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Westside Steve

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You know, like in Soylent Green.

 

WSS

Never watched it, but I don't doubt there are plenty of dystopian movies that involve eradication of religion, just as there are plenty of instances of dystopias fuelled by religion.. I know you have this whole contrarian thing going, but don't you ever get tired of not really making a point of your own?

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It will be essential for space exploration. As it is now though I don't think anyone from any major country could accept foreigners bossing then around.

 

I think space exploration, just like auto and aviation industries, is going to be pioneered by private industry, not governments.

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I think space exploration, just like auto and aviation industries, is going to be pioneered by private industry, not governments.

I hope that doesn't mean private sector mining of asteroids, raping the rest of the universe as they have the earth, but I suspect that's going to be very much the reality. The groundwork is already in place.

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Never watched it, but I don't doubt there are plenty of dystopian movies that involve eradication of religion, just as there are plenty of instances of dystopias fuelled by religion.. I know you have this whole contrarian thing going, but don't you ever get tired of not really making a point of your own?

No often we use examples to make our point. Is it tiresome to take something you saw on the Browns board and make your point here? :)

But I might mention that communism strives for atheism.

And without religion it would be much easier, as a ruler, to decide to for instance, euthanize starving people for the good of society. Right?

 

(of course atheists often enjoy pretending that there is a universal right and wrong that they make up)

 

WSS

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I hope that doesn't mean private sector mining of asteroids, raping the rest of the universe as they have the earth, but I suspect that's going to be very much the reality. The groundwork is already in place.

Who cares about asteroids? Are they going to have climate change?

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No often we use examples to make our point. Is it tiresome to take something you saw on the Browns board and make your point here? :)

You've been contrarian for a long, long time now.

 

But I might mention that communism strives for atheism.

It also strives for clean drinking water, what's your point? Hitler once drove a car you know, and now *you* want to drive a car? What does that say about you?

 

And without religion it would be much easier, as a ruler, to decide to for instance, euthanize starving people for the good of society. Right?

Not really, no. I don't know why you have this idea that without religion there can be no morals, that all atheists are selfish savages without fear of consequence or compassion for those in need. Some of the most compassionate people I know are atheists, most in fact.

(of course atheists often enjoy pretending that there is a universal right and wrong that they make up)

 

WSS

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A yes and proud of it.

 

B actually probably purposely you missed the point. One of the first things in communism is to eliminate the competition in the church.

 

C for the simple reason that morality is religion. You can use the exact same arguments against your own personal morality as you can for Christianity.

 

You have just arbitrarily decided to be bitter about one and not the other.

 

WSS

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A yes and proud of it.

There's a time and a place. Taking a conversation in a new and random direction because you feel like it isn't helping anyone.

B actually probably purposely you missed the point. One of the first things in communism is to eliminate the competition in the church.

Not intentionally. But when did I bring up communism? I get your from the area of cold war, anti-communist, anti-socialist rhetoric, but can we move past that now? Atheism is not communism.

C for the simple reason that morality is religion. You can use the exact same arguments against your own personal morality as you can for Christianity.

Morality is not religion. (the bad side of) religion is doing as you're told because you're told you have to do as you're told, questioning nothing, maintaining the status quo at all costs. Plenty of good things are also done in the name of religion as well, of course, like the religious leaders going out in to the community, helping the poor, feeding the homeless, things like that. But that's seen by some as giving people things they haven't 'earned' and therefore that old boogey man, communism.

 

Which arguments that I have used against religion, now or in the (recent) past could in turn be used against my own personal morality?

You have just arbitrarily decided to be bitter about one and not the other.

I'll give you disillusioned, but not bitter. I see plenty of good in western culture done in the name of religion, but that's usually done by the little guys, day to day, bit by bit. I don't have any doubt that OBF, for example, is a fine human being and would (and probably does) go out of his way to help those less fortunate. On the flip side, I see plenty of bad done in the name of religion, and that's usually done by those with power.

WSS

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I mentioned communism since you wistfully dreamed of a world without religion. I pointed out that in fairly recent history one form of government is particularly anti religion.

And in the name of the people it seems as brutal and terrible as anything else.

 

I'll get on the other stuff soon enough.

WSS

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Arguments against religion and arguments against your personal morality? Prove either one. Or disprove either one, your choice. Except for the fact you decided that some things are good and some things are bad, usually to use as a cudgel against political opponents, what makes something right or wrong? God or Chris and what's the difference?

 

WSS

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By the way, the hook in Soylent Green is that in the dystopian world food is really scares, the economy is in shambles but the government provides food for everyone in a variety of forms called Soylent which come in different colors. Kind of like C rations or space meals but the most popular of the Soylent series is Soylent Green. As it turns out in this society where suicide is encouraged to keep down the population, the corpses are processed into... Soylent Green.

 

(feel free to ponder if that is right or wrong)

 

WSS

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Personal morality is subjective, and subjective things are difficult to prove. However, when something that is subjectively agreed upon by the overwhelming majority, you can move that in to the objective world. For example, you ask someone if it's OK to kill someone and take their money/other, you will find most people in the world will say no. Probably some would say yeah, no problem, sure, but you have such an overwhelming majority that you can call it objective morality.

 

Religious morality is not objective, but taught. There's a lot of crossover with objective morality, and you can see that with the the law of the land. But there are things that are 'fine' in various parts of the bible that most people would object to today - that's been covered ad nauseum so there's no point going over it, but it means that at some point in time, religion was teaching people that it's OK to stone people as punishment, while today, even Walter thinks that makes you a savage.

 

 

At best you're saying religious morality is no different from personal morality.

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I vaguely recall the plot of Soylent Green now you say it. But that goes back to the point about building a sustainable world.

 

We have so much food in the western world that we could feed the world I don't know how many times over, yet people in africa or wherever starve because we haven't learnt to share.

 

We have the capability to build enough sustainable energy generators that the world could be powered for free within the next ten years, but we aren't - think about why not, and I mean really think about it. Why are we not doing that? Companies like Tesla, Nissan, Toyota and others have shown that you can have a car running perfectly well on electricity, that could be produced cleanly, sustainably and for free, yet we're not doing that, why not?

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I vaguely recall the plot of Soylent Green now you say it. But that goes back to the point about building a sustainable world.

 

We have so much food in the western world that we could feed the world I don't know how many times over, yet people in africa or wherever starve because we haven't learnt to share.

 

We have the capability to build enough sustainable energy generators that the world could be powered for free within the next ten years, but we aren't - think about why not, and I mean really think about it. Why are we not doing that? Companies like Tesla, Nissan, Toyota and others have shown that you can have a car running perfectly well on electricity, that could be produced cleanly, sustainably and for free, yet we're not doing that, why not?

Because thowe companies are making us pay far out the ass for their cars.

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Because thowe companies are making us pay far out the ass for their cars.

Not the point, the point is that the proof of concept has been done, the cars are working fine and have been for years. They could be produced quite cheaply (profit margins aside) and run basically for free, and cleanly. Besides, Tesla's design plan is open source, so anyone can copy it and undercut them, but they're not.

 

So why hasn't Tesla been more successful? Well, for a start you can look at the traditional car manufacturers' response. Instead of embracing it, trying to get ahead of the curve and compete with Tesla, they've doubled down on fossil fuel cars, and tried to stop Tesla effectively selling in various states.

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So, what do you folks think about one world government? Who here believes it would be beneficial for mankind to have one president of the world with representatives from each country, kind of the United Countries of Earth?

 

WSS

Impractical for a variety of reasons, as we all know.

 

Hypothetically, I'd lean to more local control, rather than less.

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Impractical for a variety of reasons, as we all know.

 

Hypothetically, I'd lean to more local control, rather than less.

No doubt, I'm talking about centuries from now.

 

But I would bet there are many around the world who would like to see the United Nations or something like it in charge

WSS

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No doubt, I'm talking about centuries from now.

 

But I would bet there are many around the world who would like to see the United Nations or something like it in charge

WSS

Well, would The Rapture qualify? I guess not, given the following 1,000 years of war and horrible living conditions.

 

 

PS This discussion is way to conceptual for somebody like me. My wife calls me "Concrete Sequential" - among other things.

 

I live in a flat file world.

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Well, would The Rapture qualify? I guess not given the following 1,000 years of war and horrible living conditions.

I suppose it could.

It's not like we have reached the zenith of technology nor the advancements of weapons systems that make the nuclear bomb look like a slingshot.

 

 

WSS

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I hope that doesn't mean private sector mining of asteroids, raping the rest of the universe as they have the earth, but I suspect that's going to be very much the reality. The groundwork is already in place.

 

The primary motivation will be $$$, so in order for private industry to be motivated to go to space, it has to be profitable or have the expectation of future profitability. So that probably does mean mining asteroids/other planets for resources. I've always wondered if space travel becomes cheap enough if we could start launching all our waste at the sun (the great incinerator in the sky!) to clean up the planet.

 

As for the one-government-to-rule-them-all idea, I would like it to happen eventually but it isn't realistic.

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