Why are we so bad at this?

Dwise, you stated:It's because we are trying in vain to get through to a willfully
ignorant and willfully stupid asshole who refuses to ever act
in good faith, YOU.*** There you go, showing your weakness, again.What I am talking about should be plain and simple enough
for anyone to u/s.And, it is this: the murder of innocent little babies.The Supreme Court, Congress, Executive branch, none of
these institutions have the power to make abortion right.Granted the courts can make abortion possible, but they
cannot make it right.They have no more authority to make it right than a vagrant
in the street does.If an abortion is necessary to save the life of the mother, I can
u/s that. But that would be the only situation in which I
personally find it acceptable.Even in the case of rape we do not murder the rapist. It is
sadistic to murder the innocent baby.I don't u/s why it is necessary to explain the value and worth
of a baby's life to supposedly grown-ups.

Candle, can you please define, as precisely and rigorously as you can, the word "baby?"Pretend I'm an alien without any amount of "common sense." Try to define the term so that anyone who comprehends English will understand the term in exactly the way you use it. Try to define the term clearly enough to distinguish when specifically a "baby" exists, and what distinguishes a "baby" from other collections of human cells.

I'll take a stab at this since I think I know what Candle3 will say, though I won't be hitting "return" every 60 characters. A baby, i.e., a living human being, is created when sperm and egg first come together to form a zygote. It remains a baby from that time forward. Any loss of the baby after that represents a death. If it's spontaneously or natural, such as through failure to fully attach to the uterine wall (almost always undetected) or a miscarriage, then it's an unfortunate but unpreventable death. If it's through any abortive technique then it's murder.One other common conservative Christian idea for when a zygote becomes a baby is when the heartbeat can be detected. Other ideas not widely shared within the conservative Christian community are when brain activity can be detected, or when survival outside the womb is possible given modern technology.One little addendum: If a conservative Christian family rejects modern medicine and loses a baby through medically preventable miscarriage then it is God's will, not murder.--Percy

Percy, you wrote:"One little addendum: If a conservative Christian family
rejects modern medicine and loses a baby through medically
preventable miscarriage then it is God's will, not murder."***I do not know anyone like this. Doctors study for many
years. They are quite knowledgeable.I would never tempt God by insisting that he alone must
fix the problem.God works through many doctors. Some of them pray for
His guidance every day.

I am not lying; you are just too willfully stupid to understand reality. Really! How many times do I have to explain everything to you?You don't even know what "abortion" means; from Wikipedia:

• "Abortion" describes "the termination of a pregnancy by removal or expulsion of an embryo or fetus." There are two different basic kinds of abortion:
  ​
  1. Spontaneous Abortion, AKA "miscarriage --

     quote:

     ---

     Miscarriage, also known as spontaneous abortion, is the unintentional expulsion of an embryo or fetus before the 24th week of gestation. A pregnancy that ends before 37 weeks of gestation resulting in a live-born infant is a "premature birth" or a "preterm birth". When a fetus dies in utero after viability, or during delivery, it is usually termed "stillborn". Premature births and stillbirths are generally not considered to be miscarriages, although usage of these terms can sometimes overlap.

     ​

     Studies of pregnant women in the US and China have shown that between 40% and 60% of embryos do not progress to birth. The vast majority of miscarriages occur before the woman is aware that she is pregnant, and many pregnancies spontaneously abort before medical practitioners can detect an embryo. Between 15% and 30% of known pregnancies end in clinically apparent miscarriage, depending upon the age and health of the pregnant woman. 80% of these spontaneous abortions happen in the first trimester.

     ​

     The most common cause of spontaneous abortion during the first trimester is chromosomal abnormalities of the embryo or fetus, accounting for at least 50% of sampled early pregnancy losses.

     ---

     ​
     As per that last, spontaneous abortion plays a major role in eliminating most of the "bad" mutations that creationists seem to believe must result in full-term offspring. Also, that "40% and 60%" figure agrees with the conventional wisdom that half of all conceptions will spontaneously abort. In my personal opinion, that also explains the practice of planting a few seeds in the same seed hole in the hope that at least one will germination; if more than one germinates, the farmer simply most the extras into their own holes to grow.
     ​
  2. Induced Abortion --
     This is what we are talking about (my emphasis added):

     quote:

     ---

     An induced abortion is a medical procedure to end a pregnancy. In present-day English, the term abortion, when used without further qualification, generally refers to induced abortion.

     ​

     . . .

     ​

     Abortions can be characterized as either therapeutic or elective. When an abortion is performed for medical reasons, the procedure is referred to as a therapeutic abortion. Medical reasons for therapeutic abortion include saving the life of the pregnant woman, preventing harm to the woman's physical or mental health, preventing the birth of a child who will have a significantly increased chance of mortality or morbidity, and reducing the number of fetuses to lessen health risks associated with multiple pregnancy. An abortion is referred to as elective or voluntary when it is performed at the request of the woman for non-medical reasons. Confusion sometimes arises over the term elective because "elective surgery" generally refers to all scheduled surgery, whether medically necessary or not.

     ---

     ​
     So that means THAT A THERAPEUTIC ABORTION IS STILL AN ABORTION. Indeed, the medical terminology that is entered into the patient's medical record is "abortion", which I'm sure is also the terminology used in the ICD database entry for that procedure (you see those codes in your doctor's bill). That is what it is called; you are not allowed to "define it away" as your lot tries to do with everything else. It is what it is.
     ​
     I've heard doctors being interviewed about this. The name of the therapeutic abortion procedure includes the word "abortion", since that is precisely what it is. Doctors in those states with those draconian anti-abortion laws live in fear of you anti-abortion fanatics (including local DAs) seeing that medical entry and trying to have him prosecuted under that state's literally stupid law. Or the fanatics will engage in stochastic terrorism against that doctor by deploying their flying monkey wing; I'm sure that your church is filled with them.  
     ​
     The main problem with those stupid anti-abortion laws is that they were written by idiots (like yourself) lacking medical knowledge. You just recently posted:
     ​
     Candle3 writes in Message 49:

     ​

     Doctors study for many
     years. They are quite knowledgeable.
     ​
     And yet those laws forbid doctors from using their knowledge and their medical judgement (also taught and developed in their training) by dictating to them what they can and cannot do, even if that endangers the life of the mother.
     ​
     What they need to do is to replace those extremely stupid laws with smarter ones with input from medical professionals (preferably OB-GYN, the ones directly affected by the laws) so that they make medical sense. As it is, those laws are killing women with their idiocy. We do not need religious fanatics trying to micromanage doctors in the middle of a medical emergency, especially when their intended purpose is to block her receiving the necessary medical care.

A failed pregnancy is not the same thing as an abortion. Failed pregnancy is a condition, whereas abortion is a procedure. A failed pregnancy is a condition that requires medical treatment. That medical treatment can include therapeutic abortion.How could anyone be unable to understand such basic things? I shouldn't have to explain it to anyone, yet you insist on not understanding it. And frankly, I have no reason to hope that you understand it now. "u/s"? What the fuck is that supposed to mean? Use English!If it's supposed to mean "understand", then that's most certainly a change of heart for you. Up to this point you have been resisting and opposing understanding the idea of a doctor needing to provide medical treatment for a mother whose life is seriously at stake. What the fuck do you think I've been arguing for all this time? Which you have consistently opposed.So please understand why I view your sudden change of heart with skepticism. And it doesn't help that you have a long history of lying to us about just about anything and everything. You have created your god in your own image. Since you have demonstrated yourself to be a monster, then so must be your god.

I think you might have completely missed the underlying premise: You're dissembling. Whether you know anyone like this or not, you know such families exist. Conservative Christian families withholding modern medical care from their children make regular appearances in the news, such as this one from last week: Please don't pretend (in effect, lie) that this issue doesn't exist because it very much does. When a conservative Christian family withholds medical care from a child who dies, is it God's will or murder (or manslaughter in this case)?The part of my post that you replied to is labeled "one little addendum". There was a longer section above that attempted to capture your feelings about when a zygote becomes a human being. Did I get that right?--Percy

Yes, we u/s (a dumb usage given the nature of the English language but I u/s so it does meet one criteria of effective communication if not others).We disagree. In the vast majority of cases the procedure is performed early enough that we recognize no viability to the growing cellular mass. We also recognize there are no screaming fetuses. We have a highly emotional religious preacher that loves him some fetus while having no care for the state of present humanity.Embryos are not sentient beings. Your religious pronouncements that they are does not change that. If the mother does not want the future baggage then she is free to dispose of it. We give the mother the right to decide whether to watch the child graduate from HS in 18 years or gets pitched into the bucket for human waste today.No priests necessary unless the mother wants one. Define "right"?- Acceptable to your conception of Deity?Don't care. Your thoughts on behalf of some frivolous fantasy ghost deity do not impact human reality.- Personal bodily autonomy?Along with freedom, taxes and tort claims, yes, this is exactly the kind of stuff we built our courts to help decide. They have the authority we give them. The use of the courts is the way we determine the limits to human actions. Your gods (or rather you priests) do not write our law because we have found you write terrible, evil, blood soaked law. The priests of gods are too inhumane. We rule ourselves. I don't u/s why it is necessary to explain the value and worth of personal bodily autonomy as a most vital concept to stem evil from our species.

Percy, you wrote:"You're dissembling. Whether you know anyone like this or not,
you know such families exist. Conservative Christian families
withholding modern medical care from their children make
regular appearances in the news, such as this one from last week:***God does not command this. And those who practice this
are doing so without His consent. They are fools to tempt God.There are many denominations that claim to be Christians;
yet, they refuse to obey Him.Look at the Catholic Church. They have dogmas and practices
that are nowhere found in the Bible.The RCC was founded by Simon Magus, the sorcerer mentioned
in Acts 8:9-24. Simon was a great magician, who received
his powers from Satan. Everyone at that time knew of him
and his magical powers.It was this Simon, and not Simon Peter, who went to Rome
and started the universal church.Simon Peter was the rock that the church was built upon. Jesus
was /is that Rock. A misunderstanding of Matthew 16:18
allowed Satan to use Simon Magus as this make-believe rock.There is a bronze statue in the Vatican of Simon Magus (the
RCC asserts that it is a statue of Simon Peter) that has been
kissed on one hand so many times that it is almost a stub.There are tales of Simon the sorcerer levitating in Rome, and
performing other miracles.The RCC is Satan's counterfeit religion. It calls itself a Christian
Church because Simon Magus was baptized.The RCC is the harlot in Revelation. The Apostle John states
that she has daughter churches. These churches have gained
many of their customs and beliefs from the mother church.One such custom is that of Sunday replacing Saturday as the
Sabbath. The RCC asserts that it has/had the authority to
days. They say that the simple fact that most other churches
made the change to Sunday proves they had the authority.There is not one verse in the Bible that authorizes the change.
Sunday is the mark of the RCC. It was also the mark of the HRE.Throughout history many Christians have been slaughtered
by these two beasts because they refused to take this mark.
They remained faithful to God.My point is that people can be deceived, and oftentimes, quite
easily.The members of the RCC have not been called by God. He
allows them to be deceived. They will receive their calling
along with those of other religions in their pre-set time.The Pope, Cardinals, Bishops, and priests know that they are
not as they claim to be. They are serious trouble.

And you're the exception, right?

No, no, he’s not an exception, Tangle. He’s a nutcase. A case of nuts. An enclosure enwrapping the nuggets of a weak minded religious fantasy.

AZ, you wrote:"No, no, he’s not an exception, Tangle. He’s a nutcase.
A case of nuts. An enclosure enwrapping the nuggets of a
weak minded religious fantasy."***My mind came from God. He is the One who gave me life;
He gave life to everyone and everything.You do not believe in God. You think that the life of your
fore-amoebae leeched out of a rock billions of years ago.Excuse me for laughing, but you have the gall to tell everyone
that you know what happened billions of years ago.I don't understand how you can trust your brain, which you say,
is nothing more than a random collection of atoms.You probably even have the audacity to teach that the tiny
Colorado River formed the Grand Canyon over a span of
millions of years.It should be clear to everyone that the Canyon was formed
from the runoff of a global flood, with water escaping from the
large water basin North and East of the canyon.Does your random collection of brain cells tell you why Earth's
other rivers did not do the same. The Nile, Mississippi,
Amazon, and other great rivers should have even larger
canyons.Occam's Razor states that soft tissue in dino fossils is proof
of recent death, as does C-14. But the random collection of
brain matter insist that both iron and contamination are the
cause.Understand this: we do not witness evolution happening
today, nor do we witness it in the fossils.The only place this takes place is in the minds of those who
deny the existence of God.Paul states in Romans 1 that there is no excuse for not
believing in the Creator. His creation is proof of His existence.It also states those who deny Him are fools. I agree.I could go on for hours about the absurdity of evolution, but
that random collection of brain matter in your head could
not conceive the truth.

quote:

---

You probably even have the audacity to teach that the tiny
Colorado River formed the Grand Canyon over a span of
millions of years.

---

That’s because it was. As the canyon itself makes clear. Why else would it have the shape of a river course - including meanders? Have a look at Horseshoe Bend![quote] It should be clear to everyone that the Canyon was formed
from the runoff of a global flood, with water escaping from the
large water basin North and East of the canyon. [quote] In reality that is obviously false. You wouldn’t get a canyon that looks like a mature river course out of that!

quote:

---

Does your random collection of brain cells tell you why Earth's
other rivers did not do the same. The Nile, Mississippi,
Amazon, and other great rivers should have even larger
canyons.

---

It is geological uplift that causes a river to cut a deep canyon. No uplift, no canyon.

And right on cue you prove him completely right. Good job! Plus you continue to lie your ass off every single time you open your mouth. Like with your incessant lying about "soft tissue" and "C-14" (you still haven't come to the Radiocarbon Dating Discussion with candle2 topic yet, have you? Despite that being the place to discuss radiocarbon dating. Or should I say that you are avoiding it out of fear because that's where that topic is discussed?) . I already demonstrated (in Message 83) how you had lied in Message 74 about Fibres and cellular structures preserved in 75-million–year-old dinosaur specimens, Sergio Bertazzo, Susannah C R Maidment, Charalambos Kallepitis, Sarah Fearn, Molly M Stevens, Hai-nan Xie, and you have no response?And now you add stupid lies about the Grand Canyon? What's next, The Return of the Giant Mud Fossils? We know exactly what such an event should produce, BECAUSE WE SEE IT IN THE CHANNELED SCABLANDS. And what that kind of event produces looks nothing at all like the Grand Canyon. Jessica H. Christ! Pull your head out of your ass and LEARN SOMETHING!In my latest reply to you (albeit to an old lie), Message 12 in that topic you're so utterly afraid to go near, I describe your situation: You don't know anything which makes you a prime target for creationist deception. And you have swallowed it hook, line, and sinker! And you will continue to fall for their lies as long as you maintain your pristine and profound ignorance.But if you were to learn the science that they are lying about, then you will be able to see through their lies. Learning even just a little will make their lies turn transparent -- that is why creationists avoid even talking with scientists (eg, Gish & Morris' visit to USGS in the early 70's where the hottest topic their presentation sparked was all these scientists trying to explain to them what they got wrong about thermodynamics, so that was the last time they ever talked to scientists). Similarly, savvy YECs know to avoid any discussion of young-earth or flood-geology claims with someone knowledgeable; it's just the stupider YECs, like you, who don't know when to cut and run.And seriously, which stupid lying creationist are you copying your stupid bullshit lies from? Seriously! Maybe he (or they) provide some actual links to the sources that they are lying about. Maybe even the text of their quote mining (AKA "lying") of those sources -- you know full well what I'm talking about because I have described their methods to you several times already. Oh, I'm sure you can go on for hours reciting stupid bullshit lies about "evolution" (whatever the fuck you mean by that term, because nothing you have ever posted here has ever had anything to do with evolution, but rather just some stupid bullshit strawman nonsense), but why waste everybody's time? But if you really want to expose problems with evolution, THEN FIRST YOU MUST LEARN WHAT IT ACTUALLY IS! Yet again:

DWise1:

---

My position basically boils down to this:

If you honestly and truly want to fight evolution, then at least do it right!
Learn everything you can about evolution and then attack it, not some stupid strawman caricature of it.
And do so honestly and truthfully!

​

By refusing to fight evolution honestly and truthfully, but rather using "creation science" instead, you are constantly shooting yourself in the foot, dooming your cause to failure and your followers to losing their faith.

---

What part of that are you so stubbornly incapable of understanding?Seriously, how could anyone ever possibly get through to you? If you really believed that, then wouldn't it be sacrilege to defile that "God-given mind" with complete and utter lies as you constantly do by feeding it stupid creationist bullshit lies?Or would you rather force God to cast pearls before swine (meaning before you)?

And yet you can't supply any evidence that the GC formed quickly.If it was so clear, surely you could present some evidence, right?

Not so. You have no evidence to even propose such an absurdity. Your god does not exist. Your mind came as an emergent property of physics, chemistry, biology. There are substantial points in evidence given by the universe to confidently conclude that life, the universe and everything are massive collections of matter and energy in constant motion through a universe full of energy gradients. Gods do not appear in the inventory. QFT can work in strange and mysterious ways.Except for the amoebae bit (it was the chemicals that leeched out of a rock billions of years ago, not the bug) you are right. Our best evidence goes like this: after gastrillions and gazillions and lots and lots of trying over 100s of millions of years some of these chemicals spread across an energy gradient and sparked a cascade of potentials that added structure to the gradient. The first spark of life. No gods necessary. Yep. Gall “Я” Us.Ok, so like those dioramas they made you do in grade school, we can’t place every piece of cotton ball and tape in our past into the shoebox but we know they were there. We have the evidence of what happened those billions of years ago and nothing in there evidences any form of celestial spook.Again, you lose. I never said that, lying priest.This universe is NOT built on your fallacious random strawman. We have seen and used the rules of creation and manipulation to recreate reality in our own image. We know and use those rules with exceptional fidelity and there is nothing random in our skills.But, to answer your larger question, I cannot trust my brain until its functions have been calibrated by others. That’s the scientific method.Insert religious BS about Colorado River, Occam's Razor, C-14, soft tissue dino’s, as the list of Candle(n)’s other intellectual fantasies grows to meet the Talking Snake ®. Lying priest. Yes, we do witness evolution happening today just as we witness it in the fossils from millions upon millions of years ago. You turn blind to this because it shatters the illusion and denies the exitance of your celestial spook. Yes. It is good to go into the study of universal reality unhindered by the stupidity of religious fantasy. Your bible is evil and should be burned.