Timewaster's Guide Archive

you miss the point. Collectively, personal experience is more relative than "controlled variables" because it is NOT controlled. We can do a study to prove that guinea pigs are smarter than humans with the right variable. "Science" has proven that over and over again. (See Global Warming studies, all of them, which all leave out several important factors, such as one of the thermometers they use is on top of a building in NYC right next to an air conditioning unit, and there are only 5 indicators). My personal experiences, combined with others personal experiences, trumps "controlled studies".

there is no more concrete evidence than personal visible experience. Studies and the like are always controlled and manipulated and are almost never truly factual. Remember the study which determined that eggs cause cancer? Or the ones which said smoking is not hazardous? Or the ones who claim global warming as a "fact" even though the mean temperature of the earth has cooled over the past 10 years? I work with these people day in and day out, they are all MUCH more intelligent than I am, yet I have to constantly help them with these mundane tasks, such as sending email or burning a CD. Even though they have been shown how to do these things countless times, they just dont get it.

I have read hundreds of articles where the courts (mostly in more conservative areas) refuse to acknowledge these documents when presented with blood relatives who object to them. I have even read an article where an adopted person was in a coma in an ICU and the birth-mother, via the courts, had the adoptive parents banished.

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But the fathers couldn't be recognized as legal guardians or have parental rights over the children, wouldn't have legal rights to visit the wife while in hospital and vice versa, no legal standing for the wife as inheritor should the father die or vice versa, no insurance coverage from one spouse to the other

All of these rights are available through non-marriage arrangements (well, the last one depends on what state you're in).

I think it's important for both sides of the argument not to cloud the issue with extraneousness.

But the courts routinely override these "arrangements" in favor of blood family members. Something that almost never happens with married partners. It is most definately, unequivocally, not good enough. Marriage is the only true protection life partners can give each other. Everything else is just a shadow.

The more "intelligent" a person is, the more likely they are to fail at the "simpler" tasks. I work with many brilliant people, I see this all the time.

[One reason some athiests are intolerant is that they come to their conclusion through logic. Therefore, if anyone comes to a different conclusion, they assume they are either stupid or have an ulterior motive.

Actually, you find it is the opposite. Those that came to their non-belief through logic are more likely to be passive towards your choice of religion instead of opposed. Such as myself. I came to a LOGICAL conclusion that there is no higher power. To me it is just science. But in the same token as religion, I profess zero understanding of many forms of art which others like, especially the surrealist and the like. simply because, in my eye, it is devoid of logic. Some people are religious, some people like surrealism. Some are neither. to each their own.

Ah, it seems to me that the most vociferous Atheists come from Southern Baptist stock.  I find this very interesting.

I would profer that it is the passion that Southerners have for everything they do or believe that could be the root of that. Ever go to a football game with a southerner? They put us northerns to shame as "fans".

my apologies, I was slightly off in the number: it is 15% as reported by Lauren Green, Religious Correspondent from FoxNews, concerning a Trinity College Poll

http://foxforum.blogs.foxnews.com/2009/03/11/green_trinity_religion/

The Jedi thing may have been .7, but I just threw that in there for levity. You are right though, a hefty percentage of people in the UK are 100% bonkers.

My derivative on Sept doesnt match yours, doesnt matter, you get my point, aside from terminology.

From Dictionary.com:

ag·nos·tic    (āg-nŏs'tĭk)   
n.   

One who believes that it is impossible to know whether there is a God.
One who is skeptical about the existence of God but does not profess true atheism.
One who is doubtful or noncommittal about something.
adj.   
Relating to or being an agnostic.
Doubtful or noncommittal: "Though I am agnostic on what terms to use, I have no doubt that human infants come with an enormous 'acquisitiveness' for discovering patterns" (William H. Calvin).

I should have prefaced my agnostic remark this way (was intended, even if not implied): "an agnostic is someone who believes there could be a higher power but does not care, basically."

Renoard: I said "major" sect, which would leave out the Quakers etc. Pentacostal is an offshoot of Protestantism, as is Baptist etc. They would mostly fall under the same "sect" heading, I would believe since they are loosely bound to each other for the most part, just as Lutheran, while a product of the Martin Luther protestant movement is more closely aligned with Catholicism and would fall under that heading. Mormonism, is a unique branch all it's own, and while derived from Christianity, it would not be, what most consider, true Christianity, since they annointed a new prophet in Joseph Smith (not sure if that is exactly correct, I am not as up on the Mormon faith as I am most of the others). I would even offer that, while it is Christian in name (for the belief in Jesus as Savior) that is where the similarities of faith end (as opposed to core system, which all religions share, as I explained above). I consider Mormonism a religion all it's own, rather than a "branch" like Catholicism, Protestanism, Methodism etc would be.