Messages

241

Not at the Dinner Table / Re: Who wants to help me with my political research survey?

« on: December 08, 2008, 09:51:14 PM »

Question 1.  3
Question 2.  0 If there were an option for absolutely loathe the Yankees and hope that they don't win a single game next season, I would choose that. Go Tribe.

242

Game Blog / Re: Mario Kart "Music" Weirdness... on Youtube, of course...

« on: December 05, 2008, 01:21:14 PM »

I wish I could un-hear this.

I'm not sure if my tears are from laughter or from sorrow.

That was brilliantly horrible.

243

General Chat / Re: bobman37 Jazz Concert

« on: December 05, 2008, 01:18:16 PM »

You guys are pretty excellent. Thanks for sharing your talent.

EDIT: Oh, and by the way, is the guitarist playing an Ibanez Artcore AG-75? That's what it looks like.

244

Site Discussion / Re: Deezer the Snowman

« on: December 03, 2008, 09:55:41 PM »

This put a smile on my face after a long, dreary semester. Good times.

245

General Chat / Re: I think it's about time ... we saw each other.

« on: November 15, 2008, 07:05:59 AM »

People who are in bands and leave only one guitar string uncut are so hardcore.

246

Not at the Dinner Table / Re: Time doesn't exist

« on: October 04, 2008, 09:57:07 PM »

The reason humans think they have free will (they actually don't) is because we have memory of the past but not the future.

One reason humans take grammar classes in middle school is so that they don't switch between the 3rd and 1st person in the same sentence.

247

Video Game Chat / Re: Things That Made You Poop A Little.

« on: October 04, 2008, 09:50:37 PM »

Did I ever tell you guys my middle initial?

It's 4.

Also, Lizard Dude's middle initial is P. I think it stood for Progress.

It would be a lot cooler if it were S.

248

Not at the Dinner Table / Re: What's Your Religon?

« on: September 29, 2008, 11:54:34 AM »

You know, that's just a theory/opinion. Not saying I don't think it's true to some extent, but to make a blanket statement like that is an awfully dismissive view of the text.

Just a quick question about that. How do you think that it is true to some extent? I'm just curious about your interpretation of that theory.

249

Not at the Dinner Table / Re: What's Your Religon?

« on: September 28, 2008, 07:30:35 PM »

* Koopaslaya raises his hand.

"Where's the fetus going to gestate? You going to keep it in a box?"

Also, let's not be mean to members or make fun of them or call them out on their beliefs because they are different than yours. *Cough -- Nintendoobsessed*

250

Not at the Dinner Table / Re: What's Your Religon?

« on: September 28, 2008, 06:13:20 PM »

I suppose Hell was created when the first demons (fallen angels) came about. As far as my understanding of this Theology goes, these angels thought that they could be God themselves. They openly chose to rebel against God, hate him, and oppose good. In accord with their choice, God created hell to send these evil angels where they wanted to go.

251

Not at the Dinner Table / Re: What's Your Religon?

« on: September 28, 2008, 05:12:06 PM »

1) If God is all-knowing, why is prayer ever needed?
   
2) If God's love is unconditional, then why did he make hell?

3) If Adam and Eve only had sons, from where did their wives come?

4) If man is fallible, is it also possible his interpretations of religion are as well?

1) Prayer is not needed for God, but rather for ourselves. Think of it like this: if you have a friend and he knows everything about you, does that mean that you shouldn't still want to spend time with him? Trust me, I don't pray for God's sake, but rather for my own sake to come to know God.

2) God loves all of his children, however some chose with their own free will to not accept it. God would never force anyone to do anything that he or she does not want to do. If a person truly hates God and does not want to spend eternity with him, then God (who is all loving) does the loving thing by respecting his free will and not forcing him to spend eternity with him.

3) The story of Adam and Eve is not and was never intended to be interpreted literally. As I have said before, that account of the creation of the world was most likely written in Judah about 1020-930 BC. The author had no idea how the world was created, nor did he much care. Rather, he used the story as an allegory to show life as it should be and the origins of human weakness.

4) Yes. However, this is the doctrine of faith that is integral to religion. Of course the debate will go on and on about a "proof" or "disproof" of God. Pascal's wager is also not satisfying for many (although I cannot see why). This is a real consideration, even for the most religious of people. It was just discovered, for instance, that Mother Theresa struggled with this exact question much of her life in her own faith. This, however, did not stop her from living in a Christian lifestyle and placing trust in God.

Obviously, these answers are slight, but I thought I'd offer some answers.

Of course, these responses are not meant to generate hateful replies.

252

Video Game Chat / Re: Things That Made You Poop A Little.

« on: September 28, 2008, 10:44:35 AM »

Without a doubt, the most amazing moment in any video game for me was turning Ocarina of Time on for the first time and beginning the epic adventure. That started such a fun adventure for me. I would turn that game on and just run around Hyrule for hours, never actually doing anything. I never wanted to beat the game becuase I wanted it to last forever.

I suppose a close second would be beating SMB for the first time. I remember that I was 8, and my hands were sweating so much when I saw Bowser standing on that final bridge.

Fighting Boba Fett in Star Wars: Shadow of the Empire. I never expected to see him in the game and actually battling him one on one totally made me freak.

I must second this: very cool.

253

Not at the Dinner Table / Re: The Afterlife

« on: September 25, 2008, 08:41:08 PM »

Even if our modern Bible conveys 100% accurately the original crazy crap people wrote down thousands of years ago, it's still crazy crap people wrote down thousands of years ago!

Then, I suppose, a Mark Twain novel can have no truth to it. The original authors wrote in stories to convey truths of humanity. Much of the Bible was written as a myth. For example, Genesis chapters 1-11. The original authors probably wrote it sometime between 1020 and 930 BC. They knew full well that it did not contain the exact details of creation. That was not the author's intent. Rather, the authors were attempting to show human life as it should be, and humanity's vanity. The folly of our pride and the source of our unhappiness: sin. They did not attempt to convey an exact history-- anyone who tells you that is plain wrong. They looked around their world and saw so much hate and evil, and their goal was to explain it. The truth of the Bible is not in its precise figures or its exact locations, but rather in its treatment of the human person.

It seems, however, with your worldview, there can be no such thing as truth because you have reduced us to mechanistic beings. In your materialistic thought, there can be not truth, because we can't even know anything: everything is an illusion.

We need to return to a study of the natural world around us that we can once again understand ourselves as people and not as machines.

254

Not at the Dinner Table / Re: Time doesn't exist

« on: September 24, 2008, 02:48:36 AM »

"Time is nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once."
- Woody Allen

Shyguy92

255

Not at the Dinner Table / Re: Cloning, genetic research, and the like

« on: September 23, 2008, 09:42:03 PM »

Why don't we approach this question from the perspective of Natural Law, that is (according to Francis Slade), "the ontological priority of ends over purposes." Before you stop reading for fear of big words, allow me to explain myself. Ends are what something is for, regardless of human intentions. Purposes exist in the mind of men. Something's end may or may not coincidence with a particular's purpose. For instance: a musician's end is to make music, but his purpose may be to make money, or to get babes, or to (perhaps) make music. If the musician takes money to be more important than making music, his intentions become entangled and his art conflicts his purpose.

Applying this though to stem cell research, we see that it is always immoral, because it puts a purpose over an end.

The end of a Fetus is always to continue growing into a fully flourishing human adult. In our stupidity, we attempt to prioritize our own purposes over natural ends. Thus, we think that a Fetus can be used to make other people well, when its end -- external to man -- is to continue growing.

In our mechanistic world, we must be careful when making moral decisions. We are not simply walking machines, but rather living beings that have ends within ourselves. Our ends are written upon our form -- human beings. Our source of change in within ourselves. When we mechanize the world, we take away from ourselves the very thing that makes us us: our humanity.