Great first day
10.12.09 | simon | 
Email This Post
I’d like to thank everyone today for their donations. It’s been a steady stream of donations rolling in all day. Thanks heaps guys!
We’re over 5% of the way there, which is not bad at all for the first day. There are a number of media opportunities coming up over the next week or so that should spread the campaign to a wider audience. I’ll be sure to outline them here or on Twitter as and when they occur.
Our target is $10,000 for the initial ad run. That works out at approximately $900 per ad-on-a-bus, so we’ve nearly got one ad sorted…let’s go!
173 Responses to “Great first day”
Pages: « 1 2 3 4 5 [6] Show All
Pages: « 1 2 3 4 5 [6] Show All
April 27th, 2010 at 8:41 am
many years ago, a minister of the cloth, in an attempt to explain god, said to me “god is, always has been and always will be.” i didn’t get it then and i sure don’t get it now.
everything has a beginning and an end, including our lives and ultimately our planet. the human brain is incapable of comprehending something with no beginning or end – and that’s a fact. so suck it up you believers, make the most of life while you’re here coz there ain’t nothing else
April 28th, 2010 at 8:24 pm
Sure Bob, everything in the universe known to man is contingent and overall is running out of gas, however slowly, so no part of it is without a beginning or end, i.e. eternal. If every part is contingent, then the whole must be, however vast.
God, on a theistic account, is the uncaused cause of all that exists. As such he is uncontingent or self-existent and transcends the universe.
Making the most of life while we’re here is darn good advice. So how then shall we live? On an atheist account, purpose and value for human life must be invented and at best can only last for one’s biological life. On a theistic account, purpose and value comes from outside the world, and if one finds it and lives by it, it can be enjoyed both now and forever. “There ain’t nothing else” is a pretty big gamble.
April 28th, 2010 at 10:07 pm
Reality is reality. You can choose to escape reality but taking mind altering drugs, or descending into madness whereby you don’t have to face reality, or by grasping at invented fantasies. I fail to see how ‘living forever’ as enabled by a God would bring a purpose to a human life (if you believe that an earth-bound, biological existence serves no purpose). Immortality is not purpose. Living forever is just the ultimate prolonged period of purposelessness. Living a mortal existence on earth just to thereafter live immortally as a ‘soul’ begs the question: why? what was the purpose? where is the purpose?
Can God enlighten us as to his purpose? If creating things – which is apparently what God is good for – is the ultimate purpose, then why shouldn’t a businessman feel that their life had purpose if they created a business, why shouldn’t an artist feel the same about all the paintings they’ve created, ditto a sculptor, writer, musician etc. If creation is purpose, then here on Earth we have a lot of purpose.
Why must something be never-ending to be purposeful?
Also, if you buy a ticket in a lottery that will never be drawn, that’s not a gamble. You can present your ticket any way you want, you still have the same chance of winning as the person who never bought a ticket: no chance. Meanwhile the person who never wasted the time buying a ticket to a lottery that will never be drawn will have used their time in some other way.
April 28th, 2010 at 10:23 pm
It is interesting that someone would present a scenario that the universe is running out of gas “so no part is without a beginning or an end”. I think that is an extraordinarily arrogant statement to make…so there will be no new stars, planets, moons, galaxies from this point onwards??
There seems to be something of the resentful child in mankind’s attitude to the universe. We are the ungrateful sons and daughters in rebellion against the natural world, imagining ourselves as the children of a supernatural being who is the image of us, and a very powerful version of ourselves, who we will be returned to after death. “Damn you nature, damn you universe – you can cower us with earthquakes, rain, volcano’s, sickness, death…..but we will have the last laugh. We are not of you – we are apart & our mighty father will save us. He is the real power around here – your suns and moons and galaxies are NOTHING compared to our mighty father, who has promised us life eternal. You may think we are the billions of little lives covering the face of a planet in our rude clothing and shelters like so many specks of dust, BUT WE ARE THE MIGHTY POWERFUL GOD CHILDREN, AND YOU ARE NOTHING”.
May 3rd, 2010 at 10:22 pm
Hello Aaron. Thanks for your thoughts. “Reality is reality”? This is pretty circular. What is reality and how can one know? On a materialist view (which most reflective atheists seem to hold), the mind or consciousness is merely the product of biological/physical processes, and yet somehow it is assumed (by minds) that it has access to truth about the world. How do you *know* that your thoughts about the material world, as a product of physical brain processes which are but a part of the material world, can actually correspond truthfully to reality?
Also, how can it matter whether the mind grasps at “reality” or at “fantasies”? It is questionable whether truth has survival value for the human organism—other organisms don’t seem to need it. If the ultimate “value” for humans is survival of the species, truth about a mind-independent world along with an overarching purpose for one’s existence has little hope of rising above trivial significance.
Value and purpose go together. If there is no objective foundation for human value outside one’s emotional life, there is also no objective foundation for human purpose or meaningful existence either, regardless of how one may pursue their many objectives in life. Prominent atheist Kai Neilsen admits that there is no foundation for human rights also, and I think he is consistent.
When you said “I fail to see how ‘living forever’ as enabled by a God would bring a purpose to a human life” I didn’t imply this. On a Christian view, all people are designed for eternal existence. For many there is the “ultimate prolonged period of purposelessness” as you say, since the purpose for which we are created has been sadly missed. That purpose, you seem to have no idea of.
Post#154 is completely misguided. My brief statement on entropy is pretty standard physics. Without intelligent intervention, the universe is headed for ultimate heat death or maximum entropy.
May 4th, 2010 at 3:04 pm
hey leios. you’ve joined the party late but not saying anything new.what’s the intelligent intervention you talk about? your god hasn’t been too smart over the centuries so you’re obviously not talking about that. man hasn’t the intelligence or the equipment either, despite the science fiction movies that would have us believe otherwise.
i like the word entropy you use. sounds like atrophy, which seems to me to be about where you’re at.
how do YOU “know” that your thoughts of a god can actually correspond truthfully to reality? other organisms don’t think – god is a human invention used by those who can’t face the fact of mortality.
May 8th, 2010 at 5:59 pm
Hi Bob. I agree that other organisms don’t think in the strict sense, only humans think, are self reflective and make propositions of truth or falsity, etc. Also, only humans are religiously conscious. I have been saying that on a materialist account of the human person such things are incongruent. Materialism seems to entail determinism of some kind. Consciousness, thinking, asserting of truth propositions, actions of the will, etc., are ultimately caused by physical forces that originate from outside the person. If this is so, how can any of our thoughts and beliefs, which may or may not correspond to the real world, actually be known to be true?
You assert “God is a human invention used by those who can’t face the fact of mortality.” If you believe that this corresponds to reality, and I have no reason to think it does, how about providing some evidence.
So when you ask “how do YOU “know” that your thoughts of a god can actually correspond truthfully to reality?” you might expect that I could never give an answer that would satisfy a materialist! There are however many things a person knows to be true without evidence. We call these truths properly basic. Although for me there are vary many evidences and rational arguments for God’s existence, I regard these as supplementary to my properly basic belief that a personal infinite God exists.
May 8th, 2010 at 7:00 pm
Why is there a belief that God and the Devil and the Angels etc are all in some sort of holding pattern, just because that’s where the bible ended up thousands of years ago? What if God decides he doesn’t want to be the eternal administrator the big retirement home in the sky, but wants to do something totally different, so he destroys all the humans and all their un-dead souls and starts a totally new project. He was extremely creative before, and when you’re creative you don’t just stop being creative. If God was extremely pro-active at one time, maybe he’ll decide to get extremely pro-active again. And what if the Devil gets sick and tired of tormenting the un-dead souls of human beings – surely that must get boring after a while – and decides to vacate hell and move to a different universe. Or maybe he’ll make peace with God, and they’ll have a big make-up party.
May 9th, 2010 at 9:32 pm
Hi Aaron. It seems the concept of God you describe is like a projection of a super-bloke in the sky. (Suppose that’s better than a Wattie’s spaghetti monster). Since God is timelessly eternal and infinite, perfect and unchanging (immutable), how can we stick our puny concepts of what we think He should be like and what we think He should do onto Him? Far better to seek Him with humility on His terms. Why on earth should He make Himself known personally to those who set their own terms without regard to His incorruptibly perfect goodness? Any why think that He is or has been active only in our dimension of a space-time-matter universe when He necessarily transcends it all?
May 12th, 2010 at 8:20 am
geez leios – your last post is suspicions confirmed for me. hope you and your thoughts are happy together coz you’re both seriously whacked
May 12th, 2010 at 8:54 pm
Well Bob, if all you have is ad hom I guess we can’t have rational discussion.
May 13th, 2010 at 3:04 pm
Leios, that wasn’t an Ad Hominem. You may want to look up the definition yourself.
What Bob did was express his opinion of you based on the comments you have provided. If Bob was to make some claim about you to put you in a bad light with respect to the point being debated then that would have been an ad hominem attack.
This isn’t what he did though.
May 13th, 2010 at 8:13 pm
..his incorruptibly perfect goodness….
Numbers 31
Vengeance on the Midianites
1 The LORD said to Moses, 2 “Take vengeance on the Midianites for the Israelites. After that, you will be gathered to your people.”
3 So Moses said to the people, “Arm some of your men to go to war against the Midianites and to carry out the LORD’s vengeance on them. 4 Send into battle a thousand men from each of the tribes of Israel.” 5 So twelve thousand men armed for battle, a thousand from each tribe, were supplied from the clans of Israel. 6 Moses sent them into battle, a thousand from each tribe, along with Phinehas son of Eleazar, the priest, who took with him articles from the sanctuary and the trumpets for signaling.
7 They fought against Midian, as the LORD commanded Moses, and killed every man. 8 Among their victims were Evi, Rekem, Zur, Hur and Reba—the five kings of Midian. They also killed Balaam son of Beor with the sword. 9 The Israelites captured the Midianite women and children and took all the Midianite herds, flocks and goods as plunder. 10 They burned all the towns where the Midianites had settled, as well as all their camps. 11 They took all the plunder and spoils, including the people and animals, 12 and brought the captives, spoils and plunder to Moses and Eleazar the priest and the Israelite assembly at their camp on the plains of Moab, by the Jordan across from Jericho.
13 Moses, Eleazar the priest and all the leaders of the community went to meet them outside the camp. 14 Moses was angry with the officers of the army—the commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds—who returned from the battle.
15 “Have you allowed all the women to live?” he asked them. 16 ”They were the ones who followed Balaam’s advice and were the means of turning the Israelites away from the LORD in what happened at Peor, so that a plague struck the LORD’s people. 17 Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, 18 but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man. Dividing the Spoils
25 The LORD said to Moses, 26 “You and Eleazar the priest and the family heads of the community are to count all the people and animals that were captured. 27 Divide the spoils between the soldiers who took part in the battle and the rest of the community. 28 From the soldiers who fought in the battle, set apart as tribute for the LORD one out of every five hundred, whether persons, cattle, donkeys, sheep or goats. 29 Take this tribute from their half share and give it to Eleazar the priest as the LORD’s part. 30 From the Israelites’ half, select one out of every fifty, whether persons, cattle, donkeys, sheep, goats or other animals. Give them to the Levites, who are responsible for the care of the LORD’s tabernacle.” 31 So Moses and Eleazar the priest did as the LORD commanded Moses.
32 The plunder remaining from the spoils that the soldiers took was 675,000 sheep, 33 72,000 cattle, 34 61,000 donkeys 35 and 32,000 women who had never slept with a man.
36 The half share of those who fought in the battle was:
337,500 sheep, 37 of which the tribute for the LORD was 675;
38 36,000 cattle, of which the tribute for the LORD was 72;
39 30,500 donkeys, of which the tribute for the LORD was 61;
40 16,000 people, of which the tribute for the LORD was 32.
41 Moses gave the tribute to Eleazar the priest as the LORD’s part, as the LORD commanded Moses.
42 The half belonging to the Israelites, which Moses set apart from that of the fighting men- 43 the community’s half—was 337,500 sheep, 44 36,000 cattle, 45 30,500 donkeys 46 and 16,000 people.
May 13th, 2010 at 8:21 pm
Gold, you may be right. The “atrophy” remark wasn’t related to the argument. The #160 post seemed close, as I read it that he saw my argument “whacked” because he viewed me as much. Thanks
May 13th, 2010 at 8:27 pm
Aaron,
Can you please provide evidence of “his incorruptibly perfect goodness” by providing references that are not a Tautology?
If you can manage that can you then also provide similar evidence for your Gods existence with the same restriction?
May 14th, 2010 at 9:09 am
Leios,
Close. Regarding #160 I read that as bob saying both are whacked. The idea and the individual.
If he’d worded it as the individual being whacked, therefor the idea must be then that would have been an ad hominem. But that isn’t what bob said.
May 14th, 2010 at 5:56 pm
Errr…I provided biblical passages of God ordering the slaughter of thousands of people, allowing his soldiers to take any surviving women who hadn’t slept with a man, and taking a share of the plunder resulting from the slaughter of said thousands of people. It certainly wasn’t my intention to provide evidence of ‘his incorruptibly perfect goodness’, quite the contrary.
May 14th, 2010 at 9:32 pm
You might want to add the preference of animals to humans being saved in the big boat, and … well it goes on to there being hell for most people, etc.
Dawkins articulates it quite well, doesn’t he?
May 16th, 2010 at 3:22 pm
leios – dawkins? that takes us back to march 17 and 18 where this chapter started, after our man appeared on close up. br graham-michael didn’t seem too taken with his articulation, but he’s no longer posting so we can’t check
June 6th, 2010 at 10:43 am
hey aaron. your posting 163 has hit the spot apparently re:numbers 31, cos this site has suddenly gone quiet. mind you, not much to be said in defence of that passage is there? what a shame – we will just have to find something else to talk about. not rugby or soccer though please
June 6th, 2010 at 8:44 pm
Aaron, your list of stuff in post 163 ostensibly is offered as evidence that God as per Judeo-Christian WV is not perfectly good. Now, lets grant that you have good understanding of the text and it’s historical background, etc., and consider the moral judgment you appear to be making.
On what grounds are you stating this as evidence against the view you oppose? Are you simply stating that there is some internal logical inconsistency such that it would be irrational to believe both that those things occurred and that God is good? Or are you making a moral claim from a basis or standard outside of that WV that such a God or belief in such a God is evil?
Perhaps you might rather want to say that such a belief or behaviour is undesirable, that you don’t like it, or that it is not PC, or something?
June 8th, 2010 at 7:45 pm
Yes Bob, that post exposes both the appalling barbarism of the people who wrote the bible, and the appalling barbarism that they attribute to their God.
June 12th, 2010 at 8:29 pm
Aaron, your judgment expressed by “appalling barbarism” seems to express personal distaste or disgust of a people who lived some 3000 years ago who do not live up to some current standard that you approve of. From your WV, is this consistent? Perhaps they were less evolved and hadn’t achieved the level of modern civility that you want to read back anachronistically?
On the other hand perhaps you are assuming some objective moral standard that is universally applicable to all cultural and historical era?
So what are the grounds for your judgment?