Talk:Religion/Archive 3

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new picture

While I am only moderately concerned with the picture's content--a Christian scene--the size and gaudyness of it really turn me off. The editor that put it there said it was a "test" if I correctly remember, so this is my take on it. --The Sunborn

Does the new picture of the stupa make it work now? I rather like how all that space to the right of Table of Contents is filled. Does the massiveness of the stupa balance out the "gaudyness" of the painting? ---Rednblu | Talk 02:18, 30 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Honestly, the other picture can be anything significant for any other religion, I don't care. But yes, it seems a lot less biased now. --The Sunborn

the pictures are too large. they break my layout, and they just scream at you. I'm making them a bit smaller. Although the crowd on the van de Venne painting is not very well suited for a thumbnail. How about a simpler scene, Durer's Christ or something? dab 10:16, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The organizational approach

It may also be worthwhile to mention that the organizational approach can also be seen as placing religion in contradistinction with certain belief systems, or spiritual philosophies that traditionally look down upon institutionalized practice, and so-called law, or standardized rules of practice.

An example could be traditional Daoism, or traditional Buddhism. Daoist texts often go on about how terrible rules and systemized instituionalized "religion" are, and how a Daoist can only follow the Way if they forget the rules, and return to the silent, the natural (Dao De Jing chapters 19 and 38 are notable examples). Note, this form of Daoism all but dissapeared until recently, eclipsed by a more "religious" deity-worshiping form of the philosophy.

Buddhism was also this way, with only a few gently, but completly ignorable suggestions; always remembering that none of it matters, when you reach enlightenment. Institutions of worship went against Buddhist philosophy. But like Daoism, Buddhism decended into regression soon after, and we are left with an impression that Buddhism is just like (modern) Christianity, blindly believing holy texts, and blindly worshipping deities. A notable institution would be the church of Tibet. It's really a pity how nobody can follow their own spiritual philosophies, instead concentration on the organizational approach defined "religion" of today.

GWC Autumn 59 2004 18.40 EST

Never mind; the article does reflect this.
GWC Autumn 59 2004 18.45 EST

Religion and science

Isn't is said in the Christian Bible that pi equals 3? It seems relevant.

it would be relevent if it were true. Ungtss 03:12, 20 Nov 2004 (UTC)

new and pov quotes section.

i suggest we move those quotes over the wikiquote and provide a link. that's what wikiquote is there for. we don't want to get into a quote war on this page -- it's an encyclopedia. at the very least it should be balanced and fair before being put out there. thoughts? Ungtss 17:13, 15 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Snipped section:

Quotes about Religion

"The whole religious complexion of the modern world, is due to the absence from Jerusalem of a lunatic asylum."
--Havelock Ellis, writer and clergy-baiter

"I shudder at the thought of religion. I flee the Bible as a viper and revolt at the touch of a Christian, for their tender mercies may next fall on my head."
--G. J. Holyoake, Victorian freethinker, at a public lecture in Cheltenham

"God is the immemorial refuge of the helpless, the incompetent, the miserable."
--H. L. Menken

"I do not believe that Muhammad or anyone else was impelled by ‘divine inspiration’. To call (Muhammad’s flight from Mecca) ‘strategic withdrawal’ is ludicrous … P.S. I am opposed to all superstition, Muslim, Christian, Jewish or Buddhist."
--Bertrand Russell, to an outraged Muslim offended by his writing

This article is twice as big as it should be

This article is around 64KB, the reccomended max is 32KB. I will spend some of my free time this holiday season attempting to scale down the article into sub articles. I have already started with the syncretism and religious pluralism sections. There are already sub articles that are not referenced. They include: Definition of religion (...well this got deleted) and afterlife. Articles that should be made are religious practices and Number of gods. --metta, The Sunborn ☸ 16:41, 22 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Too "protestant" approach

The approach of this article seems to me too "protestant" (in lack of a better term) to be NPOV. For example the strong emphasis on faith and belief in the definiton(s) of religion in the first few paragraphs. Many religions hold another thing as much more important and foundational than faith and holding certain beliefs -- for example conducting correct ritual in Shinto, or following the commandments in Judaism, or entering the "realm of spirits" in some brands of Shamanism and Vodoun. Also there is much mention made of sacred texts and scriptures. What about sacred images? sacred music? sacred architecture? other sacred art? sacred food or drinks? oral tradition? etc. If a person more knowledgeable than me could change this, I'd be thankful. -- 84.57.39.110 11:02, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

we've had some high-quality edits from Raj2004, and i think the structure of the page allows for a great deal of expansion from those who have a less protestant background ... since you seem to have an interest in it, why not throw in what you know:)? Ungtss 12:14, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Link

Would a link like this be helpful? [1] it's the sort of thing i'd be interested in seeing. but perhaps there's a better reference for it. Mlm42 17:36, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)

World religions. Ungtss 20:23, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Removed section

This contribution of anon looks like original research, not to say about POVisms. Is it salvageable? Any references in support? Mikkalai 03:31, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Evolutionary Theory of Religion

Religion may be a "useful lie" that allowed humans to encode useful survival tips and social structures. For example, early populations may not have understood microbes (germs), but thinking of flues as "demons that make children demons who can hop on nearby people and possess them also" supplies a mental model that reminds one to stay away from people with flues. The demon is an accidental abstraction or approximation of germs. Dogma that increases the survival of a group will spread using a kind of Darwinian selection process (see Natural Selection). The most useful lies (dogma) spread because they keep the population holding them alive to bear more children, who in turn learn the useful dogma and pass it on. The dogma is thus a useful lie that happens to work. Of course sometimes religious doctrine goes awry, but it is the net benefits that count in the end.

==End of contrib. Mikkalai 03:31, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)

same old groundless deconstructive cliches, i'm afraid. thanks for cutting it out. if we wanna do a development of religion section, we've got a whole bunch of theories to address ... certainly enough to fill an article titled Development of religion. Ungtss 03:44, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Why do you say "groundless"? It is a theory alone. It is hard to test ANY theory on the origin of religion without locking thousands in a box for several generations, so why reject this one but not others on such grounds? Perhaps we can find a more mellower way to say "useful lies". It does not matter whether they are lies or truth as long as they aid survivle, under this theory. But, I am at loss for a better word at this point.

indeed it's one theory among several ... i just think we need to present it as one theory among several, rather than "the way religions evolve." i'd be more than happy to work with you in developing an article like that ... wanna call it Development of religion so this doesn't get any longer than it already is? Ungtss 06:12, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Okay, I created that topic and reworked the text a bit. Hopefully it is a sufficient start.

great! look forward to working with you on it! Ungtss 03:01, 25 Feb 2005 (UTC)

A few comments

First--Anthropology is much more varied...

Located under: "Methods of studying religion objectively (in a scientific and religiously neutral fashion)"

Where it says: "It is believed within an anthropological approach that religion is an early and immature stage in the development of man's tools of "explanation," which is ultimately replaced by science as a more mature and verifiable means of explanation. [4] (http://www.scicom.lth.se/fmet/myths.html)."

Objection:

I suggest looking elsewhere than the quoted reference for a summary of the Anthropological view. This is not a representative description of the modern Anthropology--which is quite varied in its conjectures about religion.

The "Religion-as-proto-science" doctrine is dangerously simplistic, highly ethnocentric, and oddly Victorian (esp. the notion of social "advancement" and the primacy of the scientific worldview). Besides--logically speaking, looking at religion as a kind of science invites the possibility that science is a kind of religion, but that's a whole other can of worms...

Anyway, Anthropologists are usually sensible enough to avoid this view, despite its frightening popularity.

I definitely agree with you regarding your critiques of the view, and i would HOPE anthropologists would have outgrown their 19th century lunacy ... but i'm not aware of the "new model of religion" within anthropology, and i still hear the same tripe (in a somewhat more watered down form) today. what's the "new anthropology of religion?" Ungtss 04:36, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Well, there's the rub--there really isn't a theoretical consensus. There's lots of writing on the subject--Durkheim, Weber, Levi-Struass, Malinowski, Evans-Prichard, Eliade, etc.--but basically after Victor Turner's symbolic theories, Anthropologists kind of accepted that religion defies objective analysis and (mostly) stopped agnonizing over rigorous explanations of it. The modern approach is more relativist: understand religion in context--the social function for the practitioners themselves. On top of that, there's tonnes of competing work (mostly still aiming at objective theory or flat out debunking) in sociology, psychology, comparative religion, etc., about the scripture-based "world" religions. So rather than reinvent the eight-spoked wheel, for many anthropologists the focus is on documenting and preserving indigenous spiritual practices before they all disappear... The theory can come later. ----> or, at least that's my take on the whole thing.

In the absence of a cohesive theory, it's only mildly surprising to hear the odd anthropologist rattle off the proto-science theory (the nicest possible kind of post-industrial bigotry--"Oh, how quaint. They're just like us, but stupid..."). However, I hear it much more often from other kinds of scientists, skeptics, secular humanists, transhumanists, etc.,; most of whom (blind to their own post-Judeo-Christian philosophical biases) arrogantly deny the validity of religion altogether, yet have barely bothered to look up "religion" in the dictionary, let alone seriously investigate the topic (sorry, I'm ranting, but it makes me Mad). Here's one of my faves, from the Meme-meister himself, no less: http://www.secularhumanism.org/library/fi/dawkins_24_5.htm. Pariah

Points all well made, and refreshing to hear around wikipedia, which is, it seems, dominated by that same sort of anti-religious bigotry ... regarding the article, what about qualifying the "anthropological approach" as "the traditional, 19th century approach," and then saying, "today, this theory has lost favor due to its perceived ethnocentrism etc, because anthropology is dedicated mostly to describing the practices, rather than developing a cohesive theory" or something like that ... Ungtss 12:51, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Thanks :) Indeed--the anti-religious view seems to dominate most of Western academia. As for the article, I think that works, as long as two points are clear: First--that the 19th century approach is so ethnocentric and antiquated as to barely qualify as anthropology (anthro didn't really come into its own until well into the 20th cent.), and second--that modern socio-cultural anthropologists, while still concerned with describing social universals, prefer to study religions in terms of the personal meaning they have for the practitioners and remain cautious about theoretical or comparative analysis. Pariah 17:46, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

all sounds fantastic -- seems to me you're the most qualified here to make the edit -- would you care to do the honors:)? Ungtss 18:13, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Will do--and thanks :)--Pariah 04:01, Mar 5, 2005 (UTC)

Unrelated comment:

About Marx--when he said that religion was the opiate of the masses, he primarily meant in its anaesthetic, rather than addictive quality. For Marx, Religion was an escape from, and a justification of, the anguish and drudgery of industrial Europe--and therefore a tool that made the masses easier to control. It's the grease on the factory wheels. The Calvanists, for example, argued for the sanctity of hard work and sacrifice; with the promise of God's reward to make it all worthwhile. It could be argued that a similar function (distraction from & justification of inequality) is now served by television, consumerism, the American Dream, and Economics. Huxley's "soma" in Brave New World is also similar.

Pariah (the artist formerly known as Nomad-Soul)

interesting thought: "Prada, the new Opiate of the Masses." Marx's mistake, of course, was mistaking the cancer for the man :( ... Ungtss 04:36, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

http://www1.stfunoob.com/calvin_hobbes/86/ch860119.gif --Chinasaur 08:38, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

That's for sure. I wouldn't trust that man with a scalpel; or even a butter-knife. But his heart was in the right place. I guess idealized, third-hand accounts of communal native Hawaiian society just don't mix well with Hegelian philosophy and industrialization. Go figure. And in the end communism ends up pretty similar to capitalism anyway, anthropologically speaking--they both put the economy ahead of the people. There goes paradise, again... Doh! Pariah

"His heart was in the right place" don't even get me started... --Chinasaur 08:38, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

<<There goes paradise, again... Doh!>>

lol:). "we'll get it next time -- just give us one more shot at our Tower of Babel:)!"

Heheh--there's always next time :) Wikipedia can be our tower. Love the cartoon; but I've always wondered about the naming of the characters. Calvin & Hobbes... now those two were a couple of nutjobs; speaking of religion and social theory. Pariah 17:46, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

i always thought the names were very deliberate -- calvin, living in his imagination with very little grip on Reality, and hobbes, the "beast" (aka "leviathon") or cynical realist that's really just a projection of calvin's "other side." Each without the other is incomplete, just like that old Henson movie, The Dark Crystal. Maybe i'm reading too much into it, but maybe not:). C+H has to be the most brilliant comic series ever composed:). Ungtss 18:13, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Interesting--I never thought about it like that before. --and The Dark Crystal is awesome!--Pariah 04:01, Mar 5, 2005 (UTC)

New edits misleading...

"13:42, Mar 7, 2005 Ferdinand Pienaar m (The implicit definition of religion (any belief, basically) is too broad to be meaninful: unless it includes "the supernatural, sacred, or divine", it's not a religious belief, just a belief)"

This is not entirely accurate, although I agree with the intention to make a meaningful definition for a highly problematic term.

I guess my complaint is that religion may not mean "belief" specifically, but only rituals, practices, or methods. Some even take a quasi-skeptical stance, arguing that belief itself is a false path--for example Taoism. Likewise, not all religions include references to the supernatural, sacred, or divine and some specifically avoid them.

That said; the literal translation of religion is "reconnection"--from Latin re (again) + ligio (connection, as in ligament, ligature, etc.)... so the word religion does imply a certain kind of reunion of the individual to a greater world, be it the phenomenal world, or to some divine power or realm.

To stay consistent with a popular understanding of the word religion, but also to allow for the wide diversity of practices and stances with regard to belief and the divine, I reccomend we focus the definition on the presence of an institution or organization. Everything we might call a religion seems to have the following things in common:

• a group of specialists who preserve and disseminate the teachings of the religion (be they beliefs, or methods, or both)
• particular rituals, practices, or methods
• some kind of uniform or mark of membership--from haircuts to monk's robes
• temples or structures used for teaching, discussion, or ritual practice
• the over-arching goal to ensure a good and meaningful life (and perhaps after-life or rebirth) for the practioner and society

Okay, rant over,

--Pariah 23:52, Mar 7, 2005 (UTC)

Except there's already another term for this: organised religion

Fair enough, but then what would be a disorganized religion? I guess what I mean to say is that, unlike, say spirituality, the term religion itself implies some level of organization, but it does not necessarily imply a system of belief or a belief in the supernatural (even if it often does). Also, if a user searches for the term organized religion, they end up at the religion article.--Pariah 02:05, Mar 8, 2005 (UTC)

Pariah, I think supernatural beliefs are in nearly all cases the central definition of spirituality and religion as terms. For example, objectivist_philosophy would never be called a religion. Also, I think Taoism is still categorically a 'belief system.' --Nectarflowed 06:31, 8 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I won't comment on objectivism, but I see what you mean. Perhaps it hinges on a definition of supernatural, but I still believe there are many things out there called religions, and resembling religions in every respect--except for specific reference to the supernatural. Likewise, there are definitely religions that favour practice over "belief"--sometimes to the exclusion of it. As for Taoism--yes, it is a belief system, but so is everything--it still has more in common with philosophical skepticism than it does with Christianity or Zoroastrianism, for example. But then, I guess you could draw a line between philosophical vs. religious branches of Taoism...

I guess I just don't think we should be trying to define something as complex and diverse as religion in a single sentence. Maybe the best thing is to post three or four attributable definitions of religion and let the reader decide which best fits the entity in mind. I'll crack out my William James, if others would be willing to look up Durkheim, Weber, and anyone else they can think of.--Pariah 10:16, Mar 8, 2005 (UTC)

..... the literal translation of religion is "reconnection"--from Latin re (again) + ligio (connection, as in ligament, ligature, etc.)... so the word religion does imply a certain kind of reunion of the individual to a greater world, be it the phenomenal world, or to some divine power or realm.

I'm not sure of the given etymology, although it is nice and gives good grounds for (literary) reflection. OED and others e.g Merriam-Webster etc trace the "ligio" part to "legio" and "legere" - that is, "re-ligion" implies the reading and re-reading of certain texts so as to pass them on to succeeeding generations. The idea of repetition is contained in the Jewish terms for Deuteronomy (Mishneh Torah - a re-statement of the Torah) and of the Oral Law (a "second Torah") first committed to writing in 200CE as "The Mishnah" and amplified for at least four succeeeding centuries in the "Gemarah" - the continuation of discussion.

Noach Stern

I first heard the "reconnection" etymology in a lecture by Tom Harpur--Pariah 10:16, Mar 8, 2005 (UTC)

aren't these issues covered in the "definition of religion" section? Seems to me the more general "belief" definition is covered by the "Functional approach," while the more specific "supernatural" definition is covered by the "Form-based approach." No? Ungtss 14:58, 8 Mar 2005 (UTC)

You're right, Ungtss--perhaps I have jumped the gun a little here. I'm just concerned because the first thing the reader finds should, it seems to me, be a bit broader in interpretation.

Anyway--unrelated to these concerns: I've been digging a bit into the etymology of the term. I guess the "re-reading" etymology comes from Cicero; while the "re-ligio" (reconnection) etymology also has the connotation of re-binding... or returning to bondage. I guess even ancient scholars could not agree on how to define the term...--Pariah 22:58, Mar 8, 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, i think you've hit the nail on the head. even our etymologies are unclear:). to reread, to reconnect, or to rebind? Ungtss 23:35, 8 Mar 2005 (UTC)

"Trinitarian religions"

The article contains the phrase:

Trinitarian religions assert that there is one God with three persons. Examples include the majority of Christian denominations, with the exceptions of Oneness Pentecostals;

This is misleading in my view, because there is only one trinitarian religion to my knowledge -- Christianity (and not even the whole of that religion). The article implies that other religions than Christianity are Trinitarian -- no other religion is. (Some religions, e.g. Hinduism, have "trinities" of three Gods, but the Hindu "Trinity" on closer examination is quite different from the Christian "Trinity"; thus to call Hinduism for example a "trinitarian religion" is to do both it and Christianity a disservice.)

I propose rephrasing it to something like the following:

Many Christians believe in trinitarianism, which asserts that there is one God with three persons. (The majority of Christian denominations hold this, with some exceptions who reject it, e.g. Oneness Pentecostals.)

Which I shall now do.--137.111.13.34 07:07, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Sounds good:). Ungtss 15:23, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

definitions

this was added: (But, as many religious people believe that religion is necessary to explain natural things, this definition of religion is not one they would be likely to accept.)

I can definitely respect the sentiment -- pointing out that this is an "outside view" of religion -- however, I think there are also many RELIGIOUS people that think that religion is unparsimonious -- there are a number of people who divorce faith from reason, accept "science" by reason, and accept religion by "faith." i, of course, agree with the person who added this, that religion IS essential to explaining natural phenomena. but i'm not sure we can say "religious people would be unlikely to accept it" -- many, in fact, do. perhaps we should qualify it a bit, saying "some religious people accept this, because they accept their religion by "faith alone." others reject it, because they see faith and reason as a continuum" ... something like that? what do you think? Ungtss 15:23, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Blatant and persistent factual inaccuracy

Having educational background in thermodynamics, this one really annoys me:

Removed:

"Some, for instance, note the empirical phenomena of entropy and the Second Law of Thermodynamics, which indicate that over time, the universe passes from greater to lesser levels of organization. They further note that the only observable instances of increased organization are caused by life (in the context of evolution) or by persons (in the context of human creative efforts to alter and organize our universe). They then assert that naturalistic explanations alone are insufficient to explain Order in the universe, because they provide no mechanism by which order may arise from disorder, other than Persons. They conclude that the most reasonable explanation for the origin of Order in the universe is a Person of one form or another, who provided the creative impetus that brought about the remarkable order and structure evident in the universe."

While the Second Law of Thermodynamics does a very good job of explaining why you can't cool your kitchen by leaving the refrigerator door open, it won't help the apologist. The second law is often stated this way:

Any work done on a closed system raises its entropy (or at the very least, entropy doesn't change).

Apologists usually make one of two critical misinterpretations that seemingly make this law work for them.

• Not understanding the definition of entropy, or
• Not understanding what a closed system is.

Entropy

Entropy is usually described as disorder, but not on the everyday context. disorgaranization, possibly describes entropy, but this is even more open to misinterpretation. Entropy is basically a measure of irreversability. When the entropy of a system is increased, it is statistically unlikely to return to its previous state. Imagine a deck of playing cards. You ask a friend to cut the deck. All things being equal, if he cuts the deck a second time, there will be a 1/51 chance that it will return to the original state. If he cuts the deck a third time, there will be a much lower chance of it returning to the original state. Thus, any work you do on a closed system will raise its irreversability (i.e entropy). This is a simple matter of statistics. Entropy can be a confusing topic, and I hope that this makes it a bit more clear.

Apologists usually substitute their own more convenient definition of order or entropy. Yes, stars, galaxies, planets, etc. appear to have order to the casual observer, but remembering that entropy is irreversability, the argument starts to seem silly. Is our planet becoming increasingly more likely to decompose into the dust and gas clouds that it formed from? No. Will stellar fusion work backwards? No. With every passing moment, our universe is much less likely to reverse.

Closed system

The universe is the ultimate closed system. Since we just debunked the folklore that the universe's entropy is decreasing, lets look at other systems. It appears to the apologist that either evolution, technology, or human accomplishment is decreasing in entropy. While this claim is dubious, even if it were true it would prove nothing. That is because neither evolution, nor technology nor human accomplishment are closed systems. For a system to be closed there must be no exchange of matter or energy across its boundary. Good luck defining the boundary of evolution, technology, or human accomplishment. No boundary, no closed system. Even if one was able to draw such a boundary, it would be tricky to show that no matter or energy crossed it.

Face the music. Occam's razor cuts deep, and the pulpit physicist can't stop that.

-Casito 07:54, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

you are free to disagree with the point of view, and free to insert points of view opposed to it. but you are NOT free to delete points of view opposed to your own. Ungtss 13:19, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The 2nd law states that a closed system as a whole will not decrease in entropy. Within the system, however, parts are free to decrease in entropy. The earth, for example, is not a closed system, as it is provided heat and light by the sun. The article states that the only examples of increased organizations are caused by life. What about crystals and snowflakes? What about weather phenomenon such as hurricanes, tornadoes, or the Great Red Spot? Planets? Stars? Galaxies? The section as it stands is a joke. -- BRIAN0918  14:09, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

the point is that the "whole" cannot decrease in entropy. those who prefer the first view say that a "part of the system" can decrease in entropy ... but they can only do this by dodging the question of the entropy of the entire system. the EARTH can get more organized ... but only at the expense of the organization of the sun. and how did the sun form? the only possibility appears to be the supernova of a nearby star ... or a creator. either way, the sun depends for its existence on preexisting organization. same with snowflakes. no snowflakes without the sun. Ungtss 14:17, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The 2nd law simply states that the entropy of the universe can't decrease. The current section in the article is just technobabble, trying to sound technical when they actually have no clue what they're talking about. How do you define or measure "organization" objectively? What are the units of "organization"? If you define a unit, please show how this organization is transferred from the Sun to the Earth. Masses such as the sun and planets come together under gravitational attraction. -- BRIAN0918  15:40, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Again, the section in question may be the most horrible nonsense ever concieved -- but it is held by a number of people and is ATTRIBUTED to them on the page. it is therefore npov. further, it follows the atheistic interpretation of occam's razor above, which many consider to be utter nonsense. we cannot go around deleting attributed povs in articles just because we don't think they make sense. if it's nonsense, the reader will figure that out on their own. Ungtss 15:47, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I never said it wasn't neutral. I said it's not factually correct. Your first argument above is nonsense. You've taken the original statement of the 2nd law and created this vague concept of "order" out of it, and claimed that this concept is transferred from one object to another. All unverifiable nonsense. When a gas cloud collapses into a star, is that more order or less? When oil and water are mixed, and then separate on their own, is that more order or less? Your arguments are based completely in vagueries, and so, no matter how many individuals hold them to be true, are not correct. -- BRIAN0918  16:00, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

<<I said it's not factually correct. >> and <<All unverifiable nonsense.>>

There is a big difference between these two. to say something is factually incorrect is very different than saying it is unverifiable. you still haven't presented any reason to believe it is factually incorrect. Ungtss 16:14, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

<<When a gas cloud collapses into a star, is that more order or less?>>

gas clouds don't collapse on their own into stars. The tendency of gases to expand in a vaccuum overpowers their gravity unless an outside force like a supernova acts on them. Ungtss 16:14, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

<<When oil and water are mixed, and then separate on their own, is that more order or less?>>

that's an interesting example. i'll have to ponder that one. Ungtss 16:14, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

<<Your arguments are based completely in vagueries, and so, no matter how many individuals hold them to be true, are not correct.>>

Non sequitur. vague does not equal incorrect. Ungtss 16:14, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

How is it an argument if it's unverifiable and based in vagueries? Here are some more examples for you to ponder (they're only ponderable because these concepts you're asserting as evidence are all subjective to begin with):

When rainwater settles into the bottom of a pothole rather than distributing randomly in the space of the hole, is that "more order" or less?

Does a planet with two million species of beetles show "more order" than a planet with only one million species of beetles?

If a gene mutates in one generation and then mutates back to the earlier form in a later generation, has "order" decreased and then increased? -- BRIAN0918  16:20, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

<<How is it an argument if it's unverifiable and based in vagueries?>>

arguments can be unverifiable and vague -- they are simply bad arguments. consider theology, a 3000 year history of unverifiable and vague arguments. still arguments, tho. Ungtss 16:26, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

your examples definitely call for a removal of the word "order," and instead something like "concentration of energy." thanks for pointing out that vaguery. Ungtss 16:26, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

What do you think now? Ungtss 16:34, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I think the phrase "because the natural universe is fundamentally incapable of explaining itself" should be changed to "asserting that the natural universe is fundamentally incapable of explaining itself". Otherwise, it looks alright, I guess, although all of those argument are nonsense. :)  BRIAN0918  16:52, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

thanks:). if nonsense it must be, at least it's npov nonsense:). Ungtss 16:54, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

For neutrality, shouldn't there be a short statement at the end of that paragraph with links to articles explaining what's wrong with all of these arguments? -- BRIAN0918  16:56, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Would neutrality then allow for such a sentence at the end of the atheistic take on occam's razor? Ungtss 17:20, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Is there an article devoted to the subject? If not then I don't see how only one sentence could be added. -- BRIAN0918  17:31, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Actually, I think it's alright in its current form, since the articles in the links have criticisms within them. -- BRIAN0918  17:38, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Bingo:). Thanks for being so reasonable and working with me on this. You've definitely improved the article, and I appreciate it a great deal:). Ungtss 17:39, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I got a good reply regarding the 2nd law from an individual on talk.orgins:

"I think that people get hung up on the 2nd law and "order" primarily because of how the 2nd law is taught; that is by using an analogy of "order" versus "disorder" to illustrate the concept of entropy. What happens is that people believe that because the 2nd law governs entropy at the molecular/atomic level that it also governs "order" at the macro universe level. What they are missing is that they have made an unwarranted conceptual leap from "entropy" to "order"; in essence, they are arguing that the illustrative analogy of the second law is the second law itself."

true ... but it still leaves the question of molecular/atomic entropy unanswered:). Ungtss 18:32, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Clout

What of Clout?

these are the questions we all must ask of ourselves. Ungtss 02:33, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Dear Sir or Madam, the translation that you have provided for al-Quran 5-15 here is inaccurate (if not wrong). Islam does not prohibit muslims to take people of the book as friends .the correct translation would be that: muslims should not take people of the book as ones to listen to.

to which translation are you referring? i used this one. [2] Ungtss 03:10, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

i noticed you changed it to a different version. which version did you change to? while i'm sure there is such a version, i'd like to verify it anyway. would you be so kind? Ungtss 12:33, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)