Identity Politics is a gateway drug to the kind of racism is creates. Most people do not know how dangerous Identity Politics is. Look at me for example, if I have to tell you that I am a black African man, before you consider the validity of my intellectual stance, and the color of my skin *somehow* convinces you that may argument is valid, whether it is implicitly or explicitly, consciously or unconsciously, then you are an evil racist.
PS: I know you cannot blame people for their unconscious racism, but these are the same people that seem to be seeing racism everywhere. To the evil eye, all is evil. To the racist eye, all is racist.
When a white person looks at me and says,”white people pay more to enter into this conference and black people pay less” OR “I want to apologize for my white privilege”… and they look at me from the core of their hearts, with the sincerest of the sincerest of sincerest of intentions; this is what I hear, “I want to apologize for being so much better than you because of the color of my skin”. As an African Black man, I spit in your face. You can take the sincerest of the stupidest of your heartfelt sincerest intentions and shove it up your posterior end.
– no, you have no privilege higher than me based on your skin color
– no, a whip never touched my back and I was never a slave in this generation
– no, your life has not be far better than mine, being proud of my heritage, I dare to say that *I* have had a better privileged life than you
So I don’t need your heartfelt sincerest intentions cultural handouts. We are both human beings. We have both laughed and cried. We have both been in health and illness. We have both been hungry and full. Our histories has its sins and righteousness. Our countries have their good parts and evil part. Life happens to everyone. This identity politics is an insult of the highest order that I have ever seen in history. Come off your royal high horses! I don’t like being culturally made to be your victim/ subordinate, your brain-dead royal highness. The movie of Black Panther taught us one thing, Black people have their own privileges too (1).
Always fantastic to see Steven Pinker.What is this about? Progress, Despite everything?I know the whole world wants to always only talk about how bad the whole world is? Why is this? Aren’t we trying? Aren’t working hard? Aren’t we being our best? Why is it that some people get off and thrive on telling the world how bad it is in an attempt to derive good from it. Some this tactic works, sometimes, it doesn’t. I believe that the parameters that connote when the stick tactic works are not there. So, we need more people encouraging and celebrating the forward movement we seem to be making.
It’s just dire. I mean, what do we even mean by progress? I think that progress comes from 2 perspectives. The subjective and the objective perspective. These two are inter-dependent on each other. There are those of the cultural political-right … who want to strike a generally-acceptable definition of what is objective; this is a noble venture. But they fail to appreciate the progressive gradation of the human subjectivity into what can be generally-accepted as “objective”.
– Not every human consciousness is the same
– Not every human eye sees the same colour- Not every human cognition is the same – people are different.
There are objective realms of progress and there are subjective realms of progress. Sad to say, especially to my friends on the cultural political right trying to forsake their subjectivity (or in other words, feelings) and adhere to some sort of objectivity (in other words, facts) …. that the objectivity of human progress is dependent on the subjectivity of human progress. The subjective is always fundamental to the human. This is because, you can have the objectivity of- lovely cars- a sexy/ handsome wife/ husband- excellent children- awesome physical health
and yet, still subjectively believe that your life has not progressed; that you are miserable and that would do NOTHING for you than to virtually lead you to suicide despite your life being so objectively great. The cultural political right (CPR) try to avoid this by adhering to objectivity and it works for them. They can slap themselves in the face and say “Johnny! Why are you acting/ feeling like this!? You life is great! You have this, that and everything seems to be going well for you even though you’re faced with certain predicaments but, look, there are children dying here and there due to this and that, why dont you count your blessings and name them one by one!?” … my beautiful friends on the cultural political left (CPL), live closer to their ape brains of emotions – yes, and I know my temperamental leftist friends reading this will feel offended I described their emotional brain like this… even though most rightist will shrug, nod and just read on as though it was some *matter of scientific fact that intellect distinguishes human brains from animal-like instintive emotions* … well, you far-leftists get too offended by virtually anything and everything … i’m using the overwhelming might of my African black privilege (lol hahahahaha) to make sure that no authoritarian tyrant or fascist, never polices my language. … now i’ve rambled about that (because you have to always ramble about stuff when communicating to far-leftist in today’s culture and stand your ground while demanding civilized mutual respect in human dignity … its a sad world with too much emotions and its a grey world with too much facts. Yes, Im a centrist. People like me still exist.
The search for cain madhouse comes here in episode 5 … kinda like halfway through the anime, that is, if the anime is going to be 12 to 13 episodes long. So i’m guessing that this guy fails miserably only to come back in like episode 12 or 13 to kickass.
I’m
also noticing that this is one of those anime I watch that is going to
make me depressed for like weeks – opening my eyes to the sadness of the
nature of life and how unfortunate things can get for me and for other
people around me. Sometimes, the reward for the sacrifice for your
country is for your friend, your comrad, to kill you. It’s so sad. But
also noticing that this is a shonen – an anime genre meant for men/
boys. I was thinking initially what the necessity of Liza’s oppai was
and even got offended that it was thrusted upon us for not particular
reason in this anime. But I think I’m unto something here regarding the
psychology of the anime creators. I can’t remember which anime I heard
this from but I heard this quote: “Oppai are filled with men’s hopes and
dreams” hahahahahahahahaha . Taking this into consideration, the anime
creators may have the agenda of making us sad and depressed but
appealing to the primal nature of men with Liza’s oppai. I need to do a
quick google check what the name “Liza” means. I’m guessing ti has
something to do with Elizabeth. I think there might be a connection
between her name the hope-filled oppai she has lol. Like seriously, i’m
surprised she’s not an incarnate hahahahahahahahaah
In
symbolisms, the oppai is supposed to represent “generosity” … the
giving woman that almost never takes back since oppai are used to grace
defenseless children and nourish them. I wonder how far the anime
creators thought these through or am I just thinking too much? lol
Welcome to 2016. As it would happen, I have made new year resolution to reply to as many people as possible. So, I was going through my facebook messenger list and I found out that I had not replied a very beautiful and intelligent muslim friend of mine – Zein. She raised some very importat points and I thought that it would be fun to populate my blog with replies to her since she raised some very good and wonderful suggestions. So… here we go.
Figure 1: Zein’s Facebook Profile Picture
Zein and I were having a wonderful discussion full of mutual respect, kindness, in the spirit of friendship and it was all civilised. I want to use this time to honour Zein and not leave her hanging as I have done for 2 years plus. I do apologise Zein. And if you do not have anything to say due to the bad timing of this blog… feel free to take your time and reply anytime that you want to.
Here is a Copy and Paste of the comment raised by Zein that I want to rpley to in this blog post:
Hello Ernest smile emoticon
I promised I would reply after my exams were over I didnt forget wink emoticon I really find our conversations thrilling, as you might have noticed I’m very interested to learn more and more about this field “religion” because its the essence of our life, our purpose to be here although in the shadow of our mundane activities, deams, jobs etc. wink emoticon I hope your exams have been going well btw!
So let me start by saying I understand your point of view as a Faithful Christian raised individual wink emoticon I am not trying to convince you but on the contrary you might have noticed that I am not very “religious” as you picture other conventional muslims to be tongue emoticon In fact, I am still on my way to understanding, I am reading and studying whats out there. I have studied in Paris about all 3 monotheist religions and compared and still doing so smile emoticon During my quest you might find it hard to believe considering all the bad media coverage on the news tongue emoticon But whatever question I have on my mind, be it: why do we fast? why not eat pork? why women are advised to wear a veil? and all others…All those questions have a very logical answer in the Islamic religion, all aimed at healthy and peaceful living. Not to mention Science & knowledge thrill me and we often think that religion “catholics” in particular if you study history .. was completely against scientific developments. However you will be shocked to know… Islam has encouraged science … and it has actually lead to many of the scientific discoveries of today. No wonder they are called “arab numerals” tongue emoticon Also in one of my lectures inTissue Engineering this year, the lecturer was covering the matter of ethical issues regarding Embryonic Stem Cells… you might be shocked to hear: Islam allows Embryonic testing whereas Christians dont… I would have thought that they got over scientific curiosity/developments but thats just the scientist in me talking wink emoticon I believe science and religion should help alleviate one another. Religion provides the purpose and science provides the mechanism/the reasoning behind different concepts to help us live in a more efficient and hence peaceful way as religion wants it to be wink emoticon I can refer you to several interesting books regarding science and Islam if you are interested wink emoticon
Now regarding the matter you raise, I regard Jesus as a messenger of god, a prophet. In Islam, Jesus has not died yet. In fact if you are familiar with the stories, I am sure you are.. Juda wanted revenge.. God did not allow Jesus to die but he actually changed the face of Juda to look like Jesus. So it is not Jesus on the cross but Juda. Which seems like a more logical story. Jesus shall be back on judgement day to instruct us all and to deliver the final message. This is what Islam believe and this is what I believe. The Quran has never been changed whereas the bible has been rewritten countless times. I find it hard to believe a religion that has several big interpretations/sects/divisions in it .. soo much misconception. I believe Christianity was very logical and I respect it like any other religion however it has diverged on several paths.
Now if I were to agree with you regarding Jesus, and I dont say I do, It is simply not logical. We all agree God wants us to be good. Perfect is not a possibility because we are human, that is how he created us. He created us as beings have his soul, free spirited individuals with imagination, emotions etc. We are unlike any other creatures God created. I am also sure you are aware of the other creatures. We are all different. If God wanted us to be perfect, he would have created one person or just the same people many times. But we are all unique, we have different personalities, different colors, different sex, different origins. Life is a test for us, he wants us to have the free will to follow good. He has given us the choice and this is the best way to submit anyone to good by giving them free will, imagination “a brain”. If we do wrong he promises that he is most forgiving and gives us the chance to apologize and try again, in other words this is called “HOPE”. I love Jesus as much as you do Ernest but we dont believe the same. But please read more regarding Islam and also regarding the history of religions wink emoticon I will continue to do the same smile emoticon I look forward to your reply! My message turned out very long too!!! smile emoticon tc
Juda did not want revenge sorry but betrayal
*Judah did not want revenge sorry but he betrayed Jesus
I would like to get straight into this blog because if Zein is reading this; I want her to kow that I am going straight to the points rather than wasting her time reading through all this đ
Not Very Religious?
As you noticed, I am curious as to why Zein is not so very religious as I do not know what this means. Is it that she undermines the activity of God with regards to all the fatwas (1) (especially the Obligatory Fatwas) as depicted in the Quran? Mind to say that there are many Fatwas I do no tagree with. Such as:
In 2012, Sheikh Murgan Salem al-Gohary of Egypt, a former Taliban, issued a fatwa calling for “the destruction of the Sphinx and the Giza Pyramids in Egypt,” because “God ordered Prophet Mohammed to destroy idols.” (2)
In 2011-2012, Abdel-Bari Zamzami of Morocco issued a series of religious edicts that a man has the right to engage in sexual intercourse with his wife up to six hours after her death despite recognizing that such an action is despicable in mainstream society, Zamzami persisted in backing his original fatwa, claiming marriage does not end in death. (3)
Yusuf al-Qaradawi released a fatwÄ on April 14, 2004, stating that the boycott of American and Israeli products was an obligation for all who are able. (4)
Sheik Sadeq Abdallah bin Al-Majed, leader of the Muslim Brotherhood in Sudan, issued a fatwÄ that prohibits vaccination of children claiming it is a conspiracy of the Jews and Freemasons. (5) (6)
In 2013, the grand mufti in Kashmir issued a fatwa terming singing as un-Islamic. forcing Kashmir’s only all-girls rock band to abandon it. (7)
What shall we say about these few examples? Zein will probably know that Fatwas can span ranging from Obligatory to Permissible. Fatwas are always issued on the reasoning and logic. What could be the reasoning and logic of these muftis? I do not know. But many muslims such as Zein will disagree with them on many things. This has made islam to be more of a personal matter on one hand and then a communal matter on the other. It seems to me that Islam works as a cooperate unit. Hence, this is why I believe that Zein can distingush herself from the communal-norms by pointing to the communual-norms and say, “Hey, look. This is how islams is supposed to be practiced; I am not up the par with them even though I am part of them.”
I believe that if you have a religion, then you should take your God very seriously in what HE demands from you. But this is just me talking, I do not know much about Zein; of where she’s coming from cultural wise or her specified aspirations in life. Being in a religion is all about self-signifying. And yes, I agree that there are many Christians who as for example, practicing homosexuality, and they do no follow the teachings of Christ to the letter.
I do not believe you came here to see church as usual, you came here for church unusual. Amen? Let’s look at Luke 18:1-7.
Prayer: Daddy God, think through my mind; speak through my lips, let there be none of me and all of YOU in Jesus’ Name. Amen
Let’s read Luke 18:1-7. Jesus was a master at communicating concepts. HE used parables, HE used stories. HE was a great story-teller as we see in the bible. I believe that HE was one of the greatest story-tellers. Story-tellers are often known to use stories to communicate heavy-concepts from a higher-realm of intelligence so that the recipients can readily received it at their lower realm of intelligence and then be pulled up to the become smarter than what they used to be. In fact, when you read the bible, you are able to read the stories of people’s lives MOSTLY in soundbites, in snippets, little sections or parts. You see, in prayer, we can establish what the lawyers will call a “precedence” where if you take one story, and you can extrapolate the principles, you can stand in the throne room of God and you can use that Biography or Biographical Sketch or CV, biblical story … you can take it to heaven and you can begin to negotiate with your Daddy God, whom according to Romans 2:11, shows no favouritism, to do the same for you. This is why when you read the bible, very seldom do you have a repeat of similar circumstances because the bible really is a book about “The King”, “HIS Kingdom” and “HIS Children”. The bible is a book that allows you to view someone else’ life from a healthy perspective. By healthy, I actually mean “Godly”. In viewing that person’s life from a healthy perspective, you’re able to extrapolate the principles and you are able to use that to begin to construct your prayers.
If you cannot remember the whole story from the bible while praying, just recall a synopsis of it. For example, you may not remember how many stones David picked but you may remember that David picked up certain number of stones and then you go to your Daddy-God in prayer asking HIM to show you where your stones of victory is.
Prayer Point 1: My Father! Show me where my stones of victory is in the name of Jesus.
Then you can extrapolate the principles to make sure that the promises will follow.
Repeat after me:
Behind every principle, is a promise.
Once you know all these, you will become a very powerful prayer warrior. The Bible gives us a story that Jesus is telling; its called a parable. Why? Because HE wants to give the disciples (through out all time, that including you and I) an understanding of the power of prayer. Prayer has mechanics. It has technologies. Prayer is very very dynamic. It should not be under-estimated. You should not just cast it aside and only use it when you are in the midst of a crisis. You see, prayers can stop atomic bombs from exploding. More powerful than atomic bombs, Prayers can stop the sun from moving as we know of in Joshua Chapter 10. More powerful than the sun, prayer can destroy demons and stop angels in their tracks. More powerful than angel and demons, prayer can move God!
Prayer Point 2: My Father! No evil shall befall me nor my loved ones. All things will start to work together for good for me in Jesus’ Name Prayer Point 3: My Father! The sun shall not smite me by day nor the moon by night in the name of Jesus Prayer Point 4: My Daddy! Demonic Operations concerning my life shall not succeed in the name of Jesus Prayer Point 5: Daddy-God! Charge your angels concerning me! Let them bear me up lest I dash my foot against a stone in the name of Jesus. Prayer Point 6: Daddy-God! Move on my behalf in Jesus’ Name.
You should pray without ceasing and it’s possible. Jesus said in Luke 18:1-7
Verse 1: 1And he spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray…
Prayer is not just you talking to God giving HIM a list of things that you want done. Prayer is dynamic in that it is a two-way conversation; it is a dialogue between you and your Father. Your Father says, “…come now let us reason together…” (Isaiah 1:18) . When you pray, you are actually engaging Yahweh! It’s not necessarily that HE is coming down to your level, HE is also bringing you up to HIS level so that you can have HIS mind (1 Corinthians 2:16) to call forth by faith those things that are not as though they were (Romans 4:17). That means prayer elevates you in the realm of the spirit. Your Daddy-God is infinite. HE has nothing to gain from you when you pray. HE is God and satisfied all by HIMSELF – HE is the self-existing God… Yahweh! When HE cries or laughs for you its not because HE has lost or gained something, it is HIS love, HIS empathy that feels for you. So Prayer actually elevates you in the realm of the spirit. When your Father created mankind, HE said that HE created us after HIS image and after HIS likeness (Genesis 1:26-28). When man fell, it was the greatest travesty. Man did not fall from a spiritual or physical place. Man fell from a realm of dominion; the realm that the man dominated; where everything was in order; where he not only commanded the cosmos or universe but trees spoke to him, he spoke to animals, he spoke to nature and gave it names and whatever names he gave to nature, nature became whatever man wanted it to be (Genesis 2:19). Your Father placed Adam in a Garden. The Garden is an indication of a “Finished Work” just like Jesus has brought us all too into a finished work by crying on the cross “It is Finished” (John 19:30). All the man had to do was to “work out” the finished-work that was already “worked-in” by your Father … just like we are told to “work-out” our salvation with fear and trembling because your Father has already worked salvation in you! (Philippians 2:12-13). This is why the prayer of faith is the prayer FROM victory, not the prayer FOR victory. You need to learn how believe that you have already received answers to your prayers and then you will receive the answers to your prayers (Mark 11:24). This is spiritual-law. Logically, I cannot explain this seemingly contradiction. The test of the pudding is in the tasting. You do it and come back and testify to what HE has done for you in Jesus’ name!
The Garden of Eden was maybe as big as the whole of the United Kingdom – and your Father called that a Garden. Do you feel like you are going through a mess right now? Do you feel that you are losing control in whatsoever you may be going through, let me encourage you today … no matter the jungle or the storms of life you may be going through, stay focused on Jesus! Because when you stay focused on HIM WYSIWYG – What You See Is What You Get … as you keep your eyes on HIM, you begin to look like HIM (2 Corinthians 3:18) and the storms of life you thought were impossible for you, you will begin to walk on water in Jesus’ Name. Adam was not worn out as he worked-out that Garden in charge over what your Father deemed as a small plot of land. I have a word for someone here today: Your problem may look big, but your Daddy-God is bigger. Say this to someone else. Your Father was able to use Adam to manage what was already finished and worked in. Your Father gave Adam some insight. He told Adam to work out the Garden by dressing it, or tending to it, or managing it… to keep it, to protect it – to keep it going on. You don’t protect something if there is no threat or an enemy destroying it or a thief around to steal it. You don’t work something out unless there is a danger that it may never manifest. Remember the rhetoric: USE IT OR LOOSE IT. So your Father gave Adam some insight into the realm of the Spirit saying, “Watch out now! Even though you’re in an optimal environment; Even though the Finished-Work has all been worked in; the enemy is going to attempt to attack you. The highest form of Spiritual Warfare is not the devil giving you cancer, or giving you a cold, or causing addiction or causing strife … that’s not the highest form of spiritual warfare! The highest form of spiritual warfare is when the enemy counsel’s your mind. Why? Because when he counsels your mind, he counsels it with a thought! And because thinking is something that we do naturally and normally and the thing about thinking is that you don’t need a degree to think, you don’t need a PhD; you do it naturally! So it’s possible that the enemy can be attempting to destroy you and you would not even “know” it with that same mind. Forget about all the abracdabra and ritual charms why? Because even if satanic people are conjuring up curses because the curse causeless shall not come (Proverbs 26:2). We know that the curse is the natural outcome of an act of disobedience to the faith or disobedience to the belief. It doesn’t have anything necessarily to do with witches or wizards or warlocks or people that are involved in voodoo or white magic or black magic or Ouija boards etc It does not necessarily have anything to do with that because we know that no weapon formed against us shall prosper (Isaiah 54:17) – we know that! So those witches or wizards or warlocks are just wasting their time. You may see the evil weapons or weapons or evil people prosper, you may even hear the curse but I love what your Daddy-God said to Nehemiah in Nehemiah 13:2
2Because they met not the children of Israel with bread and with water, but hired Balaam against them, that he should curse them: howbeit our God turned the curse into a blessing.
I am decreeing and declaring that every curse that was sent to you, is going to be turned into a blessing for you in the name of Jesus. You are going to have a Joseph-experience where you are going to say, “you meant it for evil, but God meant it for good” (Genesis 50:20). Give your neighbour a high-five and say, “It’s all good! It’s all good! It’s all good!”
In the Garden of Eden, the scripture says, that when the enemy came, he just dropped a thought in the mind of Eve; “Did God really say…?… And God is withholding something from you…” What the enemy was doing was trying to plant in their minds the idea that God has no credibility. “You can’t trust HIS word. HE makes these promises and HE’s not gonna keep it … HE’s withholding something from you.” Now, when we talk about Spiritual Warfare, Spiritual Warfare is the counsel of the human mind by any other Spirit other than your Daddy God. When the enemy shows up, we may not be skilled enough to really alway discern that that’s the devil. Your Heavenly Father said, “I’m going to give you a litmus test“. He said in Philippians 4:8,
“Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.”
That means that if a thought comes to you and it doesn’t fit the descriptions of all 8 characteristics of Godly thought; if the devil injects it, you’ve gotta reject it. Now, this is important and I’m going to give you an example Jesus was giving the disciples to live in the realm of dominion – the realm that Adam fell from. Because my topic is not “Dominion”, there is a lot of things I can tell you about Dominion and how to get Dominion. And how to live on top of the world and how to be successful. And how to recognise when a door is closed in one realm, how to top to the roof and rip the roof off. But this is not a topic of Dominion – this is a topic of prayer. But Jesus teaching the disciples, HE would use object lessons. And one day there were 5 thousand men – they didn’t count the women and the children so it had to be approximately somewhere between 15 to 20 thousand people that had gathered together in one place. And Jesus said, “give them bread to eat.” And HE did this to show us how the devil can superimpose a thought – Spiritual Warfare now – into the minds of the disciples (you’ve gotta follow me). Jesus said, “You give them bread”. That means that if HE told you to do it, there is going to be a resource to do it. You may not see the resource, but if HE said “do it”, the resource is there. But the resource, if you cannot see it in the natural, it has to be in the spiritual. Your Heavenly Father has already blessed you with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places, which means that all that you need already exists but it exists in a different Realm. This is why the Bibel says,
“…walk in the Spirit and you will not fulfil the lust of the flesh…” (Galatians 5:16)
By doing this, your flesh will not drive you crazy all over the place. So one of the disciples said, “200 pennies worth of bread” I’ve done the calculation – 200 pennies, in those days, when they work for a full day, they will give them a penny for one full day. So the disciples was saying that even if I work for 6 months … they were calculating in their minds that even when I do what God wants me to do, I’m going to have to work by the sweat of the brow for about 6 months! Why? Because when Adam fell, he fell from a realm of revelation into a realm of information. He fell from a realm of faith into a realm of facts. And so the Bible says, “The Just Shall Live by Faith” and not “Facts”. So when the enemy begins to fights you, he lines up all the facts. You’re gonna get this in a minute. He lined up the facts
…you don’t have this…
…you’re not educated…
…people don’t like you…
…how’re you gonna pay for it?…
…you don’t have any friends …
…nobody is opening any doors…
…there’s nobody helping you…
…your mama…
…your daddy…
…you’re too short…
…you’re too fat…
…you’re too tall…
…you’re too skinny…
…you’re an immigrant…
…you’re not a British Citizen…
…you’re a man…
…you’re a woman…
…you’re black…
…you’re white…
Those are the facts! The Just shall live by faith. As long as you are bound by facts, you will always live in this cursed realm of struggle. But the moment you step out of the realm of facts into the realm of faith, you step into to the realm of God which is the realm of unlimited possibilities. For with God, all things are possible (Matthew 19:26). But with man, they’re impossible.
Caller: What proof and evidence do you have that Atheism is correct?
_Matt: …Atheism … is not accepting the God hypothesis … it _cannot be proven to be true
The website “Logically Fallacious” defines unfalsifiabilty fallacy as:
(D1)Confidently asserting that a theory or hypothesis is true or false even though the theory or hypothesis cannot possibly be contradicted by an observation or the outcome of any physical experiment, usually without strong evidence or good reasons.
Making unfalsifiable claims is a way to leave the realm of rational discourse, since unfalsifiable claims are often faith-based, and not founded on evidence and reason. (1)
Here are ways Christianity can be falsified so that you will not be ignorant about the Christian’s position:
1. Historical Evidences of Jesus (2)
2. Cosmological Argument (3)
3. Moral Argument (4)
4. Teleological Argument (5)
5. Lots more (6)
What does the Atheist say in response?
Atheist: I’m not convinced
Christian: This is not about convincing your _subjectivity. This is about laying down good, strong, ground logic that is objective from your subjectivity if not, this would be a subjectivist fallacy. Can you please provide any better counter-arguements devoid of fallacies so that I can scrutinise its logical objectivity?_
Atheist: Atheism is the absence of belief in God, it is not a claim for anything
Christian: Then that means that Atheism cannot make a knowledge-claim that I am right or wrong. Then you are Agnostic. And since Atheism is just the simple absence of believe, that definition says everything your subjective psychology and nothing about the objective external real world that is out there. It would have been better if Atheism was the absence of objective evidence – but look at all those evidence. Hence,
1. Not only is Atheism a huge unfalsifiable fallacy as per the afromentioned definition (D1),
2. Atheism is also a huge Subjectivist Fallacy
3. Atheism lacks an ontologically objective position to assert it’s truth values
Here is a caricture of how the General New Atheists contradict themselves in our popular culture:
I don’t know if God exists but I know that it is wrong for you to infer a God. I have no objective opinion on the evidence for either-side (God or no-God) and I cannot argue against the theist position; but I’m still gonna argue as if I know something that you are wrong to infer God. I don’t know, but I kow that the Christian is wrong irrespective of the fact that it logically contradicts my claim that I dont know. I think there exists the knowledge that the Christians are wrong, but I do not have that knowledge – but I will argue as if I have that knowlege. Although you have shown your logical burden of proof in many arguement – i know that _ALL those arguments are objectively wrong not because you have followed the unfallacious and credible rules of objective logic, but because you have not satisfied nor convinced my personal qualia subjectivity. _Hence, Atheism is ignorant of its postion and even I really don’t know if it is correct to say “I don’t know”. My actions say “I know” but my words are “ignorant”.
Seeing that you are a copy-cat – i have justified myself. Feel free to copy me again but this time if it appeases your subjectivist fallacy but do it in favour of your atheism lol. Or you can just go away and ignore me because if truth be told, you have no better rebuttal whatsoever. This should be interesting ^_^
The is a adage that says, “To the evil eye, all is evil” And I say, “To the racist eye, all is racist”
And Fredrick Nietzsche said, “if you stare into the abyss, the abyss stares back at you”
This is also Exorcism 101
Ezra Klein is one of those good-intentioned people trying to eradicate racism but ends up being the one discriminating (using fallacies) based on race. As a black guy myself (and I can’t believe that I have to be reduced to make this phrase matter, but from my stupid perspective, people are stupid – from one person’s humble stupid brain to another person’s humble stupid brain – but if announcing my skin colour moves your intellectual gear in pseudo-moral-righteousness then more pseudo-power to you)… I repeat; as a black guy myself, I find it highly patronising and offensive (in my feelings and code of etiquettes) that Ezra Klein would even accuse Sam Harris of having less black people on his show. I’ll bet money to a charity of your choice that Ezra Klein would not accuse a black person of having less white people on their show. It’s insulting of the highest order and I *feel* looked down on from the insulting vantage point of Ezra’s “good intentions”. If you watch anime, the 7 deadly sins, its kinda like the sin of pride looking down on one of the 10 commandments and pitying him because the sin is pride is confident of his own abilities. Who says that black people cannot get unto Sam Harris show based on their own merits – especially in line with what Sam discusses about.
Ezra keeps accusing Sam for keeping silent on certain subjects when it was not in the intellectual scope of what Sam wanted to achieve. Ezra, get off your high horse! This is what we call an “argument from silence”. To Ezra’s racist eyes, even your silence is racist. What is Ezra’s freaking problem? It’s damned if you do and damned if you don’t.
“Good-Intentioned” Racists like Ezra Klein make me so disgusted with some white people but I shouldn’t even be seeing colour because intellectualism does not have a skin colour. There are black-racists too and I call them reverse-racists. But Ezra is a good-intentioned racist and I see that sin of pride as the worst kind of pitiful racial inferiority. I don’t need your handout equity Ezra! I will make it to the top based on my own merits and on my own merits alone. You can take your equality-of-outcome handouts and shove them up your posterior end.
Many of these democrats are not encouraging people to be rich at all. Well, there are many ways to get around the law. To own your money without owning your company. To invest oversees … singapore for example. Sweeden is another place. You can always “legally” claim to own less than you actually own.
This is not fair for people aspiring for greatness and I think it stifels the creativity of people who want to be great in a free country. It makes looking poor and weak to be more rewarding than looking great and awesome. It’s another form of victim mentality but from a financialo perspective.
I believe that wealth begets wealth. The rich are not going to hoard their money forever – especially those who are making the money. They know the blood and sweat it takes to be wealthy, And with that, I am sure that they are
– creating more opportunities
– investing in more people
– paying more taxes to make the country better
I believe that the student debt can be decreased FROM ITS SOURCE. Education should be incentivised further … or made more competitive so that it sis cheaper but with higher quality. That way, we wouldnt have to take on such heavy loans in the first place.
I’ve been thinking whether #triggers actually exists in a world of “Free Will”. I am of the school of thought that free-will exists and this means that there exists a #singularity realm of first-order causation in humans. This is why we lock people in prison – why? because we honestly believe that they can choose to have done “#otherwise”. The mass #murderer and rapist could have chosen otherwise right?
So, we live in a era of triggers. Where people say that they have been #triggered by something and hence, the reason they lash out or act the way they do. We look at the crying #snowflake or immature and say “He’s been triggered”. We look at the #rapist and say “He wasn’t triggered” – even though he clearly was.
This is making me to think if “being triggered” is a real #phenomenon in reality. And if it is, in what correct-concept are we to hold that view? Is being triggered a “#makebelief” phenomenon? Like some sort of useful fiction? I think it is. But does making it a useful fiction therefore make it any less real or less applicable to the external real world? I do not think so
So I think that only in its applicability to being effective in social “games of thrones” would it be recognised. What do you think about this?
You can become a better negotiator. Why does this matter? Well, let’s just say that by following these techniques and starting to implement these in your life,
you’re going to save money.
You’re going to save time.
You’re going to really save a lot of your scarce resources when you’re out there and
you’re not afraid to start using this stuff.
It’s true that there are a lot of myths out there, a lot of misconceptions, and I’m going to try to give you some timeless, proven techniques so that you can become a better negotiator.
Most People Aren’t Very Good At Negotiations
The number one thing you need to understand about negotiations is that most people aren’t very good at it. Why does this matter? Because if you understand that, you realize that by making a small investment in upping your negotiation skills, you’re going to be able to get a lot of mileage out of that. You start to up your game just a bit and all of a sudden, you’re setting yourself apart, the same thing with negotiations. By starting to apply proven tactics — and the stuff I’m going to mention, the other tips, a lot of this comes out of research that’s been done by people at really smart schools, University of Texas, Harvard, Stanford, all of these schools where they have gone. People with 20-pound brains have done all this research and this stuff works. So simply by reading a book on the subject, you’re going to elevate yourself by taking a course. Again, understand that most people are pretty bad and most people actually think that they’re a decent negotiator. When it comes down to it, they may be about average because they’re just not applying the right techniques.
Understand Yourself
The number two thing that you need to pay attention to is understanding yourself. Now, I know this seems pretty general, so I’m going to get a little bit more specific, but first off, you need to know what your BATANA is. BATANA stands for “Best Alternative To A Negotiated Agreement”, again, one of those terms that came out of one of those really big books out of Harvard. Basically, the BATANA is where you’re not going to go anywhere less than. Any of you guys out there who own a company, if you’ve ever agreed to something, you take a step back and maybe the next day or even later that day, you’re like, “Man, why did I agree to that?” You know what I’m talking about? You’ve felt that because you didnât have a set BATANA when you went into the negotiation. We negotiate all the time. Every time you go into a store and you make a purchase, there’s a bit of a negotiation there. It seems like it’s one way, but there are a lot of stores that you can actually bargain with. Now, in the United States or United Kingdom or most developed countries, a little bit harder, but if anyone has traveled abroad mostly to developing countries, you’ll see that bartering and going back and forth, and a little bit of negotiation happens a lot. When you can go to a vendor at the end of the day, he’s got fruit that he needs to get rid of. This is going to go bad. He’s going to throw it out and you can make an offer. But when you know your BATANA, that you know — let’s just, I guess, use the fruit example. You know the fruit has to be at this level because if you were to pay for it and if it was at a lower quality level than you’re willing to accept, you’re not going to like the agreement. You’re going to have a certain amount that you’re willing to pay and if you go beyond that, then you know that you’re going to not be happy because you’ve got to be careful in a negotiation. This again is part two of knowing yourself, is be careful of focal points. These are emotional things that — we’re emotional beings, so oftentimes, there are certain things that we focus in on in a negotiation and we get laser-focused and we forget about all the other things around the negotiation. This often happens when someone is going in to negotiate for their salary. If anyone’s worked for a company, you realize there’s a lot more than working for a company than the money.
– There’s also how many hours are you going to be expected and required to work, – how much leave time, – how much sick time. – Can you work on Fridays – or maybe Mondays from home – How much travel are you going to need to do? – Are you going to get these in your contract?
There are all these other things, but oftentimes when we’re negotiating our salary and whenever you’re getting hired, that’s actually when you’re in your best point to negotiate. We’re just looking at one thing – the salary. We’re not necessarily going to look into all these other things.
If you’re a family person, you might realize that honestly, I am fine with the salary, but I would rather go with these other points i’ve made.
Knowing Others
This leads to point three, knowing others. Know the person you are negotiating with.
Understand the Situation
point four, and that’s understanding the situation. Many negotiations are — it’s not just a one-shot deal. Many of them are repetitive or it’s a long-term negotiation. you’ve got to think about the situation, so that’s number four. Scarcity, ideology, those are things. If you look at what’s going on in the Middle East, there’s a reason why they have had conflict for as long as — gosh, over what, a couple thousand years? It’s simply ideology, the inability for people to agree on some very basic fundamentals. Scarcity, let’s look at California, Arizona, and Nevada. Well, they’re going to have a water issue here very soon because there’s only so much water. Right now, California has taken more than its fair share. That negotiation agreement I think is already up or it’s going to be. There’s going to be a huge thing there because there’s a scarcity of water. In addition, you want to look at is this a negotiation of necessity or opportunity. Now, if anyone is a Star Trek fan, do you remember the part where the Klingons actually had to negotiate with the federation because — what was it — something exploded. I donât remember which Star Trek it was, but they’ve got to negotiate because basically, it’s out of necessity, versus the negotiation of opportunity is one that probably both parties could walk away from a little bit easier. Is agreement required? Whenever you’re getting a divorce, an agreement is required versus other ones in which an agreement isn’t required.
Make the First Offer to Anchor
Let’s go to number five, which is make — and I’m going to give you some very specific things that you can do in a negotiation to make sure that you get the best deal beyond your BATANA.
The first one is make the first offer if you are prepared. If you’re not prepared, there’s another type of thought that says go ahead and let them make the first offer, and actually see if it goes well beyond your BATANA, and then09:51try to raise it up.
But if you’re prepared, if you know a whole lot about them and you know yourself, you understand the situation, then you can go ahead and put in a very pinpointed offer, and the power of doing this is you set an anchor.
The Power of Fairness
We’re also going to talk about the power of fairness. Now, this one’s very interesting because they’ve done these tests in which they show people — they give people a dollar. They said, “Okay, you guys need to divide it up. One person is going to divide it. However, the other person can veto the whole deal and say, ‘Well, no deal and we’re not going to get anything.'” What they find is that a lot of people, they simply go 50-50 because it’s fair. It seems like that’s the right thing to do, but what happens when someone starts going 60-40, 70-30, and literally — because they’re the one dividing and they get to take the first share, and then they’re going to leave that 30 cents or that 20 cents for the other person. Well, shouldn’t that other person just accept it? I mean, it’s better than getting zero, but logic doesnât apply here because they violate the rule of fairness. The farther they do violate that rule, most people are going to say, “That is not fair. You’re completely ripping me off and I’m going to go with zero,” and they do it. Come on. Let’s think about it. It makes no sense. Even if it’s a penny, you’re actually a penny richer, but what has been violated is the perception of fairness. So when you’re in there — and this is so important — that you know the other person because if you violate their perception of fairness, you can really — all of a sudden, a logic goes out the window and all of a sudden, you’re dealing with someone that maybe is looking at this out of an emotional — and that’s the focal point. They’re like, “This person, obviously I can’t trust them and they’re trying to take advantage of me. I’d rather, despite both of us, make the negotiation fail,” so make sure to pay attention to fairness.
Expand the Pie
Number seven, this one is perhaps my favorite, is expand the pie. I sort of talked about it a little bit earlier, but oftentimes in negotiation, we focus in on one thing versus actually creating trust, sharing information, looking are there multiple issues and are there multiple parties that could be involved?Whenever you do this, all of a sudden, you can take the pie that’s being split and you can expand it. Most people, when they’re negotiating, they often miss out on the point that the pie is limited, that there are scarce resources. Now, occasionally there are scarce resources, but a lot of times, there are a number of issues in play. You can bring in a number of players and you can in a sense make the whole thing bigger and you can create what are called win-win situations. That’s ideally where you want to go. Now, a great example is look in the basketball world. In the United States, we see these multi-team trades where you’ve got three teams, sometimes even four teams, and players are just going all over the place. Money is moving. Contracts are moving. At the end of the day, everyone is happy. Everyone agreed to this. No one put a gun to anyone’s head, at least that I know of, and made these trades happen. And so, because they involved multiple parties, they all of a sudden expanded the pie. They were able to do things that two people perhaps weren’t. Another way of expanding the pie is, again, talking. Whenever you’re negotiating a salary or you’re talking with a company, perhaps the company — if you’re pushing that you just donât want to travel, but the whole reason they’re hiring you is they need you to travel, they’re willing to double your salary because to be honest, they’re incredibly profitable. They want you, but they want you to travel, so you’re going to have to find — okay, I’m a single guy. I’ll go ahead and take that extra bit of money. I’m not going to see my girlfriend as much, but this will enable us to save up for a house. Again, look how you can expand the pie.
Summary
Let’s go ahead and summarize really quick, guys.
One, most people are ineffective when they negotiate.
Number two, know yourself.
Number three, know the other party. Know who you’re negotiating with.
Hence,
