18 replies to this topic

[bacopa]

Has anyone seen the Invention of Lying written and starring Ricky Gervais, who is now a huge star with his English Office show? This is an amazing movie, it basically says there is not God, several times throughout the movie, and it has such a strong humanitarian theme, proving that love and compassion rein supreme in a world obsessed with materialism and other things that shouldn't but are important like favorable genetics.

The movie made me cry in several places mostly in how it deals with dying and how giving someone some hope can be better than the cold realities of life. Although, despite this, the movie - I won't give it away - basically says that "the man in the sky" isn't real in the end.

I encourage everyone to see this film. Upon seconded viewing some of the comedy seemed overdone in spots, but I still now rank this as one of my all time fave films.

And this film stars leading Hollywood A list actors and Warner Brothers produced it obviously taking quite a risk with mainstream audiences.

Edited by dfowler, 25 January 2010 - 02:02 AM.

[viltro]

Has anyone seen the Invention of Lying written and starring Ricky Gervais, who is now a huge star with his English Office show?

Woo, that's really old. I think I'm the only Brit who prefers the American version though.

I really really liked the idea of "the invention of lying" but was severely disappointed by the movie. One significant niggle I had is that not only did they not lie, but they also told excessive truths, which was over the top and obviously for cheap jokes. However, it does epitomise religion as I see it - a simple means of easing fears people have over life and death, good and evil.

Edited by viltro, 25 January 2010 - 05:27 PM.

[Connor MacLeod]

Has anyone seen the Invention of Lying written and starring Ricky Gervais, who is now a huge star with his English Office show? This is an amazing movie, it basically says there is not God, several times throughout the movie, and it has such a strong humanitarian theme, proving that love and compassion rein supreme in a world obsessed with materialism and other things that shouldn't but are important like favorable genetics.

He that loveth not, knoweth not God; for God is love.
1 John 4:8

[ribbit]

I also thought it was quite nice. An interesting exploration of how life might be without lies. If no one could lie, then they could not make up any mythologies to explain the world. As if everyone were an empirical scientist. To be human is to accidentally lie, essentially.

An especially nice moment was when things quickly got complicated once the concept of hell was introduced. Suddenly the rules really needed to be known. Also, very nice Pizza Hut ad placement on the tablets. Also, budweiser was an oddly prominent brand entity.

[Cyberbrain]

It was a great movie no doubt. The invention of religion was hilarious and proves so much its true nature. If only most theists can acknowledge it.

One thing that bugged me was how everyone spoke their mind all the time. They can't lie but why did they say stuff like "I hate you, you're ugly" without provocation? I thought that was a fault.

[hotamali]

The invention of religion was hilarious and proves so much its true nature. If only most theists can acknowledge it.

Then they wouldn't be theists

[magellan]

He that loveth not, knoweth not God; for God is love.
1 John 4:8

Well put.
Just as there will always be the poor,
there will also always be those without faith.

For even logic says it is far better to believe and be wrong
than to not believe and be wrong.

Faith is a walk done only when the 5 senses fail.
Faith after logical proof is simply reverse engineering of the soul.

[ImmortalPlan]

For even logic says it is far better to believe and be wrong
than to not believe and be wrong.

Pascal's Wager and Criticism

[Connor MacLeod]

For even logic says it is far better to believe and be wrong
than to not believe and be wrong.

Reason says as much, but the purview is logic is much more limited.

[magellan]

Pascal's Wager and Criticism

I wish I could count how many times that card has been played to me.
Pascal's logic is assumptive in 2 ways:
He correlates the field of finite and infinite;
that there is equality in either losing life's opportunities or pleasures,
and in losing one's place in the afterlife, which to those with faith, is eternal.
His second error is assuming that there is some sort of loss associated with being a believer.
Therefore, there should be a way to qualitatively examine relative happiness of believers and non-believers.
Do you feel there is greater happiness to be held in the lifestyle of a non-believer?
Given that I have been both non-believer and then changed to that of believer,
As far as subjective reporting will take me in this discussion,
I would readily affirm that my life is much happier since believing.

[magellan]

For even logic says it is far better to believe and be wrong
than to not believe and be wrong.

Reason says as much, but the purview is logic is much more limited.

I agree.
The limitation of 5 senses dictates that logic must prevail over instinct.
However, doubt is a closer sentiment to instinct than logic.
Faith trumps both logic and instinct as it is neither validates nor refutes sensory input.
And is so much more than sensorineural computational interpretation.

[Alex Libman]

I haven't seen this movie, but I've heard a caller to the Free Talk Live radio show / podcast express his disappointment that it shied away from depicting the deceitful nature of government, which is what an informed person would naturally hope for from a title like that, and made it all about ye olde religion. So, what I recently said on another thread applies here as well:

To be an atheist in the modern times no longer means rejecting the pre-Enlightenment religious abstractions any more than rejecting Zeus made you an atheist during the Catholic inquisitions!

BTW, see here for my one-time attempt at Machiavellian / trans-humanist / religious humor...

Edited by Alex Libman, 30 March 2010 - 05:45 PM.

[brokenportal]

To be an atheist in the modern times no longer means rejecting the pre-Enlightenment religious abstractions any more than rejecting Zeus made you an atheist during the Catholic inquisitions!

Why go half way and support deism when you can just go all the way to the truth and be an agnostic, supporting the idea that we just dont know? I sum this view up with in the big 8.

On this subject, Im not an "anti theist" but heres some interesting and well said anti theist sentiments from a speaker who I think is an important part in the balance to this ongoing eons old world debate. (but with the advent of things like the information age and others, getting ready to move forward from the eons old stalemate)

[shadowhawk]

Might as well have a debate between two sides, theist and atheist. Here is a good one. Hitchens again debates a Christian.

http://www.youtube.c...feature=related

[Alex Libman]

Why go half way and support deism when you can just go all the way to the truth and be an agnostic, supporting the idea that we just dont know? [...]

I hold an agnostic position on many things (including 9/11 conspiracy theories, for example), but given finite mental resources a rational being must prioritize potential theories for contemplation according to the probability of their relevance, and in the finite world some probabilities do round down to zero.

For example, it is logically impossible to totally dismiss the possibility that a hideous ghost just materialized underneath your bed in the middle of the night, and if you don't check under your bed and get scared or relieved appropriately it might reap your soul into the netherworld while you sleep. Sure, there's positively no solid evidence for ghosts being documented by any other of the billions of other human beings under whose beds that ghost could have materialized before yours, and, sure, you've checked a dozen times every night and there's never anything under your bed except maybe some dust bunnies, but you never know it could be this one time...

The problem with theoretical logic / mathematics is that they try to apply notional concepts to a finite world. Coming from a background as a 3D video game programmer (not that I was any good), I am very well aware of the need for computational optimization of qualified resources. Why calculate every polygon of an object that is so far away it has no relevance to the player's current experience, which you want to render at 100 frames per second so you have no processor resources to waste? There's no reason to calculate every heartbeat of every Schrödinger's cat unless and until its box is opened! You need some sort of a cutoff point of relevance, where you simply calculate the possibility (or probability) of something being significant enough to compute, which is why many things in video game events have range and time limits, just as the universe has the speed of light.

So the point is - being agnostic about every possible notion that isn't disprovable is illogical, and possibly dangerous because you're putting more plausible possibilities in the same category as absolutely implausible ones.

[JLL]

Agnosticism and atheism are for fools and cowards.

Only anti-theism is rational, seeing as how much problems religions create, indirectly (influencing public opinion) or directly (suicide bombers).

[bacopa]

Agnosticism and atheism are for fools and cowards.

Only anti-theism is rational, seeing as how much problems religions create, indirectly (influencing public opinion) or directly (suicide bombers).

Why do you make the statement you make? What's wrong with saying "I just don't know?" And anti-theism is atheism...heh. I guess your saying atheists should take a hard stance against theism. Sure, but many do.

Edited by dfowler, 31 March 2010 - 08:25 AM.

[Alex Libman]

Agnosticism and atheism are for fools and cowards.

Only anti-theism is rational, seeing as how much problems religions create, indirectly (influencing public opinion) or directly (suicide bombers).

Anti-theism is tyrannical and fails to understand the positive effect a free market in religion has on society.

As the tradition of governmental religious bias fades away, religions become self-selecting systems, whereby the people they attract are the people that gain the greatest benefit from them. Religions did not make people stupid - people were stupid way before religion! What religion does in a free society is it gives stupid people a set of beliefs that works for them and makes them better people. It's the "least common denominator" of morality - most people can do better, but some can't (the word "cretin" etymologically derives from the word "Christian"). Stupid people "with religion" suffer less depression, avoid greater forms of irrational and self-destructive behavior, have more goal-oriented lives, work harder, commit fewer crimes, take better care of their families, and so on. If you can't have the "Objectivist work ethic", then the "Protestant work ethic" is the next best thing. Convince a stupid / emotionally-retarded person who depends on religion that there is no God, and the next thing you know is you wake up in a hospital, the doctors tell you your skull was broken, and the police tell you they found what's left of your Mercedes and it's in way worse shape than you are...

That isn't to say that you should "go along to get along" - you can be an atheist but still respect other people's culture, with religion being no more subjective than most other cultural aspects: language, fashion, and so on. God is the necktie of human culture: it's uncomfortable, it's stupid, it serves no objective purpose, but no one will kick you out for not wearing one anymore, and some people like to wear them so who cares if they do? Why worry about some people wearing neckties when you have far, far more vile and violent people (i.e. government) bullying you around and clipping the wings of the human civilization?!

And, by the way: the overwhelming majority of suicide bombers over the past 150 years have been "godless" communists (possibly including my own grandfather, fighting for the Soviets during WW2), or nationalist groups like Tamil Tigers. Artificially pressuring cultures into atheism has always resulted in fanaticism that makes the old religion seem as mild as mother's milk in comparison!

[shadowhawk]

We are either going to all die before we reach 100 or if we are lucky we will reach super - centurion age of 110. That would make us indeed exceptionable. If you are under 5'8", female and would be happy in a rest home, maybe you will make it. Less than 100 have. I hope we all do and the hope seems to me to be a good thing, something humans have hoped for as long as we have existed.

Now, let me ask a religious question, “Is there any possibility of life after death?” The key word is “after.” Is there any argument for it? I ask this with the background and reality of the real science that exists today. D’Souza the Christian in my last post says the answer is yes!

“Life after Death The Evidence.”
http://www.amazon.co...n...7474&sr=1-1

Hitchens the Atheist, thinks the answer is no. Always a good Atheist, There is no life after death.
“Never one to be daunted by attempting the impossible, Dinesh D’Souza here shows again the argumentative skills that make him such a formidable opponent."

— Christopher Hitchens, author of
God Is Not Great and
The Portable Atheist

Check it out\.
http://www.dineshdsouza.com/