Get out the Strunk & White - I think the “no one” could be seen at “not one of ‘them’” in the collective sense - so “their” would be correct. At any rate, if there is a hell and there are devils, I would agree that they could look like clowns. I’ve always hated them, too!
Well, say, the unsaved don’t go to hell in the far future. You go to place called the lake of fire in the great abyss, which happens to be the perfect description of a being being sent to a black hole where a resurrected body would burn forever, being in a state of constant conversion into energy in a timeless place. Funny how the guy who described it was an old fisherman who couldn’t have known anything about modern physics or what it would tell us centuries later. Almost like God told him.
And, to agree with a couple folks above, Satan doesn’t rule there. He gets to burn with the rest of us.
If heaven and hell are “simple enough for a caveman to understand” – and Neanderthal burial sites indicate they believed in an afterlife – then what’s your excuse, aircraft-engineer? :)
And while you’re thinking up your answer to that one, consider this: if “no heaven, no hell, just the HERE and NOW” is such a simple, logical, and obvious conclusion — so thoroughly supported (as it is) by the overwhelming evidence of a random and coldly indifferent universe — how could we have ever come up with the idea that this is not all there is? And done so in every place and time that intelligent minds have ever lived? Intellectual honesty forces you to consider the possibility that the idea could only have come from something, call it what you like, outside the “HERE and NOW”.
Although I agree with Aircraft Engineer on the non-existence of heaven hell or god, I do believe that human existence requires and provides many of the very GOOD things that religion attributes to god.
Affirming the good as apposed to the bad (in the baldest of terms) without the authority of god is not just possible, it is absolutely necessary.
A thing is not good or bad because some assumed god says so, it is good or bad within a human context. We non-theist are at a seeming disadvantage when we affirm our values (loves) and moral beliefs. Not science, not logic, not any carefully crafted philosophy can provide absolute proof of any value or belief. Likewise no god and no religion can do so either.
The fact that there are no proofs for what is good and what is bad is no excuse to pretend that we can dispense with living and speaking to the real difference between them.
Human beings are capable of very good and very bad things. They are capable of believing in terrible things and wonderful things. Non-theists who also hope for the good believe that attributing the good things to god and bad things to some prince of evil is dishonest. We believe that humans choose in accordance with what they value (really value, really love) most.
Of course, we realize that our actions are very often at odds with what we might otherwise hope for. Christians (and others) pray for the strength to overcome their frailties. Non-theists likewise struggle to be better than their less than perfect selves.
We non-theists (some of us) believe that value and moral questions must be resolved within the human (and natural) universe. We believe that when anyone says “God says so” that person is really saying “I say so.” or “We say so.”
To say “I say so.” or “We say so.” would be far more honest, and would really be a better starting point for further dialogue. Non-theists (some) believe that values (what we love) can be and must be discussed without reference to god.
Humans are capable of living good lives and resolving differences wholly within the human animal natural context.
But ain’t easy!
Thinking that it’s easy is probably as much of a cop-out as a non-theist thinks “God says so” is.
aircraft-engineer: Your display of faith is an inspiration to us all (remember: atheism is not an absence of faith; it’s a faith in absence). Both the supreme being and post-mortal existence are outside the observable system, and therefore any statements about them are by definition statements of faith, not scientific observations.
HabaneroBuck: Dante doesn’t depict Satan as reigning in hell; he’s pretty much frozen in ice at the center of the place, stuck there just like all the others. I think it may have been Milton who depicted him as being in charge, but I’m not certain of that.
junco49: Well said. Whatever our beliefs and our interpretation of life, our bottom-line obligation is always to treat each other with respect, justice, compassion, and personal humility.
@plus4, another good explanation of hell is C.S. Lewis’s: that the soul that insists on rejecting the only thing that will satisfy it: Hell is like a “tourniquet on the wound through which the lost soul else would bleed to a death she never reached. It is the Landlord’s [God’s] last service to those who will let him do nothing better for them.” (Pilgrim’s Regress)
We pastafarians just take this all in good fun. Somewhere his holy saucyness, the Flying Spaghetti Monster, is chuckling with a jolly quivering of his many noodly appendages thanks to the great imagination of Wiley ;-)
Fish stix: Not *MY* plans, merely the recorded vision of St. John in Revelation.
I believe God prefers us aldente Mag. :-)
The belief in God is in our genetic make-up-“The God Gene”. So one could even suggest the non-theist has a genetic flaw rather than a grasp of science.
Good point, plus4.
Noted again: Dante rather than Biblical representations by Wiley. I still suspect ex-Catholicism. It is fun to see him make fun of so many popular myths.
It was Milton who suggested that the devil found it better to rule in he** than to serve in heaven. Paradise Lost.
While I agree with Freeholder1, I can appreciate aircraft engineer keeping all of us honest. A LOT of religious talk which is attributed to God is in fact NOT! We think we know the mind of God, but rarely do. Even the great Job who suffered, had to be rebuked by God for daring to think he understood God and how He works. Let us not judge the real God by the many ignorant men who think they can speak for Him. He is bigger than that…..thankfully enough!
If one reads the first part of Genesis with a scientific mindset, it’s amazing how close - allowing for the allegorical language - the Creation account comes to one of the current theories about the formation of the solar system, though.
There are other descriptions of Hell, though, throughout the Gospels. Jesus picked the ones that would be the most disgusting or disturbing to His listeners. Garbage dump, outer darkness, unquenchable fire (phosphorus?)… Me, I hope and pray I don’t find out the hard way… (cue Blood Sweat & Tears…)
Kali48: Actually, Hell is taking a vacation with your “best friends”. My wife and I took a 7-day cruise with her best friend and that girl’s fiance years ago. It was a nightmare after they got into an argument on the 3rd day and spent the rest of the cruise trying to get each of us to take sides.
Grammar police report (just since this was brought up in several of the comments):
The phrase “no one” is singular. Therefore the phrase “no one is” is correct.
Technically the possessive of “no one” should be “his” or “her”, but because no one wants to get into any debate about the gender of the hypothetical “no one”, it is commonly accepted to just use the word “their”. So the wording of the comic strip is just fine. Language is a more fluid, flexible thing than math - if it successfully communicated, then it worked. I used to be a lot more particular about grammar than I am now; oddly I seem to have more friends now than I used to. I wonder if there is a connection.
Thanks to Scatty for respect. I hope I can remember your advice on that. High fives to Magasek, Sometimes humor may be our only help.
FishStix I haven’t fished for years, but casting that line down to the depths always felt a bit mysterious. All the sonar gadgets kind of subtract from the fun as far as I’m concerned.
For me, as a non-theist if god is anything god is the depth-less mystery in us humans. We can not completely know ourselves, but we can try to help each other glimpse through that strange beautiful terrible dark glass.
comicgos over 13 years ago
Just flip the channel off FAUX NOISE!
pouncingtiger over 13 years ago
I heard of “plunging” to your death, but that’s ridiculous.
x_Tech over 13 years ago
The devil you say!
Coyoty Premium Member over 13 years ago
Beelzebozo. The Clown Prince of Darkness. Lord of the Pies.
thirdguy over 13 years ago
Why are we in this handbasket, and where the heck are we going?
Sandfan over 13 years ago
That was a very Extreme Makeover.
wicky over 13 years ago
Going to he** in a handcar.
Plods with ...™ over 13 years ago
Steven King was right!!!
HabaneroBuck over 13 years ago
Unlike Dante’s Inferno, the Devil does not reign in Hell now or ever.
I don’t believe “no one” corresponds with “their”. It should be “his”. This disagreement threw me for a temporary loop, I must admit.
Barbaratoo over 13 years ago
Get out the Strunk & White - I think the “no one” could be seen at “not one of ‘them’” in the collective sense - so “their” would be correct. At any rate, if there is a hell and there are devils, I would agree that they could look like clowns. I’ve always hated them, too!
1OldDude over 13 years ago
Very appropo that they are in a mining ore car, since they are underground. Wiley’s attention to detail is amazing.
lewisbower over 13 years ago
Until I was four, Mommy told me I was going to Heaven
freeholder1 over 13 years ago
Golly, Plods beat me to “IT”.
freeholder1 over 13 years ago
Well, say, the unsaved don’t go to hell in the far future. You go to place called the lake of fire in the great abyss, which happens to be the perfect description of a being being sent to a black hole where a resurrected body would burn forever, being in a state of constant conversion into energy in a timeless place. Funny how the guy who described it was an old fisherman who couldn’t have known anything about modern physics or what it would tell us centuries later. Almost like God told him.
And, to agree with a couple folks above, Satan doesn’t rule there. He gets to burn with the rest of us.
Dillithamir over 13 years ago
HAHA!!!
peter0423 over 13 years ago
If heaven and hell are “simple enough for a caveman to understand” – and Neanderthal burial sites indicate they believed in an afterlife – then what’s your excuse, aircraft-engineer? :)
And while you’re thinking up your answer to that one, consider this: if “no heaven, no hell, just the HERE and NOW” is such a simple, logical, and obvious conclusion — so thoroughly supported (as it is) by the overwhelming evidence of a random and coldly indifferent universe — how could we have ever come up with the idea that this is not all there is? And done so in every place and time that intelligent minds have ever lived? Intellectual honesty forces you to consider the possibility that the idea could only have come from something, call it what you like, outside the “HERE and NOW”.
halavana over 13 years ago
Handbasket? handcar? Shouldn’t that be a Komatsu 920-E? Or was it 930-E?
cleokaya over 13 years ago
I’d take the plunge but I am already feeling a bit flushed!
Justice22 over 13 years ago
Is that “Joe”?
Destiny23 over 13 years ago
”Oh no, it’s even scarier than we thought!!”
junco49 over 13 years ago
Scatty and Puddleglum
Although I agree with Aircraft Engineer on the non-existence of heaven hell or god, I do believe that human existence requires and provides many of the very GOOD things that religion attributes to god.
Affirming the good as apposed to the bad (in the baldest of terms) without the authority of god is not just possible, it is absolutely necessary.
A thing is not good or bad because some assumed god says so, it is good or bad within a human context. We non-theist are at a seeming disadvantage when we affirm our values (loves) and moral beliefs. Not science, not logic, not any carefully crafted philosophy can provide absolute proof of any value or belief. Likewise no god and no religion can do so either.
The fact that there are no proofs for what is good and what is bad is no excuse to pretend that we can dispense with living and speaking to the real difference between them.
Human beings are capable of very good and very bad things. They are capable of believing in terrible things and wonderful things. Non-theists who also hope for the good believe that attributing the good things to god and bad things to some prince of evil is dishonest. We believe that humans choose in accordance with what they value (really value, really love) most.
Of course, we realize that our actions are very often at odds with what we might otherwise hope for. Christians (and others) pray for the strength to overcome their frailties. Non-theists likewise struggle to be better than their less than perfect selves.
We non-theists (some of us) believe that value and moral questions must be resolved within the human (and natural) universe. We believe that when anyone says “God says so” that person is really saying “I say so.” or “We say so.”
To say “I say so.” or “We say so.” would be far more honest, and would really be a better starting point for further dialogue. Non-theists (some) believe that values (what we love) can be and must be discussed without reference to god.
Humans are capable of living good lives and resolving differences wholly within the human animal natural context.
But ain’t easy!
Thinking that it’s easy is probably as much of a cop-out as a non-theist thinks “God says so” is.
puddleglum1066 over 13 years ago
aircraft-engineer: Your display of faith is an inspiration to us all (remember: atheism is not an absence of faith; it’s a faith in absence). Both the supreme being and post-mortal existence are outside the observable system, and therefore any statements about them are by definition statements of faith, not scientific observations.
HabaneroBuck: Dante doesn’t depict Satan as reigning in hell; he’s pretty much frozen in ice at the center of the place, stuck there just like all the others. I think it may have been Milton who depicted him as being in charge, but I’m not certain of that.
junco49 over 13 years ago
BTW the guys sailing off the end of the track into oblivion is priceless, funniest part of the comic.
Kali over 13 years ago
Oh, well that explains everything. His personal assistants are known as Moe, Larry and Curly.
peter0423 over 13 years ago
junco49: Well said. Whatever our beliefs and our interpretation of life, our bottom-line obligation is always to treat each other with respect, justice, compassion, and personal humility.
iantheevil over 13 years ago
It’s in the -30’s with wind chill here today - a lake of fire doesn’t sound so bad.
bmonk over 13 years ago
@plus4, another good explanation of hell is C.S. Lewis’s: that the soul that insists on rejecting the only thing that will satisfy it: Hell is like a “tourniquet on the wound through which the lost soul else would bleed to a death she never reached. It is the Landlord’s [God’s] last service to those who will let him do nothing better for them.” (Pilgrim’s Regress)
Magasek over 13 years ago
We pastafarians just take this all in good fun. Somewhere his holy saucyness, the Flying Spaghetti Monster, is chuckling with a jolly quivering of his many noodly appendages thanks to the great imagination of Wiley ;-)
Tucker_Storrs over 13 years ago
what happened to the anti-socal network story, and while im at it what happened to the eckert
Wiley please respond O_Ofreeholder1 over 13 years ago
Fish stix: Not *MY* plans, merely the recorded vision of St. John in Revelation.
I believe God prefers us aldente Mag. :-)
The belief in God is in our genetic make-up-“The God Gene”. So one could even suggest the non-theist has a genetic flaw rather than a grasp of science.
Good point, plus4.
Noted again: Dante rather than Biblical representations by Wiley. I still suspect ex-Catholicism. It is fun to see him make fun of so many popular myths.
It was Milton who suggested that the devil found it better to rule in he** than to serve in heaven. Paradise Lost.
Him and Captain Kirk.
treered over 13 years ago
Monday mornings are always better after Non Sequitor! Hurray Wiley! :)
55nana11 over 13 years ago
While I agree with Freeholder1, I can appreciate aircraft engineer keeping all of us honest. A LOT of religious talk which is attributed to God is in fact NOT! We think we know the mind of God, but rarely do. Even the great Job who suffered, had to be rebuked by God for daring to think he understood God and how He works. Let us not judge the real God by the many ignorant men who think they can speak for Him. He is bigger than that…..thankfully enough!
Defective Premium Member over 13 years ago
I was wondering why today’s comic sounded weird, too. Someone else said it, but then someone else disagreed with him, however, he’s wrong.
No one are here….
or
No one IS here.
No one is singular. No one (of them) is STILL singular because the verb isn’t dictated by a prepositional clause.
strodgers over 13 years ago
God does exist, He told me so, unless he was lying to me about his existence. (well, I thought was funny)
RadioTom over 13 years ago
In the beginning was the Word…. (no, not “Bird”…)
If one reads the first part of Genesis with a scientific mindset, it’s amazing how close - allowing for the allegorical language - the Creation account comes to one of the current theories about the formation of the solar system, though.
There are other descriptions of Hell, though, throughout the Gospels. Jesus picked the ones that would be the most disgusting or disturbing to His listeners. Garbage dump, outer darkness, unquenchable fire (phosphorus?)… Me, I hope and pray I don’t find out the hard way… (cue Blood Sweat & Tears…)
Kali over 13 years ago
Hell is being locked together in a room with your friends. I heard that once.
milano99 over 13 years ago
Kali48: Actually, Hell is taking a vacation with your “best friends”. My wife and I took a 7-day cruise with her best friend and that girl’s fiance years ago. It was a nightmare after they got into an argument on the 3rd day and spent the rest of the cruise trying to get each of us to take sides.
NightOwl19 over 13 years ago
Grammar police report (just since this was brought up in several of the comments): The phrase “no one” is singular. Therefore the phrase “no one is” is correct. Technically the possessive of “no one” should be “his” or “her”, but because no one wants to get into any debate about the gender of the hypothetical “no one”, it is commonly accepted to just use the word “their”. So the wording of the comic strip is just fine. Language is a more fluid, flexible thing than math - if it successfully communicated, then it worked. I used to be a lot more particular about grammar than I am now; oddly I seem to have more friends now than I used to. I wonder if there is a connection.
junco49 over 13 years ago
Thanks to Scatty for respect. I hope I can remember your advice on that. High fives to Magasek, Sometimes humor may be our only help.
FishStix I haven’t fished for years, but casting that line down to the depths always felt a bit mysterious. All the sonar gadgets kind of subtract from the fun as far as I’m concerned.
For me, as a non-theist if god is anything god is the depth-less mystery in us humans. We can not completely know ourselves, but we can try to help each other glimpse through that strange beautiful terrible dark glass.
Tucker_Storrs over 13 years ago
sayhowURfeelingB4URgone, ^
Your Probally right
rockngolfer over 13 years ago
I like the Flying Spaghetti Monster theory.
But if Reincarnation is possible, I want to come back as a woman’s bicycle seat.
junco49 over 13 years ago
sayhow:
I think maybe you have thrown YOURSELF out with the bathwater. If that makes any sense.
Killing god might just harm the best part of you. Just bid farewell.
andreadler over 13 years ago
huh
bmonk over 13 years ago
sayhowURfeelingB4URgone said, about 1 faith statement ago
Just as much as the entire concept of Heaven, Hell, Religions, ect, is indeed a,
Load of Crap….!!!!
In that case, where are these poor guys? If Hell is a load of bleeep, how would we ever know?
Creniere over 13 years ago
One of you is Joe…I just know it…. :o(