Atheism also denies Hell.
Yeah...I'm now convinced I fed a troll, or a really confused atheist.
DanaBug
JoinedPosts by DanaBug
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30
Why This Atheist Respects the Jehovah's Witnesses-And why other Atheists should too!
by RaustBD ini'm an atheist, and i'd like to take some time to talk about why i hold a great deal of respect for the jehovah's witnesses, and some words of encouragement that may put an end to the ridicule and disrespect you seem to get from, well, all sorts of people.. .
i never gave this kind of criticism a second thought: i knew nothing about you, and i figured you were just another fringe group of christianity.
i now feel terrible about this, and i wish to apologize for my (admittedly never spoken) disrespect.
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DanaBug
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How do we encourage the science of homosexuality?
by sabastious inat one point in my life i chose to stop listening to my religion's advice to not research outside of their framework.
about the time i made that decision was when the gay marriage debate was going very strong; and still is to this day.
back then i felt like my state of california was leading the front on it to stop the bigotry and oppression once and for all.. it was a hot topic for me because i was questioning the bible and my faith so i started researching the science of homosexulality.
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DanaBug
If my grandkids grow up in a more tolerant world than I grew up in, that will be a start. Baby steps.
We grew up in a more tolerant world than our grandparents did. That's progress. I'd like to see an end to extreme religion too. I sometimes wonder if it's just a mental defect, lol! Maybe we should be encouraging the science on that.
Homosexuality occurs in nature, is considered 'of nature' and is therefore natural. I hate when homophobes use that term, unnatural. Call them abnormal if you want because they are certainly not 'of the norm' but don't call them unnatural, because that is wrong.
This is a really good point and something I just recently looked at. What does it say about God if he designed all these creatures like this? I'm not saying that all these things are okay; as humans we limit what's okay to what doesn't infringe on the rights of someone else.
Researchers have observed monogamy, promiscuity, sex between species, sexual arousal from objects or places, sex apparently via duress or coercion, copulation with dead animals, homosexual, heterosexual and bisexualsexual behaviour, and situational sexual behaviour and a range of other practices among animals other than humans. Related studies have noted diversity in sexed bodies and gendered behaviour, such as intersex and transgender animals.
Current understanding is that many species that were formerly believed monogamous have now been proven to be promiscuous or opportunistic in nature; a wide range of species appear both to masturbate and to use objects as tools to help them do so; in many species animals try to give and get sexual stimulation with others where procreation is not the aim; and homosexual behaviour has now been observed among 1,500 species and in 500 of those it is well documented. [ 1 ]
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Why This Atheist Respects the Jehovah's Witnesses-And why other Atheists should too!
by RaustBD ini'm an atheist, and i'd like to take some time to talk about why i hold a great deal of respect for the jehovah's witnesses, and some words of encouragement that may put an end to the ridicule and disrespect you seem to get from, well, all sorts of people.. .
i never gave this kind of criticism a second thought: i knew nothing about you, and i figured you were just another fringe group of christianity.
i now feel terrible about this, and i wish to apologize for my (admittedly never spoken) disrespect.
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DanaBug
While I do feel that many of the Watchtower's stances on various issues (such as the scientific theory of evolution) are problematic, I can honestly say that I'm not bothered too much.
Are you aware of JWs stance on blood transfusions, higher education, and disfellowshipping? If so, are you bothered by these? Have you read the articles and quotes used to support these doctrines and does the manipulation of information and deceit bother you, especially regarding articles and publications about blood and evolution?
While JWs can be commended for not believing in hell, they are harmful in many other ways. They more than make up for that little doctrinal difference, and that's what they're criticized for.
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How do we encourage the science of homosexuality?
by sabastious inat one point in my life i chose to stop listening to my religion's advice to not research outside of their framework.
about the time i made that decision was when the gay marriage debate was going very strong; and still is to this day.
back then i felt like my state of california was leading the front on it to stop the bigotry and oppression once and for all.. it was a hot topic for me because i was questioning the bible and my faith so i started researching the science of homosexulality.
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DanaBug
To me, the answer to this question would prove the Bible as false because it would expose the writer's ignorance to biology therefore could not be God's word.
I think it's the same as creationism. You would think all the evidence against creationism would prove the Bible false and people would actually read that evidence and change their minds. And they have their psuedo-scientists for that too. People will continue to believe what they want, even if it's not true, for various reasons. I do think the next generations will be much less homophobic until it gradually disappears. We're learning and progressing, slowly but surely.
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Do you find mustaches attractive?
by sabastious in.
^ i know many women who are all over that.. -sab.
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DanaBug
My father has had that mustache for as long as I can remember.
I like goatees and beards though.
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oh God.......
by Mr. Falcon ini'm watching the 2nd louis theroux visit to the phelps.
i don't feel so well..
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Oxymorons
by donny inbelow are some oxymorons that i find funny.
do you have any others to add?
oxymorons.
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DanaBug
daily miracles
A sign on a church down the road from me: When you receive daily miracles, give God glory. Or something to that effect.
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The Hobbit and Evolution: So What's Up With That?
by AGuest inmay you all have peace!.
hubby and i happened to catch an episode of "nova" last night.
fascinating stuff.
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DanaBug
Seems there's a bit of a threat to the "concrete" theories of evolution, man's origination in Africa, and hominid species.
Which concrete theories of evolution are in dispute? The dispute about H. floresiensis is whether they are homo sapiens with a genetic or endocrine disorder or a new species of homini and if so, how are they descended from or related to h. erectus. The theories of evolution are not in dispute, what is in dispute is how this particular group evolved and what that means in relation to how and when humans evolved. So the rest of your sentence is true, just not the first part.
Hominini is the tribe of Homininae that comprises Humans (Homo), and two species of the genus Pan (the Common Chimpanzee and the Bonobo), their ancestors, and the extinct lineages of their common ancestor (but see the discussion below for alternative vies). Members of the tribe are called hominins (cf. Hominidae, "hominids"). The subtribeHominina is the "human" branch, including genus Homo and its close relatives, but not Pan.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hominini
The discoverers (archaeologist Mike Morwood and colleagues) proposed that a variety of features, both primitive and derived, identify these individuals as belonging to a new species, H. floresiensis, within the taxonomic tribe of Hominini. Hominini currently comprises the extant species human (the only living member of the genus Homo), bonobo (genus Pan), and chimpanzee (genus Pan); their ancestors; and the extinct lineages of their common ancestor. [1] [3] The discoverers also proposed that H. floresiensis lived contemporaneously with modern humans (Homo sapiens) on Flores. [4] Doubts that the remains constitute a new species were soon voiced by the Indonesian anthropologist Teuku Jacob, who suggested that the skull of LB1 was a microcephalic modern human. Two studies by paleoneurologist Dean Falk and her colleagues (2005, 2007) rejected this possibility. [5] [6] [7] Falk et al. (2005) has been rejected by Martin et al. (2006) and Jacob et al. (2006) and defended by Morwood (2005) and Argue, Donlon et al. (2006).
Two orthopedic researches published in 2007 both reported evidence to support species status for H. floresiensis. A study of three tokens of carpal (wrist) bones concluded there were similarities to the carpal bones of a chimpanzee or an early hominin such as Australopithecus and also differences from the bones of modern humans. [8] [9] A study of the bones and joints of the arm, shoulder, and lower limbs also concluded that H. floresiensis was more similar to early humans and apes than modern humans. [10] [11] In 2009, the publication of a cladistic analysis [12] and a study of comparative body measurements [13] provided further support for the hypothesis that H. floresiensis and Homo sapiens are separate species.
Critics of the claim for species status continue to believe that these individuals are Homo sapiens possessing pathologies of anatomy and physiology. A second hypothesis in this category is that the individuals were born without a functioning thyroid, resulting in a type of endemic cretinism (myxoedematous, ME). [14]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_floresiensis#Laron_syndrome_hypothesis
Flores Man Denied Status As New Species
Poor Flores Man just can't rest in peace. All year a controversy has raged about whether the bones found in 2003 on the remote Indonesian island of Flores represent a new species. Australian paleoanthropologist Peter Brown insists the skeleton is a new type of human who should be called Homo floresiensis. Others say he's simply a pygmy, five feet tall, who had microcephaly, a condition that results in a small, oddly shaped skull.
That's why Robert Eckhardt, a paleoanthropologist at Pennsylvania State University, and a team have intently analyzed the 18,000-year-old bones. The group's research papers, undergoing peer review, are unequivocal. "Homo floresiensis," says Eckhardt, "is not a valid new human species."
Brown is dismissive. "Robert Eckhardt is thick as a plank," he says. Working on the joint Australian-Indonesian team that discovered Flores Man, Brown concluded that the brain shape, long arms, and chinless jaw indicate descent from an early hominid. He also believes Flores Man is, in fact, a woman who stood less than four feet tall. But Brown has lost his ability to prove his case. The Indonesian government has not renewed the Australians' permits to excavate on Flores, ending his chances to find a second skull to support the theory. Compounding the problem, the bones have been badly damaged. The pelvis is shattered and the jaw broken, injuries that Brown and Teuku Jacob, a senior Indonesian archaeologist and proponent of the pygmy theory, blame on each other. —Zach Zorichhttp://discovermagazine.com/2006/jan/archaeology-copy
66 Hobbit Wars Heat Up
When small, humanlike bones were discovered in a cave on the Indonesian island of Flores in 2003, anthropologists knew they had found something exceedingly odd. But what? A new species of dwarf people? A colony of pygmy freaks? Half-joking, some researchers simply referred to the remains as "hobbits."
The evidence from 2006 has sharpened the speculation. In September Penn State evolutionary biologist Robert Eckhardt published a paper attacking the idea that Flores Man was a separate species of hominin, related to Homo erectus, that lived in isolation as recently as 13,000 years ago. That idea is championed by Peter Brown of the University of New England in Armidale, Australia, a codiscoverer of Flores Man.
Eckhardt argues that the bones share many features, such as rotated teeth and a receding chin, with the Rampasasa pygmies living today near the cave where the remains were found. He notes that the average Rampasasa is just a foot taller than Flores Man. "They may have been going through a temporary food shortage that made them small even for pygmies," he says. In addition, his team found that the most complete specimen of Flores Man was so misshapen that the individual likely suffered from some sort of developmental abnormality, which might explain why the brain was so small.
But when anatomists at Stony Brook University in New York examined the Flores specimens at the request of Brown's team, they supported that group's very different interpretation. They found that Flores Man's shoulders were hunched slightly more forward than in modern humans, and the extraordinarily short legs ended in long feet. Such features seem to tag the Flores people as a separate species, not pygmy versions of modern humans. In addition, some of the oldest Flores remains date back before modern humans were thought to be in the area, which suggests that Flores Man was a distinct species. These little remains could rewrite the story of modern human evolution, so don't expect the debate, or the tempers, to cool down anytime soon.
Jeffrey Winters
http://discovermagazine.com/2007/jan/paleontology/article_view?b_start:int=1&-C#66
In one comparative study [subscription required], anthropologist Adam Gordon, now an assistant professor at the University of Albany, along with colleagues at George Washington University, found that the skull of LB1, nicknamed “the hobbit,” was “well outside the range of modern human variation,” according to Gordon. “When you consider the relationship between size and shape of the skull, [it] is most similar to Homo habilis,” a small hominid that disappeared more than a million and a half years ago.
In another study, paleoanthropologist William Jungers of Stony Brook University in New York studied the foot of the hobbit and found it, true to its namesake, strikingly large relative to the size of the body, with very short big toes. Jungers argues that this foot structure links the hobbit to earlier hominids. Claims that they were diseased humans, Jungers says, “are ridiculous.”
But Robert B. Eckhardt, an evolutionary biologist at Penn State University, notes that the DNA isolated from the remains matches that of Homo sapiens, and no study has ruled out the possibility that the hobbit was a human with a developmental abnormality.
http://discovermagazine.com/2009/jan/085
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They're Growing Hearts In The Lab
by metatron inhttp://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-1372938/live-human-heart-grown-lab-using-stem-cells-potential-transplant-breakthrough.html.
at this juncture, i will add my usual 'intercourse you, watchtower and your lying promises' ..................... realizing full well that a future witness will benefit from a lab grown heart while parking his flying car and while muttering 'everything is worse and worse'.
i guess that's no differerent than watching an ultra-orthodox rabbi in 18th century ghetto dress on satellite tv or jihadists using the internet to extol the virtues of a corrupt and ignorant caliphate in the middle ages.. if this keeps up, i will be hard pressed not to empathize with atheists who absolutely despise religion.
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DanaBug
Lol! And let's hope they can grow functioning brains soon too!
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Discussion Topic God's Sudden Personality Change as Seen in the Bible
by charlie brown jr. inok i'm sure this has been talked to death... but since we have a thread saying we're missing a good debate here we go..... when the bible meant something to me way back when .....even then i pondered.... god starts off as this vengeful being..."listen to me or i'll lay your soul to waste".
to his enemies ....keep your distance or you will feel the wrath of yahweh or if i want what you have ....best leave now unless any of you men wanna die.
then overnight.. he is patient, loving, kind, his son says love they neighbor.
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DanaBug
Lol! Welcome, fade_away!
Charlie Brown,
I think the bible makes a lot more sense if you look at it as the evolution of a group of people and a religion. Throw the god part out, it's just a book written by men of the same ethnicity. Have you read God: A Biography or The Evolution of God? Miles' book is a biography of the character of God in the Tanakh. Wright's book goes back to hunter-gatherer tribes and how monotheistic religions evolved from that. I don't agree with everything in either of those, but there was a lot of fascinating stuff in both of them that was new to me.