I am an atheist thread 2

[phooney]

@ontologysue

Einstein also said: “It was, of course, a lie what you read about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it.” – Albert Einstein from a letter Einstein wrote in English, dated 24 March 1954

"Scientists studying quantum particles, subatomic matter, are reaching the “rational” conclusion that the laws of nature, existence, may boil down to a universal thought, a universal wisdom, in another context, “information.”

“Matter cannot explain a mathematical concept, or love, beauty, purpose, intention, language or consciousness; an immaterial Mind, Intelligence can.”

No offence but this is nonsense and the fields of molecular and evolutionary biology and neuroscience say otherwise. I think you are making a reasonably common error in confusing “abstraction” with “immaterial”. You still haven’t shown any methodology in place or any testable hypotheses in regards to the immaterial. “No falsifiability” has no place in rational conclusions as far as science is concerned, and can’t take a hypothesis any higher than a level of “plausible” (higher levels might be “possible”, “probable” and “certain” for example) and has no argumentative value in logical discussion. So in response to your claim of “naive materialism” I might have to accuse you of an expanded form of “thoroughly dismissed vitalism” the earliest debunking of which, that I have read, is Francis Crick in “Of Molecules and Men” from the 1960s, and molecular biology has only served to dismiss the immaterial in regards to love, beauty, purpose, intention, language or consciousness since. Of course, with you not being a Roman Catholic (I think you sound kind of like a quasi deist?) I wouldn’t think you should have too much of a problem conceding this point.

“I have no idea what he’s calling “religious explanations.””

In a nutshell, explanations that require the postulation of “supernatural” agents.

“I’m not limiting my rational faculty to the unnatural limitations of materialism. Rationality, the ability to grasp abstract concepts, inevitably leads beyond the truths of the physical.”

Here’s the confusion between immaterial and abstract again.

 

[phooney]

continued…

I was planning on picking up that book “Unweaving the Rainbow” sometime anyway, and will look out for that quote. However, I don’t think one could seriously argue that there is no selective advantage in language. Certain lower primates post “lookouts” while they graze or play, or whatever activity they feel like doing at any particular time. These lookouts will give different alarm calls depending on what danger they detect, be it a hawk, a python or a leopard or whatever. Infants can be tricked into giving the alarm call for “hawk” when they see a sparrow, or when some trickster scientist holds a cardboard cutout of a hawk above them, so the beginnings of basic intentional, relevant ,fact-based communication is demonstrably hardwired into them.

To expand with a simple example, a group of animals who are able to say to each other, “There’s food under that dead tree over there, but be careful because there is a snake next to it.” has an advantage over another group that says “FOOD!” or nothing at all. Studies of chimpanzees have yeilded interesting results in teaching them sign language, with them being able to string together a few human words in a meaningful way.

Even without that, other experiments have been done to test the sophistication of their communication. One chimp from a group was taken into the experimental area (some largeish park-like habitat for them) and shown where a cache of food was, and she was then taken back to where the rest of the group was and left alone a while. Then the scientists released the other chimps… who went straight for the food. In another experiment, there was one chimp who was known to be very aggressive about food etc. This time, when the group was released, the aggressive chimp raced off to some random corner of the park, while the rest of the group went to the food was able to eat in peace for a while (anybody remember what I said about reciprocal altruism?) These examples come from Carl Sagan’s “Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors”. Daniel Dennett in “Breaking the Spell” says “Language’s contributions to genetic fitness are all too obvious” and “Once language began to be the fad among our ancestors, those who didn’t swiftly catch on to language were pretty much left out of the mating game. Chat or go childless.” (p157) While Dennett does note that humans are, so far, the only species to demonstrate greater than “first order intentionality” and language like ours seems to require those greater orders of intentionality, it certainly doesn’t mean that there is no selective advantage in language, the evidence indicates otherwise. Other examples are the dancing of bees, or the rapid colour fluctuations of certain cephalopods.

If language is so great, then why doesn’t everybody evolve it? That would be a logical fallacy of begging the question in thinking that evolution has any particular future goal in mind. Language requires intelligence, which almost always seems to require a larger brain size to body size ratio, this in turn makes child birth somewhat more difficult, and in turn makes for longer dependent childhoods. We don’t “hit the ground running” like many animals in the world. This is what Stephen Pinker would call a 'positive feedback loop" in that there are costs involved with every benefit.

“Well, here again, I would say, your’re arguing like a true materialist; ie, there can be no absolutes, no truth. The concept of “virtue” the “Good” has been established by most philosophers from Plato to Aristotle through Kant’s moral imperative. I think human history demonstrates a much greater consensus on what “virtue” consists of, than not.”

I don’t think I’m, strictly speaking, a true materialist in the sense that I absolutely deny the existence of the immaterial. All I am saying is that there is no demonstrable basis or evidence by which we could KNOW of the immaterial, therefore belief in it is irrational and unneccesary, a broken concept if you will. Absolutes are truly few and far between. Is it always wrong to kill? The answer is “it depends”. The only absolutes I can think of off the top of my head are axioms that are proved through retortion, such as the proposition that “I exist” If I don’t exist then I can’t even argue against this proposition! Other than that, the problem of induction would seem to indicate that there is no absolute certainty, and almost everything may be proved wrong. Therefore, it is most rational to be open to new evidence, but as A has stated many times, live your life according to what the best evidence currently indicates and don’t be dogmatic.

I agree that there is much consensus of what “virtue” consists of than not, but this is better explained by the evolutionary morality I described earlier rather than appealing to magic, as are the differences amongst different cultures, as are the differences within cultures, as are the differences amongst different time periods.

 

[Texas_Roofer]

I have been trying to understand faith and belief.

excellent, from my science training I know that all you do is faith and belief! This comes from an effort to prove a truth in a scientific method, which cannot be done. No one can prove the earth or sun will exist tomorrow as we know it, yet do we all not live with a faith and belief tomorrow will be like today?

Late-term abortions are quite rare, and none of your business unless you are the woman having one.

This imposes a logic problem, if it is only her business then would others who choose to kill not have the same rights as her?

Deuteronomy 20:9 is in err, or YOU are.

There may be an apparent contradiction Frankly I think the flood story actually is more difficult at least in theory. However given time I think you can come to understand why two different writers wrote things which appear so opposite by the way (btw) I do not think you meant Deuteronomy 20:9 ( maybe 20:13?)

            I think that under the catholic belief system, free will does not exist. It is more like you are free to love Jesus, or burn forever while he tortures you. Not very free.

close ( ) hell is actually defined as the absence of God/heaven/after life however you wish to say it. In the earlier comment (Deuteronomy 20)those who chose to love were allowed to defend themselves even withoffensive means against those who chose not to love. Today the church teaches there is enough security to protect us, so we can usually avoiding kill others for our protection. The actual rules concerning killing have not changed in the Catholic Church. In Judaism which is our heritage there are (or were) different rules however we believe this is part of why Christ came to earth.

I don’t know that all atheists are against killing humans.

Yes, one of my issues is how any atheist knows when to kill or not kill or when to intervene to prevent others from death? Note the abortion/killing mentioned above

 

[ontologysue]

@A

Ok, A, I have a hypothetical for you. Let’s take two individuals, one of them is a practicing Catholic, goes to church every Sunday, is on the church vestry, helps raise money for the church, blah, blah, blah. However, away from church tends to be rather selfish, cheats others in small ways, gossips at work, doesn’t challenge his intellect and generally tends to put himself first in most daily situations.

The other individual is an atheist. He feels he has to be intellectually honest on all accounts. His thirst for truth motivates his life and challenges him daily, he reads, he debates, he searches, partly out of an innate intellectual curiosity, partly because he wants meaning, whatever that turns out to be. He lives his life trying to be fair with others, trying not to use others as a means to an end to his own advantage.

Suddenly both men die. Which one is closest to God, (if we assume for argument’s sake that God exists)? Christian theology would say the atheist. Sorry to offend any Christians out there; but that’s what Christian doctrine teaches.

"Not everyone who says, “Lord, Lord” will enter; or take the example in the NT where Our Lord tells the story of two brothers, one states he will not follow the commandments, the other one assures Jesus he will. Of course, the reverse takes place when they actually get out in the world. It didn’t matter what they were saying, it was what they did that proved or disproved their faith.

If we allow that Jesus is God, then He is “Truth.” If someone is *genuinely *seeking truth in his life, he cannot be lost! To the extent that you want truth, you are in union with the “Truth”, Himself. (You may have an important Friend, after all,

Merry Christmas, A!

 

[ontologysue]

@ontologysue

Einstein also said:… – Albert Einstein from a letter Einstein wrote in English, dated 24 March 1954

Have you read Lincoln Barnett’s little book about Einstein? Einstein wrote the Foreword. He obviously approved of how he was being quoted since he promoted the book. In it, he is not afraid of using the term “God.” His vision is of “the illimitable superior spirit who reveals ‘himself’ in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble minds. That deeply emotional conviction of the presence of a superior reasoning power, which is revealed in the incomprehensible universe, forms my idea of God.” I never said he believed in an anthropomorphic God. I was making the point that he believed, through rather through a rather superior rational faculty that science inferred a “illimitable, superior spirit” which he named “God.” That’s pretty undenyable and since he promoted this quote himself in Barnett’s book I would have to question the context of what you quoted…it certainly itsn’t indicative of the majority of his statements on the subject.
Phooney;3115531:

I think you are making a reasonably common error in confusing “abstraction” with “immaterial”. You still haven’t shown any methodology in place or any testable hypotheses in regards to the immaterial. “No falsifiability” has no place in rational conclusions as far as science is concerned, and can’t take a hypothesis any higher than a level of “plausible” (higher levels might be “possible”, “probable” and “certain” for example) and has no argumentative value in logical discussion.

There’s no confusion in my thinking between abstraction and immaterial, the science of mathematics is abstract, the findings of current quantum physics is itself postulating meta-physical realities, (outside of matter) which are only measurable through probabilities, the wave collapses when measured. Basically Quantum mechanics is requiring, because of the illogical phenomena of the subatomic world, explanations that defy logic on the physical level. It’s not me, Phooney, it’s quantum physicists.

I’ll have to continue later…but suffice it to say at the moment, you’re confining yourself to newtonian physics…the world of science has moved beyond the macrouniverse to discover the micro universe and experiments in neuro biology concur.

 

[phooney]

“Basically Quantum mechanics is requiring, because of the illogical phenomena of the subatomic world, explanations that defy logic on the physical level. It’s not me, Phooney, it’s quantum physicists.”

And now you confuse counter-intuitive with illogical. Your misrepresentation of current science isn’t helping your case.

 

[steve_b]

I must admit though, that for a person with "To doubt is the greatest insult to the divinity…" as their signature, you’re a lot more reasonable than people I’ve dealt with in the past.

I’m a fan of Padre Pio. Been to his monastary in Italy.

 

[steve_b]

I don’t know why wiki validity is such an issue in this thread. Sure, people can and do edit with misinformation, but you also have the benefit of having scientists, health care professionals, etc, edit it and give accurate information right from the source, of which you would not find elsewhere. Like notself said, it should be used in conjunction with other sources. Really, that should apply to all research anyways. And your “strong” quote, is from an opinion editor. They are paid to make “strong” statements to ruffle feathers.

Here’s info about a nature article that compared wiki to Encyclopedia Britannica.

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4530930.stm

If Stephen Hawking wrote an article in Wiki, on something he’s considered an expert on, but 20 yahoos enter his article and change it all around, regardless of commentary or footnotes, I’m just wondering how would Hawking feel, and how would the serious fan of Hawking feel, not knowing who any of those editors were and what THEIR credentials are? Bottomline, Colleges don’t accept Wiki. All I’m saying, I won’t use it again until its reputation changes. What everybody else does re: Wiki, is their business.

 

[phooney]

Kind of like the bible then?

 

[Texas_Roofer]

I don’t know why wiki validity is such an issue…

…Bottomline, Colleges don’t accept Wiki…

Having been on both sides of the college issue, the reason is anybody can make the original post, whether knowledgeable or not. So students are instructed to treat it at best as a search location. Items of interest must be verified by documented sources. We suggest peer review sources.

Now back to the subject of the thread

 

[ontologysue]

However, I don’t think one could seriously argue that there is no selective advantage in language.

Everything you argue about language, including the chimp examples, etc., have nothing to do with the current studies on human conceptual development, the most salient example of which, is language.

My golden retriever can notify his cousins that there’s food somewhere with the caveat that there’s some danger connected to it! I don’t mean to dismiss your examples, Phooney, but scientists are interested in the syntax of our language to which there are no evolutionary examples, the origin of words, their meanings, as Chomky calls it the syntactical rules. Concepts, the meaning of symbols; we know what we’re thinking about, we have awareness of our own reflection…all this is due to language.

Try to think about yourself, to reflect, without language. It’s impossible.

In quoting Dawkins on natural selection I was simply trying to illustrate that atheist scientists are as baffled by language and the mind as our theist scientists. If you want to argue that natural selection is demonstrated in human sytactical language, argue with him, not me.

Have you read any of Gerald Schroeder, ie, the Hidden Face of God or others? Amazingly, scientists who have long studied the Quantum universe of unpredictability are hypothesizing that there may be a “meta-physical” underlying “wisdom” or “information” if you prefer of which both the physical and meta-physical are “embedded.” Language is built around the ability to understand, to be aware. Scientists are now pondering the possibility that the brain may be a physical apparatus that gives us access to this underlying “information.”

As Schroeder tries to describe it: The physical organ of the brain may be only the circuitry that makes the mind humanly perceptible…a form of conscieousness may remain. Smash a radio and there’s no more music to be heard. But the raio waves are still out there. We just don’t have the apparatus to change the electromagnetic radiation into mechanical sound waves. The brain does for the mind what the radio does for music."

All the studies of anti-matter, dark matter, false vacuums, that are currently being considered to explain the cosmos and what lies behind the Big Bang, are all involved in the explanation of the meta physical. Materialism, reductionist or vitalist approaches are simply archaic. Only 4% of our universe is matter.

I am not a vitalist. My view of reality is limitless"intelligence." As Varghese says, “it manifests itself in animate and inanimate.”
Life, consciousness and mind are progressively advanced forms of this intelligence." Vitalists believe in a non-- physical force that is outside physical laws. That’s not my view.

In terms of absolutes, in science, or in personal character, I think you just can’t argue that seriously; nor has the history of philosophy or science tried to. Per Schroeder: Science itself originates from an absolute; that our minds can understand the world, the law of cause and effect. One can reject these principles but if he does, he can’t propose a scientific theory, much less accept one.

All of the science in quantum physics and cosmology support my thesis of reality consisting in a meta-physical reality, since the origin of life, language, self-consciousness, even the orgin of replication…evolution,(eg, natural selection can’t even begin until we understand how replication began; )reality (before) the Big Bang, the new understandings dealing with computer technology and information…look for all these in the next 20 years of science, and if you limit yourself to materialism you’ll be stuck in the 19th century!!

Merry Christmas!

 

[phooney]

@ontologysue

“Everything you argue about language, including the chimp examples, etc., have nothing to do with the current studies on human conceptual development, the most salient example of which, is language.”

Oh… my examples of basic language in the animal kingdom were irrelevant? I thought language was what we were talking about.

I haven’t read any studies about canine communication, but I find your example interesting as well. All the examples I gave aren’t possible without some kind of syntax. The origins of words, in our case, are simply sounds that we made.

“we know what we’re thinking about, we have awareness of our own reflection…all this is due to language.”

Do you think animals sit there, completely blank in their own minds, just like robots? Have you never seen your own Golden Retriever twitching in his/her own dreams? Are you unaware of experiements showing complex problem solving skills in animals to achieve various goals? Are you unaware of studies of social animals?

I’m sure we can both admit that there is always more we can read, but your claim that the origins of language are an unponderable problem seems very defeatist to me. By the way, Chimps also recognise themselves in reflections, and for your information they find seeing themselves wearing hats to be particularly amusing. So your argument that being able to know what we’re thinking about and being aware of our own reflection is either a non sequitor, or means that chimps have language. I’ll let you choose.

“In quoting Dawkins on natural selection I was simply trying to illustrate that atheist scientists are as baffled by language and the mind as our theist scientists. If you want to argue that natural selection is demonstrated in human sytactical language, argue with him, not me.”

You seem to be implying that I will value an atheist scientist’s viewpoint over any others, but that is simply not the case. I care more about the scientific method that ANY scientist uses, the observations taken and the evidence gained. Ken Miller, for example, is a wonderful populariser of evolution in my opinion, and he is a Roman Catholic. It seems we are at an impasse in regards to the Dawkins quotations anyway, I could also dig through a couple other books of his that I have, but I think we both know that no matter what he was saying about language, he certainly was not arguing that there was anything immaterial about its origins, and neither was Chomsky, these conclusions are purely of your own invention.

“Have you read any of Gerald Schroeder, ie, the Hidden Face of God or others?”

No I haven’t, any one particular book of his that you yourself would recommend? As I’m sure you can appreciate, there is already more than a lifetime of books I could read, so I do need to try to put some quality filters in what I spend my time reading! I also haven’t read that Lincoln Barnett book you mentioned, was it any good? I’m sure we can quote Einstein back and forth at each other for quite some time and perhaps not persuade each other about anything. Even though that is the case, and this is simply an appeal to authority, I’ll include a few more. These come from the God Delusion I think, and I apologise that this isn’t a less biased source, but I am not at home at the moment so don’t have access to all my books.

“I am a deeply religious nonbeliver. This is a somewhat new kind of religion.”
“The idea of a personal God is quite alien to me and seems even naive.”

As far as I can gather, Einstein should be classified as a Pantheist, in that the universe and the laws therein are “God” and he wasn’t above using poetic talk of spirits etc to bring some level of understanding of his physics to the masses.

“Amazingly, scientists who have long studied the Quantum universe of unpredictability are hypothesizing that there may be a “meta-physical” underlying “wisdom” or “information” if you prefer of which both the physical and meta-physical are “embedded.””

Fantastic! I am all for hypotheses, they are great. However, I consider a hypothesis to be merely a candidate for belief, and believing in an untested hypothesis is irrational and shows a great indifference to the reasonably commonplace goals of finding truth and avoiding error. In this thread I myself have given extremely brief descriptions of various hypotheses, some currently unproven, and some proven false. Without evidence for them, as I said, they cannot be anything more than plausible. To believe in such things without evidence and have them turn out to be true can be summed up as an unfathomably lucky guess with statistically unfavourable implications for future belief-forming processes.

 

[phooney]

So yes, we are all free to postulate hypotheses, but until there is a way of testing them, they are not scientific conclusions, and believe me, you have quite a task ahead of you against all scientific institutions if you want to argue that. That being the case, I think it would be reasonable for you to lower your professed level of certainty in such things, the facts do not currently support it.

“Only 4% of our universe is matter.”

But of course, “material” also encompasses such things as the anti-matter, dark matter, false vacuums etc.

“I am not a vitalist.”

Then drop the unfounded notion that there is an immaterial (again please don’t confuse this with abstract) aspect of the mind. The immaterial is not required to explain any of the issues you have raised.

“My view of reality is limitless"intelligence.”"

Really require more clarification as to what you mean by this, and how this “intelligence” interacts with anything that we can observe or measure, and thus know about at all.

“Science itself originates from an absolute; that our minds can understand the world, the law of cause and effect. One can reject these principles but if he does, he can’t propose a scientific theory, much less accept one.”

This is somewhat incoherent. We already know that our physical laws as we understand them break down at the planck time, how can anybody currently have the authority to say that the laws they choose are still valid “before” then? Again, at best, this is a hypothesis.

“All of the science in quantum physics and cosmology support my thesis of reality consisting in a meta-physical reality, since the origin of life, language, self-consciousness, even the orgin of replication…evolution,(eg, natural selection can’t even begin until we understand how replication began; )reality (before) the Big Bang, the new understandings dealing with computer technology and information”

Again, this is nonsensical, there is nothing here that requires anything immaterial to explain it. There are hypotheses or theories that deal with all of this, the ones you postulate remain untestable as far as I am aware. You certainly have not indicated otherwise, or offered anything falsifiable or evidence-based at all.

“…look for all these in the next 20 years of science, and if you limit yourself to materialism you’ll be stuck in the 19th century!!”

Believe me, I am on the edge of my seat! I look at all the things in history that have gone from completely unknowable to common knowledge and look at the explosion of discovery in the past couple of hundred years and I feel very lucky to be alive at this time. I’m not THAT keen to live in the 19th century, but it is certainly a fair bit more advanced than classical greece where you seem to be basing your idea of current scientific and philosophical conclusions and absolutes.

Merry Christmas to you as well!

 

[ontologysue]

So yes, we are all free to postulate hypotheses, but until there is a way of testing them, they are not scientific conclusions, and believe me, you have quite a task ahead of you against all scientific institutions if you want to argue that. That being the case, I think it would be reasonable for you to lower your professed level of certainty in such things, the facts do not currently support it.

“Only 4% of our universe is matter.”

But of course, “material” also encompasses such things as the anti-matter, dark matter, false vacuums etc.

“I am not a vitalist.”

Then drop the unfounded notion that there is an immaterial (again please don’t confuse this with abstract) aspect of the mind. The immaterial is not required to explain any of the issues you have raised.

“My view of reality is limitless"intelligence.”"

Really require more clarification as to what you mean by this, and how this “intelligence” interacts with anything that we can observe or measure, and thus know about at all.

“Science itself originates from an absolute; that our minds can understand the world, the law of cause and effect. One can reject these principles but if he does, he can’t propose a scientific theory, much less accept one.”

This is somewhat incoherent. We already know that our physical laws as we understand them break down at the planck time, how can anybody currently have the authority to say that the laws they choose are still valid “before” then? Again, at best, this is a hypothesis.

“All of the science in quantum physics and cosmology support my thesis of reality consisting in a meta-physical reality, since the origin of life, language, self-consciousness, even the orgin of replication…evolution,(eg, natural selection can’t even begin until we understand how replication began; )reality (before) the Big Bang, the new understandings dealing with computer technology and information”

Again, this is nonsensical, there is nothing here that requires anything immaterial to explain it. There are hypotheses or theories that deal with all of this, the ones you postulate remain untestable as far as I am aware. You certainly have not indicated otherwise, or offered anything falsifiable or evidence-based at all.

“…look for all these in the next 20 years of science, and if you limit yourself to materialism you’ll be stuck in the 19th century!!”

Believe me, I am on the edge of my seat! I look at all the things in history that have gone from completely unknowable to common knowledge and look at the explosion of discovery in the past couple of hundred years and I feel very lucky to be alive at this time. I’m not THAT keen to live in the 19th century, but it is certainly a fair bit more advanced than classical greece where you seem to be basing your idea of current scientific and philosophical conclusions and absolutes.

Merry Christmas to you as well!

I’ll get back to you Phooney, in the mean time, if you have a pet, dog, cat, something along those lines, you might ask them the meaning of life, since you seem to think their self-awareness and language is comparable with our own!

 

[phooney]

That’s a fine strawman you have there!

 

[Armor_of_God]

I can’t answer such a general question. Do you have a specific conflict which you would like to examine?

I was thinking along the line of various medical studies where the conclusions are contradictory. For example, one study says that certain foods are good for the heart while at the same time, another study says that they aren’t. I assume that they are subject to the same strict requirements of statistically sound scientific research, so why the difference?

 

[Armor_of_God]

I have seen people join a church and get some faith. Took a couple of weeks.

I have seen people become a doctor and get a Phd. Took hundreds of weeks, and there were fees to pay, and tests to take.

I am no expert, but you can see that anyone can get faith, the same group can get Phd’s. Why are so many **more **getting faith? Because it’s easier.

Many people struggle with faith their entire lives, and some only attain the “degree” on their deathbeds. There are many tests, and sometimes the price paid can be very great in a wordly sense.

 

[Armor_of_God]

Why don’t you show us how your faith is superior to reason. Use the computer, internet, and any other contributions of science and technology to do it, if you like.

Now, do you mean my faith, or do you mean my Faith?

 

[Armor_of_God]

You can presume that, and you may be right, but she doesn’t bully me, which is the key difference. Your imagined god fits the definition of bully MUCH better than a mere human could.

Your previous related post implied that the only reason someone would be motivated to do something good for someone is if they were bullied into it. My motivation for the things I do (and the things I aspire to do) is my love for God. Plain and simple - Love begets love.

 

[Socrates4Jesus]

@Socrates4Jesus

“I once had a conversation with a Mormon…”
“Reminds me of another conversation i had with a Mormon.”

I never realised I sounded so much like a Mormon!
…

LOL! Maybe you and future U.S. President wantabe Mit
Romney would hit it off?



mittromney.com/News/In-The-News/Mitt_Romney_2008x_Americaxs_First_Mormon_Presidentx_The_New_England_Republican_Who_Might_Make_It_So