Would you rather live in a world without science...or in a world without religion? Showing 6,251-6,300 of 12,463

[cHriS]

Travis wrote: No, you didn't answer. You need to read back. Because I've been waiting. ..."

We have either reached stalemate about this issue, or you are playing cat and mouse with me.

If you don't think you got an answer, or the answer you wanted, ask again.

[Sarah]

I'm glad that you don't feel this way and I'm sure there are those who share your views. Unfortunately this is an issue that comes up an awful lot in my own experience as an atheist, the most common questions and views being: 'So, if you don't believe in god, what do you live for?' 'How can there be morality without a god/religion?' And possibly the worst of all 'it seems like a very'cold'existence'. This was actually in reply to a comment that a scientific world without religion would be a very cold one - a comment that I have now realised is very old! Lol
McHriS wrote: "Sarah wrote:Please do not make the mistake of thinking that these are pursuits that belong to religion alone. "

I don't think that the majority of Christians (for example) think like that. It seem..."

[Travis]

Sarah wrote: "I think some of the wrong questions are being asked here: 'why was it me who was bitten by a dog?' Why do things happen to anyone? Why did I get waved to this morning? Why did a fly land on my arm?..."

It seems common for people to think if we lose religion we also lose imagination and all emotion.
Or that society would fall apart because people would be thinking (gasp! Not that)
Which is weird. For science to work, you need imagination.
For humor to work, there has to be an element of critical thinking.
Even morality, law and social structure requires critical thinking.

Though, I do appreciate the irony in the people telling us that religion is not a man made thing also wanting to claim imagination.

[Travis]

Hazel wrote: "DAMN STRAIGHT!! We were talking about the mentalist, now lets get back to it ;P"

Guess I'll have to check out this show.
Since Torchwood got cancelled , I'm running short on shows with annoyingly good looking guys in the cast, so I can lure my wife into watching with me.

[cerebus]

Yasmeen wrote: "GUYS!!!!! you're all getting off topic by having a long disussion about who's off topic, who's a troll and how did that go??!!!! stop please, we're all having a very important discussion."
It's ok, most of us can keep track of multiple threads of discussion on this topic, just keep posting whatever you want to discuss, we'll join in :)

[cerebus]

cHriS/cs wrote: "I think you missed the point there. Hazel quite often comes to Shanna's rescue, so I added..."
Troll.

cHriS/cs wrote: "Did you get emotional by that comment?"
Doesn't matter if he did or not, your trolling is an attempt to provoke that response.

[cerebus]

cHriS wrote: "Sarah wrote:Please do not make the mistake of thinking that these are pursuits that belong to religion alone. "

I don't think that the majority of Christians (for example) think like that. It seem..."
Weren't you one of the proponents of the theory in this thread that morality stems from religion? Wasn't it one of the questions you frequently refused to answer? Like this one no doubt....

[cerebus]

Travis wrote: "Since Torchwood got cancelled , I'm running short on shows with annoyingly good looking guys in the cast, so I can lure my wife into watching with me. "
Anything with Nathan Fillion seems to be a winner on that front....

[Caitlin]

Personally, I would pick science over religion. Science makes sense to me, in addition to providing me answers that I care to know about. I don't believe a world without religion would be colder, I think it would be more critical-thats critical, not cynical. My rational mind tells me seeing is believing. Not saying that there aren't things beyond my comprehension, because there most certainly is. Only that I find a comfort in data, hard facts, conclusions that stay the same each time you test the theory. Spirtuality can exist without religion and in a world of science.

[Shanna]

Cerebus wrote: "Travis wrote: "Since Torchwood got cancelled , I'm running short on shows with annoyingly good looking guys in the cast, so I can lure my wife into watching with me. "
Anything with Nathan Fillion ..."

Firefly, love it, Castle, light no brainer fun.

[Travis]

Cerebus wrote: "cHriS/cs wrote: "I think you missed the point there. Hazel quite often comes to Shanna's rescue, so I added..."
Troll.

cHriS/cs wrote: "Did you get emotional by that comment?"
Doesn't matter if he..."

The only part of cs' bs that I personally am bothered by is whenever he sarcastically refers to the 'guardians of the thread', I'm never on that list!
What does a guy have to do to get some recognition around here?!
I'm every bit as bossy and opinionated as hazel...

[Travis]

Shanna wrote: "Cerebus wrote: "Travis wrote: "Since Torchwood got cancelled , I'm running short on shows with annoyingly good looking guys in the cast, so I can lure my wife into watching with me. "
Anything with..."

Love Firefly, haven't seen Castle yet. Have to add it to my list.

[Shanna]

Travis wrote: "Cerebus wrote: "cHriS/cs wrote: "I think you missed the point there. Hazel quite often comes to Shanna's rescue, so I added..."
Troll.

cHriS/cs wrote: "Did you get emotional by that comment?"
Does..."

I know, I know...

[Shanna]

Love Firefly, haven't seen Castle yet. Have to add it to my list

My brother has collected "Jane" and "Wash" quote t-shirts, some of them are hilarious

[cerebus]

Caitlin wrote: "...thats critical, not cynical..."
You know I think that's a very important point, one that I've failed to highlight in the past when extolling the virtues of critical thinking...not realising that some will interpret the 'critical' as 'cynical'.....

[cerebus]

Travis wrote: "The only part of cs' bs that I personally am bothered by is whenever he sarcastically refers to the 'guardians of the thread', I'm never on that list!
What does a guy have to do to get some recognition around here?!
I'm every bit as bossy and opinionated as hazel... "
You can have my Guardian of the Thread badge and uniform....I'm not on this consistently enough to have it really. There'll be a handover ceremony (almost wrote hangover ceremony there, probably more apt really), and you'll have to learn the secret handshake, and the covert nod as we pass in the street....

[Travis]

Cerebus wrote: "Caitlin wrote: "...thats critical, not cynical..."
You know I think that's a very important point, one that I've failed to highlight in the past when extolling the virtues of critical thinking...no..."

There is the problem that people will see 'questioning' as disrespectful or offense.
Drives me crazy. We have to be respectful, so we can't talk about it and then we aren't even allowed to talk about why we can't talk about it.
Then I need to lay down before my head explodes.

[Travis]

Cerebus wrote: "Travis wrote: "The only part of cs' bs that I personally am bothered by is whenever he sarcastically refers to the 'guardians of the thread', I'm never on that list!
What does a guy have to do to g..."

There's a secret handshake...?
I knew it!

Hope the uniform comes with a cape.

[Travis]

Shanna wrote: "Love Firefly, haven't seen Castle yet. Have to add it to my list

My brother has collected "Jane" and "Wash" quote t-shirts, some of them are hilarious"

Firefly is one of the most quotable tv shows I've every watched.
Joss is a master at great dialogue.

[Shanna]

Does anybody else find it ironic after the "gaurdians of the thread" comment cs feels the need to reign us in for chatting in ontopic downtime about TV?

[cerebus]

Travis wrote: "Hope the uniform comes with a cape. "
"No capes!"

[Shanna]

"Firefly is one of the most quotable tv shows I've every watched.
Joss is a master at great dialogue"

Supernatural is good but not as good as Joss

[Shanna]

Cerebus wrote: "Travis wrote: "Hope the uniform comes with a cape. "
"No capes!""

How about a deep forbidding cowl?

[cerebus]

Travis wrote: "Joss is a master at great dialogue. "
I've gotta say I hated the Buffy TV series 'cos the dialogue was all smug one-liners....used sparingly they would have been good, but when entire conversations seemed to be made up of them, it got too much....for me anyway, I'm the only one I know who doesn't like that series :)

[Shanna]

Cerebus wrote: "Travis wrote: "Joss is a master at great dialogue. "
I've gotta say I hated the Buffy TV series 'cos the dialogue was all smug one-liners....used sparingly they would have been good, but when entir..."

Sorry Cerebus you're still on your own there...
Mind you I haven't watched it since and my appreciation may have changed were I to do so.

[cerebus]

Shanna wrote: "Sorry Cerebus you're still on your own there... "
That's ok, I'm used to having some fairly singular opinions :) I also think The Matrix is one of the most overrated films ever....most everyone else seems to think it's a masterwork....

[Shanna]

Cerebus wrote: "Shanna wrote: "Sorry Cerebus you're still on your own there... "
That's ok, I'm used to having some fairly singular opinions :) I also think The Matrix is one of the most overrated films ever....mo..."

bit like the titular book of this thread and it's series

[cerebus]

Shanna wrote: "How about a deep forbidding cowl?"
I'm more of a fan of the deep forbidding scowl.....

[Shanna]

Cerebus wrote: "Shanna wrote: "How about a deep forbidding cowl?"
I'm more of a fan of the deep forbidding scowl....."

It could be incorporated into a uniform, bit of strain to keep up.

[cerebus]

Shanna wrote: "It could be incorporated into a uniform, bit of strain to keep up."
You'd be surprised, after a while it just becomes natural....

[Shanna]

Cerebus wrote: "Shanna wrote: "It could be incorporated into a uniform, bit of strain to keep up."
You'd be surprised, after a while it just becomes natural...."

Yeah I think it must, my high school german/maths teacher...

[Shanna]

But then if I had to deal with teenagers and try to teach them something...

[Kristen]

I'd have to go with science, since it writes my paycheck...

But seriously: this is an intriguing question, as both science and religion can be used for good, or abused. On the one hand, religion can be an excuse to blow up any number of things or murder someone. On the other hand, it can be the motivation to be a better person.

Same goes for science. In the right hands, it saves lives. In the wrong hands, it can destroy them.

Maybe both science and religion should require a license, like carrying a firearm. I'm kidding. Sort of.

[Drew]

cHriS wrote: "Drew wrote: but you also just proved it yourself by saying that you know Hazel WILL give us examples. .."

I think you missed the point there. Hazel quite often comes to Shanna's rescue, so I added..."

No, but that's not the point, the point is that you are trying to get an angry response, which is trolling.

I don't believe I said you were disrupting, I said you were trolling.

I didn't ask you a question but others have and you continue to disregard them and answer nothing which is part of the trolling

[Shanna]

Hazel quite often comes to Shanna's rescue
Calling bullshit on you at the same time is not coming to my rescue.

[Hazel]

the problem with a troll is they can call victory when you respond to them, but they also try calling victory when you ignore them. As such, the best thing to do is take off and nuke them from orbit, its the only way to be sure.

[Shanna]

Hazel wrote: "the problem with a troll is they can call victory when you respond to them, but they also try calling victory when you ignore them. As such, the best thing to do is take off and nuke them from orbi..."

Scorched earth policy....

[cHriS]

Drew wrote: I didn't ask you a question but others have and you continue to disregard them and answer nothing which is part of the trolling ..."

Ok then, what question did I not reply to that you feel needed an answer and that someone else asked me, and I will reply now?

You are the third person who has said this in the last few day and when I have asked , What questiion? the other two have not come back with a reply.

This 'I do not answer questions' is a myth put out by a few folks here who like to stir things up, and if they say the same thing enough times the more gullible here start to believe it as well.

For example message 6403. Easy to accuse me of not answering a question, but not able to respond when asked what question?

[Shanna]

Oh FFS did you seriously just avoid a question while explaining you don't avoid questions?

[cHriS]

Shanna wrote: "Hazel quite often comes to Shanna's rescue
Calling bullshit on you at the same time is not coming to my rescue."

Hazel has got a personal issue with me, she is very much like Cerebus, getting digs in when ever she can. She will for example, reply on your behalf, to me, just to put a false interpretation on what I say. This then looks good for her, very clever. She has done it to others as well I've noticed. Travis summed her up quite well as bossy.

One more point, you are still evading my prevoius question. Now I am not to bothered if you don't want to answer, maybe you thought it was not worth giving an answer to or maybe you don't even remember the question...............

I seem to get accused of this all the this all the time, if i wanted to perpetuate a myth I could at every opportunity say Shanna does not answer questions and hope it catches on. It worked for Hazel.

But I won't.

[Shanna]

Reply on my behalf? Hazel doesn't speak for me, she speaks for herself she may respond to something directed at me, but do me the credit of allowing me my own speech, and her hers.
You get accused because you do it all the time, Don't like the acusation, stop it.

[Hazel]

Personally, Shanna, I'm not a big fan of necrophilia, bestiality or flagellation...

[Shanna]

Yeah yeah flogging a dead horse I get it :D

[cHriS]

Shanna wrote: but do me the credit of allowing me my own speech"

That is what I was doing, but you avoided the issue.

You said .....

Shanna wrote:I was being sarcastic to cHriS/cs for the ridiculous idea that gravity didn't exist prior to it's scientific explanation/naming...

...... but you had misinterpreted what I had said, and then when I pointed this out to you you replied

Shanna wrote:I misread nothing, take your smiley face and tattoo it where the sun don't shine.

So I suggested that if you did not misread my comment you must have deliberately chose to misinterpret what I said as you did, and you said.....


Shanna wrote:My mother used to say to me "Shanna, don't argue with stupid, it drags you down to their level and then beats you with experience"....

...and then

Again utter semantic bullshit


Ok, you misread my point about gravity, no big deal, but you had to make out that you were right, and to detract from the issue you gave the above replies. When I asked you again Hazel came to your defence.

As again, she has done above.

Shanna wrote:You get accused because you do it all the time, Don't like the acusation, stop it.

Again this is just you trying to deflect things away from the main issue of the 'gravity' thing which you commented on wrongly.

So you don't seem to be able to speak for yourself other than a few a few 'bullshits' dressed up in trivia.

Address the issue of the gravity thing if you think you are tough enough. Or carry on with the 'bullshitting' and give oz a bad name here.

[Travis]

Shanna wrote: "Oh FFS did you seriously just avoid a question while explaining you don't avoid questions?"

You gotta admire how he does that. It's like watching one of those kung-fu movies where the hero does these intricate, acrobatic dodges.

[Travis]

Shanna wrote: "Yeah yeah flogging a dead horse I get it :D"

That one took me a minute, as I was pre-coffee when I read it.

[Travis]

Anyway, getting bored, so let's move on.

I was reading about Solomon and David that that era and they mentioned that Solomon used djinn ( genies) to help him build his temple.
Everybody seemed okay with him using creatures borrowed from some other 'heathen' mythology.

So, if djinn were around in biblical times, does that mean all other bits of middle eastern myth existed as well?
Doesn't that muddy the waters for christianity, if you are incorporating other myths into yours?

anybody else think they missed out on some opportunities to do some cool crossover stories with other myths?
Or have I just read too many comic books?

[Drew]

cHriS wrote: "Drew wrote: I didn't ask you a question but others have and you continue to disregard them and answer nothing which is part of the trolling ..."

Ok then, what question did I not reply to that you ..."

Isabelle asked "how could we have existed without the prescence of science"

Travis asked "can you give me an example of 'god' that is there wether we understand/ have proof of it or not?" and "so, you can give an example of ancient people 'observing god' that isn't just science?"

Cerebus asked "so can you clarify what you meant by "There was a time when there was no prescence of gravity but we still remained stuck to this planet?"

You never gave an answer to any of these you just sidestepped each one by ignoring them completely and complaining about how they are teaming up on you or giving a nonsensical reply that still did not answer the question.

[Hazel]

oo oo, lets have one froma while ago. Shaun stated that throughout history, whenever religion and science have disagreed about something such as how things work etc, then it has always been religion that has had to concede to science, and the scientific answer has been accepted each and every time. CS contested this, without giving an example of when the religious answer has been the accepted one over the scientific, and when pressed, he said "creation" (if I recall correctly, if anyone else remembers, please correct me if I'm wrong). This answer was rebutted, and reason and rationality used to explain why it did not answer the question (ie, the jury is actually still out on how the universe came to be, and despite us not knowing yet, the evidence suggests the scientific answer is likely to be closer to the truth), and asked to give a proper answer. Then commenced 3 pages of him avoiding answering the question, arguing semantics, and accusing people of being unfair (paraphrasing here, it was some time ago). He also claimed that the scientific discovery of the earth revolving round the sun was a religious one, because Copernicus happened to be a low level cleric of the catholic church. Again, this was rebutted, as the methods used for the discovery were scientific, and not religious (and by using cs's logic, that means that Copernicus' discoveries could be claimed to be advances in law, or in art, or in languages instead). I wonder, has cs come up with an answer yet that satisfies the following prerequisites:

- is something that science and religion previously disagreed on
- is something that they now agree on, and have accepted one of the two explanations for
-it is the religious explanation, ie the one taught in scripture, and/or as a dogma, that was the one that was accepted as correct by both scientific and religious communities/bodies, while the scientific answer was rejected as incorrect.

[cHriS]

Ok I will take them one by one..........

Drew wrote: Isabelle asked "how could we have existed without the prescence of science"

I did answer her comment about the prescence of gravity, and then I must have got distracted by Shanna's remark. The answer to the prescence of science would be similar.

Prescence: a person or thing that exists or is present in a place but is not seen. The stuff we call gravity was always there, but we did not always know about it. When man first picked up a stone and thought ’whats that’ science began. If man did not have the ability to question, then maybe we would live without what we refer to as science.


Travis asked "can you give me an example of 'god' that is there whether we understand/ have proof of it or not?" and "so, you can give an example of ancient people 'observing god' that isn't just science?"

I have answered this question a few times before, some pages back. You have to understand that ’belief’ plays a big part in the absence of proof. If you believe Jesus was who he said he was, then the rest follows on and man was made in Gods image. As I have said, when man first questioned something, (the stone for example) science began. Maybe this man thought the sun was God, I don’t know.

Cerebus asked "so can you clarify what you meant by "There was a time when there was no prescence of gravity but we still remained stuck to this planet?"

I don’t tend to reply to Cerebus, he is the exception to the rule, ‘no prescence of gravity’; gravity exists but we don’t yet know about it. We did not need to find out about gravity for it to work.

You never gave an answer to any of these you just sidestepped each one by ignoring them completely and complaining about how they are teaming up on you or giving a nonsensical reply that still did not answer the question.

Isabelle, I sort of answered, in the first reply. Maybe I did not clarify it. I agree.

Travis, he is always saying I did not answer his questions, but he just does not read back far enough, and I have asked him to repeat the question but we never does, see above. But you have asked instead.

Cerebus, is a special case, as I have explained. I think he must have misunderstood the ‘prescence of gravity’ question Isabelle asked. The question was not , what if we had no gravity, it was, what if we did not know about gravity.

Checking this again the word Isabelle, used was ‘prescence’ which I take to mean pres·ence. Maybe she ment pre science.