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Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins
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You`re missing the point polybot, the thing is most people then, and now, it would not have occurred to them to ask such a question.
Of course it took a genius like Newton to go on to explain why. But it the ability to think of the question in the first place that I find impressive....most people it would not even cross their minds to ask |
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wow, so completely dismissing hooke et al (and every preceding generation). no matter, where would we be without the five known prophets of galileo, newton, darwin, einstein and dawkins (and maybe those two who had movies made about them,the enigma guy and the beautiful mind one)
i guess science is sort of like harry potter, where some special chosen one with magical powers comes along occasionally to stick it to the oppressive religious establishment, but against all odds goodness triumphs, also sort of like indiana jones or luke skywalker and whatnot. |
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most people it would not even cross their minds to ask
most people, but not the brave truth seekers that paid for a copy of "the god delusion", heroically risking persecution by the lutherans and episcopalians and whatnot... |
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whoo, you`re missing a few religious types out there... is` whatnot` maybe code for something else let me suggest Islam or the 4 different Christian inquisitions lasting hundreds of years..nothing to fear from religious oppression then or now, somewhere everywhere?
nobody has to read Dawkins, or even agree with it, that is a good thing. |
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I think it is all right to read Dawkins, but we do not have to believe him, and I would encourage 12 year olds to do this.
I believe any knowledge is good. There is a danger in accepting religion without question. There is also a danger in accepting what the MEDIA says without question. Because we are told what we are supposed to believe not necessarily the truth. I would like people to question everything we are told, there are no boundaries, unless we make them our selves. lfc 1971 I think in the 17th century it would have been incredibly difficult for anybody to grasp the concept of gravity. It took a mind like Isaac Newton to do that. We progress by the cleverest of us. If we relied on the average person, I am not sure we would even have discovered fire yet  |
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ebul we agree, for once
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whoo, you`re missing a few religious types out there... is` whatnot` maybe code for something else let me suggest Islam or the 4 different Christian inquisitions lasting hundreds of years..nothing to fear from religious oppression then or now, somewhere everywhere?
nobody has to read Dawkins, or even agree with it, that is a good thing. we've wandered off dawkins' mediocrity as a scientist and onto his mediocrity as a thinker. his grip on history is as weak as his grip on maths, and this is not harmless as he deliberately preaches his simplistic drivel to impressionable 12 year olds who are susceptible to revisionism, let alone ginned up hatred or derision. let's put your bogus bogeyman inquisition in context, the spanish inquisition (comprising the majority of the inquisitions) was in fact a state or crown inquiry post the islamic occupation, it used catholic canon law which formed the legal system (courts, judges, legal code etc), which was largely derived from roman law, and leads ultimately to modern law. Over the hundreds of years of the inquisition around 3000 were killed after a trial, about the same number of killings obama has ordered in drone strikes alone, in just 7 years, no trial, no habeus corpus, just instant death for anyone in the vicinity. yet dawkins thinks a post invasion spanish state killing around 8 per year is the height of barbarism, and somehow the atheist obama who is lying about being a christian (dawkins' view) is the greatest president ever. also ignored in the equation is 100 million killed by atheist socialism in the last century, that's 3000 killed per 350 years versus 3000 killed per day for 365 days for 100 years. i know he is poor at maths but not sure how even couldn't do that sum. scotland have just imprisoned someone for tweeting something negative about muslims, so even current british secular state heresy laws are not so flash. but even ignoring all this and pretending that the inquisition was just as dawkins and the monty python sketch implies, it was hundreds of years ago, these spooky inquisitors aren't about to jump in a time machine and come after you for reading his crappy book and whatnot, so get a grip. so his case (there are numerous other examples in his book) against buddists, anglicans, mormons and rastafarians etc is weak and poorly thought through, if not downright infantile. islam is another where he fails, while others separate it out either as an outlier religion or perhaps not a religion at all but instead a political or other system, either way it is an exception. dawkins doesn't take this view in his book instead preferring to lump it in with all other religious or spiritual groups (the kind of stupid equivalence that says salafist equals amish), this got him off the hook of criticising islam proportionally, and saved him from any dangerous criticism. he has adjusted his stance slightly since, as the embarrassing stark reality has forced him to be more critical of islam. |
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With religion there has been the murder of the crusades, the torture of the inquisition. In Buddist Burma human sacrifices were still occurring in the 1850s until Britain stopped it.
Members of Indias Thuggee sect strangled people as sacrifices to appease the bloodthirsty goddess Kali. A practice starting in the 1500s and victims estimated as high as 2 million. Thugs were still sacrificing 20,000 lives a year in the 1800s until British rule stamped it out. Today Hindu priests still sacrifice goats to Kali. When puritans settled in Massachusetts they created a religious police state were deviation from the doctrine could lead to flogging, pilloring, hanging, cutting off ears or boring through the tongue with a hot iron. They had left England to escape religious persecution. The Aztecs began their theocracy in the 1300s. About 20,000 people were killed annually to appease the gods-especially the sun god who needed daily nourishment of blood. Hearts were cut out and some bodies were eaten. Others were drowned, be-headed, burned, or dropped from great height. Children were killed at various sites so that their tears might induce rain. Islamic Jihads (mandated by the Koran) killed millions over 12 centuries. The Kharijis slaughter Sunni, Azariqis decree death to all sinners...and so it continues. A brief summary of authors outlawed by the Church: Galileo Galilei, Francis Bacon, Johannes Kepler, Rene Descartes, Blaise Pascal, Rousseau, Locke, Voltaire, Diderot, Hume, Kant, Bergson, Sarte. |
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There is a danger that underlies all religion that it can end in fanaticism and superstition.
Knowledge and freedom go hand in hand. |
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I'm not sure why Christianity gets so much stick, does anyone really care about the crusades or a load of witches getting burned in america 500 years ago? It doesn't exactly keep me awake at night if i'm being honest.
For me the more Christian a place is the better, I can't think of a non traditionally christian place that i'd like to live, the decline in christianity since 9/11 hasn't exactly been great for europe |
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As for Dawkins, he's been mocking christians for years, he seems a bit over sensitive here, that's the sort of thing he would say if someone was whinging about something like this
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Christianity gets stick for being hypocritical. 'Witches' were being burned a lot more recently than 500 years ago, and not just in America.
If Christianity has indeed declined since 9/11 (not sure why you state this but I'll go with it) then it can only be considered a good thing imvho. |
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I don't think anyones that bothered about witches mate, apart from atheists on the internet, christian countries are almost always better than the alternative
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I promise to keep out of the lives of Christians - if they would be willing to treat me with the same respect.
Unfortunately, they aren't. |
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How are they not keeping out of your life?
Other than the odd old lady giving out some leaflet about Jesus near the tube station they never effect me |
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I agree with you there Jack, I have had too many Jehovahs Witnesses call
I think Dawkins is a bit out of date here. Organised religion may be a threat to knowledge, but we have a far bigger one in the West , it is called the MEDIA. I remember Enoch Powell was downed by the Media. when he warned us of excessive immigration. The immigrants got hold of the Media, who then instructed the rest of us. It is happening again, with Women, we are listening to them too much, especially the wrong type of women..but nobody believes me on that one so I go down with Enoch.  By all means listen to religion, read Dawkins but be very careful of the Media?????, that is all I can say. We think for ourselves, we have a right to our own choices, as long as they do not harm others. Suppression of any knowledge is a crime against humanity, it is our only hope. |
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Polybot mentions that during the inquisition people were put to death after a trial. There is something interesting about these trials if you look at them.
There was something called Trial by Ordeal. Ordeal was sometimes by means of hot iron and was a strict ritual administered by the Church. The accused had to grasp a red hot rod and carry it a fixed distance. If burned the person was guilty and if not God had protected the innocent and so was not guilty. If you look at the records remarkably few of the accused failed this test. So what was happening? One answer would be that God was looking on and protecting the innocent. This was a time when almost everyone believed in God and religion. The other answer might be that the priests had decided, in some way, to rig the test so that most people were not actually holding unto a burning hot bar. They did not know this and thought God was protecting them, and those watching did not know...only the priests. If the 2nd answer is correct, and it is up to you which you believe, this means at a time when almost everyone believed in Gods power only the priests did not believe it...but found it useful to use this way to increase their power over the mass of people. It was a form of mass delusion and it was manipulated cynically by the religious priesthood. This is the kind of thinking that Dawkins warns against. Of course you are free to believe that God did protect the innocent from the burning of the iron bar. |
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They are very crafty!
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lfc 1971
Religion was the Media of its day. Before the printed word the only thing people had to read was the Bible and that was in Latin. Religion gave the people some values to live by....let us say the 10 commandments, which are not unreasonable. You must also realise that church was controlled by Government, so they were telling the people what the government wanted them to believe, which was why they insisted everybody believing in Religion and in the same religion, it was a means of controlling the population, there were no books or newspapers for people to get other ideas. Once the printed press arrived this was threatened, people could read books , early newspaper, the Bible was translated into English and other languages. The Church did seek to retain its power admittedly by trying to suppress this. It is totally different nowadays in most societies. Governments use the Media nowadays, there are few theocracies. So I oppose enforced religion as Dawkins does, but I also oppose the mindless belief in the modern media we have now. It is clearly affecting us, most people use the media at some time, that is my warning. We have no idea how much we are being programmed all the time. I see 1984 approaching, it frightens me. |
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Well believable lfc. Devious b4st4rds. Look at the money generated and the power they have.
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So so you think you can tell
Heaven from hell Blue skies from pain Can you tell a green field from a cold steel rail A smile from a veil do you think you can tell. |
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also ignored in the equation is 100 million killed by atheist socialism in the last century, that's 3000 killed per 350 years versus 3000 killed per day for 365 days for 100 years. i know he is poor at maths but not sure how even couldn't do that sum.
no answer? maybe you are as retarded in maths and logic as dawkins. The Aztecs began their theocracy in the 1300s. About 20,000 people were killed annually to appease the gods-especially the sun god who needed daily nourishment of blood. Hearts were cut out and some bodies were eaten. Others were drowned, be-headed, burned, or dropped from great height. no , this is where you are supposed to step in and attack the spanish crown warranted conquistadors as catholic inquisitors, NOT defend them as leaders of the revolution that brought down the aztec cult. some useful idiot you turned out to be, no wonder they shot all their socialist backers after the iranian revolution  A brief summary of authors outlawed by the Church: you forgot me, apparently living in sin with a women makes me an evil sinner (presumably condemned to hell ), outlaw or whatever you stupidy determine to be so horrific (galileo remained a devout catholic until he died in comfortable old age). so as someone who has suffered the full fury of the catholic inquisition, as terrifying and horrific at it is, having to read your moronic and infantile ramblings, i find it far more inhumane, and i demand an apology.don't worry, i've long since realised you will simply continue to recite the predictable talking points and recognition symbols of your religion's liturgy, but this is playtime. using a combo of your, and obamas, idiotic logic, obama hates women because they are paid "over 20 percent less" under his reign. so why does obama hate black women, and why does he hate white women? his religion possibly? dawkins says atheist, some say muslim, we can all agree not christian? So so you think you can tell Heaven from hell Blue skies from pain Can you tell a green field from a cold steel rail A smile from a veil do you think you can tell. this tedious sh!te had a profound effect on me at age 12, it's fab that you are still extracting some value from it, you deserve an ecologically recycling friendliness medal. pop songs are AWESOME!!!! |
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here was something called Trial by Ordeal
ffs can you even read? (outside the accepted scriptures of your prophets, which may or may not be resd to you out loud at the nightly cult gathering? seriously, it is not difficult to look this stuff up. this practice which goes back to hammurabi (remember those discovery channel programs that deify this period for its civilisation and invention of batteries and whatnot ). it was banned by the catholics in 1215.your belief is as stupid as claiming lincoln was a racist because, despite starting a war which killed almost a million to end slavery, what about the slavery stuff that happened before? or what about that dude who kept a slave in his basement a few year ago? does this prove lincoln as pro-slavery? no. does it prove you are an idiot? you decide. |
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When Jerusalem was conquered in 1099 there were more than 60,000 victims, men women and children. This was on one day.
In the words of one witness "there in front of Solomons temple was such carnage that our people were wading ankle deep in the blood of our foes, and after that happily and crying for joy our people marched to our saviors tomb to honor it and pay off our debt of gratitude. another, "it was not alone the spectacle of headless bodies and mutilated limbs strewn in all directions that roused the horror of all who looked upon them but the victors themselves dripping with blood from head to foot. It is reported that within the temple enclosue itself 10,000 infidels perished. |
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associated press or reuters?
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This is the danger , it is not 3000 killed per 350 years but millions killed in decades in religions name. But it is the mindset and unwavering belief in things like religion and communism that Dawkins argues leads to the to these acts.
Regarding your silly understanding of the phrase authors outlawed by the church I will try and simplify it These were authors that the Church forbade its members to read. Regarding the example of what may really have been happening in trial by ordeal it is a warning to look scientifically and rationally at what is taking place...do this also now when you see claims of miracles or people being healed. In regard to pop music, the most difficult thing to do in music is to write a great pop tune. |
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still no answer on the 3000 per day, still no apology, and i know your liturgy by heart and you are almost out of ammo
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but millions killed in decades
why not billions? or kajillions? sounds better, in for a penny, in for a pound eh? |
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polybot, it is not really good enough to pass off the torture and bloodshed caused in the name of religion to say that millions were killed in the name of communism and Nazism
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remember that time pope ferdinand the nasty started the american civil war, then flew three times round the moon in his time machine and invented the NUCLEAR BOMB?!!
phew, i'll never forget the time i read that somewhere or something |
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polybot, it is not really good enough to pass off the torture and bloodshed caused in the name of religion to say that millions were killed in the name of communism and Nazism
you've just passed off the killing of 3000 people per day in the name of atheism in our time over the the killing of 0.02 people per day hundreds of years ago in a time before mass imprisonment, telecommunications, electricity, forensics and on and on. but that's "good enough" for you? |
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polybot, it is not really good enough to pass off the torture and bloodshed caused in the name of religion to say that millions were killed in the name of communism and Nazism
i hadn't factored in nazism (the national socialist workers party) but yes it was another violently anti religious (definitely anti-catholic and jewish, but accommodating toward islam) cult, this adds around 50 million to the 100 million deaths of 20th century socialist atheism, i'd ask to to adjust your equations accordingly but that would be unfair, because maths is hard. |
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This is the very dangerous thing about a blind belief and why science and rational thought are so important. The point is not to believe in something uncritically, look as best we can in a scientific and rational way. This is the basis of freedom and progress.
We must always remember that many conflicts may be religious or racial or politically motivated but it is the mindless belief in these things that gives people the ability to justify the acts. Do not believe in anything too much, step back and walk away. |
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Human Beings kill each other for all sorts of reasons....
Nationalism most of all, religion, ideologies, greed, revenge....if fact just about anything The truth is Human Beings just like killing one another, we are an incredibly violent species Do not believe in anything too much, step back and walk away. A very good observation lfc1971 |
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We kill people that are different from us.
The more differences we create between ourselves, the more room for killings. |
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Listen perhaps to Nancy Griffith "Speed of the sound of loneliness" or Willie Nelson singing "You were always on my mind".
Very beautiful yep. |
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We kill people that are different from us.
The more differences we create between ourselves, the more room for killings. We invented "Class" to discriminate against those who are the same as us. Excellent responses lfc1971, but be prepared for more abuse from the arrogant one. |