CoinCube, because I presume you don't have the real world trading experience of Armstrong, you might be focusing too much on "fundamental value" which is mostly a meaningless concept in trading and investing in assets that are driven instead by confidence, herd movement, and liquidity issues. Also we need to be very careful not to make investing decision based on any emotional reasons. This can lead to bad decisions. I've suffered from both of these myself in the past, so I am learning by fire.
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Indeed, possibly all the way to 2024 or 2032 before the end of the bull market in gold, as Armstrong has written. But the problem will be that you probably won't be able to sell for a profit. You will be trapped and watch the price come back down while you must sit on your physical gold unable to cash out without ending up giving it all to the taxman. Again, maybe some people can find ways, but the environment is going to be much more onerous than anything seen in the past, because physical cash will be eliminated by then. So what do you trade your gold for that isn't tracked by the taxman? Land titles will be tracked also.
I think you'd be much better off plowing your money into businesses and land in Asia as these will be income producing assets. Gold produces no income, so while it is sitting there illiquid you can't generate income off of it (well you can lease your gold into the future's market which is what Armstrong taught the Arabs to do since they prefer to hold gold and Muslims can't do usury).
iamnotback I pretty much agree with the entirety of your post above except for your dismissal of fundamental value. Investing based on fundamental value is viable provided you are certain of your analysis and plan for the fact that you may not be able to liquidate the investment in your lifetime if the herd moves against you in the interim. My own quite limited investment into gold and Bitcoin consists of a few of these.   I have purchased three of them for each of my small children. One will be given to each when they turn 20. The other two will be given given to their children my future grandchildren when they turn 20. My investment in gold and bitcoin is an attempt to transfer a small amount of wealth into the future to unborn generations in a way that discourages that wealth from being squandered. Were I looking to liquidate investments in only a few years I would choose other vehicles. |
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iamnotback and aminorex I read through your recent back and forth. I thought I would comment on two aspects of your disagreements. Regarding future value of US stocks and gold I am very skeptical of the argument that gold will drop in nominal value going forward. The Armstrong prediction linked is almost a year only and may be outdated. Gold like the USD is a natural hedge against worsening currency uncertainty. In the current market environment both gold and US stocks are likely to see increased capital inflows and I suspect both will rise substantially in nominal terms. Over the long run 20+ year’s I suspect physical gold at today’s prices will do better than stocks. The stock market is increasingly broken and with each passing year its ability to perform its function as a weighting device is further undermined. Fulfilling pension and liabilities require outsized gains in these stock markets regardless of fundamentals and maintaining social stability necessitates that government deliver these gains. I suspect near future will be full periodic crises and mini crashes smoothing the way for further rounds of QE. This combination would result stocks doing quite well while they increasingly become divorced from even the pretense of fundamentals. Such market control can go on as long as there is confidence the currency in the local currency. Regarding AI I think we are much farther away from true self-aware AI then most people believe. Our understanding of consciousness is infantile. I discussed unthread in my post on consciousness that consciousness may be grounded in quantum mechanics which if true would likely preclude the development of true self-aware AI until sometime after the development of robust quantum computers. Self aware AI could in theory be creative and perhaps even appear omniscient to a human while in actuality being quite limited. To the single celled organism under a microscope a human appears omniscient living an incomprehensible life orders of magnitude longer and more complex while dealing with challenges that play out over hundreds cellular generations. Any appearance of omniscience in AI would likely be a similar illusion. |
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Let me make a couple of predictions here: That the UK will
vote "Leave" in a few days time. Following that, Europe
and the USA, and Mr Cameron will do their best to make
the UK's life Hell for the next two years after which
they will propose another vote.
My prediction on how a Brexit can play out is the following:
1. Leave wins.
2. Politicians claim that since Leave wins we will leave the EU, just not immediately.
First we must create a roadmap for an orderly exit, resolve the legal issues, negotiate post-BREXIT treaty with EU
3. If EU likes nothing more that protracted eurogroup meetings I don't know what that is. So UK will be caught for years in
an "exiting" purgatory that will wreck the UK economy
4. After much pain and dead-end negotiations Brits will be pleading to forget the whole idea.
You both called this one correctly. It will be interesting to see if the rest plays out as predicted. The coming punish the UK period might be a good opportunity to invest in the UK. |
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All religions represent a code of moral behavior. The exact code varies between religions. Atheism rejects this code freeing one to replace it with something of the atheist own choosing. As evil people in power usually desire evil things they naturally regard religion as a direct threat because the moral code of most religions would condemn whatever it is they plan to do. Atheism is simply a void which leaves an empty space to be filled. Everyone lives by some sort of general principles if only simple personal expediency. This void leaves the atheist highly vulnerable to whatever unhealthy substitute moral codes are in vogue at a given moment. Eighty years ago the concepts of Lebensraum, Rassenschande, and Untermensch were in vogue in Germany. Christopher Hitchens arguments on Hitler are quite disingenuous. Hitler was a first rate demagogue he said whatever was necessary to solidify his power and advance his goals. As in all things you need to look at what he actually did. The Case Against the Nazis; How Hitler's Forces Planned To Destroy German Christianity http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/13/weekinreview/word-for-word-case-against-nazis-hitler-s-forces-planned-destroy-german.html?pagewanted=all''The Persecution of the Christian Churches,'' summarizes the Nazi plan to subvert and destroy German Christianity, which it calls ''an integral part of the National Socialist scheme of world conquest.''
In the 1920's, as they battled for power, the Nazis realized that the churches in overwhelmingly Christian Germany needed to be neutralized before they would get anywhere. Two-thirds of German Christians were Protestants, belonging to one of 28 regional factions of the German Evangelical Church. Most of the rest were Roman Catholics. On one level, the Nazis saw an advantage. In tumultuous post-World War I Germany, the Christian churches ''had long been associated with conservative ways of thought, which meant that they tended to agree with the National Socialists in their authoritarianism, their attacks on Socialism and Communism, and in their campaign against the Versailles treaty'' that had ended World War I with a bitterly resentful Germany.
But there was a dilemma for Hitler. While conservatives, the Christian churches ''could not be reconciled with the principle of racism, with a foreign policy of unlimited aggressive warfare, or with a domestic policy involving the complete subservience of Church to State.'' Given that these were the fundamental underpinnings of the Nazi regime, ''conflict was inevitable,'' the summary states. It came, as Nazi power surged in the late 1920's toward national domination in the early 30's.
According to Baldur von Schirach, the Nazi leader of the German youth corps that would later be known as the Hitler Youth, ''the destruction of Christianity was explicitly recognized as a purpose of the National Socialist movement'' from the beginning, though ''considerations of expedience made it impossible'' for the movement to adopt this radical stance officially until it had consolidated power, the outline says.
Attracted by the strategic value inherent in the churches' ''historic mission of conservative social discipline,'' the Nazis simply lied and made deals with the churches while planning a ''slow and cautious policy of gradual encroachment'' to eliminate Christianity.
The prosecution investigators describe this as a criminal conspiracy. ''This general plan had been established even before the rise of the Nazis to power,'' the outline says. ''It apparently came out of discussions among an inner circle'' comprised of Hitler himself, other top Nazi leaders including the propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels, and a collection of party enforcers and veteran beer-hall agitators.
Of course, the churches stayed in Hitler's good graces for only as long as the Nazis considered their cooperation expedient. Soon after Hitler assumed dictatorial powers, ''relations between the Nazi state and the church became progressively worse,'' the outline says. The Nazis ''took advantage of their subsequently increasing strength to violate every one of the Concordat's provisions.''
In 1937, Pope Pius XI denounced Nazi treachery in an encyclical that accused Hitler of ''a war of extermination'' against the church. The battle had been joined on some fronts. Nazi street mobs, often in the company of the Gestapo, routinely stormed offices in Protestant and Catholic churches where clergymen were seen as lax in their support of the regime.
Still, in a society where the entire Jewish population was being automatically condemned without public protest, care was taken to manipulate public perceptions about clergymen who fell into Nazi disfavor. ''The Catholic Church need not imagine that we are going to create martyrs,'' Robert Wagner, the Nazi Gauleiter of Baden, said in a speech, according to the O.S.S. study. ''We shall not give the church that satisfaction. She shall have not martyrs, but criminals.''
But once they had total power and set off to launch a world war, the Nazis made no secret of what lay in store for Christian clergymen who expressed dissent.
In Munich, Nazi street gangs and a Gestapo squad attacked the residence of the Roman Catholic cardinal. ''A hail of stones was directed against the windows, while the men shouted, 'Take the rotten traitor to Dachau!' '' the outline says, adding: ''After 1937, German Catholic bishops gave up all attempts to print'' their pastoral letters publicly and instead ''had them merely read from the pulpits.''
Then the letters themselves were confiscated. 'In many churches, the confiscation took place during Mass by the police snatching the letter out of the hands of the priests as they were in the act of reading it.''
Later the same year, dissident Protestant churches joined in a manifesto protesting Nazi tactics. In response, the Nazis arrested 700 Protestant pastors.
Objectionable statements made by the clergy would no longer be prosecuted in the courts, the Nazis said. Statements ''injurious to the State would be ruthlessly punished by 'protective custody,' that is, the concentration camp,'' the outline says. |
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I have never knowingly voted for a God botherer and if I did find out my candidate was one then they're out.
You are in luck then if you live in the US this election cycle. |
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You're trying to explain me that socialist atheists can be bad? Wahou what a news! xD
Sadly religion is like most horrible disease, it can't disappear. But it can be cured, by science and education ^^
I have extensively argued elsewhere that you have this exactly backwards and that rather then a disease religion is overall healthy and protective. Religion is on whole and for most people far healthier then a lack of religion. It will never be "cured" by science and education in fact in the long run it will be reinforced by them. Throughout history various entities and governments have therefore attempted to "cure" religion with violent oppression instead. However all of these attempts have failed and will continue to fail because the oppressing system whatever form it may take is always inherently unhealthy and thus unsustainable. Its very nature guarantees failure. Some failed historical attempts to "cure" religion. The United Soviet Socialist Republichttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USSR_anti-religious_campaign_(1921%E2%80%931928) The Soviet regime had an ostensible commitment to the complete annihilation of religious institutions and ideas. Militant atheism was central to the ideology of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and a high priority of all Soviet leaders. Convinced atheists were considered to be more virtuous individuals than those of religious belief. When church leaders demanded freedom of religion under the constitution, the Communists responded with terror. They murdered the metropolitan of Kiev and executed twenty-eight bishops and 6,775 priests. Despite mass demonstrations in support of the church, repression cowed most ecclesiastical leaders into submission. The Nazi Regimehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_Nazi_Germany#Plan_for_the_Roman_Catholic_ChurchAs Hitler rose to power, many Catholic bishops, priests, religious and lay leaders vociferously opposed Nazism on the grounds of its incompatibility with Christian morals. In early 1931, the German bishops issued an edict excommunicating all leaders of the Nazi Party and banned Catholics from membership. In 1937 Pope Pius XI issued the encyclical Mit brennender Sorge condemning Nazi ideology. In 1941 the Nazi authorities decreed the dissolution of all monasteries and abbeys in the German Reich, many of them effectively being occupied and secularized by the Allgemeine SS under Himmler. Himmler saw a main task of the SS to be that of "acting as the vanguard in overcoming Christianity and restoring a Germanic way of living" as part of preparations for the coming conflict between "humans and subhumans". Hitler called a truce in the Church conflict with the outbreak of war, wanting to back away from policies likely to cause internal friction in Germany. He decreed at the outset of war that "no further action should be taken against the Evangelical and Catholic Churches for the duration of the war". Khmer_Rougehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khmer_Rouge_period_(1975%E2%80%931979)#Religious_communitiesMany monks were executed; temples and pagodas were destroyed[14] or turned into storehouses or gaols. Images of the Buddha were defaced and dumped into rivers and lakes. People who were discovered praying or expressing religious sentiments were often killed. The Christian and Muslim communities also were even more persecuted, as they were labelled as part of a pro-Western cosmopolitan sphere, hindering Cambodian culture and society. The Roman Catholic cathedral of Phnom Penh was completely razed.[14] The Khmer Rouge forced Muslims to eat pork, which they regard as forbidden (ḥarām). Many of those who refused were killed. Christian clergy and Muslim imams were executed. One hundred and thirty Cham mosques were destroyed. Early Communist Chinahttps://www.mtholyoke.edu/~geary20d/worldpolitics/maozedeng.htmlDuring the beginning of the People’s Republic of China, Mao Zedong and the Communists had seized control and 10,000 missionaries were forced to leave the country. Persecution of Christians proceeded at full throttle. Mao Zedong did not want any foreign influence on the people. In 1952 the last U.S. Presbyterian missionaries, Frank and Essie Price, were forced to leave China a mere three years after Mao Zedong assumes power. During the dark years of Mao's 'Great Leap Forward' (launched in 1958) and 'The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution' (launched in 1966), many of the Christian leaders were killed and imprisoned for their faith, and many others spent years in hard labor camps. According to an article in the Epoch Times, “The CCP (Chinese Communist Party) has lost all composure in the frantic persecution of religion. During the Cultural Revolution, numerous temples and mosques were torn down, and monks were paraded in humiliation through the streets |
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Thanks for this poll. It's always good to know what's important for Americans to know what you should do (the opposite).
So for USA, the worst candidate is an atheist socialist... Well that's exactly what we would need then.
 Stalin called for an "atheist five year plan" from 1932–1937, led by the LMG, in order to completely eliminate all religious expression in the USSR. It was declared that the concept of God would disappear from the Soviet Union. |
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Some music from the faiths highlighted in this post. Shalom Aleichem (Peace Be Upon You in Hebrew) - Susana Allen & Hector David https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xAgLtjMrW4Baba Yetu (The Lord's Prayer in Swahili) - Alex Boyé, BYU Men's Chorus & Philharmonic; Christopher Tin https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vsINANZ6RiwLyrics: Shalom Aleichem: Shalom alechem malache ha-sharet malache elyon, mi-melech malche ha-melachim Ha-Kadosh Baruch Hu. Bo'achem le-shalom malache ha-shalom malache elyon, mi-melech malche ha-melachim Ha-Kadosh Baruch Hu. Barchuni le-shalom malache ha-shalom malache elyon, mi-melech malche ha-melachim Ha-Kadosh Baruch Hu. Tzet'chem le-shalom malache ha-shalom malache elyon, mi-melech malche ha-melachim Ha-Kadosh Baruch Hu. The words to the song translate as follows: Peace upon you, ministering angels, messengers of the Most High, of the Supreme King of Kings, the Holy One, blessed be He. Come in peace, messengers of peace, messengers of the Most High, of the Supreme King of Kings, the Holy One, blessed be He. Bless me with peace, messengers of peace, messengers of the Most High, of the Supreme King of Kings, the Holy One, blessed be He. May your departure be in peace, messengers of peace, messengers of the Most High, of the Supreme King of Kings, the Holy One, blessed be He Baba Yetu: Baba yetu, yetu uliye Mbinguni yetu, yetu amina! Baba yetu yetu uliye M jina lako e litukuzwe. Utupe leo chakula chetu Tunachohitaji, utusamehe Makosa yetu, hey! Kama nasi tunavyowasamehe Waliotukosea usitutie Katika majaribu, lakini Utuokoe, na yule, muovu e milele! Ufalme wako ufike utakalo Lifanyike duniani kama mbinguni. (Amina) The words to the song translate as follows: Our Father, who art in Heaven. Amen! Our Father, Hallowed be thy name. Give us this day our daily bread, Forgive us of our trespasses, As we forgive others Who trespass against us Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one forever. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done On Earth as it is in Heaven. (Amen) |
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Washington State Schools Push ‘Gender Fluid,’ Transgender Ideas on K-12 Kids http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/06/09/washington-state-schools-tout-k-12-gender-fluid-education-standards/The standards assume that a significant number of boys will see themselves as girls, and a significant number of girls will see themselves as boys, regardless of biology. The standards also embrace the political claim that the government, local community and people should fully accept children’s declarations that their biology and feelings of gender are disconnected, and also endorse each child’s personal sense of “gender identity.
Learning standards for the other grade levels with regard to the “core idea” topic of “self-identity” are:
Grade 1: “Explain that there are many ways to express gender.”
Grade 2: “Understand there is a range of gender roles and expression; Understand importance of treating others with respect regarding gender expression.
Grade 3: “Explain that gender roles can vary considerably; Understand importance of treating others with respect regarding gender identity.”
Grade 4: “Identify how friends and family can influence ideas regarding gender roles, identity, and expression; Demonstrate ways to show respect for all people; Define sexual orientation.
Grade 5: “Describe how media, society, and culture can influence ideas regarding gender roles, identity, and expression; Promote ways to show respect for all people; Identify trusted adults to ask questions about gender identity and sexual orientation.”
Grade 6: “Understand the range of gender roles, identity, and expression across cultures.”
Grade 7: “Distinguish between biological sex, gender identity, gender expression, and sexual orientation.”
In response, more than 60 leaders concerned about the mental health of American children signed an open letter that says the Obama administration’s K-12 gender fluid policies are “putting the nation’s children at risk.”
Among the letter’s signers are Dr. Michelle Cretella, president of the American College of Pediatricians, and Lisa Bell, founder of Youth Trans Critical Professionals.
The pediatricians assert that standards or policies that promote gender fluidity amount to “child abuse”:
"A person’s belief that he or she is something they are not is, at best, a sign of confused thinking. When an otherwise healthy biological boy believes he is a girl, or an otherwise healthy biological girl believes she is a boy, an objective psychological problem exists that lies in the mind not the body, and it should be treated as such. These children suffer from gender dysphoria. Gender dysphoria (GD), formerly listed as Gender Identity Disorder (GID), is a recognized mental disorder in the most recent edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association (DSM-V)…
According to the DSM-V, as many as 98% of gender confused boys and 88% of gender confused girls eventually accept their biological sex after naturally passing through puberty. Conditioning children into believing that a lifetime of chemical and surgical impersonation of the opposite sex is normal and healthful is child abuse.” As the parent of young children who attend Washington State schools it is time to start researching private school options  |
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If only you bothered to watch the video, or read the article, or understand Satanism at all...
Satanists are atheists... they do not believe in Satan
None of this has to do with demons, Cthulhu, or Satan
The fucking title of the article starts, "I’m An Atheist..."!!!1!!!one!
Atheists do not believe in, much less worship, Satan!
I watched the video. Satanism is not a joke. In my younger days I participated in the care of a young woman who was raised by her father who was a genuine satanist. She witnessed human sacrifice and was subject to abuse that I will not repeat here. I do understand that most of these "satanist" are atheist looking to push a political agenda. That is why I said the following. Personally I find satanist a little boring and sad. Mostly misguided people making unhealthy life choices in the false belief that they are making some kind of political statement.
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I have noticed several of your posts are about demons, Chthulu, and Satanists. Personally I find satanist a little boring and sad. Mostly misguided people making unhealthy life choices in the false belief that they are making some kind of political statement. My beliefs about Satan fall in line with those of the Jewish tradition though I am not Jewish. http://www.beingjewish.com/basics/satan.htmlSatan is not a rebellious angel. The angels are spiritual and holy, without any physical or unholy presence, and the presence of Hashem's holiness permeates them entirely. Angels, unlike humans, are therefore constantly and fully aware of Hashem's Presence everywhere. Could you stay dry in the ocean? An angel could not stop being holy, and can do no wrong. There is holiness everywhere in Creation, everywhere in the universe, and angels are made of the same thing. An angel could not stop serving G-d even if he tried.
Furthermore, humans have Satan to tempt us. Angels have no Satan to tempt them. Who would be Satan's Satan? An ultra-Satan?
The truth is that Satan has a job to do, just like every other angel. And angels have no free will. They do as Hashem commands them.
A man once came to a great Rabbi, very troubled. He said to the Rabbi, "Please pray to Hashem to take away my Evil Inclination. I do so many sins, and I want to stop sinning!"
The Rabbi answered, "Then what would be your purpose in this world, if you had no Evil Inclination? Your purpose in life is to overcome your personal Evil Inclination. That is what you were created for! Hashem has enough angels in heaven. He doesn't need one more. He created you human, so that you could improve yourself."
Humans can improve themselves, and that is their purpose in this world. Angels, however, cannot improve themselves. That's not their purpose. Angels are therefore said to be "standing." They cannot become better, and they cannot rise any higher than they are. They are, so to speak, standing.
Isaiah, when describing a Heavenly scene, says "Seraphim were standing around Him...." (Isaiah 6:2). (Seraphim are a type of angel.) Spiritually, angels are stuck at whatever level Hashem created them.
Humans are different. Humans can rise by improving themselves. For that reason, we are described as "walkers." Therefore the Prophet Zachariah told the High Priest, "This is what Hashem, L-rd of Hosts says: if you walk in My ways, and if you observe My safeguards, you and your sons after you will be the High Priests, and you and your sons will thus guard my Holy Temple, and I will make you walkers among these who are standing" (Zachariah 3:7).
In other words, Hashem was promising the High Priest that he and his children will be High Priests, and also will merit reward in the Afterlife, in the World of Souls, where righteous people go after death.
The Prophet Zachariah was saying that in the Next World they will be walkers among the standers, which means humans among angels.
So the angels are referred to as perpetually standing, but we are movers. Our purpose is to keep on moving, to keep on improving ourselves, and to keep on rising.
And how do we do it? By constant battle with the Evil Inclination.
So now we have to revise our understanding of Satan. Satan is not a fallen angel. Satan is merely an angel with a dirty job. Satan does not have a rival kingdom. Satan is not in competition with G-d, and Satan does not want followers or worshipers. He's not even happy when people obey him and sin.
Satan is the angel who tempts us, and the angel who prosecutes us in Heaven. He is also the Angel of Death. The angel who tries to make us sin is the same angel who accuses us in the Heavenly Court, and the same angel who carries out the death sentence.
So, no, Satan does not wear a red suit, or carry a trident. Nor does he wear a business suit. Satan is a force of evil in the world that we must resist. Satan most often appears as a desire within you. Of course, there is no shortage of things in the world to tempt us to sin. |
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Right in the first line you quoted it says: Apostolou establishes that parental choice is primary in human evolutionary history: ... Note that it says, "human evolutionary history." It doesn't specify the history of human family tradition. Then later it refers to evolutionary history again: Therefore human evolutionary history has left modern individuals, in a world where parental choice and control has been all-but eliminated from mainstream life, woefully ill-equipped to manage their sexual lives. Is this really talking about human traditions when it says "evolutionary history?" Personally, I understand to mean that family traditions are controlled by the process of evolution, which has to do with random selection, which is mathematically impossible in the extreme by any known process.  There are two aspects of Darwinian evolutionary theory: Natural Selection: The process in which organisms maladapted to their environment tend to be eliminated. Random Mutation: The hypothesized process in which new variation is introduced into the population. There has been documented cases of natural selection over time. It is the data backing random mutations as the primary mechanism of introducing new variation into the population that is much weaker. I have not spent a tremendous amount of time studying evolutionary biology but Charlton has. These are his thoughts on the matter. http://charltonteaching.blogspot.com/2016/03/reconceptualizing-metaphysical-basis-of.htmlStrikingly, there has been no success in the attempts over sixty-plus years to create life in the laboratory under plausible ancestral earth conditions – not even the complex bio-molecules such as proteins and nucleic acids. It has, indeed, been well-argued that this is impossible; and that ‘living life’ must therefore have evolved from an intermediate stage (or stages) of non-living but evolvable molecules such as crystals – perhaps clays (Cairns-Smith, 1987). But nobody has succeeded in doing that in the lab either, despite that artificial selection can be orders of magnitude faster than natural selection.
...
Certainly natural selection can coherently describe the historical situations leading to relatively small differences between organisms – perhaps up to the level of creating new and related species. This was already known to Darwin and was indeed the basis of his evidential argument – e.g. he described the nature and scale of effects of artificial selection done by animal breeders, plus some effects on the shape and size of beaks among Galapagos finches. To this, modern biologists could add observations on the modification of microorganisms under laboratory conditions, for instance the evolution of bacterial resistance to antibiotics. And there are also human racial differences of skeleton, teeth, skin and hair, brains and behaviours and many others – probably amounting to sub-species levels of differentiation – again these were (approximately) noted by Darwin (for instance in the mention of ‘favoured races’ in the subtitle of his 1859 book).
But all these are quantitative, not qualitative, changes; changes in magnitude but not in form. Neither natural selection, nor indeed artificial selection done by Man, has been observed creating a new genus, nor any taxonomic rank more fundamental such as a new family or phylum. There is no observational or experimental evidence which has emerged since 1859 of natural selection leading to major, qualitative changes in form – nor the originating of a novel form. Nobody has, by selection, changed a cat into a dog, let alone a sea anemone into a mouse (or the opposite); nobody has bred a dinosaur from a bird, nor retraced, by selective breeding, a modern species to its assumed ancestral form. There have, at most, been attempts to explain why such things are impossible in practice – why, for instance, the linear sequence of evolution cannot be ‘rewound’.
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atheism is really good for health because if you are an atheist , you are definitely free from religious ideas which make you be mentally ill during your life time..
There are many definitions of mental illness here is one. Mental illness: Any of various disorders in which a person's thoughts, emotions, or behaviour are so abnormal as to cause suffering to himself, herself, or other people. Unfortunately, you have gotten your analysis backwards. Rather then religion causing illness it offers a partial and very imperfect immunity to the true illnesses that are raging like an inferno throughout the world. Natural selection which was until recently held at bay by technological progress is being reimposed on humanity with a tight grip that will soon become a crushing vice. Most people do not understand this or do not care and will fail to protect themselves and their children. |
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An interesting post but it is more of an argument against the traditional mechanism of Darwinian evolution where evolution is felt to be driven by random mutation combined with natural selection then an argument that there is no evolution. |
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Sexual selection under parental choice, by Menelaos Apostolou (Review by Bruce Charlton)http://charltonteaching.blogspot.co.uk/2015/11/the-science-of-sex-most-important.htmlApostolou establishes that parental choice is primary in human evolutionary history: for many hundreds of generations of our ancestors it was primarily parents who chose and controlled who their children would marry and reproduce-with; and the individual sexual preferences of both men and women were relegated to a secondary role. This means that it was mainly parent choice that shaped human mating preferences - and personal choice would have been relegated to a subordinate role within and after marriage (e.g. infidelity choices; and the choice to end marriage - e.g. when to divorce). Most of this book is taken up by the collection and discussion of a mass of empirical data - hundreds of references, and the detailed working-through of the implications; but the take home message is relatively simple and clear. Apostolou shows that in most societies in human history, and continuing in most modern societies outside of The West, individual men and women had very little choice of their mates - and that this choice was nearly always made by their parents. In other words, marriages were arranged by the parents of the husband and wife - especially the daughter's marriage, and usually by their fathers more than their mothers. Parents preferences for a marriage partner differ from those of their offspring. In general, parents (relatively to their children, especially daughter) prefer delaying sexual relationships until an early marriage with early onset of child-bearing and little or no extra-marital sex. And parents have been generally hostile to divorce. The characteristics parents prefer (compared with individual preferences) include good character, ability to provide resources (especially men), coming from a 'good family' - with high status and wealth, and pre-marital chastity (especially in women). The characteristics individuals prefer (compared with their parents) include beauty and good looks (hair, face, figure etc. in a woman; muscular physique in a man), a charming and entertaining personality, the ability to provide sexual excitement and so on. The system of parental sexual choice seems to be unique to humans - which makes it a matter of exceptional biological interest: we may be the only species that has not evolved to choose our own mates. More exactly, the ancestral system was probably (to simplify) that two sets of parents controlled who their children married - the individual preferences of the prospective husband and wife may or may not have been consulted. Individual choice was probably important mostly after marriage - since there was the possibility of extra-marital liaisons (although Apostolou documents that these were extremely risky, and generally very harshly punished, up to and including death - especially for women). But all the ancestral societies permitted divorce (while strongly discouraging it - since this undermined parental decisions) - although mainly in a context where one of the spouses turned out to be unsatisfactory from the point of view of providing grandchildren (eg. men who did not provide sufficient resources - due to their behaviour or from illness or injury, or women who were barren). Probably since women are more controlled in arranging marriage, it is mainly women who initiate divorces. Apostolou summarizes this as: Parents decide who gets married, children decide whether they stay married. Another way of describing this is that parents screen or filter prospective spouses - and individual preferences only work within this pre-screened and filtered population. Consequently, modern men and women are not adapted to select a partner from an unscreened population - and not equipped with the proper instincts to assist their choice; so they are vulnerable to deception and exploitation. Therefore human evolutionary history has left modern individuals, in a world where parental choice and control has been all-but eliminated from mainstream life, woefully ill-equipped to manage their sexual lives. This affects both men and women adversely - but in partly different ways. men and women share a common problem of not being worried-enough about the problem of finding suitable long-term mates, marrying and having children - precisely because this whole business was managed for them by parents through hundreds of preceding human generations. Women delay and delay marriage and child-bearing, and seem unconcerned about their genetic extinction - because their deep inbuilt expectation is that these matters will be arranged for-them. men worry too much about attaining high status among men, and becoming a good provider - when these were selected for in a world where prospective in-laws wanted these attributes from men; but in the modern world they are an ineffectual strategy for getting a mate. In sum (and in terms of their biological fitness) modern men are too worried about working hard, and not worried enough about meeting and impressing individual women. So men and women who are apparently, in biological and historical terms, extremely well-qualified as potential husbands and wives, remain unmarried and childless in large and increasing numbers. Modern single people therefore are much too happy about their living in a state of unattached childlessness, than is good for their reproductive success. And this (biologically) foolish happiness is at least partly a consequence of evolutionary history: people are behaving as if mating and marriage will be sorted-out by parents - but it isn't. However, as is usual in works of evolutionary psychology - in a subject where the professionals are almost 100 percent atheists (and militant atheists at that!), in this book there is a too brief and conceptually inadequate consideration of the role of religion. The subject gets about three pages, and religion is treated as merely a trumped-up rationalization for enforcing biological imperatives. However, it is not mentioned that in modern societies it is only among the religious that we can find biologically viable patterns of mating, marriage and family - and indeed only among some particular religions that are traditionalist in ethics and patriarchal in structure: which fits exactly with the evolutionary predictions. My point is that religion needs to be regarded as a cause, not merely a consequence, of sexual behaviour and selection pressure; in sum, religion (more exactly, some specific religions) is the only known antidote to the pattern of maladaptive modern sexuality which is trending towards extinction.Another omission is the role of intoxication by alcohol and drugs. Much of modern sexual behaviour is initiated in parties, bars and nightclubs; and occurs more-or-less under the influence of intoxicants - and this in itself deranges delicate brain functioning and destroys the benefits of behavioural adaptations that may have taken centuries or millennia to evolve. An intoxicated person is maladaptive. So, from a biological perspective, I would contend that there is no reason to suppose we can solve the biological problems of modernity outwith religion (especially since the social system of religion has in practice been replaced by... the mass media - see my book Addicted to Distraction). Biological knowledge can diagnose the problem - but science cannot provide a solution nor the motivation to implement it; since humans are not evolved to structure their sexuality according to biological principles. We are 'set-up' to seek our own gratification and try to avoid suffering with reproductive success as a by-product - we do not seek directly to achieve optimal personal/ or tribal/ or national/ or species-level reproductive fitness. Such omissions and other imperfections do not detract from the exceptional originality and importance of this book and the empirical research and theoretical discussion which it summarizes. In a world where actual scientific achievement was the primary determinant of professional success; Menelaos Apostolou would be among the most prestigious, most cited, and most intellectually influential people in evolutionary psychology. I hope that this deserved outcome will, sooner or later, come to pass.
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Unfortunately in Africa the increase is due to ignorance and culture of certain people early marriages are very common which affect more girls, many girls leave school early because they have to get married, all because their culture says that "the gods rule the roost" See people with old age married with children, spent many years people continue to believe in nonsense " gods "  All of the data on STDs above is from the US and Canada. Monogamous marriage is the bedrock of the nuclear family. It is the decline of traditional marriage and the rise of modern sexual hedonism that is facilitating this surge of disease. Unhealthy choices have consequences. Sometimes the consequences are obvious like they are with SDS. Other times the damage is more subtle. |
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STD's in Canada increase in 2015 http://m.huffpost.com/ca/entry/9781762The Alberta government says anonymous hook-ups arranged on social media are the major reason for a dramatic spike in sexually transmitted infections in the province. Cases of gonorrhea last year were up 80 per cent from 2014 and are the highest since the late 1980s. The number of cases of infectious syphilis doubled in 2015 from 2014. |
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