vertigo wrote:The idea that a soul is created the moment a child would be conceived is another.
Unsubstantiated rubbish. If God is so great, why should he stick to this rule that souls are always created? If this was so bad, wouldn't he use his infinite knowledge to ensure that souls are only created when the child will not be aborted, for instance?
There should be no reason why abortion is bad at all. In fact, God could send a 'pretend' soul into those to-be-aborted foeti/fetuses, a soul-automaton. There would be no cost involved.
In other words, it is utter rubbish to suppose that souls are always created.
No it is not, but I find it strange that you even care, because by your logic, you have no soul.
Anyone that believes in God believes that souls are created, and despite demonic possessions and hauntings that have been well documented, the notion that souls exist is impossible to prove. Thus anyone who believes in God must believe that souls are created at the exact moment that a person would be conceived, as no other possible moment can be stated with any certainty, which is why by your logic, you have no soul, as to call into question the existence of any one soul is to call into question the existence of your own.
jaganath wrote:Actually, it's extremely logical to remove the most elderly members of a population; economically they are a burden, one reason why China and India have such robust economic growth is the preponderance of young people of working age.
While the Marxists in China have done terrible things, they have not killed people because they are old. The main reason China and India have such robust economy growth is because they have so many well educated people finding higher paying jobs, as a result of economic policies in those countries changing to be more open or to use better defined term, more laissez faire. If we had as many well educated people as China and India do and a laissez-faire economy, we would have robust economy growth as well. The things that keep us from that is our small population, the fairly low percentage of our population that is college educated and government policies that are fascist (the idea that government should interfere in matters of business) and socialist (the idea that government should attempt to control the economy). If the federal government would restrict its activities to those allowed within the constitution (stop trying to do things for people and stop unconstitutionally preventing states have considering bans on abortion), cut spending, cut taxes, institute an open immigration policy (i.e. only people that are approved shall come into the country but there shall be no limit on the number of people that are approved) and seal the border, we would see the economy (and thus the standard of living) skyrocket as the economy shifts to having more established Americans become more educated, taking higher end jobs alongside the more educated immigrants while less established people (i.e. uneducated immigrants) take the jobs that the more established people left when they became educated. Immigration will occur so long as there is an economic demand for it while our countries' vast resources will ensure solid stable growth limited only by the size of our population and the education of our work force, so long as the politicians do not trade the economy for people's votes by taking advantage of the less educated through promises of fascist and/or socialist government policies because they supposedly cannot help themselves.
By the way, being college educated means you earned a college degree as a result of actual learning rather than being pushed through college and learning nothing. Some people think that the fact that the degree says college ensures that they make more money, and thus standards could be relaxed through government intervention to ensure that they get it and therefore make more money but rather, it is the standards behind the degree and the lack of government intervention in the countries' universities that ensures that people with college degrees make more money. I am specifying this as I do not want to promote the idea that lowering standards through government intervention to push people through college will ensure that people make more money.
Trip wrote:What's progressivism btw?
My guess is this is the teaching that history moves in a progressive line from worse to better.
Progressivism tends to move things from better to worse while introjecting that things are getting better, but that is from my understanding of things.
Trip wrote:I think this is a Western tendency. Chinese have told me they learn of cycles which sounds far more reasonable to me.
They do. As I said earlier in this post, liberal (i.e. laissez-faire) economies have people work their way to higher standards of living (i.e. Bill Gates), at some point people drop and then they work their way to higher standards of living, completing the cycle.
To illustrate what I mean by people dropping, I will use Bill Gates' family. At some point, as generations pass, the money Bill Gates' has made will be depleted due to any of many possible things, which include poor business decisions, donations to those who are less fortunate (Bill Gates says that he will give almost all of his wealth away so that his children will have to work like he did), the inheritance being split many times, the inheritance being depleted by time or the inheritance simply being stolen (e.g. the Marxists coming to power in mainland China and stealing from those who had wealth), such that his posteriority will be forced to work their way through the ranks to re-attain it.
I am part Chinese so I am not entirely ignorant of what is happening and what has happened in China. Relatives of mine were made into paupers when the Marxists came to power, much like the von Trapp family in The Sound of Music. My father immigrated here after the fact and re-established himself, raising his standard of living (and therefore mine, although I was born years after he came here) above what it was in China. I am presently in college and I intend to work so that my future children will have a higher standard of living than I have. This cycle is the quintessence of the American dream and I am no stranger to it.
qviri wrote:Okay, so one reason and two ideas. Based on your next paragraph, I'm sure you will agree that what you believe should have no bearing whether two other people have sex.
Yes, I agree, as what I believe should no bearing on things because I believe it, rather what is right should have bearing on things because it is true and if what I believe is what is right, then so be it.