Moron Spector Talks

[Macsen]

A bit of selective breeding might be required to wipe out the tendency to invent religion etc, but it is possible.

 

Must... resist... playing... The Hitler Card...

[Subjective Effect]

Oh you people stop being idiots or I'm going to name names.

 

Warren, full of it as he usually is, actually makes pefectly good sense in that article. Mindless killfest means a game that is just kill kill kill and anyone levelling such an accusation at any Thief or Deus Ex game is being a tard.

 

He said that it was a shame that a great set of game mechanics like those in GTA should be used to create something that will only cause non-gamers to go WTF. And that is fair comment.

 

And you have no idea what you are talking about obscurus. "Bhuddism is an atheistic religion, many would argue it is a philosphy, not a religion. So you have large populations in asia that haven't felt the need to invent a god." What on earth are you talking about? Buddhism doesn't have one god, no, it has MANY. From your post I doubt you know much about schizophrenia.

[Dram]

aargh..wtflol...

 

the only thing which causes a violent society is access to crazy weapons like a rocket launcher.

 

I mean, in some parts of the US you'd say "mum, i'm going out, my friend just bought a redeemer" i mean, schwat ze schell!?!

 

(note: im being a tart)

[Gildoran]

What is it with you and redeemers?

[SplaTtzZ]

Wiping out religion wouldn't solve anything. All you would do is remove a convenient excuse to go to war. There will always be violence and war; without religion we would just be more frank about it. Money, power, land, politics, race, gender even; there will always be something different we can find to kill each other about, i would say its very much a part of human nature. The Crusades for example, were no more than a grab for land and wealth, most soldiers simply wanted the chance to murder, rape and pillage; the church simply wrapped this up as a "crusade" to suck in a few poor and pious souls to the fight. Anyone who thinks that religion has anything to do with war is deluding themselves to the fact that we enjoy killing each other and stealing others resources for ourselves, nevermind that we don't like their god and our god told us to do so.

[Dram]

What is it with you and redeemers?

 

hehehe...i hate them, cos they're in EVERY game

[OrbWeaver]

Yeah right. If he were in two minds as to whether God existed or not he wouldn't be calling for a total cull of all world religions.

 

Not true. Being against organised religion does not mean being against the idea the possible of god(s). In fact it would be possible to have a strong belief in a supreme being and still be against the idea of earthly institutions telling other people what to believe.

[Macsen]

Not true. Being against organised religion does not mean being against the idea the possible of god(s). In fact it would be possible to have a strong belief in a supreme being and still be against the idea of earthly institutions telling other people what to believe.

 

When someone claims to be agnostic he admits some ignorance as to the true nature of God. It may very well be the case that God is behind human religion, and so getting rid of them would be wrong. If you cull them all you're bound to hit a god-sanctioned one eventually.

 

Any destruction of non-violent culture and narrowing of human though is utterly wrong. Not one of the main religions are by their nature violent, though many of the 'faithful' often use them as a poor excuse to cause violence. If religion were to be dismantled these people would just find other excuses.

[Hylix Ulyx]

I respect Mr. Spector for no other reason than than giving props to Rockstar for their programming ingenuity, even if it was done in a back handed way.

 

Really, I don't see what the big deal is...human's are as violent as they are peaceful, or can be, and if there's ways to curb the violence through somekind of cathartic role-playing, who cares? Yeah, yeah, there are those who take what the PLAY and turn it into what they DO, but the same could be said of all followers of any particular entertainment past-time: Music-fans, RPG-fans, Movie-fans, etc.

 

Anyone who claims they haven't thought about pulling someone out of thier car after being cut-off in traffic and beating them to death either doesn't drive, or is deluding themselves.

 

I think it a far better thing to trade flesh and blood for pixels and polygons.

 

Course, that's just me.

 

 

 

Anyone ever notice that Atheists are just as zelous and overbearing with thier DISbelief as thiests with thier belief?

 

Just an observation.

Edited November 4, 2005 by Hylix Ulyx

[OrbWeaver]

Anyone ever notice that Atheists are just as zelous and overbearing with thier DISbelief as thiests with thier belief?

 

Just an observation.

 

That depends on the athiest.

 

I don't believe in god, but I certainly don't presume to tell others what they should believe, and I accept the possibility that there could be a god that nobody knows about.

[Hylix Ulyx]

That depends on the Atheist

 

Of course it does, just as much as it depends on the theist, but the fact that there are ANY atheists who zelously devour religious believers is, in my mind, self defeating.

 

An average atheist's main complaint about "belief" is that organized religion forces the believer to conform to such a degree as to lose one's own thoughts and ideas.

 

However true this may be, conforming to non-conformity is still conformity. A group of like-minded people who who are diametrically opposed to another group of like minded people will differ only in WHAT and HOW they believe...which is essentially dogmatic.

 

This makes Atheism no different from Religion.

Edited November 4, 2005 by Hylix Ulyx

[Fingernail]

The Dark Mod, more than previous stealth games, will offer you more possibilites to use your own ingenuity to deal with situations in non-violent ways. Or ultra-violent ways, it's really up to the player.

[Hewer]

Hah- one day my brother walked into the room and announced: "I've decided I'm an 'Induvidualist Non-comformist'". There was a moment of silence, then uproarious laughter and he had to go rethink his life strategy.

 

 

On this thread's OTHER topic- I don't know if game developers will look to modders for direction in where to go with the industry, but they certainly should.

[sparhawk]

I don't think this was meant. Rather, than modders are independent and can create whatever they feel like.

[Hewer]

oh, yeah, I know. I was just saying that I think developers should look to modders for where to take the industry. If people like something enough and have enough interest in it to put all the time and effort towards something, I would think a commercial venture could find success in that direction. But then I guess I'm glad they don't because they would most likely screw it up a la Thief DS. Now I'm talking in circles... maybe I should shut up about it.

[AtariThief]

I dont agree with Spector. Its inane to blame video games for the U.S. culture of violence, they are a symptom not a disease. Everyother home owns guns...

 

Every other home owns guns so that if anyone tried to invade they'd get an a$$ whoopin.

[oDDity]

Of course it does, just as much as it depends on the theist, but the fact that there are ANY atheists who zelously devour religious believers is, in my mind, self defeating.

 

An average atheist's main complaint about "belief" is that organized religion forces the believer to conform to such a degree as to lose one's own thoughts and ideas.

 

However true this may be, conforming to non-conformity is still conformity. A group of like-minded people who who are diametrically opposed to another group of like minded people will differ only in WHAT and HOW they believe...which is essentially dogmatic.

 

This makes Atheism no different from Religion.

Religon needs to be actively attacked. It is not, nor ever has been a benign or innocent philosophy, and to laugh it off or ignore it is to let it fester and grow. This is how is has been for too long, it's why religion has reached the corrupt and cancerous heights it has. It's only a few hundred years ago that a man would have been executed by the church for declaring himself an atheist.

Religion is not a passive thing, it's active, and therefore cannot be combated with passivism.

 

In the words of the first outspoken atheist of modern times, Paul D'Holbach -

"If we go back to the beginning, we shall find that ignorance and fear created the gods, that fancy, enthusiasm and deceit adorned them, that weakness worships them, that credulity preserves them, and that custom, respect and tyranny support them, in order to make the blindness of men serve their own interests - the ignorance of nature gave birth to gods, and the knowledge of nature will destroy them"

[sparhawk]

oh, yeah, I know. I was just saying that I think developers should look to modders for where to take the industry. If people like something enough and have enough interest in it to put all the time and effort towards something, I would think a commercial venture could find success in that direction. But then I guess I'm glad they don't because they would most likely screw it up a la Thief DS. Now I'm talking in circles... maybe I should shut up about it.

 

It takes about 15 dedicated people to make a good mod game. If they are dedicated enough they can create any kind of game they like, but if this game is a failure and only teh devs would play it, then nobody has lost anything. For a commercial company it would be pure craziness to target an audience of 15 people. Well, that's the worst case scenario, but this just shows that companies have other interests and just because somebody is dedicated enough to create something, doesn't automatically mean that it would be a commercial success if it were commercially exploited.

[obscurus]

An average atheist's main complaint about "belief" is that organized religion forces the believer to conform to such a degree as to lose one's own thoughts and ideas.

 

However true this may be, conforming to non-conformity is still conformity. A group of like-minded people who who are diametrically opposed to another group of like minded people will differ only in WHAT and HOW they believe...which is essentially dogmatic.

 

This makes Atheism no different from Religion.

 

 

No, my issues with religion have nothing to do with conformism at all. I despise and attack religion because it is a corruption and a debasement of human intelligence. To be religious, one has to void oneself of rationality, logic, reason, common sense and sanity. To beleive in something that you have no knowledge of, no reason to infer the existence of is insane. To base your life on a set of old Hebrew fairy tales or some book that some guy who claimed to be channelling the word of god wrote a thousand odd years ago is no different to an adult believing in the Tooth Fairy or Santa Claus or the Boogey Man.

 

Utterly eradicating religion won't solve all of theworlds ills, but it is a bloody good start.

 

Conformism is not a bad thing in moderation, provided it is not mindless conformism, but religion is poisonous in the most minute of doses.

 

That is a nice quote oDDity

[oDDity]

One of my favourite atheistic quotes is from the Greek philospher Epicurus, speaking 2400 years ago, but the argument is as sound today as it was before christianity destroyed free thought for more than a millenium.

 

"Is God willing, but not able to prevent evil?

- then he is not omnipotent

Is he able but not willing?

- then he is malevolent.

Is he both willing and able?

- then from whence comes evil?

Is he neither willing nor able?

- then why call him God"?

[Macsen]

Everytime I put that question to Christians they either try to deny the simple logic of it or simply say "wel, God hath not revealed all to us, his humble followers."

[obscurus]

Logic has never been the believer's strong suite. To be a Christian (or a Muslim or a Jew or a Zoroastrian or a Rastafarian et hoc genus omne) requires that you indulge in a line of circular reasoning that to me is just incomprehesible. A grown human being should be able to dispense with such fantasies.

[Forsaken]

The trail started in GTA and finished in religion... You people need a moderator!

 

I personal hate games like GTAjust because they are made to show people that I despise. I don't mind being bad in a game, but I hate being an idiot.

[Darkness_Falls]

The trail started in GTA and finished in religion... You people need a moderator!

Post anything controversial and it seems to almost always end up in either a discussion of politics or religion. Questions of morality and judgments upon man (and woman) are often inter-twined with religion. This topic underwent a natural flow, imo.

[oDDity]

The reason this is called the off-topic forum, is because the objective is to take threads off-topic as quckly and as far as possible.