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Bill: Freedom FOR Religion & FROM Religion Act #5
Details
Submitted by[?]: Kapitalist-Arbeitsfamilien Partei
Status[?]: passed
Votes: This is an ordinary bill. It requires more yes votes than no votes. This bill will not pass any sooner than the deadline.
Voting deadline: January 2495
Description[?]:
| .....b/c Militant Athiesm is a RELIGION just as much as Immerence and the Jesus cult in Meria!!! Thank you for your full support. |
Proposals
Article 1
Proposal[?] to change The governments stance on religious schools.
Old value:: Religious schools are not allowed.
Current: Religious schools are not allowed.
Proposed: Any religion may set up a school, with no regulations.
Debate
These messages have been posted to debate on this bill:
| Date | 19:52:34, December 01, 2007 CET | From | Kapitalist-Arbeitsfamilien Partei | To | Debating the Freedom FOR Religion & FROM Religion Act #5 |
| Message | DWP, you are aware that if this bill is defeated, it will discriminate against MILITANT ATHIESM as well, right??? |
| Date | 08:53:33, December 02, 2007 CET | From | Commonwealth Workers Army | To | Debating the Freedom FOR Religion & FROM Religion Act #5 |
| Message | Atheism still isn't a religion. |
| Date | 09:29:09, December 02, 2007 CET | From | Computational Intellect Project | To | Debating the Freedom FOR Religion & FROM Religion Act #5 |
| Message | Atheism is the lack of religion. A militant Atheist school is not a religious school; merely a specialized private school. |
| Date | 09:42:36, December 02, 2007 CET | From | Kapitalist-Arbeitsfamilien Partei | To | Debating the Freedom FOR Religion & FROM Religion Act #5 |
| Message | [OOC] TDP & John, I'm sorry but you are TOTALLY INCORRECT; According to the DICTIONARY--[cf. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Religion]--what we call "religion" has one of 2 meanings: (1) "a set of BELIEFS concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, ESPECIALLY (or usually, but NOT "always") when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs." (2) "a specific fundamental set of BELIEFS and practices generally agreed upon by a number of persons or sects:" (a) Atheism is much as a RELIGION as Christianity, Islam, and Judaism b/c what they ALL have in common is that they adhere to a BELIEF system that is UNBACKED by physical & empirically-tested scientific evidence. Moreover, organized religion cannot--of course--present "empirical evidence" that "proves" the existence of God, BUT an atheist cannot "prove" that God's existence does NOT exist via empirical evidence. In other words, while the Deist would hold to the view that the orgin of the universe came by the seemingly "irrational view" of "intelligent design," the Athiest likewise holds to a seemingly IRRATIONAL view that that the amazing SYMMETRY & COMPLEXITIES of a convoluted universe was created simply by an "act of dice" (random chance). I mean, even dice and game(s) of CHANCE had a "thrower"(haha). (3) Therefore, between me, Stuart, the FRP, yourself, and Greg, a sociologist and/or antrhopologist would argue the case in a peer-reviewed scientific journal that, to be "technical," ALL of us are "irrational" b/c the only RATIONAL person is the AGONOSTIC who says "You cannot say with certainty whether God exists or doesn't exist." cf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atheism |
| Date | 18:37:04, December 02, 2007 CET | From | Computational Intellect Project | To | Debating the Freedom FOR Religion & FROM Religion Act #5 |
| Message | I already responded in a different thread: [OOC] CWFP: Apparently you have no idea what Atheism really is! "Atheism is much as a RELIGION as Christianity, Islam, and Judaism b/c what they ALL have in common is that they adhere to a BELIEF system that is UNBACKED by physical & empirically-tested scientific evidence." Atheism does not have a belief system. The only thing required to define one as an Atheist is a lack of belief in anything supernatural. And much of this disbelief comes not just from disbelief, but from scientific evidence as well, and we learn more every day. For example, your religious "experiences" all come from psychological functions and electromagnetic anomalies within the brain. The "experience" you feel of a higher power being there when you pray, sing, etc. has been reproduced by a helmet...literally. Scientists at the University of Montreal have generated a helmet that fires electromagnetic waves at a person's brain in a way that causes anomalies in thought patterns. They called ministers of all faiths from around the world to test the mechanism, and fired the waves at each person's brain and asked them (using MRI's to make sure they weren't simply lying or delusional while responding) if the experience they felt was the same they feel when they feel "god's presence." All of them said yes. http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=searching-for-god-in-the-brain And all these claims of people seeing "visions" -- well, if you understand basic psychology... "Out of body experiences" have been recreated numerous times. Swiss scientists have recreated such by shocking a brain lobe behind your left ear. But two teams of scientists from the University College in London and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology have also been able to recreate out of body experiences using virtual reality, as in the article below: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/6960612.stm And year after year, science progresses more and more. The thing is, is that religion is just something that people made up to make themselves feel more comfortable; something there to fill in where they don't have the answers. The first humans must have watched a sunrise and thought that a great chariot or god was creeping up the sky. Now we know differently. The Catholic church has still not officially declared the Earth to revolve around the Sun. "BUT an atheist cannot "prove" that God's existence does NOT exist via empirical evidence." We can disprove any sort of evidence or "experiences" that people seem to claim for the existence of god. And empirical evidence is the only source of evidence Atheists and Agnostics use. We also use logic. And we can, however, disprove your god logically; as vivid in fact, as proving that 2 is not equal to 7. "the Athiest likewise holds to a seemingly IRRATIONAL view that that the amazing SYMMETRY & COMPLEXITIES of a convoluted universe was created simply by an "act of dice" (random chance)." Again, you do NOT understand evolution. Evolution is not an "act of dice" or random chance. Evolution is a scaffold. You creationists claim that the universe is 5,000 years old (one of the most retarded things I've ever personally heard) and all the animals here are exactly as they were when they were created. Creationism is actually more irrational than a theory of the universe just popping out of nowhere by random chance (which no sensible person would believe). Creationism claims that some sort of god created all these complex things, but that inherently means that that god must be as complex or more so. Therefore, if the improbability of humans popping out of nowhere is X, the improbability of the existence of god is thus greater than or equal to X. Therefore, an "intelligent" creator would thus be as improbable as the entire universe as it is popping literally out of nowhere or more so improbable. Evolution on the other hand, is not designed to explain the origin of life or the origin of the universe. Evolution explains the progression of life, and is actually rather sensible. Creationists have yet to prove the existence of a living being that cannot have evolved; that is, something that has a part or such that would have no use as a partial part. You must also bear in mind that in some creatures, their parts are created in a sort of "scaffold" method...that is, another part that was essential to that evolution used to exist, but afterwards became obsolete and useless, and is no longer there. The origin of life is not yet known, as are a lot of things in science. But that is no excuse to make an ignorant claim that a god must therefore exist just because we don't know something. Imagine if biologists and geneticists simply gave up and said that while trying to find cures for diseases and cancer??? We also know the progression and creation of the universe with the big bang theory. Perhaps another theory might take its place one day, but that's the miracle of science; it progresses as we learn more. It's about searching for truth, rather than satisfaction with ignorance. However, we do not yet know the origin of the big bang. Perhaps we may someday know. We may know a lot of things, and perhaps we may someday be able to prove with actual physical evidence that there is no such thing as the supernatural. "Therefore, between me, Stuart, the FRP, yourself, and Greg, a sociologist and/or antrhopologist would argue the case in a peer-reviewed scientific journal that, to be "technical," ALL of us are "irrational" b/c the only RATIONAL person is the AGONOSTIC who says "You cannot say with certainty whether God exists or doesn't exist."" Certainty comes in degrees and levels. And, you cannot simply state that the existence of god is a fifty-fifty chance because that is not true; it is not. Suppose I told you there was a teapot orbiting the sun in our solar system, too small to be detected by modern telescopes, and somewhere between the orbits of Earth and Mars? You cannot totally disprove such, but everyone would probably call me crazy or delusional. While you cannot disprove such the existence of a teapot, you can say that is almost certainly does not exist because logic and a little common sense would enable you to do so. Such is the existence of god. It is not a mere "fifty-fifty" chance, but is rather illogical and improbable really. If you cite to my argument earlier, for there to be a creator capable of creating the universe, that creator is as improbable or more improbable than the universe literally appearing out of nowhere by chance. The universe is everything and within exists all we know, and this universe is infinite. Thus, god is infinitely improbable. An omniscient and omnipotent god certainly cannot exist then, because that god would then be more than infinitely improbable because he would have to not only be capable of designing and creating the universe, but would then have to be able to be even more powerful than that. In fact, such a god is logically impossible because omniscience and omnipotence are inherently incompatible attributes: if something is omniscient, or all-seeing, it can therefore see everything in all times and places, including its own actions. However, omnipotence, or being all powerful, implies that this being can do anything, including change what it has already seeing. But then one of these properties would have to be violated for this to be possible. So, inherently such a being cannot possibly exist. The idea that this god made us in our own image is also a bit egocentric at best, and totally asinine to put it mildly. If we have an infinite universe of nearly infinite numbers of stars, constantly growing (although, due to speed-of-light constraints, we cannot observe most of it), and the origin of life is a one billion against chance, then there are billions of other strands of life out there at this moment. To say that such a god would pick us out of all other beings to be made after him is improbable to the point of virtually impossibility. However, pantheism, also called the Einsteinian religion (Einstein was a pantheist), is a variant of Atheism and Deism mixed; that is, that the entire universe and everything is god, and this god is therefore everything. However, god is not used here in the sense that you use it; it is not a conscious being, it is not "all-powerful" and "all-seeing." This ideal is much more complex and far from any sort of ignorance-based claims of a "personal" god made by theists, or even a conscious creator that deists claim; which are both irrational sets of belief. |
| Date | 00:16:50, December 03, 2007 CET | From | Kapitalist-Arbeitsfamilien Partei | To | Debating the Freedom FOR Religion & FROM Religion Act #5 |
| Message | [OOC] (1) "The only thing required to define one as an Atheist is a lack of belief in anything supernatural. And much of this disbelief comes not just from disbelief, but from scientific evidence as well, and we learn more every day."--John (a) Thanks for the feedback. WOW!!! That was a lot of info (haha). The point that I was making was that Atheism is a RELIGION (and this is the PROFESSIONAL opinion of Sociologists; I can get this info to you later) b/c while the ONLY thing they adhere to is a "Lack of Belief" in a Divine Being. However, your lack of belief is NOT based on EMPIRICAL evidence but ONLY logic and reason (rationalism). Yes, you can disprove the existence of my God (Jesus etc.) through logic and "reasonable doubt,'" so to speak, but I can LIKEWISE disprove Atheism through logic and reason. (b) That is precisely why it is FOOLHARDY for someone to just call themselves a "rationalist" (reason ALONE). Science requires BOTH rationalism and empiricism. Therefore, what do you call ANY philosophy that is unbacked by PHYSICAL evidence observable by sense perception??? That's right: RELIGION!!! (2) "You creationists claim that the universe is 5,000 years old (one of the most retarded things I've ever personally heard) and all the animals here are exactly as they were when they were created. Creationism is actually more irrational than a theory of the universe just popping out of nowhere by random chance (which no sensible person would believe)."--John (a) John, you are sterotyping me and confusing my beliefs with that of Fundamentalist Christians. I do NOT believe that the world is only 5,000 years old b/c I accept the "Big Bang" theory. However, I am opposed to MACROevolution (not microevolution) b/c it is scientifically FLAWED. In fact, you agreed with me when I sent you a link to an evolutionist debate. (b) Further, I agree with you that Life---through reason---MUST exist somewhere in the universe. However, the atheistic scientists holds belief in extra-terrestial life in skepticism just as equally as a the Bible-belt Fundamentalists. In fact, the MAJORITY of scientists are at the position that extra-terrestial life does NOT exist b/c of the lack of empirical evidence. Moreover, the question is immaterial to theism b/c regardless of whether there are "Martians" are not, that would not cause doubt for God's existence at ALL. (c) Rather, in my view, it will expand it showing the magnificant power of a Divine Being. (3) "You cannot totally disprove such, but everyone would probably call me crazy or delusional. While you cannot disprove such the existence of a teapot, you can say that is almost certainly does not exist because logic and a little common sense would enable you to do so."--John (a) If I cannot disprove the existence of a teapot through EMPIRICAL evidence, then that means that BOTH of our "philosophies" are "religion." Anybody that calls you "crazy" for "dogmatically" asserting that a teapot is not floating in space is irrational b/c they do not know for a FACT. That is precisely why the PROFESSIONAL opinion by the "experts" is that the ONLY "rational" people are Agonostics who humbly say "I wasn't there, so I don't know." (b) In fact, my "hypothesis" would be that if there is a teapot floating between Mars and Earth (or wherever), Neil Armstrong probably dropped in out of the Apollo Spaceship and--since gravity doesn't exist---the teapot "floated." (4) "And we can, however, disprove your god logically; as vivid in fact, as proving that 2 is not equal to 7."--John (a) Well, thus far--with the exception the book that you sent me that I will get back to you at a later date--, I have NEVER heard an athiest answer the first simplistic rational argument in defense of God levied by Thomas Aquinas: that is, if a perfectly SYMMETRICAL mechanical device (a watch) was suddendly "found" by someone on a DESERTED island, what is a RATIONAL person to believe except that it had a "designer" (whether the Truine God of the Bible or advanced species of aliens from Mars etc.)??? (b) In addition, I made a very sophisticated rational argument based in part on EMPIRICAL evidence for the proven Divinity of Christ on Facebook and you never responded to it, but instead "evaded" the topic by sending me a book that will take months to read and reflect on. Again, no pressure and I will gladly read the book that you sent as my assumption is that some of your evidence in this thread springs from it. Thanks, man, and take care. |
| Date | 00:38:52, December 03, 2007 CET | From |  Likaton Coalition of the Willing | To | Debating the Freedom FOR Religion & FROM Religion Act #5 |
| Message | {OOC} Get a room, you guys, please. |
| Date | 06:58:49, December 03, 2007 CET | From | Commonwealth Workers Army | To | Debating the Freedom FOR Religion & FROM Religion Act #5 |
| Message | CWFP - you can't disprove the lack of god... Atheism still isn't a religion. LACK of belief isn't 'based on evidence' at all - it is based on LACK of evidence. You can't disprove skepticism. |
| Date | 18:11:18, December 04, 2007 CET | From | Computational Intellect Project | To | Debating the Freedom FOR Religion & FROM Religion Act #5 |
| Message | 1) "The point that I was making was that Atheism is a RELIGION" You still have not proven this point. 2) "and this is the PROFESSIONAL opinion of Sociologists" You still fail to cite any specific sociologists. 3) "but I can LIKEWISE disprove Atheism through logic and reason." Please, attempt to do so. Frankly, I don't believe you can. 4) "That is precisely why it is FOOLHARDY for someone to just call themselves a "rationalist" (reason ALONE). Science requires BOTH rationalism and empiricism." There is scientific evidence behind natural selection, the big bang, and all of our known scientific facts. 5) "Therefore, what do you call ANY philosophy that is unbacked by PHYSICAL evidence observable by sense perception??? That's right: RELIGION!!!" (a) Religion is not based on logic and reason. There is no logical explanation for religious faith. (b) Religious people claim to have seen "divine" things. Any psychologist could tell you that the human mind tends to make things up when it has incomplete information. Take optical illusions for example: just because something appears to your own eyes to be one way, does that make it true? 6) "However, I am opposed to MACROevolution (not microevolution) b/c it is scientifically FLAWED." Macroevolution works in the sense that once life somehow originated, evolution took total control and made life into what it is today. It is not scientifically flawed because there is currently no existing life that cannot possibly have evolved in some way. As always, gaps appear in science. But the beauty is that, unlike religion, when a gap appears in science, scientists will eventually fill it, rather than throw in the towel and say "whatever." 7) "In fact, you agreed with me when I sent you a link to an evolutionist debate." I agreed that it is not the origin of life. But then again, so does Richard Dawkins and any other intelligent person. However, a god is certainly not the explanation for the origin of life, and to say so would be simply a "filler" of my own ignorance of what really did cause the origination of life. We don't know now, but someday we will, and this will put creationism a major step backwards, as science has already done consistently since the scientific method. 8) "In fact, the MAJORITY of scientists are at the position that extra-terrestial life does NOT exist b/c of the lack of empirical evidence." They do not exclaim that there are no aliens, they hold temporary agnosticism that there are aliens. I do too as well. When logic disproves the existence of something, that something most certainly does not exist. But when logic proves the probability of the existence of something, that requires empirical evidence before one can claim that existence. 9) "Rather, in my view, it will expand it showing the magnificant power of a Divine Being." It would make the existence of god less probable. 10) "If I cannot disprove the existence of a teapot through EMPIRICAL evidence, then that means that BOTH of our "philosophies" are "religion." Anybody that calls you "crazy" for "dogmatically" asserting that a teapot is not floating in space is irrational b/c they do not know for a FACT." Logically, there would have to be an explanation for the existence of the teapot. There is no logical explanation because no astronaut brings a teapot into space, so therefore it would not be there. I cannot prove empirically it doesn't exist, but I can prove it logically. Therefore, an agnostic would be irrational in this case. Conversely however, if the astronauts did bring a teapot into space, but it was missing, I could assert through logic that the teapot is floating around somewhere. However, as I have no empirical evidence, then this would require agnosticism. It's sort of like rectangles and squares. Squares are always rectangles, but rectangles are not always squares. Logical proof AGAINST existence of something always means that something does not exist. But logical proof FOR the existence of something requires empirical evidence to wave away any agnosticism and say for almost certainty that that thing does exist. 11) "Well, thus far--with the exception the book that you sent me that I will get back to you at a later date--, I have NEVER heard an athiest answer the first simplistic rational argument in defense of God levied by Thomas Aquinas: that is, if a perfectly SYMMETRICAL mechanical device (a watch) was suddendly "found" by someone on a DESERTED island, what is a RATIONAL person to believe except that it had a "designer" (whether the Truine God of the Bible or advanced species of aliens from Mars etc.)???" That's a weak argument. For one, a mechanical device was designed by a person, yes. However, a mechanical device is non-living, but a person and animals are living. Natural selection perfectly explains the only method of design without the requirement of a creator, and it works perfectly. Natural selection has not been disproved, and it probably will never be. Since the existence of an infinitely complex god requires infinite improbability, and the creation of creatures through natural selection has very high probability, given life has already originated on said planet (evolution is not "chance" as many creationists claim), natural selection, of all theories thus far, is the most likely to be true. In mathematics, when a number infinitely approaches zero (aka 0.x1, whereas x is an infinite number of zeros), the number is simply disregarded as zero. In this case, if we were to apply the same principle to the existence of a god, there would be zero probability in favor of god. 12) "In addition, I made a very sophisticated rational argument based in part on EMPIRICAL evidence for the proven Divinity of Christ" No you did not. You gave empirical evidence that there was once a time in which all the planets were lined up and shined as an ultimately bright star. Then you spilled out your personal faith and a collection of quotes from the bible, which, in no means can be any sort of evidence whatsoever. 13) "by sending me a book that will take months to read and reflect on." Well, for one, it's easier to send the book, rather than type all the arguments (there is so much to say that it would take more time than I have to say it; I read MUCH faster than I can possibly type). And secondly, it shouldn't take you months; it's only a few hundred pages. 14) You base much of your faith and arguments on a bible that specifically contradicts itself. For example, take a look at the first verse of the book Matthew: it specifically lists the genealogy for a predominant figure that is supposedly of virgin birth. "This is the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham" -Mathew 1:1. And then, it seems that the book of Matthew and the book of Luke can't seem to agree on the "genealogy" of Jesus. In the genealogy listed by Matthew, he lists 28 different generations leading to Jesus in Matthew 1:2-16. Whereas, Luke seems to list 41 generations in Luke 3:23-38, and neither list of generations seem to have ANYTHING in common. And of course, in Romans 13:1-7, your bible talks about how "there is no authority except that which God has established," and that "everyone be subject to the governing authorities," and "whoever rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted." This would infer that people like Hitler and Stalin where "godly authorities," and that rebelling against them would be rebelling against god. So, if you refuse to massacre millions in concentration camps in horrid ways, you are defying god. This entire thing seems a bit convenient to governments and theocracies, doesn't it? Even if religion wasn't just invented to keep control of the masses and "herd the sheep," if Hitler and Stalin were agents working for god, then I would rather go straight to hell. Also, it seems that John writes that people were surprised that Jesus was NOT born in Bethlehem, whereas Matthew and Luke hold that he was born in Bethlehem. This seems to be a horrible mistake for a religious text. Your book also writes in Matthew 17:20-21, that if I believe "with faith as small as a mustard seed" that I can do something, I can do anything and anything would be possible. I could move mountains with my eyes. Well, if this is true, than I truly believe I could kill god, so -- oh, I believe I've just done so. Sorry. 15) And lack of belief is not based on evidence, but lack of evidence AND on logic and reason. Whereas, religion is based on nothing. |
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Voting
| Vote | Seats | |||||
| yes |
Total Seats: 364 | |||||
| no | Total Seats: 165 | |||||
| abstain | Total Seats: 137 |
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