I'd disagree, they do have policy prescriptions but they're reactive so they're not laid out, but the overall goal is to make Muslims disappear as much as possible from the public sphere. Mosques are routinely blocked for bs traffic studies, I attended a discussion last year where people didn't want an Islamic cemetery to be built and the police actually had to say that it wouldn't be a vector for terrorism, sharia law legislation is being passed, states refusing to take (Muslim) refugees.

I'd tell him that syphilis isn't a death sentence any more and that should ease the anxiety.

He'd tell you he didn't have syphilis and his question stands.

Re: Nietzsche, I would show him that modern euro-secular culture isn't religiously based and isn't obviously less moral than other cultures.

Also, while it might be the case that our sense of morality is inspired by god, when god changes his mind about morality (e.g. divorce, slavery, gay rights, sex before marriage) it seems that he lets ordinary people know first and the people in organized religion are always the last to get the memo - which suggests that either he doesn't need organized religion to influence our moral code or morality comes to us from some other, innate source not dependent on the existence of a deity.

I should have said that killing abortion doctors is not immoral rather than it gets you into heaven (given abortion is baby murder).

And yes, almost all people will rely on their emotions rather than where the logic of their religion, if interpreted literally, leads them. But a few won't. And that's a few more than we would have to deal with if religions like that didn't exist.

The only people who think logic dictates everything they should do are either religious zealots or people like you, who just assume logic is way more powerful than it is because they suck at it. Sane, smart people understand fault tolerance, intuitively if not formally.

Dvaut, you Really Really should read page 83 -107. It is Amazing. I read the whole section on my iPhone in like 15 minutes .

My favorite part is when he comes to the great conclusion that there has to be one sex that is conditioned into cowardice to reward bravery. Leaving the awesome implications of the reverse situation to my imagination. He then veers of into equality something something.

Of course on a smaller more modern scale this is already true to a degree in urban gay communities. And a reason equality is important so people can choose "gender roles" for themselves as individuals.

About me you are wrong. I only think logic helps you score high on tests or write certain types of books or patent certain types of stuff that makes eight figures in a few thousand hours of effort.

But as far as religious zealots, you are saying the same thing as me. When the axioms of a religion suggest that evil acts are good, those zealots are apt to commit them. The believers that don't, I characterized as "in some sense", illogical which I didn't intend to mean "dumb". You called that "fault tolerant". The problem is that not everyone is like that and it would thus be a safer world if only religions that that didn't require that attribute for a person to be non violent (perhaps Buddhism?) existed.

A simpler way of saying this is that it seems one should not feel comfortable supporting someone's right to be part of a group that has a particularly dangerous tenet (eg abortion is baby murder) because you are counting on people being thoughtful enough to realize that the tenet is untrue or at least exaggerated. The fact is that most people would not feel comfortable supporting members of such a group EXCEPT when the group can call itself a religion.

Meditating On War And Guilt, Zen Says It's Sorry

''In Islam, as in the holy wars of Christianity, there is a promise of eternal life,'' Mr. Victoria said in an interview. ''In Zen, there was the promise that there was no difference between life and death, so you really haven't lost anything.''

show of hands

who says ISIS=VERY BAD NO GOOD

https://mobile.twitter.com/JacobKish...449025/photo/1

The people are speaking rather clearly. Will their elite leaders or the sheep who support them listen?

I think well named gives good citations and I do plan to read it. well named responded that he largely agreed with bobman's criticism of my posts ITT which 1) I understand, I thought the criticisms were valid and 2) I didn't really have an immediate response. If I don't respond, sometimes it's because I want to read the thing I'm recommend to read or don't really have a strong response and it's better to say nothing if I don't have anything relevant to add.

I have a backlog of long form articles / books excerpts in Evernote and this is on it; just haven't had a chance to engage in it yet.

I have a feeling you misunderstood my post in the most hilarious yet depressing way possible.

I know, but of all possible causes of death only syphilis has potential comedic value. I wasn't sure the question was entirely serious and not just prodding because I said "philosophically", but maybe I've spent too much time in the Chez forum.

Anyway, just empirically speaking it doesn't appear as though we're having any difficulty exploring or preserving morality as religious authority wanes. In fact, in our recent history and arguably beyond it appears that religious morality has frequently lagged behind on important issues and served as justification for many of the things we wish to condemn. I don't have any anxiety because, at a social level, it appears as though things just get better in prosperous, secular cultures.

Semi-grunch the male violence subthread.

Love the reference to Chimpanzee Politics, one of my favorite books.

I don't have time to get into this thread atm, but would like to bring https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jineology and the YPJ in Rojava ( https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wome...otection_Units) into it in regards bryce's post about one sex having to be the brave one.

I should have been born a Brit. You guys can even make the specter of terrorism sounds whimsically pleasant.

I realize it's a bit much to ask people to read links like that. But if a post reminds me of something I'm fond of and it's available online I usually link it anyway. Anyway, I love that whole book.

Katie Hopkins has been forced out of LBC for that vile tweet. Good riddance.

Cant link it yet because not on utubez, but have just watched a nice video by a english muslim comedian.

Not verbatim:

"People ask me, you're a muslim, why do muslims commit such atrocities, my answer is, how the **** would I know? I dont know anything about the motivations of deranged psychopaths."

There is a lot of pressure on Muslim communities to normalise the behaviour of a tiny % of their population, but no one stops to consider that maybe they are just as baffled by it as everyone else.

its pretty much how this country has always operated though.

Whilst this is undoubtedly true, it has to be balanced against polls supporting severe sanctions for apostasy, for example. Or penalties for homosexuality.

You lost me here or are you suggesting those views make you more likely to blow up eight year old girls?

In the same way as some extreme Christians go blowing up abortion clinics in the US, at the very margins of the behavioural bell curve, yes it probably does.

If you don't teach homosexuality as a sin, then no-one is getting angry about homosexuals.