The "Voluntary Human Extinction Movement" Poll

[RandFan]

The altar of evolution is that which rejects the God of Abraham, and worships the Earth, and Nature.

Are you talking about pagans or atheists/agnostics? I used to believe that atheists "believed" in atheism and that atheism was a sort of religion.

"Atheism is a religion as not collecting stamps is a hobby".

Needless to say that I don't believe that anymore.

You must be Christian if you came to argue ID.

I was deist at that point. I was raised Mormon.

I'm Christian, but I knew better than to go there. I came simply to brawl with God-haters.

I'm not sure how you hate what you believe doesn't exist. I don't hate Santa Claus I just don't believe in him.

I believe that evolution will cure all natural ills.

What does this mean? How will evolution cure all natural ills?

 

[Huntster]

Originally Posted by Huntster :
The altar of evolution is that which rejects the God of Abraham, and worships the Earth, and Nature.

Are you talking about pagans or atheists/agnostics? I used to believe that atheists "believed" in atheism and that atheism was a sort of religion.

"Atheism is a religion as not collecting stamps is a hobby".

Needless to say that I don't believe that anymore.

Those who worship at the altar of evolution are pagans.

Atheism is a religion.

I'm Christian, but I knew better than to go there. I came simply to brawl with God-haters.

I'm not sure how you hate what you believe doesn't exist. I don't hate Santa Claus I just don't believe in him.

I don't necessarily hate anything. You don't necessarily have to hate something to whip it or kill it.

And I do believe that God-haters are out there. Indeed, they infiltrate this forum.

I don't hate Santa Claus. I was Santa Claus, and when I have grandchildren, I'll be Santa Claus again.

I believe that evolution will cure all natural ills.

What does this mean? How will evolution cure all natural ills?

It's God's design. Call it ID............

If it no longer fits, it disappears; it evolves; it changes.

It's perfect. He did a great job.

 

[H3LL]

Why isn't Asimov's vision of a Trantor-like planet a viable option with a population of 45,000,000,000.

Animals smell and all that green stuff is stuck in mud...Eeuuuk!!




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[RandFan]

Those who worship at the altar of evolution are pagans.

By what definition?

Atheism is a religion.

By what definition?

Again, atheism is a religion as not collecting stamps is a hobby. Atheists don't pray. Atheists don't have any rituals or rules specific to not believing in a god. There is no dogma. There is no absolute truth. To call it a religion is to bugger the definition of religion.

I don't necessarily hate anything. You don't necessarily have to hate something to whip it or kill it.

Whatever, you said "God-haters".

And I do believe that God-haters are out there. Indeed, they infiltrate this forum.

You still haven't explained how you can hate that which you don't believe exists...

I don't hate Santa Claus. I was Santa Claus, and when I have grandchildren, I'll be Santa Claus again.

So anyone who acts the part of another becomes that person? So a person only needs to act like god... If so then I believe in god.

However, I don't believe there is a guy who rides around in a sleigh driven by flying reindeer and I don't believe there is some mystical or metaphysical being who cares if I'm a Christian or a Muslim or a Jew. And since I don't believe such a being exists then I can't hate him anymore than the mythical person who wears a red suit and lives at the north pole.

It's God's design. Call it ID............

If it no longer fits, it disappears; it evolves; it changes.

It's perfect. He did a great job.

Perfect? Parasites, bacteria, viruses and predators that kill people are hardly what I would call perfect design. A urinary tract that runs through a prostate is hardly a perfect design. My mother is suffering from Parkinsons. Hardly a perfect design.

You still haven't answered the question.

Evolution has never reached stasis. There is an arms race between predator and prey. Further there are ever changing environmental factors that present new challenges and animals and plants are stressed and suffer and many simply become extinct. So, many ills are never cured. There is only temporary reprieve of some problems. Evolution doesn't cure ills so much as it equips species with the ability to survive for a time.

 

[AWPrime]

Because it's nature.

If you think that is nature then don't complain when a pack of wild animals ate your family.

The population of China is the equivalent of nearly 1/5 of the planet's humanity. They feed themselves.

However the environmental stress of their current population is already turning land in to desert.

For decades the United States, during the Cold War, was the bread basket of the world. We produce much more food even today than we consume, even though we are told that we are "fat" and "gluttonous".

While the soil becomes less and less productive.

 

[bigred]

The people who NEED to stop having human litters not only will probably never hear the arguments against it, but they feel it to be their right to do so - in some cases, their divinely ordained duty to do so (see India, the Catholics, and American white trash).

....or are stupid enough to think more kids = more money (thanks to the brilliance that is welfare) so it's a good thing (see: black trash).

Re. Catholics, they hardly think they are "divinely ordained"

 

[bigred]

Catholics are creating more Catholics

So other theists as well as atheists aren't having kids anymore?? sweet!

(I'm a lapsed-Catholic myself).

surprise surprise. Key word there I think is "lapsed"

It also creates horrible situations where people are forbidden by the Vatican from using birth control, as if having more kids than you can afford to feed is better than slipping on a small sheet of latex.

I don't agree w/their policy on birth control either, but FYI they don't say "have as many kids as possible" - they say "use 'natural' methods, eg timing w/the woman's cycle, abstaining, whatever. If you don't know why, you're more lapsed then you realize. Again not to say I applaud it or agree w/it.

American white trash suck the Welfare system, and create well above the 2 child replacement rate - and raise them in poverty and ignorance. They arrogantly produce human litters because they know they will lead to more money from everybody else just being handed to them.

Well we agree on the welfare mentality yahoos, although in my experience/research/understanding it's a far worse problem w/black trash than white (and no that isn't an attempt to strike a blow against blacks so those whipping out the well-worn race card spare us) - maybe white trash is as bad or worse, just not my impression. I will say having lived not far from some white trashy areas (ultimately why I moved in fact) their families weren't or didn't seem large, and having known people who are or were social workers working the ghettos, it remains a big problem. Certainly that mindless welfare mentality is a big problem either way though.

Indians have a birth rate that will lead that nation to a higher population than China in a few decades. That population alone will be of a magnitude that may (or maybe not, but why should the world chance it?) exceed the capacity to feed it.

Couldn't say on this one. ouch. Hope not. Wonder why ie is it cultural, religious, both, neither - ?

 

[Orwell]

Anybody out there read "Death of the West" by Pat Buchanan?

Anybody out there read "Mein Kampf" by Adolf Hitler?

Oh lordy! I invoke Godwin's law on myself!

 

[RandFan]

Anybody out there read "Mein Kampf" by Adolf Hitler?

Oh lordy! I invoke Godwin's law on myself!

He struggled, I struggle, we all struggle.

Anybody out there read The Little Prince? Dear Ed did that book ever suck.

 

[Roadtoad]

No, The Drudge Manifesto sucked. I'll stick with Stephen Ambrose.

 

[shemp]

I hear My Pet Goat is a good summer read.

 

[Polaris]

Yup. Those are the "dirty words".



Since I'm not a "super-religious Muslim", I can't respond with authority, but it appears to me that the RCC is not ignoring the policy.

The province on Xianjiang is mainly made of Muslim Uighars - they do not allow the PRC to enforce population control there.

It's my opinion that athiests are creating more athiests - I consider athiesm to be a crime against humanity because of the self-centered focus, misery, and suffering it brings to its followers.....

Atheism isn't a religion. Atheism doesn't perpetuate itself through fear and guilt.

Because it's nature.

So are viruses.

It beats illegal immigration/invasion. Your children learn how to work by performing the labor necessary for basic life, instead of allowing "voluntary slavery", which translates to voluntary invasion.

America needs a touch of Latin mellowness. We're too uptight. And anyway, when was the last time you heard the phrase "lazy Mexican". I'm sure they're like baby pigeons - they exist but you never see one. You can't say the same for white trash.

The population of China is the equivalent of nearly 1/5 of the planet's humanity. They feed themselves.

They have population control. India does not. India has problems feeding itself.

For decades the United States, during the Cold War, was the bread basket of the world. We produce much more food even today than we consume, even though we are told that we are "fat" and "gluttonous".

We are fat and gluttonous. That has more to do with what is eaten and what activity follows the eating than food production.

I fed my family on a small truck farm, which supplemented my hunting for wild game and raising livestock. This in Alaska, with a growing season of less than 100 days.

Let me guess; for you, food originates at the grocery store.

Yes - because I have other things to do than waste my time farming. I'm not a farmer. There are farmers who grow the food. Why should I take time to grow my own food when there are other people for whom that is their full-time job? By your logic we'd all still be stuck in the Paleolithic Age, spending more time finding food than creating technology and specialization.

You have no idea what can and will feed the Chinese and Indians. You don't even know who feeds you.

Farmers and ranchers feed me. Not every land has the growing capacity we do. Eventually, with uncontrolled populations, food production WILL run out. Other things probably will run out first, like living space and materials for other consumable products, but food production is also finite. And that's not counting the factor that, quite frankly, large families where the provider cannot afford to provide for all the hungry mouths are cruel. Any situation that dictates "too bad, our (pride/God) demands it" is, to me, disgusting.

 

[Rob Lister]

Farmers and ranchers feed me. Not every land has the growing capacity we do. Eventually, with uncontrolled populations, food production WILL run out.

I'll just pick one to touch on (as Hunster's arguments, while valid in some areas, are too silly to address in others).

This assumes uncontrolled populations. Uncontrolled assumes no controller. Many such controller's exist, both natural and 'man-made'.

A natural controller is survivial security and prosperity; they tend to naturally postpone/reduce new kids.

A man-made controller is education and penalty. Both will work to some degree but neither should be taken to a far extream, IMO.

I've seen one or two papers that puts the 'natural', un-regulated, population at a stable 9-12 billion. I don't know the specifics of either nor all the assumptions on which they base those numbers. We can easily sustain that number at the current level of human existance (meaning, the same percentage still don't get enough to eat and the same percentage still get too much).

In short, unless an good case is made that this is not the case, I'm going to continue believing that it is. My fall back position is that we in the west continue to be able to feed and house our not-so-growing population and finally succumb to the reality that other non-western civilizations must fend for themselves. A strong military may be necessary to secure that goal.

Not all things in nature are pretty to the one creature in nature that can understand the nature of pretty.

 

[Orwell]

Those who worship at the altar of evolution are pagans.

If the evidence supporting the existence of god (or any other deity) was as numerous and compelling as the evidence that supports evolution, I would be a pretty fervent "believer" (if we define belief as any cognitive content held as true).

 

[Polaris]

I'll just pick one to touch on (as Hunster's arguments, while valid in some areas, are too silly to address in others).

This assumes uncontrolled populations. Uncontrolled assumes no controller. Many such controller's exist, both natural and 'man-made'.

A natural controller is survivial security and prosperity; they tend to naturally postpone/reduce new kids.

A man-made controller is education and penalty. Both will work to some degree but neither should be taken to a far extream, IMO.

I've seen one or two papers that puts the 'natural', un-regulated, population at a stable 9-12 billion. I don't know the specifics of either nor all the assumptions on which they base those numbers. We can easily sustain that number at the current level of human existance (meaning, the same percentage still don't get enough to eat and the same percentage still get too much).

In short, unless an good case is made that this is not the case, I'm going to continue believing that it is. My fall back position is that we in the west continue to be able to feed and house our not-so-growing population and finally succumb to the reality that other non-western civilizations must fend for themselves. A strong military may be necessary to secure that goal.

Not all things in nature are pretty to the one creature in nature that can understand the nature of pretty.

Oh I definitely think that prosperity is an excellent controller - especially when combined with secularism. The problem is when under- or undeveloped nations with high religious fundamentalism and almost zero control live side by side with and can see into controlled, prosperous, secular nations. Those are conditions for barbarian hordes to overrun the place. Yes I'm being dramatic on purpose.

 

[Orwell]

Oh I definitely think that prosperity is an excellent controller - especially when combined with secularism. The problem is when under- or undeveloped nations with high religious fundamentalism and almost zero control live side by side with and can see into controlled, prosperous, secular nations. Those are conditions for barbarian hordes to overrun the place. Yes I'm being dramatic on purpose.

Wohoo! Them barbarian hordes! And you're "civilised", right? There's no religious fundamentalists in our "controlled, prosperous, secular nations"...

Frankly, I have trouble figuring out who the barbarians are most of the time...

 

[RandFan]

Wohoo! Them barbarian hordes! And you're "civilised", right? 'Cause, you know, the good ol' US of A is a haven of secularism and prosperity, right?

Marying one's cousin does not make one a barbarian.

 

[Orwell]

Marying one's cousin does not make one a barbarian.

Well, I changed that post a bit before you replied (made it more general: the US isn't the only western democracy influenced by religious quackery). But you can keep it that way if you want to.

 

[pipelineaudio]

And anyway, when was the last time you heard the phrase "lazy Mexican". I'm sure they're like baby pigeons - they exist but you never see one..

Every distributor, water pump and alternator sold at AutoZone disagrees with you

 

[Roboramma]

"Wilderness has a right to exist for its own sake" Says who? The wilderness? What does that even mean? What is a right to that which can't even understand what a right is?

First I think I have to point out that the statement assumes that such things as rights exist. I'm very willing to make that assumption for the sake of argument.

Second, I think one of the problems with the above is that "wilderness" is a vague term. What does it mean, exactly? Clearly it refers to places where human impact is relatively minor.
Perhaps, then, what is being suggested by the statement "wilderness has a right to exist for its own sake" is that the other species that exist within that wilderness have a right to life.

For at least some species I agree with that. I think anyone who would kill a gorilla is a monster, but for them to live, the wilderness of which they are a part must remain intact. The wilderness is all the plants and animals that make it up (obviously), and I feel quite strongly that they have a right to exist.

Someone could make the argument that nothing (including all of us) has rights, which is fine. But what I can't agree with is that our lives are meaningful, and that we thus have a right to them, but the lives of other species are not, and that they thus have no right to them.
In short, if we have no right to live, then I can accept that maybe other species don't either. On the other hand, if we do, I'd like to see what it is that gives us that right, and why it is that no other species has that quality.