19 Responses to “Catching up….”

1. joe zamecki says:

   May 5, 2008 at 11:21 am

   Thanks for posting those urls Dave! Our Austin demo went great, but I wish I could’ve been at the DC Pope Picket/rally! It sure looks like it was fun. And of course I would’ve given my Rush albums up to have been able to join Ellen Johnson and the other Freedom Walkers on their journey. That’s good stuff.
   Joe Zamecki
   Texas State Director, American Atheists
2. tarma says:

   May 5, 2008 at 12:58 pm

   So, whoever is narrating the beginning of the Bill Moore walk says “thank god” about a minute and a half into the video. WTF?
3. quantum_flux says:

   May 5, 2008 at 5:01 pm

   Hey QF,

   You said:

   There are plenty of places in the Bible where war is justified.

   X: You’re referring to the Old Testament. Christianity uses the New Testemant and it supercedes the OT, hence the terminology.

   What does anybody think of this statement being made by X in response to my earlier statement?
4. karen says:

   May 5, 2008 at 5:29 pm

   quantum_flux

   I think you’re wasting your time arguing with Special Ed.
5. what says:

   May 5, 2008 at 6:35 pm

   QF

   I guess he’s saying that the OT is BS. The glass is half-full/half-empty.
6. quantum_flux says:

   May 5, 2008 at 7:28 pm

   I think you’re wasting your time arguing with Special Ed.

   Yeah, well, perhaps or perhaps not. I can’t get over how somebody can just believe something that has no real validity, and yet X keeps on coming up with more stuff. It sort of pisses me off, in a way. In addition, there are millions of Special Eds out there, running our government at the local and the national level. Why the heck? I’ll tell you why, because churches have authority over these folks and the politicians pay the churches to say stuff. I don’t quite see how somebody can just not listen to logic, and yet they’re all over the place. I just think I should be able to convince at least 1 of these imbeciles to disavow their bullshit.
7. what says:

   May 5, 2008 at 8:06 pm

   QF

   Special Ed is probably I true believer.

   but

   It’s my guess, with anecdotal evidence only to back me up, that most proclaimed believers already know that their beliefs are the product of a group-think. However they wont say so because saying so would mean there expulsion from their group. Robert Shiller (economist) said this about the housing ponzi scheme that began about 2003 and is ravaging our economy presently and I think the same can be said for every church and church group world wide.

   There’s a famous book written by Irving Janis, who’s a psychologist, about 30 years ago, called Groupthink. He’s a social psychologist, and he points out how even expert groups can make very colossal errors. He did a number of case studies in the book, and what tends to happen?suppose you imagine yourself and a group of experts who seem to have converged on an enlightened opinion which has arguments to support it, and it has prominent influential people saying that. It can be difficult for someone to stand up in that room and air what seem to be half-baked or half-formed doubts about it. It can be kind of damaging to your reputation. And you imagine that they have a reason to dismiss these doubts. But you don’t want to be responsible for bringing it up?especially when they’re reaching a decision. Sometimes they’re trying to make an important decision. And at that time, you would think that people who have doubts should stand up and thrust them to the fore. But, in fact, they often retreat at that point, because they may just have a sense that they’re being annoying, that they will lose status in the group. If we’re close to a decision on something, and I’d raise doubts, and they’re going to go ahead anyway and do it, you might think that’s good?because it could be a disaster, and they’ll remember that you had doubts. But the likelihood is to focus on, instead, “Now I’m kind of the party pooper,” you know. “When they’re going to implement this plan, they’re not going to turn to me because I was the guy who doubted.” Things like that went through peoples’ minds, and they don’t air doubts. And when Janis interviewed people afterward and asked them their memories of the discussion, they would say things like, “I think we had a very open and fair discussion, and everyone raised their views.” That was their memory of what happened, but they couldn’t remember the other arguments. So it wasn’t happening?there was somebody who was expressing doubts, but not effectively. And so I think that’s the kind of thing that happens when there’s just a general presumption which becomes repeated everywhere.
8. quantum_flux says:

   May 5, 2008 at 8:51 pm

   Well, I’m not going to be fighting ponzi schemes the rest of my life.
9. what says:

   May 5, 2008 at 9:22 pm

   QF

   Life’s a fight. You could learn to enjoy it.
10. quantum_flux says:

    May 5, 2008 at 10:01 pm

    I won! Even though these ponzi schemers seem to get infinite lives when you debate them, there is actually a way to win.

    http://irrationaltheorist.blogspot.com/
11. reason says:

    May 5, 2008 at 10:20 pm

    What
    you like a good fight. well under no circunstances should the white citizens allow obama a follower of black liberation theology to destroy them without a fight.
12. phreedm says:

    May 5, 2008 at 10:40 pm

    Wow…no complaints of hijacking a thread? Oh yeah…another one-way street.

    Back to the original thread…

    Three videos…Two protests and one march. And a grand total of 23 people in all…

    I think we’re seeing why Ellen is stepping down…

    I’m still waiting for the NYC protest pics…who knows? We might break 30…
13. quantum_flux says:

    May 5, 2008 at 10:46 pm

    Phreedum: Wow…no complaints of hijacking a thread? Oh yeah…another one-way street.

    I’m afraid I already hijacked the OP.
14. what says:

    May 5, 2008 at 10:48 pm

    Phreedum

    Shut up.
15. what says:

    May 5, 2008 at 10:50 pm

    Reason
    

    well under no circunstances should the white citizens allow obama a follower of black liberation theology to destroy them without a fight.

    Oh brother.
16. septos says:

    May 6, 2008 at 7:22 am

    Phreedm,
    You deliberatly try to annoy just about everybody ,you should know whats going on here.
17. what says:

    May 6, 2008 at 8:14 pm

    Septos

    I don’t think it is as much deliberate as it is compulsive.
18. reason says:

    May 6, 2008 at 9:46 pm

    What
    congrats i hear your man obama won north carolina.i still have time though to make you see that obama,mccain,clinton are bad for the country.
19. what says:

    May 7, 2008 at 1:21 pm

    Reason

    Two out of three ain’t bad.

    Meatloaf 1977