Devil's Advocate

Discussion in 'Free Thoughts' started by one_raven, Jun 9, 2003.

  1. one_raven God is a Chinese Whisper Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,433
    I thought I would try something that I think would be a fun, interesting and mind opening experience.

    Pick a subject you feel passionate about.
    An opinion you feel very strongly about.
    Abortion, Christianity, Capitalism, whatever.

    Now see how effectively you can argue the opposite point of view.

    Then someone else will argue against you in the same manner.
    i.e. taking the position that they are against.

    No matter what you argue for or against in this thread, it has to be in opposition of what you really believe.

    Let's see where this goes.
    Hopefully somewhere.
     
  2. Guest Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  3. Thor "Pfft, Rebel scum!" Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    7,326
    Okay, this is extremely interesting!

    I don't know how to start. Okay, let me see. Pop music is the best music in the world. It is the only real music and because it is popular that in itself means it's the best!

    I feel so dirty
     
  4. Guest Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  5. Pollux V Ra Bless America Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    6,495
    America's involvement in the war with Iraq and the War on Terrorism is justified!

    gahh....can't....go....any...farther.....turbines failing....sound...like....JERREK....who is....a....credit to...the neanderthal race....

    (dies)
     
  6. Guest Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  7. Mephura Applesauce, bitch... Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    1,065
    Come on..you guys should be able to do better than that.
    Hell the pop music thing is easy. You are on the right track, just expound and deffend like you believe it. put some effort into it.
     
  8. one_raven God is a Chinese Whisper Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,433
    I can't argue there!
    After all the music industry is exactly THAT, and industry.
    It is a business in a commercial market driven by our Capitalistic society.
    The music is a "product" to sell.
    The more the product sells the better the product is, obviously.

    Even from an "artiste's"

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

    point of view it is better.
    The point of music is to reach people.
    To get your message out.
    To share your talent with the world.
    Otherwise they would just make music in their backyards and garages with their friends, not make albums and sign with major record labels.
    the more albums sell, the more people the message reaches, the better the song is, right?

    Look at it from a social point of view.
    Music brings people closer together.
    It is a common bond between people of different races, different economic backgrounds, different upbringings, hell, even different parts of the world.
    It is a bridge across differences.
    I can come online, meet a perfect stranger from Zimbabwe, know nothing about them or their culture and not even know what to talk about.
    However, I can bring up Madonna's latest worldwide hit, U2's greatest hits or Britney Spear's tour schedule, and we reach common ground.
     
    Last edited: Jun 10, 2003
  9. gendanken Ruler of All the Lands Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    4,779
    Christianity is NOT hogwash, there's absolutely nothing in my believing walking on water, water to wine, parting of seas, or raising the dead that would qualify me as a raving lunatic.

    Even that bit about a plague killing off the all the king's livestock including horses and then after Moses parting the sea it saying the pharoes army of 600,000 or so chased after God's children....on horses


    No sir. Nothing loony about that.
     
  10. one_raven God is a Chinese Whisper Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,433
    LMAO @ gendanken.

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!



    However...
     
  11. Mephura Applesauce, bitch... Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    1,065
    The reason all you anti christian types can't understand is faith. While the bible may be historically inacurate, of even contradict itself at times, that doesn't diminish its value to the belief. No, it wasn't written by god, no it's every word isn't 100% true. That isn't the point. The point is that it is effective in helping bridge the gap between the everyday and the miraculous. It is a learning tool filled with allegories inspired by God. If this inspiration is directly divine or not is irrelivant. Its faith.
    Let me put this a wa maybe all of you can understand.
    Relativity.
    Both GR and SR are THEORIES. Yes they are about the best thing going at the moment, but they are still only theories. What does this mean? They might not be true. Yet many of you will visciously attack anyone who questions it in the least. Simply put you have faith in GR and SR. Possibly, this faith isn't absolute, but its a start for you to understand where christians are coming from. More than this though, Christianity is a religous belief. It has its heart in the spiritual realm, not scientific. Can everything in christianity be proven? No. Then again, For those with faith, it doesn't have to be.
     
  12. sargentlard Save the whales motherfucker Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    6,698
    I am not extremely sexy..no way..i am ugly..yes sir..nothing sexy about me. I am ugly in my eyes...i in no way consider my self good looking at all.
     
  13. one_raven God is a Chinese Whisper Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,433
    Mephura,

    EXACTLY!!

    People try to debuk Christianty by using science, then they try and say that religion has no place in science and vice versa.

    They are grasping at straws because they have fear.
    Fear of the unknown.
    Fear that they could be placing their faith in the WRONG place, so they place it nowhere, or in a place with the least amount of risk.

    If Relativity is proven wrong, what harm does it do?
    Soils their reputation a bit?
    Not even that because the evidence is there to suggest it is truth.
    Same as evolution and natural selection.

    However, if they place faith in something intangible and something they can never prove or disprove until it is too late there is no going back.

    So they simply say that anything that can't be proven is untrue.

    It gives them a false sense of security.
    An imaginary rock to cling to.
    They think they have all the answers.

    After all, to swallow your ego and admit you don't know something is beyond them.

    Whenever an Atheist should say, "I don't know", they never do.
    They either say, "I don't know YET" or, "WE don't know YET."

    They have not teh courage to just take a leap on faith and know, not think, but KNOW that God will catch them.

    In summary...
    Atheists have NO BALLS.
     
  14. gendanken Ruler of All the Lands Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    4,779
    gendanken1: you punk atheists like to tout around '"God-don't-exist slogans, and yet fall to your knees worshipping those slogans.

    gendken2: are you implying that we're doing the same things?

    gendanken1: Righty-ho. You can snicker behind a peasent girl's prayer but at least she believes in something in a world of uncertainty. You have NOTHING.

    gendanken2: what about science? what about the Universe we've conquered, you proud pope! What about all the things we've accomplished without your damn bible? your damn dogmatic theology??!

    gendanken1: what about them? You're covering up a sickly manic well-being with trivial well-doing. You can't even sleep at night. God is love. God is all. God brings peace.

    gendanken2: well * guffaw* ......well, ...uh.....you've got a bloody masochist nailed to a cross on your wall!! Whatever!


    (isn't this the point of the thread? argue both sides?)
     
    Last edited: Jun 10, 2003
  15. one_raven God is a Chinese Whisper Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,433
    The point is to argue the OTHER side.
    The one you disagree with.
    Against people that diagree with you arguing for YOUR side.

    Not both of them with yourself.

    I do that all the time by myself.

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  16. Dr Lou Natic Unnecessary Surgeon Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    5,574
    I'm probably the only person here that can(according to the rules of the thread) argue "against" your pop-music praising;
    Pop-music means popular music.
    Now the television show friends is popular, it is loved by the mass audience. This is a good indication to me that the mass audience is retarded. In fact all indications point to this. I like to think of myself as ... well... better than them.
    If most people like pop-music it is not surprising that I don't. There is music they don't know about that is so much better, and if they do know about it they can't appreciate it because again, they are retarded. They don't realise this music actually requires talent, the concept of talent is foreign to them.
    Non-pop- music has more to it, maybe too much, it seems to intimidate and frighten pop-music fans. So the radio plays their crap because according to money, thats what "human beings" enjoy.
    Well not this human being. I'm proud to say I'm not your average human being, its hard to be ashamed of not watching friends.

    ***End being fake***
    But I just need to say that you guys need to appreciate the PRODUCTION of pop mus.. *One raven snatches microphone off lou

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

    *

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  17. gendanken Ruler of All the Lands Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    4,779
    Hey SARGE

    Ever seen "Perfect Strangers"?
     
  18. gendanken Ruler of All the Lands Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    4,779
    Seeing how this thread is in its death throes.............

    Care for some theories on morality?
     
  19. Xev Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    10,943
    I think that humility and showing respect to those who have authority are the hallmarks of virtue.

    You have to have rules in life, and one of those rules is to obey the people who are in charge. If we didn't all obey not only the laws, but the lawmakers of our country, then we'd have a degenerate, licentious nation - and this would be a very bad thing because it, uh, makes the baby Jesus cry and

    -Xev collapses laughing, pauses and tries to regain composure-

    Because showing proper respect to one's superiours is very important. They are the people who enforce the rules and that is a very important and consuming task. We can't just run around willy-nilly doing whatever we please! People have to have someone to follow and obey, it's just human nature. Those who think differently should be shunned as the dangerous perverts that they are.

    Obedience! Obedience is the highest virtue! Respect your elders and the God-given values of your society!
     
    Last edited: Jun 10, 2003
  20. Thor "Pfft, Rebel scum!" Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    7,326
    Which in turn makes it good, well-scripted and well-acted.

    We can't appreciate it as it's so fcuking demented, wierd and what else can I say other than FUBAR! Going around talking about death and killing yourself, that doesn't sound like entertainment. Why can't they sing about how they've got a new person in their life, or how good their job is going or about their kids (if they could get them before sacrificing them)

    Modern pop does require talent, it oozes talent. Most of todays artists are the Michealangelo's and Picasso's of the music industry.

    More to what? I've personally listened to Heavy Metal bands such as Linkin Park and Limp Bizkit and all I can say is 'Is that the best you can offer?'


    !!SHOWER TIME!!

    That was fun, I used some arguements I've heard before. I meant the opposite of everything I said...except Linkin Park and Limp Bizkit are talentless, it was just the arguement that most people who like pop music haven't heard hardly any other styles of music and then think they know what they're on about.

    But lets do that again!!
     
  21. everneo Re-searcher Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,621
    Congrats One, you've done something like a miracle.
     
  22. spuriousmonkey Banned Banned

    Messages:
    24,066
    science and society

    Science is the most important activity of human culture. It separates us from the rest of the animal kingdom. It has brought mankind prosperity and knowledge, and made us progress from simple animals to the enlightened being we are today. How could we have build a civilized world without it?
    There should be a bigger role for science in our present society. Many problems could be overcome if more effort was being put in scientific research. A taskforce should be appointed to every single disease and we should set ourselves specific goals to beat every disease. Let us not just sit here and wait for a cure for cancer. Let us proclaim that we will cure cancer in 10 years, and we will cure cancer in 10 years!
    Present knowledge in stem cell research will lead to regenerative and whole organ replacement therapies within the next decade. We will be able to grow any organ in an synthetic womb and this will be available for everyone. We will be able to expand the human lifespan and provide a higher quality of life for our elderly.
    Let's increase the budget for science immediately and reap the benefits sooner than later. We deserve a scientifically based society.

    spuriousmonkey
     
  23. airavata portentous Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    1,352
    Interesting topic one_raven. I'll have a go.

    Pink Floyd are quite obviously the most overhyped band in history. They have survived this long only because of the phenomenon present among teenagers to look 'cool' and listen to 'deep' music. Let's look at the Floyd closely. It initially had a lead vocalist called Syd Barrett, a man who ended up taking LSD by the shovelful. Eventually he lost his hold on reality and had to be adm,itted to a mental institution. Forget that, we're talking about his music here. His music was silly, unintelligent and nursery-rhymish. He used to put loads of Brylcreem on his head so that under the stage lights it would all melt making him look like a great human blob. We can thus safely say that people liked his music solely because of his antics and because he was 'cool'. Sometimes he used to go on stage and play just one note all night, a big let down to people who paid money to see good music, not crap.

    Letting Syd Barrett go was one good thing Pink Floyd did- the only good thing they did. If you examine them closely, you will find that their output was mediocre at most times. They used to put 5 songs on one side and call that an album. Sure Roger Waters may have had his time under the sun lyrically with DSOTM and a few other albums, but let's face it.... because he sang of these 'cool' issues teenagers thought the music and lyrics were good. On the album 'Meddle', Pink Floyd made a sham of a song called Echoes. This song is 15 min. long and has 4 min. of lyrics and proper music. The rest is just monotonous silence with horrendous pipe organs trying to play a tune.

    The biggest sham however was the album, 'The Wall'. The average length of each song is around 2 min. and this album was incredibly Waters-centric. Hell, they made a 10 sec. song called 'Stop' and threw it in there to take up time. Sure Gilmour might have had his moment with Comfortably Numb but that was a one-off hit anyway. The film, 'The Wall', was quite possibly the worst waste of reel I have ever seen. An entire story told through horrendous music. After Water's left the band, the Floyd made 2 more albums, 'A Momentary Lapse of Reason' and 'The Division Bell'. Needless to say, these albums are quite possibly the worst of the Floyd albums.

    So there we have it. Pink Floyd- easily the most hyped up and overrated band in the history of music. Waters' bass lines were always ridiculously easy and Gilmour had only a few hits. The less said about the drumming the better. An absolute sham of a band.
     

Share This Page