Is there a mention of firemen in the Bible?

Then the LORD rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the LORD out of heaven; And he overthrew those cities, and all the plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and that which grew upon the ground.

But his wife looked back from behind him for a quick nosey at the firemen for she was lustful, and she became a pillar of salt.

In reality though it's just one fruitcake and her even loopier Dad and it's only got on the news so people can point and laugh at it. If the school were to ban the book then I would be worried but I have some small faith in the human race so doubt that will actually happen.

The family should be sterilised though to prevent any further damage to the gene pool.

She thinks the books should be banned because it features people burning the bible.

EVEN THOUGH THE POINT OF THE BOOK IS THAT PEOPLE SHOULDN'T BURN THE FUCKING BIBLE

FOR FUCKS SAKE IT'S FILLING ME WITH RAGE CAN YOU BE ANY MORE STUPID THAN THAT?

"I WANT TO BAN THE DEPICTION OF EVERYTHING THAT IS A BIT NASTY AS IT IS NASTY LETS ALL JUST READ THE BIBLE WHICH HAS NOTHING NASTY IN IT AT ALL IT IS JUST CUDDLES AND THE BABY JESUS AND ANGELS AND FOOD BEING PREPARED ON CLEAN SURFACES - LET US CLOSE OUR BORDERS - LET US NOT THINK AT ALL - DO NOT DEPICT OUR FIREMEN!!!!

I'm incandescent with rage.

I'll shake, you yell.

For goodness shakes..

They don't try to understand the point of 'Fahrenheit 451'

Not a chance in hell of that book being banned in that school. Phew. If it was, I'd break something quite expensive.

My fave line from Alton Verm is...

"And then there's no reason for it being read."

Which is exactly the reasoning the fire chief and the government employs against books. Not due to moral corruption, or depravity, or religious intolerance, but stating as reason that books give you nothing of any value whatsover.

I suspect the only book this man finds a reason for is the bible. I feel sorry for him and more so for his daughter. Though I would still like to just fly over there with my own cable news team and explain in painstaking detail why they're idiots and try, somehow, to explain to them as well.

Gaggh.

No? Well, true believers make idiots look like fucking amateurs

Hmm. Fundies, I'd agree with, but I've met some very rational and intelligent true believers.

irrational faith

But God actually existing? That's about as good an example of irrational faith as you'll get

weak atheism (which is apparantly not the same as agnosticism, although I've never quite figured out why).

It is no less irrational that believing there is no God, though.

No, that's an impossibly stupid conclusion.

I also do think that there is evidence of a lack of education when these complaints come up, as the complainents do often appear from come the lower socio economic groups, and then everyone points and laughs at the 'rednecks'.

It is no less irrational that believing there is no God, though. Given that one of the fundamental aspects of God everyone seems to agree on is that you can't prove its existence one way or the other, genuine atheism is surely as irrational as genuine belief. Hence weak atheism (which is apparantly not the same as agnosticism, although I've never quite figured out why).

Hey, heard the one about the dyslexic agnostic insomniac?

You're just trying to be a smart arse contentious motherfucker.

Nicking my jokes, tsk

If you accept the constraint that you cannot prove or disprove the existence of one or more gods, then strong atheism is illogical.

Hah. It's almost like you know me or something

See my comments elsewhere in the thread. If you accept the constraint that you cannot prove or disprove the existence of one or more gods, then strong atheism is illogical; I accept that's a crappy constraint but it does seem to be one that comes up a lot.

I could blather on for ages about this one, but the simple answer is I DO NOT accept that constraint. Only a fucking idiot would. And as I said earlier, there's little or no point arguing with them

Are you familiar with the phrase, 'poisoning the well'?

Mind you, Bradbury did get published in Playboy a fair bit, so that's a good enough reason to read the magazine.

Slightly off topic, but all the old sci-fi authors did... Playboy was incredibly important to the growth of sci-fi as a genre. It was one of the few mainstream places where sci-fi could get published.

On topic: Dear Alton Verm. You are a pillock.

If you accept the constraint that you cannot prove or disprove the existence of one or more gods, then strong atheism is illogical; I accept that's a crappy constraint but it does seem to be one that comes up a lot.

If you define strong atheism as a "100% belief there is no god" then both Dawkins and Myself would agree it's illogical.

But by accepting that "you cannot prove or disprove the existence of Gods" that doesn't mean each side gets equal weight.

A (logical) atheist see's the complete lack of evidence for God and so decides non-existance has significantly more weight. 99.999% chance it's bullshit or something like that.

A agnostic on the other hand (presumably) see's the complete lack of evidence for God and weighs it against the billions who believe so puts about equal weight between the two ideas. About a 50:50 chance of god existing.

Nevertheless as McM says, God is an idea proposed, so the burden of proof lies with those who propose it.

And this post would also apply if we replaced 'God' with 'Intergalactic Space Elvis who Rapes Planets'

A (logical) atheist see's the complete lack of evidence for God and so decides non-existance has significantly more weight. 99.999% chance it's bullshit or something like that.

But how can you even put a probability on something that is, by definition, supernatural? I'm not convinced evidence makes much difference in that kind of situation, at least for all types of God-belief. Analogy with, well, any empirical process falls apart because of this; if something is expressly either working in a non-consistant or undetectable way then it isn't really the same as something we can make a reasonable guess at the liklihood of.

“He who will determine,” returned Imlac, “against that which he knows because there may be something which he knows not; he that can set hypothetical possibility against acknowledged certainty, is not to be admitted among reasonable beings."

A agnostic on the other hand (presumably) see's the complete lack of evidence for God and weighs it against the billions who believe so puts about equal weight between the two ideas. About a 50:50 chance of god existing.