Re: Ben Stein: Win His Career


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On Wed, 28 May 2008 10:19:42 -0500, "Suzanne" <shiloh7@xxxxxxxxx>
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"Rupert Morrish" <rupert@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
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Suzanne wrote:
"Ritsjoena" <bramvandam@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
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On May 12, 6:34 pm, "Suzanne" <shil...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
"Glend" <interelectromagne...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
[major snip]
No, idiots have tampered with people reading the
Bible in school or any reference to any kind of
religion. So it's not really the same as it was when
I was a child. That's what my comment above was
all about. It never was disallowed to teach evolution
theory. What this is about now, is not that they want
the right to teach evolution, that never was not taught.
But the Bible has been attacked and the people do not
want that.

Your use of English makes it very hard to work out what you are
saying. "It never was disallowed to teach evolution theory." is a
very
badly put statement that is also wrong.

Saying that something "never was disallowed" is a
literary form of protest against someone saying
that something never was allowed. This is a form of
editorial writing. It's not wrong, it's considered to be
very colorful.

It is TOTALLY wrong, and any English teacher would throw the book at
you for using such appalling phrasing.

Something like "The teaching of evolution theory has never been
disallowed" would have been better - even though you would still be
wrong because we all know it was banned.

Bob, you misunderstand some things.

Rarely.

Do tell.

I don't
know where you live,

Gloucester, UK.

OK, UK.

but haven't you ever heard,
someone say "you can't do (something)," and a
person responds by saying "you can't (afford to)
NOT do (something)"...?

There are people who abuse English in that way - it doesn't make it
right.

All right, we have established that you are
not familiar with American English.

I've spent a reasonable amount of time translating it into real
English.

Probably
also not Irish English, or Australian English,
or South African English, or Goergia English,
or New York English, or Bostonian English, or
Florida English, or Alabama English, or Texas
English, or Minnesota English, or California
English, either. We all speak it a little differently
than you probably do.

But most try to get it right when they write it.

I have a feeling this is going over your head. (This
is an expression in English.)

You are talking to
someone that teaches ESL, Conversational English,
Accent Reduction, and Basic Understanding of
Spoken and Written Styles of English?

Then you should learn to write English correctly.

I do know how to write English correctly, Bob, but
I am in a newsgroup speaking converstational
American English and not the proper King's
English. For that matter, you no longer speak
the King's English, either, because you don't
use "thy," "thou," or "thine." Even your English
has changed, Bob.

I do not make any of the basic mistakes you do.

You are not speaking correct English. You are
speaking a modern adapation of it. True English
most people can't understand.

Have you
never heard catchey expressions replied to common
styles, for example, someone says "No way!" and
another responds, "Yes, way!!"...? I normally don't
tell anyone this, but I've had people that are orators
say they love the way that I put words together, and
that it is modern and refreshing.

It is also, from many example here, wrong.

There is a standard of English that is acceptable in the street, on a
face to face basis. The standards are higher when you come to written
English.

Ok, your error ridden text read: "It never was disallowed to teach
evolution theory. What this is about now, is not that they want the
right to teach evolution, that never was not taught. But the Bible has
been attacked and the people do not want that."

Should have read: "The teaching of evolution theory was never
disallowed. What this is now about is not that they want the right to
teach evolution, but that the bible has been attacked and some people
do not want that."

That has now put it into reasonably correct English. However, it still
contains one major error, the very first sentence is factually wrong.

How many people in here have been so lucky
as to have gotten an English lesson from you?

"gotten"? I thin you mean "received".

You "thin" so, do you?

I've seen some positively atrocious usage of
English in here. I am so lucky, I must say. : )

In what way are you "so lucky"?

That's an American way of saying something in
an ironic manner, actually. It's sort of slight
humor, which is usually socially acceptable in
most circles.

Perhaps where you
live, they don't allow this...? You can't pick up a
novel, see a movie, or a play, or read a good editorial,
but what it is displayed that people do talk and also
write this way. The expressive modern ways of talking
and writing are meant to make the reader, or hearer,
stop and really think about what the author is saying,
and not just skim past it blindly.

The bible has no place in school - other than in a comparative
religion class. It certainly has no place in a science class.

The Bible does have a place in school.

Yes, but ONLY in a comparative religion class where is can be compared
with other religious works on an equal basis.

Possibly you are younger than I am,

I'm 54.

I'm 68. En Garde.

You act, and write, like a pre-teen.

It's more like the dialog(ue) in a Cary Grant
flick (movie).

but when I was
growing up, it was a wonderful part of our lives in
school.

No, it was a complete waste of time.

That bad, huh?

I do regret the time wasted on religion when I was in school.

You had religion in school? Did you go to a
Catholic school? Would you mind terribly
explaining? I'm interested.

It was not in a class, it was a lifestyle that
was conveyed and it was a good lifestyle that it put
forth. The few people that were atheists did not take
issue over it and were glad that there were goals and
ideals being upheld that had been advanced by the
reading of the Bible,

What about Jews, Muslims, Hindus....? What about 'other' christian
faiths that do not approve of the KJV bible? In today's society it is
not acceptable to impose religion on kids.

If you don't introduce children to the Bible, then
YOU have decided for them and have pushed YOUR
belief down their throats.

Not at all. Unlike some people I do consider it right to teach school
kids about religion. Probably about the age of 11 or 12. By that time
they are developed enough to deal with it. But they must be taught
about religion, not about one particular religion.

In your mind, in your way of viewing the world,
and under certain conditions, perhaps. But in my
world, someone intruded into it and murdered my
father when I was very young, before I even went
to school. The Lord made his presence known to
me and he wanted me to trust him, which, in a short
time, I made the decision to do. He came into my
heart and my life in a strong way, and he has been
in my life ever since. It wasn't "religion" that helped
me, it was the Lord, himself. By that, I am saying
that religion is like an anesthetic that dulls someone's
fears. The Lord takes the fears away with his love
and care for a person. I learned this first hand way
before reading verses about that such as this one:
1 John 4:18: "There is no fear in love; but perfect
love casteth our fear: because fear hath torment. He
that feareth is not made perfect in love."
We are not the ones with the perfect love, God is
towards us. Even if we have faith that is no bigger
than the size of a mustard seed, it is enough faith,
if we sow it continually.

The children that you exclude who didn't make it
to their 11th or 12th birthday, do need something
more than just nothing to hang onto. They all have
things happen to them that you may not know about.
As for whether a person should study all the religions
in the world, I don't agree with that. The ultimate goal
is to find the Lord, so you can't improve upon perfection.
If you have him, you have all that you need.

In so doing that, you don't
allow them to have the freedom to choose for
themselves what to believe,

Children don't, that is why religion is very dangerous to young kids.
If taught properly, at the right age, then the can make up their
minds.

I have a feeling that you are perhaps talking
about your own experience. Is this right? And
if so, then I can see your point if you did not
get the right information to begin with. There
are many religions in the world that teach that
you have to obtain perfection by your own
efforts if you want to be acceptable to God.
People can't be perfect, no matter how hard
they try. Salvation is not a "clean up your act
and then come" scenario. It's more like a
"come as you are" party. For example, look
at these words:
In Matthew 11:27, Jesus is speaking here
saying "All things are delivered unto me of my
Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the
Father; neither knoweth any man the Father,
save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son
will reveal him."
This is as what happened to me when I was
7 years old. He was revealed to me. Then look
at what is said after this that is the plea from
the Son for someone to do, and these I've
memorized because of the comfort that they
bring:
28. "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are
heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
29. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me;
for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall
find rest unto your souls.
30. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."

and in fact, you will have
hidden things from them that people the world over
put their trust in. Great Scott, Man, even the Muslims
read the Bible! Didn't you know that?

Yes, sadly that is true.

and many of them today can
quote the Bible, and even admire some of the better
known and quoted verses.

Poor kids.

Poor kids, baloney! They still will get into problems,
but at least this way, when the going gets rough, they
will have something to encourage them to do better.

Hohohohoho! What a laugh. Read the bible, learn how to rape, kill,
steal lie.

The Bible tells that people do that, but it says not to
do those things. So why are you saying this?

It could, just remotely, have a place in a history class in a lesson
on "look at the stupid things our ancestors used to believe."

I am happy to know that you can express yourself
freely in speech, even though I do not agree with
you.

own comments and not allow anyone else to make their own
comments. Dawkins, for example, was allowed to read his
whole description of God. He was allowed to express what
he believed, and his statements were allowed to be in the
film. Of course Stein stated his opinion, too. But he still
allowed Dawkins comments to be in the film and Dawkins
also must have approved of his role in being in the film as
See the controversy about that. Dawkins approved of a film of a
different kind.

Thank you, I shall.
well. Ben expressed how he felt about many things, and
all of them were his opinion. Both Dawkins and Stein seemed
to be in agreement that a single cell is a very, very
complicated
structure, far more so than people formerly believed. The
animation within the film of the intracies of a single cell was
worth the price of admission, by itself, alone. It goes without
saying that I would believe that a single cell is created by a
Creator, since you all know me to be a Christian. But for
whatever reasons you think about it's origins, don't act as
though a single cell is so simple.
The cell being complex is not enough reason for me that a
creator
must
exist. I see no reason why such a thing could not arise by
natural
means. The cell might be complex, its origins (or the processes
by
which is becomes so) does not have to be complex (can be complex
of
course).

That's very interesting. I don't know that we have enough
information to say how an original cell started.

Several current hypotheses are summarized here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenesis

I have previously read this, thank you. It is very
interesting, truly. It does not tell the complications
of a single cell though,

It wouldn't. It is talking about a point far earlier in the
development of life.

and that is what there is
no evidence of...a simple single cell that started
life

The cell came long after the start of life.

You were there? : )

My ancestors were.

And did they actually tell you that they were
non-cells at one time?

Yes, they have done that by leaving parts of their DNA/RNA in modern
life.

No, you don't have the first life forms.
You don't know how life began on the
earth.

We know life did start on Earth. We know all life today is descended
from a common ancestor.

Human beings did not come from one being.
They come from the union of two beings.

Like all the things that we don't know that are
being discovered as we speak that will be
revealed. They've found the colossal squid.
Ten years ago it was not found.

All you have is what has been found.
Don't you know there are millions of things
you don't know, that have not been found,
that are pieces of the puzzle?

Like?

What do you mean by that? Do you think
that you have full knowledge of everything
that there is to know? Don't you know that
people don't know everything there is to
know?

Sure, form a
"picture" of things with what you have got.
But don't make that be absolute. Leave some
room for differences that you don't know
about. Let me give you an example:
-
You undoubtedly know about plate movements
on the earth and how the continents have drifted
apart...that there was at one time a single continent
that we call Pangaea? That continent split into
Eurasia and Gondwanaland. It used to be that
in my lifetime, people didn't even know that much.
Now we know that before there was a Pangaea, there
was another configuration of continents that were
strewn in a ring around the earth laterally, and that
those continents came together to form Pangaea.
New information keeps changing one's concept of
what the beginning was.

And where would we be on that if we had not thrown off the
straight-jacket of religion?

I hate to break this to you, but the world still has
religions in it. There are plenty of scientists that
discover things every day that have religious
beliefs. Perhaps something in your life is different
than I know about.

Or did someone else tell
you what he thought they were and when he
thought they lived?...someone attempting to at
least try to figure it out, given the limited
knowledge that he had some years ago?

Knowledge is building all the time, and that includes our ability to
decode the messages past life have left us.

But you are saying that in the beginning life
began a certain way that you expect,

What we can say is that it was a natural process. No supernatural
processes have ever been found.

I'm really not sure what you are saying here.
Why should you have to detect supernatural
processes, and for that matter, how would
you propose to do that? Though human beings
have only two sets of natural teeth, and they
have to buy some after that, why do you think
it is that we don't make a third set, even though
some will live past their two natural sets of
teeth?

and you
are not able to say how it began in the beginning
because you are basing your ideas only on what
is known. You are not factoring in the unknown.

As I said was "What we can say is that it was a natural process. No
supernatural processes have ever been found."

and managed to produce all that we have that
is very complicated. That part is still just theory.
What amazes me is this idea said in this article
that even allows that alien forms of life could
be what started life on the earth. This shows that
no one knows how life began on this planet.

Of course there is a possibility that life started off-planet, but
not
a high probability. Certainly many of the building blocks of life
came
from space where they are quite common.

And where did life come from on that
supposed alien source? And what alien
source are you considering?

Personally I don't favour panspermia, but if it is true then it just
moves abiogenesis to another point in our galaxy.

If scientists come to a place where they can see
that an intelligent being in some other location in
the universe actually was responsible for life forming
on the earth, I wonder if they will ever see that it's
possible that this "alien" being's name might be
already known on earth as "God?"

Gods are the invention of primitive man, we have outgrown the need for
them now.

That may be true of some gods. But that is not true
of the God of the Bible.

It is true of ALL gods.

You say that you can't detect anything supernatural,
so you therefore conclude that only what you know
about exists. Now listen carefully. It sounds like you
are saying that you know all things.

He is what is keeping our
planet and our univese from flying apart into a million
pieces.

Hohohohoho! You do have some very funny ideas.

You think so?

There is a great
difference between who some think that God is,
and who he really is. Think of him as being the
intelligent alien that created life on earth,

Then he would not be a god. Look up the definition of a god.

Why not!
Number 1 answer: Merriam-Webser online:
God:
1. captitalized: the supreme or ultimate reality: as a:
the Being perfect in power, wisdom, and goodness who
is worshipped as creator and ruler of the universe.

What is this "reality"?

Gods are fiction, no reality involved.

For starters, reality is knowing that you don't know
everything. You've already said that you can't
detect what is supernatural, and you therefore
conclude that all gods are man-made. You can only
"scientifically" conclude that if you know all things.
You don't know all things.


that also
desires to make contact with his creations through
internal, built in means and inward thoughts.

That part
surely is still a theory.

No, none of them yet have survived sufficient attempts at
falsification
to
be called a theory.

I am meaning that it is still a theory as to how
life began on the earth.

No, it is not yet a theory.

It is a theory how life began on earth unless
one considers what the Bible says.

No. It is NOT a theory. Learn what is meant by a "theory" in science.
We know, beyond all doubt, that abiogenesis occurred, we can see it
from the geological record. However, we need a lot more research
before action theories of how abiogenesis occurred can be put forth.

If you cannot prove how life began on the earth,
and you can't, then that part is a theory.

Once again, please go away and learn what the 'theory' is in science.

I know what theory means in science. I am talking
about your THEORY about how life began on the
earth, not about the systematic "theory" study of a
field of science based on known evidences.

I don't have a theory. I do have evidence.

But you don't have evidence of supernatural things
because you don't have a supernatural detector. There
was a time when people didn't know there were
Roentgen rays. Now they do. There was as time when
they didn't know there were other galaxies. Now they
do. There was a time when they didn't know how to
help people not get polio. Now they know. There was
a time when they didn't know how to do some of the
operations they can do now. Now they know how to
do them. There was a time when people thought that
if Christopher Columbus sailed west, he would fall
off the edge of the world. Now they know better. You
don't know all things.

At best,
you surely must realize opinions about how life
began on the earth are simply opinions based on
what facts are currently known. Unless you think
you have all the facts there are to know (and
scientists do not think that), then you have to call
that part a theory.

Learn what the 'theory' is in science.

Learn the other usage of the word "theory,"
and don't get them confused again.

It is you that is getting confused.

I'm not confused at all about it. Scientific
theory is a speculation based on what evidence
is tangible, and that only for a probe to test
a hypothesis, to see if it is true. It's a probe.

No more of this thing you are
saying that I need to learn what theory is. That's
nonsense. I am not talking about the study of
evolution as scientific theory, I am <ahem>
talking origins. (Catchey name...what?)

But you need to learn what the word 'theory' means in science. You
keep misusing it.

No, I am NOT misusing it.

Yes you are.

If I say you have a
theory as to how life began on the earth, I am
not speaking of a scientific field of study. I am
speaking of your own personal viewpoint of
how life began on the earth.

Then make that clear when you use the word.

I just think that people are surprised
to find out that a single cell can be as complex as it is.

Way more complex than any known designer would make it, for sure.

I saw a news article in the past year that said scientists
had finally figured out what it is that makes aged wine
taste like aged wine. But thousands of years ago, Jesus
made new wine at the wedding in Cana,

No he didn't.

Yes he did.

No he did not. It is not possible to change water into wine - it is a
fairy story.

Is real.

Rubbish.

Your problem is that you don't believe the Bible
is true.

Of course not, I know too much about it.

And that is because you know everything. : )

You should see the program on TV that
is called "The Naked Archaeologist." Last week, they
showed writing from the Hebrews found in caves
that quote the great Shema,

So what?

that is 1,000 years older
than the oldest manuscript of the Bible that is found
in the Dead Sea Scrolls.

So about 1,200 BC. So what?

I think it is older than that. But I'd have
to see it again. I do have it recorded.

I highly recommend this show.

It can be fun, but I would not take it too seriously.

http://www.historyinternational.com/nakedarchaeologist/

It is really a nice show.

and he made it
so that it would have the flavor of aged wine. The
servants, Mary and Jesus alone knew this. The maitre d'
did not and he tasted the wine and exclaimed that he
thought the host had saved the best wine for the last.
It was the custom that you served the best wine first
then, so that when people were slightly tipsy, they
may not notice the flavor of the later distributed wine.
When they ran out of wine, Jesus still made the best.

Fairy story.

No, it's not.

Yes it is.

Jacob struggled with God, and came to the conclusion
because of the struggle that God was certainly there,
and he wanted God's blessing upon his inner emptiness
for having cheated his brother and father. God took away
all his "evil" (sins) and left him with a peace, that he
even acknowledged years later: Genesis 48:16. This was
upon the occasion of the blessing of the sons (grandsons)
he had from Jacob. On that earlier occasion, Jacob's name
was changed curiously to Israel, which meant that he
was one who had struggled with God and who also prevailed.
Within his name that he was then given anew, is the presence
of a pagan god right up against the true God, curiously:
Is-ra-el. Most people struggle with this internal battle where
a false god is struggling to survive against the true God.
Some prevail. Prevailing seems to mean that the person
more than believes, he receives (the blessing.). It's real.

Bronze age fairy stories.

No it's not.

Yes it is.

Tell me, do you accept the stories of Greek Mythology? Are their gods
different to yours?

I would not know what or who their God was.

Forty odd years ago I was instrumental in getting one of England's
major book retailers to stop putting some books in a "religion"
section and others in a "mythology" section. After all, there is no
difference between any of the gods - they are all equally fictitious.

How did you get him to do that? What kinds of books
were they?

It would be no problem for the Lord to have made a
vintage earth and universe.

Why?

Why not? : )

So you cannot answer the question.

I did answer the question, with a question that you
cannot answer.

Then you did not answer the question.

I did answer the question with a question that
is prerequisite to answering the question.

There is no prerequisite. Just answer the question or admit you have
no answer.

That's
your problem, not mine. You didn't answer it.

Will you answer the question? Yes or no?

You have not asked a question someone can
give you an answer for.

Suzanne

.

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