Comments on: Obama’s meaningless words

By: Admin

Admin — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 23:59:55 +0000

No, we are not left with mere opinion … what you call faith. That is all virtually every tradition has to offer, except one. Christianity tradition alone can point to an event in history that validates the truth of its teaching. That is the significance of the resurrection.

Saying we have human rights because we are human won’t carry any freight. It’s an empty assertion with nothing to validate it. Where does the notion of rights come from? Why wouldn’t an evolutionary anthropologist regard it as convenient a fiction as the concept of God?

There is an answer. And it’s already been published. A long, long time ago.

By: Christopher Earle

Christopher Earle — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 23:38:54 +0000

That is all anyone has. Religious people have faith that they are right, I have faith that they are wrong :-).

We have human rights based on being human. I do recognize that religion had more of a role in the past before we had the scientific and educational systems to comprehend things like lightning and…ermm….human rights :-). In fact, we may eventually need religion again, but from my knothole it has done little for the past 500 years but kill people and damage cultures (PLEASE don’t ask me to document that, lol!)

There are other alternatives to democracy and tyranny. Both democracy and tyranny are derrived from European thought. There are plenty of other valid models, but they aren’t militaristic and this were crushed by what I see as an inferior socio-political system (yep, I’m one ‘o THOSE guys). I have no delusions that what I think will work will work on the scale that it needs to work, so the trick is to take aspects and integrate them into the parts of our present system that work.

I wish I had the answer, if I did I’d publish and retire to a Thai beach with a plate of noodles and a salted fish :-D.

By: Admin

Admin — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 20:59:13 +0000

You can reject all religion and religious based thinking if you want. You can believe people have the possibility of redemption if it pleases you. But it’s merely your opinion. You have no basis on which to demonstrate that what you believe actually is true. You have no basis on which to demonstrate that what I believe is not true. All you have is opinion.

The contradiction is that secular society has no basis on which to make judgments about what is just or unjust. We talk about democracy and human rights, but we can’t even prove to ourselves why people have rights or why democracy is better than tyranny. We certainly have no basis for persuading someone who doesn’t share our values.

By: Christopher Earle

Christopher Earle — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 20:32:21 +0000

I actually agree with a lot of what you are saying. However, I also reject all religion and religious based thinking, so your Bible quote is where I see your arguments crumbling. I think people have the possibility of redemption. It won’t happen fast, and it won’t be easy, but eventually Kim Jung Il will die, he will be replaced by his son, his son may or may not be more reasonable, and if he isn’t, eventually he or his heirs will be overthrown.

Obama is trying to diffuse what is looking to be like a global Crusade/Jihad. The religious loonies are looking for a fight. Note that I said “religious loonies” not “all Christians and Muslims.” I think he hit the nail right on the head with is “violent minority” rhetoric.

I also don’t see any contradictions in the speech. Sure, if you look at what he was saying in the short term, but when you realize that in the historical sense, the U.S. is a brief blip in time, there is no contradiction.