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Search found 116 matches

by Parapraxis
January 20th, 2009, 3:55 pm
Forum: Humanist Ethics & Morality
Topic: Sick jokes - a question of ethics?
Replies: 19
Views: 4818

Re: Sick jokes - a question of ethics?

Btw, I don't see why doing something primarily to entertain, as opposed to doing something primarily to hurt (as in the lions-xtians example), makes a difference to the rightness and wrongness of it, if the end results are same: some people are hurt, others are entertained. The results are qualitat...
by Parapraxis
January 20th, 2009, 10:38 am
Forum: Religion
Topic: Holocaust Theology
Replies: 1
Views: 868

Re: Holocaust Theology

I found God, he was behind the sofa all this time... It's not a particularly new point, the Holocaust has been used countless times as an example of "evil" that weakens a concept of a benevolent god. I would agree that people need to seek out god, in that to me a personal belief is much better than ...
by Parapraxis
January 20th, 2009, 10:11 am
Forum: Humanist Ethics & Morality
Topic: Sick jokes - a question of ethics?
Replies: 19
Views: 4818

Re: Sick jokes - a question of ethics?

Isn't how much something hurts people without good reason a measure of whether something is morally wrong or not? Getting eaten by a lion sounds like a pretty horrible way to die and yet in days gone by people were entertained by the spectacle. Nowadays I think most of us would say that feeding peo...
by Parapraxis
January 19th, 2009, 6:06 pm
Forum: Humanist Ethics & Morality
Topic: Sick jokes - a question of ethics?
Replies: 19
Views: 4818

Re: Sick jokes - a question of ethics?

It would be inconsistent of me to condemn offensive humour as a whole, given that I have told, and laughed at, many an offensive joke. If not generally than at least for myself and a small minority of others, offensive humour allows us to acknowledge the darker side of our imagination; not necessari...
by Parapraxis
November 25th, 2008, 11:37 pm
Forum: Social Club
Topic: Have you ever?
Replies: 33
Views: 7106

Re: Have you ever?

I have Googled my own name, and could be anyone of the following

- A homophobic Australian MP (oh the irony)
- An estate agent (an unenviable job in the current economic climate)
- A professor at the University of York

OR

With a slight misspelling of my name, a very famous British author.
by Parapraxis
November 25th, 2008, 9:46 pm
Forum: Social Club
Topic: Explain your avatar
Replies: 561
Views: 146838

Re: Explain your avatar

I was looking for a cool picture to cover my Vista folder "Psychology" that I use to store my uni stuff, no prizes for guessing what I study now, my avatar picture is what I found (and liked).
by Parapraxis
November 25th, 2008, 9:43 pm
Forum: Social Club
Topic: Which historical figure would you like to meet?
Replies: 18
Views: 2818

Re: Which historical figure would you like to meet?

Erich Fromm, although he would not be my first choice of person I would wish to meet as that said person is still alive and thus hardly "from history". Even Fromm is not much of a historical figure, but his book ( The Fear of Freedom ) is one of the few books that has "struck an intuitive chord" wit...
by Parapraxis
November 25th, 2008, 4:33 pm
Forum: Miscellaneous Discussions...
Topic: Well should they?
Replies: 32
Views: 4011

Re: Well should they?

the justification for not allowing the public to use firearms (I'm including tasers in that group), is that they are not appropriate and justified as a means of defence. If the police are routinely armed, then they would have no argument to stop the public owning them. If the assumption that the pu...
by Parapraxis
November 22nd, 2008, 10:19 am
Forum: Sciences and pseudo-science
Topic: Injured man dies because he shunned conventional medicine.
Replies: 19
Views: 3301

Re: Injured man dies because he shunned conventional medicine.

I'm going to play Devil's advocate and say if anecdotal evidence is not acceptable for the efficacy of alternative medicines, then it cannot be acceptable for the lack of efficacy of these medicines :smile: But obviously there is a wealth of rigorous scientific and empircal research supporting the e...
by Parapraxis
November 22nd, 2008, 10:15 am
Forum: Education
Topic: Should BNP members be barred from teaching jobs?
Replies: 60
Views: 12443

Re: Should BNP members be barred from teaching jobs?

My view is thus: People are entitled to their beliefs, usually I would say "reasoned beliefs" but then even to us here if voting for the BNP seems completely unreasonable, to those who do vote somehow they manage to rationalise it in their own mind. So, everone has the right to their beliefs, the di...
by Parapraxis
November 2nd, 2008, 10:42 am
Forum: Religion
Topic: The Vatican
Replies: 9
Views: 1810

Re: The Vatican

"I think...well I don't know really, but I think the gays are wrong...I'm pretty sure god doesn't like em...but then, well god may not exist ya know...I think he does! Let's say for the sake of argument god exists...yeah then he wouldn't like gays. God's son only went around telling men to leave the...
by Parapraxis
November 2nd, 2008, 10:37 am
Forum: Humanist Ethics & Morality
Topic: What do you make of this?
Replies: 17
Views: 3658

Re: What do you make of this?

Talk about straw man arguments and misrepresentation!
by Parapraxis
November 2nd, 2008, 10:35 am
Forum: Education
Topic: Dumbing down in Universities and Colleges
Replies: 44
Views: 27044

Re: Dumbing down in Universities and Colleges

I am glad to see that my university does not appear! A lot of the universities offering such courses are former polytechnics, and mine also being a former polytechnic I was worried I was about to see it there! I'm equally glad that, thus far, nobody has placed a counselling/psychotherapy course as b...
by Parapraxis
September 30th, 2008, 4:32 pm
Forum: Sciences and pseudo-science
Topic: A fridge that uses no energy?
Replies: 11
Views: 2332

Re: A fridge that uses no energy?

But I want a tan, and I can't wait for global warming :(
by Parapraxis
September 29th, 2008, 9:41 am
Forum: Sciences and pseudo-science
Topic: Opus Dei and Science
Replies: 2
Views: 1163

Re: Opus Dei and Science

Isn't it sweet they're investing in science to present a face of at least searching for somewhat more objective truth?
by Parapraxis
September 29th, 2008, 9:38 am
Forum: Sciences and pseudo-science
Topic: A fridge that uses no energy?
Replies: 11
Views: 2332

Re: A fridge that uses no energy?

I'm renewable energy, my wings are solar-powered.
by Parapraxis
September 29th, 2008, 9:37 am
Forum: Miscellaneous Discussions...
Topic: Why are we impressed by celebrity?
Replies: 45
Views: 5077

Re: Why are we impressed by celebrity?

I would like to pretend that I'm never "star struck", yet for some reason even if I see a famous-person, regardless of whether I actually spoke to him/her or not, for some reason it becomes important news.
by Parapraxis
September 24th, 2008, 10:31 am
Forum: Sciences and pseudo-science
Topic: A fridge that uses no energy?
Replies: 11
Views: 2332

Re: A fridge that uses no energy?

There is something quite peaceful about going down to the fridge at midnight and being illuminated by that enigmatic glow...mould or no mould!
by Parapraxis
September 13th, 2008, 11:29 am
Forum: Education
Topic: Creationism
Replies: 10
Views: 2832

Re: Creationism

I think Eddie Izzard put it best, about how (Darwin's theory of) evolution had "a few holes" but then it is not right to go "Fucking magic!" YouTube clip here. I remember back in secondary school (Catholic) a boy had a bit of a debate with the biology teacher, when we were learning about evolution, ...
by Parapraxis
September 1st, 2008, 11:48 am
Forum: Education
Topic: Humanism for Schools - new BHA site.
Replies: 10
Views: 3658

Re: Humanism for Schools - new BHA site.

If religion was taught discursively, and critically, I think it would be both necessary and important to teach humanism or at least "secularism". I cannot speak for how secular schools teach religion, if they teach it at all, but I remember RE from both primary school and secondary school (both Cath...