Reason #3242 why I’ll never be elected President: Government severs diplomatic ties and warns people not to travel to North Korea as it is unsafe and there could be dire consequences. Some travel anyway. They get detained. Appeal to the US for Help – Prisoners claim US is abandoning them. If I were President, I would say ” . . . and . . . there you go. Sorry, but tough.”
religion
The World is not ending any time soon (and what I believe to be the “Atheist’s Creed”)
It doesn’t matter who – they are ALL WRONG! The Mayans, the preppers, the Y2K’ers, the Fatalists, etc. Stop worrying and enjoy your life, people. Do we have to go through this for every archaic end-of-world prediction? – http://www.examiner.com/article/ragnarok-end-of-the-world-norse-apocalypse-passes-world-still-here
The world is not coming to end any time soon. Not in our lifetime – not in our children’s or grandchildren’s lifetime (sorry Al Gore.) So enjoy your life people. Worry about your health, yes – but do something about it so you can live longer. But yes, you will die – and I have news for you. That will be it for you most likely. I am afraid there is no heaven. BUT – the good news is there is no hell. That was created by the religious establishment to use fear to keep you both in line (if you had a lack of morality) and/or more importantly – to keep you coming to church and TITHING!
If you are looking for a creed to center you. To reconcile religion and morality. You can’t. You do not have to have religion to have morality. Religion is not true morality. Take a read here:
A sample: ”
Religion cannot and should not be replaced by atheism. Religion needs to go away and not be replaced by anything. Atheism is not a religion. It’s the absence of religion, and that’s a wonderful thing.
Religion is not morality. Theists ask me, “If there’s no god, what would stop me from raping and killing everyone I want to.” My answer is always: “I, myself, have raped and killed everyone I want to … and the number for both is zero.” Behaving morally because of a hope of reward or a fear of punishment is not morality. Morality is not bribery or threats. Religion is bribery and threats. Humans have morality. We don’t need religion.”
Go, I love Penn Jilette (yes, irony intended.)
Revisiting the Reality Distortion field.
I think it is time to remind people of Steve Jobs and the RDF (Reality Distortion Field)
From Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reality_distortion_field
“RDF is the idea that Steve Jobs is able to convince himself and others to believe almost anything with a mix of charm, charisma, bluster, exaggeration, marketing and persistence. RDF is said to distort an audience’s sense of proportion or scale. Small advances are applauded as breakthroughs. Interesting developments become turning points, or huge leaps forward. Impossible-seeming schedules, requirements or specifications are acceded to. Snap judgments about technical merits of approaches are sometimes reversed without acknowledgment. Those who use the term RDF contend that it is not an example of outright deception but more a case of warping the powers of judgment. The term “audience” may refer to an individual whose attitudes Steve is intending to affect.”
To call it a form of Jedi Mind Trick is insulting to the Star Wars Universe. The Jedi Mind Trick is fiction and based on tricking people who are not otherwise easily persuaded. RDF, on the other hand, is real and predatory and only requires highly suggest-able people who desperately want to be part of a group to the point of drastically changing their lifestyle to fit the groupthink.
In other words, you all belong to a cult.
Now that Jobs has passed on, his cult-like following has blossomed into a religion where Steve Jobs now seems to get sole credit for all of the technological developments and advancements of the last 40 years. Talk about the revision of history. All for a man who literally believed his own bullshit to the point where he ignored is doctor’s advice and lived off a fruit diet and bypassed all advanced medical treatments until it was well too late. Who knew someone who lived off fructose would ultimately get pancreatic cancer? LOL.
Now the reality distortion field is trying to insist that people want to carry around a phone, tablet, *AND* a Laptop.
http://www.businessinsider.com/apples-view-of-the-future-of-personal-computing-2014-1
Another Example of Natural Selection Irony
I guess he didn’t have enough faith . . .
Reality show snake-handling preacher dies — of snakebite
http://www.cnn.com/2014/02/16/us/snake-salvation-pastor-bite/index.html
PS: Yes, this doesn’t just happen in Will Ferrell comedies. This stuff is real! Is Darwin somewhere laughing? No, probably not. What’s scary for me is I was once married to someone who had very close relatives who attended these churches. And to think, it is all based on a couple of Bible versus (likely taken out of context at best.)
You see churches, like everything else in social society, love to find ways to make their group unique. We don’t just have religions, but each religion has denominations, and each denomination has sects, and sects may differ on *laugh* doctrine. Even if the doctrine is the same, sometimes, churches separate simply because they do not like the preacher or the location – (hence such items such as 1st Baptist Church, 2nd Baptist Church, etc.)
On Ender’s Game – the Movie vs. Politics.
I thought this was a great movie. I have not read the books but I can tell that the adaptation summed up much of the exposition well. The story is set over 100 years into the future and I can understand why the author waited so many years for a film adaptation. He wanted to wait until technology was believable. Let me say this, forget the XboxOne and PS4 – I want to play THOSE games using THOSE Game controls! The movie did not do as well as it should because there was too much controversy attached to the religious views and politics of the author. Since I don’t research the personal politics of every person involved with everything I see, view, or hear (I have a life) I did not fall prey to the desired boycott. For those who may not know, there are no religious or anti-gay messages in this movie. Unlike CS Lewis and the Narnia series – none of the author’s religious influences were played out in the story. I find the notion of giving this movie a review or boycotting it (in some cases – trying to squash the making of it) simply because you don’t like the religion of the book’s author terribly disturbing and un-American. I say this as an Atheist who completely disagrees with Card’s personal viewpoints. Regardless of his viewpoints, it is a great story. Just like Wagner wrote great music and Mel Gibson made good movies – are we supposed to pretend these great works of art do not exist? That is akin to the Taliban blowing up the stone Buddha’s simply because it is different from their religion.
Many of my friend’s are in moral quandaries over this. Some only find it objectionable because he’s vocal and they’re probably blissfully ignorant of other opinions that I disagree with from other folks that I still patronize…. but many of them are holding firm for years on Chick-Fil-A, Hobby Lobby, and Wal-Mart.
How far do we take this? Do we no longer support all of the actors and workers who participated in this movie? Do we boycott Harrison Ford and the new Star Wars films because he took a paycheck and appeared in the film. What if we found out the voting record of every person who wrote and directed movies. We would only see movies made by people who politically agreed with us?
Nerdodamus 