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Science/Technology / Re: A Must Read For Creationists by DaughterOfAllah: 11:36am On Sep 08, 2021
PART 4


(16) The "evolution is a belief" nonsense.

At this point, it should be sufficient for me to point to (2), (4) and (6) above, and tell those entertaining this fatuous idea to go and learn something. However, I suspect that the attention span of the typical creationist is such that a reminder is needed at this point. And that reminder is now forthcoming.

When scientists provide hard evidence supporting their postulates, in the form of direct empirical tests of the validity of those postulates, "belief" is superfluous to requirements and irrelevant. This has happened time and time and time again in evolutionary biology, and once more, if you can't be bothered to read the actual scientific papers in question in order to learn this, then you are in no position to critique a theory that has been subject to more thorough critical scrutiny than you can even imagine is possible. Oh, and as an indication of the size of the task ahead of you, if you think you're hard enough to dismiss the scientific evidence on a case by case basis,
you have over a million scientific papers to peruse that have been published in the past 150 years. Be advised that tossing one paper into the bin isn't enough, you have to toss all of them into the bin. Good luck on that one.

Just in case this hasn't registered here, the critical thinkers regard belief itself as intellectually invalid. If you have to ask why, then again, you are in need of an education, and badly. As a corollary of the above, I now turn my attention to:


(17) "You only believe in evolution because you hate god".

Anyone posting this particular piece of drivel, and make no mistake, it IS drivel, is quite frankly beneath deserving of a point of view. Erectors of this sub-amoeboid, cretinous, verminous, pestilential and thoroughly decerebrate cortical faeces are not considered to be worth the small amount of effort required to treat them with utter disdain, let alone the greater effort required to subject them to actual contempt.
Aside from the fact that I have dealt with the "belief" bullshit in (16) above, and aside from the fact that I've dealt with the complete failure of supernaturalists to provide any evidence for their pet magic man back in (1) above (yes, you need a proper attention span if you're going to engage in debate here), and as a corollary of this latter point, we'd like to know how one can "hate" an entity whose very existence has only ever been supported by vacuous apologetics instead of genuine evidence, this particular favourite meme of creationists is singularly retarded because it misses the whole point by several thousand light years. Allow me to remind you all once again, first that the critical thinkers do not regard "belief" as intellectually valid full stop, and that the critical thinkers accept the validity of evolution because reality supports it. That is what counts here, because it is what counts in professional scientific circles. You can whinge, moan, bitch and bleat all you like with respect to this moronic canard, but be advised that people who paid attention in classes at school regard this canard as one of the most utterly spastic pieces of apologetics in existence, and given the fulminating level of stupidity that has emanated from apologetics over the years, this makes the above canard rather special. While we're at it, let's deal with one polemical argument that was presented to me recently, and one which is again entirely specious. Namely, the argument that evolutionary theory was erected "to kill off the idea of a creator". Er, no it wasn't. Anyone who follows the actual history of the development of evolutionary theory will know that it was erected to provide an explanation for observed biodiversity, and to provide an explanation for observed dynamic change in populations of living organisms. I know that creationists love to erect specious doctrine-centred arguments such as this (which dovetails with the doctrine-centred thinking and specious apologetics covered in (15) above), but such specious doctrine-centred arguments are, not to put too fine a point on it, blatant lies. Just because creationists can't accept that someone might alight upon a view of the world that doesn't rely upon doctrinal presuppositions doesn't mean that such a view cannot exist. But then, the entire creationist argument consists of asserting that the world conforms to their ignorant wishful thinking, so it's no surprise that they adopt the same view with respect to the development of scientific theories. So, if you erect any of the "you hate god" or other specious polemical pseudo-arguments here, be prepared to endure much mockery for doing so, especially if you do so after being directed here and told to learn from this.


(18) The argument via link to crap websites/copy-paste screed/crap YouTube video.

By now, those who have been paying attention know what's coming next. So, if you haven't been paying attention, you're in for a shock! Time and time again, we see creationists turning up, posting a one-line post consisting of a link to some worthless apologetics website, thinking that they're going to "stick it to the stoopid atheists". Aside from the fact that this is terminally lazy, and merely demonstrates that the poster couldn't be bothered to present the "arguments" contained in said link using original prose of his or her own devising (which requires one to have actually bothered to read the apologetics in question, which a surprisingly large number of link spammers never do), the fatuousness of this approach should become evident very quickly upon asking the following question. If you are told that you have been diagnosed with a brain tumour, who are you going to ask to remove it? Are you going to ask a professional neurosurgeon, who has trained for years specifically to perform this operation, or are you going to ask a football coach?
If that question seems inane to you, then it is meant to seem inane. Specifically for the purpose of bringing into sharp relief the inanity involved in pointing to an apologetics website as a purported source of "scientific" knowledge, as opposed to pointing to the website of, say, an actual university evolutionary biology department, or the website of an actual evolutionary biologist, or the website of a scientific journal that publishes papers in this field. If you think some self-service-break televangelist in a $5,000 suit paid for by gullible rubes is somehow an "expert" in the field, then once again, you really are in need of an education. Which of course brings us back to (2) above.

Let's get this straight once and for all. Websites devoted to religious apologetics are worthless as sources of genuine scientific information. If you want real scientific information, you go to a professional scientist, a professional scientific body, or a professional scientific journal. This is why science textbooks are written by actual scientists. Because, in case you hadn't worked this out, these are the people who know, and who are paid to know. I don't care how many people purportedly possessing Ph.Ds are cited by your favourite apologetics website, this is irrelevant, because the mere fact that those people are contributing to that website means that they are not practising real science, they are practising apologetics, which again brings us back to (2) above.
Which means that the likes of answersingenesis, ICR, the Discovery Institute and the various other organisations that act as ideological stormtroopers for mythology-based doctrine are worthless from the standpoint of disseminating genuine scientific information, because their primary interest is apologetics. Their primary interest is propagandising for mythology. As a consequence, these websites frequently misrepresent valid science (again, see (2) above). Indeed, several of them peddle outright lies about science (see (3) above, where I provide a handy link to the destruction of one instance of said lies). Consequently, if you come here linking to one of these organisations, the response from the critical thinkers here will be to go into petunias mode (again, see Douglas Adams for the reference).

Whilst we're here, I might as well address the related argument by copy-paste screed canard, which fits in here too. Copying and pasting a large wall of text from an apologetics website, dumping it here in the same manner in which an incontinent baby dumps the contents of its nappies on the floor, then running off thinking that you have somehow "refuted" valid science, merely earns you our lasting scorn and derision. Even more so if there is a stark contrast between the literacy level of the copy-paste screed, and that of posts containing your own words. If you are unable to spell words of more than five letters correctly when writing your own posts, and unable to post more than, say, 15 words in such posts, then suddenly unleash a wall of text upon us, the critical thinkers will know what they're dealing with, and the resulting savaging that your posts will receive will not be pretty to watch. Picture the spectacle that would result if you slashed a baby with a Stanley knife, then tossed it into a piranha infested river. That's what will happen to your posts. The same spectacle will result if you post a link to, or embed, a crap YouTube video. If we see John Pendelton, Kent Hovind or any of the other well-known charlatans appearing, or for that matter any of the well-known wannabees, popping up in the video clip, other than for the purpose of having their execrable ignorance, stupidity and wilful dishonesty eviscerated, then your post gets the piranha treatment.


(19) The tiresome "design" argument.

Let's get this straight here. This is nothing more than the resurrection of the Paley's watchmaker zombie, which stinks even more after 150 years of rotting in the grave than it did when Paley first erected it. Aside from the fact that this argument fails spectacularly because artefacts arising from known manufacturing processes are qualitatively different from the rest of the world, and said artefacts are not self-replicating entities, the entire "design" argument fails for one very important reason. Propagandists for mythology have never presented a proper, rigorous means of testing for "design", and for that matter, don't even understand what is needed in order to provide genuine evidence for "design". The fatuous "it looks designed to me, therefore my magic man did it" argument will, once again, receive the piranha treatment if you make the mistake of deploying it here (see (1) above). Make no mistake, this is nothing more than the typical supernaturalist elevation of ignorance to the level of a metaphysic. The "design" argument consists of nothing more than "I can't imagine how a natural process could have achieved X, therefore no natural process could have achieved X, therefore magic man did it". Learn once and for all that reality is not only under no obligation whatsoever to pander to this sort of ignorance and wishful thinking, all too frequently, it sticks the middle finger to said ignorance and wishful thinking.

Now, I'm going to be kind here, and explain what is needed, in order to have genuine evidence for "design". You need ALL of the following four criteria satisfied, namely:
(19.1) That there exists a detailed, rigorous, robust methodology for segregating entities into the "designed" and "not designed" classes ("It looks designed, therefore magic man" isn't good enough);
(19.2) That the methodology cited in (19.1) above has been tested upon entities of known provenance, and found to be reliable via said direct empirical test;
(19.3) That the methodology cited in (19.1) above, and determined to be reliable in (19.2) above, is accompanied by a rigorous demonstration of its applicability to specific classes of entity of interest;
(19.4) That the methodology cited in (19.1) above, determined to be reliable in (19.2) above, and determined to be applicable to the requisite class of entities in (19.3) above, yields an unambiguous answer of "designed" for the entities to which it is applied.

Unless you have all of the above criteria fulfilled, you have no evidence for "design". Don't even bother trying to claim otherwise until you've spent at least a decade or so devising the rigorous and robust methodology specified as an essential requirement in (19.1) above, because the critical thinkers will know you're lying. To give you an idea of the magnitude of the task at hand, just fulfilling (19.1) above would constitute a major scientific achievement, and by the time you got to (19.4), you would be in Nobel-winning territory. That is, of course, if you fulfilled (19.1) to (19.3) above properly. If you ever made it to (19.4), your name would be indelibly stamped upon history. The idea that some random poster on the Internet is going to achieve this with nothing more than blind acceptance of mythological assertion to guide him is, needless to say, regarded here as a complete non-starter.
Science/Technology / Re: A Must Read For Creationists by DaughterOfAllah: 10:26am On Sep 08, 2021
PART 3


(10) Specious and asinine creationist "probability" calculations.

I've already dealt at length with this in this thread. Don't bother posting copy-paste bullshit from Stephen Meyer or other creationist blowhards from the Discovery Institute or AiG with respect to this, because what they have disseminated is bullshit. So-called "probability" calculations erected by creationists are based upon assumptions that are either (1) never stated so as to avoid having their validity subject to critical scrutiny, or (2) when those assumptions are stated, they are found to be based upon well known fallacies. The link above addresses two of those fallacies in some detail, namely the serial trials fallacy and the "one true sequence" fallacy. If you post bullshit about "probability" supposedly "refuting" evolution or abiogenesis, virtually all of which arises from the same tired, previously debunked sources, then you will simply be setting yourself up as a target for well deserved ridicule.


(11) The tiresome conflation of evolutionary theory with abiogenesis (with Big Bang side salad).

A favourite one, this, among the creationists who come here. Which always results in the critical thinkers going into petunias mode (read Douglas Adams in order to understand that reference). Since so many creationists are woefully ill-educated in this area, I shall now correct that deficit in their learning.
Evolutionary theory is a theory arising from biology, and its remit consists of explaining the observed diversity of the biosphere once living organisms exist. The origin of life is a separate question, and one which is covered by the theory of naturalistic abiogenesis, which is a theory arising from a different scientific discipline, namely organic chemistry. Learn this distinction before posting, otherwise you will simply be regarded as ignorant and ill-educated. While we're at it, evolutionary theory does not consider questions about the origin of Planet Earth itself, nor does it consider questions about the origin of the universe. The first of these questions is covered by planetary accretion theory, the second by cosmology, both of which arise from physics. As a consequence of learning this, if you subsequently erect the tiresome conflation of evolutionary theory with the Big Bang or the origin of the Earth, be prepared to be laughed at. As a corollary of the above, it is time to deal with:


(12) The Pasteur canard.

We have had several people erecting this canard here, and it usually takes the form of the erection of the statement "life does not come from non-life", usually with a badly cited reference to the work of Louis Pasteur. This particular piece of duplicitous apologetics, apart from being duplicitous, is also fatuous. The reason being that Louis Pasteur erected his "Law of Biogenesis" specifically for the purpose of refuting the mediaeval notion of spontaneous generation, a ridiculous notion which claimed that fully formed multicellular eukaryote organisms arose directly from dust or some similar inanimate medium. First, the modern theory of abiogenesis did not exist when Pasteur erected this law; second, the modern theory of abiogenesis does not postulate the sort of nonsense that abounded in mediaeval times (and which, incidentally, was accepted by supernaturalists in that era); and third, as a methodologically rigorous empiricist, Pasteur would wholeheartedly accept the large quantity of evidence provided by modern abiogenesis researchers if he were still alive.


(13) The asinine preoccupation with "monkeys".

This is a particularly tiresome creationist fetish, and again, merely points to the scientific ignorance of those who erect it. I point everyone to (4) above, and in this particular instance, remind those wishing to post here that what science actually postulates with respect to human ancestry is that we share a common ancestor with other great apes. Indeed, Linnaeus decided that we were sufficiently closely related to chimpanzees, on the basis of comparative anatomy alone, to warrant placing humans and chimpanzees in the same taxonomic Genus, and he decided this back in 1747, no less than sixty-two years before Darwin was born. You can read the original letter Linnaeus wrote to fellow taxonomist Johann Georg Gmelin, dated 27th February 1747, lamenting the fact that he was being forced to alter his science to fit religious presuppositions by bishops, here in the original Latin. So if you wish to indulge your monkey fetish, go to the zoo and do it there, and allow us the light relief of hearing about your coming to the attention of law enforcement when you do.


(14) The "no transitional forms" canard.

In order to deal with this one, I have the following to ask. Namely:
(1) Have you ever studied comparative anatomy in detail, at a proper, accredited academic institution?
(2) Do you understand rigorously what is meant by "species"?
(3) Do you understand even the basics of inheritance and population genetics?
(4) Do you understand the basics of the workings of meiosis?

If you cannot answer "yes" to all four of the above, then you are in no position to erect this canard. And, canard it is, as anyone with a proper understanding of the dynamic nature of species will readily understand, a topic I have posted at length on in the past. Indeed, you only have to ask yourself the following question, "Am I identical to either of my parents?" in order to alight quickly upon why this canard IS a canard. Your own family photo album supplies you with the answer here. You are a "transitional form" between your parents and your offspring, should you have any offspring.


(15) The "evolutionist" canard (with "Darwinist" side salad).

Now, if there is one guaranteed way for a creationist to establish that he or she is here for no other reason than to propagandise for a doctrine, it's the deployment of that most viscerally hated of words in the lexicon, namely, evolutionist. I have posted about this so often here, that I was surprised to find that I'd missed it out of the original list, but I had more pressing concerns to attend to when compiling the list originally. However, having been reminded of it, now is the time to nail this one to the ground with a stake through its heart once and for all. There is no such thing as an "evolutionist". Why do I say this? Simple. Because the word has become thoroughly debased through creationist abuse thereof, and in my view, deserves to be struck from the language forever. For those who need the requisite education, there exist evolutionary biologists, namely the scientific professionals who devote decades of their lives to understanding the biosphere and conducting research into appropriate biological phenomena, and those outside that specialist professional remit who accept the reality-based, evidence-based case that they present in their peer reviewed scientific papers for their postulates. The word "evolutionist" is a discoursive elision, erected by creationists for a very specific and utterly mendacious purpose, namely to suggest that valid evolutionary science is a "doctrine", and that those who accept its postulates do so merely as a priori "assumptions" (see (3) above). This is manifestly false, as anyone who has actually read the peer reviewed scientific literature is eminently well placed to understand. The idea that there exists some sort of "symmetry" between valid, evidence-based, reality-based science (evolutionary biology) and assertion-laden, mythology-based doctrine (creationism) is FALSE. Evolutionary biology, like every other branch of science, tests assertions and presuppositions to destruction, which is why creationism was tossed into the bin 150 years ago (see (2) above). When creationists can provide methodologically rigorous empirical tests of their assertions, the critical thinkers will sit up and take notice.

Furthermore, with respect to this canard, does the acceptance of the scientifically educated individuals on this board, of the current scientific paradigm for gravity make them "gravitationists"? Does their acceptance of the evidence supporting the germ theory of disease make them "microbists"? Does their acceptance of the validity of Maxwell's Equations make them "electromagnetists"? Does their acceptance of of the validity of the work of Planck, Bohr, Schrödinger, Dirac and a dozen others in the relevant field make them "quantumists"? Does their acceptance of the validity of the astrophysical model for star formation and the processes that take place inside stars make them "stellarists"? If you are unable to see the absurdity inherent in this, then you are in no position to tell people here that professional scientists have got it wrong, whilst ignorant Bronze Age nomads writing mythology 3,000 years ago got it right.
While we're at it, let's deal with the duplicitous side salad known as "Darwinist". The critical thinkers here know why this particular discoursive elision is erected, and the reason is related to the above. Basically, "Darwinist" is erected for the specific purpose of suggesting that the only reason people accept evolution is because they bow uncritically to Darwin as an authority figure. This is, not to put too fine a point on it, droolingly encephalitic drivel of a particularly suppurating order. Let's provide a much needed education once and for all here. Darwin is regarded as historically important because he founded the scientific discipline of evolutionary biology, and in the process, converted biology from a cataloguing exercise into a proper empirical science. The reason Darwin is considered important is not because he is regarded uncritically as an "authority figure" - the critical thinkers leave this sort of starry-eyed gazing to followers of the likes of William Lane Craig. Darwin is regarded as important because he was the first person to pay serious attention to reality with respect to the biosphere, with respect to the business of determining mechanisms for its development, and the first to engage in diligent intellectual labour for the purpose of establishing that reality supported his postulates with respect to the biosphere. In other words, instead of sitting around accepting uncritically mythological blind assertion, he got off his arse, rolled up his sleeves, did the hard work, put in the long hours performing the research and gathering the real world data, and then spending long hours determining what would falsify his ideas and determining in a rigorous manner that no such falsification existed. For those who are unaware of this, the requisite labour swallowed up twenty years of his life, which is par for the course for a scientist introducing a new paradigm to the world. THAT is why he is regarded as important, because he expended colossal amounts of labour ensuring that REALITY supported his ideas. That's the ONLY reason ANY scientist acquires a reputation for being a towering contributor to the field, because said scientist toils unceasingly for many years, in some cases whole decades, ensuring that his ideas are supported by reality in a methodologically rigorous fashion.

Additionally, just in case this idea hasn't crossed the mind of any creationist posting here, evolutionary biology has moved on in the 150 years since Darwin, and whilst his historical role is rightly recognised, the critical thinkers have also recognised that more recent developments have taken place that would leave Darwin's eyes out on stalks if he were around to see them. The contributors to the field after Darwin are numerous, and include individuals who contributed to the development of other branches of science making advances in evolutionary theory possible. Individuals such as Ronald Fisher, who developed the mathematical tools required to make sense of vast swathes of biological data (heard of analysis of variance? Fisher invented it), or Theodosius Dobzhansky, who combined theoretical imagination with empirical rigour, and who, amongst other developments, provided science with a documented instance of speciation in the laboratory. Other seminal contributors included Müller (who trashed Behe's nonsense six decades before Behe was born), E. O. Wilson, Ernst Mayr, Motoo Kimura, Stephen Jay Gould, Niles Eldredge, J. B. S. Haldane, Richard Lewontin, Sewall Wright, Jerry Coyne, Carl Woese, Kenneth Miller, and they're just the ones I can list off the top of my head. Pick up any half-decent collection of scientific papers from the past 100 years, and dozens more names can be added to that list. So, anyone who wants to be regarded as an extremely low-grade chew toy here only has to erect the "evolutionist" or "Darwinist" canard, and they will guarantee this end result.
Science/Technology / Re: A Must Read For Creationists by DaughterOfAllah: 9:12am On Sep 08, 2021
PART 2



(5) Learn the distinction between proof and evidential support.

This is something that supernaturalists never tire of failing to understand, so once and for all, I shall present the distinction here. Proof is a formal procedure in pure mathematics, and only applicable to that discipline. Proof consists of applying, in an error-free manner, well-defined rules of inference to the axioms of a given mathematical system in order to produce theorems, and thence recursively to those theorems to produce more theorems. Evidential support consists of providing empirical demonstrations that a given set of postulates is in accord with observational reality. This is the process that is used in the physical sciences in order to build scientific theories. Postulates that are NOT in accord with observational reality are, as stated in (2) above, discarded. As in (4) above, if you cannot exercise the basic level of intellectual effort required to learn this simple distinction, or worse still, erect fatuous nonsense about "proving" a scientific theory (especially if "prove" is mis-spelt with two 'o's), then expect your posts to be treated as a free fire zone for scathing and withering derision.


(6) Scientific theories are NOT "guesses".

This is a favourite (and wholly duplicitous) canard beloved of creationists, and relies upon the fact that in everyday usage, English words are loaded with a multiplicity of meanings. This is not the case in science, where terms used are precisely defined. The precise definition apposite here is the definition of theory. In science, a theory is an integrated explanation for a class of real world observational phenomena of interest, that has been subjected to direct empirical test with respect to its correspondence with observational reality, and which has been found, via such testing, to be in accord with observational reality. It is precisely because scientific theories have been subject to direct empirical test, and have passed said empirical test, that they ARE theories, and consequently enjoy a high status in the world of scientific discourse. As a consequence of the above, anyone who erects the "it's only a theory" canard with respect to evolution will be regarded with well deserved scorn and derision.


(7) The operation of natural processes, and the intellectual labour required to learn about those processes, are two separate entities.

That I have to address this explicitly, and deal with this particular canard, after it had been repeatedly erected by one particular creationist here, after he had been repeatedly schooled upon this, really does make one wonder if some of the people purporting to be in a position to critique valid scientific theories, have ever attended a real science class in their lives, let alone paid attention therein.

Let's knock this particular nonsense on the head once and for all. Just because scientists perform experiments, for the express purpose of determining how a particular natural process operates, and the details of whatever quantitative laws that process obeys, does not in any way, shape or form, support "intelligence" at work within those processes. The only "intelligence" in operation here is that of the scientists trying to learn about the natural process under investigation. In order to demonstrate the fatuousness of the converse view, consider gravity. This is a regularly observed real world phenomenon, and, as real world phenomena go, is about as mindless as one can imagine.
The idea that "intelligence" is at work when something falls off a cliff is asinine to put it mildly. Now, in order to deduce the quantitative relationships at work when gravity acts upon objects, scientists can perform various experiments, to determine, for example, the speed of impact with which objects strike the ground when dropped from tall structures of varying heights. That they have to do this in order to deduce these quantitative details, and derive the requisite laws operating within the world of gravitational phenomena, does NOT in any way support the idea that "intelligence" is operating within that natural phenomenon itself. Indeed, applied mathematicians can postulate the existence of all manner of alternative forces, obeying different quantitative laws, and determine what would be observed if ever instances of those forces were observed in the real world, but again, this does not support for one moment the idea that those forces are innately "intelligent". So those who try to erect this nonsense with respect to experiments in evolutionary biology, or abiogenesis, will again invite much ridicule and laughter. For those who really want ramming home how absurd this canard is, the online satirical magazine The Onion has published this hilarious piece on "intelligent falling". Anyone who reads this without laughing, and regards the content as a serious exposition of scientific thinking, is in dire need of an education. As a corollary of the above, I am also required, courtesy of the same creationist who was unable to distinguish between the two, to address this:


(cool Real world observational phenomena, and the theories erected to explain them, are two different entities.

Again, the mere fact that I have to state this explicitly testifies to the scientific ignorance of many of the individuals who come here, purporting to be in a position to tell us that the world's most educated scientists have all got it wrong, and that 3,000 year old mythology has somehow got it right (or 1,400 year old mythology, depending upon your particular religious ideological background). With respect to evolution, populations of real living organisms have been observed evolving in real time. This is what is meant when the critical thinkers here state that evolution is an observed fact. Real populations of real living organisms have been observed changing over time, and have been documented doing so in the peer reviewed scientific literature. The theory of evolution consists of the postulates erected, and the testable mechanisms arising from those postulates, to explain those observed phenomena. Learn this distinction, or once again, prepare to face much contempt from the critical thinkers here. This brings me on neatly to:


(9) The infamous "chance" and "random" canards (now with "nothing" side salad).

Few things are more calculated to result in the critical thinkers here regarding a poster as a zero-IQ tosspot with blancmange for brains, than the erection of the "chance" canard. Usually taking the form of "scientists think life arose by chance", or variants thereof such as "you believe life was an accident". This is, not to put too fine a point upon it, bullshit. What scientists actually postulate, and they postulate this with respect to every observable phenomenon in the universe, is that well defined and testable mechanisms are responsible. Mechanisms that are amenable to empirical test and understanding, and in many cases, amenable to the development of a quantitative theory. Two such quantitative theories, namely general relativity and quantum electrodynamics, are in accord with observational reality to fifteen decimal places. As an aside, when someone can point to an instance of mythology producing something this useful, the critical thinkers will sit up and take notice, and not before. Likewise, erecting statements such as "random mutation can't produce X", where X is some complex feature of multicellular eukaryote organisms, will also invite much scorn, derision and contempt. First of all, drop the specious apologetic bullshit that "random" means "without rhyme or reason", because it doesn't. In rigorous scientific parlance, "random", with respect to mutations, means "we have insufficient information about the actual process that took place at the requisite time". This is because scientists have known for decades, once again, that mutations arise from well defined natural processes, and indeed, any decent textbook on the subject should list several of these, given that the Wikipedia page on mutations covers the topic in considerable depth. Go here, scroll down to the text "Induced mutations on the molecular level can be caused by:", and read on from that point. When you have done this, and you have learned that scientists have classified a number of well defined chemical reactions leading to mutations, you will be in a position to understand why the critical thinkers here regard the creationist use of "random" to mean "duh, it just happened" with particularly withering disdain. When scientists speak of "random" mutations, what they really mean is "one of these processes took place, but we don't have the detailed observational data to determine which of these processes took place, when it took place, and at what point it took place, in this particular instance. Though of course, anyone with a decent background in research genetics can back-track to an ancestral state for the gene in question. Indeed, as several scientific papers in the literature testify eloquently, resurrecting ancient genes is now a routine part of genetics research. Then, of course, we have that other brand of nonsense that creationists love to erect, which also fits into this section, namely the fatuous "you believe nothing created the universe" canard, and assorted corollary examples of palsied asininity based upon the same cretinous notion. Which is amply addressed by the above, namely that scientists postulate that well defined and testable natural mechanisms, operating upon the appropriate entities, were responsible for real world observational phenomena. In what fantasy parallel universe does "well defined and testable natural mechanisms, operating upon the appropriate entities" equal "nothing"? If you think that those two are synonyms, then again, you are in serious need of education, and you are in no position to lecture those of us who bothered to acquire one.
Science/Technology / A Must Read For Creationists by DaughterOfAllah: 8:54am On Sep 08, 2021
The contents of this thread are extracted from this Richard Dawkins website. They were posted by forum user called Calilasseia and I found it a very interesting read. As a result, I've taken the liberty of reposting it here. I've also had to split it into multi-parts (from the original 2) so it will fit!

Originally posted on
this website

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

PART 1

In order to deal with several of the canards we see resurrected here with tedious regularity at source, I thought it apposite to launch this topic. Where appropriate canards can be dealt with in one spot, so that future propagandists for reality-denial doctrines arising from mythological blind assertion have no excuse for resurrecting them yet again.

Consequently, I have a message for all creationists visiting this forum. If you think that you possess some startlingly new "wisdom" that you think is going to overturn valid scientific theories, then I have news for you. You don't. The canards that you and your ilk erect here all too frequently, are well known, well documented, and have been debunked many times before. This post has been erected specifically to provide you with a single point of reference where you can check this, and find out in advance that your canards ARE canards. Now, since I went to the trouble of compiling this post, and exercised much effort in doing so, the least you can do is exercise the mental effort required to read this post in full, and learn in detail why parroting any of the canards contained in this list will lead to you being regarded with at best disdain, at worst contempt. So, before you launch into your posting careers, study the following in detail, and learn that posting previously debunked nonsense without having performed the requisite research beforehand, to determine whether or not said nonsense has been debunked previously, is regarded here as indolent in the extreme.

So, here goes with the list of canards to avoid when posting here.


(1) Parroting blind assertions does not constitute "evidence".

Let's make this explicit, just so that even the most casual of observers of this thread cannot avoid having noticed it.

Mythology (and I don't care how precious you consider your "holy books" to be, that is what they contain - mythology) merely erects unsupported blind assertions about the world, and presents those blind assertions as if they constituted "axioms" about the world, to be regarded uncritically as eternally true, and never to be questioned. Well, those who wish to adopt this view will find that they are given short shrift here. Because one of the fundamental rules of proper discourse is that whenever an assertion is erected, no one is obliged to regard it as valid unless proper, critically robust supporting evidence is provided for that assertion. Which means independent corroboration from an outside source, or a direct, methodologically rigorous, repeatable empirical demonstration of the validity of that assertion. Without this, any blind assertions, particularly those erected from mythology or mythology-based doctrines, can be dismissed in the same casual manner in which they are tossed into the thread. Failure to provide proper evidential support for blind assertions will result in a poster being regarded as an inconsequential lightweight. Just because you think that mythological blind assertions constitute "axioms" about the world doesn't mean that everyone else does, and you'll soon discover the hard way how much firepower is directed toward those who come here expecting the rest of the forum to genuflect before said blind assertions uncritically. Plus, in the case of supernaturalist blind assertions, parroting these and expecting everyone else to accept them uncritically as established fact in the same way that you did, constitutes preaching, and is a violation of forum rules. Learn quickly to qualify assertions properly when erecting them, unless you wish to be regarded as tediously sanctimonious, boring, and boorishly ill-educated into the bargain.

Oh, and while we're at it, don't bother trying to assert that your favourite invisible magic man is "necessary" for the biosphere or some other observed entity, until you can provide proper, critically robust evidential support for the postulate that your magic man actually exists. Given that 300 years of continuous scientific endeavour has established that the universe is not only comprehensible without needing magic, but is thus comprehensible in precise quantitative terms, you will be well advised to devote some serious time to providing methodologically rigorous support for all assertions concerning magic supernatural entities, because without it, you're bleeped from the start.


(2) Science is NOT a branch of apologetics.

Science is as far removed from apologetics as it is possible to be. Science exists to subject erected postulates to empirical test with respect to whether or not those postulates are in accord with observational reality. As a consequence, science is in the business of testing assertions and presuppositions to destruction, Those that fail the requisite tests are discarded. Science modifies its theories to fit reality. Apologetics, on the other hand, consists of erecting convoluted semantic fabrications for the purpose of trying to prop up presuppositions and blind assertions, involves no empirical testing, and seeks to force-fit reality to the aforementioned presuppositions and blind assertions. Therefore, treating science as if it constitutes a branch of apologetics is dishonest, and those who engage in this pursuit will be regarded with due scorn and derision.

Among the more duplicitous examples of such dishonesty, all too frequently seen here in the past, is quote mining of scientific papers or scientific publications. There are entire websites devoted to the exposure of this particular brand of dishonesty, and anyone making the mistake of erecting quote mines here will have their buttocks handed to them in a sling.

(3) The "assumptions" canard (with "interpretation" side salad).

This is a frequent favourite with creationists, and usually erected for the purpose of attempting to hand-wave away valid science when it happens not to genuflect before their ideological presuppositions. As I have stated in (2) above, science is in the business of testing assumptions and presuppositions to destruction. As an example of destroying creationist apologetics with respect to this canard, I point interested readers to this post, where I destroyed the lies of the laughably named "Answers in Genesis" with respect to their assertion that 14C dating was based upon "assumptions". I've also trashed this canard in detail with respect to radionuclide dating as a whole, so don't even try to go down that road. Likewise, if you try to erect this canard with respect to other valid scientific theories, you will be regarded as dishonest.

Another favourite piece of creationist mendacity is the "interpretation" assertion, which creationist erect for the purpose of suggesting that scientists force-fit data to presuppositions. Apart from the fact that this is manifestly false, it is also defamatory, and a direct slur on the integrity of thousands of honest, hard working scientists, who strive conscientiously and assiduously to ensure that conclusions drawn from real world observational data are robust conclusions to draw. This slur, of course, is yet another example of blatant projection on the part of creationists, who manifestly operate on the basis of presupposition themselves, and appear to be incapable of imagining the very existence of a means of determining substantive knowledge about the world that does not rely upon presupposition. Well, I have news for you. Science does not rely upon "presupposition". Indeed, scientists have expended considerable intellectual effort in the direction of ensuring that the conclusions they arrive at are rigorously supported by the data that they present in their published papers. There exists much discourse in the scientific literature on the subject of avoiding fallacious or weak arguments, including much sterling work by people such as Ronald Fisher, who sought during their careers to bring rigour to the use of statistical inference in the physical and life sciences. Indeed, Fisher was responsible for inventing the technique of analysis of variance, which is one of the prime tools used in empirical science with respect to experimental data, and Fisher expended much effort ensuring that inferences drawn using that technique were proper inferences to draw.

Basically, there is only one "interpretation" of the data that matters to scientists, and that is whatever interpretation is supported by reality. Learn this lesson quickly, unless you wish to be regarded as discoursively dishonest on a grand scale.

Meanwhile, as a corollary of (2) above, it is time to address:

(4) Learn what scientists actually postulate, not what you think they postulate, or have been told that they postulate by duplicitous apologetics websites.

This dovetails nicely with (3) above (because creationists always assume they know better what scientists postulate than the scientists themselves), and also dovetails to varying degrees with (6), (9), (10), (11), (12), and (13) below. If creationists really want to critique the theory of evolution, then they had better start learning what that theory actually postulates, as opposed to the farcical strawman caricatures thereof erected by authors of duplicitous apologetics. If you cannot be bothered to exercise this basic level of intellectual effort, then don't be surprised if people treat your attempts to erect 3,000 year old mythology, written by ignorant Bronze Age nomads, as being purportedly "superior" to the work of Nobel Laureates, with the scorn and derision such attempts deserve.
Science/Technology / Loophole Free Bell Inequality Test by DaughterOfAllah: 6:51am On May 31, 2021
Recently, an experiment setting out to test Bell's Inequality, free from the loopholes that afflict previous experiments, was conducted in the Netherlands. The Nature paper is now a free download. Here it is:

Loophole-Free Bell Inequality Violation Using Electron Spins Separated By 1.3 Kilometres by B. Hensen, H. Bernien, A. E. Dréau, A. Reiserer, N. Kalb, M. S. Blok, J. Ruitenberg, R. F. L. Vermeulen, R. N. Schouten, C. Abellán, W. Amaya, V. Pruneri, M. W. Mitchell, M. Markham, D. J. Twitchen, D. Elkouss, S. Wehner, T. H. Taminiau & R. Hanson, Nature, 528: 682-686 (21st October 2015)
. You can download the full paper here for more comprehension.

Hensen et al, 2015 wrote:
More than 50 years ago1, John Bell proved that no theory of nature that obeys locality and realism2 can reproduce all the predictions of quantum theory: in any local-realist theory, the correlations between outcomes of measurements on distant particles satisfy an inequality that can be violated if the particles are entangled. Numerous Bell inequality tests have been reported3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13; however, all experiments reported so far required additional assumptions to obtain a contradiction with local realism, resulting in ‘loopholes’13, 14, 15, 16. Here we report a Bell experiment that is free of any such additional assumption and thus directly tests the principles underlying Bell’s inequality. We use an event-ready scheme17, 18, 19 that enables the generation of robust entanglement between distant electron spins (estimated state fidelity of 0.92 ± 0.03). Efficient spin read-out avoids the fair-sampling assumption (detection loophole14, 15), while the use of fast random-basis selection and spin read-out combined with a spatial separation of 1.3 kilometres ensure the required locality conditions13. We performed 245 trials that tested the CHSH–Bell inequality20 S ≤ 2 and found S = 2.42 ± 0.20 (where S quantifies the correlation between measurement outcomes). A null-hypothesis test yields a probability of at most P = 0.039 that a local-realist model for space-like separated sites could produce data with a violation at least as large as we observe, even when allowing for memory16, 21 in the devices. Our data hence imply statistically significant rejection of the local-realist null hypothesis. This conclusion may be further consolidated in future experiments; for instance, reaching a value of P = 0.001 would require approximately 700 trials for an observed S = 2.4. With improvements, our experiment could be used for testing less-conventional theories, and for implementing device-independent quantum-secure communication22 and randomness certification23, 24.

Enjoy. smiley
Science/Technology / Re: 5 Everyday Science Facts (nearly Everybody Gets Wrong) by DaughterOfAllah: 11:00am On May 29, 2021
READ MORE HERE
Science/Technology / 5 Everyday Science Facts (nearly Everybody Gets Wrong) by DaughterOfAllah: 10:57am On May 29, 2021
We all love science, sure. It's what makes things explode when we want them to, and keeps things from exploding the rest of the time. But science is hard, and there's lots of stuff we can't get our heads around. And we're not just talking about super complicated topics, we're talking about everyday stuff all around us, like ...

5) "You Are What You Eat"
Not long after humans became self-aware and also realized we like eating, we figured out we're made out of the same stuff as those yummy bits of food. We eat, we break food down, and we build those food components into our body. Eat a lot, and you get big; eat nothing, and you wither and die. If you skip on eating some specific nutrient, you can't build that into your body, and you get sick. And if you eat a lot of a nutrient, you build a whole lot of it into your body. Right? That sounds reasonable enough. But that very last observation is kind of only true with fat, which is something your body likes to store away (and even fat storage is more complicated than that). With other stuff, you have to eat it, but if you eat extra, your body just kind of discards it.

Take cholesterol. Doctors have long known that when patients have lots of cholesterol in their blood, that's bad for their heart, so doctors advised such patients to strike all cholesterol from their menus. These patients dutifully gave up eggs and quit Sausage McMuffins, and if their cholesterol stayed high, well, doctors assumed they were cheating on their new diets. But it turns out that there's no relationship between how much cholesterol you eat and how much cholesterol's in your blood. That's because you make your own cholesterol (which is an essential compound, part of every cell) in your liver. Eat less cholesterol, and your liver makes more; eat more, and your liver produces less. There are substances you eat that raise your cholesterol, true, but these substances aren't cholesterol themselves - they raise your cholesterol by breaking how your body works, not by pumping more cholesterol into your system. Likewise, eating salt won't raise your sodium levels, unless your body is already broken. Something similar goes on with good nutrients. Like calcium. Calcium's essential. Miss out on calcium (or on the vitamin that lets you use calcium), and you develop rickets, which gives you bendy bones and a sickly British accent. "That means," reasoned parents for decades, "if we give kids lots of calcium, their bones will be extra strong!" So they gave kids a big ol' glass of milk with every meal.

But it turns out your kid's body will deposit some amount of calcium into their bones today, yet if they drink extra calcium beyond that, that doesn't help at all. Studies lasting decades have failed to find any benefit on people's bone health from drinking extra milk. There's even some evidence that drinking extra milk makes your bones lose calcium. The science on that last part is uncertain (it has to do with blood chemistry and how the body deals with acidity), but it's possible, because biology's more complicated than "I eat, therefore I am."

Or take iron. Iron's another essential mineral, and if you don't eat enough, you get anemia, which means thin blood and another sickly British accent. So, what happens if you eat extra amounts of iron? Are you going to get a bunch of extra red blood cells, and also the ability to run marathons? Uh, no. You just kind of take in the iron without using it. For a long time, people believed spinach was a great source of iron -- this was why Popeye got his powers from spinach. Hilariously, this was a myth based on a typo that accidentally multiplied the amount of iron in spinach by 10. But what's possibly even more hilarious is that even if spinach did have 10 times the amount of iron it really has, that wouldn't do you any good. It would not coat your entire body in iron armor. Assuming you aren't starving, you almost certainly don't have an iron deficiency, so the extra iron wouldn't make any difference whatever. (Unless you really do eat a ridiculously high amount. Then you get iron poisoning.)

4) "Save The Rain Forest, It's The Earth's Lungs"
Speaking of essential elements, oxygen is pretty important, and if you don't believe us, just try holding your breath a couple minutes and see how much you like it. Good thing then that we have trees gently farting that sweet stuff into the air. In particular, when people talk about fires in the Amazon, you'll hear about how important that rain forest is in providing a fifth of all our oxygen. Now, the next time someone with a clipboard stops you in the street with this line and tries to get you to donate to Greenpeace, there's a very simple well actually response you can give: Most oxygen doesn't come from trees at all. It comes from algae in the ocean. And you don't get many trendy charities for looking after algae, because no one had fun climbing algae as a kid.

But we shouldn't really be quibbling over whether some particular rain forest provides 20 percent of our oxygen or 2 percent of it. Because overall, the rain forest doesn't produce oxygen at all. It consumes it. The forest consists of trees but also all the animals who live there (when fires or industry destroys the forest, we mourn the animals too). Tally up trees and beasts, and the forest takes in more oxygen than it produces, and destroying the forest reduces oxygen consumption. We're not talking about how tree loss has recently made the area overall worse at capturing carbon – we're talking about untouched parts of the forest, thanks to the sum total of everything living there.

Trees aren't that great at producing oxygen, you see (or at absorbing carbon dioxide, which is the other side of the same equation). A tree produces oxygen as it splits CO2 apart to make biomass, but nearly all that biomass will eventually be consumed - partly by the plant itself - or will rot, which turns oxygen right back into carbon dioxide again. So when you hear businesses talking about searching for new carbon capture tech, don't snicker because we already have the perfect tech in the tree. We're looking to make something vastly more efficient than that.

Okay, we seem to have digressed a little from trees producing oxygen to trees absorbing carbon dioxide. There's a reason for that. Because what if we tell you that, despite what we said a little while ago about oxygen being important, it's not actually at all important how much oxygen plants create? The reason: We have so much oxygen right now that it makes no difference. The atmosphere is about 22 percent oxygen, and we have a lot of atmosphere. For the last couple decades, we've been burning off eons' worth of captured carbon, and that raised the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere (and reduced the level of oxygen) by just 0.005 percentage points...which is a lot when we're talking carbon dioxide, which we measure in parts per million, but it's nothing when we're talking oxygen. All of our oxygen consumption involves organisms breaking down organic matter, and even if all organic matter on Earth were instantly burned, that would only use up 1% of the reserve oxygen supply. Even if all oxygen production worldwide stopped today, we'd be perfectly fine (fine oxygen-wise; factors other than an oxygen shortage will wipe us out). We have enough oxygen to last for millions of years.

Trees are still great for what they do for climate, biodiversity, water regulation, lumberjack roleplay, etc. But something about our psyche makes them feel most valuable when we falsely picture them as little factories constantly pumping out a gas we all need. Maybe because we're all industrialists at heart, or maybe it's because we play too many resource management video games. Both of which might also explain our next misconception:
Family / Re: God Is Not Needed For The Origins Of Life by DaughterOfAllah: 7:43pm On Jan 11, 2021
F0REVERB0SS:
The chance of RNA forming even in the right conditions is low, for the basic organelles it is even lower, for it to know how to use ATP is even lower, the chance is lowered further when you consider that they have to be able to take RNA and duplicate it along with other organelles, and it is hard for RNA to become DNA.

And with each success there are more chances for future success, because that's how reproduction works.

The chances of multi-celluar beings decrease the total chance even more, and even then, why does life need consciousness?

It doesn't, clearly. Most living things don't have any form of
recognizable consciousness
. And the Gish Gallop continues.



Why does it need to reproduce?

It's an adaptive trait


Consciousness would be so hard to develop and it is probably outside us anyway.

There's no reason to think that's the case, or that it's even possible.


There is also the possibility of gamma-rays, an asteroid or comet will hit the planet, or other cosmic disasters.

Huh How likely are those things?


What about the fermi paradox? If life evolved here it would have to be able evolve in other places, unless we need a god to create life.

You mean the Fermi paradox that says life is likely to form all over the Universe, which is the same thing I'm telling you? That Fermi paradox? Yeah, I'm familiar with it. Why do you think it supports your argument? And, like I said, no scientific evidence!
Family / Re: God Is Not Needed For The Origins Of Life by DaughterOfAllah: 7:30pm On Jan 11, 2021
F0REVERB0SS:

First, if there were no failed evolution attempts
That has nothing to do with anything I said.

If the first randomly put together life form did not have the necessary parts, it could not live or reproduce
And that has nothing to do with evolution or abiogenesis. Learn to read! You don't even know what "parts" the first organism would have had.

If there was no universe there was no space, there was no time, then we can not assume it had any conditions other than nothingness.
And again you're talking about an entirely different topic! What you're doing here is called a Gish Gallop. I'm going to say that we can't make any assumptions about conditions before the Big Bang because all of our experience is based on conditions within the Universe. Other than that, I'm going to ignore your claim because it has nothing to do with evolution or your claim that it's impossible.

Also, 13 something billion years is the life of the universe.
Refer to my previous comment. A one-in-a-million chance event is pretty likely to occur if there are billions of events every day that could trigger it. Given the size of the Universe the odds of a specific rock hitting the Earth's atmosphere are astronomical, and yet we see shooting stars all the time. Because there are a lot of rocks in space.

When you say it's unlikely for RNA to form, you're talking about a single event in a single environment on a single planet... etc. As I said, trillions of galaxies full of planets.

Please try to read before you respond this time
Romance / Re: This Pic Is For All The Small Minded People In Here (warning) by DaughterOfAllah: 7:21pm On Jan 11, 2021
Everytime I log on here, it's always one weird thing after the other

I can't even with you guys anymore...lol grin

1 Like

Family / Re: God Is Not Needed For The Origins Of Life by DaughterOfAllah: 6:33pm On Jan 11, 2021
Are you aware that this forum has a religion section, Oladimeji247?

F0REVERB0SS:
How can proteins reproduce, and you realize the amount of failed attempts for amino acids evolving would take more than Earth's life to become stable. What are the chances that a cell will come together and have a reproduction system, ATP energy system, and a way to move them out.

There's no scientific evidence to back that claim, and it doesn't even make sense the way its constructed. There are hundreds of known, potentially life-supporting planets in our galaxy alone, and the number of galaxies in the observable universe is estimated to be in the trillions. So why would we limit the viable time period of a random event to the lifespan of one planet? On top of that, we're talking about an event that would be heavily dependent on environmental conditions, and it's not known what environmental conditions were present during the initial abiogenesis event. That alone is a good indication that the claim doesn't come from any reputable scientist. It makes claims of impossibility using information that isn't known.

Even if all of that checked out, though, the premise would only work if evolution were a linear, non-cumulative process, and that's not how evolution works, even where amino acids are concerned. Now, in fairness that part depends on which specific creationist claim your referring to here, but the complete misrepresentation of the actual principles they're claiming to describe is a feature of most of them. These claims that evolution is so unlikely as to be impossible are tailored for people who don't understand science and are likely to settle on an idea that appeals to them rather than critically examining the facts. You do yourself and everyone else a disservice by spreading that nonsense around.
Crime / Re: Why Is The Girl Raped In A Mosque Not Trending by DaughterOfAllah: 12:16pm On Jun 30, 2020
Charleys:
A 6 years old girl was raped in a mosque here

https://www.vanguardngr.com/2020/06/kaduna-girl-raped-found-dead-in-mosque/

But this has not trended, no one is talking about it because, the media is silent on this.

No one is talking about it.

But the didn't let us rest when it was in a church.

Rape is rape. The first one had the power to fight back, the second one in a mosque had no power to fight back.

We need to talk about it now
OP I'm lost as to exactly what basis you're implying there's a double standard. Can you please clarify?
Romance / Re: South Africa Has More Fly, Sexy Girls Than Nigeria by DaughterOfAllah: 12:03pm On Jun 30, 2020
OP, what metric did you employ to arrive at this outrageous conclusion?

2 Likes

Religion / An Important Message For The Christians & Muslims by DaughterOfAllah: 10:24am On Jun 30, 2020
Hello,

[Disclaimer] I intend this message to be for the people who feel compelled to win souls to their respective faiths i.e online evangelists, online apologists etc. However, I honestly recommend that every believer of every faith read this piece. Before I continue with my post, I want to start by declaring that I am, as a matter of fact, an atheist. As an atheist, I have no belief in the existence of any supernatural being(s). My lack of belief stems from the lack of credible evidence for the existence of all such alleged cosmic beings. However, I do not claim to know there are no gods. There is a fundamental difference. Therefore, I'd deeply appreciate an honest understanding of my position, rather than a strawman caricature thereof. I apologise, however, for the length in advance.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

When abandoning any prominent religious faith, I've discovered that attempts to correct any such departure increases exponentially the longer you remain detached from any said faith. As such, I've had few close acquaintances who, aware of my stance on religion, constantly try to argue me right back into it. And believe me, no matter how hard I express myself or justify my position, they remain undeterred!

When making a case for their gods, theists love to employ lots of strategies and gimmicks just to win you over. From desperate apologetics, to self-righteous sanctimonious piety, to attempting to reverse the burden of proof, to emotional appeal, manipulation and outright threatening the unbeliever with eternal damnation in HELL! Sometimes, they assume you were never a true believer, even though you've practiced said religion all your life. They pretend that they have it all figured out. Listening to unbelievers before conversion attempts is completely unimportant in their book.

There is a common flaw I've noticed when these people try to convert me. This flaw is noticeably prominent in believers of all faiths: They never listen. Things would be a lot more easier for religious followers if they just stopped a second to hear the unbelievers out!. The moment you begin to make assumptions about your co-discussant(s) in any rational discourse, you've already lost - especially if your sole purpose is to get them to change their minds.

I was watching a Christian movie last night titled God's Not Dead. I've heard a lot about it, but I only came accross it last night while surfing the web looking for stuff to download. Judging from the title, I had assumed that some filmmakers wanted to share incontrovertible, undisputed, empirical evidence for the Christian god. Oh, how wrong was I! What I got instead was nearly two hours of atheist strawmen caricatures, Christian propaganda all enmeshed in false persecution complex. I mean, even by religious standards the film was a mess. It did nothing but reinforce the fact that Christians usually don't give a damn about anyone but themselves! They portray their religion as a selfish one. As long as they can take the W over anyone with disputing views, they don't mind if they peddle lies and falsehood or even outright contradict themselves. I could go on another rant slamming God's Not Dead and exposing it's fallacies and lies, but that's a whole other issue entirely.

Religious believers make a lot of unjustified assumptions when talking about atheists. I'm going to table out a list of these assumptions. (Mind you, this list is based on the observation derived from conversations with believers for a significant time period. There will obviously be a tiny few exceptions.)

UNJUSTIFIED ASSUMPTIONS AND LIES MOST RELIGIOUS BELIEVERS MAKE ABOUT ATHEISTS
1) Atheists reason like all other religionists. To demonstrate this, ask any Christian or Muslim if they think atheists view people like Richard Dawkins or Christopher Hitchens as infallible authorities of knowledge. I can bet an overwhelming majority would say yes! This is the problem: without any justification, religious believers think atheists reason the way they do, but in reverse! They view the Bible and Quran as the infallible words of Yahweh and Allah respectively; of course atheists feel the same about Neil DeGrasse Tyson and other prominent atheists right? Wrong! Our epistemology differs! Atheists rely solely on reason and logic to decipher truths. Most of us became atheists before we even heard of Richard Dawkins or concepts like evolution and the big bang. Ideas like evolution only serve as occasional reinforcement. Even if evolution was disproved today, we'll still have no beliefs in god(s). This is the reason why people trash talking evolution always amuse me: I don't care about evolution! All I care about is the existence of god(s) - for which no incontrovertible evidence has yet been demonstrated under reliable and/or controlled settings.

2) Atheists do not have spiritual or religious experiences. This is a pure lie. Atheists DO have "spiritual" experiences - they just interprete it differently than you do. Most believers are quick to shut down atheists when they assert that they've had strange things happen to them, this denying them their experiences. Some gloat and rub it in the atheists face that such experience proves their god really exists. But this is not true in the slightest. The truth is this: people have a habit of interpreting significant events in their lives through their respective worldviews. A Christian who experiences an NDE will see Jesus just the way an Indian will see Vishnu, or a Muslim will see Allah. Another fact is that most fantastical events we have experienced in life can sometimes be explained through natural laws and physics, from eerie sounds or moving objects to even crazier things like hallucinations, mass hysteria, NDEs etc. Things like thunder, rain and even alchemy we're mysteries in the ancient times. Today, we know much better. When you're a believer, it is often convenient to view everything that happens around you through the lens of your religion. However, you still have no right to deny people their own legitimate experiences or label them as lies just because they are not of your religion.

3) Oh this one really ticks me off: Atheists behave the way theologians describe them. First of all, it should be noted that religious theologians and apologists like William Lane Craig and Ravi Zacharias are not authorities on atheism! These people mostly carry out NO research to corroborate their "facts". They come from institutes which are founded on the belief - which most still uphold - that atheists are morally bankrupt and worthy of damnation. These institutes differ from other educational institutions who arrive at their conclusions, only after sufficient data has been collected and processed.
These theologians are informed solely by their faith. They presuppose who atheists are and this is very evident when you watch their debates. An academic scholar with background(s) in counter-apologetics is a good source but majority of the time, the only true authorities on atheism are atheists themselves! If you are bent on converting a specific atheist, the worst mistake you can make is confront them with baseless accusations like claiming "you know deep down you believe! you are just lying to yourself". You've already made up your mind about this individual, why do you suppose s/he will open up to you any further?...Hasn't the discussion been terminated prematurely? As I have stated countless times already, the fastest way to enstrange somebody in a discussion is to presume how they reason. It not only denies them a voice, it also destroys the purpose of the discussion in the first place. Speaking of false accusations....


4) Atheists secretly believe in God. The bible has pretty much destroyed the atheist's chance of having a voice to speak for his or herself. Romans 19:18-20 asserts that god has made the knowledge of his existence "plain" to the atheists. It's hard to argue in this context, given that Christians believe their holy book to be inspired by god - and he can't have been lying! Or can he? Generally, this makes Christians think than no true unbeliever exists. To them the knowledge of who god is evident to ALL. It also doesnt help that religious texts paint a sinister picture of unbelievers as "fools" or "enemies of an all-loving god". Thus, the hearts of believers is even more hardened towards non-believers. To put this in perspective and demonstrate how problematic this is, consider this: As a Christian, imagine if I told you, you don't believe in God. You can argue with me all day that you believe and that you obey his words, but I just shut you down and assert that your emotions are creating illusions of righteousness and loyalty, getting the best of you. You are actually just a lying sinner. Of course you'll feel helpless because I've denied you your feelings! That's exactly how you make atheists feel. It's always best to try the shoe on the other foot sometimes. Most of us atheists, really do not see any evidence for god. If you fail to understand this, any discussion with an unbeliever is pointless.

5) There are no atheists in foxholes. This is a tired canard that unfortunately, still gets trotted out in this day and age. The idea that atheists discover faith when faced with severe tribulations is as false as it is hilarious. Religionists truly believe that atheists are "agents" of the devil. They believe that when an atheist is suffering untold pain, it is due to unbelief, and that such pain will be removed when they accept their god(s). This assumption is not only irritating but highly irrelevant. People change worldviews all the time. Muslims can become Christians. Atheists can become Buddhists and so forth. There is no universal reason for this change. It is a non-argument. Just to add, some theists see successful atheists as people backed by the devil. Basically, if you're a rich atheist, Satan is behind your success. If you're a struggling atheist, your unbelief and blasphemy against god is catching up with you. There's no winning with this people!

Ultimately, it is important for religious followers who seek to speak to atheists to understand where they are coming from first. I know it sounds like a heavy task, but that's the only way to achieve mutual beneficial discussions of this nature. Honestly, if you're not willing to find out what makes an atheist tick, I wonder what you stand to gain other than being a bullying, self-righteous, opinionated arse when engaging any atheist in a discussion.



This rant has probably triggered lots of believers who may feel the impulse to scroll right down and comment to pass judgements about me. I expect that. However, the fact that this post lacks transcience would justify me should any baseless accusations arise. Therefore I'd recommend that if you must put down a comment, endeavour to read (and understand!) the OP before jumping headlong into unfounded conclusions.

Thanks

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Family / 5 Abortion Myths That You Hear Everywhere (debunked) by DaughterOfAllah: 5:55pm On Apr 24, 2020
In any abortion debate, there seems to be one recurring set of "facts" that the anti-abortion crowd likes to roll out. It's a sort of Greatest Hits album for taking away somebody's bodily autonomy. Surprise! These arguments aren't entirely on the up and up. For example ...

5. "Having An Abortion Means You're Irresponsible!"

When someone accidentally winds up pregnant, it's easy to judge them or their partner for being irresponsible. We all sat through the same sex education classes, where we were taught that responsible sex-havers always use contraception, and that any "accidents" are the result of wanton recklessness. This is a big talking point among the anti-abortion crowd, who argue that abortion is merely a way for the irresponsible to avoid having to deal with the consequences of their (in)action, and therefore shouldn't exist.

Except this argument doesn't hold up. There isn't a clear-cut line between "responsible" and "irresponsible" sex, because when it comes down to it, you can be the most cautious sexer to ever exist and still wind up with an unwanted pregnancy, because no form of contraception is 100% effective. According to both the CDC and Planned Parenthood, the pill is only 93% effective, while condoms are on average only 85% effective (and that's if you use them precisely right).

If you want to improve your chances, there are implants and the buddy system, as well as good ol' abstinence. At some point, though, we're going to have to get over the idea that "responsible" sex has as much to do with numbers as it does behavior -- as well as the idea that the actions of "irresponsible" people justify stripping the rights of "responsible" people.

This ties into another popular anti-abortion talking point, that having an abortion means that someone doesn't care about children and/or the sanctity of human life. But in the U.S., 60% of abortions are sought by people who already have children. Many are sought by people who describe themselves as religious. One study found that out of 670 women surveyed, 53% described the decision to have an abortion as "very or somewhat difficult."

It's not just America, either. Despite an increase in the number of countries to legalize abortion in the last two decades, the worldwide abortion rate has dropped. This is something you wouldn't expect if we were treating safe, legal access to abortion as an invitation to participate in The Purge: Kidz.

4. "Most People Regret Their Abortions!"

The problem with debunking the idea that people who receive abortions are heartless monsters is that it hands the opposition a different stick with which they can beat abortion rights. If people who receive abortions care about the decision, doesn't it make sense to restrict access to abortion in order to spare people from regretting their decision down the line?

It's a popular argument with lawmakers these days. In 2006, for instance, a since-repealed anti-abortion law in South Dakota passed in part thanks to testimony that abortion "carries a greater risk of emotional harm than childbirth." In 2007, Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy defended upholding a law banning late abortions by saying that while "no reliable data [exists] to measure the phenomenon, it seems unexceptionable to conclude some come to regret their choice to abort." Gee, thanks for the concern?

While having an abortion can cause temporary emotional distress, there's no evidence that any significant portion of people spend the rest of their days regretting their decision. When UC San Francisco spent three years tracking the emotional health of women who'd received an abortion, they found that an "overwhelming majority" felt they'd made the right decision. In truth, getting turned away for an abortion can be more emotionally devastating than receiving one. In another study by UCSF, they found that women who were denied abortions "experienced more anxiety and lower self-esteem in the short-term than women who received them."

READ MORE HERE ==>

https://www.cracked.com/article_26604_5-abortion-myths-that-you-hear-everywhere-debunked.html

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