Sunday, March 15, 2015

Conscious Words from Savant




You've shifted from saying that atheism was rooted in the theory of evolution, which I showed to be wrong since we can find it one or two centuries before Darwin. Now, you ask "when" the theory was created, and at least suggest that it was motivated by Protestant desires to justify slavery (or at least that Protestants accepted it because of their desire to defend slavery). First of all, the defense of slavery began at least a century or two before Darwin. There were theological, philosophical and scientific defenses of slavery which were essential forms of theological and scientific racism. In America, the primary RELIGION was used more than science. Also, by the time the theory of evolution was formulated and well known slavery was already over or on its way out. The ORIGIN OF THE SPECIES was published in 1859, just one year before the American Civil War and six years before the abolition of slavery. I doubt if many Americans--pro-sla very or anti-slavery--were even aware of its existence. it didn't enter into the debates over slavery. THE DESCENT OF MAN wasn't published until 1871, six years AFTER slavery had already been abolished. Moreover, once the theory of evolution DID become known in the USA it aroused vehement opposition from most of American Protestant Christianity. It was even banned from being taught in public schools. The challenge to that ban by a dissident teacher led to the famous Scopes Monkey Trial of the 1920s As for 1 billion babies being aborted in the name of atheism, the issue should be questioned as posed. For one thing, I don't know the source of that figure or how reliable that source is. Furthermore, the moral rightness or wrongness of abortion is itself debatable (as is the issue of whether the fetus is already a human baby when it has gills and a reptilian tail). My own moral sentiments regarding its rightness or wrongness is ambivalent for reasons too complex to elaborate here, and probably too complex for you to comprehend. But let's put my ethical ambivalences aside and assume for the sake of argument that abortion is morally wrong unqualifiedly, or at least under all but the most extreme circumstances. So, what has abortion to do with atheism? (And I know atheists who are opposed to abortion!) In America, only 5% of the people are atheists. In Black America, about 1% are atheist. And this is a relatively recent development while abortion has been around for decades, if not centuries. Do you REALLY expect me to believe that ONLY 5% of Americans in general, and only 1% of Black Americans have had abortions? Most people having abortions are religious BELIEVERS. Atheism is hardly the basis or the inspiration for abortions. Also, I've no evidence that the roots of atheism are in Russia or China, as these tendencies appeared first in France and England. I don't know whether most people in Russia or China are atheists, but I tend to doubt it. We do have evidence that most people in Sweden and Denmark are atheists, and from certain studies they are (as national collectivities) healthier, happier, better educated and economically well of than are average Americans despite the fact that USA is richer by far. Religion has not made us any better off.


-Savant

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Another thing freddy the fool seems not to realize is that Blacks were moving to the suburbs as early as the 1970s when I was in high school. Almost EVERYBODY knows this, and the simpleton announces this bit of old news as if it was hot off the press. Tell me something I DON'T KNOW, fool. One other thing that he seems little aware of: While in the beginning the movement to the suburbs among Blacks was a voluntary migration on the part of the middle classes, now it is increasingly happening with the Black poor, the black proletariat. But not always voluntarily. The wave of gentrification that has hit the cities in the past 20 years or more have had the consequence of FORCING many poor and working class blacks out of the cities as whites (i.e. affluent whites) return. They aren't so much moving as being PUSHED out. Freddy should shut up on these, be humble, and maybe I can instruct his ignorant ass. Apparently, when he migrated from England he left brain behind. Maybe just as well. It probably wasn't functioning even over there

-Savant

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More whites are being killed by whites, but less so by the police. Police often try to reason with armed whites who pull guns on them, while shooting unarmed Blacks--even Black children. Also, your comment was not relevant in terms of the debate you intruded into. Maybe you should learn the context of a discussion before jumping in at the tail end. Freddy's claim (to which I responded) was that only inner city Blacks have problems with the police. I know too many fellow Black professionals and intellectuals living in the suburbs who have problems with the police, including a teacher and writer who was choked like Eric Garner, but fortunately survived to tell about it.

-Savant

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A conflict between the industrial interests of the North and the agrarian interests of the slaveholding South.

-Savant

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