Faith is not "without evidence" argument

[ZenMode]

Your opinion doesn't apply very well to black slaves since less than 10% of them were literate, inspite of laws limiting their education. Trying to make a case that 10% benefitted from slavery is woefully ignorant of the facts.

Additionally, there's the life expectancy of black slaves: 22 years to free whites 40. Is learning to read worth the cost of half a lifespan?

https://www.history.com/news/nat-turner-rebellion-literacy-slavery
Ultimately, however, Virginia and other southern states opted to keep slavery in place and tighten control of African Americans’ lives, including their literacy. In the antebellum South, it's estimated that only 10 percent of enslaved people were literate. For many enslavers, even this rate was too high. As Clarence Lusane, a professor of political science at Howard University notes, there was a growing belief that “an educated enslaved person was a dangerous person.”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slave_health_on_plantations_in_the_United_States
A broad and common measure of the health of a population is its life expectancy. The life expectancy in 1850 of a White person in the United States was forty; for a slave, it was twenty-two.

https://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/disp_textbook.cfm?smtid=2&psid=3040
Slaves suffered extremely high mortality. Half of all slave infants died during their first year of life, twice the rate of white babies. And while the death rate declined for those who survived their first year, it remained twice the white rate through age 14. As a result of this high infant and childhood death rate, the average life expectancy of a slave at birth was just 21 or 22 years, compared to 40 to 43 years for antebellum whites. Compared to whites, relatively few slaves lived into old age.

A major contributor to the high infant and child death rate was chronic undernourishment. Slaveowners showed surprisingly little concern for slave mothers' health or diet during pregnancy, providing pregnant women with no extra rations and employing them in intensive field work even in the last week before they gave birth. Not surprisingly, slave mothers suffered high rates of spontaneous abortions, stillbirths, and deaths shortly after birth. Half of all slave infants weighed less than 5.5 pounds at birth, or what we would today consider to be severely underweight.

Infants and children were badly malnourished. Most infants were weaned early, within three or four months of birth, and then fed gruel or porridge made of cornmeal. Around the age of three, they began to eat vegetables, soups, potatoes, molasses, grits, hominy, and cornbread. This diet lacked protein, thiamine, niacin, calcium, magnesium, and vitamin D, and as a result, slave children often suffered from night blindness, abdominal swellings, swollen muscles, bowed legs, skin lesions, and convulsions.

Again...... while everything you stated above could be true, is it true or is it not true that a freed slave could benefit from a skill/trade/ability to read while a slave?

This is a simple yes/no question, yet you and BidenPresident seem to have a very difficult time answering it because, you know, politics apparently trumps truth.

 

[Into Тhe Night]

You clearly insinuated in the OP that the only ideas that count are those that have tangible evidence.

Many scientists are at least open to, if not accept the possibility of things for which there is no tangible evidence. I gave a list and could keep adding to it. Nobody has ruled out a multiverse or the Many Worlds hypothesis.

Speculation and clever ideas are a lifeblood of science.

Oh, look. Another person illiterate in science.

 

[ZenMode]

Nobody on this board would agree to be a slave for 20 years so they could learn how to make horseshoes.

Correct and I wouldn't (didn't) make that claim.

 

[ZenMode]

It depends such as the "work camp" example you keep dodging.

I'm a firm believer that "Knowledge is power". However, saying people are better off as educated slaves than as ignorant freeman is a matter of opinion, not fact. The part I disagree with you, besides your dodging of questions, is that you have often stated or implied your opinion as fact.

I never said they'd be better off when compared to being free. I ONLY said that some slaves learned skills that benefited them after being freed.

Which part of THAT do you disagree with?

 

[Dutch Uncle]

Again...... while everything you stated above could be true, is it true or is it not true that a freed slave could benefit from a skill/trade/ability to read while a slave?

This is a simple yes/no question, yet you and BidenPresident seem to have a very difficult time answering it because, you know, politics apparently trumps truth.

You really are a simple person, ain'tcha, son? Perhaps you could benefit from slavery so you could learn to read and write like a white man. /sarcasm

The ability to read was, for obvious reasons, very rare among slaves. However, some slaves (generally female) who were responsible for much of the care of the master's children, were taught how to read and write to be able to then teach the master's children.

Yes or no, would that slave, who was able to read and write, have an advantage when freed?

Again, so was learning a skill in a Third Reich "work camp".

Yes. What percentage of slaves learned to read and what percentage were able to get a good job using the skills their Massa' taught them? I'd like to see your data.

The fact I answer your questions and you run from mine is indicative of your lack of veracity. Sad, but you aren't alone on this forum for being disingenuous, racist and more than a little assholish.

 

[ZenMode]

You really are a simple person, ain'tcha, son? Perhaps you could benefit from slavery so you could learn to read and write like a white man. /sarcasm



The fact I answer your questions and you run from mine is indicative of your lack of veracity. Sad, but you aren't alone on this forum for being disingenuous, racist and more than a little assholish.

Because you ask questions that are irrelevant to the reality that some slaves benefited from the skills/crafts/education they received while slaves. The percentage of those who benefited is irrelevant. Your comparison to other terrible situations is irrelevant. The fact that slavery was terrible is irrelevant. The fact that slaves would have been happier in their homeland than being a slave is irrelevant.

There is a simple truth here: some slaves benefited from what they learned as slaves. Stating that fact does not make you a racist, despite the dishonest attempts by you and BidenPresident to portray it that way.

Facts are facts. Facts can't be racist - they are just facts.

 

[Dutch Uncle]

Because you ask questions that are irrelevant to the reality that some slaves benefited from the skills/crafts/education they received while slaves. The percentage of those who benefited is irrelevant. Your comparison to other terrible situations is irrelevant. The fact that slavery was terrible is irrelevant. The fact that slaves would have been happier in their homeland than being a slave is irrelevant.

There is a simple truth here: some slaves benefited from what they learned as slaves. Stating that fact does not make you a racist, despite the dishonest attempts by you and BidenPresident to portray it that way.

Facts are facts. Facts can't be racist - they are just facts.

So it's all my fault? Got it. Thanks for your input, 'Mode.

 

[Cypress]

Correct and I wouldn't (didn't) make that claim.

The fact that there is no tangible evidence of a multiverse does not stop scientists from speculating about it, and entertaining the possibility it exists.

Einstein and other early 20th century physicists just wanted to believe the universe was static, unchanging, and uniform because that belief was more intellectually pleasing than the concept of a moment of creation and evolving universe

Metaphysics and assumptions underlie a lot of science, more so than laypersons realize.

That's not a diss on science. The inductive method is arguably the most powerful intellectual tool ever invented by humans. But the fact is, science knows a lot less than laypersons realize, and assumption and metaphysics underlie a lot of scientific theory.

 

[ZenMode]

So it's all my fault? Got it. Thanks for your input, 'Mode.

What are you saying is your fault that you believe isn't your fault?

 

[Dutch Uncle]

The fact that there is no tangible evidence of a multiverse does not stop scientists from speculating about it, and entertaining the possibility it exists.

Einstein and other early 20th century physicists just wanted to believe the universe was static, unchanging, and uniform because that belief was more intellectually pleasing than the concept of a moment of creation and evolving universe

Metaphysics and assumptions underlie a lot of science, more so than laypersons realize.

That's not a diss on science. The inductive method is arguably the most powerful intellectual tool ever invented by humans. But the fact is, science knows a lot less than laypersons realize, and assumption and metaphysics underlie a lot of scientific theory.

Agreed. It seems to be seen more in the math than in Newtonian space....and area which quickly rises above my expertise.

 

[Dutch Uncle]

What are you saying is your fault that you believe isn't your fault?

Why do you care? You never answer questions and you persist in spinning topics into nonsense then running from inquiries.

The main reason I'm interested in you is to see what makes you tick since you are clearly hiding something.

 

[IBDaMann]

Climate change is scientific consensus.

Climate Change is a religion, and you are too uneducated to recognize a religion when it's right in front of you. Of course, you don't know what science is either, and you feel free to interchange the two as convenient.

By the way, why are you citing NASA? Are you also too uneducated to realize just how stupid that is? Did it ever occur to you that only science has anything to say on the matter? No, it never did? Oh, that's right, you are scientifically illiterate. What was I thinking. Do you also believe that the earth is flat and that the moon landing is a hoax? You do, don't you? You've got one fucked up safe-space; you had better hurry up and put me and science on "Ignore".

Do you also deny evolution?

You're going to have to be more specific with your question. Do you deny a brown leaf? Do you deny thirty kilometers per hour? Reword your question to eliminate ambiguity.

Are you one of those creationist idiots who thinks that The Flintstones is historically accurate?

There are no creationists who think The Flinstones is historically accurate ... outside of your safe space, of course.

Do you even know what creationism is? Wait, let me guess, you don't have a fucking clue, right?

You waste a great deal of time committing error after error.

 

[Dutch Uncle]

There are no creationists who think The Flinstones is historically accurate ... outside of your safe space, of course.

Do you even know what creationism is? Wait, let me guess, you don't have a fucking clue, right?

You waste a great deal of time committing error after error.

Mantra 44 Pulling nonsensical conclusions out of your ass.

Mantra 1a.

Mantra 4a.

One of the "miscellaneous" documents on that site is Into the Night's mantra list.

 

[IBDaMann]

You asked me why I like killing babies.

Nope. Let's add "inability to read English for comprehension" to the list of your shortcomings.

I simply stated your position accurately as being in favor of killing living humans who have not committed any crime. Where did you imagine reading the word "babies"?

That's a strawman.

Nope. It's your cowardly fallacy of omission. My question is legitimate and sincere. I can find others on JPP who are not totally brain dead who can easily answer those direct and straightforward questions.

And, yes, climate change is the scientific consensus.

Nope, but you are a moron who is too stupid to learn. I can find children who can understand that science, being completely objective, cannot be determined by subjective opinions. You, however, are too stupid to grasp this simple concept. It's no wonder that science is way over your head. This has been explained to you twice already and you aren't able to get a handle on it so it would probably be best for all involved to just recognize that you are a complete idiot and laugh about it over a beer.

Oh, and your citing of NASA is way too funny. I have always made fun of people who believed everything they read on the internet just for it being on the internet ... and here you are believing something that is absolutely erroneous, just because you read it on the internet! Too funny. You had no idea that you were supposed to have called booooolsch't. You really aren't the brightest bulb in the pack. At this point, I don't think anyone is going to honestly think you have any business chiming in on any science topics, except for when it's your turn to tryout for the Def Comedy Jam.

 

[Cypress]

Agreed. It seems to be seen more in the math than in Newtonian space....and area which quickly rises above my expertise.

From what I have read, the cosmic inflation hypothesis might imply that there have been different big bangs that happened at different times, leading to individual bubble universes. In some sense, it supposedly ultimately comes down to quantum fluctuations and the uncertainty principle.

 

[Into Тhe Night]

Nope. Let's add "inability to read English for comprehension" to the list of your shortcomings.

It's apparent that you're as dumb as a bag of rocks.

simply stated your position accurately as being in favor of killing living humans who have not committed any crime.

Wrong again, idiot. I support abortion. When did I ever say I support "killing living humans" (itself a redundant phrase)? A microscopic fetus is not a living, thinking thing. Killing a bug is a greater atrocity than killing a microscopic fetus is.

Where did you imagine reading the word "babies"?

We were talking about abortions. You think that a microscopic fetus is comparable to an infant because you're an idiot. Keep up, idiot.

My question is legitimate and sincere.

I don't question the sincerity of it, but only because you're an idiot.

Nope, but you are a moron who is too stupid to learn.

The Jesus believer who denies science is calling me "stupid."

Oh, and your citing of NASA is way too funny. I have always made fun of people who believed everything they read on the internet just for it being on the internet ... and here you are believing something that is absolutely erroneous, just because you read it on the internet! Too funny. You had no idea that you were supposed to have called booooolsch't. You really aren't the brightest bulb in the pack. At this point, I don't think anyone is going to honestly think you have any business chiming in on any science topics, except for when it's your turn to tryout for the Def Comedy Jam.

Hm. Should I side with NASA or the retard?

Yeah, I'm going with NASA.

 

[Into the Night]

All of it. Stop playing the fool.

If a slave learns how to harvest cotton, that slave still knows how to harvest cotton when freed. They can then be paid for the services to harvest cotton. They might even become cotton farmers themselves.

 

[Into the Night]

There is no evidence of miracles; supernatural influence on the outcome of an event.

There is. There is also evidence no miracles exist.

However, even with zero evidence of God

There is. There is also evidence there is no god or gods.

and magic in the Universe

There is. See Penn and Teller or any other magician.

that is not evidence that something greater exists.

Evidence exists for that too.

Both Franklin and Jefferson were Deists; believer in a "Watchmaker God" where God created the Universe and then let it run itself out.

This makes sense to me for several reasons: 1) what is a Googol of years to an eternal being? It's nothing. Time only matters to those living inside the bubble of our Universe.
2) If humans, or all living things, have an essence that transcends mortal death, does it matter how long they live as opposed to how they live? I think the time element is unimportant compared to the quality of one's existence in the natural Universe.
3) Why would an all-powerful being create a Universe with set rules then violate those rules for arbitrary reasons? Especially considering the first two points made above?

Why do you think the Universe was created? How could any god or gods create something that is universal? If they exist outside the Universe, the Universe is not universal. How does anything exist outside a Universe with no known boundaries?

 

[Into the Night]

I agree with that statement. Two things can be true at once, right?

So, again, which part of what I said do you disagree with?

Remember that a lot of slaves were never IN Africa. They were born into the U.S. as slaves. They've never known anywhere else except the U.S.

 

[Into the Night]

I have no tolerance for your nonsense.

You have no tolerance.