** Official July Chat Thread: The Black Swan **

[D.L.M.]

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Yeah well when Jeffrey dommer, and unibomber were programed god must have been smoking some chronic herbs at the time.

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Not at all. They certainly knew that what they were doing was wrong. They chose to do it anyways, as does many people who commit crimes.

We are programmed to KNOW right from wrong. It is completely our decision whether we want to follow that guideline or not.

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So middle Eastern Terrorists are "programed" to "know" what is right from wrong. This programming comes from the same god as you yet these guys firmly believe in blowing themselves up just to kill people like you with your policial affiliations. So you are ignoring what you were "programmed" by not doing this as well???? Or is it that god has a different program he installs in the darker people? Or maybe people who reside on different bodies of land?I think your logic is flawed.

[1p0kerboy]

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Who is stealing what from who and why.

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Give me an example of where stealing would be okay to you. (I'm not saying you're wrong)

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Anyway we all start to become influenced by the environment

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Meaning not quite literally the environment per se, but we are influenced socially by others. And I accept that argument, but why would others want to influence our inner morality? Only to make it closer to their's. Which came from the same place ours came from. Which would mean we had to have been created with it.

I can't fathom us randomly being created with a set of moral codes within us.

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There are some 'moral' traits exhibited throughout the animal kingdom

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I don't necessarily disagree with this but it's kinda irrelevant to the conversation. In other words, these animals could have also been created in a somewhat similar fashion to us. (and likely were so)

[myheadhurts]

I don't really want to get involved in this argument, mainly because people try to force you into the "for" or "against" camp, whereas I'm in the "The only thing I'm sure about is Richard Dawkins is a arrogant git" camp. However, as a mathematician I do hate to see the word "proof" get thrown about without being deserved. So, several question do present themselves:

Where do we draw the line between being anti-stealing and anti-law-breaking? While stealing is a concept that has applied in just about all civilisations in history, it generally only applies stealing from WITHIN the cilivilisation. Stealing from ANOTHER civilisation has generally been considered fair game until fairly recently. Why is this?

Why didn't God include anti-racism in the right/wrong coding?



Man, this is like a student bar. Who wants to quote Douglas Adams first?

[1p0kerboy]

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So middle Eastern Terrorists are "programed" to "know" what is right from wrong. This programming comes from the same god as you yet these guys firmly believe in blowing themselves up just to kill people like you with your policial affiliations. So you are ignoring what you were "programmed" by not doing this as well???? Or is it that god has a different program he installs in the darker people? Or maybe people who reside on different bodies of land?I think your logic is flawed.


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This is actually an interesting area.

If I joined the ARMY and was sent to IRAQ and killed the enemies in war, is that moral? I think so.

If I killed innocent people that would be wrong.

I don't think fighting is necessarily immoral. But I certainly think sucker-punching somebody is. And worse yet is starting a fight or attacking somebody who doesn't want to fight. In other words, down inside I believe these suicide bombers know that what they are doing is wrong. I think it takes a great deal of effort for them to ignore this or convince themself otherwise.

[D.L.M.]

Just so everyone know i am in the "I have no clue" camp. I just ask the questions that ussually end up turning people into athiests or pissing off religious people. which is kinda funny how pissed they get when all im doing is asking simple questions.

My simple explanation is that somthing created us. whatever it is gave us free will and minds. together society has come up with some rules from culture to culture.

Many religios following is based on location which is supsect to me, very suspect.

Trying to put gods will into words probably amuses (he,she,it). I think that the whole planet is in a sense an antfarm ( ----) likes to watch. We dont resent this just as ants do not know to resent us. And we shouldnt resent it because with out god we would not be here to resent him.

follow?

[Mr_Donktastic]

- the most obvious one would be that my family is starving and the only food available must be stolen from somebody else who has plenty.

- environment as I meant it includes both our physical and social environment.

- the animal kingdom can be useful because as you point out they are governed by the same natural rules as us but are outside of our social conditioning (although they have some of their own).

[SABR42]

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I don't know. He doesn't say in the bible. Maybe one day I'll find out.

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Why do you believe the Bible? Serious question.

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So besides my point that this world is too complex and beautiful to merely be random

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LOL, please. The "too complex" argument was defeated by Darwin 150 years ago.

Only people who have never read evolutionary biology still bring up that argument.

[SABR42]

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whereas I'm in the "The only thing I'm sure about is Richard Dawkins is a arrogant git" camp.

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IMO, it's much better to be arrogant than ignorant.

Some of the most succesful people in every field are very arrogant.

In other words, I'd much rather be a smart-ass than a dumbáss.

[mlane]

I like play pokahs.

[Mr_Donktastic]

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So besides my point that this world is too complex and beautiful to merely be random

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LOL, please. The "too complex" argument was defeated by Darwin 150 years ago.

Only people who have never read evolutionary biology still bring up that argument.

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I don't think anyone would really argue that the world as we know it got here through randomness...that's not REALLY what you mean is is PB?

On the flip side I don't know how people can argue that the whole world was Intelligently Designed either, unless they are just ignorant (ignorant meaning either they just don't know the evidence or choose to ignore it on purpose)

The answer has to be some kind of mix imo.

Our world is shaped by natural laws, evolution being one of them. OTOH there is a [censored] of randomness. Put them together and let the experiment run for a few billion years and you get what we have today.

There is no reason why this is an argument against religion either, because you can just believe that God created the rules of nature and planted the seed of life and then just let it go from there, like DLMs antfarm.