From the TDWTF Google+ feed
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Morality doesn't exist except as a concept
Remember this the next time you get mugged or beat up.
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If God created the universe, we're assuming She created stuff like the laws of physics. We'd probably all agree that physics are objectively physics, no matter who created them. Maybe She created the laws of morality, too.
FTFY.
Filed under: Everyone knows God is Alanis Morissette
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Morality doesn't exist except as a concept,
So your answer is "neither?" Mu?
Physics and morality are very different.
So are protons and neutrinos.
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My opinion is that they're trying to dodge the question as it puts them in a bind. If the answer is the former, then good things have objective value and God isn't needed. If the latter, then ethics is just a matter of following orders.
These conclusions are oversimplifying theology. Also, there's indication in the Bible that not all commandments from God are given on a "good or bad" basis. Sometimes they're given on a "this is what is needed" basis. For example, the Law of Moses was a set of rules and commandments given to the Isrealites through Moses. No Christians follow the Law of Moses, and haven't since Christ's crucifixion.
As another example, look at the cleansing of Canaan. God commanded that the Isrealites kill all the people and all of their animals. It's generally accepted that not killing is good, and this is even one of the Ten Commandments given to Moses on Mt Sinai. We don't have all the details, and we don't know what would have happened if the Isrealites hadn't obeyed, but being omniscient, God probably did. I'd say that He issued that commandment to protect them from something, which would make it a good thing.
At this point, I would say that many times God commands things because they are good, but sometimes things are good because they are commanded by God.
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So we do have a "Both" guy here. @boomzilla, you're on.
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So we do have a "Both" guy here. @boomzilla, you're on.
He's used specific examples. Seems defensible to me.
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These conclusions are oversimplifying theology.
Sure, but I generally only bring up the question to people who are already doing that, specifically both sides of the "if God doesn't exist then everything is permitted" divide. Smarter people than me have been discussing these issues for thousands of years. I don't pretend to have any definitive answers.
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So your answer is "neither?" Mu?
'Mu' is closer to 'dude, that question is dumb' than 'neither'.
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"Mu" is unasking the question.
The next post that mentions Mu will use triple quotes.
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'Mu' is closer to 'dude, that question is dumb' than 'neither'.
Yes, and I'd like to know which better represents @ben_lubar's answer. Well, it's no big deal to me, really, but if we're going to discuss, let's discuss. I remember being about his age and knowing lots more than I know now.
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I remember being about his age and knowing lots more than I know now.
Did you travel back in time or are you talking about the relative size of your known knowns vs known unknowns?
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I think it's a bit simpler than that, actually.
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I'm guessing the later, but just in case: @boomzilla do you have suggested lotto numbers?
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Did you travel back in time or are you talking about the relative size of your known knowns vs known unknowns?
In a way, yes, I traveled back in time. And compared my known knowns.
Wow, that sentence looks funny.
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@boomzilla do you have suggested lotto numbers?
Sure, but they're all from the past.
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The next post that mentions Mu will use triple quotes.
''''Mu''''
one... ah ah ah...
two... ah ah ah...
three... ah ah ah...
four... ah ah ah...
...
FRACK!
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http://what.thedailywtf.com/t/the-quasi-official-stupid-ideas-that-have-actually-been-done-thread/4621/41?u=ben_lubar
saw that yesterday. that's what reminded me of that guy for making my "joke"
guess it was either not funny at all or waaaay to subtle....
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I was hoping the onebox would work instead of just putting up an empty quote. I knew you were referencing that, which is why I posted it as supplementary reading material.
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never watched past 3.14159.... you mean he actually messes up like that at the end, or what?
i stopped watching because the badly tuned and low quality TTS made my ears bleed, and as i've shown before i have big ears
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Oh, I just meant the count-ing.
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Did you know that the first usage of the word ‘atheist’ was to refer to christians? Romans were very tolerant of other religions, they assumed that all other gods were just Roman gods in disguise—Jews, for instance, were assumed to be worshippers of Dionysus—as long as people were going to the temple, doing sacrifices, doing what the priests told them, Rome was ok with that.
But then Jesus came along like “you don't need to live under crushing guilt the whole time. Just do your best, and if you make a mistake just ask for forgiveness” and the Romans couldn't handle that. Nobody could handle that. Even the christians couldn't handle that, hence why we got Saul of motherfucking Tarsus, the prototypical brain-dead activist, exterminating christians to the best of his ability one day then having a change of heart and pushing just as hard in the opposite direction, without pausing for even a moment to reflect “hey, maybe I'm actually a fallible person, not the actual mouthpiece of the gods, maybe making up rules for rules' sake isn't the best way to go about things...”
Depending on my mood, I either think of Jesus as a necessary step on the path to true freedom, an iteration of the perpetual cycle of revolution and stagnation, or just another Holden Caulified dumbass who needs to read this tweet (image because fuck twitter oneboxing):
Anyway, in practise, the problem I have found with christianity is that they seem too willing to just smooth stuff over for the short-sighted good of the community rather than actually confronting and resolving difficult issues. The pedophilia thing was a high-profile example, but it happens on a more mundane scale as well. My youth pastor once recommended me this book (a highly-regarded self-help book for christians that says that if someone in the church is hurting you, the best thing you can do is to never let anybody know how bad you're feeling, just trust that god will give them what's coming to them), said it had helped him. If I wasn't a child at the time, maybe I would have seen it as a cry for help. Later, after living a lie became too much for the guy, all the church elders would say was just “he really disappointed us”, never owning up to the fact that their version of helping him with his gayness was to marry him off to someone in the church (two kids), and give him a job as youth pastor. All we knew was that one week we were having the most amazing, dynamic youth group sessions and the next week we were stuck with some boring old slob.
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So is sacrificing a goat to make a program work good or bad in that view?
It's a categorical mistake. Sacrificing a goat to make a program work is merely a necessary step.
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I recommend killing off Santa Claus and the tooth fairy.
What about the Easter Bunny that lays chocolate eggs?
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Sacrificing a goat to make a program work is merely a necessary step.
Coming soon: Goat Sacrifice Simulator
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Anyway, in practise, the problem I have found with christianity is that they seem too willing to just smooth stuff over for the short-sighted good of the community rather than actually confronting and resolving difficult issues. ...
Except these aren't problems in Christianity. These are problems in the organizations set up to propogate Christianity. There is a difference. While Christ was willing to forgive individuals, he never just completely let them off the hook. He didn't just tell the woman taken in adultery that everything was ok, he told her to "go and sin no more." and when something was wrong in the temple, he wasn't afraid to clean house with a whip.
The issues you describe sound a bit like they were influenced by PR decisions. And I can pretty much gaurantee that the well known pedophilia instances were covered up for PR reasons. If Christ had been in charge in those situations, I'm pretty certain that there would have been some house cleaning going on.j
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the Earth is hollow and inside live
mythical creatures like centaurs and unicornslizard people who control the world governmentsBelgium you Discourse, a post with an altered quote isn't empty.
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Damn swype... Really nedd1 to proof read it more, it kicks out random stuff on occassion.
1 see what I mean?
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Damn swype... Really nedd to proof read it more, it kicks out random stuff on occassion.
random? or based off you texting history?
actually you know what, i think it's safer for my sanity if i don't know the answer to that one....
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Random. I don't text that often. And almost all my mobile typing goes to here.
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i'll accept that answer.
99% of my texting is on the desktop through Google Hangouts...
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I just checked, and there was apparently an update for my Swype dictionary. Maybe that will help.
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If Christ had been in charge in those situations, I'm pretty certain that there would have been some house cleaning going on.
Lol, yeah, Christianity would be much better if Jesus was still around (ooh, sick burn, etc.)Except these aren't problems in Christianity. These are problems in the organizations set up to propogate Christianity. There is a difference.
Yes. I was using metonymy. But ok, let's discuss this idealized notion of christianity too: if all of the implementations of a standard are problematic and incompatible, how can we say that the standard itself is good? If PR is such a problem, why did Jesus not give us better tools for identifying and neutralizing our own natural tendencies toward that kind of thinking?
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Oh god, did a quote from someone I know (and probably from my old chatroom no less) turn into a religious debate?
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I keep seeing reply notifications and thinking someone acknowledged that my Skyrim mod review exists, but no, it's just people yelling at each other about things that don't matter.
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If you hope it'll get replies, it won't.
If you hope it won't get replies, it will.
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If God created the universe, we're assuming He created stuff like the laws of physics. We'd probably all agree that physics are objectively physics, no matter who created them.
Serious but possibly stupid question...
If God created everything then take as an example the human body. It's full of livers, spleens, bacteria of the gut, hammers & anvils, cells, membranes, etc, etc. If God could have made it work any way He/She wanted then why make it so complicated? Why not just make living creatures a bag of red goop that processes food and drink into energy, liquid waste and solid waste?
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If God created everything then take as an example the human body. It's full of livers, spleens, bacteria of the gut, hammers & anvils, cells, membranes, etc, etc. If God could have made it work any way He/She wanted then why make it so complicated? Why not just make living creatures a bag of red goop that processes food and drink into energy, liquid waste and solid waste?
Because God was creating Man in His image. Duh!
Now, why does God have a spleen and an appendix and so on? Nobody could ever tell me that without being very unflattering.
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If God created everything then take as an example the human body. It's full of livers, spleens, bacteria of the gut, hammers & anvils, cells, membranes, etc, etc. If God could have made it work any way He/She wanted then why make it so complicated? Why not just make living creatures a bag of red goop that processes food and drink into energy, liquid waste and solid waste?
The fact that it is so complicated and still works, show you that god is the almighty.
anyone can create a single cell and call it a day.
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If God could have made it work any way He/She wanted then why make it so complicated? Why not just make living creatures a bag of red goop that processes food and drink into energy, liquid waste and solid waste?
Genesis says God created humans in His image. That seems to imply that God's body is full of livers, spleens, bacteria of the gut, hammers & anvils, cells, membranes, etc, etc.
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Genesis says God created humans in His image. That seems to imply that God's body is full of livers, spleens, bacteria of the gut, hammers & anvils, cells, membranes, etc, etc.
Or Genesis might have been talking about the spirit, not the flesh. Geez.
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Or Genesis might have been talking about the spirit, not the flesh. Geez.
Next you'll be telling us that the G-man provided each of us with the bottom of a shoe.
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The fact that it is so complicated and still works, show you that god is the almighty. anyone can create a single cell and call it a day.
But can you create a single celled organism that does everything we can do? Walk, talk, think, etc
Genesis says God created humans in His image. That seems to imply that God's body is full of livers, spleens, bacteria of the gut, hammers & anvils, cells, membranes, etc, etc.
From which I infer that either God created Himself with all the complicated bits or that the way He works is outside of His control. Either God gave Himself a bladder or He had no choice and had to have one.
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Next you'll be telling us that the G-man provided each of us with the bottom of a shoe.
If you actually try to make sense of it, going with the
- God made us in his own image meaning god is a peace of meat
vs
- God made us in his image, the spiritual way. meaning he gave us the ability to even wonder what we are wondering.
or doubt what we doubt.
Look at a pig. A pig got all those nice organs we have, what is the difference between you and the pig?
