Sunday, May 31, 2015

"Liberals" Will Soon Propose Making This "Legal"

Psychic Bob: 2016 Presidential Predictions

Sen. Rand Paul spoke out against the Patriot Act on Sunday, hours before it was set to expire

The Return of Granny Panties

Did they ever leave? Actually, I was hoping more for the return of Granny Glasses. My girlfriend does not wear a thong. She wears real women's underwear. So? Why should she, or any decent woman, conform to the sick sexualization of women that treats them only as objects to be ogled by men.

Not only did the sales of fuller styles of panties like briefs, boy shorts and high-waist briefs increase by 17 percent, but the sales of thongs also decreased seven percent. That's bad news for guys, but it's apparently great news for millennial women like Julia Baylis who recognize that "the slight indignity of showing a subtle panty line trumps the major indignity of having a piece of cloth yanked up their backside for 16 hours."-Granny Panties Are Making A Comeback

And I don't need to mention that the hatred of "old people" is part of the sickness too, as the term "granny" suggests old fashioned, outdated, not in tune with the modern world's loathing of the past.

“Manspreading”

Making yourself comfortable on a NY subway train could land you in hot water, especially if you occupy too much space

Fuck the MTA and NEW FASCIST CITY (AKA "liberal" run NYC).

The government of New York spent on an ad campaign telling men to stop sitting with their legs spread. On May 22nd, police arrested two Latino men on the charge of ‘man spreading.’

Some people are arguing that this is an excuse by police to increase their arrest quotas, and to crack down on undesirable ethnic minority males. Russia Today reported that the NYPD issued approximately 1,400 summonses for manspreading in 2015.-The First Male Has Been Arrested For “Manspreading” In NYC

Is there Life After Death ? - Scientific Research Facts

Is there life after death ? Near Death Experience Researcher Dr. Jeffery Long shares his expertise after studying over 4000 NDE's through his website: http://www.nderf.org

Commentary on the New CBS "Reality Show" The Briefcase

Here’s the premise of the show, as Lyons explains it. A family dealing with what CBS euphemistically calls “financial setbacks” is given a briefcase full of $101,000. They are then shown another “financial setbacks”-plagued family and are told they must decide how much of the cash to share — if any. Unbeknownst to either family, this alienating setup is presented to both. Lyons writes that in the early episodes sent to critics, the families find their responsibility to be so great as to cause one woman to vomit and “several” to say it’s “the hardest decision they’ve ever made.”-read more: America’s never-ending war on poor people: Why “The Briefcase” is just the latest assault

Saturday, May 30, 2015

Darwinism's Failed Predictions

Ever since Darwin evolutionists have been certain of their theory. They hold that evolution is a fact beyond all reasonable doubt. Evolutionists arrive at this conclusion from a wide range of powerful arguments based on contrastive reasoning where evolutionary theory is compared to alternative hypotheses derived from the concept of independent creation. (Hunter 2014) Evolutionists have found these alternative hypotheses to be false, leaving evolutionary ideas as the only remaining possibility. This process of elimination, which traces back to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, is based on comparing scientific evidence with expectations derived from independent creation. Therefore the motivation, justification and truth claims for evolutionary theory entail metaphysical beliefs about independent creation.

This raises the question of how evolution fares without the metaphysics. That is, how does evolution compare with the scientific evidence? Evolutionary theory holds that the biological world (and more generally the cosmos as well), arose from the interplay of chance and natural law. In other words, evolution holds that the species arose spontaneously. From a strictly scientific perspective, this is a high claim. It is perhaps not surprising that, setting the contrasting reasoning aside and focusing exclusively on the science, evolution’s fundamental predictions fail badly. The above sections reviewed several fundamental predictions of evolutionary theory, once held with great conviction, that have all been found to be false, much to the surprise of practitioners.-Darwins Predictions

New Crime Wave in 2015! Black Crime and Police! 2016 Election Analysis!

The New Nationwide Crime Wave

Republican presidential hopeful Carly Fiorina told a packed audience that a huge, complex and sometimes corrupt government was "crushing the potential" of Americans.

Carly Fiorina: Big government is crushing Americans

Around the Web: Cats, Lemons, The Patriot Act, Hitler's Cones and Single Duck Ladies

Meanwhile the cold eyes of the killer stare out at ice cream customers from the side of the packaging. In some instances he appears in cartoon form in a Swastika-shaped top hat with a jaunty red bowtie, which is somewhat at odds with his furious expression. Other more sombre packages depict him in full military regalia with almost photographic realism, looking very out of place next to an ice cream that’s almost as big as he is. - See more at: http://disinfo.com/2015/05/looking-final-solution-summer-heat-need-hitler-ice-cream-cone/#sthash.ZY2yO1Um.dpuf

Just remember that Hitler cones don't go well with Stalin brand ice cream.

News of the Hitler ice cream cones provoked a furious response on websites calling for the brand to be withdrawn.

One spectator in Berlin, said: ‘There is taste and there is tastelessness. The people of India should be made aware of the terrible crimes committed by him.’

German newspaper Bild labelled the ice cream cones a ‘macabre publicity stunt’, while several Twitter users branded them ‘tasteless!’-The Luft-wafer: Ice cream cone named after Adolf Hitler on sale in India sparks anger in Germany

Beyonce's "Single Ladies" set to Duck Tales theme

Near Death Experiences - The Case of Ron Bell

Summer Vacation

Friday, May 29, 2015

Aren't we all atheists?

George Carlin - Airport Security

Muhammad’s Relationship with a Nine-Year-Old Girl

For the Western mind, perhaps the most disturbing fact about Islam is that its founder had a sexual relationship with a nine-year-old girl. Because of this, it has become increasingly popular in some circles to refer to the Prophet of Islam as a "pedophile." This is, of course, extremely offensive to Muslims, who view Muhammad as the ideal servant of God and as the greatest example of what a man should strive to be. Nevertheless, Muhammad’s relationship with a young girl presents a problem for Muslims, especially for those who want to share their faith with others.

Since much of the following information will come as a shock to those who are unfamiliar with this issue, we must be careful not to jump to hasty conclusions about Muhammad. Pedophilia is one of the most serious charges that can be leveled against a person, so the term "pedophile" should not be used lightly. We must also remember that, if a man has a sexual relationship with a young girl in a culture where such a union is permissible, this doesn’t necessarily mean that the man is a "sexual predator," as the term "pedophile" implies. Christians especially should be wary of flippant name-calling. With that said, let us carefully examine Muhammad’s relationship with Aisha, recalling the Western principle that a man is innocent until proven guilty.-http://myislam.dk/articles/en/wood%20was-muhammad-a-pedophile.php

The Assault On Art

"Our plan is to promote ugliness, repulsive, meaningless art."

Another Atheist Bites the Dust (and Learns the Truth About Reality)

Of course, Michael Martin (1932-2015) already knew the truth, but denied it in his hatred of God, goodness and human immortality...
You know what I would think would be a really interesting debate topic? I’d love to see two scholars come out here and debate on the existence of air. That would be downright fascinating. Just think of it, profound and articulate argumentation, cross-examination over whether air was real, all the while the two disputants breathing air in and out as they huff and puff their arguments at each other. This would be rather silly wouldn’t it? We are debating on the existence of air while breathing air as a precondition of our ability to debate. I think it would be a scholarly exercise for a person who offers erudite arguments against the existence of air to pursue that project as though air didn’t exist, when in fact contrary to his conclusions, he is using air all along. He would in that case, be a living contradiction. His argument would be possible only if his argument were wrong. He could argue against the existence of air all the while breathing air only if his argument proved to be wrong. I believe that that is something of an illustration of what is so wrong with the scholar trying to debate and show that God does not exist. He may argue this way and that way; he may enlist profound lines of erudite reasoning, but because of the validity of what is assumed and utilized in debate–the cogency of logic, language, objective knowledge and a number of other things– only make sense in the theistic worldview, the atheist debater is like the man who is continuing to breath all the while arguing that air does not exist. The existence of God is rationally necessary to rationality, science and ethics. In which case, the atheist must secretely take for granted the very thing he hopes to refute in order to engage in the debate at all. By participating in the debate, he has in principle, already lost the debate.-The Debate That Never Was
Back in my lying "atheist" days I was much enamored of Martin, a "great" thinker and philosopher who had refuted the existence of God with new lines of argument that put theists to shame. His foolish tome Atheism a Philosophical Justification deserves to land upon the ash heap of philosophical history. Read it, I dare you. I own a copy. Even back in my atheist days I could see how colossally dumb so many of his "arguments" were. Theism cannot be defeated, because God does exist, and without God there would be no existence, as he is not only creator, but sustainer of every moment of existence. There would be no Michael Martin without God, because without the eternal mind there would be no minds at all.

Michael Martin Has Died

A fool comments at Jeff Lowder's post (linked above): At least he (Martin) got 83 years though.
My reply: Did he indeed get 83 years? If dead is forever dead, it matters not whether one dies at 20 or 80, because in death it is as if you had never been born. If atheism is true, there never was a Michael Martin. He never existed, as you foolishly believe he does not exist now.

This is what Sam Harris believes can and should replace philosophy and traditional morality

I note that it isn't any of the pro-vaxxers, the climate change scammers, the "I fucking love science" crowd or the True Believers in evolution that are calling out this vast quantity of scientific fraud, but rather the science skeptics, like me, who have repeatedly and reliably observed that the human element of the profession has indelibly tainted all confidence in the process.

: And then recall that this is what Sam Harris believes can and should replace philosophy and traditional morality as an effective guide to human behavior. - Scientistry is not scientody

Thursday, May 28, 2015

Goodbye Diet Soda?

Scared ya, didn't I, diet soda addict! You thought the title of my humble post had to do with the very bitter end of diet soda, that perhaps the insane soda companies had finally come to their senses, that the guvment was going to ban artificial sweeteners.

Well, relax, soda guzzlers! Never fear, the end of your bad habit is not near. No, the title is a real question, should you say bye-bye to aspartame?

Why Diet Soda Doesn’t Belong In Your Diet

While there is disagreement about the dangers of artificial sweeteners, I simply don't trust them in terms of long run health risks. Of course, my problem is, I enjoy soda! I avoid HFCS, so I switched to Pepsi's real sugar products (Real Sugar Pepsi, Sierra Mist, Mountain Dew Throwback). Still, it's a lot of sugar, and sugar isn't too good either. For cola, the best I've found is Coke Life, with sugar and stevia and a lot fewer calories (though I don't like the taste as much as Pepsi with sugar, and no, that's not due to Pepsi being "sweeter", because I like "original" Coca-Cola just fine). The best is to switch to unsweetened flavored seltzers and club soda. Still, I tend to let people enjoy their little pleasures. After all, none of us are going to get out of this world alive.

On the health effects of the diet stuff, I tried Shasta diet soda for a time, made with Splenda, which I imagined was better than aspartame. It gave me headaches almost always. Also, Diet-Rite, and also made with Splenda, same thing basically as Shasta. I think Splenda initially got its "healthier" reputation in part because of the early TV commercials touting it as "made from sugar".

On alternatives, I have found that the simple bubbly nature of seltzer waters is quite satisfying. It's your thirst you want to quench, and carbonated water works just fine. Of course, people drink soda for caffeine and sugar and other reasons (or because they feel that plain water is "boring"). You might have noticed that in our modern era, almost everything good is labeled boring, from good liquid to good men.

What A College "Education" Will Do To Your Mind

Totalitarian nightmare regimes with absolute dictators for life and cults of personality enforced on the entire population under threat of torture, imprisonment and death (and tens of millions of their own citizens exterminated or sent to concentration camps) vs W? Oh well, no contest. Bush is the evilest ever!

College Students Rank George W. Bush More Evil than Stalin and Mao

The Marble Man

I guess this is a better use of marbles than using them in a slingshot to go after squirrels, which was one of my dad's later ideas that he didn't actually follow up on (though he did have a slingshot and went to a toy store to buy marbles as ammo).

Tuesday, May 26, 2015

Mind is More than Brain

Dr. Robert Almeder interviewed.

Catholic Priest: Twelve Reasons Why I Never Argue With Internet Atheists

Very often atheists will ask for “evidence” for the existence of God, but I have never been able to ascertain from any of them what they mean by evidence. Do they want scientific evidence of the sort you produce in a laboratory? Archeological evidence? Documentary evidence? Historical evidence? Eyewitness evidence? Contemporary sociological evidence? Psychological evidence? Forensic evidence? I can provide all those kinds of evidence that points to the existence of God, but whenever one produces such evidence the atheist disputes the evidence. Interested in evidence? You tell me what kind of evidence you want and I’ll try to provide it. None have. Meh. Fuhgeddaboudit.-Twelve Reasons Why I Never Argue With Internet Atheists

Monday, May 25, 2015

Saturday, May 23, 2015

Is God Necessary for Morality? - William Lane Craig and Shelly Kagan Discuss

Kagan was talking ethics and rationality theory. Craig was talking moral ontology and existentialism. Kagan was being dishonest because he knows on moral ontology and existentialism there is a lot more than what he is just talking about.

1. Why would human existence even have moral value & worth to begin with?

2. Why not live according to self interest if this is the one and only life that you have?

3. If all life ends at the grave, then ones destiny of the grave its totally unrelated to ones behaviour in life. Therefore, it does not really matter how one lives their life as it all ends up the same.

4. Who or what is laying any real moral oughts or shoulds upon anyone if there really are none?

So, Craig was addressing these questions where Kagan was not. Craig won the debate. Therefore, Kagan bluffed his way through and because many people don't know about moral ontology and existentialism -- then they thought Kagan won when he didn't at all.-from the comments https://youtu.be/Rm2wShHJ2iA

I’m convinced that keeping the distinction between moral epistemology and moral ontology clear is the most important task in formulating and defending a moral argument for God’s existence of the type I defend. A proponent of that argument will agree quite readily (and even insist) that we do not need to know or even believe that God exists in order to discern objective moral values or to recognize our moral duties. Affirming the ontological foundations of objective moral values and duties in God similarly says nothing about how we come to know those values and duties. The theist can be genuinely open to whatever epistemological theories his secular counterpart proposes for how we come to know objective values and duties.-William Lane Craig

Shelly Kagan

William Lane Craig

I do want to make a comment of my own on Craig's committing the "No True Scotsman" fallacy. It gets off on the wrong track for Craig when he says that in Christianity it's the "bad guys" who go to heaven, that is it Christ who "bears the penalty for sin". The response was easy enough for Kagan (or anyone) to make: I can do any evil I want, even of the very worst sort, and as long as I recognize Jesus as savior in time (a few seconds before I breath my last breathe?) I will be "saved" and won't have to have any personal accountability or make any personal payment for my crimes and wrongdoing.

Craig's weak reply: "No genuine Christian would think like that"! He doesn't even address Kagan's point about ultimate accountability of the individual.

The problem for Kagan is that his point only applies to some religions (in this case a specific version of Christianity) but not to theism in general. After all, the supposed question was "Is God necessary for morality", not "Is Christianity necessary for morality" (maybe we need Philosophical Theists instead of Christians defending God in these debates).

If it is reasonable for me to believe that if God is good and just, then evil people will be punished in some way for their evil, and the good will be rewarded. Certainly people can change their ways, and if such change is genuine, no matter how late in life it occurs, God's mercy is always there. If God loves us all, he will treat us justly in the life to come. But punishment and direct payment for our shortcomings and harm to others does not contradict that.

Craig is right of course when it comes to the "heat death of the universe" rendering everything ultimately pointless and meaningless. Kagan simply doesn't get it (or pretends not to in his fantasy world of atheism).

Finally, a brief point about the discussion on animals. Kagan proclaims himself a vegetarian and non-user of leather products. Why? Because morality boils down to "don't harm and do help". He asks "can animals be harmed", answers yes, and concludes we shouldn't therefore eat them or kill them. He thinks, somehow, this makes his position on animals the morally superior one, which it isn't.

Would he conclude, as PETA does, that the killing of chickens on chicken farms is equivalent to the Holocaust? That there is no moral difference between the two? It is hard to avoid that that is the logical conclusion of assuming that creatures without reason and moral agency have rights just as humans do. Would he believe that if a dog and a human being were both drowning that it would be just as moral to rescue (assuming you could only have time to come to the aid of one or the other) the dog over the person?

And what of the "rights" then of the zebra to not be harmed by the lion? Should we patrol Africa with the purpose of protecting zebras from lions? Can a lion be charged with murder if our efforts to protect the zebra fail? Atheists often charge God with the crime of not preventing evil, so it logically follows that if we should not kill animals, we should not also allow animals to kill other animals, if it is in our power to stop it. I doubt though that Shelly Kagan would subscribe to the idea of creating of a police force to prevent one animal from killing another.

Atheism and the denial of the special place that human beings have in the universe leads to such absurdities. How about pests and vermin such as rats and mice? Is it evil to exterminate them?

If even vegetarianism alone were a requirement to be an atheist, there would be very few atheists. Which only goes to show that most atheists don't follow their worldview to its logical conclusion.

Monday, May 18, 2015

Peter Fenwick on "Experiences surrounding near-death and dying"

The problem with current research is that often there is no clear distinction between consciousness, mind and brain. We know that the functions of mind are supported by the brain and constructed by it. There is a widespread acceptance that mind and consciousness are the same. Consciousness is intimately entwined with the brain, and that is why the usual fMRI experiments cannot distinguish consciousness from mind and the proposition that these two functions are the same persists. In order to distinguish mind from consciousness, situations (outliers) in which brain function and the associated mind are absent or degraded and yet consciousness appears to persist must be examined. At present the only circumstances in which the brain is not working, mind is absent and yet consciousness appears to persist, are in approximately 10 – 25% of people who have a cardiac arrest. In these circumstances higher brain function and mind are absent, and yet after recovery the subjects report consciousness experience very similar to the near death experience; these are called Actual Death Experiences (ADE).

A recent PhD thesis by David Rousseau, who has interpreted the nature of the world, assuming the phenomenology of the veridical nature of the out of body experience in the ADE is correct, postulates a five-dimensional consciousness and the presence of ‘psychic stuff’ in the universe. The other outlier is the death process itself. Brain function becomes increasingly compromised as death approaches. About 50% of people who have clear consciousness until nearly the moment of death may have experiences similar to those who have ADEs. This suggests that these experiences may originate in consciousness rather than in a mind which is degrading. Certain end of life experiences (ELEs), such as deathbed visions, transiting to a new reality, aspects of terminal lucidity are similar to the ADE and also raise the question of consciousness beyond the brain. At the moment of death, a number of phenomena, for example deathbed coincidences, mechanical malfunctions and odd animal behaviour suggest a non-local effect and add an additional argument for consciousness beyond the brain. Further, work by David Luke on DMT and psychotropic drugs suggests that the best explanation for transcendent conscious experiences is the filter theory with the brain restricting the input of wider cosmic experiences If that is so, then the ADE, the NDE and the ELE all point towards the universal nature of consciousness.-https://youtu.be/rlXK68tMm7Y

Peter Fenwick is Consultant Neuropsychiatrist Emeritus to the Epilepsy Unit at the Maudsley Hospital, which he ran for twenty years. He is presently appointed as Emeritus Senior Lecturer, at the Institute of Psychiatry Kings College and Southampton University, and Emeritus Consultant Clinical Neurophysiologist at Broadmoor Hospital.

Dr Peter Fenwick - 'Consciousness and Dying'

Sunday, May 17, 2015

Atheism Quote of the Day

"Atheism is the least plausible of all theologies. I mean, there are a lot of wild ones out there, but the one that clearly runs so contrary to what is possible, is atheism. I mean the idea that all this universe, I mean what is it, always existed, or it created itself ex nihilo. I mean, talk about the violation of human rationality."-Charles Krauthammer

Debate: 'The Christian God, the Jewish God or No God'

Christopher Hitchens vs Dinesh D'Souza and Dennis Prager

Christopher Hitchens and Dennis Prager discuss 'god is not great' [2007]

SHOCKING Facts for your ears!!

I used to frequently share Happyslip's videos, but then she disappeared for a long time. Always found her videos fun and funny, and thought she did some great comedic acting in them. I just discovered she's back (or seems to be, this video is from last month). She doesn't get into costume in this one and impersonate her relatives, but it is nice to have her back making videos. The subject in this one is a little gross at times, but I still enjoyed watching.

And a little bit about her:

Saturday, May 16, 2015

The Real Gateway Drug

Ironic, isn't it, that the so-called war on drugs has been, in effect, the gateway drug for the state's embrace of full-fledged police-state tyranny. At first, the drug warriors simply arrested people and charged them with possession of or trade in certain drugs. But pretty soon the thrill faded, and the drug warriors could not get high unless they forced school children to pee in a cup for testing, broke into people's homes using commando tactics, and poked their fingers into people's body orifices at random traffic stops. Next thing you know, the thrill had worn off again, and the drug warriors had to send the U.S. military to Latin America and the Middle East in order, or so they said, to suppress so-called narco-terrorists. That drug-war gateway never should have been opened. Give a drug warrior an inch, and he'll take an entire society's liberty.- Robert Higgs

Freedom or Flag?

Laughing Birds

Bird Laughs Like Super-Villain

Funny Laughing Bird on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show- 1976

The Case for the Soul: Refuting Physicalist Objections

Lenin and the Russian Revolution: Institutionalized Insanity

Debate - Jonathan Sacks and Richard Dawkins - Science And Religion

Who Deserves Hell?

Think of those whose intuition tells them there is something more to life, something more than nature, something more than just blind material forces at work in the universe, but then along comes a Sean Carroll, or Lawrence Krauss, Stephen Hawking or Dawkins or some other promoter of the false religion of scientism, and tells them that no, science, physics, evolution, have proven beyond reasonable doubt that there is no God, no hope for an afterlife, no cosmic purpose to existence. If anyone deserves Hell, it not the murderer, or the rapist, or the thief, it those men.

Now, let me make it clear that I don't believe in a literal "Hell". I also don't believe in eternal punishment. I do, however, believe in justice, and in the afterlife, those who not only denied God and human immortality, but used lies and their prominence as "scientists" to influence the masses toward atheism (which leads to despair and hopelessness for society) will pay a price for their crimes against humanity.

Friday, May 15, 2015

Hillary Clinton Not Inevitable

Are people going to recognize yet that Hillary Clinton is not the inevitable president in 2016? She has a shot, but let's face it - if she was unstoppable, she wouldn't have been stopped in 2008. People don't seem to realize that while Bill Clinton is a master bullshitter and good at building support, that ability doesn't get transferred to Hillary by marriage.-Crude Ideas

Evidence of the Afterlife? Dr Jeffrey Long

http://www.nderf.org/

Is there a life after life ? Anita Moorjani

Thursday, May 14, 2015

Maruchan Instant Lunch Review - plus Cup Noodles!

Cup O' Noodles were my first introduction to instant ramen noodles. Though Nissin later changed the U.S. name of the product to just "Cup Noodles" to me they will always have that O. The other major brand is Instant Lunch, and as for myself, I can't say I have a preference for one or the other. They both taste pretty much the same to me (though this is not necessarily true of the respective food companies other rival products).

"Cup Noodles ad -Times Square 02" by Karan J from Sydney, Australia - Cup o' Steam. Licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons.

I was introduced to noodles in a cup (to be generic) back in the 1970's. I was living with my dad in Colville, Washington, North of Spokane. We often enjoyed these noodles in the evening (and I'm thinking in the cold evening of winter in particular, when all we had to otherwise warm us was one wood burning stove in the corner of our little rented home). We usually made toast to go with them, and a specific toast, made from the rich, nutty tasting Oroweat Honey Wheat Berry bread. So good and once buttered I would often dip mine into the broth of the noodle cup. We had several cats that would beg for the toast. I guess they liked the butter and heartiness of the bread. We would sometimes break off little pieces of toast and feed it to them.

I don't eat cup noodles much anymore, but whenever I do, it brings back many of those memories, and of course, the noodles themselves are an easy, quick to prepare comfort food.

Japan - Masters of Cup Noodles!

What are the Limits of Darwinism?

By the way, the comments on this video at YouTube are filled with vitriol and the usual atheist Two Minutes Hate.

Multiverse Non-Explanation and the Fine Tuning of the Universe

Lying fool Sean Carroll's "debunking" of the fine tuning argument is actually a complete failure. Typical of atheist "scientists" he finally resorts to the imaginary "multiverse", which explains nothing at all. As respected atheist philosopher Thomas Nagel says, the appeal to multiple universes to explain conditions in this one is a cop-out.

His first strategy is to deny there is any fine tuning in the first place, even though that is one of the main motivations for the multiverse speculation, then he goes on to say God doesn't need to "fine tune" anything because, well, He's God, and, as an omnipotent being, can do whatever he wants, while under naturalist materialism, you've got to have the right conditions for life. Well, I suppose God could, but then we wouldn't have a universe governed by laws that we can discover, would we? God could also regularly suspend gravity so that no one ever falls and gets hurt or killed, but again, that would not be the type of universe that suited God's purpose in creating this one.

He then goes to the old, tired, argument from scale and how insignificant life is in the enormous universe with billions of galaxies that we can observe. It never occurs to Carroll the lying atheist that God might have a purpose in creating a universe on such a large scale, or that perhaps each of those galaxies has planets similar to earth with rational beings on them, or that God, to prove He is God, would want something grand so that we would know it is the one and only God that created and sustains the universe, rather than some tinpot deist demigod that was only capable of creating a "human-scale" universe that the atheist God mind readers think he should have created if he exists.

Would we not feel like rats in a maze in some super advanced technology alien's experiment if the universe was scaled down so that the earth was the obvious center of it, the stars were the size of beach balls and Heaven was "up there" so we could reach it with a rocket? Instead we find ourselves in a seemingly endless universe with unlimited wonders to discover. That makes more sense if God exists than the silly imaginings of liars for atheism. In fact, if the universe was small, that fact would make a thinking person more likely to doubt God's existence, not less.

Size, of course, has nothing at all to do with importance, as G.K. Chesterton said: "It is quite futile to argue that man is small compared to the cosmos; for man was always small compared to the nearest tree." Yet, lying atheist Sean Carroll states with confidence "There is nothing in our experience of the universe that justifies the kind of flattering story we like to tell about ourselves." So minds are insignificant? But if there were no minds, there would be no universe to discover or explain, would there? For only rational, thinking beings can discover, observe and explain things. If there was no God (impossible, but for sake of argument I'll suppose it) and also no humans or similar creatures, what could truly be said to "exist"? But if mind is indeed primary, then it all makes sense.

Now imagine that there is nothing at all but one tiny pebble floating in space. No stars or planets, no gods or God, no life or minds of any kind. Nothing but that one solitary pebble for eternity. Does it really then exist? But if Sean Carroll the liar is right (of course, he's a liar, so he has to be wrong) then nothing does exist. Not only we as individuals, but our species, our local star the sun, our planet and ultimately our universe itself, will one day cease to be forever, as if they never existed at all, and with no Supreme Being, that would be the case. Yeah, that makes more sense than God.

He then launches into an absurd list of "expectations" given theism or atheism (what he prefers to call naturalism) and claims that "over and over" his self-refuting "naturalism" wins every time (what a surprise). I won't go in to now, but save it for another post, as it isn't directly related to the subject at hand.

Finally, to emphasize the problem Carroll dismisses so easily (fine tuning) I offer the following video, whose description is thus: At the heart of modern cosmology is a mystery: Why does our universe appear so exquisitely tuned to create the conditions necessary for life? In this tour de force tour of some of science's biggest new discoveries, Brian Greene shows how the mind-boggling idea of a multiverse may hold the answer to the riddle.

And of course the tuning is why the non-explanation of a multiverse is offered. By the way, Brian Greene here talks a lot about the unproven non-science of string theory.

"...without the hypothesis of multiple universes, the observation that if life hadn't come into existence we wouldn't be here has no significance. One doesn't show that something doesn't require explanation by pointing out that it is a condition of one's existence. If I ask for an explanation of the fact that the air pressure in the transcontinental jet is close to that at sea level, it is no answer to point out that if it weren't, I'd be dead."- Thomas Nagel, Mind and Cosmos.

Wednesday, May 13, 2015

Yellen is Half Right About the Market

AntiRacist Hitler

via universal non-stick formula

Terrorists? Nothing to Worry About! Guns? Be Afraid! Be Very Afraid!

This was linked to on Facebook, and the person posting wrote "Fuck Gun Owners!"

Here's the article: In Gun Culture America, Children Kill More Than Mass Shooters And Terrorists

Spurious logic from an ignorant gun hater. The number from the story, while tragic, is an estimate of 237 per year for 2015, that's in a nation of over 300 million. Meanwhile, back in realityland:

"There were 30,057 fatal motor vehicle crashes in the United States in 2013 in which 32,719 deaths occurred. This resulted in national motor vehicle crash death rates of 10.3 deaths per 100,000 people and 1.11 deaths per 100 million vehicle miles traveled."

One may as well say "Fuck car owners" and have magnitudes more justification for saying it. Also, think about the contradiction. "Liberals" (at least those who have some concern for civil liberties) have been saying for years that your chances of being killed in a terrorist attack are vanishingly small, so you shouldn't let fear let you be swayed by those who would seek to decrease your liberty in the name of safety. Yet, when the topic turns to guns, suddenly the solution is to bring in big government and ban them, because otherwise, some toddler might shoot you!

Further comments from me in reply to the FB poster:

Gun Hater:The problem, of course, is that no one actually needs guns. Cars do actually provide some benefit, guns do not, despite carrying a heavy cost and making those who own or are around them less safe.

Logical Person (Me):I've never felt "less safe" around guns, and have been around them all my life. As for your claim that no one "needs" guns, you'd have to provide evidence for your claim, not merely assert it. People have guns for various reasons, many of them (though not all) quite good in my judgement and there are many reasons to consider gun ownership a net benefit. But then again, if you reasoned logically, that wouldn't fit well with your usual practice of begging the question.

Garbage Horses! They don't associate with those uppity horses that look down on their employment

Horse-drawn Trash Service

The Scientific Crucifixion

Uh, what?

Rejecting all approaches that involve mysticism, the supernatural, or theories of theology, Moore’s analysis puts forward solid scientific answers in what he calls “Atonement Biology.”...He maintains that the Crucifixion, Burial, and Resurrection were an identifiable procedure to transform the body for Earth into a body for Heaven, and that the procedure can be understood in terms of modern science. Always firmly rooted in Scripture, Moore’s analysis heralds a revolutionary advance in understanding for the Christian believer of the 21st century.-Crucifixion: The Science Behind the Christian Atonement

So, who's nuttier, this guy (V. J. Moore) or Frank Tipler? Or are they not as nutty as they seem to me? I actually bought Tipler's The Physics of Immortality when first published and found it interesting but unconvincing. I have not read his "sequel" The Physics of Christianity.

Robert Almeder on Reincarnation Evidence and Ian Stevenson's Research

Saturday, May 9, 2015

Magic

I don't believe that reason could arise from nonreason, therefore I think that reason is at the foundation of the universe. According to the naturalistic view, the normative arises from the nonnormative, the logical arises from the nonlogical, the universe exists without an explanation for its existence even though it looks contingent as all heck, the universe was finely tuned for intelligent life, purposes arise where none existed before, consciousness comes from a lack of consciousness. The very foundations of science don't even seem possible in the irrational universe that atheists believe in. Even the very fact that our thoughts are about something else is something that can't be captured by basic physics. It has always seemed to me that the atheists, not the theists, are the ones who believe in magic.-Do you believe in magic

Maybe there is magic, and perhaps God is the Great Magician.

Debate: Did Jesus Rise from the Dead? (David Wood vs. John Loftus)

As a theist, but not a Christian, I obviously disagree with both gentleman in this debate. But I am open to arguments, and the possibility that Jesus did rise from the dead.

Doggie Door Warning

I hate thieves, and burglars are especially hated in my personal world of villains. No, they are certainly not the most evil of common criminals, but stealing from ordinary people and violating someone's home is worse than bank robbery (not to mention that the banks are criminal organizations, too). 

I was watching my local news last night when a story about a neighborhood plagued by a recent series of burglaries came on. The crooks were getting in through the doggie doors on these houses. They were committing their crimes in daylight, and "Beware of Dog" signs did not deter them in the slightest.

One older couple interviewed stated they had gotten rid of their doggie door already, but for prevention of a different sort of invasion, by possums, racoons, skunks, and other unwanted critters. 

So just a word of warning, doggie may need to trade his freedom in exchange for a little home security.

Wednesday, May 6, 2015

I Need Another Life

I fall far short of real goodness, of real compassion for others, of real empathy. Sometimes I think I come close, but I'm human, and I fail over and over. It's a long journey to perfection. I'll never get there in this life, which is why I'll need another.

Tuesday, May 5, 2015

Does The World Need Me and You (or You and I) ?

I wrote to a friend (she expressed feelings of depression) on Facebook the following: The world needs you, please don't ever give up.

She replied: How does it need me

I responded with this, that just came to me:

I guess it don't. Is that the answer? I don't know. It doesn't need me either, I suppose. Does it need anyone at all? Did it need Einstein, or Shakespeare, or Mozart? Does it need kindness instead of cruelty, creativity instead of destruction, good instead of evil?

You can keep adding to it. Love instead of hate, mercy instead of hardness, and on and on. You don't have to be Mozart or anyone or anything "great", however greatness is defined. The little things are sometimes the most important, and we all can do those little things. You are not unimportant and the world does need you, as it needs anyone who cares (or even someone who thinks they don't but has within them the potential to see that they really do).

Why I Am a Christian (David Wood)

Lots of people have been asking me how I became a Christian, because I usually don't share much of my story. Here's a video explaining why I left atheism... -David Wood

via Victor Reppert and John W. Loftus

Dianne Feinstein Is an Enemy of the Bill of Rights and Should be Locked Up!

Out of many facets of degradation of our culture, one of the worst is the decline of the basic freedoms enshrined in (but not created by) the US Constitution and Bill of Rights, this has mostly been executed by this same process of turning rights into mere priveleges, this goes that extra step by saying only educated professionals have that privilege. This same lack of ethics and understanding of basic human rights can be seen everywhere in the surveillance state and in the way police treat the citizens they are supposed to be protecting and in the courts that coerce people who cant afford a lawyer into rescinding their right to a fair trial by a jury of their peers by threatening them with a longer sentence if they refuse to plea bargain and admit they are guilty even when they know they are not.-Matt Sonnie

Bloom Rapidly Coming Off Recovery Rose

Sunday, May 3, 2015

Christianity or Islam, Has Europe (by embracing atheism and unbelief) Chosen Islam?

Christianity at least reflects Western values, Islam DOES not.

Let's look at Western Europe. There is no doubt that in many countries of that continent, Christianity, and indeed belief in God, is in serious trouble. (This is a temporary trend, and many atheists mistake it for some fort of inevitable triumph of non-belief.) But society is definitely and demonstrably not thriving. Quite the contrary - Europe is basically committing continental suicide. To use your own words, it is "struggling and dying off". Many ethnographic projections suggest that within a generation or two, what has historically been considered "Europe" may indeed disappear, to be replaced with something more resembling the contemporary Middle East. Now isn't that a lovely thought! Yet another continent full of Syrias, Egypts, and Iraqs.

So yes, the fashionable atheism of contemporary Western Europe is very much "a threat to social well-being". What we would call a Clear and Present Danger.-Comment by B. Prokop

Christians (or at least theists of some sort) would defend Western culture against Islamic insanity. Richard Dawkins style atheism cannot and will not. Goodbye Europe, and so long atheism!

What's Wrong with Sadomasochism? Pro-Feminist Ben Barker Explains the Harms of BDSM & the Kink Scene

Doritos Roulette

I'm drawn to Doritos like a pig to slop! Will have to try these if I can find them.

He is evil, period.

He is evil, period. No excuses or extenuating circumstances for his acts of selfish cruelty that caused so much suffering! Many, if not most, atheists, deny or have doubts we have free will, but if we don't, then this man is not truly guilty ( he just couldn't help himself, you see, because he had no choice in the matter). But I don't believe that, and I don't think anyone else does either.

A man has been convicted of raping a one-day-old baby boy and two other young children.

Stuart Young preyed on the children between November 2008 and December 2013 at various locations in Edinburgh.

The High Court in Edinburgh heard the attacks on the one-day-old boy continued until he was aged three months.

A jury convicted Young on two charges of rape and another of sexual assault. Sentence was deferred.

The week-long trial heard how, in November 2008, Young raped a girl who was aged just six months.Man guilty of raping one-day-old baby boy

Quote of the Moment: US Prisoners

"The United States now imprisons more people for drug offenses than Western European nations imprison for all crimes combined. No human society has ever before imprisoned this high a proportion of its population. It is now so large that if all U.S. prisoners were detained in one place, they would rank as the thirty-fifth most populous state of the Union." ― Johann Hari, Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs

The Cult of Banning

From foie gras to sugar to salt to plastic bags to guns. From homeopath products to coffee to alcohol and cigarettes to recycling. From GMO to climate change to vaccines. From race to racialism. From music lyrics to classic novels and films that offend contemporary sensitive sensibilities to the attack and sometimes destruction of freedom of speech. Never mind the disturbing trend of reversing our hallowed maxim of innocent until proven guilty. Nope. Now, it's all burn them at the stake before the facts come in.
 
It's a culture of fear and control (usually in the incompetent and nonsensical form of bans (for our own good), caps and trades (with negligible results and impact on the environment but a boon for eco-profiteers), taxes that help to spawn create black markets etc). Always has been. Once upon a time we were terrified of gods, witches, technology, and Jews (well, we still are apparently). We just made a trade is all. We're far more ambitious with this climate change thing.

Point is. Aspirin (and Crestor) works.

Irrational behavior (always masked in self-righteous crap or scientific jargon) is a key feature of humanity. Guys like Bloomberg are nanny-ninnies who seek to control in the name of protecting. In the end, all they contribute to the 'greater good' is irrationalism. Often graduating into surreal logic and behavior.

Release your inner reason I say. Appeal to your basic logic free of emotional input. No?

It also seems to happen quite a bit in capitalist systems. But I digress.

Nevertheless, be careful. Be very afraid.-http://friendlymisanthropist.blogspot.com/2015/05/the-cult-of-scaredy-cat-nut-cases.html

The Reason US Fluoride Levels In Water Were Lowered

If all the fluoride in tap water supporters were and are right, why has the Federal government now lowered the levels allowed? I thought it wasn't harmful? Doesn't this act by the Feds prove that fluoridation opponents were right all along to be concerned about its health effects? Doesn't it also show that all the nasty ridicule heaped on fluoride doubters was unfair?

Atheism Inspires Evil

The cruelty of atheism is hard to believe when man has no faith in the reward of good or the punishment of evil. There is no reason to be human. There is no restraint from the depths of evil which is in man. The Communist torturers often said, 'There is no God, no hereafter, no punishment for evil. We can do what we wish.' I have heard one torturer even say, 'I thank God, in whom I don't believe, that I have lived to this hour when I can express all the evil in my heart.' He expressed it in unbelievable brutality and torture inflected on prisoners.-Richard Wurmbrand "Tortured for Christ"

I read Tortured for Christ around 1979. My dad and I were both Christians of the Evangelical or Fundamentalist variety. I remember the book vividly, and how it also increased my natural hatred of Communism (I was becoming increasingly conservative in my political outlook, even though I wasn't yet old enough to vote). What's important here (even if you are not a Christian, and I currently am not) is the plain fact that atheism allows people to commit the very worst evil and crimes against humanity, by the very nature of its belief that there are no ultimate consequences for our behavior here on earth.

The failure of atheists to take responsibility for their own history means they learn nothing from the ghastly events of the last century. No lessons learned means nothing stopping them from repeating the same mistakes (a.k.a., crimes against humanity) in the future.

If an individual has a problem in his life (say alcoholism), he must first acknowledge that he has a problem before there can be any hope of overcoming it. The same thing applies to societies and nations. Germany's admission of guilt in the Second World War paved the way for that nation's reintegration into the Civilized World. The Truth and Reconciliation Commissions in South Africa enabled that country to rise above its apartheid past.

The atheists' refusal to own up to crimes demonstrably committed by their fellow non-believers and (yes) in the name of their shared non-belief, guarantees that given the chance, they'd do The Same Damned Thing again. Repetitious insistence that "It wasn't us!" only deepens the denial.

It's far worse than a drunk telling himself he can handle "one more drink" - this is a case of him denying he's even holding the bottle (which everyone can plainly see in his hand)!-B. Prokop

source: dangerous idea: Atheism had nothing to do with it? That's not what they said: Wurmbrand's Tormentors and atheism

Saturday, May 2, 2015

Ignosticism

Ignosticism or igtheism is the idea that every theological position assumes too much about the concept of God and other theological concepts. Some philosophers have seen ignosticism as a variation of agnosticism or atheism, whereas others have considered it to be distinct.-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignosticism

A Short Introduction to Libertarianism: The Libertarian Mind with David Boaz

I Bonds In 2015?

I started buying I Bonds at the end of 2014. I'm holding off further purchases for now.

Buying Series I Bonds In 2015? No, Wait!

Friday, May 1, 2015

Baltimore Blowback

The right demands order and compliance, hence police are free to kill with immunity; the left demands compassion with your money, hence generations grow without any comprehension of the idea of respect for property and life, no knowledge of how to productively contribute to society.

There is nothing surprising about Baltimore. Blowback. Actions have consequences.-bionic mosquito

Britney Spears Fall

I like Britney Spears. I remember her from her very early years as a singer and public figure. I admire her for her amazing comeback and success. She is one performer whom I'd really like to see in concert (though I feel that she, like Beyonce, is way too sexual in performance and videos; not that I'm not turned on by that, but my personal weakness doesn't make it right). Anyway, she fell on stage and hurt her ankle...

She is currently in Las Vegas at least until the end of this year (2015). I want to go to Vegas again (lived there for 2 years) and see some shows, which I never really did before. Now that I know Britney is there, I may get tickets for a future show and take my girlfriend (if she agrees). I'd like to see those sharks and a magic act as well.

I can understand why Britney went to Vegas. No traveling, and a big payday:

Britney is a resident at Planet Hollywood with her Piece of Me show. She earns $15 million per year (an average of $310,000 per show) as part of the initial two-year deal...-Watch Britney Spears Fall During Las Vegas Show

Best wishes on a quick recovery, MS. Spears. By the way, just one payday of $310,000 would suit me fine. I'd feel set for life.

Voting and the Non-Aggression Principle

Economist Walter Block, a former Ron Paul supporter, argues that there is no conflict between voting and the non-aggression principle.-https://youtu.be/DnfgcxQsbQk

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