EPTThe Richard Dawkins Thread - Page 24
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0z
Luxembourg877 Posts
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zobz
Canada2175 Posts
On July 17 2008 01:49 SirKibbleX wrote: That's a very attractive theoryWhy do anorexic girls think that they're fat? Because they repeatedly tell themselves that they are. Over the years they FEEL horrible about themselves, this negative emotion builds and builds until they completely believe they are fat, and no amount of telling them otherwise or having them look in the mirror will change that as the belief system resides prominantly in the emotional brain, not the logical brain. There is no evidence that God exists, so why do people kill themselves in his name? Because they believe he does. They have so much emotion attached to the idea of a God and redemption in the afterlife conditioned from early childhood. All those years they have been convinced and convinced themselves by putting huge amounts of emotional faith in this idea that no simple intellectual understanding can remove. | ||
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HaFnium
United Kingdom1075 Posts
On July 16 2008 04:00 Funchucks wrote: I think evolutionary biologists in general get more credit than they deserve. Darwin said all there was to be said on the principles, and he said a lot more than he should have. Concepts like selfish genes or punctuated equilibrium are trivial. Evolution operates at every level and on every timescale. Even evolution evolves; overly static genomes will be surpassed and outcompeted, while unstable ones will lose advantages as quickly in times of ease as they gain them in times of trouble. Enumerating the levels and emphasizing particular ones is a waste of time and a departure from wisdom. I don't think Dawkins's work deserves to be called science. He has never risen above rambling about vague principles. It is because he failed as a true scientist, and succeeded as a champion of quasiscientific ideas, that he eventually moved into a career as a prophet of the Religion of Science and a champion in its competition with other religions. Previously, a lot of efforts are spent on inter-species studying, the selfish gene theory opens a new area of biology/zoology where matters couldn't be explained thoroughly. The morality implication brought by his discoveries may be more concerned by the public though. He brought science closer to a lot of people. Look at his position at Oxford, he holds the Charles Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science. Surely Oxford must think he is a true scientist before he can spread it to general public... And his position means that his work are more known for their easiness of reading, hence making people think hes not a true scientist... | ||
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zizou21
United States3683 Posts
On July 17 2008 17:26 zobz wrote: That's a very attractive theory o i c wat u did there | ||
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oneofthem
Cayman Islands24199 Posts
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Deleted User 3420
24492 Posts
On July 17 2008 17:26 zobz wrote: That's a very attractive theory it'd be more attractive if it lost a little weight | ||
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MyLostTemple
United States2921 Posts
On July 17 2008 17:10 0z wrote: When I discovered santa klaus wasn't real, i didn't stop believing my parents. then you should agree with the point that keeping lies around to make people behave better is probably not a good thing or to say the very least, there are better ways to go about teaching people to act justly. | ||
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0z
Luxembourg877 Posts
On July 18 2008 05:42 MyLostTemple wrote: then you should agree with the point that keeping lies around to make people behave better is probably not a good thing or to say the very least, there are better ways to go about teaching people to act justly. How does it follow that I should agree with that point? I would rather interpret my remark as an indicator that I lean towards the opposite opinion. (Actually I don't know if I lean or not, it was just a balancing counterexample to some remark of somebody, i think BottleAbuser) | ||
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MyLostTemple
United States2921 Posts
On July 18 2008 05:54 0z wrote: How does it follow that I should agree with that point? I would rather interpret my remark as an indicator that I lean towards the opposite opinion. (Actually I don't know if I lean or not, it was just a balancing counterexample to some remark of somebody, i think BottleAbuser) i think i may be misunderstanding u then. maybe we're on the same page. can u restate ur point? | ||
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BottleAbuser
Korea (South)1888 Posts
As a counterexample, 0z points out that his parents lied to him, he realized it, and he does not have diminished faith in his parents. However, how likely would it have been that you believed your parents if they told you some other mystical creature was bringing you your presents, it just wasn't Santa Claus? Consider also that you probably have strong reasons to have faith in your parents other than what they told you before. You have a strong bias towards trusting them, which is the opposite with scientists and politicians. Especially with people who are both. | ||
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MyLostTemple
United States2921 Posts
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Funchucks
Canada2113 Posts
If someone gets up to the age where they learn about Santa and the Easter Bunny, and that doesn't clue them in about God, they're probably not both intellectually and emotionally equipped to deal with undiluted reality for the rest of their life. | ||
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0z
Luxembourg877 Posts
On July 18 2008 09:14 BottleAbuser wrote: I said that using convenient lies to encourage desirable behavior may not be a good thing, because them stupid plebs might someday find out that you were telling them lies. Good-intentioned or not, they may feel that the lies are an indication that them damn lying scientists aren't trustworthy after all, so this strategy is not a strong one in the long term (order of decades, not months). As a counterexample, 0z points out that his parents lied to him, he realized it, and he does not have diminished faith in his parents. However, how likely would it have been that you believed your parents if they told you some other mystical creature was bringing you your presents, it just wasn't Santa Claus? Consider also that you probably have strong reasons to have faith in your parents other than what they told you before. You have a strong bias towards trusting them, which is the opposite with scientists and politicians. Especially with people who are both. Have you noticed then, that people usually refer to the priest as 'father'? It might be that most people need some kind of consolation source after they outgrow the age where physical parents can do the job after all. Not scientists of course, their job is totally different, indeed many scientists themselfves follow some kind of religion which underlines this separation. In terms of qualifying this as good or bad I think one has many options, simiarly many people find it bad that the lion needs a good bite of antelope flesh to keep himself going, but another point of view is that this is just how things are. | ||
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0z
Luxembourg877 Posts
On July 18 2008 08:39 MyLostTemple wrote: i think i may be misunderstanding u then. maybe we're on the same page. can u restate ur point? The point is that you didn't provide argumentation for your claim that putting people in the dark is always bad and bottleabuser provided an argument which alone doesn't hold, due to the counterexample I gave. Bottleabuser then expanded his argument and the discussion went on - see above. | ||
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BottleAbuser
Korea (South)1888 Posts
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IdrA
United States11541 Posts
On July 18 2008 17:41 BottleAbuser wrote: I want to believe that everyone trained in logic will see the inconsistencies with religion. The evidence doesn't allow me to do so. Logical attacks on religion fail. Dawkins, in this regard, is beating a dead horse. There is no hope for the eternally (or at least until they're dead) damned. Is there? logical attacks on religion can be overriden by faith and brainwashing, they are not entirely useless. dawkins is aimed at the people on the fence or the weakly religious. laying bare religions logical issues can very often 'convert' them. | ||
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Dagor
Germany64 Posts
On July 16 2008 04:00 Funchucks wrote: I think evolutionary biologists in general get more credit than they deserve. Darwin said all there was to be said on the principles, and he said a lot more than he should have. Concepts like selfish genes or punctuated equilibrium are trivial. Evolution operates at every level and on every timescale. Even evolution evolves; overly static genomes will be surpassed and outcompeted, while unstable ones will lose advantages as quickly in times of ease as they gain them in times of trouble. Enumerating the levels and emphasizing particular ones is a waste of time and a departure from wisdom. I don't think Dawkins's work deserves to be called science. He has never risen above rambling about vague principles. It is because he failed as a true scientist, and succeeded as a champion of quasiscientific ideas, that he eventually moved into a career as a prophet of the Religion of Science and a champion in its competition with other religions. Hahahahahaha. Oh man. you cite some highschool science stuff and because that is easy therefor evolutionary biology is easy. Yeah i alway thought those geneticists get far too much credit. The mendelian Laws are really not that complicated... Evolutionary Biology today is a very complicated science that involves a lot (and i am talking a lot) of mathematical modelling. You can actually do quite a bit with all the new information from modern molecular biology. Here is one random example Evolution at a multiallelic locus under migration and uniform selection People like you really crack me up. You clearly don''t know what you are talking about but still you know of course better than those stupid scientist, those pathetic experts. What do they know. Oh and Dawkins did not fail as a scientist. Go to the website of the university of Oxford and download his curriculum vitae, than take a look at the list of his publications in Journals. After that come back and tell us again that he failed as a scientist. | ||
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LordofToast
United Kingdom250 Posts
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Thrill
2599 Posts
Dawkins earlier work which he as a point of argument (and in many ways as a Devils Advocate) has decided to stick with later in his career doesn't really fall within the boundaries of science at all as it fails to present actual disputable theories. Without comparing the two, i will make a parallell between his work and that of number mystics. Both are attempts to find a thoughtmodel that 'fits' for a broader scope of collected thoughts. Sure - while we see several evident examples of mathematically perfect shapes appearing in various aspects of nature, putting our finger on this really doesn't lead anywhere, just like declaring that 'genes determine everything' while seemingly accurate in many cases - leads nowhere. What should be regarded as a Dawkins threads main purpose is its ability to disarm theology. "If Dawkins is so wrong, what's to say your prophet isn't? Dawkins evolutionary drives and functional principles are as valid points of view as Christianitys moral standpoints." Discussing Dawkins work is off topic in my mind. Yeah, honestly. If you want to do that you're way off and in as deep waters as anyone arguing the Theodosian (no idea if that translates to anglian differently) problem with a spokeseperson for Christianity - something which should be done 1on1 if you want anything fruitful to come of it. Dawkins is a brilliant man with outstanding academical achievement in his backpack. Concidering his radical theories anything more than a troll for the religious scholars is an insult to his intelligence. Btw, nothing would have given me more satisfaction than if L. Ron had stated in his will something along the lines of "Oh, guys - scientology? Looool, was just trolling you ffs, damn people are stupid. I'll be laughing at ya throughout eternity." Dawkins doesn't even need to do that seeing how it's so apparent from speaking with the man - he's a thinking human being and not a zealot which you'd have to be to actually believe in some of the stuff he's trolling us with. | ||
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Hier
2391 Posts
Lo and behold a guy comes up to the microphone to ask a question branding a TL shirt! We are everywhere! Fess up, who was that? The video is time stamped. | ||
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