I only use spoons to eat my macaroni.  This is because according to a personal experience, the spoon told me I'd burn for eternity if I used a fork.  I figure even if there's only a one in a million chance that the spoon is right, I just can't risk it because there are no croco-ducks.

 
Promise you won't tell anyone I once bought a fork from a gay prostitute.  I never used it, I got it home and threw it away and threw myself before the spoon in tears. I was tempted, but I threw it away.

 

You can go right along and continue to use the fork.  But by your own admition you know the spoon is better.  This would make you a closet aforker, despite you going through the motions and continuing to use the fork, and really just makes your life a lie.  I would even suggest that by continuing to use the fork you are really just insulting the fork and other fork users by pretending that the fork is better. 

To me the Fork is Religion, the Spoon is a Rationality, and the macaroni is Information. When using the fork/religion you pick and choose which macaroni/information you want to use according to how well or how much it fits to your fork/religion....

But when using the Spoon/Rationality your able to get more out of the bowl of macaroni/information without picking and choosing according to how well it fits. And in the end it doesn't leave a big mess on your face, lol... (take that last part how ever you understand it

Slimm,

I appreciate (most of) the responses.

 Tarpan: I never said that the spoon was better, but rather that it was the rational choice because it was more efficient. But, supposing I had stated such, I don't think it would matter. I doubt that the fork, being a fork, can be insulted by my using it despite it being the "lesser" of the two utensils. Forks, as far as I am aware, don't have feelings of jealousy, or a sense of honor to tarnish. I could be wrong though.

Slimm: An excellent analogy. Not quite what I had in mind, but it was a very astute way of connecting ideas.

SamSexton:  I will take your suggestion into consideration, but I still don't understand why I should have to use the spoon. And I also don't understand why you, as a spoon user, expect my fork using friends to support my use of a spoon, when you do not support my use of the fork. This seems like something of a double standard to me.

As for the rest of the responders... well, let's just say that I was unpleasantly surprised to discover that they allowed children to be moderators and administrators on this website.

If I'm comparing rational vs irrational, then the rational choice is the better choice.

I assumed based on your post and seeing as this is a forum where rationiality vs religion are the topics I thought it fair and rational to assume that this was in fact an anaolgy on religion so I took it the logical step further. The fact that you turned it into a literal interpretation to me either means that you're avoiding the turth of my response or you truely did not acknolwedge the assumed intent of your post when you made it.

I hope that you should still see my point if you removed the 4 words that embed the anthropomorphic fork into my analogy. 

Brilliant.

streak, I accept that you prefer to use a fork for whatever makes your macaroni-and-cheese-eating experience more pleasant. In fact, if someone tells you that you cannot use a fork, I will defend you, despite the fact that I don't fork. But if most of the country were forkers, and they passed laws that made spooners unable to have the rights of forkers (e.g. tax benefits for fork shrines with their multi-tined steeples. the right to enjoy their cheesy goodness with others of the same gender ,the rights to run for political office, the requirement to pledge to some forking deity), I would fight against that. If the forkers told lies about how forking is more efficient than spooning, and wanted that taught to our impressionable youngsters, I would fight that. If forkers attempted to scare people into forking with lies about eternal damnation in a pool of boiling cheddar, I would fight that. If the forkers told lies that terrorist attacks and hurricanes were the result of my spoonage displeasing some forking entity, i would fight that. And lastly, if people were killing one another to please some forking deity, I would really want them to become spooners.

By the way, do you have a particular way of forking that is better? Are 4-tine forks better than 3-tine ones. And will the 3-tine ones go to a 4-tine hell? And some people spear their macaroni and insert in their mouths right-side up and the others insert upside down. Which of those will go to the cheesy hell?

 

simple. i take away your fork, so that all you have is the spoon. 

I like your connections slim.. but hang on both fork and spoon prerequisite an awareness that you are eating macaroni, in that case religion is more like using a Straw.

I think you just misunderstand what we mean by rational.

Interesting.
How many things are you responsible for in life?
In order to meet these responsibilities you need to be able to deal with them as accurately and as efficiently as possible. Now maybe your responsibilities don't require the sort of truth we are looking for, but ours do... well, not me - I'm on here as a hobby.
But many of the American's here are fighting for their rights as citizens.

In what way are your answers important?
Aesthetically?
Practical purpose?

That you'll do what is necessary to fullfill it.

Lol! Well how are you going to convince if not with reason?
Besides, the original post in this topic looks like an attempt at reasoning to me...

For real?
Didn't it scare you in the least?
Didn't you feel bad for the children being indoctrinated with such guilt and fear?

Lol! I guess you're never going to be motivated against religious politics then! If that film didn't strike a nerve enough for action, how did we at the RRS manage it? How could you possibly find us more annoying than evangelical Christianity?!

this losingstreak character is a troll.  he's deliberately trying to get a reaction, which he gets a rise out of because it gives him a false illusion of power and control over people.

Crying "troll" are we? Fair enough.

Pffffft. I could have told you that. 

"Too-cool-for-school"? If you say so. I for one wich you'd make up your mind about me. First I'm a troll, then I'm not a troll, I'm just  crazy and stupid. Inconsistent much? How long will it be before you change your mind again, I wonder? I'd appreciate it if you didn't bog down my topic with such flagrant off-topic posts. If you don't have anything to say about the subject at hand, then why bother ruining it for everyone else?

In any case, it's about time that I got around to responding to all the peopl who are still taking the time to chat with me about this interesting quandary.

Tarpan: The nature of my fork is such that I cannot "score points" with it either way. Unlike other forks, my fork isn't anthropomorphized nearly to death. It isn't my the fork of my mother and my father, or their parents, back and back and back. Mine is a new fork, unpolished and simple.

 Strafio:

Things that I am responsible for do not interfere with my views and (mis)understandings of reality.

My answers are important to me in that they are my own. If I cannot trust my own understandings, and my own feelings towards a certain thing, then how am I to trust them towards anything? You could tell me that the spoon is better, but if I cannot trust my own choice in the fork, then how could I ever be able to trust your choice of the spoon? This rationale is the basis of my own irrationality.

Would it be accurate then to say that a man who desires money, but does not want to rob a bank, does not really desire money? What about a man who has been paralyzed by an automobile accident? Would it be fair to say that the man doesn't really want to walk again, because he doesn't do the impossible and unsever his spinal cord?

That is my own problem, it would seem.

Reasoning with what, pray tell? I simply asked for your take on a situation as I see it.

 I feel bad about a lot of things. I feel scared about a lot of things. I often find that most of the things I feel bad or afraid of are out of my control. Bad things happen. To coin an overused phrase, "life isn't fair." It would hardly be fitting for me to decide who to help, since I obviously cannot help everyone.

I'm not afraid of the religious right. I know exactly what they want, and I am fairly certain that they will suffer the same fate as all those before them who have tried to stand in the way of progress. No, my friend, the way I see things, it is you who hold the reigns of the future. That is why you stir a reaction in me that the religious right never will. I may be irrational, but I'm not stupid.

If you really understood deliberate irrationalism, then you would understand that it relies on rationalistic thinking in order to create contrast. 

Two Whole Pages on this Thread!?

You need to quit eating mac n cheese. Have a Hot dog. 

I would like to point out that whether you use a fork or spoon, you end up eating the same macaroni.

Same macaroni!? Yummy imaginary macaroni!? At an imaginary tea party in the sky!

I DONT BELIEVE IN MACARONI!

YOUR MACARONI IS DANGEROUS AND DIVISIVE!

YOUR MACARONI IS POISON IN THE BELLY OF ALL HUMANITY!

 

You should try Spaghetti!

TOUCH ITS NOODLY APPENDAGE! BE AN FSM PIRATE AND HELP STOP GLOBAL WARMING! EAT OF THE GOLDEN APPLE OF DISCORD AND HAIL THE ALMIGHTY GODDESS! SEEK OUT THE ALL SEEING DISEMBODIED HEAD OF THE MIGHTY BOB DOBBS AND DRAW FROM HIS ETERNAL PIPE THE WISDOM OF SUBGENIUSNESS! FOR THESE ARE THE ONLY TRUE MACARONI IN ALL THEIR HIGH MACARONIOUSNESS! BOW DOWN AND PRAY FOR FORGIVENESS FOR YOUR BLASPHEMOUS WAYS! REPENT TO LORD OMAR KHYAMM RAVENHURST KSC AND DON THE EVERLASTING SNUBLESS CROWN OF CHAOS!

how idiotic did that all sound?

not anywhere near as idiotic as what you wrote, but at least mine was kind of funny.

 

High Pope

P.S. Yummy Macaroni to FEED THE TROLL!

What a perfect example of your childish immaturity, emotive reasoning, and irrational qualities. If I'd needed further evidence of your inability to form a cohesive and intellectual argument, this is it.

 

 

When Logic didnt work the first time, I wasnt going to try it again. When you repeat the same behavior again and again but expect a different result each time its called "insanity".

Your Macaroni isnt real.

CAN WE HAVE A DIFFERENT METAPHOR PLEASE?

I killed this thread.

we both agree that the spoon cannot represent atheism if the fork represents theism.

now the burden of proof is back on you. 

 Prove to me that your Macaroni is real.

 

Sure. Reason is our methods to distinguish right from wrong and truth from falsity. The rules of logic play an important part, rules like the law of noncontradiction. I'm sure you intuitively recognise that if someone contradicts themselves then their theory is clearly flawed.

You could say that reason is basically competent in thinking.

It's not always clear cut and the issues are often complex and confusing. However, there are agreed methods. For instance, everyone agrees that contradictions are bad news.

I don't believe that theism is necessarily irrational, I just believe that it often is, especially when politics are involved. To judge whether your theism is rational enough, I'd need to understand your worldview, your justifications and from there work out whether your belief is rational or not.

Another important point is that although most of RRS might think that your theism is irrational, that doesn't mean that they think you are irrational. The common belief is that many theists are rational in most areas of their life, but allow religion a free ride for some reason. Or that they are rational in their area of expertise, but for something they're not so confident on they trust their local priest pastor.

I am judging you and your attitude on your conversation with me.
Infact, later down the page you noticed it yourself:
pwned!!!

I actually disagree that we should build our beliefs from empirical evidence. I think that empirical tests make great truthmakers for claims that can be tested, but there are some of areas of knowledge where empiricism is irrelevent. The most obvious example is mathematics.

I don't think that it was as unfavourable as made out.
While early Christians were persecuted, so were all religions that conflicted with the main religion of the day. Although what I am about to say is pure speculation, it is a possible explanation of how Christianity grew out of its infancy:

1) While irrational by modern knowledge, Christianity was heavily compatible with the philosophy of Plato, which was a large step forward from other religions of the time.
2) It combined this intellectual superiority with a theology that appealed to common people. It made claims about an absolute good and justice for downtrodden people, that ordinary people (who had never been seen as important) could be saved by just being loyal and believing.

Given the times, such a theology would be very attractive to a large number of people. The perfect combination of cutting edge philosophy and folk romanticism.

Lol! Do you have political ambitions to force your faith on other people?
If not, the ambitions of the RRS won't really effect you.
I think I know what you're getting at.
It can seem disconcerting to see people so passionately opposed to beliefs of yours, especially when you consider your beliefs to be harmless. What you have to realise is it's not you their opposition is aimed at. It's fundamentalists.

Haha! What sort of oppression would you expect rationalist overlords to bring down upon you?
The political goal is to enforce the ideals that most people implicitly agree with anyway - maximise prosperity and respect people's rights to believe/disbelieve. The 'destruction' of faith would be simply a matter of no longer allowing nutcases to interfere and try and bulldoze their dogma on others.

Once fundies have been forced off the secularists toes, private religious beliefs will be respected, like they are in England.

Do do for issues that interest you.
I know this because it takes deliberate skill to make your arguments as clear and coherent as possible. In this discussion you have achieved this. I can tell you value consistency and coherency because it is implicit in your arguments.

It's like all social labels, there's no clear black and white.
Where's the line between politeness and rudeness?
Where's the line between nice and nasy?
There isn't an obvious criterion for judging. We must observe the person in question and make our judgement intuitively. We are humans in this forum and none of us are perfectly rational, just like how the nicest communities are rarely 'perfectly' nice.

The best way to understand the distinction is to compare a nice group with a nasty one, in order to grasp the overall difference. Likewise, browse some Christian forums and watch how they play with obscure Bible quotes to make abstract points. I obviously can't speak for you, but judging by this conversation I think you'd find that you have more in common with us than with them.

Mathematics as a whole would better be described as internally consistent than true, but individual mathematical statements are true or false.
A bit like how 'Chess' isn't right or wrong as a whole but particular moves within chess can be right or wrong.

I recommend you read this topic.
Yellow Five's post speaks for all the atheists in this forum who might've mis-judged you. We get a lot of trash in here and while you might've asked a question earnestly, when someone is used to being baited, it is easy for them to come to expect it.
I know that's not rational but like we always say, rationality is our ideal and reality we are only human.

On the question of labels, I personally think we should have another label called "fucking cool theist" that we could dish out to the ones who have earned some respect.

break this down for me because you are right, I cant seem to interpret this any other way, so I need you to explain what everything represents so I can more adequately argue with you.

here is how I interpreted your meaning:

your fork represents your religious views and macaroni and cheese represents life.

your friend has a spoon representing an alterative religious view (possibly atheism?) this makes him more efficient at eating macaroni and cheese thus a metaphor for how he lives his life.

BELOW IS WHERE I GET A LITTLE LOST:

here is where I though you were talking about atheism with the "rational" reference.

knowing now that the spoon is not atheism, but before this is how I interpreted your meaning here:

As Atheists we are living our lives (eating macaroni) with a sort of scorch-earth policy (the spoon just tears thru the macaroni so we can eat it as fast as possible) and because we finish eating more quickly we die sooner without enjoying our mac and cheese (life)

 

you establish that you are comfortable using a fork (your religion) to eat your mac n cheese (live your life)

So why should you change?

 

IF THIS IS A COMPLETELY INCORRECT ASSUMPTION PLEASE CLARIFY YOUR MEANING.

or am i really giving you too much credit?

 

what the hell are you saying?

 

tell me what each thing represents so I can slap it down properly!

 

Fork=?

Spoon=?

Macaroni=?

 

Let me break it down for you:

 

loosingstreak is irrational.  He even ADMITS it.  End of thread.

 

He will only remain rational as long as fits into his desired reality.  Once it begins to challenge it, he will justify his thinking by saying that he "just wants to" (from a rational point of view, this is a tautology disguised as an argument).  If you further push him about it, he will ask you why rationality is so important.  This is tactic as I've already dealt with this guy.  It's a double-standard.

And to artificially sustain his false reality, he tries to revel in his irrationality by boasting about it and stumping people who haven't yet caught on to his game (his game stumps some people because they don't realize that it's a impossible to logically level with someone who already rejects logic).  The more stumped and reactive people get, the more his reality is affirmed.  Thus, it's a very ego-based reality, and ego-based realities are always hungry and needy.  Do not feed it!  You are wasting your time and will never be able to prove anything!