About chemical drugs, Everything is chemical….so any recreational drugs is good for health, Just like the H20…

The media was wrong to lie about burial at sea being okay (although I saw at least one Islamist say it was okay if there was no way to quickly bury the body in the soil) but all the other rites were performed, and even that I think was more than he deserved. Besides, at least this way no one can find the body and dig it up or create a shrine to it.

I think you mean *don’t know* how to swim?

Other than that interesting post. I’ve never gotten into the whole historical Jesus vs made-up Jesus. I think if there was a real preacher named Jesus, stuff attributed to him got out of hand, much like how St Nicholas theses days is fat, has flying reindeer, wears a red suit, and lives at the North Pole instead of in Turkey. Jesus, if he was an actual person, might have been honest or he might have been good at sleight of hand, like a magician. OTHO I see the incredibly close similarities to Mithra, so I wonder if the whole Jesus idea wasn’t just co-opted from pagans to begin with. So I’m pretty open to both options atm.

In this case the instruction to “stop worrying” is likely to have created more resistence than it avoided, because (in my fairly long experience) one of the things many people hate to think they are doing – about anything – is “worrying”.

BTW2, did you hear about Dawkins’ next great idea? Another poster, this time showing two smiling children with the slogan: “Please don’t label me. Let me grow up and choose for myself.”

Problem: The two children photographed for the poster came from a family of devout Christians. Still, as their father said, it was nice to know that the atheists who selected that photo thought that his children looked the epitome of genuine happiness and intellectual freedom.

BTW3, if Dawkins et al want children to be left free to think whichever way they choose until they are old enough to make genuinely independent decisions about what they will believe, why are they trying to promote summer camps where the children (presumably the offspring of atheists?) will be further inculcated with atheistic notions?
Looks like incredibly confused thinking, especially coming from someone who so modestly labels himself and his fellow thinkers “brights”.
(ROTFLMBSO)

“I am curious Andy, [1] how do you define yourself religiously, and [2] separate from the existence of god, do you think that churches are a force for good in the world?”

1. I am a Christian, though not a particularly good example.

2. Churches are like any other organization – any given church is as “good”, or not, as the people leading it and the people who attend it. A good church is – in my opinion – one where the congregation get the kind of education in their religion that would enable them to knock behaviour like that you advocate on it’s backside without stopping to draw breath.

For example, near the start of this blog you say:

“Anyway, forget the moral dilemma, this blog isn’t about why, it’s about how.”

To which the very obvious answer is simply: “Only a person with no moral standards would claim they could divorce their behaviour from the moral standards on which it is based.”

End of story.

By the way, since you imply that your standard of intellect is higher than people with conventional religious beliefs, I invite you to read one of John Lennox’s recent books which purports to rebut the various arguments put forward by Dawkins, Dennett, Hitchins, etc., just as he has nailed Dawkins, Hitchens and others in public debates in various countries.

Of course the arguments are presented openly to encourage thought, rather than covertly or in a way that would circumvent thoughtful consideration. But I bet you can get used to that if you try

It’s called: “Gunning for God: Why the New Atheists are Missing the Target”, published by Lion.

Come to think of it, if you really want people to think things out for themselves, why do you rely so heavily on covert manipulation?
Seems kinda self-defeating/rather revealing, if you know what I mean. Nudge, nudge, wink, wink.

Please do not use NLP for wrong purpose.