Every House Has a Maker

Did a god make our world? I must admit that I know that every house has a maker. A lot of work goes into making a house. A house is built by humans, using processes developed by humans, with materials discovered and formed by humans. We make houses to serve as shelter for our population. What does this say about how Earth came into being? 

Well in nature, we do not see such an effort being made. In nature, everything is random. Houses don’t just come into being by themselves. 

If this Earth was created by a nurturing and carrying god, one of the main things one should expect is that all of humanity's corporeal needs are directly addressed. For example, if an average person today was dropped into the middle of the wilderness without supplies, most persons would not be able to survive. Another example, people who raise animals feed their animals, groom them, raise them, protect them, provide companionship to them, and even clean up after their dirty business. Imagine what would happen if a cat owner didn’t clean the litter box. Yuk! 

Yet, this world doesn’t do any of that for us. We have to find our own food. We have to cook our own meals. We have to build the houses in which we live and the cars we drive. We even have to wipe our own asses. 

Bottom line, where there is a house, there is indeed a maker. Where there is no house, there is certainly no maker.

Someone made my day

I got the funniest automated news today. I was notified by Yahoo! Answers that I am now a level 2 member for earning 250 points on the Answers area. (That's not the funny part.) I checked out why.
It appears that I had previously answered the question "If only god can judge, shoudn't we abolish all the courts and tribunals?" with one simple little statement "LOL". So, apparently somebody thought that my answer was most appropriate and voted it as the Best Answer for that question. LOL I think I laughed for like a minute or more when I made this little, simple and yet ironic discovery. In fact, it is ironic in its irony. hehe This made my day.
Ok, so what does "Level 2" status give me? Well, I now have the power to rate other people's answers. ::insert unnecessary and fake maniacal laugh here:: I haven't even explored the Yahoo! Answers thingy in like 6 months. When I did, it was out of boredom for a few evenings here or there last summer.
Hmm, I'm not feeling bore right now...this being Lovers Day, I have some stuff I need to do, but maybe I can take a few minutes to explore.

Metaphors of Religion

What are my religious views? Metaphors are created to explain what is currently unknowable. Religion is formalization of those metaphors into a belief system that often involves the necessity for particular practices. Far too often, religion takes their metaphors as fact. When knowledge is increased and what was previously unknowable is finally discovered, a religion will often cling to their metaphors. They may reinterpret them to conform to the new knowledge, or may oppose the new knowledge.
Imagine a person who has never seen or heard of a banana. Now imagine that person is hungry. A kind stranger walks along and hands that person a banana and tells them that it is food. The person tries to taste it without peeling it, but really doesn’t know what to do with it. All they know is that they’ve been told is that they can eat it. So, another kind stranger walks along seeing this hungry person looking at the banana. That stranger walks up and peels the banana for the hungry person. But now imagine that instead of eating the newly exposed banana flesh, the person throws the flesh aside and continues to grasp the peel as though the peel well feed them somehow.
This is kinda how religion tends to respond to new knowledge. When the metaphor is found to no longer be useful (peeled away to reveal knowledge), a religious system will often still hold on to it instead of taking in the newly discovered knowledge.
To break free from this, a person must realize that the metaphor has its place, not as factual representation of knowledge, but as a way to explain what is currently unknown. If one can admit that they do not know something, then the metaphor can be used effectively until such knowledge is obtained. This can be an empowering position.

Interviewed by the Devil?

Q: Do you believe in God?
A: No. I believe in things that are tangible or that can be proven.

Q: Do you have a car?
A: Do I have a car? Yeah, sure.

Q: What make is it?
A: What make? It’s a Ford.

Q: So Ford made your car?
A: Well, yeah. the company Ford.

Q: So your car had a maker? That maker was Ford. Your house has a maker too, just as everything must have a maker. (This statement is sometimes followed by a biblical reference). [Note: Normally, this isn’t actually a question, but a preaching point to link to the next topic, which is usually started before the interviewee can reply.]

Q: Are you a good person?
A: Sure, yeah, I’m a good person.

Q: Have you ever lied?
A: Sure, who hasn’t?

Q: What does that make you?
A: A liar.

Q: Have you ever stolen anything?
A: Sure, I guess.

Q: What does that make you?
A: A thief?

Q: Have you ever looked at or lusted after a woman?
A: Well, yeah, kind of, I guess.

Q: The bible says if someone looks at a woman with lust, they have already committed adultery in their heart. [No pause or opportunity is usually allowed before the next question is asked.]

Q: Have you every used God’s name in vain?
A: Sure.

Q: That’s blasphemy. The bible says that sinners are going to hell. Given your sins, where does the bible says you are going once you die?
A: Well, I don’t believe in the bible, but I guess if you believe in such things, it says you are going to hell. But do you think hell is a reasonable expectation for such minor things. I’m a good person and always do what I’m supposed to do. I’ve never been punished for anything I’ve done by the law, nor have I intentionally tried to hurt anyone. Do you think someone like that should go to hell?

Q: The bible only offers only one way out from going to hell. That is through our Lord Jesus Christ who came down and did something amazing for us. Do you know what he did?
A: Well, again, if you believe in such things, he died for us.

Q: He suffered for us on the Cross to pay for all of our sins and buy our way to heaven. Only by accept him can we escape hell… [At this point, it turns pretty much in to a preaching session. The interviewee is usually left a little confused and frustrated at the fact they just allowed them-self to be preached to by some thickheaded bible thumping dumb ass. If the interviewee iterates being an atheist or brings up any further counterpoints, the interviewer will excuse them-self and abruptly cut the interview short, often iterating comment about going to hell.]

The important thing to note is that the interviewer is employing conversation and thought manipulation. If the person were weak minded (or even just undereducated), they may be influenced into accepting the preached message (even if it’s just a little bit), leaving that person open to being controlled by further suggestions.

Even experienced and educated persons will be trapped in this conversation. There is no real point to this interview other than to find someone who is impressionable or to make the audience feel justified in their belief system by harassing what they consider to be willful unbelievers.

One way to engage in the conversation and make it two-sided is to break up the rote pattern that is being used by the interviewer. Force them to acknowledge answers to their questions instead of just running through a list of questions culminated with a preaching service. Bring them into the conversation by holding them accountable for their questions and answers to your questions. If they are inexperienced, they will be suckered into a pointless point for point debate that they cannot win. If they are experienced, they will excuse them-self and move on to the next hapless victim. This will prevent them from using the interview in their sermons later on. Of course, avoiding the interview altogether is the best choice, but how much fun is that?

So, how about if the interview went something like this?

Q: Do you believe in God?
A: Nope. The existence of a god cannot be proven.

Q: Do you have a car?
A: Sure. It’s a Ford.

Q: So Ford made your car?
A: Yup. In a manner of speaking.

Q: So your car had a maker? That maker was Ford. Your house has a maker too, just as everything must have a maker. [Interrupt them at this point.]
A: Do you have a psychology degree with a license to practice?

Q: No. I’m asking you if it is reasonable to say that your car had a maker, but not the Universe, because…[Interrupt them again at this point.]
A: No, you are using psychology conversational tools used to direct one’s thought. But instead of using it to help someone, you are using it as a brainwashing technique. That is wrong, and in your terms, it is sinful to try to control someone’s mind. If your god was real, he wouldn’t need mind tricks to try to con people into being followers. Trust me, if there is an afterlife, you are going be held more accountable for your mind control deeds than any one else you claim is a sinner only because they don’t know Christ. You know what? I’m going to report you to the authorities for practicing psychology without a license. What is your name again?

Of course, it doesn't matter whether anything you say make 100% sense, or is even true (I'm sure there aren't any laws linking flawed arguments with "practicing psychology".  The point is to take up their time so they can't harass anyone else, and to maybe scare them a bit so they think twice before continuing to practice their technique on unwitting people.

Another method is to take the line of rote questions away from them.
Q: Do you believe in God?
A: Nope. I find it hard to believe in something that can't be proven. I mean, that's the difference between a car, which has a known maker, and the Universe. You can see that a car was made by humans because it is assembled to fulfill a particular role. But you don't see that in nature. In nature, everything is random. Cars and houses don't just come into being by themselves. If this Universe was created by a nurturing and caring god, one of the main things we should expect is that all of our corporeal needs are directly addressed. For example, people who raise animals feed that animal, groom it, raise it, protect it, and even clean up after its dirty business. Imagine what would happen if a cat owner didn't clean the litter box. Yuk! Yet, this Universe doesn't do any of that for us. We have to find our own food. We have to cook our own meals. We have to build the houses we live in and the cars we drive in. We even have to wipe our own asses. [At this point, the interviewer should be pretty red in the face and trying to cut the interview short. Bate them as long as possible into a pointless argument to keep them from pouncing on some other unwitting victim.]

Yet another way to ask for an insane amount of detail to explain their questions, then use their answers to prove they are not the true religion. This requires some knowledge of the bible, but can be particularly fun.

Q: Do you believe in God?
A: Which god?

Q: The God of the bible.
A: Which god in the bible. There’s several mentioned. Elohim, Yahweh, Jesus is referred to as a god, and Jesus himself calls Satan a god.

Q: The Father, Son and the Holy Spirit. That is the only true God.
A: Oh, the Trinity. Which type? Do you believe in three persons, one god? Or is it one god with three facets?

Q: God is three persons and one God. [Of course, the answer doesn’t matter cuz either way, this is the answer:]
A: That's odd, I thought you said you believe in the god of the bible. There’s no mention of that god in the bible. When the bible goes into talking about the nature of god, it only mentions one person. Well, OK. You are a sinner and a blasphemer. I'm sorry. It's against my faith to talk to you about the bible. Christ makes it clear not to associate with bad apples.

Q: [If they are dumb enough to try to argue your points, let them have it.]
A: Nope, I'm sorry. You are the devil appearing as an angel of light. You use god's name, but you do not know him. Get away from me, Satan! Only by accepting the true god can you be saved. Repent now, SINNER!

Any other ideas? :) 

Primitive Man Never Existed, and the Stone Age Never Happened?

I came across a website that has some pretty amazing claims. I’m going to entertain myself by posting it here for journalistic purposes for rebuttal. The source for this article is here, but I don't necessarily recommend visiting it because of pop-ups.

“Did you know that 700,000 years ago, people were sailing the oceans in very well-constructed ships?” Umm, yeah, this is the opening statement and it’s hella random. 700,000 is long before modern humans walked the Earth.^FH  Our ancient ancestors in that time knew how to make fire and hunt. (Yup, the use of fire wasn't even invented by modern humans.)^FF  The advent of advanced world wide sailing actually consists of well documented events. Do the names Columbus and Magellan come to mind?

“Or have you ever heard that the people described as “primitive cavemen” possessed an artistic ability and understanding just as refined as those of modern artists? “ Umm, again, hella random.  First of all, artistic ability is in the eye of the beholder.  However, artistic ability can be judged in terms of complexity and the ability to create the desired results as accurately as possible.^AA  This statement is literally comparing the Mona Lisa with finger painted stick figures, and calling them both equal.

“Did you know that the Neanderthals, who lived 80,000 years ago and whom evolutionists portrayed as “ape-men,” made musical instruments, took pleasure from clothing and accessories, and walked over painfully hot sands with molded sandals?” Painfully hot sands in Europe during the Ice Age?  LOL  Seriously, Neanderthal was adapted for Europe,^EU not the Northern Sahara.  It isn’t likely very many Neanderthal often encountered hot sands. Besides that, no modern consideration of Neanderthals describes them as "ape-men".  They were human and very likely contributed to modern human lineage outside of Africa.^NH

“In all probability you may never have heard any of these facts.  On the contrary, you may have been handed the mistaken impression that these people were half-ape and half-human, unable to stand fully upright, lacking the ability to speak words and producing only strange grunting noises.  That is because this entire falsehood has been imposed on people like yourself for the last 150 years.”  This paragraph uses a common literary technique that attempts to accuse the reader of holding on to an incorrect view point, but through no fault of their own.  No one likes to be accused of ignorance.  Perhaps this article intentionally targets supposed weak-minded individuals?  This method involves numerous logical fallacies.^LF

“The motive behind it is to keep alive materialist philosophy, which denies the existence of a Creator. According to this view, which distorts any fact that stands in its way, the universe and matter are eternal.  In other words they had no beginning, and thus have no Creator. Then how did life come to be?  The supposedly scientific explanation is the theory of evolution.” These statements are just plan lies. “Materialist Philosophy”^MP is a term that often is misused as general accusation against anyone that doesn’t blindly accept a particular viewpoint about a creator.  Beyond that, no where in modern science will you see any statement that suggests our Universe as no beginning.^BB  That’s just nonsense.  Then the paragraph goes on to ask stupid questions that are meant to direct the reader’s thinking (getting them to think they are starting to realize some secret that the “establishment” has been hiding from them). Again, continuation of numerous logical fallacies.

“Because since materialists claim that the universe has no Creator, they must provide their own explanation for how the life and myriad species on Earth came into being.  The theory of evolution is the scenario they employed for that purpose.  According to this theory, all the order and life in the universe came about spontaneously and by chance.  Certain inanimate substances in the primeval world combined by accident to give rise to the first living cell.  As a result of millions of years of similar coincidences, organisms came into existence.  And finally came human beings, as the final stage of this evolutionary chain.” Actually, I’ve written about this before.  Evolution didn’t come about to prove anything about a creator.  It came about because evidence from geology was contradicting long held beliefs that were derived by taking the Christian bible too literally.  That’s it.  Facts contradicted beliefs, so the facts won and our understanding of biological evolution was discovered because of this.^DE

“The early history of mankind—which is alleged to have come into being as the result of millions of accidental mutations, each more impossible than the last—has been distorted to fit in with this scenario.  According to the evolutionists’ account, which is totally lacking in any proof, the history of mankind is as follows: In the same way that life forms progressed from a primitive organism up to man, the most highly developed of all, so mankind’s history must have advanced from the most primitive community to the most advanced urban society.  But this assumption is completely devoid of any supporting evidence.  It also represents the history of mankind prepared in line with the claims of materialist philosophy and the theory of evolution.” Again, that “materialist philosophy” accusation is present.  This paragraph also declares an opposing view as an assumption with no evidence, but of course, the opposing view is no assumption, and is based on facts.  This continues to employ logical fallacies.

"Evolutionist scientists—in order to account for the supposed evolutionary process that they claim extends from a single cell to multi-celled organisms, and then from apes to man, —have rewritten the history of mankind.  To that end they have invented imaginary eras such as “The Cave-Man Age” and “The Stone Age” to describe the lifestyle of “primitive Man.”  Evolutionists, supporting the falsehood that human beings and apes are descended from a common ancestor, have embarked on a new search in order to prove their claims.  They now interpret every stone, or arrowhead or bowl unearthed during archaeological excavations in that light.  Yet the pictures and dioramas of half-ape, half-man creatures sitting in a dark cave, dressed in furs, and lacking the facility of speech are all fictitious.  Primitive man never existed, and there never was a Stone Age.  They are nothing more than deceptive scenarios produced by evolutionists with the help of one section of the media.”

Well, this is a long paragraph full of falsehoods and, in my opinion, intentional misdirection (lies).  First of all, this paragraph argues against points that simply don’t exist.  No facts support the idea of a half-man/half-ape being, and no serious person supports this idea as fact.  Who are these “evolutionist scientists” that this paragraph is referring too?  No one.  They don’t exist since no true scientist of evolution or otherwise would say such things.  They are as imagery as the half-man/half-ape being mentioned.  Humans are apes and evolved from a common ancestor with the other apes.^HS  Furthermore, this paragraph talks about points in anthropology, not evolution.  Such confusion is common place for such literature.  One more point, the Stone Age is a well studied period.^SA

“These concepts are all deceptions because recent advances in science—particularly in the fields of biology, paleontology, microbiology and genetics—have totally demolished the claims of evolution. That the idea that living species evolved and transformed into “later” versions of each other has been deemed invalid.” Well, this appears to be a direct lie.  All of the sciences mentioned here grow more and more dependent on our understanding of evolution as more is learned in each of their fields of study.  The foundation of evolutionary studies is not the will to prove a creator doesn’t exist.  The foundation of evolutionary studies is several principles of geology, as mentioned by me above.  However, since the principles within geology are ironclad, they are never mentioned by such articles. Writers of such articles intentionally hide any references to geological principles because any mention of them would destroy their arguments outright.

“In the same way, human beings did not evolve from ape-like creatures.  Human beings have been human since the day they came into existence, and have possessed a sophisticated culture from that day to this. Therefore, “the evolution of history” never happened, either.” This statement is thrown into to make it seem as though the article proved the existence of a creator.  However, the article never even addresses any points that prove such a position; more logical fallacies.

“This book reveals scientific proofs that the “evolution of human history” concept is a falsehood, and we shall show how the fact of creation is now supported by the latest scientific findings.  Mankind came into the world not through evolution, but by the flawless creation of God, the Almighty and Omniscient. In this site, you can read the scientific and historical proofs of this.” This is a common redirection used by many people trying to promote highly questionable notions.  The paragraph assumes the reader was convinced of the writer’s message and offers more “enlightenment” (often for a fee).  Well, I’m not going to charge my readers anything!

Future talking points

I grew up in a protestant fundamentalist home. The thing about protestant fundamentalism is that followers are told they have the answer for everything right directly from the bible. From my observations, each individual protestant fundamentalist group tends to take a core set of scriptures and ideas and build their beliefs around those; then they go through the bible picking and choosing other scriptures to support their conclusions. Normally they are able to form some grand harmonious scheme that convinces the group’s followers that they are the only ones on the right track in figuring out the bible, the universe and everything.

There are plenty of protestant fundamentalist groups in existence. Each one has convinced itself they are the only true path to fulfilling God’s will. Of course, the question comes up, if God was so interested in saving lives in this manner, why would he give his word to so few at such a later period in time?

Anyways, as I was growing up, I was taught that the bible says all modern supernatural phenomena are the work of the Devil or his demons who are trying their damnedest to pull people away from the word of God. Of course, this belief did nothing but reinforce the notion that Satan was succeeding because so many did not accept our version of God’s Word. I was taught that ghosts were demons pretending to be the deceased, psychic powers came from conjuring demon influence, and other supernatural events were the efforts to turn people away from God or at least distract us from doing his will. So, much of my life, I had both a fear of the supernatural and an unnatural arrogance about having the ability to know what it is and how to eliminate it.

This led me to completely misinterpret what was really going on around me. This led me to not understand my place in this world. I treated events around me too matter of factly (natural, human, and supernatural), almost with arrogance because I so strongly believed myself to be immune to them. Looking back now, I can say I was pretty ignorant, but that my heart was in the right place.

I'm now far more skeptic, but I'm also skeptical of skepticism. 

Pat Robertson

The notion that Pat Robertson might be slowing going insane has recently crossed my mind. Over the past couple of years, he has increasingly said some of the most ridiculous things. This isn't like the 19th Century where one could claim not to have said sumfin, so he always has to make some comment the next day to clarify his outragous statement. His clarification normally contains one or more major undeniable lies to try to make his original statement sound more reasonable. These lies have involved his claiming his original statement did not say what it says. lol The good thang is the people are finally starting to take notion and critize him for the ridiculousness and for the subsequent lies to cover over his ridiculousness. However, for some reason, he's still running the 700 Club. Is no one minding the store over there. Do no one at the 700 Club see that he's starting to slip over the deep end? Psst, the 700 Club is a large corporation that this thinnly guised as a nonprofit charity organization. The fact is, it makes more money than most companies in America, and that it spends that money in the effort to big further wealth. This is illegal for a nonprofit corporation. Anyways, I'm getting off topic. Pat Robertson is going insane. One would think that the people running the 700 Club would want to get their number one money maker back in line with reason to prevent the corporation from being taking as seriously. Hmm

Breathe of relief

On the AP today: "'We find that the secular purposes claimed by the Board amount to a pretext for the Board's real purpose, which was to promote religion in the public school classroom,' [U.S. District Judge John E. Jones III] wrote in his 139-page opinion."
This was part of the judge's finding in the case where the then Dover Area School Board attempted to cram that ridiculous notion of Intelligent Design into our U.S. classrooms as an alternative to the Theory of Evolution. The judge also had other harsh words for the school board and their actions.
I doubt there will be an appeal to the ruling since the Dover area community kicked all 8 of those guilty school board members out of office earlier this year.
I expect that religious leaders will now push for a repackaged Intelligent Design concept under some different name, and that we will be having this issue come up again within 15 years. What these I.D. proponents don't realize is that the more they try to become scientifically accepted, the more they will eventually have to adopt evolution and natural selection into their own belief systems. This is pretty much the end of the legal road for anyone that wants to dearly hold on to the traditional biblical creation myths and force those myths on everyone else. From this point on, the movement behind I.D. will eventually turn into a scienitific group that will one day turn it's back on it's own origins.
The only other legal battle pursuable by the religious faithful is to pretend that the 1st Amendment of the Constitution doesn't really forbid government tampering in a society's religious beliefs. If they can convince a judge of this nonsense somewhere along the line, they may still be able to openly get religion back into our school system. But then all hell will really break lose because every religious group in existence will claim their right to be present in our schools. I'm guessing that any judge, regardless of their beliefs will want that to be the result of their ruling. Given that, even this battle will be lost once and for all by the religious nuts one day.

World of Hypocrites

Hypocrisy is part of the human condition, but it is not part of what it means to be human. We just have a bunch of people in our world that feel they have a right to tell others what to think or how to act while exempting themselves from those same rules (at least in their own minds). This is the classic scenario for over 2000 years since the rise of monotheism. It seems that the belief in only one god inherently creates a breeding ground for hypocrites and liars. 

The world is full of popular people who instruct their believers one thing, then turn around and do the opposite themselves. They are also capable of saying one thing here, but say the opposite somewhere else to appease whatever audience to which they are speaking. Open lying is terribly obvious these days when one does it on TV for an audience of millions, yet the likes of Pat Roberts still do so freely in full view of everyone, and they are never held accountable. Many professed Christians are now getting caught up in possible crimes of their hypocrisy such as bribery, insider trading, stealing, false testimony, treason, violating National Security, etc. These are the same people that just a couple years ago called upon fellow Christians to vote for them because they held the same religious beliefs. Now that all these people are being held accountable for their misdeeds, their proponents are standing by their sides saying, “They are being attacked because of their faith.” Is corruption really apart of the Christianity?

I get the sense that these people are the same that claim that Christians are being persecuted by this world. ::cough:: This world is under the power of Christianity and has been so for a 1000 years. Who in this world is persecuting Christians on a large scale? Other Christians, perhaps? Ridiculous. It’s as though the word persecution really means that a Christian’s misdeeds aren’t being ignored and other people aren’t helping that Christian to commit their misdeeds. What else could it possibly mean in the context of today’s world?

These issues aren’t limited to Christianity. Islam and Jewish faiths also carry this burden, but the Christians are in control, and it is they who must take the lead to stamp out the hypocrisy. Of course, for the time being, they will not, at least in the U.S.

Recent quote from AP

From the AP: "Danforth, a Missouri Republican and an Episcopal priest, commented recently
'I think that the Republican Party fairly recently has been taken over by the Christian conservatives, by the Christian right,' he said in an interview. 'I don't think that this is a permanent condition, but I think this has happened, and that it's divisive for the country.'
He also said the evangelical Christian influence would be bad for the party in the long run."

Ya'think!? This is obvious. It happened when Bush Sr. weakend the Republican Party from 88-92. They lost their way. In the void, the extreme religious right stepped in and started consolidating their power within the Republican Party in the same manner that the Nazi Party took over the Germany government. Then they used their momentum to take over the U.S. Government, and now we have a mess to clean up that will be an embarassment to American generations to come.