The concept of a "Dark Age" originated in the 1330s with the Italian scholar Petrarch, who regarded the post-Roman centuries as "dark" compared to the "light" of classical antiquity.[1][2] The term employs traditional light-versus-darkness imagery to contrast the era's "darkness" (lack of records) with earlier and later periods of "light" (abundance of records).[1] The phrase "Dark Age" itself derives from the Latin saeculum obscurum, originally applied by Caesar Baronius in 1602 when he referred to a tumultuous period in the 10th and 11th centuries.[3][4] The concept thus came to characterize the entire Middle Ages as a time of intellectual darkness in Europe between the fall of Rome and the Renaissance. This became especially popular during the 18th-century Age of Enlightenment.[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Ages_(historiography) What brought us out of the dark ages? Science, which religion sought to suppress and still does.
Biodegradable plastics are just now coming available for general use. This was not an option and still isn't for some products. If all we had to do was change it would have happened long ago.
What....you think the secular state operates in a void? They are completely neutral without values or non-values of their own? No, they are a religion unto themselves. Study Rome and it's fall., or even Stalin.
Well that depends on what you call "religion". I call it a formally organised set of rituals based around a fairh. That is not secularity. In fact since secularity has to do with the rejection of the existence and therefore influence of a god, and the knowledge that humans are the source of what happens over time ( the logical extension of the enlightenment) and that secularists do not operate in any formal way, no. It is not a religion. Rome fell. BTW, after the govt had accepted Christianity.
The discovery, or rather the insistence on living the illusion, of dualism. After that, the next worst thing is the hypnotism of materialism.
As I said, they are about power, as is religion. So yes, religion and "evil" empires are much the same. But that doesn't imply that non religion seeks power by its nature. There are examples but that isn't definitiive by a long shot. Religion is all about power.
So you think because you label yourself "Non-religous" that makes you pure as the driven snow? Mao Se Tung might be your role model.
I don't agree with you on plastic...life without it would be tough..especially in the medical category. I wish cars were still basic without all the computerized bells and whistles, microchips and sensors. Fixing your car yourself or fixing it without putting out thousands I'd becoming a thing of the past.
Plastics are poisoning the planet on a massive scale. We are close to the point where there is more plastic in the oceans by weight, than there are fish. And plastics have already moved through the food chain to humans Microplastics found in human blood for first time Microplastic pollution has been detected in human blood for the first time, with scientists finding the tiny particles in almost 80% of the people tested. The discovery shows the particles can travel around the body and may lodge in organs. The impact on health is as yet unknown. But researchers are concerned as microplastics cause damage to human cells in the laboratory and air pollution particles are already known to enter the body and cause millions of early deaths a year. https://www.theguardian.com/environ...oplastics-found-in-human-blood-for-first-time
And Constantinople persisted a thousand years before the Muslims conquered it. An interesting fact is that the Byzantine Empire engaged only in defensive wars.
I define religion as the belief that there is an underlying order to existence and it behooves a man to align himself with that order. So atheistic beliefs can be called religious including Marxism and Progressiveism and neither are shy about forcing their ideas about the underlying order on hapless civilians.
Those are not secularism. Secularism forces nothing on anyone It merely rejects a divine being has any effect on our existence. That humans are the only "deciders" about what life and our existence is and does. it is the logical extension of the enlightenment. Look it up. Do some research. I am a secular humanist but also deeply believe that we should be very conservative about what laws we make and how much power we give the state. Secular just implies that humans are in total control of their own creation. It says nothing about the nature of government.
I don't believe I am pure as the driven snow because that is a religious concept. But I did finally shake 40 years of religious nonsense that was driven into my head as a child. Unfortunately over half my life was gone by then and there is no way to get my life back.
I'm I'm so sorry about that. I wish someone had steered you in the direction of faith. Religion does have a stifling effect on the soul. People of faith never believe they are pure as the driven snow. They know their imperfections and that is why they need Jesus.
Deaths from lack of plastic is more realistic then assuming deaths with plastic. And assumptions, not facts, is strong in this vendetta against plastic. A fact is that plastics have revolutionized medicine and has increased life spans and quality of life.
We can't even guess at the ramifications of a planet covered in plastic. But I get your point. In a similar since I argued nuclear weapons have prevented possibly a billion premature deaths due to war. What you are missing is that we don't know the true cost yet.
Yes risks are in everything. Did we know that lead water pipes would cause such injury and deaths when they were installed 100 years ago? It took 100 years. Or lead paint? I think we were using lead paint oretty recently. Or asbestos? But sometimes anti plastic "researchers" throw out more assumptions then facts. I'd love to go back to glass bottles...not sure of the environmental long term consequences of that..but I enjoyed returning bottles for pocket change back in the day. Sea glass is prettier then old plastic for sure.
No, not me. I think for myself. In fact I had to free myself from the nonsense religion had pounded in my my head before I was old enough to think for myself. That crap ruined much of my life and I consider it a form of child abuse. Terrorizing children with tales of eternal torture if they don't obey, people should get arrested for that.
Really? Everything you believe is an original idea that nobody told you about? You may have freed yourself from nonsense religion but you just replaced it with other nonsense somebody told you.
