₦airaland Forum

slimtoney:
If your problem is with the name ISLAM and not the banking system, then u do not have problems. U jst making mountain out of mole hill, looking for trouble where there is none, u are jst being intolerable to a religion because u do not belong to it.

Islam accomodates xtianity to a greater extent than xtianity to islam. Its razor sharp utterances like these and debasing statement from our xtian fellows that causes fracas. Pls lets be moderate in all our doings and learn to respect beliefs of others.

My problem is with the slow eroding of Nigeria's secular status. It doesn't matter how nice and wonderful your religion is. The Nigerian government cannot promote a state religion. it cannot give any religion a higher status than others. It cannot make islam-specific CBN regulations or pass Christianity/Ifa/Devil worship specific laws.

To do so would violate the constitution and more importantly, the foundation for a major religious conflict in the future. By by allowing these islamic banking rules, they are entering the slippery slope of slowly reducing non-muslims to second-class citizens.

If people of all faiths (and not just christians and muslims) are to live together in peace in this country, there must be no doubt that all of us are equal.

If they can't find a way to do non-interest banking without using the words "Islam" or "sharia" in the regulations, then they should just scrap the whole thing. End off story.

oliidell:
Zakibi Heaven bles u. i was saying d same tin yesterday, the name is the issue. if they had advertised "No Interest Banking" loads of ppl wud go for it,  but we have never known SLS for tact have we?

Just shows how clueless these government people are. What so hard about calling it "non-interest" banking? Don't these clowns understand that they are threatening the nation's secularity with all this stup.dity?

They should simply remove all references to sharia, islam or any other religion and nobody will have anything to complain about. Its very simple.

You cannot deny doctors the rights that everybody else has just because its convenient. If a shoemaker has the right to stay at home then so does a doctor. If you think their services are so important, then you should pay them what they are worth. When they complain about their work conditions, you should try and address their concerns quickly. The problem in Nigeria is that strikes are the only language our useless government seems to understand. You can't negotiate with the government, you can't reason with it. Your only option is to go on strike.  Now, instead of doing something about the appalling work conditions doctors are subjected to, they want to resort to gestapo tactics. Well good luck to them. They'll only succeed in driving even more young doctors out of the country.

Once, when I was in medical school, the residents didn't get paid for about 6 months for one reason or the other. After the fourth month of working for free, they went on strike. Of course, the government immediately invoked the "no work, no pay" rule despite the strike being all about working without pay. I remember one of the senior residents pulling me to one side and advising me to start reading for foreign medical license exams so I could leave Nigeria. "This country doesn't deserve us" is what he said.

Best advice I ever got.

Omo_Tier1:
a good judge waits to hear both sides of an event, take stocks of the fact of the matter, thereafter concludes.

You have not had the oppourtunity of hearing from both sides and you'r passing judgement already.Moreso that the article is coming from a tabloid who once claimed Lagos is the capital of Nigeria and that Nigeria is an islamic country.

I take articles from the sun less serious because they are a bunch of misfits

The story is perfectly plausible. Higher order pregnancies like this almost always result from overuse of fertility drugs, it almost never happens naturally. I actually know a number of women who are abusing the same drug without a doctor's involvement. It's more common than you think.

That doesn't make it any less stu.pid though.

The Road safety guy in the video (FCT sector commander Nseobong Akpabio) appears to be a class A m0r0n.

Luckily for him, that's no barrier to success in Nigeria.

Typical senseless Nigerian behavior. I'm sick and tired of seeing stu.pid people abusing prescription drugs the way people do here. From using powerful antibiotics to treat catarrh to the nonsense this woman did.

How could she be so irresponsible taking such a powerful drug without a doctor's supervision and at such high doses. She could very easily have killed herself and and all her babies. She was just lucky she managed to get herself to a place where the oyibo magas were willing to treat her for free. And the newspaper is also at fault for mentioning the name of the drug she used. Now god knows how many reta.rded nigerian women will want to try the same nonsense. For every woman who does this and gets away with it, maybe a hundred will end up with a bunch of dead babies or worse.

She should not be allowed to get away scot-free. They should lock her up and make her wash plates until she pays her hospital bills.

Rubbish!

Mobinga:
[img]https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria?action=dlattach;id=301545;type=avatar[/img]
Epic.

I'm glad you like it.

alj_harem:
now is jonathan met to tell us that the 12 miniters in the previous cabinet that did not improve their respective sectors will now marvellously improve it now that jonathan is the president

Be quiet!

How dare you speak against the government of our great and prosperous nation Nigeria? How dare you question the wisdom of our dear leader President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan? The government will no longer tolerate such irresponsible utterances. The ministers have clearly all done brilliant jobs in the past administration and that  is why they are being re-appointed. I advise you to stop fostering dissent. Freedom of speech does not give you the right to make statements that may destabilize the nation. Or are you like Nasir El Rufai, among those who are plotting to overthrow the government? Mr. El Rufai is guilty of the crimes of sedition and divisionism, that is why he has been arrested. Soon, he will receive a fair trial and be sent to prison.

Let his fate be an example to the posters on this site. We have been monitoring your activities for several months and have compiled comprehensive files on a number of your members.  All of you would be wise to be very careful of your utterances from now on. The government will no longer tolerate the kind of irresponsible speech we have seen here in the past. Do not forget that since the sim card registration exercise, we now have a comprehensive database of all your personal information. Your phone conversations are being monitored, your ip addresses are being logged and your locations are being tracked. Do not think you can escape by using fake names. The State Security Service has the technology to unmask you. All those who incite anti-government sentiments will be severely dealt with! No one will escape punishment.

From today onward, all those who make seditious comments will be arrested. All those who criticize the government shall be jailed and all unapproved protesters will be shot. The Federal Government is willing to go to any length to preserve our free and open democracy from the threat of dissidents and malcontents.

You have been warned.

Signed,

Alhaji Evil D. Brain
Assistant Director for Electronic Intelligence Monitoring
State Security Service,
Abuja.

koruji:
God I hope this article is not the reason why GEJ's SSS is arresting Rufai.

It has to be something more, something that they need to tell us about very soon - otherwise this is a terrible direction for the government to be heading.

Or they could be using the fact that Rufai currently has a case to answer before the EFCC to get back at him for this article, especially since his lawyers were recently accused of using delay tactics. The government might want to impress it on him that if you out on bail or whatever over corruption allegations while in government, then it is not particularly bright to be writing condemnatory articles about the government

Okay, I am trying to help this government find a managable excuse before this becomes eggs on their faces.

Be quiet!

How dare you speak against the government of our great and prosperous nation Nigeria? How dare you question the wisdom of our dear leader President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan? Mr. El Rufai is guilty of the crimes of sedition and divisionism, that is why he was arrested. Soon, he will receive a fair trial and be sent to prison.

Let his fate be an example the posters on this site. We have been monitoring your activities for several months and have compiled comprehensive files on a number of your members.  All of you would be wise to be very careful of your utterances from now on. The government will no longer tolerate the kind of irresponsible speech we have seen in the past. Do not forget that since the sim card registration exercise, we now have a comprehensive database of all your personal information. Your phone conversations are being monitored, your ip addresses are being logged and your locations are being tracked. Do not think you can escape by using fake names. The State Security Service has the technology to unmask you. All those who incite anti-government sentiments will be severely dealt with! No one will escape punishment.

From today onward, all those who make seditious comments will be arrested. All those who criticize the government shall be jailed and all unapproved protesters will be shot. The Federal Government is willing to go to any length to preserve our free and open democracy from the threat of dissidents and malcontents.

You have been warned.

Signed,

Alhaji Evil D. Brain
Assistant Director for Electronic Intelligence Monitoring
State Security Service,
Abuja.

Nonsense.

The truth is that games are far easier now than they've ever been . If you don't believe me, try playing the original Battletoads on the NES. Back then, most games were crazily hard to make up for being short on content.

You're just making up excuses for being a rubbish gamer.

obinna120:
you people should not worry, a new list of super ministers is almost out and she must be definitely be there.

Is there going to be a list of supa dupa ministers? How many are there going to be in total? Personally, I don't think 34 is enough. There should be 774 ministers: one for each local government. That way one of my uncles could become one and I could finally get a decent job.

MyJoe:
Many Witnesses do reject blood till the very end - cases abound worldwide. There have even been Supreme Court cases in Nigeria arising from this matter. There have also been cases in Nigeria of doctors losing their license due to misconduct arising from this matter.

The problem of rejection of blood transfusion by the Witnesses cannot be solved by denying the issue, denying them treatment, or going on and on about the fact they risk death if they persist in their ways. They know that. I think it can be be solved by engaging the leadership of the religion on the theological basis for rejecting blood transfusion - which is very weak.

I'm not interested in solving the Jehovah's Witnesses "problem". If they want to waste their lives, then they should go ahead. That is their god-given right. I only have a problem with them refusing to donate blood, and discouraging others from doing so, then turning round and asking for it when they themselves need it.

If you refuse to donate, how is it fair for you to recieve? The harm these people do is real. They are not only hippocrites but they are also indirectly, killers. If the JWs would just keep their reta.rded rantings to themselves, fewer people would die for lack of donated blood. 

I've also heard about Jehovah's witnesses refusing blood until they died but I've never seen it happen live. The moment I tell them "madam, your baby is going to die in the next 30 minutes" they always come to their senses. I'm only speaking from personal experience.

@inesQor I'm not who you think I am, sorry.

Oh, and have you guys heard the news?

m.aljazeera.net/?name=aj_standard_en&i=8784&guid=2011628224144784687&showonly=1

Deadly attack on Kabul hotel 'ends'

06/29/2011 03:29:44 AM
A brazen attack on a major hotel in Kabul has ended with the
killing of attackers by security forces, an Afghan interior ministry
spokesman said.
"We believe between six and seven attackers have been killed,"
Sediq Sediqqi said on Wednesday. "All have been killed."
The NATO-led coalition in Afghanistan said two of its helicopters
fired on and killed three fighters on the roof of the hotel.
At least six Afghan civilians were killed in the attack. "They seem to
be hotel employees," Sediqqi said.
However, Mohammad Zahir, the head of the Kabul police crime
unit, told Reuters news agency that "at least 10 civilians, including
hotel staff, were killed when six suicide bombers attacked the Intercontinental." Sediqqi said lights were back on at the hotel after it was plunged into darkness during the five-hour-long raid.
An AFP news agency photographer close to the scene said part of the hotel was on fire. Ambulances were being sent to the scene of the attack, a favourite spot for foreigners in Afghanistan and Afghan government officials.
Among the guests staying at the hotel were Afghan government officials from around the country who were in Kabul for a conference on the handover of power from foreign to Afghan
security forces.
"There are foreign and Afghan guests staying at the hotel,'' Sediqqi said. "We have reports that they are safe in their rooms.''
Local police sources told Al Jazeera that the attackers entered the hotel after a firefight. At least one of them detonated himself, they said.
Bystanders were ordered to lay down on the ground for their own safety as the Afghan police battled the attackers with machine guns and other weapons.
Rocket-propelled grenades and tracer rounds could be seen and heard during the attack. Reporters at the scene said they could hear bursts of gunfire and shooting from the roof of the five-storey building.
Samoonyar Mohammad Zaman, a security officer for interior ministry, said the attackers were armed with machine guns, anti-aircraft weapons, rocket-propelled grenades and hand grenades. Zaman said there were 60-70 guests at the hotel, and that he had seen the bodies of two suicide bombers at the main entrance to the hotel.
Bette Dam, an independent journalist who was at the scene, told Al Jazeera that gunfire had gone on for "hours after hours", and that she had seen rocket-propelled grenades being fired. She reported hearing two loud explosions at the site, though it was unclear what caused them. She described the attack as "very
coordinated".
Taliban claim Zabiullah Mujahid, a Taliban spokesman, claimed responsibility for the attack in a telephone call to the press.
Al Jazeera's Bernard Smith, reporting from Kabul, said the Interncontinental is a very "well-defended hotel". "This happens - possibly coincidentally - as a two-day conference here in Kabul is due to start tomorrow, with people coming from across Afghanistan to talk about the transition - the taking over of the security responsibility by the Afghan security forces," he said. "People who are going to that conference are staying at the hotel."
Streets leading to the Intercontinental were blocked. The hotel is situated on a hill overlooking Kabul. The scene was dark as electricity was out at the hotel.
Jawid, a guest at the hotel, said he jumped out of a first-storey window to flee the shooting.
"I was running with my family," he said. "There was shooting. The restaurant was full with guests."
Attacks in Kabul have been relatively rare, although violence has increased since the May 2 killing of Osama bin Laden, the al-Qaeda chief, in a US raid in Pakistan and the start of the Taliban's annual spring offensive.
On 18 June, armed men wearing Afghan army uniforms stormed a police station near the presidential palace and opened fire on officers, killing nine. Late last month, a suicide bomber wearing an Afghan police uniform infiltrated the main Afghan military hospital, killing six medical students. A month before that, a suicide attacker in an army uniform sneaked past security at the Afghan defence ministry, killing three people.

Not that this has anything to do with what we're discussing. I just thought you guys might want to hear the latest news.

What I've learnt from this thread is that nairaland muslims either don't read the koran or cannot understand unless someone else explains it to them.

I'm always yabbing christians for swallowing and vomiting everthing their pastors tell them instead of reading the bible for themselves but what I've seen here has shocked me. You muslims are truly living in lalaland.

All of you are basically parroting the same crap you see on islamist websites. There's nothing to suggest that you came to this conclusion yourselves otherwise, ther wuld be some muslims who agree with some facets of the "islam is violent" argument. Instead, its like arguing with Man U fans that Chelsea is better.

How can you watch CNN or al Jazeera and claim that Islam is not violent? How can you read the koran and claim that your religion is of peace? You keep claiming that the koran doesn't encourage killing when all of us can read it and see that it quite clearly does. I find it difficult to understand how muslims can so boldly deny something that is so glaring. You might as well say that the sky is not up or that water is not wet. The level of bullsheat and hubris from muslims is truly ridiculous. Its either none of you went to good secondary schools or you're all hopelessly self-deluded.

You people had better stop decieving yourself. Your people are causing far too much death and misery. You better fix your religion before outsiders are forced to fix it for you.

Dreams have no hidden meaning or significance. Anyone who says otherwise is a m0r0n.

A quick science lesson: When you sleep, you go through a cycle of what's called slow-wave sleep followed by REM (rapid eye movement) sleep. Dreams only occur during REM sleep, thus you can always tell when someone is dreaming by looking at their eyes. Most people have over a dozen seperate dreams each night, one for each cycle of REM sleep. Children have more dreams, old people have fewer.

You only remember your dreams if you wake up during REM sleep or a short while (typically less than 5 minutes) after. Those who tend to wake up during slow-wave sleep don't remember their dreams. If you wake up during REM sleep, you'll usually have very vivid memories of what you dreamed of but you'll forget most of it within minutes unless you write it down, or tell someone, or something.

Also, dreams don't have a plot or narrative while you are actually doing the dreaming. They are really a fairly random procession of images based on your memories. It's only after you wake up and try to make sense of it that your mind cooks up a story to try and connect those images together.

People have been documenting their dreams for thousands of years. Yet no one has ever managed to glean any useful information about future events from them. Anybody who believes that dreams predict the future is just fooling himself.
[/science lesson]

Oh, and one more thing: Martian is trolling you people. He doesn't really believe all that superstitous mumbo-jumbo. He just said it in the hope that someone'll post something even more re.tarded and that lols would ensue. And you guys fell for it.


Suckers! Image123 is the only one that noticed.

InesQor:
If you were at the brink of death and you terribly needed a blood transfusion, would you accept it? 

When you answer that question, you have answered this one too. 

So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.
- Jesus in Matthew 7:12 (NIV)

Everyday, I see Jehovah's Witnesses and other religious lunatics preaching and ranting against blood transfusions.

Yet in all my years as a doctor, I have never seen a single one of these people refuse blood once it becomes clear to them that their life was at risk. In every single case I've seen, they change their mind at the last minute.

And yet these hippocrites spend their time trying to reduce the blood supply, discouraging people from donating and shortening the rations of those of us who aren't re.tarded like them. They'll happily accept blood to save their own lives, yet they work to deny others the same option. I for one think these people are scum.

So here's my suggestion. If you oppose blood transfusions on religious grounds and you happen to have an accident, or are bleeding to death after childbirth. Or if perhaps your newborn baby has jaundice and is about to be permanently brain-damaged. Please be a good christian: stay at home and die there. Practice what you preach and be true to your religion, even to the bitter end.

I can't believe the sort of childish, nursery school arguments the muslims on this thread are using to defend their religion. Like "but, but, Richard the Lionheart was a christian and he killed people" or "see the violence in the US, and they're christians". Its really pathetic.

If you people had an ounce of sense, you would look at the mountain of evidence, admit you have a problem and start thinking of what little things you can do to fix it. Instead, you're pointing at others like a bunch of four year olds.

The first step on the road to a solution is acknowledging that there is a problem. From what I've seen from you people, Islam is going to remain a violent religion for a very long time. Pity.

Can we get a better picture please? Perhaps a full-body pic. All can see from this one is big hair and garish make-up.
Definitely not my type.

Kossy04:
You want me to kill someone for proof? Okay, within the next 3 months, a member of your family will die of a "brief illness." The illness will be so brief that it'd have lasted no longer than two weeks (almost three at most). When that happens, remember this post, for that's the proof of the supernatural you're looking for. When it happens, do share you testimonies of the proof of the supernatural with other users of this rotten website (at least, so others may learn from your errors, or shall I say S.T.U.P.I.D.I.T.Y).

Don't ever call those Zap.I.N.G B.A.S.T.A.R.D.S my brothers again, or you may follow the corpse to the grave!!!

Guy, read my post again. I guess reading and comprehension is not your strong suite. Maybe the grammer was too much so let me rephrase: I asked you to kill a small animal not a person. I also requested that if you or your co-satanists were planning to kill someone soon, you'd notify us in advance so that we could all see your true power. I would never advocate the killing of another human to prove a point. I unlike fanatics like you and your christian and muslim brothers (oops, I did it again!), I actually know the value of human life.

I already mentioned that I don't believe in the supernatural so rest assured that your silly threats don't concern me. Keep living in your fantasy world.

Please respond soon because this thread is giving me enough lulz on a boring Saturday.

Cheers.

Kossy04:
If you'd like proof, find out yourself. That shouldn't be so hard since you "don't believe in the supernatural " (what harm can come from what you don't believe exists? After all, it "DOESN'T EXIST!". As for the "scare my family by doing some devilish ritual" part, that's just an excuse. Who says your family has to know? SO GO ON, FIND FOR YOURSELF THE PROOF YOU WANT when your family is away or something. I don't kill people unless they've GRAVELY pissed me off!!!!! I won't kill someone (or anything for that matter, or, even attempt) to prove anything to an I.D.I.O.T such as yourself! 

FOR THE RECORDS, don't try any of these rituals "TO PROVE" anything!!!! You'd only piss the spirits off, and at least one of three things will result from that; INSANITY, DEATH, and A COMPLETE COLLAPSE OF ALL THAT WAS GOOD IN YOUR LIFE!!!! Many HAVE died and suffered calamities, many ARE dying and suffering calamities, many WILL die and suffer calamities!!!!!! This warning is STRICTLY FOR THE RECORDS: YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!!!!!!!!

Wow, that was rude! Why so cranky? Maybe you should take 2 paracetamol. Or get a girlfriend.

Anyhoo, I was kind of hoping you'd be different and actually deliver something convincing enough to shake my convictions. Instead its just insults and bullsheat just like your christian and muslim brothers. You theists are all the same, a bunch of self-deluded losers. Enjoy living in your fantasy world, okay.

Cheers.

OP has made some bold claims. I would be interested to see if they are true. I personally don't believe in the supernatural but if I'm wrong, I'd like to know about it. Members of other religions make similar assertions but cannot back it up. None of the christans or muslims I've challenged have been able to show me any tangible benefits of following their religion so if OP can do that then I'm willing to try it out for the sake of scientific curiousity.

Mind you, I'll need to see something pretty convincing before I scare my family by doing some devilish ritual. Perhaps you could kill a small animal remotely with your powers and post a video to youtube. You'll have to make it convincing. Use an animal you couldn't have had access to beforehand (perhaps in a zoo, or part of a large herd)

I won't suggest that you kill a human being for me, but if you or any of you co-devilworshippers happen to be murdering anyone prominent through spiritual means soon, perhaps you could post the person's name in this thread for me. The timestamp would act as proof that you at least knew about the death beforehand which is good enough for me (no sickly Yar'Adua types please).

If there is such a thing as the supernatural, I'm sure I can find some practical uses for such power. Like a jazz-powered mosquito killer or something. I could make millions selling something like that.

vedaxcool:
haba, are you that foolish? thank goodness you only showed how daft you actually are, how will a mature man with all faculties of thinking working, stoop so low to want to unrinate in a building? You just nailed the coffins of Paganism, since it has made you behave irrationally to the extent of unrinating in a building, do you unrinate in you bedrooms,parlours? well I guess the idols you worship need urine to feel important, but i do advise you, behaving like an animal-goats to be precise - is only acceptable within your bedroom, whe you are alone only proves how your paganism has failed you. My 7 year old cousin knows it is wrong unrinating on his bed talkless of urinating deliberatly in the parlor, chie.

You're dodging the issue. Whether he's foolish or animalistic is irrelevant. What matters is his point that many (most?) muslims don't practice what they preach. Should urinating on a building really be a capital offense? What justification do muslims have for trying to lynch anther human being? This kind of nonsense happens all the time and it has to stop.

You can quote flowery verses as long as you like but as long as muslims keep commiting and threatening violent acts, then islam will continue to be known as a violent religion.

I didn't vote for GEJ but let me try and be the devil's advocate:

These allegations are the handiwork of detractors and rabblerousers. Sahara reporters never has anything good to say. He has not been convicted of anything, he is innocent. Anyway, everybody takes bribe, it is normal. Even though he took bribe, he is very sorry and should be forgiven. After all, even our lord jesus christ forgave. Buhari must be behind this! We should all trust Jonathan, he is a good man and he wants the best for this country. Buhari would have appointed bigger thieves if he had won. It's the evil men in PDP that are responsible, don't worry after 2015 we will start seeing the real president Jonathan and things will be different.

OAM4J:
_SMF-BREAK_You people should be patient nau, it is not easy. He needs time to settle down and draw the roadmap, hopefully by 2015 the implementation would have started._SMF-BREAK_

Are you being sarcastic? Please, tell me you're being sarcastic.

The sad thing is, no matter how useless a leader this guy turns out to be, he's still going to be our president for the next 8 years or more. For every informed person who complains about GEJ's incompetent handling of security or his wasteful spending, there are a thousand more who think the Arik air near crash was averted because of the president's "good name".

There-in lies the problem with majority rule: the majority of people are ignorant and stup!d. I think we should all get ready for 8 years of frustration because agenda or no, we're going to be seeing a lot of his black face (and sadly, that of his fugly wife as well).

Why did it take almost 2 years to file charges against these people. What about all the animals in police/army uniform who can be clearly seen gunning down unarmed and defenseless abokis on youtube. Why didn't Yar'Adua or his pet mumu GEJ condemn the killings when they happened? Why didn't they sack the state commissioner of police? Why didn't the IGP resign? Why hasn't the government even said anything up till now?

People are in such a hurry to condemn Boko Haram forgetting the thousands of innocent Hausa/Fulanis that were murdered in cold blood by our goverment. Judging by body count, the nigerian police force is by far the biggest terrorist group in this country.

I'm not trying to defend Boko Haram but God knows, if the government came to my home town and started killing people en masse like they did in Maiduguri, I'd probably be mixing homemade explosives in my kitchen right now.

Epic post by divinereal. My favoutite part is this:

I would urge Muslims to stop going to biased pro-islamic propaganda websites and look at the original material like the Quran and Hadith themselves. Read the Quran from first page to last in a language that you understand and you will see the unbelievable hate and violence that I saw and quickly realize that it was written by a war mongering man who imposed his ideology on Arabia through force and brutality.

I think if all muslims and christians would take the time to actually sit down to read and understand the scriptures for themselves rather than just swallowing predigested explanations from their imams/pastors, there would be a lot more athiests in the world. Those books make very little sense and they certainly don't say what most people think they say.

That "islam is a religion of peace" stuff is complete bullshiat. The same applies to "God is good". The god of the old testament is one of the most thoroughly evil characters in all of fiction. To me he's second only to Sauron in the Lord of the Rings. If you don't believe me, then read the bible and find out for yourself.

The concept of God fills gaps in human knowledge. For instance, our ancestors didn't know why the nearby volcano occasionally made scary noises, so they gave sacrifices to appease it. They didn't know where diseases like syphilis came from so they assumed it was a punishment from on high for intimate immorality. They didn't know where all the diverse creatures on earth came from so they assumed that some powerful being(s) must have created them. They couldn't undertand why the sun, the moon and most stars moved round the sky in an orderly fashion while a few renegade stars seemed to dance around randomly so they thought "it must be God's work".

But now, the gaps in human knowledge are closing fast and there is little space for God in any rational understanding of the world. We now understand geology so we no longer pray to volcanos. We have the germ theory of disease to tell us how illnesses spread. Darwin's theory of evolution through natural selection has shown us that you don't need a designer for new species to emerge. We now have astronomy and physics to tell us about the stars, planets , comets and even about the origin of the universe. There is now very little space for god in science.

Now inesQor says that the Higgs fills a hole in human knowledge and I agree. It is when he says the same about God that we have problems. God might have been a good explanation for why things are the way they are 300 years ago, but he certaingly isn't now. Given what we now know, the concept of an all powerful creator poses far more questions than it solves.

For instance, there is the chicken and egg problem. If the world could not exist without an creator, then how did the creator come to exist? Who designed the designer? Where did God come from? Following the same logic, it means there must be a super creator somewhere. And a supa dupa creator, and so on, ad infinitum. And if God could exist without anyone making him, why can't the universe? Or man?

Where does god live? In space? On another planet? Does he have mass and occupy space? Can he move at superluminal speeds? Is he the only one of his kind? How are his powers mediated? How can we humans gain such power? And if he ever tried to destroy us, how do we defeat him militarily?

And then there are the christianity-specific questions like why does God allow so much suffering in the world? Why doesn't he stop being such a cold-hearted @ssh0le and use his powers to feed all the starving children? How can he regret he made man (genesis ch 6 vs 5-6, the flood) when he's omniscient and omnipotent. Why did he set poor Adam and Eve up in the garden of Eden (he already knew what was going to happen before he created them, the tree or satan). Also, how can we defeat him militarily given that he's already tried to wipe us out once?

The Higgs bosun doesn't create nearly as many problems that need esplaining which is why its considered to be a valid solution to the problem of gravity in physics. Please inesQor, stop comparing god to the higgs. They have nothing in common.

InesQor:
Only in the US will you find such statistics

In my experience, Nigerians are just as ignorant if not more. I remember having one long, tedious argument with one pastor who seemed to believe that the donkey was the olden days version of the stretch limousine. And that Jesus riding one into Jerusalem showed that pastors should ride around in big cars and live luxurious lifestyles. The scary thing is that the guy didn't seem to be trying to deceive me. He actually, truly believed that. That's just one of the funnier examples of pastoral ignorance I've encountered.

I think that the problem is that too many christians (and muslims, etc) are already convinced that they know the scriptures, so they never actually bother to learn anything. Also pastors do their best to discourage people form actually reading the bible. They insist on breaking everything into tiny 1 or 2 verse portions taken out of context. I guess it makes it easier to twist the meaning or to hide their own ignorance.

InesQor:
It often appears like [i]Atheism [/i]begins to stutter whenever there is no particular or generally accepted abstraction or concept of God for Atheists to express their displeasure or misgivings about, or a peopled religious system that they have qualms with.

InesQor: There is a bujubuju on your head!
Scientist: Don't be silly, there's nothing on my head. And what the hell is a bujubuju?
InesQor: See? You precious science has begun to stutter since I won't/can't tell you exactly what a bujubuju is.
InesQor: Praise Bujubuju!

@InesQor
I accused you of making a strawman arguement. This is what I mean:

InesQor:
All I said is this:
1. Atheists don't believe in God because he is not "tangible". They ask, where is the evidence.
2. Some Atheists are Scientists who also believe there is a Higgs Boson, which is intangible and they have no evidence either but build their "lives upon it.
3. Why the bias?

In simple terms, if you are an Atheist, and a Scientist, I want to know why there is such a Bias. That's all.

The Higgs Bosun may not have been observed directly, but its far from intangible. The belief in its existence was arrived at through a process of deduction. lagerwhenindoubt gave an excellent analogy of using the movement of the tall grass to tell that there must be a tiger hiding there. Of course you can't be 100% sure until you actually see the tiger, which is why they built the large hadron collider.

You've created a strawman by suggesting that the scientists believe in the Higgs' existence for they same reason theists believe in god. This cannot be farther form the truth. Physicists believe in the Higgs because so far its the simplest way to explain how gravity is mediated taking into account all the information we have till date. Scientists are actively trying to prove/disprove the Higgs' existence, and if some new information shows us that the Higgs theory is wrong, the scientific community would happily discard it for a newer and better idea. No scientist has "faith" in the Higgs Bosun. To suggest that they do is just being disingenuous.

You cannot make similar claims about religion or belief in god. People did not start believing in god because of logic suggested he exists. There is no evidence proving or even suggesting that there is such a being. Theists never consider contrary opinions and will not change their views in response to new information. Theists do not apply logic or common sense to their world view and even seem to be proud of it. They believe that they are above logic. There is no amount of proof that can convince a theist that god does not exist, they reach their conclusions first then look for facts that support them while ignoring or denying contrary evidence. That is the very opposite of the scientific method.

If theists were like scientists, they would have all abandoned religion the moment it became clear that the earth was not the centre of the universe. If scientists were like theists, we'd all still think that the sun goes round the earth and the apparent movement of moons round Jupiter was caused devils trying to trick us. The bible tells us that if we built a tall enough building that we could reach heaven. Where would we be if nobody ever questioned that?

Buried inside Uwazuruike's mostly senseless statement is a very valid point. That the Federal Government is promoting violence by pandering to criminal groups. The Boko Haram people have seen the rich rewards the MEND people have gotten from their murderous campaign: money, political influence and legitimacy. Now the government wants to talk to BH when they have been ignoring peaceful groups for years

The same thing happened when the corrupt niger delta states were wining and dining with kidnappers and paying ransoms. We can all now see where that has led us.

Any leader worth his salt should know that you do not negotiate with terrorists under any circumstances. You don't talk to them, you don't make deals with them, and you certainly don't offer them amnesty. Doing so is just inviting more violence.

It looks like we will all learn this lesson the hard way in the next few years.