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from the when-you-DO-NOT-want-them-to-"think-of-the-children!" dept.
A couple of weeks ago this story was reported by The Daily Beast :
Members of an American-backed rebel group in Syria beheaded a young child in a grisly execution video.
The footage surfaced early Tuesday of members of Harakat Nour al-Din al-Zenki and a captured child in Handarat, near Aleppo. The young boy, who appears to be prepubescent, is then executed on the back of a pickup truck.
The gruesome videotaped murder of a child drew outrage on social media and the promise of an inquiry from the group's leadership, which has previously received U.S.-made weapons and American funding. The group no longer gets such backing. But it's also renewed questions about which rebels the American government has supported in Syria's ongoing civil war.
[...] State Department spokesperson John Kirby told The Daily Beast. "We strongly condemn this type of barbaric action, no matter what group is responsible. We encourage al-Zenki to investigate the incident and expect all parties to comply with their obligations under the law of armed conflict."
[...] the group's leadership issued a statement condemning the beheading. It said it formed a committee to investigate how such a crime could have happened.
More video from the incident has been released:
The victim is seen among a group of fighters from the US and Turkish backed militant group, in the same red pick-up truck that features in their video of his execution. In a chilling exchange the jihadist militants can be seen taunting the child, taking selfies, and threatening him with 'slaughter'.
When asked about his final wish, the child asks to be shot rather than slaughtered. Their shocking answer? "Slaughter. We are even worse than ISIS"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 02 2016, @09:04PM
I am assuming that you are letting your emotions run roughshod over your reason. "I can't believe people like you are allowed to walk around free", implying you would see me killed or caged when I openly oppose all human tyrants regardless of their theology?
If the Bible is a pack of lies, there will be no unopposably powerful "space alien God" who rides thunder down to Earth, and people like me will continue to challenge usurpers until the heat death of the universe or until the very idea of liberty is stamped out, whichever comes first. It is to your own detriment if you support our murder or imprisonment.
On the other hand, if the Bible proves true, then the Creator God is love, truth, and justice incarnate, even if the details aren't something able to be grasped with a human mind. If I could comprehend the totality of the observable universe, I might be more concerned with my inability to comprehend the total nature of the Creator; however, as I can't comprehend the totality of the mere creation, what sense does it make to reject the Creator on the basis of my own limitations? While not on the same scale, I liken choices and consequences to observable laws such as gravity. Why would a God of love cause me the pain and suffering of a broken leg if I jump off my roof in disregard of gravity?
The lake of fire is very disturbing. Yet the same place is discussed in Matthew 22 [biblegateway.com], which ultimately boils down to a situation of "freedom of association". Those who choose not to associate with God will not be forced to, although the place where God is not present will not be pleasant. God is never involved in the torment of individuals - instead it is the work of His enemies, such as Lucifer, whose goals are described as killing, stealing, and destroying. If there is a place where God will not be, but where killers, thieves, and destroyers will run rampant, is it not only possible but probable that the tormentors will in fact be those same beings who refused association with God? There is even an eerie parallel in the Stanford Prison Experiment [wikipedia.org] where, in the absence of oversight, those with power/force began inflicting abuse on those whom which they could within a mere six days. What would you expect of a place where powerful beings, killers and destroyers, are set loose among others who want nothing to do with God for eternity without the all-powerful embodiment of love, truth, and justice being present?
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday August 03 2016, @02:54AM
Ah, it's you again. I recognize your style. Why don't you ever sign your posts? In any case, I realize that you are likely a lost cause, but will happily use you as an example to anyone else who might be watching. To start us off with: your entire wall of text was by turns irrelevant, fallacious, and outright sociopathic. Rather than waste the pixels and electrons analyzing it in fine detail, I'm going to get right down to brass tacks.
Now, I am going to assume you are not a Calvinist, from the sound of your post. I will also assume that your theodicy of choice is something along the lines of Plantinga's free will defense, i.e., your attempted solution to the Problem of Evil is that free will leads to sin. Is this correct?
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 03 2016, @05:00AM
The content of a message should carry more weight than the messenger, that's my excuse. I'm still confused as to why you'd rather see myself and people with my mindset dead or caged, particularly in that we seem to generally agree on the scope of governmental authority (within the USA, at the least) being limited to that of a single individual human's - it remains of interest to me, particularly if there is some reason for it beyond flippant emotionalism.
I'm not much for theological punditry. So many words written, almost always to justify some transparently stupid claim (I'm the vicar of Christ, buy indulgences!; Jesus will end up saving whomever He wants, so I'll just sit on the couch; God makes me do evil) versus a concise summation: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. [...] Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets. [biblegateway.com] Seems pretty straightforward to me: doing so is "good". Not doing so is "evil". The very existence of good/evil begs the question that reveals an ultimate authority, else there is no such thing as "evil" and any imaginable atrocity is perfectly acceptable as long as the perpetrator can avoid negative consequences. As near as I can determine, I do have free will and have used it to do both good and evil in my past. Against humans, restitution is the goal. Against the Creator, I have no currency to use for restitution, but am able to ask for freely-given forgiveness [biblegateway.com], resulting in reconciliation of a broken relationship.
Free will allows for the option to break relationships, but does not require it.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday August 03 2016, @05:18AM
Answer the question, please. If you can; it may be you're so theologically illiterate I can't even class you as an apologist, but boy do you love to run your big mouth...
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 03 2016, @05:44AM
You say that I like using words as much as you like using ad hominem insults?
Free will allows for evil, but does not require evil.
Along with your response, will you finally deign to detail why you openly advocate for myself and others like me to be killed or caged (or drowned on the Flordia coast)? I'd prefer to sort the problem out with words before it came to a shooting match.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday August 03 2016, @03:52PM
Okay, so just so I have this straight here: you DO actually advocate a free-will theodicy, in other words, that the solution to the Problem of Evil is "necessarily, significantly-free, non-God essences will sin?" I want to make sure I'm representing you correctly before I shred you in public...
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 03 2016, @04:45PM
You're leading hard. For the third time: free will allows for the choice to choose evil, but does not require evil to ever be chosen.
(Once again, you refuse to disclose the motive for your openly disclosed impulses for killing, drowning, or kidnapping people who advocate for recognition of "self-ownership" and the necessary deconstruction of governments' power to match its legitimate authority of being limited to that of a single individual's.)
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday August 03 2016, @05:11PM
The answer to the second part of it has nothing to do with government, really; it's just karma for you and your kind...the souls of all those you've killed from Nicaea all the way up till the present day for "heresy" or disbelief are screaming for your blood. You personally weren't involved (though you might have been, in a previous incarnation), but your continued support of the same ideology and the same death cult and the same demon you worship as God makes you guilty. Please, please, disavow this religion of devil worship; if you die in this mindset you're going to end up in your idea of Hell for I don't know how long.
As to the rest: interesting, so you've decided to go against the grain of major apologists such as Alvin Plantinga. So, if free will qua free will does not necessarily lead to sin, what does? What is your solution to the Problem of Evil?
This should be very interesting...and probably darkly hilarious :)
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 03 2016, @08:22PM
The idea of "karma" is directly harmful to the concept of a self-owning human. Such a human learns about their surroundings, makes choices, deals with the consequences of said choices, then dies. The concept of karma then dictates, what, that the same human being is reborn in different cirumstances but without any knowledge of their responsibility as to how said circumstances came about? That sounds like a blanket dismissal of personal responsibility (because said "person" no longer exists in any recognizable form), an impediment to offers of charity, and a terrible attitude for someone concerned about the wellbeing of the poor to take: "they are poor because it's their karma; if I try to help them, it'll actually hurt them because they need to suffer for their karma". I understand this exact scenario to be a horrific problem in places like India. As far as ascribing to me the responsibility for murders of "heretics", it is identical in form as if you supported the genocide of the Native Americans because their ancestors wiped out the Clovis people. To the contrary, the view I hold regards the initiation of the use of force as a crime against a self-owning being regardless of the theology of the attacker and/or the victim, and this view is in harmony with the voluntary nature of the claimed relationships between the Biblical Creator and humans.
The concepts and basic arguments of "free will, evil existing, and God as described in the Bible" I am long familiar with. A crash-course on Alvin Plantinga seems to suggest that his "free will defense" does logically resolve the "Problem of Evil" [utm.edu]. Yes, this does require that the Creator cannot do certain things, such as contradict His nature. This doesn't change the practicality of the claim of unlimited power in that all of creation is supposed to be under the complete control of its Creator, to the point of seemingly impossible feats such as making the sun stand still in the sky without flinging humans off the earth or stripping the sun of its fuel via inertia. Yes, this does suggest that humans may lose their free will at some point, by being unable to choose evil after obtaining a glorified body. None of these seem problematic for a person who desires to continually do "good", yet regularly does "evil" due to what is traditionally described as character flaws.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday August 03 2016, @08:41PM
Will you stop cranking out these walls of irrelevant (and, more importantly, WRONG) text and engage with what is being said to you? I'm done wasting my time on Gish Gallops. Plantinga's free will defense does not answer the problem of evil--and his use of modal logic in some other arguments is, politely put, rather questionable.
Thankfully, like everyone else who thinks as you do, you've fatally undermined your free will defense, though you chose the second horn of the dilemma rather than the first. This if anything makes you easier to deal with than the ones who insist that we retain our free will with a glorified body :) Hmm, guess free will isn't THAT important to the Flying Canaanite Genocide Fairy, now is it?
And, my oh my, we haven't even gotten into how completely self-contradictory the very description of this Yahweh fellow is. From the looks of it, though, we may not need to. Man, and I thought Harman was disappointing...
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 03 2016, @09:37PM
Oh, please. I bit on your claim that Jesus was an advocate for government-force-as-charity, and have just been following your own Gish Gallops [rationalwiki.org] from there.
1. Jesus wasn't a socialist [soylentnews.org]
2. Follower of Yahweh != governmental authoritarian [soylentnews.org] (not in the USA at least)
3. God does/will not participate in torture, oh and you'd prefer peaceable people be murdered or kidnapped [soylentnews.org]
4. Detail-free handwaving regarding the topics of free will, existence of evil, and omnipotence, along with the assumption that the human mind is capable of grasping the totality of the universe, let alone anything greater [soylentnews.org] (see: Godel's Incompleteness Theorums [wikipedia.org])
Offloading the bulk of your text to multipage esoteric references while claiming my comments compare to a "wall of text" is laughable. If you want to engage in a discussion, then feel free to start. You've been coy with anything of substance (though I do thank you for finally giving some explaination to your wishes for others' demise) while at the same time ignoring my [soylentnews.org] repeated [soylentnews.org] answer [soylentnews.org] to your own question [soylentnews.org].
Even this last post of yours is filled with a myriad of rabbit trails:
A. How does Plantinga's free will defense not answer the Problem of Evil
B. How does an error in "other arguments" from Plantinga invalidate (presumably) his Free Will Defense
C. A (so far) naked assertion that a person who entertains the possibility of a future loss of free will is "easier to deal with"
D. An invitation to engage without an actual question beyond an apparently rhetorical one regarding speculation the value of free will
E. More ad hominem
... well? Care to dispense with the Gish Gallops and share the reasoning for why you believe Jesus was an advocate for using governments to forcibly extract resources from some people in order to take care of the poor, like that "other socialist Jew" Bernie?
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday August 04 2016, @08:00AM
I don't think Jesus gave a good himself-damn about WHERE the money came from so much as that it DID come. Remember "render unto Caesar?" Besides which, if you know your history (which you of course do not...) you would know that charity partly consisted of leaving the edges of vineyards and the corners of fields unreaped, i.e., very literally giving a portion of the fruits of their labor to the poor. In a service-sector economy with a fiat currency, rather than an Iron-age agrarian milieu, the equivalent of this would be...you guessed it, tax money put toward social programs.
Also, this is the guy who thought the end of the world was coming Real Soon Now (TM)--which kiiiiiinda makes you wonder why he said "the poor ye have always with you" if that's the case, doesn't it? Yet *another* contradiction...you really oughtta think these things through before you start spitballing. You're badly outclassed here.
Regarding Plantinga's Attempted Free Will Defense not answering the PoE: I'm not sure you can follow this, as it involves modal logic, but the compressed version of his argument goes like this: basically, it is logically impossible (that is, there is no possible state of affairs, or "possible world" as he calls them) for significantly-free, non-God essences to exist while sin does not. That is, there is no set of circumstances in which significantly-free, non-God essences obtain and sin does not.
This raises the question: "Are you sure about that? What about your heaven?" And THAT leads us to the following four possibilities:
1) Free will obtains, and sin does not obtain, in heaven.
2) Free will does not obtain, and neither does sin, in heaven
3) Free will obtains, and so can/does sin, in heaven
4) Free will does not obtain, but sin does, in heaven.
Now, #4 is obviously absurd from a Christian point of view. #3 is also deadly to the Christian worldview...despite that fact that, unless something has changed drastically since the supposed rebellion in heaven, this is likely the correct answer. More on that later. #1 is what most people challenged with this say, and it is also instantly and globally fatal to the entire genus of free-will theodicies for what should be obvious reasons to anyone with a shred of intellectual honesty; anyone who does not see this is refusing to, rather than incapable of, understanding.
#2 is the answer you chose; oh, sure, you're *trying* to dodge the implications by saying free will may be "somewhat reduced" rather than entirely eliminated with glorification, but that's not gonna work: if we are ONE IOTA LESS FREE, the defense fails, for what should also be fairly obvious reasons to anyone who doesn't have an emotionally-motivated reason not to understand this.
I have never, ever, not in the entire decade I've been doing counter-apologetics, met anyone so happily and blindly willing to impale himself on the second horn of this dilemma. It's almost making me wonder if you didn't understand the question. That is what I mean when I say you're easier to deal with than the people who insist on #1; you've completely undermined yourself. Now in fairness, this one trips up even people with PhDs in theology; so far I've deconverted 3, gotten blocked by one, and gotten death threats from another, all of whom had at least graduate degrees in theology :)
Regarding point B: I don't actually think he argues very well. His continued popularity baffles me, frankly. Several of his arguments have actually made me say, out loud into the empty room in which I was reading them, "Good grief, is he serious?!" Take, for example, the Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism: the entire sordid mess is based on the false premise that in a naturalistic worldview, all propositions are on an equal footing. If I recall correctly, his example concerns a caveman and a sabre-toothed cat, with the assertion being that on naturalism, said caveman is precisely as likely to think "Hurr hurr pet da floofy" as "Run like hell, this thing thinks I'm 160 pounds of Kaveman Kibble."
This, of course, betrays a profound and wide-ranging ignorance of everything from sociology to biology to ethology to ecology. The flaw of this argument is assuming 1) that all propositions exist in a vacuum, rather than an interacting and in many cases hierarchical system with one another and with, for example, instincts, possible "genetic memory" effects, and so forth, and 2) it begs the question by implicitly assuming what it wishes to prove: that a naturalistic worldview would not allow any sort of "error checking" of this sort of proposition--beyond the obvious, that being getting turned into tiger munchies.
Do you see why I don't hold Plantinga in very high regard now? I am a geologist by training and I fix computers (and get condescended to by people who think women can't fix computers...) for a living, and I can shred this guy in seconds.
Now, regarding Godel's Incompleteness Theorem: that's actually something I've been wondering about with regard to epistemology for a while now. The Theorem, if I recall right, states that certain classes of formal logic cannot be proven to be internally consistent within themselves; it's the "does the container contain itself?" problem rephrased for logic basically. You're strawmanning here, though; I never said we need to understand the totality of the universe. You've fallen into the same trap Plantinga did in the EaaN.
Besides which, in a metaphysically-naturalistic worldview (which I do NOT hold to, by the way...you likely assume I'm an atheist, when I'm actually a Deist or panpsychist) the WORST possible outcome is global scepticism, a permanent, unsettling feeling that we may be being fooled all the time. However, on a theistic worldview, this is the BEST possible outcome you can hope for, and in an Abrahamic worldview you can't even hope for that, since the Bible contains numerous instances of Yahweh admitting outright that he, whether directly or through "lying spirits," deceives humans and manipulates their minds...which, by the way, ALSO throws your idiotic free-will theodicy out the window.
How would you know if you were being fooled by Yahweh? How would you know to what extent? You don't, and can't, but you DO know that if his claims about himself are honest, he HAS done it before. The complete atheist, the metaphysical naturalist, has no such fear.
Furthermore, the universe of the Abrahamic theist is basically a cartoon; think specifically of that Looney Tunes short where Bugs Bunny in the role of animator spends a solid 10 minutes trolling the ever-loving shit out of poor Daffy Duck. This is why I laugh when apologists attempt a "uniformity of nature" argument; the whole bloody point of theism is that nature is NOT uniform, that $GOD is able to tell the laws of reality, which he made and is by definition absolutely-sovereign over, to go fuck themselves sideways.
Lastly: I would prefer to heal your mind and rescue you from this hellacious death cult rather than see you die, but in the same way a doctor must fear Ebola while s/he treats the Ebola victim, containment is sometimes necessary. Much as I dislike the idea, neutralizing you might be appropriate. And there is, as mentioned, a kind of poetic justice in you suffering the sort of thing your kind has inflicted on its foes from Constantine to the Enlightenment...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 04 2016, @10:49AM
Of course. I spent the better part of ten years bashing ideas around into a shape that has thus far survived remarkably well for its assertion that USians in general are not (or not obligated) to follow government diktat unless it falls within the scope of a single "normal" person's authority as a self-owning individual. The USA is not a theocracy, establishing one would appear to violate the Romans 13-esque God-established authority (oddly enough), and since I have no authority to take half of your paychecks by force neither can I delegate such authority to a government. [soylentnews.org] Socialism (theocratic or otherwise) is as inappropriate for today's USA as is stoning rebellious children by the city gate, and this assertion nonetheless remains in harmony with the Biblical directives to obey authority (assuming that the American Revolution was also so harmonious).
Considering that time is relative [wikipedia.org], I'm very hesitant to demand literalism - from a human's perspective - from the words of a being who potentially views time as a whole [biblegateway.com], and/or who is not subject to time as we know it due to the likelihood that time itself is a part of the created universe. I might as well lump other claims to God's contradictory nature in here as well: the hardening of Pharaoh's heart [biblegateway.com] is not a situation for which I have the answer I'd like, although such a case may be addressed by God abandoning the mind of a human who continually rejects Him [biblegateway.com], or by mere omniscience knowing in advance Pharaoh's own chosen reaction to the plagues,
Now's a good a time as any to disclose that I assemble my views primarily based on the preponderance of evidence rather than trying to solve all the mysteries of the universe with my own mind. The world's smartest humans have been unable to do so, thus I doubt I have the ability (hence my nod to Godel). I do try to use reason and logic where they can obviously apply, particularly among the observables of human behavior and records of history. Nor am I trying to impose my thought process upon you, but only to communicate it.
Now, as for logic as it applies to Plantinga's Free Will Defense [utm.edu], I'll first note that you brought it up along with the "Problem of Evil" rather than respond directly to my counter-claim that the Creator does not "torture ANYONE ELSE for ANY length of time" [soylentnews.org]. There are familiar concepts in both, but I was not familiar with Plantinga nor did I present his views for a defense. Nonetheless, I read through multiple descriptions of his FWD, and even though you seem to disagree, there is an explicit case (listed as "W4" [utm.edu]) describing just such a free-will world without evil - in fact, according to the Bible, that seemed to be the intended plan for Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden. (Note that dissatisfaction with Plantinga's reasoning on a different topic, EaaN, cannot by itself invalidate different reasoning in a separate topic, FWD.)
As to the matter of free will, I can't speak to God's valuation of it, but I'll draw a parallel in human legalism with a concept I'm quite familiar with: consent. Consent is what differentiates a crime from a non-crime. If I were to give consent to someone else to remove, say, my drug-addiction problem, even at any price, then no crime could have been committed. In the same way, I am of the opinion that I would prefer to do "good" in all situations even though I regularly choose "evil"; if I could give consent to someone I trusted to be able to rid myself of the temptation to do "evil", I believe I would. This seems the essence of the situation in which one of Yahweh's followers might possibly trade some or all of their free will in exchange for finally being free of the temptations to choose "evil". Any removal of free will in such a case would itself be an act of free will.
Considering that I can't know for certain that I'm not, say, a dismbodied brain in a jar somewhere: I don't think I could. Trust is essential. If I do the best I can to judge the observable evidence and am fooled by a reality-warping superbeing, oh well - not much I see myself being able to do about that situation.
I suppose I shouldn't continue to be surprised by your repeated justification for my kidnapping/murder. I am saddened, though. Nonetheless, I recognize that evil exists, and that I have a measure of responsibility [biblegateway.com] which includes taking steps to protect my own personal safety that extends to the physical [biblegateway.com], another topic I am keen to discuss with other Christians. I don't plot or entertain thoughts of your disappearance nor execution, but merely plan for defense against criminals of any stripe.
(I hope you'll excuse me for mostly ignoring your continued insults and chest-thumping; I would have thought that you were confident enough in your other assertions that you could have done without them, but...)
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday August 05 2016, @03:33AM
Good grief, you're hopeless. This is like giving medicine to a corpse. Not one single thing I said got through to you did it?
Oh well...can't really say I'm surprised :/ The truth stands for itself; those who have ears to hear, as the saying goes, will hear. Those who deliberately wish not to hear...well, give it some time. You'll come around, either here or in the next world.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 05 2016, @06:03AM
You made some assertions, and I believe I found errors in them. My reply [soylentnews.org] noted the apparent errors and made counter-assertions to the primary point (using some pretty solid evidence [soylentnews.org] if I do say so myself) and the following minor points. You can of course disagree with me without further explaination. However, if you expect others to blindly accept assertions that appear faulty to even a cursory examination, I don't believe you have the audience you're expecting.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday August 05 2016, @04:58PM
*siiiigh* This isn't FOR you, idiot. I know you can't be saved. You're not even capable of doing an honest analysis of your own beliefs, and it's fairly obvious why. No, this is for the benefit of anyone watching who may either attempt to use your arguments, or who may face someone who does and would like the antidote.
You made your choice a long time ago. All you're good for now is to be a negative example, a warning.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...