Oh I don't know Sam, - I have read a report that churches are now filling with all these Catholic immigrants coming from mainland Europe.
How many churches and how full depends on the amount of new folks moving into a particular suburb.

But I agree with the rest of your comment, in as much as we don't really do religion as fundemental to day to day living for most in the UK.
-then again with some towns and cities now being predominantly Muslim, maybe life is much different in those place.

Quote from Racer Y :

What I meant was about the "god gene" was an inclination to believe in a God.

It has been mentioned in this thread before.

Its not so much a "god" gene as a gene that makes you behave as your parents and peers do which is learned from birth as a survival mechanism.
In as much as you are conditioned to behave without conscious thought. - at one time it would have been stay in the cave near the fire at night to stay safe from predators.

Plus we are naturally a pack animal anyway, so substitute pack leader for "god" and you start to see things a little more in perspective.
We as humans assume control of a pack of dogs as pack leader in a similar way.

At the bottom of it all is basic primal survival instinct, and it is this that has become or has been utilised as the "god" gene.

Everybody want to "belong" to a larger group because this gives them a feeling of safety in numbers, which also reinforces their own beliefs.

Quote from Mazz4200 :

(although i should point out that my main objective within the religion was to get inside a particular womans knickers ! and before anyone asks, yes i did, and it was a very nice place to be, thank you very much :tilt

Was it a divine experience?

But the one question i never got a satisfactory answer too was, "If there is no God, then who exactly decides who or what you're gonna be when you get reincarnated ?"

If you believe in god then maybe you believe in reincarnation too - but chances are if you don't belieive in god then you probly don't believe in reincarnation too - since they are both unatural.

Quote from thisnameistaken :

If there is any way at all that this will reduce the number of representatives needed to govern me, I'm all for it. Especially if most of my laws are decided by a centralised authority and Westminster becomes nothing more than a tourist attraction.
I'm not against the idea in principle, but experience tell me this will will simply be an extra burden and waste of resources, as it already is.
Free trade yes, but most of the rest of it is not good news from my viewpoint
I think if any part of the world is adequately prepared for a union like this it's Europe, as it consists mostly of established industrialised nations with similar politics and solid diplomatic relations.
Nah, as the saying goes - too many chiefs and not enough Indians - or too many cooks spoil the broth.

Too much central control, and too many individuals with their own agendas.
We see countless millions going to waste now, - and thats what we know about - it will get worse.

They have never submitted any accounts at all, which can only indicate possibly how bad things might really be.

Why would they care? - they're never going to be voted out of their jobs are they? - so nobody is accountable.

Quote from Shotglass :

nice conjecture... now try to prove it
Well since man appeared, nearly all of the wildlife has disappeared from many parts of the world, and is rapidly in decline everywhere at present.
The rest is just plain common sense.
its a time to be proactive then... your suicide will help the world tremendously (me in particular)
And from this point on, I don't think I will discuss this any further with you, as you have now shown me you have very limited debating abilities and because you have no argument, resort to abuse

Quote from wsinda :

@ Polyracer: Claiming to know THE TRUTH (preferably in large red capitals) and saying that folks with differing views should be "cured" has caused some of the ugliest crimes in human history.

LOL yes point taken,

When I say truth, I mean in the sense that everything I believe in can be proven or it gets the thumbs down from me.

I don't take thoughts or ideas to be fact - and then try to convert others to the same mindset.

And yes I mean cured - sorry if it offends but thats your problem.

To me, religeon is a virus that effects the very young, and it is normally the youngs own parents that usually infects them to begin with, - at a time when they have no independent thought and are dependent on their parents.

And it only takes the acceptance of factual knowledge to effect a cure (not anihilation as some religions would think feel justified) providing the sickness is recognised in the first place.

Quote from Shotglass :

no i dont because it doesnt follow any corherent logical path whatsoever

So explain what you see as a contradiction or is illogical

Quote from Shotglass :

and how is any of this necessary to support the current number of humans? There needs to be far less humans - and the fewer the better.
also do you have kids? Two- who have given me five grandchildren use biofuel? No - I gave my car up in 94, since then I have used my pushbike whenever possible, I use public transport mostly otherwise but on rare occasions I hire a car eat at mcdonalds? nope for many reasons eat beef from argentina? Dunno where it comes from - apart from Tesco's eat wild fish? sometimes - we all have to eat don't we. if so why are you actively being a part of the problem?

When I was twenty (thirty five years ago) we were not aware of the present problems.
But I independently observed that as a species we just cannot carry on with this business as usual attitude, - we cannot go on wasting the worlds resources like it is infinite.

And the more people there are - the quicker it is all going to disappear and as it disappears it will contribute to further polluting our environment.

So yes I am part of the problem, like yourself I had no choice in being born, but I try to make the impact of my existence cost as little as I can to the planet I need to live on.

Quote from Shotglass :

and it didnt even take more than 5 posts

Eh?

Quote :

btw... fFs its spelled religion learn your own language for crying out loud

Hmm Ok, I make loads of spolling mistakes and trypin errops. but I hope you understand my thinking and what I'm tring to say

Quote from Samh :

You're not an atheist. You are an antitheist. Genuine atheists don't think the way you do. Just FYI

Well I'm not going to get into that - lol, the amount of discussion I've seen on that subject

I think you understand also where I'm at, -

I don't believe in God(s) or believe that there was or ever will be a God.
There is no heaven or hell, and I believe everyone who disagrees is deluded - and in some cases possibly mad.

Man does not need religion to do good things, but good men need religeon to do bad things.

Religion is a mind virus which infects the young at their weakest, and prevents them from thinking freely and clearly for their entire lives unless they can be cured.

All if not most religion is trying to infect the minds of the entire world and they don't care how or who suffers, - the end justifies the means, because of course, they all know the one true way.

So whatever I am - thats how I feel.

Quote from Shotglass :

i still fail to see how a world where food is abundant enough to be thrown out and in part destroyed and despite all where obesity is one of the main health concerns is overpopulated

Just because as a species - we have the ability to do something, does not make it right that we actually go ahead and do it.

Would you be happy to see all wildlife disappear completely to make space for us humans?
I take it that you don't see anything wrong in humans living on every square inch of the planet on the basis that we can provide enough food to do so?

The seas are dying as we speak - from overfishing and all the crap and chemicals that we are piping into it.

We are burning down all the tropical rainforest to make way for the biofuel to put in your car and the next Big Mac on your plate - you think thats right?

Tell me - where would you draw the line of maximum human population - and why?

Quote from Shotglass :

ie the same thing
one tries to save the guy from eternal damnation the other one tries to save the guy from wasting his life... personally i thinks boths views are a pile of hogwash

You are missing one point, - The truth

Believing in fairies or the superatural or god (pretty much all the same thing without evidence) is one thing but -

How about kids growing up in the real world being taught that the earth is around 6000 yrs old - yup I hope everyone here knows thats bollocks too, but these kids are going to grow up with this sort of thinking.
They are going to grow up believing this crap and it will influence their outlook on life (as intended), they are going into jobs where they will be in conflict with people with a different (or correct) way of thinking, maybe as scientist etc, do you not think these people will have a reasonable balanced view.
You have to think of this as child abuse - which to me describes all religeon anyway.

How would you feel if you had a daughter who caught a bus to work one morning and was killed by a guy that blew himself up taking maybe 30-40 others with him. - Simply because he thought his religeon dictated this was the right thing to do and was promised a reward of life forever shagging virgins.
How does that effect your thoughts on whether religeon or atheism being a pile of hogwash?.

Of course I said your daughter to make it feel personal to you, but those people that died, along with all those people in the World trade Centre, and all those people are dying right now in Irack Palestine Israel, and all those millions of people that have died and will die because of these lies.
They were all someones daughter, son, mother, father, brother, sister.

And its shallow folk like you who glibly say "Its a pile of hogwash" whilst you burn up the planet and tuck into your Big Mac dinner wondering whats on TV tonight.
Was "its a pile of hogwash" the first thing that came into your mind when you saw those planes fly into the WTC?

Or perhaps you thought its in a different country far away and its nothing to do with me?
These things were done by people who believed the same lies as all religeous people.

So thats why as an Athiest I am bothered, - what you believe is up to you, but if you knew the truth you might believe something else entirely.

I'm bothered about the truth because it effects my safety, and that of my family and country - though you may think its a pile of hogwash.

Last edited by Polyracer, Thu 17 Apr 2008, 08:03.

Quote from thisnameistaken :

Or a "No kids for thickies" rule. Yes I know thick people have the same rights as everybody else but I always thought it was a strange situation to be in. Let's start by taking away their vote.

Won't work, thikies don't have the intelligence to vote in the first place (actually I don't vote either , but I have my reasons).

But yet I see your point, as generally its the thickies that don't have the brains or inclination to control the number or behaviour of their offspring.
Most of them don't work and just see kids as a passport to free social housing and extra social security cash.

Remove the incentives and better education has to be the answer, but how do you educate someone who is simply doing what their parents ("parent" probably mum - absent father actually) did, and they don't have the brains or incentive to be educated in the first place.

All most of them are bothered about is finding the cash for the booze, fags and drugs, - day after day.

I have two problems with with multiple wifes or partners
a/
I don't believe it is good for the planet in general, there are far too many people here already, and for a man to have many many children - who presumably will grow up to have many children also, all of which may have two cars each TV's, fridges houses etc etc etc etc, just cannot be right - I mean christ where does it end?, surely anyone can see the folly here.

And b/
I already see people coming into my country bringing their wifes and offspring and being allowed to have this special relationship (religeon getting its way yet again).
The burden on our state finances are bad enough, but with each of these children getting the family credits that our rules say they are entitled to is just plain crazy.
And thats assuming there is at least one parent working to support this arrangment, which most often there is not.

Again on a personal level - I don't give a toss how many wifes and kids a man can have, but there are many other issues, not least of which, I do not want my hard earnt taxes going to support this arrangement.

Like I said - its less people that this planet needs.

Just about every problem we have in this world can be traced back to overpopulation, but religeon and goverments don't see that, all they see is the extra cash coming in from donations and taxes.

Am I really the only person that can see this?

Quote from duke_toaster :

If the UK got a referendum the Europhobic Daily Mail loons would cause the mad, the bad and the sad to turn up and vote no.

Give me a vote and it would be an emphatic NO

And so would the greater part of the UK - All three main parties know this, and this is why this bunch of crooks incompetents and fools, (90% of our politicians) are trying to gag us, and drag us kicking and screaming through the back door into an even bigger lunatic assylum.

We have quite enough dealing with our own home grown political ego's without having to deal with more unelected unrepresentative faceless brainless criminals who ride the gravy train to work each day in the name of European cooperation and development.

My local authority is bent incompetent and inefficient, my national government is pretty much the same on a larger scale, so why would I vote yes to a further tier of **** you - I'm all right jacks.

All I see, is me paying more and more for less and less.

Quote from David33 :

Not exactly. Photosynthesis (and there are some animals that do it, too, btw) uses light energy to convert carbon dioxide and water, into glucose (a simple sugar). So, photosynthesis starts with physical material and ends with physical material; it's just the configuration of the physical material, that changes..................

Thanks for the clarification tho we are on the same page here.

Quote :

I think that you're overgeneralizing about "religion." Certainly, there are "religious" persons who are afraid to to consider ideas that may threaten those that they already have (this applies to some scientists, also, and I would expect that it may apply to particular atheists). However, there are many persons who are devoutly religious and also very curious about many things; and historically, religious scholars have often been at the forefront of naturalist and other philosophical considerations. The Age of Reason, and the Scientific Method, came out of a Christian culture, and these were not at all exclusively the product of atheists. Many great scientists of history, proceeded with their investigations, due to their "religious" belief in a rational and intelligible Creator God that designed nature according to rational and intelligible Laws of Nature that could be found and described.

I was thinking in terms of the more fundementalist religeous, - fear of temptation etc.

You are an obvously well read and intelligent person, and I know you are no exeption as you remark, but I have always been puzzled by intelligent folk who believe in God and life after death without any evidence to support their thinking.

Statistically you are just as likely to suffer a death, cancer or other missfortune as myself, you won't live any longer or be any happier than the average atheist.
It also seems to me that most of the Godfearing countries also have far more natural disasters than most predominantly non religeous countries, (earthquakes, floods, eruptions etc - are these still considered acts of God?).

Quote from Racer Y :

What you said makes me wonder... would morality ultimately survive if there wasn't anything to hold it? I mean speaking for ourselves yeah, sure we'll still be cool, but what about the others? What about the guy that cheats on his taxes, what about the the little old lady that runs stop signs? What else would they start doing???

Just because we have no god does not mean we don't need laws to keep the bad guys in check.
Most Atheist like myself have high moral values you know, I never thought about shooting someone or strapping a bomb to myself to prove a point.
I have no respect for any religeon, but I respect all men that have respect for me as a person.
No matter whether they are religeous black white whatever I don't care.

I don't mind religeous folk who keep religeon to themselves, - but when they think they have god on their side and they think they know the one true way and try to force their way on me - my family or my countries legal system, than I become very very agitated.

I don't believe in atheism, it is not a belief or religeon, it is just a state of mind, I am atheist which simply means I don't believe in any god.
I am a threat to no one I don't seek to convert anyone to my point of view, though I do enjoy good debate on the subject, so I can try to understand the believers point of view.
Religeon had its uses up to a few hundred years ago, but really in 2008 it has no useful significance and it is time the human race grew up and moved on.

I arrived where I am now without influence from others, I simply use what I think is common sense to guide my feelings and actions, and for me religeon falls very short of common sense.

There's already at least three PC games that you can drive this track - GTR 2, GTL, and Rfactor.

Three good reasons not to buy a PS3?

Have to say that after using this for a couple of weeks now, what a brill piece of kit.

Its really good but not a must have for track racing, but for Richard Burns Rally and Flight sims it is just bloody fantastic.

Up until now I have used the look into corners feature in most games and that also is a good feature but with track IR you free up two extra buttons on your wheel for other purposes, and there aint many buttons on a G25 wheel.

Track IR also gives a better 3D perspective which I found to increase emersion - as others say I don't think you would improve your LT's but it does a great deal for emersion.

Take a little time to get used to it and develop your own profiles - it even made me a little nauseous at times, but Im really glad that I persevered.
I cannot imagine being without it now, it has become so intuitive to use that I would feel a little handicapped without it now.

Quote from Racer Y :

But a problem I'm having with it is the same as I get from an athiest point of view. I mean I don't believe that we came from sea sludge to space age as basically dumb luck

Providing that you can ignor what religeous leaders tell, just go and look for the information on this, there is now so much evidence that anyone with a modecome of intelligence can see the lie and stupidity of religeon - why do you think that they tell you it is sinfull simply to look for yourself, this must surely indicate that they have something to hide and are afraid of it.

No athiest is afraid of reading any book, the Bible and the Koran are not off limits to the atheist, as say for example - the God delusion would be to any religeon.

To help a little with the sea sludge comment - ask how it is possible to survive and live well on sunbeams?

Answer:
plants convert simple light into physical material that we can eat and thrive on - does that not sound equally impossible?

Nope - I'm Sparticus

Quote from SamH :

Sorry guys.. I couldn't take it any longer.. I've edited the typo out of the thread title!!

I'm wondering if anyone noticed....

This thread is a little off topic anyway lol

Quote from Shotglass :

homosexuality is not genetic... at least not in the sense that there is a homosexual gene in ~10% of the human population

Yeah, to be honest I know nothing of what the cause is, and logically if it was a genetic mutation, it would have dissapeared long ago and we would not even have a word for it.

And as David33 pointed out, I think the figure of 10% is high, but it is the last official figure I read some years ago.

Quote from JTbo :

By

I hate gays and I'm proud of it, certainly I won't be any relationship in community full of them.

about 10% of everyone you know is gay, do you think they would tell you knowing what your attitude is towards them?

Quote from JTbo :

How long until having sex with young boys is ok? There is not much of difference really,Of course there is a difference between two consenting adults and the abuse of a minor, whether by a homosexual or normally orientated person maybe soon drugs are good thing, what is wrong with it some may like it, so it have to be acceptable?
So what is wrong with drugs?. So you won't be knocking a few beers back tonight with your butch friends will you - drugs is drugs after all.

In army and school group has always guided individuals to path of generally accepted ways and it has happened with violence and it still continues to happen, no matter how bluffy soft world you think you are living in.

I think you are living in a bubble with your "mates" and your outdated attitudes.

Hey JT look at it like this -

Being Gay is not normal, but a pecentage of gay people within a group/population is.

There is some part of their Genes that they/we/I/you have no control over it is simply a genetic variation, and is normally harmless to everyone.
You have no right to persecute them simply because they get their jollies in a slightly different way to you and me.

For you (and nature), the upside is that these people cannot have children, so in theory - if I am correct they will become less in number as time goes by (but you need a little patience) because thay cannot pass the homosexual Gene to their offspring.

Theoretically homosexuality should dissapear altogether, but it is a fact of life that it has always existed and for you and me always will, accept that and move on.

And on the other hand, what if a woman can have many husbands?

Whats good for the Goose?

Not that I agree at all - and there are plenty of animals/birds that have one partner for life.

also I have no problem with Gay couple getting "married", but I don't agree that they have a right to adopt or bring children into the relationship, - there are issues there for me that I'm not sure about.