Posts by Coded Logic

242

Do You Think President Trump Will Be Impeached?

by minimus in

jw
friends

whether you like him or not.... it doesn’t matter.

do you think he will be impeached?

?.

Coded Logic

There are two possible avenues for impeachment:

1: If Trump obstructed justice (this is what Nixon got kicked out of office for)

2: If Trump broke the law

The first one, to me, seems to be blatantly obvious. But we'll have to see what Mueller says. Concerning the second one, "collusion" with Russia could potentially break several laws including:

Accepting a contribution from a foreign government (52 USC 30121)
Gathering or delivering defense information to aid a foreign government (18 US Code 794)
Conspiracy to defraud the United States (18 U.S. Code § 371)
Fraud by wire, radio, or TV (18 USC 1343)
Benefiting from corrupt foreign practices (15 U.S.C. § 78dd-1)
Failure to disclose campaign finances ( The Federal Election Campaign Act)

If Muller brings evidence for either of this claims I think impeachment proceedings will begin. And if Democrats take the Senate than I have no doubt Trump will be impeached. Otherwise, with Republican's in power I'd say the odds are 50/50. But all this really hinges on what the Mueller investigation turns up.

We'll have to wait and see.

286

Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Baker Who Refused to Bake Cake for Gay Couple

by Simon in

seems like such an obviously correct decision to overturn the previous overreach - it should never have been necessary to go to the supreme court but happened because the rights of the religious were being ignored.. as the fundamental level, no one should be able to compel you to work for them or to provide services that go against your beliefs, and certainly not have the government be able to force you to comply.. if this was allowed there would be so many unreconcilable situations that would clog up courts over nonsense.. i also have little patience for these activists that intentionally look to be offended.

it really doesn't do their cause any good to go round looking to make trouble for people.

it's also misguided because it ends up strengthening religious rights over effectively stupid issues.. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/04/us/politics/supreme-court-sides-with-baker-who-turned-away-gay-couple.html.

Coded Logic

What you can't do is refuse to sell someone something that you are willing to sell to others simply because you don't like some identifiable trait.
-Simon

But isn't that exactly what happened? A gay couple came in asking for a "wedding cake". The wedding cake was not gay. It didn't have a rainbow flag on it. It wasn't topped with two people of the same sex. It didn't have a fabulous unicorn throwing up a handful of glitter on it. Etc.

The business owner was asked to bake a cake for a couple that happened to be gay. They WEREN'T asked to bake a gay cake. This is an important distinction.

I really enjoyed you analogy you gave about a black business owner asked to bake a cake with the confederate flag on it. I can definitely understand why they'd want to refuse. And conversely, if a Christian fundamentalist were asked to bake a cake with a rainbow flag on it I understand why they'd want to refuse as well.

But that's not what happened here.

"The case, Masterpiece Cakeshop Ltd. v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, goes back to 2012. In July of that year, Charlie Craig and David Mullins, a same-sex couple, went to Masterpiece Cakeshop in Lakewood, Colorado, to try to buy a cake for a wedding reception. The owner, Jack Phillips, refused the request, arguing that due to his Christian beliefs, he opposed same-sex marriages and did not want to do anything that looked like an endorsement of a same-sex wedding.

Craig and Mullins filed charges of discrimination in response, citing a Colorado law that prohibits discrimination based on sexual orientation by public accommodations (places that are open to the public, such as hotels, restaurants, and bakeries)."

72

Since Democrats Are All About the “Children” why does ABORTION Not Bother Them?

by minimus in

jw
friends

if everything is supposed to be about the lives of children, how can they hypocritically fight to take babies and kill them?

what about the children and their quality of life?.

Coded Logic

I don't think women should have abortions. Not even in cases of rape or incest.

I also don't think the state should be dictating what women can and can't do with there bodies.

I believe that a fetus should be granted basic human rights. But I also think the rights of the fetus DON'T supersede the rights of the mother.

So am I Pro-life? Or am I pro-choice?

I feel like I see both sides of the argument. But there's a profound difference between how I think other people ought to behave vs. what sort of behavior I think the State should mandate.

18

Bill Nye vs Ken Ham debate

by Whynot in

did anyone else watch the bill nye versus ken ham debate?

it happened february 4, 2014 and just watched it a few months ago.

i thought it was interesting but must confess that i felt extremely embarrassed for ken ham.

Coded Logic

Are you some sort of Bill Nye hater bot or what?

Bill Nye has no religion. He has no dogma. He doesn't prop anyone up as being infallible. And he holds no beliefs that are beyond question.

That's the complete opposite of religion.

169

Universal sovereignty on trial

by Factfulness in

i just had a thought of clarity regarding the jw explanation for this doctrine.

they explain that satan challenged god regarding his right to rule.

god failed to prove his right to rule.

Coded Logic

But the idea of an uncaused material cause that started the universe doesn’t seem to make sense since everything that is material has a cause.
-SBF

Everything we observe in our universe is energy changing from one state to another state. We've never observed a "material cause". Insisting that the universe have a "material cause" since nothing else in the universe has a "material cause" seems to be entirely arbitrary and is probably a non-sequitur.

18

Bill Nye vs Ken Ham debate

by Whynot in

did anyone else watch the bill nye versus ken ham debate?

it happened february 4, 2014 and just watched it a few months ago.

i thought it was interesting but must confess that i felt extremely embarrassed for ken ham.

Coded Logic

Bill Nye is an incredibly honest and open individual. Instead of having a religion where claims are made without evidence - he instead pursues an evidence based belief system. He has no dogma. He doesn't prop anyone up as being infallible. And he holds no beliefs that are beyond question.

If more people were like Bill Nye the world would be a much better place.

169

Universal sovereignty on trial

by Factfulness in

i just had a thought of clarity regarding the jw explanation for this doctrine.

they explain that satan challenged god regarding his right to rule.

god failed to prove his right to rule.

Coded Logic

The idea that the universe and all its laws can exist without something outside of it causing it and sustaining it seems like special pleading.

Why would the universe need something "outside" of it "causing it"? I'm not aware of anything in science that necessitates this. Is there any good reason to think there is existence outside of space/time?

169

Universal sovereignty on trial

by Factfulness in

i just had a thought of clarity regarding the jw explanation for this doctrine.

they explain that satan challenged god regarding his right to rule.

god failed to prove his right to rule.

Coded Logic

For many who believe in God . . . he stands outside of the universe, outside matter, outside time, outside of “being” as such.
-SBF

Surely you'd agree this is a case of Special Pleading. When we talk about existence we are necessarily describing something that is both local and temporal. To say that something "existed no-where for zero seconds" would be the same thing as describing something that doesn't exist.

If Theist want to put forth the proposition that God "exists" outside of space and time then they need to first demonstrate that such a thing is possible - AND THEN they can use that as an explanation. Not before.

169

Universal sovereignty on trial

by Factfulness in

i just had a thought of clarity regarding the jw explanation for this doctrine.

they explain that satan challenged god regarding his right to rule.

god failed to prove his right to rule.

Coded Logic

Why shouldn’t God as a hypothesis be the starting position? “Because I say so” seems to be the best atheists can come up with.

There is actually a very good answer to this question SBF. The reason we don't assume claims are true until proven false is because it would put us in the position of believing contradictory things simultaneously. If the JWs say there is only one God and the Hindus say there are multiple Gods - we're now put into a impossible situation of trying to believe two incompatible things at the same time. That's why positive claims require positive evidence.

And can you imagine a world where claims are assumed to be true until proven false? I'd be able to say, "SBF murdered kids" and we'd have to lock you up in prison until you were able to prove you had never murdered a child in your entire life (an impossible task).

THAT's why the God hypothesis - just like any other hypothesis - shouldn't be the default position. The default position is "I don't know". And then we can take a look at the world and see that every single thing ever investigated has had a naturalistic cause - and zero things have had a supernatural cause. And, as all the evidence is operating in one direction, our position moves from "I don't know if there's a God" to "There's an infinitely higher likelihood that gods don't exist than do exist."

18

Bill Nye vs Ken Ham debate

by Whynot in

did anyone else watch the bill nye versus ken ham debate?

it happened february 4, 2014 and just watched it a few months ago.

i thought it was interesting but must confess that i felt extremely embarrassed for ken ham.

Coded Logic

You think Bill Nye was in league with Ken Ham to promote the creationist museum???

You can't be serrious