Amergin
Well-Known Member
Sounds a wee like Scientology. It goes to show that Bill Maher is right. He says religious belief is a neurological disorder, a form of consensus insanity.
Amergin
Raelism
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Sounds a wee like Scientology. It goes to show that Bill Maher is right. He says religious belief is a neurological disorder, a form of consensus insanity.
Amergin
I have never known Bill Maher to be right on anything.
He almost always leans far to the left.
Amergin
Well-Known Member
Bill Maher says things that take courage in a rather oppressively religious country like the USA. He is a non-believer as I am also. He thinks clearly and rationally which is not a common practice in the USA. America is a great country. It is great because of a small minority of bright, rational natural scientists and skilled technical scientists. The majority of them are clear thinkers, and non-theists (atheists or agnostic naturalists.)
Yet the majority are scientifically illiterate, weak rational thinkers, mathematically challenged, hyper-religious fanatics opposed to any reality that contradicts their Bible.
America is one of the world's leaders in science along with the EU, Russia, and China. However, its school kids perform poorly compared to all First World countries in math and science.
U.S. mathematics and science K-12 education ranks 48th out of 133 nations worldwide. The recent 2011 survey showed US students are 31st in math, 23rd in science, 17th in reading.
Princeton University Press Blog Blog Archive US students are 31st in math, 23rd in science, 17th in reading. Bad news right? Not so fast says Ben Wildavsky
America is dependent on a tiny educated elite to be a great power. And that minority are where most US non-theists are concentrated. I attend many neuroscience and medical neurology conferences in America every year. Finding an American theist there is a difficult task. Lectures clearly demonstrate a rational non-theistic naturalism. America's vast population is closer to Third World conditions. Fully half of Americans doubt Evolution and believe the world is 6000 years old. To them the Bible trumps scientific inquiry.
Amergin
Yet the majority are scientifically illiterate, weak rational thinkers, mathematically challenged, hyper-religious fanatics opposed to any reality that contradicts their Bible.
America is one of the world's leaders in science along with the EU, Russia, and China. However, its school kids perform poorly compared to all First World countries in math and science.
U.S. mathematics and science K-12 education ranks 48th out of 133 nations worldwide. The recent 2011 survey showed US students are 31st in math, 23rd in science, 17th in reading.
Princeton University Press Blog Blog Archive US students are 31st in math, 23rd in science, 17th in reading. Bad news right? Not so fast says Ben Wildavsky
America is dependent on a tiny educated elite to be a great power. And that minority are where most US non-theists are concentrated. I attend many neuroscience and medical neurology conferences in America every year. Finding an American theist there is a difficult task. Lectures clearly demonstrate a rational non-theistic naturalism. America's vast population is closer to Third World conditions. Fully half of Americans doubt Evolution and believe the world is 6000 years old. To them the Bible trumps scientific inquiry.
Amergin
Amergin
Well-Known Member
To lean to the Left is considered an insult in Right Wing America. To me most of Left Wing means Liberal.
LIBERAL comes from Latin root LIBER meaning free, unrestricted, independent. The word LIBERAL comes from LIBERALIS meaning belonging to freedom, or worthy of a free man.
CONSERVATIVE come from the Latin root, CONSERVUS meaning slave or fellow slave. CONSERVA is a female slave. CONSERVITIUM is Latin for servitude. CONSERVO means to keep, maintain, observe, to save. CONSERVATOR means a keeper.
America's founders were Enlightenment LIBERALS. They were the left wing of the British Empire while the Conservative/Tory/Right were the authoritarian monarchists. The Conservatives/Right Wingers were the Americans who opposed the Revolution and fought in Conservative or Loyalist militias on the side of the Redcoats.
US Conservatives opposed:
- the abolition of Black Slavery,
- racial segregation,
- African American voting rights
- women's voting rights,
- women's reproductive rights,
- gay people's rights
- interracial marriage
- teaching of evolution in schools
- non-discrimination in job hiring
- Non-Christian belief systems
- freedom of speech and press.
US LIBERALS opposed:
- the British Monarchial Theocracy
- Slavery
- Racial segregation, Jim Crow Laws
- Interracial marriage prohibition,
- Laws based purely on Religious dogmas
- the Drug War which invades personal rights and privacy.
- any laws prohibiting what humans ingest (alcohol or drugs)
- discriminatory voting
- Patriot Acts and similar laws oppressing freedom of thought.
- Censorship
- Socialized obstetrics regulating a woman's pregnancy.
Why is Liberal such a bad word in America? Democracy has been dying in America for decades. Paul Kurtz refers to this time as "Post-Democracy America.".I call it Corporation Plutocracy. You have Government of the Corporations, by the Corporations, and for the Corporations. Congressmen and Congresswomen work for their CEO bosses, not for the people.
I am not anti-American. I am sad for what is happening to you. Your Revolution and Constitution inspired the world. It is the great irony that Americans have had their Democracy and rights slowly sucked up by greedy immoral Corporations who grow richer while the people sink into more poverty, poor health, and ignorance due to failed education system.
Take back your country, Mate.
Amergin
LIBERAL comes from Latin root LIBER meaning free, unrestricted, independent. The word LIBERAL comes from LIBERALIS meaning belonging to freedom, or worthy of a free man.
CONSERVATIVE come from the Latin root, CONSERVUS meaning slave or fellow slave. CONSERVA is a female slave. CONSERVITIUM is Latin for servitude. CONSERVO means to keep, maintain, observe, to save. CONSERVATOR means a keeper.
America's founders were Enlightenment LIBERALS. They were the left wing of the British Empire while the Conservative/Tory/Right were the authoritarian monarchists. The Conservatives/Right Wingers were the Americans who opposed the Revolution and fought in Conservative or Loyalist militias on the side of the Redcoats.
US Conservatives opposed:
- the abolition of Black Slavery,
- racial segregation,
- African American voting rights
- women's voting rights,
- women's reproductive rights,
- gay people's rights
- interracial marriage
- teaching of evolution in schools
- non-discrimination in job hiring
- Non-Christian belief systems
- freedom of speech and press.
US LIBERALS opposed:
- the British Monarchial Theocracy
- Slavery
- Racial segregation, Jim Crow Laws
- Interracial marriage prohibition,
- Laws based purely on Religious dogmas
- the Drug War which invades personal rights and privacy.
- any laws prohibiting what humans ingest (alcohol or drugs)
- discriminatory voting
- Patriot Acts and similar laws oppressing freedom of thought.
- Censorship
- Socialized obstetrics regulating a woman's pregnancy.
Why is Liberal such a bad word in America? Democracy has been dying in America for decades. Paul Kurtz refers to this time as "Post-Democracy America.".I call it Corporation Plutocracy. You have Government of the Corporations, by the Corporations, and for the Corporations. Congressmen and Congresswomen work for their CEO bosses, not for the people.
I am not anti-American. I am sad for what is happening to you. Your Revolution and Constitution inspired the world. It is the great irony that Americans have had their Democracy and rights slowly sucked up by greedy immoral Corporations who grow richer while the people sink into more poverty, poor health, and ignorance due to failed education system.
Take back your country, Mate.
Amergin
Amergin
Well-Known Member
There is at least a handful of neuroscientists exploring spiritual issues, Amergin, who take them quite seriously, though not theistically necessarily. They do not tend to be reductionistic, however, in assuming "it's only tricks of the brain." As this doc points out, there tends to be an overlap between fundamentalists and atheists when they descend into debate regarding notions of "God."
135. Dr. Andrew Newberg on God of the Fundamentalist Atheist | Skeptiko - Science at the Tipping Point earl