New Crusade

EP

Will you stop with stuff like this..???

"See, this is exactly why you are a nutter"

You disrespect human reason with your personal drivel

Occam

 

I explain to you how and when reason is in effect.
You look and learn.
Thx

 

El proximo

Had reason before u existed
Small silly child.

Occam

 

This has been my argument to you (in bold) the whole time. If someone is going to use atheism incorrectly or not inline with your true position, then its up to you to inform them. If Occam insists on thinking Atheism is a belief and that isn't the case, then there is no more reason to debate unless it is accepted that it is also and in most cases a lack of or absense of belief.

Also, when the debate comes down to name calling then I guess there is nothing else to say. Have a good day

 

Yes

The name calling really shits me.
Isdarts may disagree with me but he dosnt call me names.
Occam values that honest position of belief.
For occam 'believes' much that 'conventional' reason might call suspect.
That is reason that is based on what we know..
Yet.. we know very little

Occam

 

Are the two or three of you really concerned about someone being called a 'nutter' and writing for my benefit...
Or
Are you really just making a preamble for the censorship you intend to lobby for?

 

Censorship?

No lobby for that. Call people anything u want.
But
How long will they listen to you?
You expect people to have respect for your ideas...But disrespect those
same people at every turn with labels like 'turkey' and 'nutter'.

You imply with such that you consider others your inferiors.
Less than u in wisdom and reasoning skills.
Yet have displayed so far..nothing to support that premis

Occam

 

This advice coming from the biggest turkey on the board.

 

Wow

Occam feels like Gary Cooper in 'Sergeant York'
Poke your heads up damn hun
gobble gobble. [said the turkey]

Occam

 

Notably Dawkins also ranks somewhere near the realm of genius - a lot nearer to it than EP. I think you can be absolutely certain Dawkins will know what he means even if you disagree with him, or not. It will also be a fact that if you start telling people not to use terms like "weak" and "strong" atheism, you will miss vital clues as to what they are talking about. I think you either didnt read any of the Dawkins article or just read some of it - but one thing shines out - you havent much of a clue what you are on about at all

 

Ok col im gonna do a review on weak and strong athiesm
And agnosticism.

Occam

 

Dear Mouthbreathers,

I have already explained to you that Dawkins uses the terms in the popular sense in which the listener will receive them.
Here is a quote:

"Maybe we have to be technically and strictly agnostic, but in practice we are all teapot atheists."


Fishbane uses the same sense:

I believe there is no god, but I have no way of proving that is so, so the best word for my belief state is agnostic.

Now,
Lets talk about your idea to use the qualified terms,
Weak Atheist
or
Strong Atheist.

Stupid.
It wont work, will confuse the listener and get abandoned leaving only more confusion.
Remember years ago during Creation/Evo debates and Evos 'pretended' to accept the terms
Macro Evolution
and
Micro Evolution.
Bad idea.
As soon as the terms came into play, the Evos (who knew full well what was intended meaning) turned to people like you and allowed the misunderstanding to take commonplace.
"If Micro is accepted... then Macro is only many many 'Micros' added together... so Macro is accepted right?"

Thats what you are headed for.
"So a 'Weak Atheist is someone who believes there is no god but just weak in their beliefs right?"

Thats what you are heading for.

Dawkins and most of his kind use the word 'Atheist' to describe a belief in a godless universe.
This is (like it or not) the way the word is taken by almost everyone now.

You know Im right.

 

It might confuse EP - but reasonable people will be able to read things where the exact terminology of what constitutes weak n strong atheism will be made known and that will apprise them of how to use those terms and what others are talking about. As a left-of-field example -You might want to use the term "mechanical determinism" at some point but you sure wont want to use it in certain theories of "mind" cuz it wont wash if you have the view that mind is not mechanically determined (and yet otherwise determined)- so "weak" and "strong" are gonna be terms that have appliance to a particular brand of atheism applicable to a certain type of debate
A bit like "mechanical determinism" only applies to a certain kind of debate
NOW JAGEDDIT ?? HUH - DOH !
It applies because there is a general agreement to debate things in those terms as it denotes what kind of thing you have in mind when you use the term
A bit like not all washing powders are the same - some are bio and others are non-bio but theyre both washing powder. Now to a normal regular - "I just want washing powder" kind of guy - it dont matter which he buys - but to a - "hey I make washing powder" - kind of guy - believe me it matters
but when it comes to knowing your washing powder who you gonna trust?
mr regular - or mr makes-thestuff?

 

Ok,
Good luck with that.
Its not working now and it wont work later.
Here is what you can work with:

Atheism: The belief in a godless universe.
Agnosticism: 'Not Knowing' if there is a God or Not.
Dumbassery: Insisting everyone else get with your 'weak/strong' atheism' program.

 

Hmm I prefer Dawkins style - he's much more understandable, once you take the time to educate yourself with his understanding - you must read him one day proximo - you could give us all a good conversation once you have

 

Why not just weld theism and atheism together and say
Evolution is creationism
After all its the temporal aspect that confuses most
Who is to say how 'quickly god creates"
Life evolves with a little help from a friend

Thus,, 'disproving evolution' is is an atheist act

Sounds just as reasonable as any other arguement occam
has heard on the issue



Occam

 

Yes, I have read Dawkins and just watched his documentary (if i can call it that) 'The Root of All Evil'.
Then I sat through several hours of Dawkins interviews including a CBC 'roundtable' and a BBC interview.

There is nothing new with Dawkins though, he is really just the 'last man standing' among the Old Skool Naturalistic Atheists.
Not a single new insight since 1982 at the most.

So you read Dawkins propaganda Columbo?
It wouldnt surprise me a bit.
I have no doubt you really did think it was easily understandable.
Sunk in very easily didnt it?
Easily absorbed eh?
I bet it was!
LOL

 

PULEEZ at least do the right thing and attack the argument not the person
wikipedia on weak and strong atheism
Suppose Dawkins were arguing against the athiest argument he would still acknowledge that W and S atheism existed - To him it would be simply wrong not to differentiate - NOW, you may choose to try and pick apart atheism but whenever you argue against Dawkins or other people who assert the W/S case, he will stop you and say "which brand of atheism" ? especially if you are not explaining away one brand without also attacking the other - attack weak atheism and you might not be attacking strong atheism - And visa versa - you can see how atheism still stands. It offers MORE of an opportunity to defeat the argument than anything if you only attacked on two fronts - as he has attacked religion. At least Dawkins added to the whole debate - youre just slagging him off because you dont understand the reason for his saying there are differences, without you understanding that there are differences
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Dawkins

Following september 11th - Dawkins was assked how the world might have changed

You may laugh at my association with his arguments but - I can tell you that this sentiment is growing and becoming the prevailant sentement throughout Britain - it may not be too long after all that a capitalist country completely denounces religion - and my interest is in the cultural phenomena that Dawkins expresses well - Elton John also calls for a ban on religion, and many others including academics, businessmen, and (in closed circles) so do some politicians, and a fair number of celebrities - And behind them are millions of ordinary people - it would seem Britain is fast becoming the leading exponent of atheism - If you believe in religion I suggest you learn to defeat this trend - a good idea always spreads
I have already stated in HF that I do not believe it wrong now to practice or assert ones faith but neither do I assert it wrong to deny the state its faith in god and thus to deny religion its protected status in law - You do not need status under the law to believe a religion is true - you can just believe its true - but unless you defeat atheism - religion will slide down the pan
Yes - I've read his propoganda but then I've read god's propoganda too. I prefer the least warmongering of the two - and I cant wait for his next book

 

Its so simple its stupid.
Dawkins is describing Islam.

He then pulls a little trick that is so stupidly simple that it works like magic on people like you:
(ready)
Islam is a 'religion'.
Therefore
This is what comes from 'Religion'.

Watch me do it.
Are you watching?

Government is evil.
Governments are destroying the planet and a threat to us all.
(lets imagine this is WW2 Britain for some fun)
Government is the problem people and the fact a government is bombing us, killing kids and causing harm everywhere proves it.
"Many of us saw political parties as harmless nonsense. Beliefs might lack all supporting evidence but, we thought, if people needed a crutch for consolation, where's the harm? 1942 changed all that. Political Ideology is not harmless nonsense, it can be lethally dangerous nonsense. Dangerous because it gives people unshakeable confidence in their own national righteousness. Dangerous because it gives them false courage to kill themselves, which automatically removes normal barriers to killing others. Dangerous because it teaches enmity to others labelled only by a difference of inherited government tradition. And dangerous because we have all bought into a weird respect, which uniquely protects Governments from normal criticism. Let's now stop being so damned respectful!

Dawkins really is much much smarter than almost everyone else.
He just pulled the simplest trick and look how many people fell for it.

There is no religion known as 'Religion'.
Its a broad umbrella term that can include anything and everything.
Islam,
Satanism,
Buddhism,
Heck.. Atheism can be a 'religion'.

The point is that I just made as convincing an argument that 'Politics' is a menace to society as Dawkins did for 'Religion'.

Tell me where Im wrong and why I didnt just do that?

 

I was gonna argue but its just dumb to argue against the inept - ok ok - just one more try
The guy doesnt mention all the different religions simply because the ones he argues against all have ONE THING IN COMMON HUH? hence they call them THEISTIC - when he's attacking a non-theistic religion(an atheist religion) he wouldnt argue against theism - hey, why not?
because theyre not fuckin theists and he's arguing from an atheist position

So he's an " A-THEIST" (non theist) indicating that he's attacking only theism !!!! hence his very need to call it weak and strong atheism - because he wants you to know from which type of atheist position he's arguing
He wouldnt argue against atheistic religions with an atheist argument - he would argue from a different position because atheism attacks theism - it does not attack atheism

Proximo - all you gotta do in order to argue more effectively is THINK ABOUT WHAT WORDS ACTUALLY MEAN rather than what you think they mean. english words have a sense and meaning stretching back thousands of years into Greek and Latin, French, and German I suggest you bookmark the following link
http://www.etymonline.com

Jeez talk about having to state the bleeding obvious
also regarding your comment that its an attack against muslims - its not - you would understand that if you lived in Britain where we have been under attack from bombs planted by christian extremists since 1969 to mid 1990's, 15 or 20 bombs in any year sometimes.
And remember this - its best to attack Dawkins arguments because he is educating far more people than you ever will - if you oppose him - learn what he advocates before attacking it. You have to see the strength of his argument before you see the weaknesses. In fact he also educates the educators
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Dawkins
read about why you know nothing of Dawkins - he is a member of the "brights movement" a group dedicated to showing how atheism need not show religion in a bad light
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brights_movement

naturalism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naturalism_%28philosophy%29

Did you get that quote? how does his brand of atheism differ from weak atheism ? because weak atheism doesnt necessarily spring from a naturalist ontology ! ergo - weak atheism might not attack bhuddism for example.
suggest you clarify these terms for yourself:
Ergo, Ontology, philosophical naturalism, naturalism, metaphysics, metaphysical ontology