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Oligo

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Posts posted by Oligo


  1. Ok i will. But what i can tell you right know is that if you've been in one of those meetings and literally seen people with one smaller leg then the other growing in a matter of second to be perfect. Or old people suffering from arthritis to only a few moments later jump up and down like something even a monkey would find hard to do. Is quite amazing! So seing it kinda makes it eaiser to belive, don't you think? So whats my point? If you'd be really interested and curious (oh and) doubtfull the best thing i can recommend is visiting one of those meetings, like i and some friends did.

    About that leg-growth thingy: I would love to see x-rays of the leg before and after the healing. Even better would be to feed the patients some mildly radioactive bone-precursors before the healing so that new bone could be distinguished from the old bone in the x-ray. Unfortunately spiritual healers never want to provide such evidence of their genuineness. Ironically enough, such evidence would definitely increase the amount of people attending the meetings.

    About arthritis: How do you know they really had arthritis? How do you know they didn't just imagine that they got better?

    I also must point out that as a scientist, nothing would thrill me more than the discovery of previously unknown phenomena like spiritual healing. Imagine, a completely new thing to dissect, analyze and exploit.


  2. Those that totaly diss the whole bible and Christianity, what do you say to the millions of people that have been healed and recived tremendous miracles?

    There are two circustances in which I would not consider miraculous healing stories unreliable and therefore irrelevant:

    1. If I personally was miraculously healed. It's easier to believe something, if it happens to yourself. It sort of eliminates the ugly business of lying on purpose. (Of course I admit that one could still be lying to oneself without knowing it, which is what I incidentally think that most of the healing stories and other miracle stories are all about.)

    2. If I was presented with scientific observations (with instruments capable of recording) confirming that a miracle has happened. I'm not talking about dork doctors witnessing crap. I'm talking about taking an x-ray of a broken limb, having a miracle healer heal it and taking an x-ray afterwards. Preferably I would like to be the one taking the x-ray to eliminate the lying factor.


  3. Here is another vague rambling written by a jewish person, which is titled "the future" but could as easily be titled "revelations". It just bristles with hidden meaning, but unfortunately it is a song and not a religious text. Personally I like the style of Leonard better than those little jews who wrote the bible (see below).

    The Future (by Leonard Cohen)

    Give me back my broken night

    my mirrored room, my secret life

    it's lonely here,

    there's no one left to torture

    Give me absolute control

    over every living soul

    And lie beside me, baby,

    that's an order!

    Give me crack and anal sex

    Take the only tree that's left

    and stuff it up the hole

    in your culture

    Give me back the Berlin wall

    give me Stalin and St Paul

    I've seen the future, brother:

    it is murder.

    Things are going to slide, slide in all directions

    Won't be nothing

    Nothing you can measure anymore

    The blizzard, the blizzard of the world

    has crossed the threshold

    and it has overturned

    the order of the soul

    When they said REPENT REPENT

    I wonder what they meant

    When they said REPENT REPENT

    I wonder what they meant

    When they said REPENT REPENT

    I wonder what they meant

    You don't know me from the wind

    you never will, you never did

    I'm the little jew

    who wrote the Bible

    I've seen the nations rise and fall

    I've heard their stories, heard them all

    but love's the only engine of survival

    Your servant here, he has been told

    to say it clear, to say it cold:

    It's over, it ain't going

    any further

    And now the wheels of heaven stop

    you feel the devil's riding crop

    Get ready for the future:

    it is murder

    Things are going to slide ...

    There'll be the breaking of the ancient

    western code

    Your private life will suddenly explode

    There'll be phantoms

    There'll be fires on the road

    and the white man dancing

    You'll see a woman

    hanging upside down

    her features covered by her fallen gown

    and all the lousy little poets

    coming round

    tryin' to sound like Charlie Manson

    and the white man dancin'

    Give me back the Berlin wall

    Give me Stalin and St Paul

    Give me Christ

    or give me Hiroshima

    Destroy another fetus now

    We don't like children anyhow

    I've seen the future, baby:

    it is murder

    Things are going to slide ...

    When they said REPENT REPENT ...


  4. The problem is that vague ramblings like "(Rev 6:1,2) Now I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seven seals, and I heard one of the four living creatures say, as with a voice of thunder, "Come!" And I saw, and behold, a white horse, and its rider had a bow; and a crown was given to him, and he went out conquering and to conquer." could be claimed to mean anything in the past world, in the current world or even in the future.

    If the bible said: "United States of America is one of the four horsemen of apocalypse." you would have my interest. (But then again, no country founded by christians would name itself that if it said so in the bible.)

    I guess my point is this: If you think that your interpretation of that part of the Revelations is correct, why not try to interpret the rest and come out with a plan to avoid the apocalypse? Since if apocalypse is unavoidable, why should we care about it? When they said repent, I didn't know what they meant.


  5. The thing is, no one is denying that the Palestinian "freedom fighters" use terrorist tactics. People are objecting to it and saying that its the wrong way to do it.

    Then again, when did anybody ever gain freedom without using all out warfare to acquire it? (Not counting Gandhi.) Freedom fighters (or whatever you want to call them) have limited options.


  6. So USA attacked Iraq so that it could station its troops there and by that appeasing their oil-rich Saudi friends. Machiavelli would be proud of Bush's team.

    U.S. is appeasing the terrorists? But appeasement is... BAD!


  7. And i agree, going with something with no grounds in fact and believing in it is crazy, much like most religions and most common core aspects of daily life. Though it's not like science has all the answers, it does not have the scope to cover

    everything, and has more than enough of its own massive flaws and huge assumptions. How does science explain becoming concious in dreams? Thats something that is possible, it is absolutley a fact, how does science bring that into focus, out of religion?

    Despite the fact that dreaming is possible, the scientific speculations dont prove so, even if they did, they are just speculations, much like the visions of a priest about the god he doesnt actually know (as in, have any experience of). Then the scientific findings will turn to fact, not based on truth, and be believed, notice a pattern maybe?

    Science does not even pretend to have "all the answers". Scientific process observes the world, then builds hypotheses on these observations and finally proves or disproves the hypotheses with further observation. What we thus have is a gradually evolving description of how the universe and everything in it works. What is so cool about it is that all the observations that were done to build that description can be independently verified by whomever who is suspecting some part of the description of the world. No belief is needed. Everything is based on fact.

    Thus I don't understand your comments on how according to science, dreaming is not possible? What? Clearly dreaming is a fact that each and every one of us can verify by going to sleep. This is the observation and it must be true. The next step would be hypothesis on how dreaming works and experiments to prove that hypothesis. As far as I know, the mechanisms of dreaming are not yet wholly understood, but that merely means that more research has to be done.

    The point is, scientific description of the world is not dogma, because it changes all the time as new data becomes available. If somebody treats it like dogma, the that person is treating science as religion, which is a fallacy.


  8. So people thinking there could be life elsewhere in the universe are religious, because they..think? No, things can be what they are, people can think and believe in whatever they want, without it being "the bud of religion". I am not a religious person at all, i prefer freedom, hehe, but is that religion too?

    See, speculating that there might be life elsewhere in the universe is one thing and believing all the X-files episodes are true is another thing.

    Making speculations based on the data available is a part of science. Taking some totally arbitrary "truth" and then believing in it without any proof whatsoever is religion insofar that it utilizes the same responses of the human brain as institutionalized religion.

    But whateva, rock'n roll foreva, mon! If you honestly cannot see the religious undertones of Morpheus' faith, it really won't fuck up my day.


  9. Believing a prophecy is not a religion. That would mean peeps that beileve nostradamus stuff are in a religion. People sometimes have to believe in something. Technque and guidance systems are not dogma, like learning to use a lighthouse to steer a ship is not dogma when learning to navigate.

    People who choose to believe in the prophecies of Nostradamus are in some level engaging in a religious process. What is the myth of Nostradamus, but a bud of a religion? What is the myth of UFOs, but a bud of a religion? All those have a dogmatic text, a prophet or prophets, deliverance, etc...

    Try to think out of the box.


  10. It's the same reason the death penalty isn't a good idea. Sure, the majority who are killed will deserve it, but there will inevitably be the odd person who is innocent but dies anyway.

    I'm sure the reply to this is going to be: "If you want to make an omelette, you got to break some eggs."

    Blah.

    crazy_o.gif


  11. That bad attitude isn't just restricted to Finland. I'm not trying to bash anyones political beliefs here, but it seems to me that leftists in general follow that pattern of: "legislate our lives from cradle to grave". We have people in Canada calling for a way to regulate (install a speed govenor in) all cars to a 100kp/h speed limit because people keep speeding. I also hear people talk of birth licences. Pathetic, eh?

    I hate the extensive legislation, because it forces me to break the law if I want to keep any of my freedom. Anything that can only harm the person doing it should not be banned.

    Anyway, what do you mean with birth licences? Is it that you have to apply for a permission to have a child? That is actually one law I would very much like to see: No child if you cannot prove that you have resources to take care of it so that other people don't have to pay for your brats.


  12. In order to keep total control over the human race the mashenes have a matrix within a matrix. So when Neo and his friends think their free they are really just in another matrix. Now this is 100% control over the humanity as they believe they are free although they are not.

    There is an alternative explanation to Neo's "superpowers" in the real world. Remember when Smith said that he got something from Neo that set him free, when they touched? Well, maybe Neo got something in return: A way to communicate with the machines, like machine network protocols or something? Remember when Neo says: "Something is different, I can feel them [sentinels] now." He isn't necessarily a human, you know, he could be a cyborg or a robot wearing a Keanu-suit.

    Then again, it's pretty stupid trying to second-guess the plot of a sci-fi movie. biggrin_o.gif


  13. But lets look past the news report here.  Shouldn't we do everything possible to stop terrorists from killing more civilians?  Why should we give a terrorist the same rights we give an innocent person when that very same terrorist wants to kill the innocent person?  Don't you think innocent peoples lives outweigh an evil person's rights?

    How do you propose we can tell whether a person is "good" or "bad"? How can you be 100% certain that somebody is a terrorist and thus should be tortured in order to obtain intel? Please enlighten us.


  14. This will be very hard to agree upon. Whose system is best? Whose Legal system is best? Whose social or pension or tax or wage system is best? There are major differences right now so whos system loses out?

    God I hope the finnish "control every goddamn thing with legislation since people are too dumb to understand anything"-attitude is one of the losing attitudes. I'd pretty much prefer the southern european "who cares what the man says"-attitude.


  15. And when did it say that religion was a form of mind control?  I remember in the first movie morpheus said that you'd get sort of a matrix cookie for going to church (as well as paying your taxes, showing up to work on time, playing OFP), but that's not using it as a form of mind control.

    Hhmmmm, let's see: The humans as depicted in the film, did not have any other religion except the belief on the One (that only some chose to adopt). As far as religions go, worshipping the One fullfills all the landmarks of a religion: temples, prophecies, gifts to the messiah, etc. Unfortunately the whole One-religion was another mind control trick by the machines to keep dissidents like Morpheus the Fanatic under control. Hell, Morpheus might have otherwise dreamed up a plan of his own to cause some real shit to the machines, if he did not blindly believe that the messiah (the One) will deliver everybody as soon as the prophecy is fullfilled and spend all his energy on fullfilling the religious fantasy.

    And the look on the face of the fanatic (Morpheus), when the prophecies turn out to be bullshit... That really made my day, since I'd like to see that look on the face of every fanatically religious dimwit on this planet.   wink_o.gif


  16. Hhm, this is just a wild theory, but maybe UK has the "we won the last war" syndrome? People are thinking along the lines of: "We won that last war, so damn it if we are going to give in voluntarily to THOSE bastards. We rule forever, ok?"

    I see a partial manifestation of that syndrome here in Finland. Although we didn't win the double wars we had back in WWII, all people are still taught in school that we practically won, because the big bad soviet union did not occupy or annex us. So these people think: "We practically won the last wars, so damn it if we are going to give in voluntarily to THOSE bastards. We rule forever, ok?" It's like since so many people died to preserve our independence, it has become a holy thing to keep no matter what.

    If you compare that to the rest of the european countries, most of them got their ass totally kicked by at least once during WWII. If you have no glorious victories to remember, you might be more pragmatic.

    But then again, I'm probably wrong.


  17. I saw Reloaded yesterday. I thought that the action was very nice, just like in the first movie, and I don't really mind any oh-my-god-it-looks-like-CGI-that-sucks-big-time, since in my opinion even computer games have adequate graphics already (it's the story that matters, graphics are just a tool).

    The plot was a lot better than in the first movie, especially since they explained some dumb things that were in the first one. And to include themes like "religion is just one type of mind-control" is excellent in my book. Of course you cannot expect to have a really good plot in an action flick, but the plot of Reloaded was a move to a better direction.

    In my opinion, the shallowness of the characters (they seem a little non-human like a lot of people have whined) is intentional (and even if it is not it fits the movie perfectly). In this way, the characters seem like only half-awake, lost in the question of what is real and what is not, especially since even dreams have the ability to kill you. If you would have to struggle to stay sane every second of your existence, see how human you would appear to your peers. The best demonstration of what I mean is the sex scene, where Neo, engaged in the very basic vertebra level action of screwing, is still unable to shake the anxiety and ends up reliving his vision of Trinity's death (dreams invading the reality again).

    I think you should be clinically depressed to truly appreciate Matrix:Reloaded, because then you could really indentify with the half-awake-half-asleep characters.


  18. I don't know enough to argue whether every response from a human can be predicted and is wholly based on genetics and experience, but in my opinion, a computer isn't truly intelligent while it is merely a program running through predetermined lines of code.

    Every response from a human is wholly base on genetics and experience, but cannot be predicted due to the randomness in nature (see the random number thread).


  19. That's the only quasi-positive side I see to it. But does that mean Cold War II?

    I don't know. What I do know is that I don't want to live in a world shaped by the politicos selected by the voters of U.S. of A. Their view of the world is way too simple to my liking.


  20. Smaller countries like Finland, Portugal and the soon-to-become-members from Eastern Europe fear that a federation will mean that they'll have no say - that the federation would be dominated by the larger countries.

    Politicos of small countries are whining, because they are fearing for their power.

    Without a federal europe there will be no counter-power to US ultra-far-right-religious world domination. Not good.

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