The last big frontier: A movement of staunch conservatives and doomsday-watchers to the inland north-west is quietly gaining steam
Hmm. Sounds like someone's setting up Galt's Gulch.
- Hot
- New
- Categories...
- Producer's Lounge
- Producer's Vault
- The Gulch: Live! (New)
- Ask the Gulch!
- Going Galt
- Books
- Business
- Classifieds
- Culture
- Economics
- Education
- Entertainment
- Government
- History
- Humor
- Legislation
- Movies
- News
- Philosophy
- Pics
- Politics
- Science
- Technology
- Video
- The Gulch: Best of
- The Gulch: Bugs
- The Gulch: Feature Requests
- The Gulch: Featured Producers
- The Gulch: General
- The Gulch: Introductions
- The Gulch: Local
- The Gulch: Promotions
- Marketplace
- Members
- Store
- More...
I see scared people running away from things. Many of these "preppers" as they're known are not preparing for a Fed, soft-money-driven economic collapse, but for a zombie apocalypse, a nuclear winter, rising sea levels, asteroid impacts, etc. While I'm sure many are well versed in the political problems we have today and have concluded it will all collapse one day, they solution appears to be to hide alone somewhere, not to build something better.
If you want a true gulch-builder, look to the Seasteading Institute.
I currently live in a somewhat remote part of upper Midwest. I have sufficient financial resources to live as I please and learn skills I deem necessary. I do what I want for me not the looters. When and if the country returns to its roots and tenants of the Constitution then perhaps, just perhaps mind you, I would consider using my considerable abilities to assist in building or re-building of that country.
My understanding is that atheists insist there is no God, where agnostics are more open minded and, simply, want some kind of evidence before they will believe.
Would I be invited to live in "their" Gulch? I have to assume that my moral lifestyle would be all I needed for entrance, but swearing obedience to their chosen deity is not in the cards.
In Atlas Shrugged, just repeating of the oath required something more, an integrity that understood and believed the reason for the oath. It was nothing like those willing go through the formality of saying the Pledge of Allegiance or taking an oath in court as a witness or a jury member. One time as witness I had made arrangement with the defense attorney to have a secular oath. Of course that did not happen and I replied 'No' to the religious one with some stirring of the jury. They expected everyone to acknowledge a god so they had to go hunt up the Wisconsin secular oath. I got a little fear in me that maybe the judge would try some contempt of court thing on me. Lucked out. Same happened with jury duty oaths. Sad that they always have to hunt around for the secular version.
I suffer from chronic back pain and spasms. To people who have never had back spasms, I may appear to be a loafer. This doesn't mean that my pain isn't real, just that most people who have never suffered from debilitating back pain have difficulty believing it is as bad as it is.
No...as much as I need believable evidence to prove there IS a God, I would have to actually see something to prove to me that there is not. I'm not yet willing to commit myself to either side of the issue.
Maybe you believe that an atheist is one who says that there is no god? But the word atheist is composed of the Greek 'a' (without) and 'theist' (one who believes in the existence of god). No evidence is needed to be an atheist. Evidence can only rationally be needed for something in order to consider it real. If someone says he has evidence for god, then that is something positive about reality so you can have him prove that the evidence exists. If he cannot then he is wrong. If he can then you can decide whether it is correct that the evidence is actually for a god.
I know a guy who swears that back when he was using drugs that at a lunch counter two demons sat down next to him and then more recently he claims that it was god telling him that he was living his life wrong when he was knocked face down on his driveway with a heart attack. I would discount both of his beliefs because he has no evidence to link to actual demons or to an actual god. A Jehovah Witness stopped by a couple of times to prove that god exists. The evidence he gave was the fact that the trees, etc. are too complex and have design so god must exist since that could not happen without an consciousness. But he was not pointing out any kind of complexity but rather simple patterns noticeable to a human mind and no connection to any god like thing.
Deduction from evidence for a god requires more than first assuming a god and defining
its properties and then finding stuff that fits the definition. You have to find stuff first that would imply the existence of a god.
You say, "...as I need believable evidence to prove there IS a God, I would have to actually see something to prove to me that there is not." You are correct about the first part, but see something that does not exist is impossible. There is no evidence for what does not exist, only 'no evidence' for showing that something positive exists. An absence of a belief can be changed when some positive evidence is seen that implies that something is there to exist. A newly born baby begins life without a belief in the existence of a god and is an atheist whether it has the ability to call itself or not.
What I am doing here is called atheism which tries to give reasons why a theist's belief might be incorrect. It is usually a waste of time but you seem to want to be rational about existence.
Here is the definition from a standard dictionary.
“atheist
Pronunciation: /ˈāTHēəst/
noun
A person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or gods”
http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s962R...
and you will know what you face. Right?
My late sister couldn't wait to get to heaven to hear heavenly music for eternity. That would truly be hell. She could not get her mind around what eternity would mean.