Phi for All

If you want a separation between church and state, you need to have distinctions that allow for that separation, and taxation of religion can be viewed as governmental control and therefore violates the separation. But, as I said before, if you're going to have that separation, it needs to be a complete one, so absolutely no taxpayer funding should be going to help ANY organization that has religious status. First Clinton, and then Bush (in a big way) blurred those lines with the concept of Faith-based Initiatives and that really needs to stop. If the distinctions are clear, and churches are receiving no help from taxpayers, then whatever guidelines regulate tax exemption for churches should apply to you if you can prove you're a church. If you choose to take that path, you should not be able to take advantage of any public funding. Then you should be able to buy whatever kind of flooring or windows your followers are willing to fund. Something I've learned from this discussion is that full financial disclosure is not something required from churches that have tax-exempt status, certainly not to the extent required of other non-profits. I realize this may seem like governmental control being exerted, but I really feel more transparency is needed here. I really don't care if churches spend money given to them by their followers on gold candlesticks, but I really think we should make sure that revenue sheltered from taxation is received properly, and not as a result of investments made in for-profit concerns or joint ventures with secular companies. I suppose we can't really object to a church investing money received from followers in secular ventures, but I do think profits from those investments should NOT be tax-exempt.

That's a generalization. Not all institutions are alike. And science has progressed a great deal since the concept of classical elemental natures. This is a perception that isn't as well supported as the facts surrounding Wakefield's deliberate falsifying of data in his studies. I can't think of anything like this. Help me out with some examples of what you're thinking about. Evidence has very specific definitions in science. Arete gave some excellent links to peer-reviewed studies several posts ago. You should read them, and see how the studies were performed. This is one of the best ways to look for stuff.

It depends on your need. Is this for a trick that's going to last a few minutes, like pretending to sever an artery, or is it for a costume look that needs to look bloody for a few hours, like a zombie after a messy kill?

What makes science and the scientific method different are the sheer numbers of people salivating to overturn accepted theory or find something wrong with mainstream practice. These people would gain more "power" if they could do so than they would by playing along with some sort of conspiracy. No offense, but the difference between you and them is that they have to back up their refutations with rigor and supportive evidence, whereas, so far, you get to just make insinuations and quote unsupported assertions. There are simply too many people out there with the capability of revealing a fraud of the magnitude you're suggesting.

Only if you qualify as a non-profit organization under state guidelines. Even churches don't get to be property tax exempt if they don't qualify. I think where the real dilemma stems from is that churches aren't subject to rigorous financial disclosure the way other non-profits are. They enjoy this exemption as a kind of nod to the division between church and state. But if this is allowed to continue, I'd say that the other exemptions and subsidies should be ended (did I mention that Faith-based Initiatives should stop?). On the other hand, if the churches want them to continue, then they should have to provide full financial disclosure the way other non-profits do. They shouldn't get to have all the bonuses with none of the penalties.

Personally, I have no problem with religious groups being given the tax-exempt status any other non-profit gets. If they're using their income for upkeep on their buildings, running their organizations and funding their charitable works, they should be allowed that status. It appears, however, that they currently enjoy exemptions that other non-profits don't, like the parsonage subsidy. If I read this correctly, the home of the church leader is exempt from taxes, and I don't think there is any correlation to any other similar group. I'm not sure what the Investment Tax Subsidy is exactly, but the non-profits I've been involved with were prohibited from any capital gains from investments (they usually had to spend all the money they made every year and weren't allowed to hold any over). If this is something the churches are allowed to do differently, then I would object to this practice. I've already mentioned my objections to the Faith-based Initiatives programs. These are just wrong, and would be seen by many as harmful to free market principles if they were granted to private or public businesses. Most of the "Subsidies Not Estimated" are exemptions other non-profits enjoy. They may be objectionable, but not because only churches get them. The one that concerns me though is the Related Business Income Tax Subsidy. If this allows churches to invest in joint-venture business arrangements with for-profit businesses yet keep any income from those ventures tax-exempt, or lend their own tax-exempt status to for-profit businesses on a limited venture basis, this is also a loophole that needs to be closed.

Many of Bush's faith-based initiatives give grants and government contracts specifically to religious organizations for community work. I don't like any favoritism when it comes to who gets federal contracts. These are contracts that only go to religious organizations, and bypass the normal grant procedures. Some religious groups are even allowed to hire people based on their religious affiliation and still get federal grants and contracts. And we're basically giving government contracts to groups that are allowed to preach their religion in the course of fulfilling their government program contracts. We're also talking about teen outreach programs that preach abstinence-only birth control methods, which study after study have shown to be ineffective.

I think you and I have different definitions of lazy. I've shared mine, and I still don;t think working smart instead of working hard is lazy. It's just smart. I think lazy is not working at all, or pushing work you could do yourself onto others. I don't see how you can possibly think that when we have accomplished more in the age of technology than in all the history prior to it. How is that lazy? Yes, it suggests that we have a specialized society where I can earn money to buy what I can't produce. It doesn't suggest that this society is lazy. We're more productive than we've ever been. How is that lazy? A lot of those "a lot of people" are working hard twelve-hour days and have no time for using methods that take more time. How is that lazy? I can partially agree with this example, but only for people who can't work WITHOUT using computational machines, and there are still plenty of those types of people who can do both. They use the machines because they take less time, allowing them to produce more work. How is that lazy? Perhaps I'm more interested in learning than teaching, that could explain why I don't write as much as I read. I've also been trained to listen more than I speak; in business it's more important to find out what clients want than to tell them what you think they need. I'm not a particularly good musician. I choose instead to listen to music made by those who are better at it. And I use technology to listen to that music rather than travel to where live musicians are for reasons like cost, time and varied availability. How is that lazy? I don't think our use of technology is lazy. A "dependence" on technology may be different. If you would sit around and do nothing if you didn't have your technology, I would call that lazy. If you're generally a lazy person, I don't think you need technology specifically to enable you to be lazy. Lazy people can be lazy without it. I see them leaning on low-tech shovels all the time. I guess it all comes down to what you think is important. In a day, I can use technology and perform roughly fifty activities, from learning what is known about Haikouichthys as one of our earliest vertebrate ancestors, to walking for half an hour on my elliptical in my cool basement while it's 95 F outside, to washing/drying/folding the week's clothes of a family of three. Without technology, I'd be lucky to get ten things done from my list. And I definitely wouldn't get to discuss technology and laziness with people all over the world.

I really object to your bringing this wad of garbage generalization into this discussion. You were asked some very specific questions and have responded with unsupported opinion (which has been copied from a source that may or not be yours) stated as undeniable fact. Very disappointing and unprofessional. Your post is being reported.

Actually, I also think most people who are detractors of anything requiring a great deal of study are ignorant of the subject. I wouldn't go as far as saying "vast majority", which I personally consider to be 75% or more, but I do think more than half the people are not willing to put in the time for in-depth study, especially when they have already formed an opinion on the subject. That said, I think most people who support anything requiring a great deal of study are equally ignorant of the subject. They tend to form opinions the same way detractors do, based on a bit of information and possibly too much faith in the people they get the information from. This is actually one of the things that attracts me to science. At least the scientific method has a mechanism for me to study and draw my own conclusions based on the most trust-worthy explanations, even when I've chosen not to do the actual observations and experiments myself. I know there are always people out there trying to overturn theory and those people don't believe knowledge should be sacred and etched in stone. As long as that's not the only thing they read, I agree. Send the Amish to college!

Which "entities" do you think are responsible for human instincts? And since right and wrong are culturally relative, how can they possibly be innate? Finally, no one could possibly have "absolute" freedom; this may seem like nitpicking, but such all-encompassing terms have meaning when they're used correctly, and therefore it's very important to carefully maintain that meaning in any discussion.

After "going out on a limb" one too many times, I learned that most people just happen to believe the way the folks around them (family, congregants) interpret the Bible. There's a true miracle, that so many people who found the one "true" way would all just happen to live in the same community!

It's hard to beat Italy for down-to-earth, simple fare with beautiful surroundings, rich history and architecture. On the other hand, if you speak a bit of Spanish, Italian is going to sound enough like it to mess you up good. Australia is next on my list, so I would push for you guys going there. It takes less time to filter the accent than Ireland or Scotland (seriously, I still don't know what's being said in the first ten minutes of The Commitments), and I've only heard fabulous things about the places and the people in Oz. Isn't that the truth, though? I think the rude French stereotype is undeserved. It's probably perpetuated by those who can't handle so much cool.

But in Matthew 5:17, Jesus clearly states that the Old Testament laws are still in effect, that we are to follow them if we follow Christ. Yes, more than twice. Oh please, how can anyone know what the Bible really says? Anybody is just one of billions of interpreters with millions of interpretations about hundreds of thousands of topics. Why should I trust anyone's explanation about something with so many explanations? The only true stance is to take it literally, word for word, and that doesn't work out very well.

! Moderator Note Mohammad Shafiq Khan, this is a thread where a member has asked for mainstream explanations about Relativity. This is NOT the place for your attempt to refute such an accepted and supported theory. If you feel the rest of the scientific community is in error, keep your comments confined to your own threads and please stop trying to hamper the understanding of those who are trying to learn the accepted explanation. If you have issues with this modnote, feel free to report it or complain via PM. Do NOT further sidetrack this discussion by responding to this modnote in thread.

I agree with this. But this should also mean that everything but the income tax subsidies should be dropped. The faith-based initiative subsidies, the parsonage subsidies and the rest transcend what is normal for non-profit organizations, iirc. We should never have gotten into funding religious endeavors with taxpayer dollars.

! Moderator Note If you are trying to speak to a specific member, quoting them in a relevant thread and posing your question, or sending them a Personal Message is preferable. Naming a thread by member is not as likely to garner the type of response you want.

I think there's a disconnect going on here. I think some people are talking about technology and laziness like "I'd rather surf the web than go outside and mow the lawn", while other people are talking about using technology so we don't have to work as hard. I don't think the latter is lazy, I think it's being smart. Why is using a computer as opposed to pen and paper considered lazy?Why is it lazy to invent a machine that will plow ten rows in a tenth of the time it would take me to plow one by hand? There's a difference too between getting technology to do my work for me and making me as productive as 100 people. Am I being indolent while a machine does my work or am I doing other work today while technology does what I was busy with yesterday? I play one online game with some pals once every couple of weeks, and I have an online game I play with family members (which I'm getting fed up with as it's one of those constant maintenance crap games that just eat up time better spent elsewhere). I still work and walk and bike and socialize, and read more than I write. Am I lazy because I use a computer, and write lists and listen to music and text friends and family and get driving directions and time my cooking and keep a calendar on my cell phone? I wouldn't have nearly the time to do any of that without technology. How can I be lazy when I'm constantly doing SOMETHING?!

Politicians get money for their campaigns from special interest groups mostly made up of businesses. They're then beholden to those groups for getting into office. They appropriate funds and pass bills benefiting those groups. This kind of work is then spun to pass as representation of the public and economic welfare. Unfortunately, what works best for businesses these days is rarely what works best for the public or the economy. Current business models are not in parallel with the models people used to associate with a healthy economy, well-regulated commerce and productive social programs. There are too many conflicts of interest going on, and the political paradigm has gone from statesman to spin doctor hand puppet or uber-secretive CEO. Edit to add: I don't think Big Business is anything evil or inherently corrupt. I think they've simply convinced themselves that manipulating the system from within is the legal, ethical way of doing business these days. They probably feel they are helping the country by bringing commerce and keeping people employed and consuming. It's the business models that are at odds, that requires them to rebel against regulation, that shows them lobbying can be more profitable than manufacturing, that shows them a bottom line made healthier by NOT hiring national workers. Democracy is not working properly with the current business models in place, imo.

I don't know. Definitely. It's possible.

This is the principal I use for getting ketchup out of the bottle.

I've been told the site is privately owned by a conglomerate of hyper-intellegent pan-dimensional beings. The truth of this, while constantly being questioned, is nevertheless quite unquestionably possible.

Evolution is the change in allele frequency within a population over time. "Tampering" is just a type of selective pressure. And since we're part of nature, anything we do is not really abnormal or unnatural. And evolutionary changes take generations for even small changes. What kind of changes do you envision for us? Emotions are a big part of sound judgement. They motivate us to do many things, most of which are good. Good judgement must include the emotional reasons why we do what we do. Why would you want to set aside emotions? Even anger can lead us to correct injustices.

I think the Republican party is the one most used by Big Business to corrupt policies in their favor. If you look at some of the arguments they make, and compare them to reality, you see the conflicts within the platform. Morality is usually a key concept that's argued, usually centered around things like abortion, which seems like more of an individual rights issue. Yet individual rights get trampled on with the Republican solutions. Also look at entertainment. There have been numerous articles about how television ratings are allowing more objectionable content to be aired. This seems like a fairly easy legislative fix, yet it looks like Big Business would rather we NOT mess around with regulating what is attracting younger and younger audiences and making them so much money. And the free market argument is regularly used by Republicans when it comes to regulation, but conveniently stuffed in a drawer when a big corporation wants to hedge out competing corporations with special lobbying or no-bid contracts. Where's your free market competition NOW?

First of all, we need to remember that when you ask the questions properly, you find we're not all that far apart in what we really want. Notice that the pundits in the media don't talk about what the issues or the solutions really mean, they just use the broad terms like "Welfare" and "Military Spending" and "Immigration" and "Abortion" and then let whatever spin they've already put out do its work. That's why these left/right political distinctions are so useful to pols and media types, because they instantly evoke certain ideologies so volumes of information are assumed with the use of a few quick sound bytes. We all need to demand more clarity from both our media and our politicians. This is one of the ways the pols get us to forget every few years that they're still the ineffective system abusers they were last time we voted for them. When much of what you mean is merely implied by what you say, it's easy to convince the voters that you're speaking directly to them and represent their views. Second, we need to insist that our problems be dealt with rationally instead of emotionally. If we truly trust the market economy model then we should rationally address our individual fiscal responsibility and stop racking up so much consumer debt. Forget what's "good for the economy" and start being smart about our money. That goes for tax revenue spending as well. It's insane that we spend hundreds of BILLIONS of dollars on corporate welfare to already successful businesses while we're slashing education budgets for our children and grandchildren. Worse still, corporations are paying less in taxes than ever before. After WWII, corporations used to pay half the taxes in this country, with individuals paying the other half. Now corporations kick in about a fourth of what individuals do, and those corporations are hiring more foreign workers all the time while running their trucks over roads they want us to pay for. We have to stop letting ourselves be sidetracked by emotional issues and look at the problems for what they are. Third, we need to find better outlets for reaching people with the message that our differences are being exploited and magnified out of proportion. We allowed corporations to own both media AND regular businesses, and now it's difficult to get coverage that may hurt profits. Solutions are out there, but they get buried by sensationalism and fear-mongering. Remember the movie Dave, with Kevin Kline as a guy who looks just like the president and gets a chance to run the country when the real president goes into a coma? I'd like to see a major movie with a popular cast come out with all the fixes so many people have put forth, maybe about a candidate who comes out of nowhere with a common sense message and real solutions that cut through the left/right, conservative/liberal ideologies.