Muhammed Ali

https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199556182.001.0001/acprof-9780199556182 https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/soul-hypothesis-9781441152244 And more than that.

Did they really change or did circumstances reveal their true weaknesses and flaws? Perhaps it is our criteria for making judgments that needs to be worked on? And maybe we have negative bias. I.e. we are focusing on the few that did disappoint instead of the many that don't change? I have rarely had to change my mind about a person that I regarded highly - except when I was much younger. I realized that we should not simply think well of a person that is religious, intelligent, knowledgeable, working in charity, active in the community etc. Humans have innate desires for God and thus even the corrupt would be religious. Others would do it for tribal reasons etc. A corrupt person is usually a mixture of good and bad, and not just a monolith of bad traits. So if we see a person doing charity work, it shouldn't make us think well of them if we see some troubling traits too. These are what people call red flags. Often such bad traits are the tip of the iceberg. What you see in open is worse in private (the opposite is also true for very good people that hide their deeds). In my humble opinion the most important traits we could look for in determining character are: Akhlaq (this doesn't mean simply being a 'nice' or polite person - it is an assessment of the nature of the person), conscientiousness, wisdom, being apologetic and open to changing their mind on even their strongly held views. When judging religiousness we should focus on the spiritual elements more than the rituals. And Allah knows better. Sorry for the careless wording in the post.

You rule out all possibility that an Imam {a} didn't narrate a 'sahih' hadith. How can you be sure that absolutely nothing went wrong in the transmission?

You give too much credence to solitary narrations. It's like gambling. I.e. too much at risk with evidence isn't strong enough. Within your framework (the science of ahadith etc) something is 'sahih' but what if the framework has flaws? And what about noise from randomness (even if the framework was perfect)? I am not referring to that hadith in specific, but your general approach.

This is why religions can be so dangerous. They make people do absurd things. Child sacrifice etc. I might be misunderstood.

Give me a couple of days please. I am sorry, I am very bad at responding to posts.

To be clear, I am not a liberal. If the point of having guns is to defend against a government then surely as a government becomes more powerful, the citizens need to own more powerful weapons to counter them. As another poster said, the citizens need to be as powerful as a government soldier. However if that were to happen you would have major problems in society. My point about civil war is also serious. You are speaking about a hypothetical tail event, e.g. attack from a government; however civil war is also a tail event. If guns supposedly will aid you with the former, they will destroy your society in the latter. The US is creeping towards it.

To clarify: It is not the view I hold. If we rely upon political leaders we will always be in a bad state. We have to improve (including empowerment) ourselves and also exert political pressure. The former should have priority over the latter.

Indeed it has been (given other compounding circumstances), but it doesn't take away from the fact that it has revealed how poor some people's decision making has been.

I am making a serious argument, at least give a serious rebuttal instead of accusations and mockery.

I can't say a lot about your country but does it not offer a means to select better candidates much before the election? We in the UK have a means to select candidates much earlier than the general election. But we end up choosing the wrong people. Our prime minister was chosen by ordinary people from a list of candidates in his party. And that list of people were chosen by people at local elections. We are at fault. Consider how many people actually believed that Corbyn was anti-Semitic. Doesn't that show you how ignorant the people were? You have seen it in your own country. And you have seen it with our extreme conspiracy friends on this forum. The fact that we end up with such bad candidates is a reflection of the people. You cannot expect good leaders to come about when the people are ignorant and negligent. Throughout the history of Islam we have seen how easily people are duped by bad leaders. Imam Ali {a} was appointed leader in front of about 100k people, yet some how Abu Bakr took power. The people were weak and disorganised. I am not saying people are incapable of ever making intelligent decisions in this context, nor am I calling them immoral to the extent of choosing such lousy leaders.

Your civil wars will be brutal. You would kill each other with heavy weaponry. Imagine a civil war in the UK compared to the USA. If the people are not smart enough to vote for good leaders, they are not smart enough to hold guns. The populace has already the means to change the leaders but they fail miserably.

The number has to be compared to how many your guns will help save against the state. So how many people will survive because your guns will keep you safe? If the US government decides to attack you, how many lives will you save with your guns? Also elaborate upon why and how the state may attack you. This will help us understand how your guns may be used.

What is the sword of the future? A WMD? A serious question. Do you think there should be a limit to how powerful a personal weapon should be? If there is a limit then how will you defend against the state (your guns are useless compared to what the state has. It's almost a redundant argument.)? If there is no limit then how will you keep the people safe?

I would rather live in a country where school children are not in danger of being killed by a crazy person with a gun.