Incompetent Design

[abester]

Good article on truthout.org about the fallacy of the incompetent mantra that is all to often applied to this administration.


On the Iraq war:

I am going to find a china shop somewhere in the city and walk in with a free-swinging baseball bat. My goal, which will be clearly stated, will be to improve upon the place. I will spend the next three years meticulously destroying everything I see inside, from the cash registers to the display cases to the nice Royal Albert tea sets in the corner. Along the way, I will batter the brains out of any poor sod unfortunate enough to get in my way. When I am done, I will claim with as much self-righteousness as I can muster that none of the mess is my responsibility. I will then, of course, refuse to leave.

:)

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/032706J.shtml

[darkmaestro019]

1. That was good stuff. Welcome to DU and thanks for the link. (eom)

[LiberalPartisan]

2. A former friend is an IDer

The cognitive dissonance required to adhere to ID is really quite extraordinary. It requires an otherwise intelligent person suspend all capacity for basic reason and critical thought. But what really got me was the absolute certainty the Earth is only 8000 years old.

IDers are essentially children in desperate need of an all knowing father always at the ready to check under the bed for the boogie-man. Additionally it shows the how American conservative christianity has devolved to a cult.

[abester]

3. A former friend?

What happened, if I may ask?

I agree with your assesment. However, I think I word of caution is in order. I've seen a number of devoutly religious individuals whose mental faculties were otherwise pretty good, and to me this shows the need to seperate the ability for analytical thought from the inate emotional desires of people.

I would not at all be surprised if one day it were found that people who have this strong need for cults, religion, or otherwise esoteric views have some kind of neural abonormality. This need to 'believe' is present in perhaps the majority of people, and mostly stems from whishful thinking, but they all differ in the extend they seek magical explanations.

I also have no problem with what or how people think about the world around them, but I truly despise those who have this evangelical trait. No matter how they disguise it, they feel theirs is The Right Way, and others are misguided and in need for their doctrine. They will deny it, but ultimately, if they had any power, they would see to it that those who disagree with them are destroyed, and as such this subset poses a serious threat to society.

Another observation of mine is that the most devout christians also happen to be the most hypocritical ones. One usually finds them in affluent homes in rural countries, and preach conservatism and denounce socialsm. How ironic, for who in the world was not the greatest Socialist ever? Jesus of course.

Didn't he heal the blind and crippled? (free healthcare for everyone!) Didn't he gave food to the poor?

I bet he, assuming he ever lived, would condemn this flock for their actions and hollow words.

[LiberalPartisan]

5. The person kept trying to convert me.

As an adult this person became very religious, very evangelical and very fundamental. I'm a Catholic and have no intention of ever converting. After refusing on several occasions to accept this I told that person I never wanted to have anything to do with them ever again. I severed all ties immediately.
What made it both easy and hard was the person became stridently anti-catholic: 'All Catholics worship Mary instead of Jesus. All Catholics are statue worshippers.' The typical anti-catholic crap.

[megatherium]

6. Your former friend is a young-earth creationist.

The mainstream ID theory people (Michael Behe et al) believe that the Earth is 4.5 billion years old, and (some of them) believe in descent with modification (the doctrine that all life has a common ancestor from which it evolved). But they claim that chance/necessity (random variation/natural selection) cannot explain how life developed, nor the origin of life. (They deny Darwinian explanations.) ID at this level is not a scientific theory (it can't be falsified using science) but at least it isn't wildly incompatable with our most basic knowledge in science.

I myself believe much as the Catholic Church teaches: God created the universe and life, but he used evolution to do this. Evolution is fully compatible with Christian theology, as explained by Kenneth Miller in his book Finding Darwin's God. (Miller is a prominent biologist and biology text author, who is a Roman Catholic.)

[megatherium]

7. accidental dupe. nt

[sinkingfeeling]

4. Will Pitt sure can write. I saved this column away with many others of

his. Way to go, Will!