ok. I will.

TheBo$$: Some Muslims claim to have seen the picture in the Wikipedia article I linked to.

I saw the picture in the Wikipedia article you linked to too but it wasn’t clear enough for any detail.

Why are there never mass sightings of pixie or unicorn images?

Why are there never mass sightings of pixie or unicorn images?

There are plenty of these sightings if you’re high.

Oh, and I just sent Nunyabiz a Gmail invite for the blowjob movie. I’ve seen it before, but he gets one for reminding me (I’d forgetten about it).

It just seems kinda pointless to get married and not have kids. Why bother getting married? Why not just live together?

How about so that your legal next-of-kin can be the person of your own choosing, with the same values as yours (or at least a deep enough respect for yours), that could be trusted to make medical decisions should you be incapacitated… so that your whack-job fundy relatives won’t force you into being a living corpse when you’d rather be dead?

I didn’t want to have children, but no doctor would tie my tubes until after I’d already had one (and even then only because I threatened them with legal action if they refused to do it while they already had me open for bowel surgery when I was 31).

Of course, I wouldn’t trade my daughter for the world, but had I been sterilized at 24 when I started asking for it to be done, I’d have not passed on my jacked-up genetics that are responsible for the medical condition she suffers from.  There are ALL sorts of reasons people might not want to have kids, and no matter WHAT those reasons might be, their choice to remain childfree is theirs alone and should not be questioned or denied.

As for Marian apparitions, people see what they want to see.

Having children is not a global problem.

John, while I agree with you about the connection between education, health care, and a strong economy with declining birth rates, it remains a fact that having children is a global problem, not just a third world problem, because of the inordinate demands placed on the environment by first world children.

While many of the problems of hunger and environmental degradation are amenable to political and scientific advances, and while there is no calculus or godgiven truth to tell us how many kids are enough or too many, depending on where we live and how we live, there are simply too many consumers on this planet.  Overpopulation may not be the root of our problems, but it’s the problem that exacerbates all others- habitat destruction (whether it’s hungry settlers slashing and burning the jungle, or MacDonalds), pollution, war, famine…

I don’t have any solutions, and I suspect there are none which are easy to swallow.  Education, birth control, and economic help for developing countries are certainly appropriate.  Unfortunately, war is more profitable and popular.

I’m with OB on this one. If you think the only reason to get married is so you can have kids then you need to do a little research into marriage laws. As an atheist my decision to get married had nothing to do with gods or children and everything to do with the legal benefits such a social contract provides. Not the least of which is the ability to have my wife included under my health insurance plan, first in line to inherent my crap if I should kick the bucket, able to legally make medical decision on my behalf should I not be allowed to, and so on.

My daughter came from a relationship that was headed toward marriage, but never made it because it went sour before the marriage came to pass. About a month after we split up she told me she was pregnant. I didn’t marry her because I thought that the resulting bad relationship would be worse for my child than having two parents who were never married.

If my only interest were procreation I wouldn’t bother getting married. Seems a bit of a hassle if I really want to spread my seed around.

John,

But how would us first-worlders reproducing willy-nilly do anything to help “mom and pop” in Africa get better educations?

...and about the apparition of Mary in Zeitoun, Egypt: of course Maryam is important in Islam too, so we shouldn’t be surprised that she was seen by Muslims also.

In looking around for information about this apparition I came upon an abstract of a study which strains credulity, to say the least:

J. S. Derr and M. A. Persinger (1989) Geophysical variables and behavior: LIV. Zeitoun (Egypt) apparitions of the Virgin Mary as tectonic strain-induced luminosities. (English) Percept Mot Skills 68 : 123-8
Temporal analyses were completed between the occurrence of intense displays of exotic luminous phenomena over a church in Zeitoun (Egypt) during the years 1968 through 1969 and regional seismicity. These phenomena, viewed by thousands of onlookers, began one year before an unprecedented increase (factor of 10) in seismic activity about 400 km to the southeast. Monthly analyses also demonstrated a moderate (0.56)
correlation between increases in seismicity and the occurrence of luminous phenomena during the same or previous month. These results were
interpreted as further support for the hypothesis that most anomalous (terrain-related) luminous phenomena are generated by factors associated
with tectonic strain.

Tectonic strain projecting images of the Virgin Mary?  I’ll eat a Grilled Cheese Virgin Mary before I believe that.  Come to think of it, it’s almost lunchtime…

Zilch, I have a hard time agreeing with you because your statement “having children is a global problem” does not jive with my looney logical reasoning.  The statement just does not scale well.  If we were to take your statement as law and quit having children, that would be a global problem as well.  In another 120 years nobody would be left alive.  You also have to define what you believe to be a global problem.  For all I know you may believe the extinction of the human race would not be a global problem, and in fact the planet would benefit.  On the other hand some would argue that without observers to the planet, there is no planet. This simple statement you made can cover much ground.  In some arguments you could be wrong, in others you could be right.  For this reason I could be wrong if I agree with you or not. 

I will concede the population is causing problems with the environment, but a good discussion should include practical reality.  For people to stop having children on a massive scale is not practical.  A slow reversal of population growth is practical because it is allready happening in some areas. 

The logical way to stop developing nations from having a population explosion is to create the same conditions in these countries that have resulted in population decline the more wealthy nations.  These people need the education, health care, and strong economy. 

Socialist Swine, what we can do to help them out is invest in their countries.  Africa has a large untapped labor pool which will be very useful when the populations of the rest of the world is dropping.  Eventually the outsourcers are going to outsource and these untapped markets are going to be on the receiving end of these jobs.  Economic growth demands reform and transparency.  It also contributes to building the infrastructure that will allow these countries to output skilled labor.  A society that is running on all cylinders has less children.

Zilch, I have a hard time agreeing with you because your statement “having children is a global problem�? does not jive with my looney logical reasoning.  The statement just does not scale well.  If we were to take your statement as law and quit having children, that would be a global problem as well.  In another 120 years nobody would be left alive.  You also have to define what you believe to be a global problem.  For all I know you may believe the extinction of the human race would not be a global problem, and in fact the planet would benefit.

John, perhaps I was not clear enough.  I of course did not mean that we should stop having children altogether.  I also thought I made it clear what I meant by a “global problem"- that of environmental destruction and resource depletion, and concommitant hard lives for us humans and other life forms.  As far as benefitting the “planet”, unless by “planet” you mean “the biosphere” and not “the hunk of rock we call Earth”, there’s no “benefitting” possible. 

On the other hand some would argue that without observers to the planet, there is no planet.

That’s another thread.  For the record, though, I think this argument is silly, sort of like Clinton saying he didn’t have sex with Monica based on his definition of “is”.  By that definition Pluto didn’t exist until 1930.

Tectonic strain projecting images of the Virgin Mary?  I’ll eat a Grilled Cheese Virgin Mary before I believe that.

Not all that far-fetched.  The March 2003 Scientific American has a great article by Michael Shermer.  I’ve copied part of it here:

Five centuries ago demons haunted our world, with incubi and succubi tormenting victims as they lay asleep. Two centuries ago spirits haunted our world, with ghosts and ghouls harassing sufferers during all hours of the night. This past century aliens haunted our world, with grays and greens abducting captives and whisking them away for probing and prodding. Nowadays people are reporting out-of-body experiences, floating above their beds.What is going on here? Are these elusive creatures and mysterious phenomena in our world or in our minds? New evidence adds weight to the notion that they are, in fact, products of the brain. Neuroscientist Michael Persinger, in his laboratory at Laurentian University in Sudbury, Ontario, for example, can induce all these perceptions in subjects by subjecting their temporal lobes to patterns of magnetic fields. (I tried it myself and had a mild out-of-body experience.)

Similarly, the September 19, 2002, issue of Nature reported that neuroscientist Olaf Blanke of Geneva University Hospital in Switzerland and his colleagues were able to bring about out-of-body experiences through electrical stimulation of the right angular gyrus in the temporal lobe of a 43-year-old woman suffering from severe epileptic seizures. With initial mild stimulation, she felt she was “sinking into the bed” or “falling from a height.” With more intense stimulation, she said she could “see myself lying in bed, from above, but I only see my legs and lower trunk.” Another trial induced “an instantaneous feeling of ‘lightness’ and ‘floating’ about two meters above the bed, close to the ceiling.”

The rest of the article is very interesting, and can be found Here.

Tectonic activity creates a resonance in the magnetic field of the planet.  Animals are attuned to this, as has been documented repeatedly.  We are, after all, animals ourselves even if we’ve lost the majority of our primitive survival instincts.  Some part of us that would have responded a hundred thousand years ago to these resonances in an instinctual way, may have changed to interpret these signals in a very different fashion.

As for the Mary photo, I’d be more inclined to believe it’s an image of St. Elmo’s Fire, or ball lightning.

Now as to the marriage issue, Bo$$ brings up an excellent hidden point that no one, surprisingly, has struck on.  It’s not that a marriage license should obligate one to procreate, but rather that we should ALSO issue additional licenses to those that DO wish to procreate.

This would help negate the hostility over gay marriage, by reducing marriage itself to a civil contract, with all the rights and benefits thereof, excepting the authority to sexually reproduce.  Prior to obtaining such a license to reproduce, people will undergo appropriate blood tests, and any additional screening factors as might be necessary.  For example, parental IQ tests (Below 90 not allowed), evaluation of ability to support child (If you will be on welfare, no spawn for you!), etc.

Naturally to ensure genetic diversity, the procreation license will also include proper matching.  For example, luscious cocoa-brown, physically attractive women like Halle Berry, Holly Robinson-Peete, and Vanessa Williams would be paired with overweight but intellectually gifted white boys…like me.  Thus ensuring proper genetic distribution.  Really.  That’s my only motivation.

In addition, the government gains another revenue source, not only from the issue of procreation licenses, but also from the issue of gay marriage licenses, thereby tapping that market. 

I tell you, we’d all be better off if government ran itself like a business.

Thanks for the very interesting info, Skippy.  I’ll see if I can dig it up (the link you gave doesn’t work for me, and I couldn’t find the article).  One Virgin Mary (or more likely, Amy the Amoeba) Grilled Cheese sandwich down the hatch.  Come to think of it, ball lightening is probably also affected by tectonic disturbances.

One slight quibble:

We are, after all, animals ourselves even if we’ve lost the majority of our primitive survival instincts.

Depends on what count as “instincts” and whom you listen too, but current psychoneurologists (Steven Pinker, Tooby and Cosmides) show evidence that humans have more, not fewer, instincts than other animals.  But that’s really another thread…

Now as to the marriage issue, Bo$$ brings up an excellent hidden point that no one, surprisingly, has struck on.  It’s not that a marriage license should obligate one to procreate, but rather that we should ALSO issue additional licenses to those that DO wish to procreate.

I’m not sure that would do much more than create more bureaucracy in an already constipated government.  I would lean more toward a program that educates parents.  Even that would increase bureaucracy but would have lesser impact on legislation.

I tell you, we’d all be better off if government ran itself like a business.

Actually, that would be one the worst things to happen to government.  You’re already seeing some of the impacts of business controlled government, just imagine if laws and regulations were established only after reviewing the impact on the bottom line.  It would result in a departure from a democratic republic to a capitalistic oligarchy.

As an atheist my decision to get married had nothing to do with gods or children and everything to do with the legal benefits such a social contract provides.

I fully agree with that statement; I’d just like to point out I never mentioned gods.

Now as to the marriage issue, Bo$$ brings up an excellent hidden point that no one, surprisingly, has struck on.  It’s not that a marriage license should obligate one to procreate, but rather that we should ALSO issue additional licenses to those that DO wish to procreate.

I was waiting for someone to pick that up.

Now the Egypt apparition thing is different than say, Lourdes. The Egypt one occured once, but according to Lourdes there were 18 apparitions. I think at least something definitely went on.

The Lourdes Story/Mythos also states that Bernadette’s body never decomposed (ie, “incorrupt"). I’m not saying it’s indicative of anything, but it’s certainly interesting…

The Egypt one occured once, but according to Lourdes there were 18 apparitions. I think at least something definitely went on.

Uri Geller has bent hundreds if not thousands of spoons, but I still don’t believe he has paranormal powers…

John,

I have a pretty good handle regarding what you think we can do to help Africa.  However, earlier you said that us having more children would help with the world’s problems or something to that effect.  I was curious how us having more kids would be beneficial if the problem is overpopulation.  However, I think you must have just misexpressed an idea or I misinterpreted what you were getting at.

Far be it from me to endorse or promote thread drift, but my nitpickmodule just noticed this:

As to words changing, that is certainly true. The word ‘nice’ used to be an insult meaning lazy.

Bo$$, that’s a new one on me.  Where did you hear that?  It’s certainly true that the meaning of “nice” has evolved through the centuries.  In the recent past (and still in current use by sesquipedalians and pedants such as myself), “nice” meant “fine, picky” as in “a nice distinction”.  In Middle English it meant “foolish” or “wanton”, not far from its Latin root “nescius” meaning “ignorant, unknowing”.

The evolution of language is natural and can’t be stopped.  Unfortunately, a modern trend is the increasing wishywashyizing of definitions, by which nice distinctions are lost.  What’s the difference between “awful”, “dreadful”, and “terrible” nowadays?  They all mean “very bad”. Or between “fantastic”, “amazing”, “astounding” and “incredible”?

I saw the thing about nice on Wikipedia somewhere.

As to the synonyms you mentioned above, they are just testament to the richness of the English language. Some are from Germanic roots, others from Latinate origin.

Socialist Swine, I probably did a poor job of explaining myself.  I think I got lost in the debate somewhere.  The problem with this thread is you cannot come up with a full argument in a posted comment that spans only a few sentences.  Absent a full argument there is really not much to debate.  I will not understand your full point and you will not understand mine.  I don’t have time to do this because I have plenty of other papers to write for school.  To say having children is a global problem has no substance, and the same is true of my reply when I say having children is not a problem.  I think the best way to fully argue this would be to write an essay and post it on my own weblog, but I do not have the time for this right now.

I also consider myself Libertarian.  Government intervention is bad.  People talk about allowing this, forcing that, and supporting measures that do this other thing.  Please, no more whacky laws!  Keep the goverment out of this stuff.

Unless you seriously propose to put social security squarely back into private hands (Bushs favorite tactic apparently) this is very much a matter that should be discussed and weighted (how state-operated retirement money is paid and disbursed).

Fact is that here in Germany, the burden is increasing all the time. Therefore the benefits will have to be reduced or the payments increased. Should those without kids pay more? I say yes, even if GM disagrees. They spend less on kids already (its a saying here that the easiest way to become poor is to have a large family) and they ‘contribute’ to the aging of society.

While I certainly think that this planet COULD do with a lower (or at least stable) population size, I do think that the shift we see in Europe here is way too fast (and anyway, in terms of total population made irrelevant by the third world).  But its causing serious harm to our society now and in the coming decades!

I guess I’m one of those assholes who is married with NO intention of having kids

Anyone said so? I myself, as stated, look like the kind of personm right now who is unlikely to get kids, even though I want to.

The gist is that if you don’t have kids - save up more for retirement ON YOUR OWN (you already have more spending money!). Don’t expect an ever-smaller share of young people to take that burden.

Anyone said so?

This should obviously mean ‘Anyone said such people are assholes?’.

Unless you seriously propose to put social security squarely back into private hands (Bushs favorite tactic apparently) this is very much a matter that should be discussed and weighted (how state-operated retirement money is paid and disbursed).

Fact is that here in Germany, the burden is increasing all the time. Therefore the benefits will have to be reduced or the payments increased. Should those without kids pay more? I say yes, even if GM disagrees. They spend less on kids already (its a saying here that the easiest way to become poor is to have a large family) and they ‘contribute’ to the aging of society.

I am against these types of meaasures.  Social Security is giant ponzi scheme.  It served a purpose at the time it was conceived but I feel it is no longer fit that purpose.  The changes that have taken place in the generations that have come calls for a change to social security as well.  This system was set for failure from the beginning and is obviously headed for trouble. 

As a young American I have no confidence in this system.  I will plan my years with the expectation that I will never see this program as it is currently.  To have people pay more taxes is not the answer to fix a broken system.

There is no problem of “contribution” to an aging society. This is simply a natural progression of the world.  The aging society will cause adjustment pains, but we will be the better for learning to deal with this fact.

The aging society will cause adjustment pains, but we will be the better for learning to deal with this fact.

I fear that it will be more than adjustment pains. I DO believe that for all its mistakes, western (and specifically European) culture has brought a lot of worthwile ideas and advances into this world. And much of that is in danger of being lost if we all become no more than a geriatric ward here. The US is not nearly in as big a problem.

As it stands over here, we do not even have the sane immigration and naturalization policies that might help transmit the good parts of our culture to people coming here from other parts of the world.

I DO believe that for all its mistakes, western (and specifically European) culture has brought a lot of worthwhile ideas and advances into this world.

My personal favorite is Weisswurst.  Yes, that white sausage everyone loves.  Mmmmm.