll resist the temptation to say that your difficulties in this regard, if your post is anything to go by, stem from the fact that you are an idiot.

98. The Fleas Are Multiplying!

Comment #68710 by NMcC on September 8, 2007 at 8:21 am

JemyM

My apologies if it seems that I was criticising your use of English. That wasn't the point of my post. Obviously, English isn't your first language and I should have taken cognizance of that.

Anyway, my real criticism is there to be seen in the post.

Please feel free to address that.

Perhaps if you start with the recognition that what you call 'communism' and 'socialism' is properly called 'state-capitalism', or 'capitalism run by the state' and that 'old Europe' as you describe it, can more properly be understood as 'feudalism', it would help put things into perspective.

coretemprising

It was what was said that I was more interested in, not the way that it was said.

I'm sorry if I riled you to the extent that you feel compelled to 'make the mistake of posting'. I'll try harder in future not to say anything that might get your core temp to rise above head shaking. Heaven forfend!

99. The Fleas Are Multiplying!

Comment #68691 by NMcC on September 8, 2007 at 7:03 am

pewkatchoo

Perhaps my post is 'a bit over the top', but is it false? As a socialist, the kind of rubbish expounded by 'JemyM' has the same effect on me as the rubbish that the Wee Flea comes out with has on you.

Anyway, did you not say yesterday in another thread that you're the rip up your carpet and crap in your slippers type of chap?

phasmagigas

I'm of the opinion that there is quite a bit of 'explaining' in my previous post. Laced with a certain amount of annoyance, granted.

Mind you, I quite enjoyed Darwin's rotweiler telling Cornwell that he was talking nonsense (and more than once) the other day.

Also, at least I didn't tell JemyM to 'go away and read a book' as the good Prof. did to a caller on one of the radio shows he was on.

Perhaps Dawkins is more polite and patient than me. I'd have told the idiot to 'fuck off and read a book.'

Oh dear, I'm doing it again. Better calm down and go and watch the mighty Northern Ireland beat Latvia. On second thoughts, watching Northern Ireland play football may not be the best way to calm down.

Regards.

100. The Fleas Are Multiplying!

Comment #68683 by NMcC on September 8, 2007 at 6:02 am

Jack Rawlinson

No, there's no personal grudge involved. I've no idea who JemyM is, nor, I strongly suspect, do I want to know. Far from my post being a 'splenetic rant', it's a perfectly reasonable response to a lot of ignorant drivel.

I see that JemyM has come back so this is for both of you:

"The comparision (sic) between atheism and communism is profound ignorance".

Yes, JemyM, yours! I think what you mean to convey in this sentence is that it's profoundly ignorant to equate atheism with communism.

Is it indeed? Profoundly ignorant? Well, the ideas of people like Karl Marx, whose writings are generally considered to form the bedrock of socialist/communist theory, are predicated on the philosophy of historical materialism. This philosophy, among other things, states that it's from the real, natural, material world that we derive our views, ideas, opinions etc. In short, that it is the material world that we have to deal with as there is no evidence for any such thing as a supernatural world. Marx himself put it well enough when he characterized the part played by religion in the material world as 'the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the soul of soulless conditions'. It's simply not consistent to be an advocate of the socialist philosophy of historical materialism, whilst at the same time maintain a belief in the supernatural.

So, the theoretical genius of JemyM notwithstanding, it's anything but 'profoundly ignorant' to equate socialist/communist ideas with atheism. If JemyM had simply stated that you don't have to be a socialist/communist to be an atheist, then that would have been perfectly true.

The rest of JemyM's first paragraph is simply an embarrassment. Anyone who can lament the lack of formal education on the part of unknown others whilst being the author of this atrociously worded, ignorant rubbish (the last sentence even says the exact opposite of what JemyM means to say!!) needs to go away and enroll in a few night classes at their local school.. (I'm assuming that JemyM is not a school kid as it is, of course).

"To even understand socialism one must understand European and Asian history…"

Actually, to 'understand socialism' you only have to read a few works by socialist writers. For a no-nothing like JemyM, a good start would be Frederick Engels' pamphlet 'Socialism, Utopian and Scientific' for the historical and philosophical ideas, or Marx's Value, Price and Profit or Wage Labour and Capital for the economics of the subject. There is any number of other books, of course.

….where people were divided by class."
As a matter of fact, 'class' as far as socialist/communist theory is concerned is defined by a person's relationship to the means of producing and distributing material needs, wants and wealth. As such, every society, (and not just in 'old Europe'- by which, I assume, is meant feudal Europe- as JemyM puts it) since the dissolution of primitive communistic societies, is a 'class society', including the USA.

"Unlike the US, where you are born equal, if you were born poor in Europe/Asia you belonged to the bottom class for the rest of your life……"

I've already commented on the idiocy of the first part of this sentence in my previous post. As to the second part, represented by the dots, I simply can't make head nor tail of it. Nor can I be bothered to try. So, I challenge JemyM to word this in some kind of understandable English and I'll be pleased to deal with it.

All I will say about the above mentioned paragraph is that the person who states 'In most places socialism succeeded peacefully, abolished the class system and eventually turned into capitalism' knows nothing about the meaning of the terms 'socialism', 'succeeded', 'peacefully', 'abolished', 'class', 'system' and 'capitalism'.

"An atheist deny (sic) god…."

This should obviously say that atheists deny there is any evidence for the existence of a God or Gods.

"....while socialist (sic) fight the class system and everything that represent (sic) a 'class'"

Funnily enough, Socialists, or at least, the ones I know, generally see no contradiction between arguing (fighting) against the myriad detrimental effects of a class riven society like capitalism and not believing in fairy stories of the sort told by the religious.

"You can be communist and Christian at the same time."

See above. And, in general, only in the sense that JemyM can both be the author of this rubbish and, at the same time, be considered by Jack Rawlinson to be 'reasonable'.

"The connection between atheism and the Soviet Union/China is as profund as calling any christian a muslim because they believe in god, or automaticly assume that thoose who speak against dictatorship are anarchs."

Er…at this point I've lost the will to live!