HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: boyd@acsu.buffalo.edu (Daniel F Boyd)
Newsgroups: alt.atheism
Subject: Re: HERETICS
Date: 22 Nov 92 19:20:24 GMT
Organization: UB

In article <1eh0ifINN5u4@kitty.ksu.ksu.edu> yohan@kitty.ksu.ksu.edu 
(Jonathan W Newton) writes: 
> Even the most liberal of philosophers will argue that the mandates
> of the state should take precedence over religious belief when they
> come into conflict.

Before I go arguing about this, I'd like to ask what you really meant
by 'mandates of the state'.  A mandate can be either: a command FROM
the state or permission given TO the state by the people.  If you are
saying that state-originated orders always take precedence over
religious beliefs, I think that's wrong.  You would be saying that the
state can regulate or outlaw any religious practice it feels like for
whatever reason it feels like supplying.

If by mandate you mean the people's mandate to the state (the
permission that the people give to the state so that the state has
legitimate authority) then I have no problems with your statement.  In
that case, it's implying that a religious belief can't take precedence
over the social contract between the people and the government --
which makes more sense.

-- 
Daniel F. Boyd -- boyd@cs.buffalo.edu         -a +X -x -e -m -S -F"> "
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((lambda (x) (list x (list (quote quote) x))) 
 (quote (lambda (x) (list x (list (quote quote) x)))))
From: keith@cco.caltech.edu (Keith Allan Schneider)
Newsgroups: alt.atheism
Subject: Re: Blasphemy??
Date: 23 Nov 1992 01:15:21 GMT
Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena
NNTP-Posting-Host: punisher.caltech.edu

dpn2@po.CWRU.Edu (Damien P. Neil) writes:

>In article <1992Nov21.052905.28697@midway.uchicago.edu> hau4@ellis.uchicago.edu (sven  hauptfeld) writes:
>>In article <dpn2.108.722127085@po.CWRU.Edu> dpn2@po.CWRU.Edu (Damien P. Neil) writes:
>>>
>>>To nitpick -- it is quite possible to be atheistic and still believe in 
>>>absolute good/evil. :-)
>>
>>How do you define "good" and "evil" in which you believe (or not)?

I don't believe in "good vs. evil" but instead "right vs. wrong".

keith
From: dpn2@po.CWRU.Edu (Damien P. Neil)
Newsgroups: alt.atheism
Subject: Re: Circumcision (was Re: God Is Unfair)
Date: Fri, 20 Nov 1992 05:00:04 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University
NNTP-Posting-Host: b63519.student.cwru.edu

In article <1992Nov19.214614.15620@watson.ibm.com> strom@Watson.Ibm.Com (Rob Strom) writes:
>Your AMA example actually works against your argument.
>For a certain period of time, medical doctors considered
>circumcision *beneficial* for reasons relating to
>hygiene and incidence of cancer.  Many Gentiles were
>circumcising their children.  As with many other
>practices (e.g. exposure to sunlight), new studies
>came in and the medical profession changed its mind.
>Their position now is that there is no longer a
>sound medical reason to perform a circumcision.

I can confirm this -- my parents were Christien, and I am circumcised. I 
never bothered to ask why they had it done. In fact, it took me about twelve 
years to find out that not everyone is that way.

>That's not the same as saying that they consider
>circumcision harmful.  And it's certainly not
>an open and shut case for calling it "barbaric",
>any more than we should call sunbathing barbaric.

Says who? I consider sunbathing to be far more barbaric that circumcision. 
One is painful -- the other kills.
+-------------+------------------+---------------------------------+
| Damien Neil | dpn2@po.cwru.edu | Case Western Reserve University |
+-------------+------------------+---------------------------------+
Newsgroups: alt.atheism
From: mccullou@cae.wisc.edu (Mark McCullough)
Subject: Re: Chaotic brain behaviour and its influence on duplicating a perso
Organization: U of Wisconsin-Madison College of Engineering
Date: 15 Nov 92 17:01:00 CST

In article <3g50TB4w165w@mantis.co.uk> mathew <mathew@mantis.co.uk> writes:
>simon@dcs.warwick.ac.uk (Simon Clippingdale) writes:
>> In article <1992Nov9.222823.2219@gacvx2.gac.edu> emiddlec@mora.gac.edu (Eric 
>> > I don't know how much info is really stored in DNA. I think the brain netwo
>> > (the actual neural data/combinations) would not be stored in DNA but in cel
>> > themseves. Otherwise the body could, concievably, repair some brain damage.
>> > It seems improbable to me, anyway, that the body would duplicate the brain'
>> > exact status in DNA.
>> 
>> Right. The genome does not contain enough information to specify the
>> architecture and connectivity of even just the visual system, let alone
>> the entire brain.
>
>To be more specific, the human genome contains about the same amount of
>information as a single compact disc.  How many CDs can you remember all the
>music from?

Few things.  1.  It is not the human genome that dictates what you remember.
Two, I know people who remember all the music from several pieces of music
that fill up a CD.  A CD contains 1 gigabyte.  For those who don't know
computer jargon, a byte is a character.  giga normally means billion, but
not here.  Here, it means 2^30.  That is somewhat more than a billion.
That translates to 1073741824 characters, or about 214748364.8 words (at
five characters per word.)  This seems like a tremendous amount, but how
much memory does it take to represent visual images?  Lots.  Memory is 
stored in the brain by a diffuse process of paths through the neurons in
the brain.  A memory is recalled by a path being travelled by a pulse.
Forgetting is done by these paths breaking down, as a certain part of the
neuron that emits synaptic fluid emits less and less.  The more stimulated
a path is, the stronger the enzyme to emit synaptic fluid becomes (the more
is present).  This is a basic model of memory in the brain, as of current
published research in 1990 that I could find.  It is overly simplistic
I know, but it shows how memory doesn't work like computer storage does
and has a potential for more memory.  (How many neurons in the brain?  How
many ways to connect them if order counts and length is variable?)
:)M^2
>
>
>mathew
>-- 
>You can communicate with me securely using PGP 2.0.  For more information
>send mail to pgp@mantis.co.uk.
>


Newsgroups: alt.atheism
From: rescorla@rtnmr.chem.yale.edu (Eric Rescorla)
Subject: Re: the Four Dummies
Organization: Rescorla for himself.
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1992 15:53:25 GMT

In article <62132@mimsy.umd.edu> mangoe@cs.umd.edu (Charley Wingate) writes:
>People have been sniping at the gospels for a century now at least--
>anything to pry them away from any real experience of Jesus.
This is a major insult to the many rather devout scholars who have
worked on NT formgeschichte. You should know better, Mr. Wingate.
I ask you to retract it, sir.

Come now, we hardly need anything so feeble as textual criticism
to dimsiss the gospels. We may merely ignore them, just as you ignore
the histories of the cult of Asclepius.

>One can read tons of words of textual analysis of the gospels.  I don't
>think a reading of them as dumb or dishonest is reasonable.  The best
>counterargument is that they are isolated from orginal sources, an argument
>typically argued on the basis of dates.  In my experience, these arguments are
>rather speculative, and manuscript discoveries tend to push these dates back.
On the contrary. We don't have, to my knowledge, a singe actual document
of the NT earlier than 150 CE. Moreover, the text that is generally
acknowledged in the academic community(through formgeschichte) to be the
oldest of the four(Mark) has no resurrection narrative at all in the
earliest versions. 

-Ekr



-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Eric Rescorla, DoD#431 (Nighthawk S)              rescorla@rtnmr.chem.yale.edu
Former chemist now CM400 mechanic                 ekr@eitech.com(preferred)
                "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss."
From: torkel@sics.se (Torkel Franzen)
Subject: Re: Is omniscience impossible?
Organization: Swedish Institute of Computer Science, Kista
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 16:32:22 GMT

In article <1992Nov23.141836.14409@ousrvr.oulu.fi> ktikkane@phoenix.oulu.fi 
(Kari Tikkanen) writes:

   >"The Omniscient does not know this sentence to be true."
   >If Omniscient knows A then A is true. A says that  Omniscient doesn't know
   >the sentence, which is contradistion. So Omniscien can't know sentence A.
   >This means he doesn't know everything. So there can't be Omniscient being.


 I have a proof that is exactly as good that there is an Omniscient being.
I assert

   "If this sentence is true then there is an Omniscient being"

If my asserted sentence is true, then there is an Omniscient being. So it
is true. So there is an Omniscient being.
From: mathew <mathew@mantis.co.uk>
Newsgroups: alt.atheism
Subject: Re: REAL Gods
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 92 11:20:56 GMT
Distribution: world
Organization: Mantis Consultants, Cambridge. UK.

David.Rice@ofa123.fidonet.org writes:
> I have found the deities above, Jehovah, Krishna, and Jesus,
> to be utterly lacking in any redeeming qualities.

There is but one worthy Goddess, and her name is Eris.


mathew
-- 
Official Meta-Pope of the SubGenius Church of the Radioactive Jesus
(formerly Hamburgers for WOTAN, Inc.)

Newsgroups: alt.atheism
From: jwest@wisc (Jeff West)
Subject: Re: Judiasm in an atheist
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL3
Date: 23 Nov 92 09:20:57 CST

Mark me down for enjoying the holidays as well.  When it comes to
Christmas I'm still a little kid.  My family, which is Christian,
knows my views and feelings.  We don't try and convert each other
we just enjoy a time of year that has been traditionally set down
for family and friends.

I understand that Chistmas has Christ in it but I treat it as a
secular holiday.  "Peace on earth and good will toward men." is
not a bad philosophy for anyone to try and live up to.

Jeff
From: aaron@minster.york.ac.uk
Newsgroups: alt.atheism
Subject: Re: Accuracy of Texts
Date: 18 Nov 92 13:25:30 GMT
Organization: Department of Computer Science, University of York, England

Eric Rescorla (rescorla@rtnmr.chem.yale.edu) wrote:
: 1) Much of the DSS was released years ago. You can pick it up in any
: decent bookstore. The books have titles like "The Dead Sea Scrolls
: in English."

  The DSS scrolls fall into four main categories.

  a) Versions of existing Biblical texts. Almost all (?) released
  b) Commentaries on same. Much released
  c) The copper scroll (list of treasures of Temple). Not released
     (for reasonably good reasons)
  d) The so called 'secular' documents which are, apprently, actually
     religious documents internal to the Qumran community. Not released
     for no readily apparent reason.

: 2) The DSS reflects a viewpoint of Apocalyptic eschatology. As far as
: I know, they don't really contradict anything in the Bible. The
: OT texts are quite similar to the MT, although I hear that the Isaiah scroll
: is somewhat different.

     The commentaries do, on occasion, contain controversial explanations
     which the International Group have often attempted (rather 
     unconvincingly) to harmonise with currently held theological views
     and preconceptions about the nature of the Qumran community
     (The latter preconceptions chosen to apparently avoid bringing into
      question the origins of Christianity)

: 4) The reason that the portions of DSS which were  not released
: were not released is, as far as I can tell, that they were fragmentary
: and therefore took much longer than anticipated to translate. 

     Many scrolls have been translated for many years and not released
     hence the anger of Allegro and Eisenmann. Eisenmann has just
     released a book on the subject, although I can't actually remember
     the title at the moment. The book may contain fragments not previously
     published alhtough I am not sure on this question.

		Aaron Turner		aaron@minster.york.ac.uk
From: I3150101@dbstu1.rz.tu-bs.de (Benedikt Rosenau)
Newsgroups: alt.atheism
Subject: Re: Vatican approves Death Penalty
Date: 19 Nov 92 17:14:39 GMT
Organization: Technical University Braunschweig, Germany

In article <1992Nov19.092657.13190@midway.uchicago.edu>
hau4@ellis.uchicago.edu (sven  hauptfeld) writes:
 
>I'd like to see some linguistic support for this, e.g. what is Hebrew for
>'kill' and for 'murder' and related, and what word is in fact used.
>
It is something like r-ts (or is it z?)-h. The NT uses phoneuein, if memory
serves. But when it comes to their use or meaning, you'd be getting into one
of the worst dogmatic discussions about culture and cultural relativity.
 
As usually, I'd prefer that those who believe in it would settle the argument
among themselves first, before they try to impose their dogmas on others.
   Benedikt
From: hau4@ellis.uchicago.edu (sven  hauptfeld)
Newsgroups: alt.atheism
Subject: Re: ...and Puppies! (WAS:Re: Kittens!)
Date: 24 Nov 92 01:07:30 GMT
Reply-To: hau4@midway.uchicago.edu
Organization: University of Chicago Computing Organizations

Newsgroups: alt.atheism
Subject: Re: ...and Puppies! (WAS:Re: Kittens!)
Summary: 
Expires: 
Followup-To: 
Distribution: 
Organization: University of Chicago Computing Organizations
Keywords: 

In article <By3uDo.E66@umassd.edu> rolls@cis.umassd.edu (Frank Pinto) writes:
>In <1992Nov21.021807.22347@midway.uchicago.edu> hau4@ellis.uchicago.edu (sven  hauptfeld) writes:
>
>>One beautiful spring Sunday, Father O'Malley took a walk trough the park. The
>>Sun was shining, the skies were blue, the flowers were blooming in rainbow
>>colors... and everything was merry.
>
>>Father O'Malley saw a little girl playing with her puppy. With a friendly
>>smile on his face, he approached the cute kid:
>
>>"What is your name, my dear child?"
>
>>"Blossom," the girl replied, her blue eyes widely open.
>
>>"That is such a beautiful name! How did you get it?" Father O'Malley asked,
>>admiring the child's innocence.
>
>>"While my mother was praying to God to give her a little daughter, a blossom
>>fell on her hair. So she said she would call her daughter Blossom."
>
>>"How beautiful that God was so good to your mother" - exclaimed Father O'Malley
>>in delight - "and what is your puppy's name?"
>
>>"Porkey." Said the girl in her cute voice.
>
>>"And how did he get that name?"
>
>>"He likes to fuck pigs."
>
>
>>	Sven
>
>Wtih all due respect Sven, I desagree with you.
>As an atheist I feel that you should make your point
>in a gracious, justified, logical and diplomatic way.
>Don't bring your self down by demening any one, or 
>anyones' belief. This was a joke in very poor taste.
                  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
BINGO!

I read it in a book titled "Truly Tasteless". 

I also consider it very funny - even many years after first reading it.

And with all due respect:
1) I wasn't "making a point", I was telling a joke;
2) I'd prefer to leave the "diplomatic way" to politicians;
3) the joke does not "demene" any one or anyone's belief - unlike the
  kittens joke, which started this thread.

Of course, if you object to using the word 'fuck', then read a newsgroup
in which it is not used.

>
>Sincerely
>

How about a signature?

	Sven
Newsgroups: alt.atheism
From: I3150101@DBSTU1.RZ.TU-BS.DE (Benedikt Rosenau)
Subject:      Re: Atheist Philosophy
Date: Sun, 22 Nov 92 15:06:33 MEZ
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Mark McCulloughs types among other misunderstandings:

>Non power: Ozone.  How long has the ozone hole existed?  Noone can answer
>because noone knows!

No, a ozone hole has far reaching side effects such as an increase in skin
cancer that would have been detected earlier.

>It could have existed for centuries.
It could not.

>How do you
>create ozone?  Shine UV light on O_2.  What does ozone shield against?
>UV light!  Nice isn't it?  Yea, CFCs need to be more controlled, but
>the enviornmentalists aren't telling us everything.
The first time I read that was in a environmentally concerned Time Life
book about twenty years ago. Further, I doubt that you understand how
UV light is absorbed and how CFCs (among others) and ozone interact.

>Am I suppossed
>to reject religion and then turn around and accept everything the
>enviornmentalist claims without question?  Sounds like I am to reject
>one religion for another.

Accepting claims without question is not exactly how the Scientific Method
works. Ever heard of it?
   Benedikt
Newsgroups: alt.atheism
From: hau4@ellis.uchicago.edu (sven  hauptfeld)
Subject: Re: Chief Justice God (WAS: God unfair)
Reply-To: hau4@midway.uchicago.edu
Organization: University of Chicago Computing Organizations
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 22:20:16 GMT

In article <1992Nov23.055553.6673@bmerh85.bnr.ca> dgraham@bmers30.bnr.ca (Douglas Graham) writes:
>In article <1992Nov23.042433.14280@midway.uchicago.edu> hau4@midway.uchicago.edu writes:
>>In article <1992Nov22.024219.23897@bmerh85.bnr.ca> dgraham@bmers30.bnr.ca (Douglas Graham) writes:
>>>In article <1992Nov21.231315.27514@midway.uchicago.edu> hau4@midway.uchicago.edu writes:
>>>
>>general disease, ilitteracy.
>                  ^^^^|^^^^^
>Is this a joke? ------+

No. It was a mistake made in speed. Don't pretend you don't know what
illiteracy really means (certainly not spelling).

>BTW, I wonder about whether illiteracy is the cause of fundamentalism,
>or vice versa.  What with the fundies taking over the school boards and
>watering down the curriculums, and teaching their shit in science classes,
>I think a good case could be made that illiteracy is a symptom of
>fundamentalism.  In any case, there certainly seems to some positive
>feedback there, which is quite worrisome.

iYes, I agree that it works both ways.

>>BTW, if there were God - and an anthropomorphic one - I see no reason why
>>he would have to abide by the same moral standards as humans.
>
>Yes, but you and I both know that the god of the Bible was created by
>man and not vice versa, so your point is irrelevant.  Further, it
>doesn't seem unlikely to me that people tend to aspire to be like
>the gods they have created

But that is a sin in almost any religion. Consider Promethaeus or Tantalus.

>>Was Solon a tyrrant? Pericles? Augustus? Kharoun-al-Rashid? Charlemagne?
>>Suleyman the Magnificent? The Medicis? Frederic the Great? Peter the Great?
>>Napoleon? Maybe you'll say yes, but that would mean that you have no sense of
>>history. Yahweh was not a tyrrant to contemporary readers.
>
>Tyrants, every one (at least those that I am familiar with).  In fact,
>it seems quite peculiar to me that we tend to attach "the Great" to
>those who have created the most misery for mankind.  Why is it that
>we make heroes out of conquerors, and forget about those sane individuals
>who envisioned a better way?

While they were 'tyrrants' by today's standards, all of the above rulers
contributed immensly to the development of democracy and justice as we 
know them today - some by direct social reforms, some by sponsoring the
work of philosophers, humanists or scientists, and some in both of those
ways.

>  I'm not sure what you mean by my not having
>any sense of history.  If none of the people you mentioned were tyrants,
>then would you please name somebody that you think *was* a tyrant,
>and explain why you think so.

Nero, Ivan the Terrible, Stalin, Hitler and many others. The last paragraph
should be enough to explain the difference.


	Sven
From: y41@aix320b.urz.uni-heidelberg.de (Jeffrey Hazelwood)
Subject: PROOF OF GOD
Organization: University of Heidelberg, Germany
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 92 15:52:16 GMT

     Well, enough nonsense about God. Since everyone seems to have run 
out of clever arguments I think it's time to search for God.  But, 
before we go off looking, we gotta figure out what the heck (I don't 
believe in hell!) we're looking for.  So, before we can find the guy, 
girl or whatever it is that we are looking for, we need to figure out 
what the heck it is. Otherwise, an organizied search would be fruitless.  
Does anyone out there know what we are looking for?

     As soon as that question is answered, I propose first that we search 
the immediate area, particularly planet Earth since we are already here 
and of course the financial aspect of being much cheaper.  Futhermore, I 
propose that the team include myself, a few other folks (those interested), 
lots of beautiful women and as many varieties of alcoholic beverages as we 
can carry.  We shall begin our search on the beaches in Rio.  Mainly 
because it's as good a spot as any, and of course the giant statue of
Christ is nearby.  We will continue to search the local area, soaking
up as much sun as possible, having fun, while at the same time, 
conducting a scientific search. Evidence of course should include a
lengthy discussion with the Almighty, and a few photos and autographs
for the kids. However, if no evidence of God is found there,
we will continue our search by Jet-setting to various other beaches and
tropical climates around the world since according to legend, God if
existing, seems to prefer his subjects in lush, warm settings. Those 
beaches and tropical sites will be selected as randomly as possible in
an effort to catch this God thing off guard, if in fact, it exists.  If 
these searches yield nothing, I then propose to make it my life work to
continue searching for God in the service of Mankind.  Anyone care to
help out with funding? I await your replys.  


Ciao.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jeffrey T. Hazelwood                    Universitt Heidelberg
EMAIL: y41@ix.urz.uni-heidelberg.de       Heidelberg, Germany 
Das Paradox...   "Gott ist Tot." - Nietzsche    "Nietzsche ist tot." - Gott
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: rescorla@rtnmr.chem.yale.edu (Eric Rescorla)
Newsgroups: alt.atheism
Subject: Re: Paganism & Atheism
Date: 18 Nov 92 16:12:23 GMT
Organization: Rescorla for himself.

In article <1ecr1vINN664@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu> bx461@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Leo J. Mauler) writes:
>Neo-Paganism, as it exists today, seems to consist entirely of
>people who worship a Deity or Deities without any set form or
>dogma.  Quite a few are like the Buddhists or Taoists who worship
>without Deities whatsoever.
>
>Which is why it seems to me that Atheism is more or less a subset
>of Neo-Paganism, in that Atheists live their lives without
>Supernatural Beings, and not denying others their own beliefs.
>The only Pagan "law" I ever came across in my life has been,
>"As long as you don't hurt anyone else, do as you want."  It
>strikes me that a great many Atheists act in this manner without
>Deific persuasion, so what is there to make this idea false?
That makes WHAT idea false? If you don't believe in any deity at
all, you are an atheist.  It does not follow from ((Some Pagans believe X)&&
(Atheists believe X)) that (Atheists are pagans).
Since I don't believe in any sort of myth and don't worship with or
without deities, it seems to me that calling me a pagan would be
massively inappropriate.

-Ekr




-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Eric Rescorla, DoD#431 (Nighthawk S)              rescorla@rtnmr.chem.yale.edu
Former chemist now CM400 mechanic                 ekr@eitech.com(preferred)
                "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss."
Newsgroups: alt.atheism