Say a door man asks to see your ID, you give it, he scans an image of the front and back, and gives it back to you. How legal might this be?

centipeed · 2 years

Don't know if you'd consider it classical, but: Philip Glass - Mad Rush

TheTwilightPrince · 2 years

"Punk rock died when the first kid said, 'Punk's not dead, punk's not dead" -Silver Jews

BaxterHaHa · 2 years

Well, a person kind of has an obligation to not fuck someone else's wife. It's not all on her, even though, I agree, she is more in the wrong.

No, actually thank him for making you see what kind of a person your wife is, and be glad that you won't have to spend any more time with her!

Thank him for fucking your wife. Next, ascend to a cloud on high, emotion-free, and look down on the tiny world below with a contented look on your face, forever.

aross · 2 years

What's the difference between a hormone and an enzyme?

You can't make an enzyme.

(If you don't get it, you might wanna say that one out loud to yourself.)

gooseno · 2 years

If that works for you, fine.

If someone asks you what you want to eat, and you say you're not hungry, that's a fair answer, because the question was phrased in a loaded way. If someone asks you what your religion is, and you say you are an atheist, that's only "false" insofar as the questioner believes atheism is a religion. It is a refutation of the question, and if they don't understand that, too bad for them. 'None' and 'I am an atheist' are both correcting the way the question was put.

The problem with "none" is that that you may end up in the same category, at least in the mind of whoever is asking, as someone who believes in God but not organized religion. If that is less important to you than being more technically correct with your answer, fine by me.

I see my answer as being as clear as I can be in a single word. I won't say it's perfect.

gooseno · 2 years

I'm aware atheism isn't a religion. I realize I phrased it above as though I thought it was. It is of course completely true that plenty of people in the world really don't get what the 'a' in 'atheism' means.

I could see going out of my way to answer in a way that highlighted that atheism is not a religion, bald is not a hair color, etc.

'None' is a fair answer of course. But again, in a real world situation, if I want to be clear, that might put me in a fuzzy category with people who don't believe in organized religion, philosophically or because they don't like getting up on sunday morning, but who still believe in God, or what have you.

"I'm an atheist" is the most clear and least equivocating, in my view. People who are going to insist atheism is a religion are going to do it anyway. To be pedantic, when someone asks me what my religion is, I should say what I see as being the best answer.

strobelite33 · 2 years

Actually, not really.

Supplying a link to it in the window where you sign up (if it's not there already - I forget) sounds like a plan. But how can you require them to read it? Of course I wish people would become familiar, but required reading would probably be skipped though just like most people skip through terms of service agreements. I always kind of liked how easy it is to create a new account on reddit, ie: no email confirmation, no hoops to jump through other than a captcha.

gooseno · 2 years

What muddies the waters is the way these terms are used commonly. Technically I would be an agnostic - but often 'agnostic' is claimed by people who are are a lot more religious than I am, to express some doubt in the 100% truth of everything they're supposed to take on faith, while they still believe a significant amount of vague mystical semi-profound nonsense.

If someone asks me what my religion is, I tell them I'm an atheist. This better lets them understand that I put the Abrahamic God up their in terms of credibility with Thor. If I'm going to have a deeper conversation about it, I'll be happy to clear up the technicalities.

Really, what it comes down to for me is that I don't want to give the impression that I'm 50/50 on the issue, or something.

This doesn't directly address your question as to what the correct scientific position is, of course, but I think it's one reason the terms generally get muddled up.

nzveritas · 2 years

Do you think that God answers prayer, or otherwise intervenes directly in human affairs?

Measure76 · 2 years

Does anyone else find D'Souza incomprehensibly annoying?

Yes and yes.

Hitchens mentioned once (I forget where) that he considered D'Souza to be the best debater among the theists he faced, adding that D'Souza was was probably the only one who understands the atheistic point of view well enough that, if he wanted, he could present the arguments as well as he could the theistic ones.

D'Souza is probably better learned than most, but I'd have a hard time putting him the top 50% of the debaters Hitchens has taken on. I have resorted to comforting myself that perhaps Hitchens said that partly because holding up such a pissant as the best of the other side is a subtle dig. I don't know if I really believe that, but golly gee would I like to.

mentaldent · 2 years

I had a long drive and then I got a blowjob. "The Brown Bunny"

fellow_redditor · 2 years

As I said later in my comment, religion shouldn't have anything to do with laws, at least according to our constitution.

Does the constitution prohibit people from organizing around religious beliefs and then attempting to influence government policy? In that way they still have something to do with laws (if we're to use that same phrase) in a way the constitution doesn't have anything to say about.

It takes a while for these things to get worked out, too, doesn't it. You could not be a black mormon priest until 1978.

The thread was about how theists are treated on reddit and some atheists over generalize about religious people here. That's all my point was. Maybe I worded it poorly. But I understand this is not a perfect world. I'm just saying it's not religion's fault, it's that some irrational and otherwise crazy people happen to be religious. There's crazy people in every group. Sorry if i didn't make that clear.

Okay. I can see that now.

Incidentally. I don't go around insulting or provoking theists, or assuming they're crazy, far from it. But the 'there are crazy people in equal proportion everywhere' argument, while certainly diplomatic, doesn't sit too well with me necessarily. If you're already crazy, religion would be a good place for you to go. Particularly the weirder churches. I'm thinking of your Jesus Camp type things. You look devout, get to believe in voices in heads being irrefutable, play with images of god and hell and fire and even maybe speak with some authority. I wonder which happens most, those people getting the social support they need there, or encouraging and legitimizing delusions that make the problem worse than it would have been. I do know that you can get social support lots of places, but if you want to be told that certain kinds of out-there stuff is holy and irrefutable, for you to pour your crazy into, you're probably best off going to a church.

gooseno · 2 years

...And then we watch Peter Griffin making fart jokes on it. :)

gooseno · 2 years

Upvoted because

a) I completely agree
b) Three people so far have downvoted man landing on the moon. Take that, astronauts!

naspinski · 2 years

If Jesus came back today he'd probably be diagnosed with Jerusalem Syndrome and given a sedative.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerusalem_syndrome

fellow_redditor · 2 years

Careful! In gay talk, scrotum means good. ;)

(Just kidding. I'm not gay, but the general socially tolerant atmosphere is one of the best things about this place, for me.)

fellow_redditor · 2 years

I'm Canadian too. I can't say I've noticed a lot of Canadian smugness. I've certainly seen a lot of the weak sauce jokes such as described above. Not that they actually bother me.

Actually, what bothers me is they're not funny. They're always about the same five things. The money is worth less / there are mounties / it is cold / eh. 98% of the Canada jokes are the equivalent - in terms of originality - of saying, oh, you're black, are you going to go eat some fried chicken?

(In terms of originality, not in terms of actual prejudice of course.)

"America's hat". I heard that here. That I like.

Anyways. In a year when I saw 12,300 Republican senators go on the news (we get the news now) and talk about how Canada's health care system leaves people dying in the streets, alone, unlike the American one which they "believe" to be "the best in the world", maybe next year can be the year I feel bad for you about this ;)

fellow_redditor · 2 years

But really, there is no issue that religion actually affects.

Um... to pick a random recent example, google the Mormon's role in proposition 8. Their institution, which has millions of members, is openly anti-gay. This doesn't affect the issue of gay rights? What does?

Religious groups organize and try to popularize their ideologies all the time. They organize to exert pressure on elected officials. I'm not saying there's something wrong with writing your congressman, but they certainly effect issues to a considerable degree.

Abortion = when you think a fetus is a person.

And 'life begins at conception' is a religious teaching. The church tells children that any other opinion angers God, and that if you anger god too much you will be tortured after you die. I literally can not think of a more comically enlarged and clear example of influencing the issue than that.

Or at least shouldn't be.

Am I missing something here? If you're saying that in an ideal world people would make up their own minds, okay. If you're saying that since it is possible to believe in both evolution and be a Christian, okay, but that doesn't mean religion doesn't affect the issues.

fellow_redditor · 2 years

most church-goers are simple-minded folk who need a religious community to hold on to.

I know some religious people who think this is true, too.

If what you mean by organized religion being a necessity is that it will never go away, that's one thing.

But if you mean it is necessary because otherwise the people will act badly, I think it's another. I would point to counties which are more atheistic and have better crime rates than America, etc.

fellow_redditor · 2 years

Honestly I sometimes see the disdain for religion on reddit as one way people here try to protect themselves from the very likely possibility that there is something larger than all of us out there.

It seems to me that religious people do the religious things they do to protect themselves themselves from the very likely possibility that there isn't something larger than all of us out there - if by that you mean an a fatherly God, watching and caring, reuniting us with the grandparents when we die.

I think Reddit atheists get the way they do partly because people like to be internet tough guys, but also because: with all the damage religion does and has done in the world, it's taboo to criticize it openly.

It all reminds me of this video of Oprah talking to some atheist women and, and coming in with, to paraphrase, "If you're happy, maybe you actually do believe in God, and just don't know it."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILbCjL2lri4&feature=player_embedded

Some people don't get that if you say something like that it actually does, to some other people, not sound less silly than if you said it about Zeus.

chewxy · 2 years

I read that whole thing. Jesus.

We both know, if you'll pardon my crudeness, that he's got his head so far up his ass that the pressure is probably turning it into a giant diamond. Kudos to you for remaining respectful and not responding to his ad hominem nonsense with your own.

I don't think there's a lot you can add. Maybe a few links regarding evidence of evolution if anyone wants to learn more.

Darn you and your elitist jargon!

I would hope that your average christian reading that can tell that you're being reasonable, and that he's being the mayor of Dipshit-town.

gooseno

TROPHY CASE

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