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VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

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Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#211

Post by gregoreous »

drinchev wrote: post #95
iamthepieman wrote: post #37

I work with a Muslim and I'm a Christian. Since we are both very conservative, I actually have more in common with him than with my secular coworkers and friends. Unfortunately we both work remotely and live several hundred miles from each other. I think we could be good friends if we lived closer. One thing I have learned talking with my Muslim coworker is that, just like in Christianity, there are many divisions an…

Hello. I really like your honesty, courage and passion that I can sense from what you wrote. I don't want to sound offending, but you are saying that you are happy to discuss this and I have almost no contact with deep religious persons that are in IT, so I have a couple of questions. 1. Where is the boundary of your beliefs? I'm always trying to be polite with my dev co-workers, but for example if I write a flagged…

I hope you don't mind my taking this post as an open invitation for anyone to reply to, but I thought I should reply as well.

1. I love talking to people with different beliefs. If we have a respectful debate based on our best evidence I assume we will both learn something.

2. Facts are facts. However, I think all people build world views around those facts which interpret those facts in ways that are consistent with their non-scientific beliefs. The scientific method is just a important to me as an agnostic in terms of whether a medical procedure is safe.

3. See answer 2. Many Christians have no trouble with evolution. It was discovered by an Anglican after all. It's true that Darwin lost his faith over the discovery, but after a few years, many Christians just incorporated it into their faith.

4. It is very hard to prove historical facts, but there is good evidence for many arguments (like the resurrection for example; or that the King James Bible was developed by a committee). I think for many Christians, good historical scholarship is fundamental to the sorts of things that they now believe. This works both ways; however. For example, after the Divinci Code came out I was able to quickly discard the sorts of claims it made because the evidence was so bad. Similarly, Richard Dawkins should not give up his day job to become a biblical scholar since he doesn't seem to have the knack for it.

Cheers

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#212

Post by tome »

megalodon wrote: post #111
cygx wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course it's not "all Muslisms". But those who claim "it's only the terrorists" or "it's all politics" do not grasp the scope of the problem, ie that globally speaking, a significant number of adherents of Islam hold ideas that are incompatible with an open society. If you naively extrapolate from the 2013 Pew Poll The World’s Muslims: Religion, Politics and Society (which in principle represents nations with a tot…

World's largest arms exporter: US ($10,194,000,000 in 2014) World's largest arms importer: Saudi Arabia ($4,243,000,000 in 2014) To me, these are scary numbers. > When a country decides to invest in arms, rather than in education, housing, the environment, and health services for its people, it is depriving a whole generation of its right to prosperity and happiness. We have produced one firearm for every ten inhabit…

This appears to be the Chewbacca defense

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chewbacca_defense

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#213

Post by JustSomeNobody »

venomsnake wrote: post #166
lmm wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed but it works both ways - non-religious harmful ideologies can be almost as bad. What proportion of people - even of western college-educated liberals - genuinely , in their heart of hearts, supports free speech even when it's speech they disagree with, freedom of religion even when it's a religion they disagree with, and all the other enlightenment values? I fear it's pretty low.

I support freedom of speech - absolute and unrestricted. I don't support freedom of religion, but support freedom from religion - no other human should be able to force religion on other. The religion should be private matter to the individual and individual alone.

Freedom of Religion means I can practice whatever religion I want without the Government telling me I can't. It does not, in any way, force religion upon anyone.

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#214

Post by utku_karatas2 »

0xFFC wrote: post #159
omginternets wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I respectfully (and partially) disagree. The invasion of Iraq was stupid, reckless and selfish. It was a for-profit war that destabilized the region and allowed ISIS to take on its present form. I'll have you remember that France staunchly opposed this war. Now the US and the brits have left us with a veritable cesspool, and we're bearing the brunt of the consequences. This isn't a liberation attempt or a preemptive…

Am pretty angry about what is going on in world , so if you felt insulted , I am so sorry , and You should understand I don't want to insult you or any other person specifically,But I want insult Ideologies pretty badly. As person who LIVES in heart of middle east (Iran) and I have seen shia militant from very close(I know people who works in IRGC),You are completely and pure wrong , do you know what would generate a…

> with a little being gay,I am not gay , but sometime things go wrong

At first I thought this was a hilarious line to come out of the closet. Had to read again. :)

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#215

Post by yetanotheracc »

DamnYuppie wrote: post #136
megalodon wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

World's largest arms exporter: US ($10,194,000,000 in 2014) World's largest arms importer: Saudi Arabia ($4,243,000,000 in 2014) To me, these are scary numbers. > When a country decides to invest in arms, rather than in education, housing, the environment, and health services for its people, it is depriving a whole generation of its right to prosperity and happiness. We have produced one firearm for every ten inhabit…

It appears, from what I could find, that Saudia Arabia's yearly spending on education is $57.9B, they spend $42.7B on health, with a total spending of $229.3. So they spend 25% of their budget on education and less then 2% on arms importation. Yes they could spend that money on something else, but please don't make it seem like they are neglecting healthcare or educational spending for arms. http://www.us-sabc.org/cu…

And what an education it is!

https://freedomhouse.org/report/special-reports/saudi-arabia...

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#216

Post by crusso »

daemonk wrote: post #68
iamthepieman wrote: post #37

I work with a Muslim and I'm a Christian. Since we are both very conservative, I actually have more in common with him than with my secular coworkers and friends. Unfortunately we both work remotely and live several hundred miles from each other. I think we could be good friends if we lived closer. One thing I have learned talking with my Muslim coworker is that, just like in Christianity, there are many divisions an…

Is there an absolute definition to these categories though? I would be pissed off too if I was a Muslim and the radical minority hijacked the terminology and twisted it into something different. But to the radical Muslims, their definition is the correct one. How do you argue which definition is more correct than the other? By Historical precedence? By how we interpret the teachings? By popularity? It just seems like…

radical minority hijacked the terminology and twisted it into something different

A huge part of the problem is that they're not hijacking anything. The jihadists are reading the plain text of the Koran and the Hadiths and following them literally. Moderate Muslims typically have very little scriptural text to stand upon when decrying ISIS and its treatment of infidels. ISIS can be more easily argued to be following the "most pure" form of Islam.

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#217

Post by acveilleux »

megalodon wrote: post #111
cygx wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course it's not "all Muslisms". But those who claim "it's only the terrorists" or "it's all politics" do not grasp the scope of the problem, ie that globally speaking, a significant number of adherents of Islam hold ideas that are incompatible with an open society. If you naively extrapolate from the 2013 Pew Poll The World’s Muslims: Religion, Politics and Society (which in principle represents nations with a tot…

World's largest arms exporter: US ($10,194,000,000 in 2014) World's largest arms importer: Saudi Arabia ($4,243,000,000 in 2014) To me, these are scary numbers. > When a country decides to invest in arms, rather than in education, housing, the environment, and health services for its people, it is depriving a whole generation of its right to prosperity and happiness. We have produced one firearm for every ten inhabit…

Just as scary, these numbers are small fractions on the US arms procurement budget.

DoD spent about $115B in 2013 and budgeted $100B in 2014 for procurement (PDF source: http://comptroller.defense.gov/Portals/45/Documents/defbudge...)

That's a lot of weapons.

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#219

Post by venomsnake »

JustSomeNobody wrote: post #213
venomsnake wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I support freedom of speech - absolute and unrestricted. I don't support freedom of religion, but support freedom from religion - no other human should be able to force religion on other. The religion should be private matter to the individual and individual alone.

Freedom of Religion means I can practice whatever religion I want without the Government telling me I can't. It does not, in any way, force religion upon anyone.

That is the keyword. Practice. You cannot practice that parts of the religion that contradict with a country's laws. But that don't infringe on your freedom of religion since no one is punishing you for your religious beliefs.

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#220

Post by jacquesm »

venomsnake wrote: post #166
lmm wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed but it works both ways - non-religious harmful ideologies can be almost as bad. What proportion of people - even of western college-educated liberals - genuinely , in their heart of hearts, supports free speech even when it's speech they disagree with, freedom of religion even when it's a religion they disagree with, and all the other enlightenment values? I fear it's pretty low.

I support freedom of speech - absolute and unrestricted. I don't support freedom of religion, but support freedom from religion - no other human should be able to force religion on other. The religion should be private matter to the individual and individual alone.

> I support freedom of speech - absolute and unrestricted. I don't support freedom of religion

That, at first reading does not appear to be internally consistent. At some level freedom of religion is freedom of speech. Unless you want to lobotomize people who are religious so they no longer speak their mind on the subject but you can't have the one without the other.

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