jayjay says:

Africa is a serious place Cali and it has always been necessary for primates to beat the shit out of big cats, or at least leopard-sized ones, or at least to mount a considerable threat. Primates complicate predator’s hunting by being dangerous to attack. It’s common for African mammal prey species to be dangerous to attack, consider the range giraffe, buffalo bushbuck and porcupine.

This is just nonsense. Humans evolved in Africa. All humans started out in Africa, we are all descended from those original apes who stepped down from the trees. Humans have been in Africa for what? 2 million years? How come we continue to grow our numbers if it's such a serious place. From what I can see the most dangerous predators in Africa are other humans. Not leopard and lions and bears. (Ooops I lied about the bears, we don't have bears in Africa).

A leopard attacks a child sleeping in a tent in a fenced camp, just a week or so ago. When last did leopards kill a human child? Statistics?

Man-eating lions have been recorded to actively enter human villages at night as well as during the day to acquire prey. This greater assertiveness usually makes man-eating lions easier to dispatch than tigers. Lions typically become man-eaters for the same reasons as tigers: starvation, old age and illness, though as with tigers, some man-eaters were reportedly in perfect health.[3] The lion's proclivity for man-eating has been systematically examined. American and Tanzanian scientists report that man-eating behavior in rural areas of Tanzania increased greatly from 1990 to 2005. At least 563 villagers were attacked and many eaten over this period—a number far exceeding the more famed "Tsavo" incidents of a century earlier. The incidents occurred near Selous National Park in Rufiji District and in Lindi Province near the Mozambican border. While the expansion of villagers into bush country is one concern, the authors argue that conservation policy must mitigate the danger because, in this case, conservation contributes directly to human deaths. Cases in Lindi have been documented where lions seize humans from the centre of substantial villages. It is estimated that over 250 people are killed by lions every year.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man-eater

Maybe you should go to those villages to hand out sticks for those at-risk people to beat their attackers.

By contrast, "49 people were murdered each day in South Africa" in 2015.https://www.enca.com/south-africa/crime-sats-2015-violent-crime-remains-problem-murder-46 That is in ONE country out of the 54 that make up the African continent.

Each day, 49 people. Multiply that by 365, roughly 18,000 people a year. In one country! Average that across the 54, say 15,000 a year, close to a million people killed by other humans.

You should rather be worried about how humans are wiping out humans than how wildlife is doing that. I'm still amused though that you haven't suggested that our citizens should all be armed with knobkieries so they can donner the lions as well, while they're knocking in the heads of their human attackers.

Agrippina wrote:jayjay says:

Africa is a serious place Cali and it has always been necessary for primates to beat the shit out of big cats, or at least leopard-sized ones, or at least to mount a considerable threat. Primates complicate predator’s hunting by being dangerous to attack. It’s common for African mammal prey species to be dangerous to attack, consider the range giraffe, buffalo bushbuck and porcupine.

This is just nonsense. Humans evolved in Africa. All humans started out in Africa, we are all descended from those original apes who stepped down from the trees. Humans have been in Africa for what? 2 million years? How come we continue to grow our numbers if it's such a serious place. From what I can see the most dangerous predators in Africa are other humans. Not leopard and lions and bears. (Ooops I lied about the bears, we don't have bears in Africa).

A leopard attacks a child sleeping in a tent in a fenced camp, just a week or so ago. When last did leopards kill a human child? Statistics?

Man-eating lions have been recorded to actively enter human villages at night as well as during the day to acquire prey. This greater assertiveness usually makes man-eating lions easier to dispatch than tigers. Lions typically become man-eaters for the same reasons as tigers: starvation, old age and illness, though as with tigers, some man-eaters were reportedly in perfect health.[3] The lion's proclivity for man-eating has been systematically examined. American and Tanzanian scientists report that man-eating behavior in rural areas of Tanzania increased greatly from 1990 to 2005. At least 563 villagers were attacked and many eaten over this period—a number far exceeding the more famed "Tsavo" incidents of a century earlier. The incidents occurred near Selous National Park in Rufiji District and in Lindi Province near the Mozambican border. While the expansion of villagers into bush country is one concern, the authors argue that conservation policy must mitigate the danger because, in this case, conservation contributes directly to human deaths. Cases in Lindi have been documented where lions seize humans from the centre of substantial villages. It is estimated that over 250 people are killed by lions every year.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man-eater

Maybe you should go to those villages to hand out sticks for those at-risk people to beat their attackers.

By contrast, "49 people were murdered each day in South Africa" in 2015.https://www.enca.com/south-africa/crime-sats-2015-violent-crime-remains-problem-murder-46 That is in ONE country out of the 54 that make up the African continent.

Each day, 49 people. Multiply that by 365, roughly 18,000 people a year. In one country! Average that across the 54, say 15,000 a year, close to a million people killed by other humans.

You should rather be worried about how humans are wiping out humans than how wildlife is doing that. I'm still amused though that you haven't suggested that our citizens should all be armed with knobkieries so they can donner the lions as well, while they're knocking in the heads of their human attackers.

And many of these murders are based on, or inspired by belief, in sky-daddies. Those filthy people who don't worship any god or the 'wrong" god.

Yes. It's funny how prisons are full of religious people.

That's because prison made them find jeeezus and now they're good people!!!!111

Sorry for the off topic. Don't know how it works in other countries but having a declared religion in institutions often gets a few privileges, be it going to services or special diets etc. I know in our hospital we have a disproportionate number of muslims certain times of year because people like the halal curries. Even the thought of a sip of communion wine is enough for some.
Might be one reason for the high numbers.

monkeyboy wrote:Sorry for the off topic. Don't know how it works in other countries but having a declared religion in institutions often gets a few privileges, be it going to services or special diets etc. I know in our hospital we have a disproportionate number of muslims certain times of year because people like the halal curries. Even the thought of a sip of communion wine is enough for some.
Might be one reason for the high numbers.

Do you think they do the same in prison ? Commit felonies in order to enjoy certain lunches there ?

aban57 wrote:

monkeyboy wrote:Sorry for the off topic. Don't know how it works in other countries but having a declared religion in institutions often gets a few privileges, be it going to services or special diets etc. I know in our hospital we have a disproportionate number of muslims certain times of year because people like the halal curries. Even the thought of a sip of communion wine is enough for some.
Might be one reason for the high numbers.

Do you think they do the same in prison ? Commit felonies in order to enjoy certain lunches there ?

Sorry, think you mistook me. I work in a secure hospital, we cater for mentally disordered offenders. Religious privilege is still observed. Preferential visits if it's from some sort of pastoral type person, special diets etc. It pays to be of a religion for some. I know it's the same in prisons here. I wondered if it's the same elsewhere. Not that people commit crimes for the privileges but once there, people take what they can.

aban57 wrote:Do you think they do the same in prison ? Commit felonies in order to enjoy certain lunches there ?

That convicts might claim to "have seen the light" in order to obtain privileges or parole consideration is not such a shocking idea.

Scot Dutchy wrote:Do really think anyone is going to read your lousy wallpaper.

Most of that “lousy wallpaper” was (a) long pastes by Cali of scientific papers that it would have been injudicious to snip, even though their bulk was the point he meant to make and (b) points Cali made that I could reply to. I don’t worry about a target audience.

Sendraks wrote:

Jayjay4547 wrote:
Tiresome, amateur, fatuous. Another way of defacing a point being made. I accompanied the graphic with a discussion of how it illustrates the contingency and the tendency towards self-creation in the human origin story.

originstorygraphV3.jpg (16.47 KiB) Viewed 1144 times

Sendraks wrote:They're criticisms of the graph and justified ones at the. The graph doesn't make a point, it is just a pretty picture you've created on the basis of no evidence what-so-ever, just to illustrate your opinion. It is tiresome, because your references to it are tiresome. It is amateur, because it was created by an amateur. And it is fatuous, because it is silly and pointless.

The picture simply illustrates the fantasy you want it to illustrate. There is no reason why any rational person should take it seriously.

You don’t go over the most basic fact, which is that the graph plots recourse to to external agency against date when an origin story told. And that it depicts a contingent trend away from external agency.

A “rational person” wouldn’t blat on about the graphic being amateur, tiresome, fatuous, silly or pointless. A rational person might well argue about the relative position of points, or propose more data points contradicting the impression created. Then a rational discussion of origin stories could be reflected on the graphic itself. In other words, a rational person would ADD to the graphic. But here, self-identified rational sceptics chose instead to deface the graphic, deny it might show anything at all, and decry its graphic quality. It’s astonishing that you could let yourself do that.

Agrippina wrote:jayjay says:

Africa is a serious place Cali and it has always been necessary for primates to beat the shit out of big cats, or at least leopard-sized ones, or at least to mount a considerable threat. Primates complicate predator’s hunting by being dangerous to attack. It’s common for African mammal prey species to be dangerous to attack, consider the range giraffe, buffalo bushbuck and porcupine.

This is just nonsense. Humans evolved in Africa. All humans started out in Africa, we are all descended from those original apes who stepped down from the trees. Humans have been in Africa for what? 2 million years? How come we continue to grow our numbers if it's such a serious place. From what I can see the most dangerous predators in Africa are other humans. Not leopard and lions and bears. (Ooops I lied about the bears, we don't have bears in Africa).

You make it sound as if our ancestors just had to hang around in Africa while they “evolved”, like kindergarten kids in a playground waiting for their milk teeth to fall out. But what actually happened was that Africa molded our parents into a highly distinctive series of forms; first a biped primate that protected itself against predators by expertly using hand weapons instead of expert biting. Second and from that, into a biped primate that could talk. Or was it really “Africa” that did that? Was it Logos? Nature? We creationists call the agent “The Creator” Whatever, it happened to us.

If you are sleeping in a suburban house then sure, other humans might be the most dangerous predator. But if you are a Mozambican immigrant traipsing through the Kruger Park at night then lions might be more dangerous. And similarly for your Australopith ancestor two million years ago.

Agrippina wrote: A leopard attacks a child sleeping in a tent in a fenced camp, just a week or so ago. When last did leopards kill a human child? Statistics?

I didn’t hear about that. Did recently hear of a child in a tent being bitten by a HYENA. According to data from Cheney et al, from a ten year study, leopards kill between 70% and 96% of adult female baboons in Moremi in Botswana, depending on how one calculates doubtful cases where individuals observed during the day disappeared. Not such a high proportion of baboon juveniles were taken, those seem to be better protected.

Agrippina wrote:

Man-eating lions have been recorded to actively enter human villages at night as well as during the day to acquire prey. This greater assertiveness usually makes man-eating lions easier to dispatch than tigers. Lions typically become man-eaters for the same reasons as tigers: starvation, old age and illness, though as with tigers, some man-eaters were reportedly in perfect health.[3] The lion's proclivity for man-eating has been systematically examined. American and Tanzanian scientists report that man-eating behavior in rural areas of Tanzania increased greatly from 1990 to 2005. At least 563 villagers were attacked and many eaten over this period—a number far exceeding the more famed "Tsavo" incidents of a century earlier. The incidents occurred near Selous National Park in Rufiji District and in Lindi Province near the Mozambican border. While the expansion of villagers into bush country is one concern, the authors argue that conservation policy must mitigate the danger because, in this case, conservation contributes directly to human deaths. Cases in Lindi have been documented where lions seize humans from the centre of substantial villages. It is estimated that over 250 people are killed by lions every year.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man-eater

Maybe you should go to those villages to hand out sticks for those at-risk people to beat their attackers.

Baboons and Chimps both chase leopard during the day while baboons at least are at a disadvantage at night, in spite of retreating to sleeping refuges. (Cheney et al, Boesch as cited before) Modern humans face a similarly bimodal threat during the day and night. See this account of patrolling soldiers who climbed powerline pylons to get away from lions on a moonless night, but looked for a possibly wounded lion during the day.

http://safaritalk.net/topic/5870-kruger ... l-account/

In a well-defended society “problem animals” are hunted down and killed during the day. Where that doesn’t happen the community isn’t well-defended, as exists in many contexts in colonial and post-colonial Africa. Anyway, ancient hominins might well have acted in similar ways.

Agrippina wrote: By contrast, "49 people were murdered each day in South Africa" in 2015.https://www.enca.com/south-africa/crime-sats-2015-violent-crime-remains-problem-murder-46 That is in ONE country out of the 54 that make up the African continent.

Each day, 49 people. Multiply that by 365, roughly 18,000 people a year. In one country! Average that across the 54, say 15,000 a year, close to a million people killed by other humans.

You should rather be worried about how humans are wiping out humans than how wildlife is doing that. I'm still amused though that you haven't suggested that our citizens should all be armed with knobkieries so they can donner the lions as well, while they're knocking in the heads of their human attackers.

You are very easily amused Agrippina. Here, I want to discuss the ways that atheist ideology has messed up the human origin story.

Jayjay4547 wrote:
A “rational person” wouldn’t blat on about the graphic being amateur, tiresome, fatuous, silly or pointless. A rational person might well argue about the relative position of points, or propose more data points contradicting the impression created. Then a rational discussion of origin stories could be reflected on the graphic itself. In other words, a rational person would ADD to the graphic. But here, self-identified rational sceptics chose instead to deface the graphic, deny it might show anything at all, and decry its graphic quality. It’s astonishing that you could let yourself do that.

Will you please stop pontificating about what rational persons should do ? You clearly are not one of them, so you have absolutely no lesson to give on the matter. Keep telling your nonsense over and over again, that you do very well.

Jayjay4547 wrote:

A “rational person” wouldn’t blat on about the graphic being amateur, tiresome, fatuous, silly or pointless. A rational person might well argue about the relative position of points, or propose more data points contradicting the impression created.

Those points represent actual data? Not from what I see. You will have to explain how those points represent actual data and where where that data comes from.

No, "it's a representation of what I imagine my imaginary misrepresentation of history might look like as a graph" is not a useful presentation of source data, though it is a data source, just not one that is salutary towards yourself.

Jayjay4547 wrote:

Agrippina wrote: A leopard attacks a child sleeping in a tent in a fenced camp, just a week or so ago. When last did leopards kill a human child? Statistics?

I didn’t hear about that. Did recently hear of a child in a tent being bitten by a HYENA. According to data from Cheney et al, from a ten year study, leopards kill between 70% and 96% of adult female baboons in Moremi in Botswana, depending on how one calculates doubtful cases where individuals observed during the day disappeared. Not such a high proportion of baboon juveniles were taken, those seem to be better protected.

Sorry you're right. It was a hyena.

Agrippina wrote:

Man-eating lions have been recorded to actively enter human villages at night as well as during the day to acquire prey. This greater assertiveness usually makes man-eating lions easier to dispatch than tigers. Lions typically become man-eaters for the same reasons as tigers: starvation, old age and illness, though as with tigers, some man-eaters were reportedly in perfect health.[3] The lion's proclivity for man-eating has been systematically examined. American and Tanzanian scientists report that man-eating behavior in rural areas of Tanzania increased greatly from 1990 to 2005. At least 563 villagers were attacked and many eaten over this period—a number far exceeding the more famed "Tsavo" incidents of a century earlier. The incidents occurred near Selous National Park in Rufiji District and in Lindi Province near the Mozambican border. While the expansion of villagers into bush country is one concern, the authors argue that conservation policy must mitigate the danger because, in this case, conservation contributes directly to human deaths. Cases in Lindi have been documented where lions seize humans from the centre of substantial villages. It is estimated that over 250 people are killed by lions every year.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man-eater

Maybe you should go to those villages to hand out sticks for those at-risk people to beat their attackers.

Baboons and Chimps both chase leopard during the day while baboons at least are at a disadvantage at night, in spite of retreating to sleeping refuges. (Cheney et al, Boesch as cited before) Modern humans face a similarly bimodal threat during the day and night. See this account of patrolling soldiers who climbed powerline pylons to get away from lions on a moonless night, but looked for a possibly wounded lion during the day.

I'm not disputing that they are chased by wildlife, but the more exposure wildlife gets to humans, the more likely they are to run away, rather than the other way around. I live in a game reserve, I see wildlife every single day of my life. All I see is wildlife running the other way if we approach them, even though they could kill us with their horns or kick us to death, they run.

http://safaritalk.net/topic/5870-kruger-park-lion-attack-13th-august-1987-personal-account/

In a well-defended society “problem animals” are hunted down and killed during the day. Where that doesn’t happen the community isn’t well-defended, as exists in many contexts in colonial and post-colonial Africa. Anyway, ancient hominins might well have acted in similar ways.

Problem animals happen when they find a source of food. They are opportunistic, if you feed them they will come. If you live anywhere near monkeys, you will know that idiot humans feed them, then wonder why the hell the monkeys won't stay out of their houses. Stop bloody feeding them and in one generation they will become too afraid to come near humans. We had to send a zebra away because idiot humans treated it like a pet horse. The daily treats at the care centre caused it to become a danger to the residents. Then new pair who've moved in here don't approach us on our walks, they run the other way.

Agrippina wrote: By contrast, "49 people were murdered each day in South Africa" in 2015.https://www.enca.com/south-africa/crime-sats-2015-violent-crime-remains-problem-murder-46 That is in ONE country out of the 54 that make up the African continent.

Each day, 49 people. Multiply that by 365, roughly 18,000 people a year. In one country! Average that across the 54, say 15,000 a year, close to a million people killed by other humans.

You should rather be worried about how humans are wiping out humans than how wildlife is doing that. I'm still amused though that you haven't suggested that our citizens should all be armed with knobkieries so they can donner the lions as well, while they're knocking in the heads of their human attackers.

You are very easily amused Agrippina. Here, I want to discuss the ways that atheist ideology has messed up the human origin story.

I am amused because you make stupid assertions, while you persist in refusing to explain what atheist ideology is. Seeing that we can't agree on what we don't believe in, I can't see where you get the idea that such an ideology exists. I'd like you to define the ideology clearly, and with properly supporting evidence, then maybe I'll take you a little seriously.

Jayjay4547 wrote:
You don’t go over the most basic fact, which is that the graph plots recourse to to external agency against date when an origin story told. And that it depicts a contingent trend away from external agency.

The graph plots what you want it to plot. It is a graphical representation of your opinion, nothing more. It is not a representation of any factual data. With the exception of the dates for publications, it is a complete work of fiction and not any sort of quantifiable analysis that could be subject to rational analysis.

Jayjay4547 wrote:A “rational person” wouldn’t blat on about the graphic being amateur, tiresome, fatuous, silly or pointless.

Fatuous = silly and pointless. Do make use of a dictionary, you might actually learn something.
As for what a "rational person" would do, this is just another tiresome logical fallacy on your part. People are not "rational" based on your say so and it is not rational argument to imply the insult that people who disagree with you are irrational.

Jayjay4547 wrote: A rational person might well argue about the relative position of points, or propose more data points contradicting the impression created.

No. It is simply sufficient to point out this graph for what it is.

Jayjay4547 wrote: Then a rational discussion of origin stories could be reflected on the graphic itself.

The graph has no basis in fact, only opinion, it is not a given that it is a rational representation of anything.

Jayjay4547 wrote: You are very easily amused Agrippina. Here, I want to discuss the ways that atheist ideology has messed up the human origin story.

No you don't. If you wanted to have a discussion, you'd have clearly defined what constitutes the "atheist ideology" in the first place, so we'd understand the basis on which this discussion is taking place.

Also - if you were genuinely interested in a discussion, you'd be actually trying to learn from what people tell you, rather than handwaving comments away and dismissing relevant evidence as un-interesting just because it conflicts with your ideology.

I am amused because you make stupid assertions, while you persist in refusing to explain what atheist ideology is. Seeing that we can't agree on what we don't believe in, I can't see where you get the idea that such an ideology exists. I'd like you to define the ideology clearly, and with properly supporting evidence, then maybe I'll take you a little seriously.

I'll take a go, let's see if I can get close.

None of this will probably be stated clearly, but these would be the main points:

* The default position of a human being is to believe in and worship God
* If you deviate from this then you are in rebellion against God and your true nature
* Because you are rebelling against your very nature, you need a set of rules or an ideology to keep you away from God and in rebellion. This is a way of thinking and seeing the world that is at the forefront of your mind in everything you do. (I guess it could also be subconscious).
* This way of seeing the world, or ideology, poisons everything else you touch, including science
* This ideology has messed up the scientists' minds that study the history of our species and have made them postulate that we created ourselves
* Therefore God or something to do with Africa.

Coastal wrote:

I am amused because you make stupid assertions, while you persist in refusing to explain what atheist ideology is. Seeing that we can't agree on what we don't believe in, I can't see where you get the idea that such an ideology exists. I'd like you to define the ideology clearly, and with properly supporting evidence, then maybe I'll take you a little seriously.

I'll take a go, let's see if I can get close.

None of this will probably be stated clearly, but these would be the main points:

* The default position of a human being is to believe in and worship God
* If you deviate from this then you are in rebellion against God and your true nature
* Because you are rebelling against your very nature, you need a set of rules or an ideology to keep you away from God and in rebellion. This is a way of thinking and seeing the world that is at the forefront of your mind in everything you do. (I guess it could also be subconscious).
* This way of seeing the world, or ideology, poisons everything else you touch, including science
* This ideology has messed up the scientists' minds that study the history of our species and have made them postulate that we created ourselves
* Therefore God or something to do with Africa.

Something like that.

I'm wondering if it's the idea that we came out of Africa that's the problem with accepting human evolution, or any evolution, and the true belief in a 6,000 year old universe complete with penguins and kangaroos swimming from the other end of the world to catch a boat to save them from drowning, and incestuous interbreeding with siblings, that's driving the argument that we are a cabal of illuminati who hate God, and big teeth.

Agrippina wrote:

Something like that.

I'm wondering if it's the idea that we came out of Africa that's the problem with accepting human evolution, or any evolution, and the true belief in a 6,000 year old universe complete with penguins and kangaroos swimming from the other end of the world to catch a boat to save them from drowning, and incestuous interbreeding with siblings, that's driving the argument that we are a cabal of illuminati who hate God, and big teeth.

Won't somebody tell the sloths that the flood is all over?They're still doing their best to get to the middle east.......

Indeed. They must've made another plan seeing they're still around. Them and tortoises, and snails.

Agrippina wrote:

Jayjay4547 wrote:Here, I want to discuss the ways that atheist ideology has messed up the human origin story.

I am amused because you make stupid assertions, while you persist in refusing to explain what atheist ideology is. Seeing that we can't agree on what we don't believe in, I can't see where you get the idea that such an ideology exists. I'd like you to define the ideology clearly, and with properly supporting evidence, then maybe I'll take you a little seriously.

Speaking as an atheist, I think there is an ideology which underpins modern atheism, though I don’t agree with Jayjay4547’s view of what that ideology is. I think one very good brief statement is by Brian Cox at the beginning of his current BBC TV series “Forces of Nature”. (The first episode "The Universe in a Snowflake", which I’m quoting from, is here, but it will only be available until the end of July 2016, and it’s on iPlayer, which I think is not available outside the UK.) The programme starts with pictures of children playing in snow and general remarks from Prof Cox, then the transcript is:

But if you look carefully, there’s something deeper. (Picture of a single snowflake.) Every one is perfect, as though they’d been cut out of thin paper. Snowflakes are complex, intricate things; they’re all different, but there’s something similar about them. They are beautiful, but there is also, I think, a deeper beauty, and that beauty is in an idea. The idea is that all the similarities and differences, the structure, of snowflakes, can be explained using a few simple laws of nature. And that idea goes to the very heart of science, because those laws themselves are beautiful, and they are universal. They can explain so many things, from snowflakes to stars.

If everything, from snowflakes to stars to our own bodies and brains, “can be explained using a few simple laws of nature”, then that cuts out supernatural human-like forces as ultimate explanations. It’s a simple idea, but one which is not in the least simple to demonstrate, if we are starting with the fantastic complexity of the natural world. For the early hunter-gatherers, the obvious explanation, and best predictor, for the behaviour at least of living things, is the idea that there are human-like minds in charge. It took centuries of collaborative observations and mathematical development to come up with the laws of motion that hold across the universe, those laws being, as Brian Cox says, beautiful largely because they are so simple. The idea of evolution by natural selection doesn’t have quite the austere beauty of the laws of physics, though it’s again far simpler than the phenomena which it has been shown to underlie.

Jayjay4547, as far as I can tell, is claiming that “atheist ideology” involves humans somehow creating themselves, with human minds having supernatural powers. That is not my ideology at all. I’m happy if someone says I have an ideology as an atheist, but I’m certainly not agreeing with Jayjay4547’s version as I understand it. (I would also want to point out that my ideology depends on evidence, the scientific laws of nature are open to revision.)

zoon wrote:It’s a simple idea, but one which is not in the least simple to demonstrate, if we are starting with the fantastic complexity of the natural world.

Even before you get to that, you have at least to consider the other side of the demonstration equation. If you fail to demonstrate something, it's not always your fault.

I don't have an ideology. If I were to express my personal "philosophy" then it is this: to accept nothing of any importance I'm told without evidence, to do as little harm to the earth as is possible, to try to make the people I meet comfortable in my presence, to share whatever I have in abundance with those who don't have the same comforts, to harm as few non-humans as is possible, and to look for the positive in every adversity. Of course I get angry, and I stand up for myself when I'm wronged, but even then I'll try to see the other person's point of view, and try to walk away having resolved the conflict. i don't expect anyone else to have the same values, or to agree with my own, but I do expect other people to respect my disbelief in their beliefs, whatever they are, in the same way that I will not try to sway them from those beliefs, no matter how inane.