William Strunk Jr., you seem to be arguing that it wrong to impart unprovable beliefs to children, and that this constitutes abuse.
Can you prove that all religous beliefs are unprovable? Not just some, mind you, but all of them. Furthermore, can you prove that the impartation of these beliefs is inherently harmful. In other words, it’s not enough to point out some instances wherein it can cause harm. Rather, one must prove that it is inherently and intrinsically harmful.
If not, then you had best keep silent on this message board, lest some innocent child stumble across your tirade.
Such a law goes directly to religion, which is, after all, belief for which there is not definitive evidence. It’s about as certain as any claim in constitutional law can be that such a law would be found to be violative of the First Amendment.
Since the proposition that it is wrong to teach kids unproveable facts is itself an unproveable assertion, would it be child abuse to teach kids that the government considers it wrong to teach kids unproveable assertions?
Is the assertion 2+2=4 unproveable, or is it a tautology? Is it child abuse to teach kids that 0.99999…=1, or is it child abuse to teach kids that 0.999999…!=1?
some philosophies may even challenge this. For that matter, consider the virtual world hypothesis, that we are merely in a computer simulation, therefore we really “aren’t” since we’re at the whim of whoever controls the power switch to the simulation, and thinking is merely an electronically controlled process in a great computer.
And if Mr. Strunk wants to complain about slippery slopes and of course he’s talking about common sense notions of “prove” and “fact”, I would reply that we know what he is, we’re simply negotiating the price.
Considering that you fucking asserted it as an underlying premise in your OP, I’d say that you damn well did the precise equivalent of asserting it. So:
Post proof or retract. You assumed the onus of proof in your OP. Otherwise you’d be right in raising that challenge. But your keyboard is writing checks, and your argumentative skills had better set to honoring them.
The government has no rights – only powers. And one of the restrictions on government is that it “shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”
If you really want to cast yourself as philosophically identical to Roy Moore and Garry North and their ilk, we won’t stop you. But I’d encourage you to think carefully before you decide to bring the power of government to bear. It’s a balky servant and a stern master.
Hmmm. So, what **Bill Strunk ** is suggesting is that my mother and father should be punished for hauling me first to Methodist Church Sunday school and worship and later to Episcopal eucharists?
Do you have any idea how you denigrate **real ** child abuse with this kind of crap? Yes, my parents should be punished for child abuse – my father for the bruises he laid across my butt and legs with a wooden stick and my mother for not doing a damn thing about it; and both of them for letting my fifth grade teacher treat me like her personal whipping boy for eight solid months. But for teaching me about their religion? Hell, that was one of the GOOD things they did! Why not punish my father for being poor? Or for choosing to be a cop instead of choosing to go back to college?
Yes, I believe religion is just dressed-up mythology empty of any real value to human beings, but there isn’t a damn thing wrong with using it to raise your children to be good people.
I think we should first concentrate on punishing people who hold to unprovable civic and personal claims:
Representative government is a good idea;
One should marry the person with whom one falls in love;
that sort of thing. (There is certainly sufficient evidence that representative governments have manifested evil in the world and the divorce courts are full of people who foolishly married for “love” instead of having their marriages arranged as financial contracts.)
I don’t think you’re refuting what you think you are. **Der Trihs ** isn’t shocked that all these religious people think abortion is murder yet is it not illegal, hence his point is invalid; rather he’s disagreeing with JThunder’s suggestion that most religous people consider abortion to be murder.
Of course, I could be misreading his or your posts. Either way, I wouldn’t mind a cite from JThunder supporting his view.
he means either PROVE what you said or RETRACT your argument (say that what you said is wrong)
I recommend the second one, since several of the posters have provided you with sound places to retrench your argument and call for a more manageable place to argue from
Do you understand that ‘warping’ is in the eye of the beholder? Do you understand that you cannot provide evidence that teaching religious belief constitutes harm or ‘warping’ and therefore you, yourself, are guilty of professing lies because your own claims are unprovable? Do you get the irony? Yet?
Oh lordy. So ‘subjective feelings’ that you happen to feel somehow avoid the test you propose that everything taught to children must be provable but the subjective feeling (faith) that others have must pass the test?
Every thread about math in this board goes waaaaaaaay over my head. That kind of math is not provable to me. I have to take it on faith. If someone who knows about math more than I do tells me that
squiggly . othersquiggly > thirdsquiggly
is true, I have to take their word as true on faith alone, or call them liars (even if not to their faces).
So, should I stop reading those threads? They have lots of pretty squigglies!