JackC

This is not a fallacy. If a book claims to be fact, it should stand up to scrutiny. If it does not stand up to scrutiny in the areas that can be verified, it casts serious doubt on the rest. When that book claims to be the word of an omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient God; then logical absurdities, incosistencies and scientific errors are fatal for the legitimacy of that book. The word of God is one seriously big claim that should require seriously big evidence to back it up. Fiction on the other hand remains fiction even if scientifically and logically it is a load of crap. Now if thats your point, why didn't you just say so?

That's not what I said. I said (and I'll repeat it word for word so there is no confusion) "Heisenberg got the same treatment for the uncertainty principle as he did for his toughts on government. There was no special pleading. One stood up to scrutiny (thus far), the other didn't." Note the bold text. Why did the Thompson Model or Rutherford's Planetary Model or even Bohr's Model of the Atom fall out of favour? You don't need to give Heisenberg any special treatment, you can do his derivation yourself and read all the evidence and came to your own conclusion. 'tis not the kings stamp can make metal better or heavier. Why did you throw in literature and politics in there? There is a peer review system for literature if it claims to be factual (unofficial perhaps). Same with politics. Communism was tried and seen to fail (mostly) so who in their right mind would try it again? Now fictional literature, music and art are another ball game. Who cares if Eminem is better than 50 Cent, or whether the Picasso is better than Van Gogh. Nobody burns heretics for liking Country music (even if they really deserve it)

Oh come on Bill, you know that is complete rubbish. Heisenberg got the same treatment for the uncertainty principle as he did for his toughts on government. There was no special pleading. One stood up to scrutiny (thus far), the other didn't. In your own words in reply to me saying "Heisenberg made no special pleading when he wrote down the uncertainty principle": Of course. You are free to doubt him as well, although I think it would be foolish to do so. If I came up with a testable theory that explained everything that Quantum Mechanics does, plus a bit more and provided a measurable way of falsifying the HUP, how long do you think Heisenbergs "special pleading" would last? Doubting the validity of any scientific theory is one of the basic tennets of science. Heisenberg gets no special treatment. No one does. Where is the peer review system for the accepted validity of religions?

These days, virtualy no one uses the Bible as the ultimate authority on morals. Even those that do pick and choose the nice bits and ignore the nasty bits. The God of the Old Testament for instance was jealous, racist, sexist tyrant with a bloodlust that would make the worst of genocidal maniacs blush. Superb role model there eh Bill? And anyway, why does the Bible get special treatment for its moral claims but not for its scientific claims? Special pleading again are we? Argumentum Ad Populum is a logical falacy as you well know. And one that the untold thousands of people persecuted in the name of religion would disagree with. Moral truth my arse.

The Bible claims to be The Truth. Keeping only the moral bits and dismissing the science bits as the superstitious mumbo jumbo of a bunch of Bronze Age nomads is a very dubious position. Exactly what is it that makes the Bible a better moral guide than any other book? Rubbish. Heisenburg made no special pleading when he wrote down the uncertainty principle. He didn't claim an absolute truth just because his favourite sky pixie told him so through a burning blackboard. On the other hand, the bible claims its truth exactly by special pleading. If the bits of the Bible that can be verified are found to be false (and they are) then how can you believe the bits you can't verify?

Hit a tree and was killed in Tallinn, Estonia in 2000 while leading a 125cc race having already won 750cc and 600cc events earlier that day.

Ok, simple answer then - no What about going up against 10 cops armed with a swag bag, stripey shirt and a Saturday Night Special shouting "You'll never take me alive, Copeur!!"

Just for clarity here in the distinction - although I know you are fully aware of the difference. Kamikaze pilots were volunteers. "The Way of the Samurai is found in death. When it comes to either/or, there is only the quick choice of death. It is not particularly difficult. Be determined and advance. To say that dying without reaching one's aim is to die a dog's death is the frivolous way of sophisticates. When pressed with the choice of life or death, it is not necessary to gain one's aim." - Yamamoto Tsunetomo, Hagakure

To quote Richard Dawkins Humans have a great hunger for explanation. It may be one of the main reasons why humanity so universally has religion, since religions do aspire to provide explanations. We come to our individual consciousness in a mysterious universe and long to understand it. Most religions offer a cosmology and a biology, a theory of life, a theory of origins, and reasons for existence. In doing so, they demonstrate that religion is, in a sense, science; it's just bad science. Don't fall for the argument that religion and science operate on separate dimensions and are concerned with quite separate sorts of questions. Religions have historically always attempted to answer the questions that properly belong to science. Thus religions should not be allowed now to retreat away from the ground upon which they have traditionally attempted to fight. They do offer both a cosmology and a biology; however, in both cases it is false. There is plenty of evidence that religion can turn people into fundamentalist nut jobs capable of truly terrible acts of violence. On a slightly more benign level, some only want to redefine words so they can get their brand of The Truth (TM) taught in science class. There is significantly less evidence that religion actually makes the world or the people contained therein, any better. I fear that if you were to judge religion based solely on what it has done, it would not compare favourably. Then maybe when Jesus claimed to be the Son of God, he actually meant that in the same way as "like, dude, we're all the 'son of god'". Maybe when he said "blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth", he was being cynical and only meant six feet of it. If the bits of the Bible that can be verified are found to be false (and they have been), then it has no more value than Homer's Odyssey and should be treated as such. If you want a book to teach morals, perhaps a law book would be better. It is at least based on reality.

The world population is increasing at the rate of 150 people a minute. I'm talking net figures, not just births. That's a jumbo jet full, extra, every 3 minute. The recent Indian Ocean Tsunami stopped the clock for only about 24 hours before the population clock ticked on. The world may be able to support 10 or 20 billion people, but what happens when we reach saturation point and the population is still growing at the rate of 5 or 10 people a second?

Two cannibals eating a clown. One says to the other "Does this taste funny to you?" A man and a giraffe walk into a bar and start having a few quiet drinks. As the night goes on, they get pretty drunk and the giraffe passes out and collapses near the pool table. As the man is leaving, the barman says, "Hey, you're not gonna leave that lyin' here, are ya?" "Hic," says the man, "that's not a lion, it's a giraffe." Q) What's green, has six legs and will kill you if it lands on your head? A) A pool table. Q) What do you call an Italian with a rubber toe? A) Roberto.

Dave, cruisers just don't go round corners, get over it. When you only have 3" of ground clearance it's not surprising that you can get your pegs down. Just because you can do this doesn't mean you can do this or this.

Can't help you but you could try typing this into Google. intitle:"index of/" puretone addicted

How do you know your perspective isn't generated by a brain meme, or a chemical imbalance or just good old wishfull thinking? And since when does the existence of anything depend on the attitude of the observer? Of course if god is a figment of your imagination, then attitude is crucial. You were quick to jump on Sinker when his story didn't add up and call pajarito blinkered when he didn't buy into yours. Surely if god is dependent on perspective as you claim, then their perspective is just a valid as yours or mine?

I know that. Try editing the executable. You'll need a hex editor.

Bill, what does a compiler do?

Not true. I also know what the word spoon means. Why would I want to pre-suppose the answer before I start looking for it? Forget it, this is going nowhere.

You said (and I quote) What the blue blazes does "the divinity is in the detail" mean? Do I need a microscope? How do I know when I've located a lump of divinity? What happens when I poke it with a stick? Does it smell? But if I need to join a commune, unblock my chakra's and learn how to bend spoons with the awesome psionic power of my own karmic hemorrhoids, then forget I asked.

" and anything else you want to believe " And there you have it.

If they are unorganized, have never been called up and don't have any standing officers, how can they be considered well regulated?

Isn't that usually the Devil? If the best you can come up with is hey look at that tree, isn't it pretty, therefore God exists; then I'm sorry I asked.

So where exactly is he/she/it then?

Nope. The M-W definition you posted: Main Entry: re·li·gion 1 a : the state of a religious See religious below. b (1) : the service and worship of God or the supernatural Contains the word god. (2) : commitment or devotion to religious faith or observance See religious below 2 : a personal set or institutionalized system of religious attitudes, beliefs, and practices See religious below 3 archaic : scrupulous conformity :CONSCIENTIOUSNESS Archaic, nebulous and irrelevant. 4 : a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith Contains the word faith, which is exactly the thing that atheists do not employ. So we get on to the word religious Main Entry: 1re·li·gious 1 : relating to or manifesting faithful devotion to an acknowledged ultimate reality or deity Contains the word deity, another word for god. 2 : of, relating to, or devoted to religious beliefs or observances Contains the word religious. Circular definition and therefore meaningless. 3 a : scrupulously and conscientiously faithful b : FERVENT, ZEALOUS Faith again. So which ever way you look at it, the word religion is defined either in terms of itself, faith or in terms of god/deity. If you remove the definitions containing god, the definitions only ever refer to themselves, which is circular and therefore useless, or faith which is not relevant since atheists do not employ faith. By this definition, just about any belief is a religion. Conservative Republicanism is a religion, Star-Trekism is a religion, alcoholism is a religion, Skydivism is a religion, loch-ness-monsterism is a religion. This definition is so wide, it literaly covers anything and is therefore useless. It also doesn't fit the definition of the word religion. So is second-amendmentism, pornographism and purple-invisible-asteroidism. Read the definition again. It either refers to itself (useless), faith (irrelevant) or god. The word god definately does appear in the definition of the word religion. You know this already. What is an extreme atheist? Is it someone who doesn't believe is god A LOT! Isn't that a bit like saying she's a little bit pregnant? You lost me there. So would I be correct in assuming that you must be agnostic then? Surely an agnostic who has no knowledge of god, wouldn't place any faith in the god of which they have no knowledge and would therefore be atheistic towards this god? In your opinion, is agnosticism also a religion?

I agree that atheism is a belief, but it does not fit the definition of a religion. That's because it does not fit the definition of a religion. Then went on to equate disbelief in a proposition with a belief that the proposition is false. This does not necessarily follow. You suggested that atheism is a religion, the definition of which it most certainly does not fit. This is an attempt to redefine the word religion so that atheism (a - without, theism - belief in god) can be described as a religion (a belief in god). Noted. The point that disbelief in incohent entities is justified, is still valid. Fair point, I appologise and will remove the statement.

If you consider religion to be any strongly held system of beliefs which you seem to be doing, almost anything fits the definition. For example, if you sincerely believed that bombing Iraq back to the stone age was a good thing to do then your religion could be described as lets-bomb-iraqism. Atheism is the disbelief in the existence of deity. Disbelief in a proposition means that one does not believe it to be true. Not believing that something is true is not the same as believing it to be false. Atheism is not a religion and it always amazes me why people try to define it as such. On the subject of proof, it may not be possible to prove conclusively that no God exists anywhere, but it is possible to prove that a God with certian strict attributes does not exist in the same way that a square circle cannot exist. In my opinion, the omnimax judeo-christian-islamic god is incoherent and a disbelief in such a god is justified and requires no faith in the same way that disbelieveing in square circles requires no faith. In fact, to place faith in something in the face of all reason, despite evidence to the contrary; is the very definition of a delusion. In my opinion, any unshakable belief that has no basis in reality and significantly affects the decisions you make is extremely dangerous.