Eran Talks

Do good and evil exist? What is good and what is evil? I believe they are relative terms that that exist only within the framework of circumstances surrounding them. Nothing is inherently good or inherently evil. I think this is easily proved by asking questions about any given set of circumstance.

For example, is killing good or evil? That is a rather broad question, so we should break it down a little further by determining what it is that we are killing. Is killing an animal good or evil? If you catch a domestic cat and smash its head in with a hammer for no reason, you would probably consider that behavior as evil. What if the cat was full of disease, like rabies, and was running loose around your secluded mountain property and tried to bite your children on several occasions. Perhaps you could get no help from the local authorities to catch the animal. You happen to trap the cat and your hammer is your only tool in hand when the cat tries to bite you. Is it a bad thing you then killed that cat?

What if you killed a deer to feed your family while stranded and lost in the mountains? By not killing the deer, you may be killing your family. By killing the deer, your family lives longer that they would otherwise. So, is killing the deer a bad or evil thing? Would allowing your family to die, when you could kill a deer and save them, be the same as killing the deer? If it’s my family, I think not. And you should remember that making a decision to not do something is still a decision. If you believe you should never kill anything and you refuse to kill the deer, you have made a conscious decision to kill your family. You can’t make the excuse that you didn’t kill your family, they just starved to death, because you had the opportunity to prevent them from starving and chose to allow them to starve.

Is it wrong to kill a human being? Not enough info, right? What if a serial killer had your wife and two children captured in the middle of a suspension bridge and he was slowly chopping the rope that holds up the bridge. You have the means to kill the serial killer, but he is a human being. You may believe you can’t kill a living person, but if you don’t kill the one serial killer soon, you allow your wife and two kids to fall into the chasm below and die. If you don’t kill the killer, you will have consciously made the choice to kill your family. You can’t say the serial killer killed them. Yes, he contributed, but the decision to allow him to kill your family was made by you, if you could have stopped it and chose not to take the killer’s life first.

Good and evil are relative terms that depend on the circumstances at that time. “Well, there must be something that is purely evil,” you say. What then? Can you name a bad thing that is never good no matter what the circumstances might become? I think you can’t because good and evil are merely terms that describe an action or event based on the circumstance at that event during the time it occurred.

This morning on KNUS radio, the host, Dennis Prager, talked about good and evil and said he thought people were born with both qualities. He gave the example of babies being born with jealousy. I like Dennis Prager, but many of his decisions are based on his Jewish beliefs. Whenever you have God as the premise of a logical formula, you are never guaranteed a valid answer. Why? The existence of God is a theory, not a fact. No one can prove God exists. Therefore, any conclusions based on the premise that God exists may be faulty. I didn’t say they are faulty, but they may be faulty. You can input wrong information into a computer and still get the right answer, although I doubt it happens often.

I thought it was rather silly to say babies are born with a built in jealousy emotion. I believe jealousy is something that is learned behavior. I certainly am not aware of any scientific studies that show jealousy is an instinct. And, I wonder if jealousy is always bad.

If I told you I found out my wife was sleeping with another man and I felt angry and I was jealous of that act, what would you say? Would you say I should not be jealous? Would you say jealousy is a bad thing and I should stop feeling jealous?

What if I told you my wife was sleeping with other men and I was not jealous? Would you consider that normal and a good thing, because to have jealousy is bad?

I digress. Is jealousy an instinct at birth? I think not. Jealousy is a learned behavior. We learn it from our parents and other people we are around when we are children. The first roots of jealousy may become apparent when a parent takes away something of value to them because they are afraid the child may break it. I’m sure you can think of many things that parents do that may root the feelings of jealousy in a child.

Another proof against the theory that jealousy is a born instinct is that I know people who are not jealous. If it’s an emotion we are born with, why don’t they have it? Could it be they were brought up in a way that jealousy never made an impression on them as a quality they needed to have?

Let’s look at it another way. Why are Catholics Catholic? Is it because they were brought up that way? Why are Jews Jewish? Is it because they were brought up that way? Why are people jealous? You can guess my response. Maybe it’s because they were brought up that way. They saw jealousy in their parents, neighbors, friends, and schoolmates. Maybe they were taught jealousy. I think so.

Our emotions are relative to the circumstances surrounding us at any given time. Good and evil are also relative to the circumstances surrounding us at any given time. And yes, the circumstances surrounding us include things like societies beliefs and the laws of the society we live in. Therefore, there is no definitive ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ in the world. It’s all based on our perceptions of right and wrong and our perceptions may not always be correct for any given set of circumstance. Think about it.

I have been posting more on the Denver Post BlogHouse than I have on my own blog. Shame on me. However, I found I needed to comment on a blog that was so racially biased and full of liberal generalizations that it made my teeth grind while reading the nonsense. The blog is by Dani Newsum, aka D.Note.

I have been following her for a few months now, and I am convinced she is a racist and extremely liberal. Both of those things bother me, but they are not so unusual from a liberal newspaper like the Denver Post.

In one of her recent blog articles titled, “McKinney and Kennedy: a tale of two congresspersons,” she gave the impression the white police officer stopped McKinney because McKinney was black. I had to comment on this ask where the evidence was that proved her statement. I also mentioned how tiring it is to hear black people always playing the black card against white people.

I never see white people who give a damn whether you’re black, yellow, red, brown or white, but I constantly hear black people claiming prejudice against the whites. This leads me to believe that the real prejudice comes from the blacks and not the whites in most cases.

In fact, I believe most blacks forget what Martin Luther King Jr. said in his “I Have a Dream” speech. For example, he said the following:

“I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”

and

“Let us not wallow in the valley of despair, I say to you today, my friends.”

So, I made my comments and asked for proof of the white officer’s intentions. I know there is no proof and my point was to ask why claim racism if there is no proof? In my opinion, an unjustified racist claim like this, promotes unease among the different races. After all, any comments like these are absorbed without thought by liberals. They readily accept it as true, no questions asked. Then the misinformation spreads like a disease across the country. The cure for this disease is pointing out misinformation and asking for proof. Truth acts as an antibiotic for the disease of liberalism; if you could only get the sick to take (understand) the medicine, perhaps they would get well.

However, in making my point, I used the word “crap” twice in one sentence, as was so aptly pointed out by a commenter in the article to the Blog Superintendent. Shortly thereafter, all my comments to this article were removed. I left new comments, much more subtle in nature, and they too were later deleted. I tried a third time, no ranting or raving or name calling or cursing, and it too was deleted.

Then, they moved Dani Newsum’s blog to a new site under the BlogHouse and comments to her current article, “Star Spangled Blather”, have been turned off. If Newsum’s blog contains such volatile information that the comments need to be turned off, why is she allowed a blog in the first place? Oh yeah. I forgot. She’s liberal and anything she writes is ok to publish. It’s the non-liberals that need to be censored. Well, that’s a bunch of crap and we all know it. Ops, there I go again. I hope you weren’t too offended by that.

Anyhow, I have written the BlogHouse Superintendent a letter and I’m posting it below. I hope to also post the answers to my questions, if I get a response.

Eran
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BlogHouse Superintendent,

I’m sorry to see you have begun censoring non-liberal comments from the Denver Post Blog House. I am speaking specifically of comments I left on the D.Note blog of Dani Newsum titled Mckinney and Kennedy: a tale of two congresspersons.

My comments were never censored until someone complained of my use of the word “crap” in my comments. I can’t see this as a reason censorship, because “crap” is not a word normally censored. In fact, I heard Matt Lauer, this morning on the Today show (5-10-6), use the word “bastard” and it wasn’t censored. I often hear the word “bitch” on television and it’s not censored. I doubt I would ever use “bastard” or “bitch” in my comments, and I’ve never used “shit” or “bullshit,” which may have been more accurate than the milder version I used.

My point is that I don’t believe I was censored for using the word “crap.” I believe I was censored for non-liberal comments. After my “crap” comments were deleted, I wrote a new comment and tried to tone it down as far as I could. However, I did ask for proof that the white police officer stopped the black Congresswoman McKinney because she was black. This comment was also removed as well as a third calm, questioning comment to Ms. Newsum.

Why is Dani Newsum allowed to make racist comments merely based on emotion with no evidence to back up her claims? Why am I censored for calling her on her racist claims and asking for proof? I am not the only one who has noticed her racism and made reference to it in the comment section of her blog.

I know liberals readily accept emotional claims without requiring proof from the accuser. However, I was not brought up to accept things just because someone says it’s a certain way. I like evidence to support my beliefs, something that is totally missing from most of Dani Newsum’s columns.

The Denver Post is a liberal newspaper, but I am always amazed at liberals making whatever comments they wish to make, while asking that the opposing view be censored. Free speech is for liberals only? I think your censorship is obviously slanted toward the idea of ‘no free speech for non-liberal ideas.’ It’s a shame you don’t believe in equality for non-liberals. At least, that is how it appears to me, and I’m sure it appears that way to many others.

D.Note’s blog was moved and I would guess it’s running on a separate version of WordPress so you can stop comments from people like me without affecting my ability to post on your main blog site. In fact, D.Note’s latest entry in her new blog is blocked from anyone making comments. If her writing generates comments that are so touchy you can’t print them, why is she allowed to blog on your site?

If I am allowed to continue posting comments, I would appreciate seeing a written copy of your rules for posting, so I can make an effort to write within your guidelines. Heck, I’d like to see a written copy regardless of your decision to allow me to post comments in the D.Note blog.

I appreciate you taking the time to read this and I eagerly await your responses.

Thanks,

Eran Jada<—319034789f0c413c60e07e15fc82b0fd—>

I’m surprised at the continued harping at our President about immediately withdrawing our forces from Iraq. I’m surprised at the lack of thought that’s put into a statement like that. Do you have any idea what the consequences would be if we left Iraq too soon?

Let’s be honest. The truth is that liberal socialists, i.e. Democrats, are angry they lost control of the Congress. They want control back and the only way their lightweight minds can see a return to power is to discredit the President and conservatives. That’s the truth and it’s obvious to most people.

I was against President Bush going into Iraq. (Have you noticed how the liberals refer to our President as: Bush, George, or other names without showing any respect at all for the office of President of the United States of America?) I did not see any evidence that Saddam was a threat to the USA. Yes, Saddam did pay the families of suicide/homicide bombers. Yes, Saddam did allow some terrorist training in Iraq. I feel those things could have been addressed without invading Iraq.

However, we did invade Iraq and that makes the question of whether we should have invaded, or not invaded, a moot question. The question should be: what do we do now that we are there?

Leaving Iraq too early would guaranty the failure of their new government and a return to power of a terrorist in Iraq. Yes, Saddam was a terrorist at the least to his own people, who he murdered, tortured, raped, dissolved the living in acid, pushed handcuffed people from rooftops, chopped off hands, whipped, and tortured, and by many other horrid methods. Would you prefer Abu Musab al-Zarqawi take over leadership of Iraq? I’m sorry to say that I believe you liberal Democrats would prefer that, because it would make President Bush look bad and that is your ultimate goal, not peace, or winning the war, or helping a nation begin a new century of democracy and fairness to all citizens of Iraq.

In addition to the new government of Iraq failing, if we withdraw too early, all the deaths that have occurred since the beginning of the war—most of which are deaths of Iraq citizens fighting for freedom—will be for nothing. You will invalidate all the deaths of this war and give more power to the terrorists who will think they have won. Terrorist attacks will then increase and more people will die. This is not hard to see if you just look with your eyes open and not tainted by the color of prejudice in trying to make the President look bad.

I’m afraid the liberal socialists are concerned with only one thing: making the President of the United States of America look bad and making conservatives in general look bad. It’s an emotional response from the left. The left thinks with emotions and not logic. They can’t help it and we can’t change it. I’m thankful the logical conservatives are in control of fighting the terrorists, even if I don’t believe everything conservatives believe. I certainly don’t want emotions running our country in a time of war—or at any other time actually.<—be4cbab24fb53061efed399b54c0768f—>

Are guns really the problem? I once placed all my firearms on the kitchen table and sat staring at them and listening for hours. I wanted to see if any of the guns would try to talk me into robbing a bank or into shooting someone. Over time, I noticed that none of them moved or spoke a single word to me. I finally got tired and put them to bed.

“Well, that’s a really stupid thing to do,” you say. “Guns don’t talk; people talk.” Yes, I’m thinking you are right. Guns don’t do things by their selves. People must use them as a tool, whether during the heat of passion or with deliberate forethought. A gun has no mind or will.

Therefore, when we talk about gun control, shouldn’t we really be talking about people control? I believe we concentrate on gun control because it’s easy. It’s much harder to think about what we must do to cut down on murders and robberies and how we are going to change the behavior of people. To change behavior we would have to consider the poor, the under educated, the sick, etc. It’s much simpler to just control guns.

For example, it’s easy to say, “If we get rid of guns, we can save many lives.” It’s easy to say, but you’re living on Fantasy Island if you think you can make guns disappear. There are too many firearms around the world to be thinking you can eliminate them all. It’s an absurd thought. I am betting it can’t be done. It won’t be done.

Firearms are relatively easy to make—even at home. Firearms are in demand by people around the globe and when someone wants something, someone else is usually there to provide them their wishes. In fact, if you make it illegal, organized crime will sell it at a high price. A price only criminals can afford since they can steal as much money as they need to make the purchase.

Firearms also have useful purposes that are legal; at least legal this year. Many people use firearms to protect their families at home against unlawful intrusions from criminals. Is this wrong? Would you stop someone from protecting their family?

What did you say…police? You said, “Let the police protect the people?” My personal police officer is never there when I need him. Is yours? Do you have a personal police officer?

Which occurs faster: beating someone to death with a tire iron, or waiting for the police to respond to your location? Saying you should let the police protect us is absolutely one of the stupidest arguments for not having guns that I have ever heard. The people who voice this idea have no working brain functions at all.

A common thought is to make firearms harder to buy and less available to people. Therefore, we make laws that try to accomplish this. Many people aren’t capable of realizing how useless it is to make stricter gun laws. After all, criminals are people who break laws and they aren’t going to care about or abide by new gun laws. They break laws; that’s why they are called criminals. Make all the laws you want, they don’t care!

Take this example for comparison: We decide to make the drug cocaine illegal because we don’t want people using this substance. We make laws against using, selling, buying, and distributing cocaine. The results of these laws are: No one uses, sells, buys, or distributes cocaine. That didn’t really seem to work, did it? If it doesn’t work with drugs, why would it work with guns?

I believe the real problems are with the behavior of people, not guns. Yes, it’s much harder to address behavior problems. But, until it’s addressed, the problems won’t go away.

Some examples of wrong behavior:

•Inadequate parenting by people who believe they are great parents. Out of all the classes in school and all the careers chosen by graduates, the one thing almost everyone has in common is that they will be a parent. And parenting classes are rarely seen and, as far as I know, never mandatory. So, we will just learn from our parents, right?

•Inadequate schools where passing kids to the next grade is more important than teaching them. Why are tenured teachers allowed to stop being productive and still keep their jobs? Well, they are tenured, right? Is it right?

•Believing kindness and compassion work in place of punishment. Why do we release criminals from prison and allow them to prey on more and more victims instead of removing them from our society permanently? You say, “It’s being harsh to remove them permanently.” I say it’s harsh to let them create thousands of victims each year while they are free so we can feel better about being too harsh on the criminal.

•Believing that playing games without counting the score is more important than having someone loose the game. How do we learn to compete in business as adults where winning is important?

•Allowing people to promote ideas like “just give peace a chance” or the idea that “we should lay down our arms (military) and others will leave us alone.” This kind of thinking idealistic, childish, and means nothing to those who would video tape your terrors while your head is slowly sliced from your neck.

•Handing money to people on street corners with signs saying they “…just need a little help. God bless you.” If they were honest they would say, “I make more money this way than if I were working, it’s easier than working, and I pay no taxes. So, please, stupid people, help me support my drug/alcohol habit and give me a hand out.” Did you ever offer them a job? I have. They say no.

There are many more people problems that need to be addressed and it’s complicated to do so. It’s our nature to take the easy road.

It’s much easier to cry out our concern for the lives of our countrymen while complaining about the 2,000 military lives lost while fighting terrorists than it is to address the 50,000 lives lost every year in the USA from automobile accidents. At least we feel better because we did something.

It’s also easier to make gun laws than to address behavior. Then too, you can feel better because at least you have shown you care about people and you tried to do something about the problem. But, do you really care?

Eran<—dc7fab7b7e600a59f47683a46ddc9908—>

Is the evidence for or against God?

Everything we think we know about God has come from people. All religious books were written by people. All reports of encounters with God were reported by people. We have: no scrolls or text of any sort that was written by God, no video or tape recordings of God, and no other communication by God that does not travel first via a human being in order to get the message to the rest of us. Where is any firsthand evidence for the existence of God?

There is no direct evidence. Is there circumstantial evidence of God? You may think there is and you would perhaps propose miracles as indirect evidence. Or you may wonder how trees and animals and everything else could be created without a God. Mostly you feel there must be a God because your parents told you God existed when you were a child and you certainly don’t want to believe your parents lied to you.

It’s not a lie if your parents really didn’t know they were wrong. Things can be created just because it’s natural for them to be there. Unnatural things don’t last long; that is part of evolution. And miracles are simply things we can’t explain with science today.

God is supposed to be omniscient; all knowing, omnipotent; all-powerful, and perfect. Do we know these things because we’ve seen God’s resume? Of course we haven’t. We have been taught these things by people; people who presume to know what God wants.

Imagine an indescribable super-being that is so powerful it can create an entire universe out of nothing. It is the most powerful thing in the universe. This super-being knows everything going on in the universe, can create plants, animals, and human beings. He/She/It can create Angels and banish bad Angels to Hell.

God can decide a plan for humanity throughout eternity. God can create light and dark, the oceans and the world. God can destroy people, cities, or the entire world if He wants. He can make us happy or sad. God decides who will die and when. God decides who will live even when things look hopeless to humans. God can impregnate women through the air without their permission. God defines sin. God can take away our sin at will, but chooses not to do so on certain occasions.

All of this God does and much, much more. And we can’t even begin to imagine how God accomplishes any of it. However, religious people always claim to know what God wants of us. They claim to know which writings by humans were inspired by God. They claim to know how much sex God wants us to have and under what circumstances. They claim to know how God wants us to worship, when, where, and with whom. They seem to know so much about what this super-being wants of us and yet no one can tell you what God looks like. Why can’t we see God? The easy answer is God won’t let us look at him. Solves that issue, doesn’t it?

They claim to know that God’s purpose in having Abraham attempt to kill Abraham’s son, was to test Abraham’s faith in God. However, since God is omniscient (all knowing), shouldn’t God have already known Abraham’s conscience and loyalty? The test was unnecessary if God is really omniscient.

If God is omnipotent (all powerful), why would we be put on earth to learn? God could snap His fingers, if he has fingers, and make us know whatever He wishes us to know and all the time people spend learning about God would be unnecessary. We could just know it if He wished it so.

Why would God make a rule whereby people must believe in Him in order to have everlasting life and then refuse to interact with mankind on any level that would leave no doubt that God exists? The idea that we must have faith in God in order to go to heaven, without direct and undeniable proof from God of his existence and wishes, sounds like God is playing some kind of child’s game. Is God a child?

Did God create the great flood to correct a mistake? Mistakes from God are not possible because God is perfect. If God was punishing people for not following his law, is that not an indicator that God’s teaching methods are flawed? But, they can’t be flawed, because He is perfect.

Can the all-powerful God create a being more powerful than Himself? If He can, then He is no longer “all-powerful.” If He can’t, he was never “all-powerful.” The idea of an omnipotent God does not make sense. It’s an oxymoron.

There are so many contradictions within religion that the questions can go on forever. The spurious answers to those questions will lead to new questions. The only sensible answer I can see follows the principal of Occum’s Razor; the simplest answer is usually the right answer. The only answer to the question of God’s existence that also answers all the questions that conflict each other is that God does not exist.

Eran<—6ea39f7e02ff7ae30a63d4faf8805d4d—>

Does God exist? I was taught as a child that God (He) did exist. I was told that God was all powerful, all knowing, and perfect. I was told that God knew what everyone was doing all the time no matter where they were. I was told God would punish me if I was bad and God would reward me if I was good. I was told to pray to God for help when I needed help. However, I was also told that God helps those who help themselves. Then I had a question: If I helped myself, why did I need God?

I spent many years wondering if God existed, but reasoned that I must believe in Him since everyone else believed in Him. But, I always wondered where the proof was for the existence of God. I was told that the proof was all around me and in all things living. I was told I needed to have faith.

I did not really understand faith or what other living things had to do with the existence of God. If I merely accepted God and asked no questions, how could I learn what I needed to know in order for me to understand that God was real? I wondered why everyone accepted God without proof. Eventually I realized that ‘faith’ was a copout. Saying you had faith is the same as saying you have given up on the search for truth; an excuse to not keep looking for answers. Of course, that’s only my opinion and you may feel free to tell me why I am wrong.

The question ‘Does God exist?’ is the most important question about religion that I can ponder. Why? If God doesn’t exist, then all beliefs that stem from a belief in God may not be true. Why do I say “may not be true?” Let me explain.

I am an atheist because I see no proof that God exists. I also see no proof that a God needs to exist. However, I do believe that all things living are connected and I believe there may be what I call a Universal Life Force.

“Well,” you say. “Your Universal Life Force is God.” I’m afraid not. I do not attribute the ULF, if you will allow me the latitude to abbreviate, as having a consciousness of its own. I do not believe the ULF is all knowing, all powerful, and perfect. I do not believe the ULF watches over us and decides who will live or die today. I do not believe when a child dies that God, or the ULF, has recalled them to Heaven. In fact, I don’t believe in Heaven.

“Well, what do you believe in?” you say. What I believe in will take many pages to write and when my life is over, I expect I will not have all the answer I seek. So, what I believe in is much too broad to answer all at once. I think we should keep this conversation to the original question: Does God exist? My answer is no and I ask you to show me evidence that I am wrong or why it even makes a difference if I am right.

Thank you,

Eran<—88896180a00f2114a326c2cd01ecfa94—>