Frustration building...

Any college student who chooses a major based on his perception of its difficulty SHOULD NOT PURSUE HIGHER EDUCATION.

-all majors are difficult if you really put yourself into it. If you are just looking to "graduate college as easily and as quickly as possible" then do yourself, your parents, your possible future professors, TAs, and fellow undergrads a favor and re-analyze your decision to go to college.

Any college student who fears having to deal with "a lot of memorization" SHOULD RE-EVALUATE THEIR DEFINITION OF LEARNING.

-what's the difference between memorizing and remembering? What's the difference between remembering and learning? I know what the differences are to me, I've known since I started high school. That's how I've managed to go through the past 11 years of schooling without memorizing ANYTHING.

If you make a claim based on no shared evidence and someone else refutes your claim you cannot require the refuter to come up with evidence against your claim. THE BURDEN OF PROOF RESTS ON THE PERSON MAKING THE UN-EVIDENCED CLAIM.

-too many times I've heard religious faithfuls ask "rationals" to come up with proof for the un-existence of God. Unfortunately, that doesn't make much sense. Observe the absurdity of the following conversation.

Person 1: I believe that I have two pairs of lungs, but one of the pairs is incorporeal, unable to be x-rayed or MRIed or touched with human hands.
Person 2: I think you are misguided - you do not have two pairs of lungs.
Person 1: Prove it!

If person 1 is fair in his demand, then it is now person 2's job to prove that person 1 does not have a second incorporeal set of lungs. Unfortunately, due to the very nature of this pair of lungs, Person 2 will not likely come up with proof. Does this mean we are to believe that the claim of person 1's second set of lungs is true?

According to many many many folks, who don't think about stuff before they are interviewed on television, yes.

============ Rant ==================

Now I don't like to get involved in arguments about religion for many many many reasons.
The problem is that when I hear arguments between a religious faithful and a "rational" I often find major logical faults, or scientific inaccuracies/misunderstandings with the arguments made by the faithful. Similarly, I tend to have a major problem with the method that the "rational" employs to make their point. So I get angry (or involved) because most of these discussions/debates become intellectually fruitless.

In the above paragraph, by the way, "rational" is in quotes because I do want to make clear that "rational" in this sense is meant to be someone who has applied logic to his belief system without appealing to the supernatural. "rationals" might not be rational in the sense that they often get involved in religious debates with poor purpose or goal. Many such supporters of atheism feel that the goal of this discourse should be to "eradicate religion" and they do this by ridiculous tactics such as trying to show how stupid the opposition's argument is.

The goal, I think, should be for both parties, though one at a time, to incrementally build an understanding from the smallest claims that they can agree on. That way, the most basic disagreements can be identified, targeted, and resolved or noted. I've seen this type of debate happen twice before, both people keeping calm and rational, tempers unflaired.

Ultimately both of these debates ended with the rational "rational" conceding that there was no proof that a god didn't exist but believing that it was irrational to suppose one does exists, and the religious faithful conceding that the only thing they had to sustain their belief system was faith and personal experience but believing that this was more than enough to stick to their convictions.

This is a good resolution to expect because

A: the goal of the "rational" should be to make sure that everyone is using a fair and logical system to evaluate claims such as "you must prove to me that vishnu does not exist" and not to claim that the religious faithful is simply wrong. History has shown that only mass murder/extinction or the encroachment of a new idea can effectively eliminate a belief system (see the greeks or mayans for examples of these). If one really wishes to see religion disappear, one has to replace it with something really good and let time do its work (because no one should be murdering anyone). Maybe logic and compassion is enough as a replacement, but we'll never know if one side is constantly belittling or bullying the other.

B: the religious faithful should truly examine their own belief system and make sure that their comprehension of it is not simply a result of indoctrination and simply going along with the motions. If one believes something because of the joy in their heart or the personal miracles they experience, that is fine. But this is a personal belief and one has to really think about and understand the way that it should or shouldn't be applied to the rest of the world with respect to prostelatizing, relying on prayer, making laws about stem cell research, and teaching our children (especially those who don't share that belief system) about the world.

The end