www.talkrational.org

dave Hawkins #fundie talkrational.org

THE SLIPPERY SLOPE

[Fictional but somewhat plausible scenario]
2011 - Admins on internet forums are lenient on people who make posts about killing people in cold blood
2012 - Various government agencies, being underfunded anyway, stop prosecuting internet crimes
2013 - Anti-Christian hate groups start killing Christians and largely get away with it
2014 - A new law is enacted which labels Christians as "subversive to society"
2015 - Football stadiums accross the nation add a new event to generate more revenue - Lions Eating Christians

Before you laugh, stop and think ... did the Romans just wake up one day all of a sudden and say "Hey, let's start feeding Christians to lions!"

No. There were most certainly steps leading up to it.

Where do you want society to be in 20 years?

Dave Hawkins #fundie talkrational.org

And if we really really really want to get serious about "not exploiting young people" ... let's talk about how SCIENTISTS are poisoning young minds in public schools with "fake science" about how the earth is millions of years old and your uncle is a monkey and we all evolved from pond scum and so on. Oh and how about vaccinations? Shooting up babies with a scary cocktail of god-knows-what and LYING to parents telling them it's good for their kids.

Yeah ... let's talk about exploiting people, shall we?

supersport #fundie talkrational.org

(according to Supersport, native Americans fought with dinosaurs on a regular basis)

you obviously don't have this book:

http://www.amazon.com/Fossil-Legends...7904052&sr=1-1

Mayor, a folklorist and historian of science, continues the project of understanding what premodern peoples made of fossils that she started in The First Fossil Hunters: Paleontology in Greek and Roman Times. Surveying accounts of Native American tradition from the earliest Spanish conquistador and missionary records of Aztec and Inca lore up through present-day Indian oral histories, she correlates Native American myths with the fossils they are known or presumed to have observed. The results are unsurprising: giant fossil mastodon and dinosaur bones engendered myths about giants—giant elk, bear, birds, centipedes, subhumanoids and mysterious "water monsters"—who populated the earth

would you like some quotes about indians finding dino bones and telling stories about them and/or using them as tools? I do own the book......... What's really cool is the stories they passed down through the generations of actually interacting/fighting with the dinos....but of course the evos, such as the one who wrote the book, think these stories were just made up...that indians by the hundreds saw the bones and then, like 3-year olds living in Make-Believe world, concocted elaborate, fictional tales about them....even though they evidently didn't construct the bones to form these creatures so that they'd know what they looked like......these "fiction" stories were deemed important enough to be remembered and faithfully retold generation after generation.

supersport #fundie talkrational.org

what fossil record? Even darwin knew that it didn't support his theory. Evos have been trying to rationalize the non-gradualistic/catastrophic-looking fossil record for years...this is what PE is all about. My question is how do long-agers rationalize dino-bones (including dino meat) laying on top of the ground so that American Indians and other ancients could find them and use them for tools. According to evo theory, 120 million year old bones should be way down below the surface.

supersport #fundie talkrational.org

well there's 2 separate issues here. The first issue is that it is quite clear by now that studying genes isn't going to tell science much about evolution or disease -- as both of these are influenced equally -- maybe even moreso -- by the epigenome (environmental factors.) Although there are a host of genetic diseases that are plaguing society, by far the most damage is being done via heart disease, cancer, MS, lupus, arthritis and other degernative diseases that have nothing to do with ones' genes, but instead how one (or their parents/granparents) live their lives. Diet, activity level, toxic chemicals, etc play much more of a role in disease than science lets on...therefor their interests should be directed towards showing people how to reverse the diseases that come as a result of years of abuse. Degenerating bodies can be regenerated, most people don't know this, but they can be taught.....even cancer can be reversed, which is just a degenerative (epigenetic) disease. Same with heart disease, high cholesterol, diabetes and all the rest....all reversible/curable if they're not too far along and haven't done too much damage. (interestingly, I read the other day that fasting actually reduces the built-up plaque on the walls of the heart's arteries.)

So the first issue is that science is wrong-headed about what is actually going to help the masses, and by merely studying genes they are wasting a lot of time and money...(not to mention lives.) The second thing -- and this is just a personal opinion -- is that our government shouldn't be in the business of health or disease to begin with. There are all kinds of companies with billions of potential dollars who can do the job just fine. If they find the cure -- genetically, epigenetically or otherwise -- the money will come. Nothing promotes a sense of urgency to produce a cure moreso than the reality that people won't get paid until that happens. But as it is, the government is in the business of "research." Thus, this "research," otherwise known as the continuing pipe-dream promise for a cure, is in itself a giant money-maker. I don't like paying for decades of empty promises -- like the 40-year "War against Cancer" -- I like paying for results....but I don't like paying for them until they're availiable. Therefore, I believe individual companies should put up their own money to do their own research and then, if they come up with a cure, reap the rewards. I don't believe my money should be stolen from me year after year to fund this chronic "research" that never produces a cure for a single thing.

He's Back!

Apparently one of his bans expired.

Supersport #fundie talkrational.org

so now science tells us that some of the earliest humans put feathers on their heads, smeared paint on their faces and shot the bow and arrow. Eventually science gets around to telling us what we already knew. Is it any wonder that the American Indian seems to have vague memories of the days of creation?..memories that often reflect those written in Genesis?...that's because their ancestors were there.

Dave Hawkins #fundie talkrational.org

I understand that there is igneous rock all over the place, but this is supposedly created slowly and steadily not abruptly and catastrophically like a volcano erupting.

[The whole thread is a goldmine of creationist stupidity]

gamera #fundie talkrational.org

"Wait, why is Christianity getting the credit again?"

Let's see:

The classical world had no real moral system except might makes right. This was true of the Greeks, the Roman, the Germanic tribes, the Babylonian, The Persian, Etc.

Judaism came up with this revolutionary idea that other people should be given moral consideration, even the poor, even the reviled, even one's enemies.

Along comes Christianity and makes that into a universal moral imperative, one that ultimately informed our worldview today. Indeed, we can trace that imperative to various particular Christian texts, such as the gospel, Paul's epistles, the writings of Augustine.

Which is why we ask if some action is right or wrong -- that wasn't really an issue in the classical world.

Does that help?

Ray Martinez #fundie talkrational.org

Presupposing an explanation to be necessary presupposes the falsity of Creationism. Creationism, once postulated, makes the request for this explanation unnecessary. That is the very point and purpose of Creationism: to kill any debate concerning why because "why" presupposes transmutation to be true and Creationism-ID to be false. The Creator wants to kill this debate so mankind can get on with studying the Bible and not animals.

Ray

SuperSport #fundie talkrational.org

[After looking at a Homo erectus skull and skeleton]
It doesn't look apelike at all. There are many explanations for how homo erectus' could have some of those traits...take brow ridges. As a YEC, I believe that the world's earliest humans indeed lived to be hundreds of years old....this belief is not only stated in the Bible -- a historical document -- but also passed down through generations of American Indians and even Europeans. So the point is that since homo erectus was probably a long-lived person, he/she probably matured and developed much slower than modern humans do. In this way, his bones were probably softer for a longer period of time because, as you know, kids' bones are softer and more pliable than adult bones are. If it was the case, then, that homo erectus was a hunter, then his diet probably consisted mostly of meats.....chewing meat requires more jaw strength and probably puts more pressure on the brow plates, causing them to enlarge due to this need for extra strength and support...and having soft bones for longer periods of time, homo erectus probably just developed this anatomical feature due to diet.

Supersport #fundie talkrational.org

you dopes never learn, do you....when are you going to learn to not doubt me?

http://www.nutrition2success.com/information/cats.php


If you do a little research on the subject you will learn that they used to do REAL science back in the good ole days before Darwinism was such a mainstream kook religion that was not to be questioned. Anyway, Dr. Pottenger did an experiment on cats that lasted many years and many generations whereby he took different groups of cats, feeding one group healthy foods such as raw meat, while the other he fed cow's milk and cooked meat, both of which had had any good nutrients and enzymes cooked out of them. As you will see in the above link, the cats placed on the crummy diet, within just a few generations developed all kinds of heritable diseases, anxiety, behavioral problems, eye problems, and all kinds of other problems including: Increasingly abnormal activities occurred between the same sexes

If science was worth a cotton-picking penny they'd be doing all kinds of these types of experiments on animals like rodents or cats or whatever to validate or invalidate the findings of Dr. Pottenger...(which, incidentally have already been verified by another scientist (forgot his name) who had many of the same results with mice. But the problem is, today's science is full of pigs who don't know how to do real science....they don't know how to do any experiment that might contradict their dingbat, non-intellectual theory that says everything we see around us just happened to form because it popped up by dumb chance in the right place, at the right time and in the right conditions so that the organism got laid more than others, with absolutely no evidence to back up such a wild and goofy hypothesis.

(Referring to an earlier post by same guy: http://fstdt.com/fundies/comments.aspx?q=50098)

Supersport #fundie talkrational.org

homosexuality is, in part anyway, caused by the diet of parents and granparents...specifically on the maternal side. It's just another example of how you are what you eat.....if you or your prior generations consume(d) a bunch of junk...alot of sweets, fats, sugars, sodas, pizzas, chemicals, etc....you're likely to produce junky, dysfunctional kids who are angry, frustrated, rebellious, lazy, non-productive and, yes, oftentimes homosexual -- all of which will most certainly turn out to be angry libs.

Dave Hawkins #fundie talkrational.org

After using to a Lego set as evidence for Young Earth Creationism, our fundy (Dave Hawkins) had this exchange:

Posted by (sane person) SteveF: You've got to be fucking kidding.

Posted by Dave Hawkins: No, Steve. Not kidding. Dinos/Humans. Did they co-exist? What are we teaching our young children? You need to drink a cup of strong coffee if you think this is not appropriate for the E&O forum.

Posted by SteveF: You crack me up Dave.

Posted by Dave Hawkins: Good. Keep laughing and I'm going to quietly re-educate your kids.

Supersport #fundie talkrational.org

[When asked why salamanders can regrow body parts but humans can't]

I'm not convinced humans can't. Heck, we regenerate things all the time: muscle, skin, brain, bone, even spinal columns to some degree, etc. Granted we are not as capable of regeneration as we might like to be, but maybe we just haven't yet learned how to do it. Maybe regeneration takes belief, for example. But if a doctor tells a paraplegic that he'll never walk again, why in the world would he ever believe otherwise? It's the same with cancer. We all know the placebo effect is real, yet doctors insist on giving cancer patients death sentences by saying things like "I'm sorry but you've only got 6 months to live." Well gee wiz, doc....thanks for giving people absolutely no hope.

It may or may not be the same with regeneration in humans. Of course the scientific community would never test such a thing.