He was devoted to God because he did not have access to the knowledge or facts that would have caused him to doubt his faith because they did not exist yet. Notice that the number of atheists seems to increase along with collective human knowledge.
rance did it through a bloodbath and the excecution of random innocents,
Are you actually coming out against the French revolution? Coming out against the starving peasants who killed their oppressive rulers who were born into their positions and did nothing to deserve the support of the people?
Stephen Hawkings has the highest IQ ever measured in a human and is an atheist. And I am not saying there are no smart Christians, because I would have to be retarded to say that, but the thing is that in modern day most of the smartest minds (highest IQ people) are atheist who belong to institutions like CERN, the American Academy of Science, etc. The thing is that most of the really smart Christian minds like Issac Newton, Galileo, Kepler, etc who were absolutely brilliant lived in a time before most of the theories and facts existed that would have caused them to doubt their faith. Even someone like Einstein who is arguably one of the smartest men ever and was religious, but was still rather ignorant because he rejected the emerging and proven field of quantum physics because he said "God does not throw dice." This is an example of where a previously held belief is inhibiting the growth of knowledge because it clashes with belief. That is why most of the smartest minds today are atheist, because there are all of these proven theories, facts and fields of scientific discovery and advancement which are in stark opposition to faith.
I see what point you are trying to make. I am a 17 year old Canadian, I am quite knowledgeable on politics and world issues, I have clearly established views and ideology. I am an intelligent free thinking human being who would like to have a say in the future of his country but my voice is worth nothing compared to my grandfather who can vote as he pleases although he has alzheimers, dementia and can't remember his own name. What kind of a system is this? However the problem with weighing the votes of different people with different characteristics is that it is in favor or a political position on the spectrum depending on how value is determined. After all, value is not intrinsically found in nature, it is something we impose on it to say for example that we value an educated person's opinion more than stupid person's one. It's simple; if you have a country of idiots, you will get politicians who are idiots. But by saying to some people, your vote doesn't matter as much because you don't have traits that are characteristic of my agenda is murder to democracy. Now obviously there is a problem with the current system, that my vote is meaningless until I reach that magic age of 18 where I apparently gain some profound wisdom which enables me to vote, and until I gain that wisdom I am just too retarded to handle a say in my country's future. I don't know what a proper change or solution is but weighing votes is rather un-democratic.
Find one politician who would vote for that to implement it. What makes you think they would subject themselves to a lie detector if they can't even accept video footage of their own contradictions and lies. Getting a politician to implement that is like asking a human to breathe methane, you can't survive the changes.
It doesn't matter that the Chinese outnumber the Americans nearly 4.34 to 1, because the US has a large number of very powerful allies but they also spend much more on military then China does. The US spends 46.5% of the world military spending while China accounts for 6.6%. Not only current spending but the US has the economic capability to spend more than China ever could. The US has a GDP of 14.2 trillion dollars while China's sits at 4.99 trillion. If there ever was a war, the US could spend much more money on it, also the US contains most of the worlds weapons manufacturers and by far the most advanced military technology on the planet. Numbers don't really matter when it comes to modern warfare, the numbers game may have worked up until the end of WW2 as the soviet union almost single handedly won WW2 with while sustaining massive casualties, but now technology and money wins wars hands down if they are committed. All china has going for them is numbers, but the money, technology and powerful allies of the US would almost certainly defeat china.
I'm not going to sift through someone else's argument to find the parts that pertain to the question. i am genuine about the debate but I will not respond to the hundreds of tangents contained in that forgery, I am willing to debate points that he has to make. If you are going to use someone else's argument because it is still valid that's fine but at least give credit, what he did is lying and stealing and i am pretty sure there are commandments you are supposed to be following forbidding those things. Considering he referred to himself in an earlier debate as following jesus 100% he isn't exactly living up to his claim.
How about you make your own argument instead of stealing it from http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/
A long time ago giant corporations like banks, oil and gas companies, pharmaceutical and biotech companies, agribusiness companies, weapons manufacturers, etc learned one of the best investments they could ever make was to buy a politician. Now there are some independents left who haven't been bought out yet but the thing is the system is designed to preserve those with money to back them up. you need at least 300 000$ just to run for senate, or congress etc, and most people who have the ideology or motivation to make positive changes in the country are average people who can't afford to do that. It really saddens me that that is the political situation you have in America where Democrats say they stick up for those without money and stand for progress but lie to get in all the while being bought and paid for since the beginning, while republicans tell you right from the get go they are pro-rich and pro-corporate america. Money really does corrupt and when you have a 14.6 trillion dollar GDP there is a lot at stake and buying politicians here and there pays off quite nicely.
Were your ancestors not immigrants at some point? Wtf is a natural born citizen? By your definition only native Americans can run for office because their parents didn't immigrate to that country recently (15 000 years ago approx, but the first humans here nonetheless). I don't like Obama as a president but stop being a close minded xenophobe because your parents or their parents or their parents etc were immigrants at some point too.
Final shuttle launch is a monument to the advances of science and human understanding of the physical world. The royal wedding is the union of two self important people. I honestly do not understand why anybody (who is not related to or knows the couple) could conceivably give a shit about that wedding. It's the union of two people who will never give a shit about you, to continue an archaic system of monarchy. There are so much more important things going on in the world; there are natural disasters all over the world, Japan has been wrecked by an earthquake, the middle east is a powder keg waiting to explode as they have a massive % of their male youth unemployed and desperate for physical and religious survival, millions of children starve to death daily, and incredible scientific break throughs are discovered every day, and somebody could possibly care about some wedding? It honestly perplexes the hell out of me, how someone can give a shit about the royal wedding. I'm from Canada and I am not fond of the British royalty. They are not my leaders, I do not care about them, and it costs us millions whenever one of them comes here. I would much rather watch a the shuttle launch, an amazing symbol of the astounding intellectual progress we have made over thousands of years, than watch two people I do not give a shit about wed to continue an archaic and outdated system of royalty.
Because humans are social creatures which rely on the success of the group to survive, lying is typically an act that hurts the good of the group and is thus seen as wrong because it would hurt the group and by proxy it would hurt you. However I say that lying isnt wrong if it benefits you, for instance monkeys have been observed to lie. Let me explain; monkeys are social creatures and have certain calls to signal danger so they can retreat to the trees while gathering food if there is a threat to them, now the dominant monkeys will often take and consume the food that weaker and more submissive monkeys found, however some of the weaker monkeys will use the danger call when they find food so they other monkeys flee while the weaker monkey eats the food it found. So you see lying is only considered wrong or "immoral" when it is perceived as detrimental to your individual success. We perceive it as wrong because it hurts the good of the group which in turn hurts your success.
Not my favorite song but it has amazing lyrics, that why I like it, You should take a few minutes and listen to it, it's definitely worth it. He isn't my favorite artist because I don't really have favorite artists, I just have music that I like and music I don't like, I have songs from all genres and all people, it doesn't really matter where or who it comes from, what's in the song is what matters to me.
I'm not a fan of the compromiser in chief you guys elected, he is weak, hypocritical and can barely be considered liberal. As much as I am not a fan of Obama he will most likely be the lesser of two evils between him and some fundy republican nut job. I would still rather have another Obama than another Bush.
I looked it up and according to this study ( http://www.businessinsider.com/
