Taboo Topics (Heavily moderated)

[Syobon]

How is Zeus more false than Yahweh?

He's not, Kamak was speaking from the perspective of Christianity. Please put more effort into understanding other people if you're going to post in this thread.

[Barabba]

Ah, sorry, sorry, I got carried away.

[Reyo]

You gotta realize, also, that we're just as imperfect and mortal as the people who wrote the book in the first place. Do the people who write our laws always follow them? Hell no, and I kmow why. In each person's mind, an ideal society is one where they themselves get to do whatever the hell they want, while everyone else follows a very strict set of rules.

To put it simply: People are cunts.

[TheStranger]

Agreed, but if you dont even bother following the most basic stuff in the daisies book, how can you call yourself a good Christian? This isnt like all that other stuff that people almost knife fight over what the correct interpretation is, this is the Word Of God, directly from his mouth, if you're not going to follow THAT, whats the point in the first place? Though Im guessing whoever it was who wrote those down probably put most of it in to keep the early tribes from murdering eachother over stuff they wanted, especially that covet thing, considering theres like three separate sections describing what you are not allowed to covet.

[Cori]

I do agree with Stranger that the Commandments are pretty clear in what's expected of God's followers. You'll always find people that try to twist things to their advantage.

Most of the Commandments still work today, despite being written thousands of years ago. Do not steal, do not kill, don't commit adultery...
Still, you'll always have people trying to find loopholes. It's not something to be proud of.

[TheStranger]

People love feeling morally justified for the horrible crap they do, and there really is no better source for false reassurance than reinterpreting a holy text to fit whatever crime you want to do. It probably doesnt help that nearly all the war accounts in the Bible were written from the point of view that God WAS on their side while they did it.

[Cori]

You'll find people justifying 'Holy war' in any religion, though.

[TheStranger]

I know, it wasnt specifically targeted at Christianity. Hell, or even religion for that matter. Every side in every war always think theyre the good guys.

Usually, no one is.

[Cori]

Oh sorry, since we were talking about christian stuff I thought you referring to just christianity.

Speaking of which, it's really fascinating to research the christian crusades. They're great examples of war people thought was justified because their power-hungry religious leader said so.

[Dedivax]

Some people forget the scene in the gospel(s?? don't remember if it was included in one or some of them) where Jesus has to carry the cross to Golgotha and is aided by a random passerby, eve though it's pretty important in understanding what the cross is supposed to mean: it represents suffering, which is a constant in everyday life but is lifted with Jesus help. It's basically telling Christians that life may be hard but their god is always there, helping them in some way (this of course applies to people other than Christians, if the Christians you question are nice people)

[Kamak]

Wait what, how is Zeus Pagan?

Isn't he pagan as far as Christianity thinks of it? I thought Christians considered any "barbaric culture's" religion to be pagan, including the Roman/Greek Gods.

Wasn't that why they had some myth back then that God banished Hades/Pluto to the bottom of Hell for holding onto all of the souls and an explanation for why God was the true god amongst the others?

IDK, Christianity back then was kind of a mess of "my God can beat up your God" stuff.

The Commandments: You have to realize that the entire Bible itself is an imperfect book. It eas written a long booty time ago by extremely mortal human beings, human beings that were a part of a culture completely different from ours, so there's going to be reerences to slavery, sexism, cultural taboos, etc. That's why I like the book as a sort of cultural reference instead of a history textbook. You need to realize that if a truely omnipotent God exists, he's not going to be confined to a single book with respect to morals and ability.

Sure, I get that, and accept it to a point, there's a lot of stuff in there thats colored by the times it was written, but the Commandments arent vague at all, God bodaciously told us not to do this stuff, so either the account is wrong, or people arent following their religion correctly. No killing, no stealing, no coveting, and dont be a dick to your parents, there's really nothing that can be misunderstood there. And yet, youd be hard pressed to find a single person not doing atleast two of these things. Okay, you probably arent going to find many graven images worshippers anymore, but coveting and taking the lords name in vain? People break those rules before breakfast. Hell, its not like the Rules are WRONG either, you really shouldnt do most of this stuff even if you arent Christian.

The stones that the commandments were etched into were destroyed over the course of history and warfare, so the exact wording is lost, and considering it spread by word of mouth afterwards, it'd probably be condensed to the most "literal" and succinct definition people could remember them by. Still doesn't mean that people who know the current commandments and don't live by them are right, but if they were meant less bodaciously originally and more of a general guide to self-betterment... it depends.

Plus, some Christians treat things like confessionals as a way to wash themselves clean of all sins, so the fact that they break the commandments isn't a problem as long as God forgives them. Though, not everyone treats confession like that, so really, it depends on the Christian.

[Barabba]

My Biology Teacher once talked about how Science can take a woman's skin cells and turn them into sperm. Does this make men useless?

[Syobon]

People have more uses other than reproduction.

[Barabba]

Yes, yes, but the gender would be useless if only females are necessary for reproduction.

[Kamak]

My Biology Teacher once talked about how Science can take a woman's skin cells and turn them into sperm. Does this make men useless?

The sperm making genes in the body are located only on the Y chromosome, which means that you'd likely need their involvement at some stage to go through spermatogenesis, even if the end result is solely X chromosome gametes.

Additionally, males are actually fully capable of producing eggs with their cells due to having the necessary genetic information on the X chromosome, so clinics could make egg cells out of male stem cells. The main issue becomes preventing the Y chromosome from dominating the X and getting rid of the Y eggs since they would likely be unable to be fertilized (unless an X sperm is able to set it off. A lot of chemical signals for the egg side of fertilization are on the X chromosome).

Either way, it's not likely that either gender is going to be rendered defunct anytime soon, and if Scientists can reverse/stop the damage to the Y chromosome, we won't have to worry about the human race ending due to that.