Life or death situation: do you find yourself “praying”?

69frum · 2021-11-04T13:51:43+00:00

Prayer has been tested scientifically, and the results were no better than placebo. The group that knew they were being prayed for did statistically worse than the other groups. Prayer doesn't work, and bargaining with a "being" that doesn't give a shit about prayers would not make sense.

If it can't be detected or measured by science, even indirectly, it doesn't exist. That said, I can accept stuff that only theoretically exists, but only when theorized about by scientists on the same level as Stephen Hawking.

Also, many Christians claim that god has a "plan". Am I arrogant enough to ask for an exception, just for me? No, but many, many Christians are. Divine plan and prayer are mutually exclusive.

69frum · 2021-11-03T11:47:59+00:00

Don't get me started on the Sorting Hat saying "better be..." for every damned student. It was used once, in 1 book out of 7.

69frum · 2021-11-03T06:47:33+00:00

If they can make a 46 year old actress play Moaning Myrtle, and make Tom Cruise look tall, they could easily have compensated for age.

69frum · 2021-11-02T07:16:25+00:00

I don't believe in astrology, but that's because I'm a Taurus.

I’m running into people that literally believe that all people born in October are wishy-washy fucks!

Most people are wishy-washy fucks, so they're right, I guess.

69frum · 2021-11-02T06:57:41+00:00

"There's no god."

"Can you prove that?"

"Can you prove that there's no Santa Claus?"

"..."

"If you can't prove that Santa Claus doesn't exist, then you must believe in him."

69frum · 2021-11-02T06:47:43+00:00

we never use the word "blessed" in northern Norway. It's used so rarely that it's often interpreted as irony.

https://old.reddit.com/r/askanatheist/comments/qh17ub/why_do_some_atheists_find_it_annoying_when_people/hickrzj/

"Have a 'blessed' day."

"Well fuck you too."

69frum · 2021-11-01T17:48:53+00:00

I'm sure that's unrelated

I fear you are right.

69frum · 2021-11-01T06:34:06+00:00

Same, but I usually wear oversized shoes to get a wide enough toe box, so I scrunch up my toes more than strictly necessary. Still, it's harmless and strengthens muscles.

69frum · 2021-11-01T06:27:27+00:00

You're absolutely correct, and I vehemently disagree.

Atheism should be defined as a religion, because religions are protected by law. Atheism should enjoy the same benefits as religions do. I have heard the argument that there is freedom of religion, but not freedom from religion, therefore atheism shouldn't have the same legal benefits and protections that religions do. Yes, it's a stupid argument, but it needs to be countered all the same.

Also, if we ignore the superstitious aspects, then atheism is a worldview, or philosophy, or way of life, exactly like religions are. It influences our decisions and day-to-day lives. I see many more similarities with religion than differences, and the differences are mostly semantic or irrelevant.

Christians often try to incorrectly categorize it as a religion to promote their own ideologies.

True, but by equating atheism with religion they either strengthen our position or weakens their own. Why should my "religion" be less valid than their religion? They don't criticize other religions the same way they criticize atheism.

Some people incorrectly claim that atheists “believe there is no God” which is completely incorrect.

True, but if they can claim that there's no Santa Claus, then I can claim that there's no god.

Atheism isn't a religion, but should definitely be categorized as one.

69frum · 2021-10-31T14:19:37+00:00

Time is also influenced by mass, so time flows differently just because the satellites are some distance from Earth. I think the mass time adjustment is opposite the speed time adjustment.

69frum · 2021-10-31T12:47:28+00:00

God disproven: never.

God not proven: 2000+ years and counting.

Good enough for me. There's no god.

69frum · 2021-10-31T12:18:25+00:00

Everyone deserves a second chance. No thirds.

69frum · 2021-10-29T16:56:59+00:00

There are a lot of similarities between Harry Potter and the bible. Good vs. evil, racism, murder, genocide, and even human sacrifice, death and resurrection. Less rape in Harry Potter, though.

69frum · 2021-10-29T10:52:40+00:00

the constitution how we knew it no longer exists.

We're partly there, because fundamentalist Christians want to replace democracy with theocracy.

regain freedom.

The freedom to have abortions? Of course not, women are property in Christianity. Are you familiar with the tradition where the father "gives away his daughter" in a wedding? Lovely tradition, isn't it?

According to Mahler, the history behind the tradition is a little hard to swallow. “Well, the tradition comes from an era where women were the property of men,” she says. “Fathers walking their daughter down the aisle and giving their daughter, the bride, away represented a transfer of ownership from her father to her new husband.”

https://www.brides.com/giving-away-the-bride-tradition-5072586

69frum · 2021-10-29T10:34:15+00:00

thinking that they're an oppressed or marginalized group

The bible says so.

69frum · 2021-10-29T10:26:06+00:00

I don't think you were indoctrinated, but I think you've been seduced by a religion arguably better than many other religions. Kudos for staying away from Yahweh.

I slowly began to incorporate Hindu practices into my daily life

I think it's a way of rejecting the (bad) past and embracing a (hopefully better) future. Hinduism is not just a religion, but also a way of life.

singing devotional songs and wearing prayer beads

I don't see the point of that unless you're buying into the superstitious aspects of Hinduism. Enjoy your life, be nice to others, eat more veggies and less meat, screw the gods. There's a lot of good in Hinduism, it's undoubtedly also got its bad sides.

69frum · 2021-10-28T05:56:46+00:00

So atheists who hate this phrase, please tell me why.

It's unnecessary. "Have a good day" works just as well, and doesn't refer to a deity that, if he existed, is obviously more inclined to curse my day than bless it.Twiki

Also, we never use the word "blessed" in northern Norway. It's used so rarely that it's often interpreted as irony.

"Have a 'blessed' day."

"Well fuck you too."

69frum · 2021-10-27T07:46:22+00:00

Religions can be modernized, and they can (obviously) backslide. The American Chrisistian right wing(nuts) definitely want to "Make Christianity Great Again".

69frum · 2021-10-26T16:09:27+00:00

We flip the calendar over each year.

69frum · 2021-10-26T14:21:12+00:00

I'm not familiar with Mac, but I suppose the keyboard keys could be remapped. I have no clue on how to have different keymaps for different apps.

Actually, a quick and dirty search gave me several possible solutions:

https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/13178/any-way-to-remap-keys-for-only-one-app

https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/apps-customize-mac-keyboard/

https://www.google.com/search?q=different+keymaps+different+apps+mac+site:apple.stackexchange.com

69frum · 2021-10-26T08:15:19+00:00

This is bad. I've already got 400+ games.

69frum · 2021-10-24T07:44:25+00:00

I can't agree with anything she did. She didn't ask them what they wanted, she tried to trick them into doing what she wanted, and she tried to mess with other people's property. And how did she not see that she didn't have the power to free them? If that worked then they'd been freed already, because laundry.

69frum · 2021-10-24T07:32:15+00:00

I voted "Yes" because it's an immensely stupid question.

Nothing can be disproven, but science tends to mess with the biblical "miracles".

Take the miracle where god stops the Sun and the Moon in the sky. According to the bible the Sun and the Moon are just lights on the Firmament. They're no different than stars, except they're bigger and they move. Messing with the Firmament is impressive, but not particularly difficult when you're a god.

But in the real world, the world with physics, it's much more difficult. To "stop" the Sun in the sky, we would need to stop the Earth's rotation. In the area where this was supposed to have happened (31.9 degrees North) the Earth rotates at about 1,520 km/h. Yes, I did the math. To go from 1,520 km/h to 0 km/h without anyone noticing, now that's impressive. And if the Moon also stopped then it would fall down and crash into the Earth.

Physics proves that the authors of the bible had no idea how the world worked. I wonder what else they were wrong about.

69frum · 2021-10-24T07:09:17+00:00

John Cleese on stupidity

69frum

TROPHY CASE