America's first Atheist Monument

[FiremanBob]

SHMIV: I'm sorry, but the argument from "I never tried it, but I still don't like it" is not valid in logic.

Every statement that is not a fact about the physical world is an opinion. What makes some opinions worth more than others? The validity of the premises (assumptions) based on their relevance and factual accuracy, and the validity of the logic applied to them.

Without re-hashing the entire theism vs. atheism debate, If atheism is not true, then which of the hundreds of world religions is? And if any one of them is true, are not all the others merely someone's opinion? And how to determine which one is true, when the bottom-line, clincher argument for all of them is, "you have to take that on faith"?

Gunderwood: I do not agree that "Ordering the world according to human nature yields the mess we have, not the libertarian utopia she desired." On the contrary, it is attempts to order the world in defiance of human nature that has brought us to the mess we have today. Madison wrote extensively on this topic in The Federalist.

[Kreutz]

You don't see death threats or blanket statements about a groups morality issued by atheists and there are no infallible atheist texts that call for the death of the believer.

Give it time.

[wpoppert]

You don't see death threats or blanket statements about a groups morality issued by atheists and there are no infallible atheist texts that call for the death of the believer.

Give it time.

Kreutz may be right. It might not have happened yet in this country, but it certainly did in the USSR and China. LOTS of religious people of all sorts were rounded up and imprisoned or executed. Political trends in this country have taught me not to say that "it couldn't happen here."

[mamabearCali]

You don't see death threats or blanket statements about a groups morality issued by atheists and there are no infallible atheist texts that call for the death of the believer.

Give it time.

Kreutz may be right. It might not have happened yet in this country, but it certainly did in the USSR and China. LOTS of religious people of all sorts were rounded up and imprisoned or executed. Political trends in this country have taught me not to say that "it couldn't happen here."

If left unchecked this is most likely where we are headed.

[Mindflayer]

I am taking donations for a 5000 pound Buddah.

[Kreutz]

Kreutz may be right. It might not have happened yet in this country, but it certainly did in the USSR and China. LOTS of religious people of all sorts were rounded up and imprisoned or executed. Political trends in this country have taught me not to say that "it couldn't happen here."

There's that, but I meant give it time until atheists are hacking each other to death over doctrinal differences.

[wpoppert]

Kreutz may be right. It might not have happened yet in this country, but it certainly did in the USSR and China. LOTS of religious people of all sorts were rounded up and imprisoned or executed. Political trends in this country have taught me not to say that "it couldn't happen here."

There's that, but I meant give it time until atheists are hacking each other to death over doctrinal differences.

That, too!

[SHMIV]

Bob, my personal opinion of Rand is irrelevent to my point. My point doesn't require me to read anything that she wrote in order to stand. If Atheism is true, there is nothing to seperate us from the rest of the creatures. This "human essance" idea sounds nice and all, but, absent a creator, all it is is a nice idea.

Indeed, absent a creator, we are just another species, accidently grown from... well, nothing. Just like every other creature. There are no rights to speak of, only the natural order of things, which is cold and uncaring. There is no incentive to hold to any sort of moral code, or any particular set of values. There is no good, there is no evil. No meaningful difference between Mother Theresa, Joseph Stalin, Charles Manson, or John Wesley. Absent a creator, all we have is a bunch of rules that someone came up with, that we adhere to because they sound nice.

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[FiremanBob]

I'm sorry but you are wrong. If you were to read "The Objectivist Ethics" you would see laid out in very plain language the incentive to hold proper values and a moral code. One that I have found convincing - in fact a stronger, more satisfying argument than any "take it on faith" exhortation could provide.

But if you refuse even to consider it, then you're like the child who has never tasted broccoli and swears that he never will.

[SHMIV]

Bob, I never said I'd never read the damn books; only that I hadn't. You'll have to forgive me for not immedately running out and buying a small collection of Rands work; it's hard to find parking at the bookstore for 80 feet of truck.

I wonder, though, if you've got a full understanding of it, yourself. You haven't even attemted to explain it in your own words.

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[FiremanBob]

I wasn't asking you to go out and read the books. I was pointing out the logical error in arguing from ignorance. I don't have time today to expound on it; but may do so later.

[downzero]

A monument to who, or what?

[Palladin]

I am taking donations for a 5000 pound Buddah.

Is that a little one or a big one?

[Reverenddel]

Can I rub it's belly for good luck?