Stogumber

Returning to the topic, there will always be people like Trump among a human population. Trait distribution in a population will almost always follow a bell shaped curve, so statistically people like Trump who combine narcissism and an innate charisma with racism, misogyny, and so on, will always exist. If you don't think people possessing human qualities that eventually lead them to break the law should be prosecuted for things like election interference and theft of national documents (many of them classified), please explain why.And if you think people like Hunter Biden, who possessed the very human quality of vulnerability to addiction, should be hounded for years for things he didn't do simply to hurt a close relative who's a politician in high office, please explain why.It's timely that Alexander Smirnov, the former FBI informant, just pleaded guilty to lying about Hunter and Joe Biden receiving bribes from Burisma. It was his lies back in 2015 and 2016 that resulted in the congressional investigation that was the beginning of all Hunter Biden's troubles. Smirnov also possessed some very human qualities, like dishonesty and greed. One of the charges he pleaded guilty to was failure to pay taxes on $2.1 million earned over three years - apparently dishonesty can be very profitable. Yes, basing opinions on things other than facts is another common quality that has persisted in humans for millennia. Inability to tell fact from fiction is another. We are no better now as a species then we were a couple hundred thousand years ago. In fact, there seems to be a tendency for those with the greatest responsibilities, especially those in government, to behave like petulant children.--Percy

While it is certainly true that *we* have not yet examined a higher intelligence than our own, it is a bit more vague to ascribe spiritual powers to anything other than a spirit.
You may get a kick out of imagining yourself as a humanistic shaman, but you are no more a shaman than a package of Raman noodles, oh noodly one! And IF Jesus lives, He lives despite your most feverish and concerted efforts to blot Him out of your wind.Your attempts to vanquish Him with but a thought are but a waste of mental energy that could be better spent helping drug addicts or other dysfunctional poor people.
Or in planning to countercheck Trump's next move.

That's not what AZPaul3 meant. All he meant by "Your higher power is us" is that if you're looking for a higher power, the highest one we have any evidence for is us. He did not ascribe any spiritual power to us. He instead reiterated our violent tendencies unchanged from our ancient selves and whose addiction to belief in a higher spiritual power is the cause of much of that violence. Again, he said nothing like that. You can substitute any unprovable idea into your sentence. "If the universe is actually just the imaginings of a mind in a jar, then that's despite your most feverish and concerted efforts to blot this out of your mind."Your Sunday visits and your time spent on your knees and in exercising prejudice against those who see a different higher power could also be better spent helping drug addicts or other dysfunctional poor people.And poor people are no more dysfunctional than any other group. Your bigotry is showing again. A predilection for political games and seeking power are more ancient human traits that are as prevalent today as they've ever been.--Percy

I know this. I was likely projecting. I like to pick on AZPaul3 a bit. He seems so convinced that all religion is hateful and the cause of societal problems. He and you both have such a mental block towards the idea that Jesus is real. And eternally alive. Not all of reality can be handily proven by objective evidence.

I support deportation only to the degree that it is limited to those who have committed criminal acts here in their short time in the United States. It has been my experience that the vast majority of newcomers are nice and honorable people. They work hard and are just like the rest of us if not better. There is, however, a small minority of troublemakers. We do not need them here. We have enough troubles of our own. I rarely watch Fox News, by the way.

You're describing this incorrectly. I accept that for which there is evidence. The only way to support any proposition is through evidence.--Percy

The concept of a spirit is derived from our wonder at the qualia of our own conscience. We extended that wonder first to our family then we personified it into the things that caused our fears, the trembling of the ground, the fury of the storms. Some shaman from ancient tribes found the same spirit in the river and in the rocks along its banks. And as within us, they saw in this spirit the power to act in all the ways our imaginations can describe. The volcano, the sun, the blizzard, became as men with conscience purpose of will.Decoupling these spirits from the observed physical objects of our fears and elevating them into the imagined gave us the gods and their minions. From there, spirits, unseen, non-physical, were ascribed great powers to affect our world. From there all manner of religion evolved. All from our own imaginations. All of it emotional. None of it real.We, ourselves, were the origins of spirit, with our human emotions, questioning and imagining. No gods necessary.I am a spiritual person. I feel the wonder of my own existence. Powerful emotions swell within when I see stretched out before me the blaze of glory that is the Milky Way. Existential awe. The feeling is emotional and both the feeling and the spirit experiencing it are confined within my head. No gods necessary. Spirit is not supernatural. It is an emotionally laden description for a strong emotional human experience. Pesto Be Unto Him.And, yes, I am a shaman. I am the sole intermediary between the natural and supernatural worlds in my universe. I use the magic of physics to cure illness, foretell the future, control the universal forces, and alter my world to fit my own image.Unfortunately, I can’t do Raman noodles. I tend to over salt the dish which isn’t good for my heart. He doesn’t. We know this. If he ever existed, he’d be older than me and would be much deteriorated. For all their bombast the priests have yet to show me any 2000 year-old living body that can still stand in the pulpit and preach without his arms and ears falling off half way through the sermon. Too late, Phatman. As the history of humanity has already amply attested. You can’t fight the reality, Phat. It’s in the history books. You and your fellow evil-followers can try to ignore religion’s history but it has already bit you … hard. Oh, Phat, please. Objective evidence is the only evidence there is. Reality is assessed by the evidence it produces and, right now, that evidence precludes any of your religious delusions. Your god and his talking snake are not real.

AZ Shaman:

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The concept of a spirit derives from our wonder at the qualia of our conscience. We extended that wonder first to our family then we personified it into the things that caused our fears, the trembling of the ground, the fury of the storms. Some shamans from ancient tribes found the same spirit in the river and in the rocks along its banks. And as within us, they saw in this spirit the power to act in all the ways our imaginations can describe. The volcano, the sun, the blizzard, became as men with conscience purpose of will.
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Decoupling these spirits from the observed physical objects of our fears and elevating them into the imagined gave us the gods and their minions. From there, spirits, unseen and non-physical, were ascribed great powers to affect our world. From there, all manner of religion evolved—all from our own imaginations, all emotional, none real.
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Compared with

NIV, Deut 4:15-20:

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You saw no form of any kind the day the LORD spoke to you at Horeb out of the fire. Therefore watch yourselves very carefully, so that you do not become corrupt and make for yourselves an idol, an image of any shape, whether formed like a man or a woman, or like any animal on earth or any bird that flies in the air, or like any creature that moves along the ground or any fish in the waters below. And when you look up to the sky and see the sun, the moon and the stars--all the heavenly array--do not be enticed into bowing down to them and worshiping things the LORD your God has apportioned to all the nations under heaven.

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One man's shaman is another man's raman. And what I mean by that is that you essentially worship the human intellect. You worship the creature and deny the Creator.
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You do know I am immune to scripture, yes?

I don't know why AZPaul3 didn't comment on this, but this is obviously untrue. He talked about awe at the universe and so forth and you call it worshipping himself. You're just tossing grenades in reaction to the lack of receptivity to your preaching, another example of hostility (bringing this back onto the topic introduced in Message 1) directed at those who don't share your beliefs.--Percy

Ill take a different tactic from Percy here. Do you think it's wise to project your view of the world ("worship") onto others?Does this help you accurately understand the motives and positions of people who genuinely think differently from you? Or does it just make you personally feel better, because you feel like you can assert hypocrisy?I've never met an atheist who would agree that they "worship" anything. For many of us the term is itself repulsive.This is a common thing with people with a strong attachment to faith. They presume and even insist that everyone else is doing the same thing they do, just with different targets. "You have faith too!" "You just worship something different!"There are two issues with this.1. It's just not true. You're using the term "worship" in such a broad context as to take away all meaning of the term. You might as well say someone "worships" gravity. Nobody is going to churches and singing praises about human intellect. Nobody is praying to human intellect. I'd guess that most of the people you'd accuse of this would actually agree that humans are not all that smart - we need to develop complex and self-correcting systems to correct the ease with which human intellect produces errors (there's a reason we use the scientific method to investigate reality, and not just individual contemplation).2. It's an attempt to set up an argument that would itself be fallacious, a "tu quoque" fallacy.Further, very few atheists "deny the creator." Rather, we are unconvinced that a creator exists. There's a difference. That position may be nuanced and different for specific creator-claims (since there are many, some more falsifiable than others), but in general only Christians and the faithful say anything about "denying."

Of course. The only narrative that you ascribe to comes from your own mind. You ridicule ancient texts yet create your own "modern texts" and narratives. You are following the teachings of your "father"...*ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil..*.I still respect you as a person. What I refuse to acknowledge is the voices in your head."Meet the new Boss...same as the old Boss"...~The Who

I am assuming that you meant to use the word "word" instead of "world".
​ I am not trying to assert hypocrisy. I am pointing out the hatred of ancient texts coupled with the narrative of one who imagines themselves to be "spiritual" yet who (from my viewpoint) lifts up the human and the wisdom of this world.I am only pointing out the obvious contrasts and the irony of an antitheist who professess a form of spirituality. I note that we are quite different.

We're not the ones having to deal with voices in our heads, but rather Christians are the ones who constantly self-describe as being so afflicted ("Jesus is always talking to me."). You are projecting again.

Malcolm in the Middle, final season:

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Reese to Dewey: Don't do what the voices in your head tell you! They are NOT your friends!

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I note this, Rahvin. You have a point. My "hostility" is not directed at you, or AZPaul3 or at Rahvin. My hostility is directed at "spirits" opposing the Holy Spirit.Any grenades I toss will not affect you.
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