Fighting fire with fire

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"Family Values" as currently promoted by Dobson/Robertson/Falwell/Far RW Republicans:

Sex is wrong except for procreation. Evolution never happened, Creationism is actually science, not mythology. Anything even remotely associated with homosexuality is wrong and anybody practicing it will burn in hell.

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None of that is in the teachings of Jesus as related in the Gospels; therefore, those things are not real Christianity nor even real "fundamental" Christianity.


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Everything in the Bible is the unvarnished truth, and it should be followed to the letter.

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That is not Christianity either, because the two Great Commandments of Jesus supersede all the old law.


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The only exceptions to the last item are: Ignore anything to do with turning the other cheek, caring for the sick and the poor, loving thy neighbor, thou shalt not kill.

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A lot of Christians, even preachers, expand upon the teachings of Jesus in their own way--and unfortunately, often not to good effect If you want to try to understand Christianity, don't listen to Falwell or Robertson or even to the Pope, but rather read the Gospels and dwell on the words and life example of Jesus. That is the true Christianity: the rest is fluff added by others. Sadly for most, and confusingly as well, the fluff is generally preached and thought about as much or more than is the central message. Thus we have so-called "fundamentalists" arguing a Christian basis for things that really have nothing to do with the central principles or message of Christianity.

[madnak]

Plenty of animals plan in the short term.

I think the major differences in humans stem from out communicative capacity. Maybe opposable thumbs, to some degree. But would we be able to plan into the future without language?

[theweatherman]

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Plenty of animals plan in the short term.

I think the major differences in humans stem from out communicative capacity. Maybe opposable thumbs, to some degree. But would we be able to plan into the future without language?

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More important than language is writing. The average university library has waaaaaaaaaay more information in it than can be stored in thehuman mind. Writing allows for our species to accumalate knowledge, rather than relearning it every generation.

Modern humans are no smarter than our relatives were15k years ago, however due to our ability to store knowledge we are far more advanced.

[madnak]

This may be true, but it isn't a strictly biological difference.

I think to a degree it's a reflection of the biological capacity of humans to form and transmit "memes," which is probably a major element of our success.

[Cyrus]

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Because the rest of the animals are provenly incapable of registering (the passage of) time as we do.

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Provenly???

[/ QUOTE ] OK, how many conversations did you have recently with your dog about the History of the Dog Race?


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[Animal] experience ...[is] in no way comparable to the complexity of consciousness.

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Unfounded assertion, especially with regards to dolphins and chimpanzees, which is the greatest likely exception to your very broad assertion.

[/ QUOTE ]Why would you think that an animal could be capable of forming complex thought but, at the same time, showing total lack of willingness to share those complex thoughts with other animals, including the humans? This is not about "technical" incapacity. The chimps have all the physical tools we have, yet they are so way back in the evolutionary scale that they neither grasp nor communicate any complex, asbtract concepts.

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If dogs could realize that they all are heading towards certain death, they would also be able (have the means) to express that realization - and their reaction to it. They would (like humans) do something about it.

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Humans do very little about it, and what they do is at present merely a forestalling of the inevitable. Dolphins don't have prehensile hands, so they CAN'T do much about anything in the way of tools. However they are highly intelligent.

[/ QUOTE ]You have misunderstood what is meant by "doing something about it", meaning about death.

Man's denial of death is the core of the issue -- not medical science or technological progress. I'm not looking for chimp doctors -- but for chimp societies organised at the very least like primitive humans. There are no rituals or concerted thinking or any signs of organised social life (organised around metaphysical concepts and not just survival) as there are in Homo Sapiens.

There is no inherent existential anxiety in animals (only concern for their daily survival - not the same thing at all) because there is no consciousness of existence as a Being. What they have is physical experience of being alive (and an instinct that directs them to stay that way).



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[Dolphins] are the ONLY beings on the planet with a higher brain/body mass ratio than humans (which ratio is loosely but well correlated to inteligence when comparing species). So it is actually quite possible that dolphins are both more aware and smarter than we humans are.

[/ QUOTE ] This is completely incorrect. You are confusing specific instances of seemingly "human-like" behavior of dolphins (playfulness around humans, tenderness towards offspring, etc) for Homo Sapiens-level intelligence.

And brain-to-total-body ratio has nothing to do with it.

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You have consciousness and self-awareness yet you simply presume that even the most intelligent non-human animal species cannot. Talk about hubris, wow.

[/ QUOTE ] I am not "presuming" anything. This is a sober yet trivial conclusion of elementary examination. Next time you have a communication with an animal about an abstract concept, report it to the room manager.

[Cyrus]

Better take this to the SMP forum.

New thread

[HLMencken]

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Because the rest of the animals are provenly incapable of registering (the passage of) time as we do.

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Provenly???

[/ QUOTE ] OK, how many conversations did you have recently with your dog about the History of the Dog Race?

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Wow, that is a brutal attempt at an argument.

Just when I thought your credibility couldn't get any lower...

[Cyrus]

It is a rhetorical but totally serious question.

You have probably missed the thrust of my argument completely.

[MtSmalls]

I would be the first person to agree with you that little or nothing of the current "family values" crowd has anything to do with "christianity". However, that is the very disguise that they are using to foist it on the American public and drive their fundamentalist base....