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Research on Belief in God

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RetroActive said:
Sure but those myths contain concepts that baffle us to this day.

Hermes/Thoth/Odin/Buddha/Mercury, the mind.

What is so damn baffling? It's the eternal question of being over the unacceptability of extinction. Nature seemed to offered hope. Christianity though, ironically, unlike all the other pagan mystery religions, desacralized nature, while at the same momment drew from its principle of cyclical birth, death and renewal. At least that much is clear. The liturgical calendar speaks clearly of this.
 
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rhubroma said:
What is so damn baffling? It's the eternal question of being over the unacceptability of extinction. Nature seemed to offered hope. Christianity though, ironically, unlike all the other pagan mystery religions, desacralized nature, while at the same momment drew from its principle of cyclical birth, death and renewal. At least that much is clear. The liturgical calendar speaks clearly of this.

I was thinking more along the lines of consciousness, time, space etc.

"It's the eternal question of being over the unacceptability of extinction." In that case civilisation was probably a bad idea. I wouldn't place Christianity squarely in the bull's eye for that necessarily. There was already a desert that man created in the ME before Christianity entered the frame. The more we learn about nature the more we exploit and abuse her certainly.
 
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aphronesis said:
I think Rhub was hewing to a more metaphysical line, but you may find that this book answers some of your questions and sorts out the move from a particular individual to a discursive field of symbols that come to occupy different roles as they move through the centuries.

More generally, although not the only book on the subject by any means, its approach does much to clear up many of the less interesting binaries that were being tossed around a few days ago: church/state, laws/values, sacred/secular etc.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Kingdom-Glory-Theological-Government/dp/0804760160

Cheers. +++
 
rhubroma said:
Listen, I chalk this all up to human prepotency and the fact that left in a natural state we are all basically egoists.

FINALLY !! Thanks for finally giving me the credit that I deserve and admitting what I've kept saying for years and years.

The atheist doctrine is the belief that we are all basically egoists but apparently when you say it it does not shock anybody while when I say it ... wow. :D
 
Echoes said:
FINALLY !! Thanks for finally giving me the credit that I deserve and admitting what I've kept saying for years and years.

The atheist doctrine is the belief that we are all basically egoists but apparently when you say it it does not shock anybody while when I say it ... wow. :D

I haven't had the pleasure to discover your complete set of beliefs, but from what I have seen you tend to believe that those that aren't religious are, by definition, egoists, but that those who are religious are not egoists.

What is generally shocking are your blanket judgments about those who don't share your beliefs. Rhubroma was making a statement about the entirely of mankind, not one select group that does or doesn't believe in the same things as himself.
 
Echoes also believes that Saddam Hussein and Bashir Assad are heroes of the human race and unashamedly calls Putin the greatest man alive.

That aside from the laughable pseudo historical comments made here about how racism was a 19th century atheist invention and all the rest.

and on cycling his constant blanket ryo like statements about how only he knows anything about cycling and everyone else is a "bore de france" fanboy

With these things in mind I don't think these " discussions", will get very far.
 
Echoes said:
FINALLY !! Thanks for finally giving me the credit that I deserve and admitting what I've kept saying for years and years.

The atheist doctrine is the belief that we are all basically egoists but apparently when you say it it does not shock anybody while when I say it ... wow. :D

How is not being a believer tantamount to being an egoist? This is pure and utter nonsense and rather insulting as well.

I have met many so called Christians who are egotistical in the fullest and hypocritical with it, while non-believers who have more concern for their fellow humanity and nature than most.

Naturally you can make the same observation in the opposite sense, but that's not the point. The point is, given the lay culture we have, the religious cannot presume to hold a monopoly on ethical behavior, nor compassion, nor solidarity. In fact many behave with appalling hypocrisy in trouncing upon every virtue their faith preaches, while at once condemning those who do not abide.

Furthermore you seem to think that in the absence of faith and religion, humans are like depraved and wild animals, without any conscience of virtue and vice, right and wrong in civil relations and beholden only to a vapid self-interest. Have you any idea of the arrogance behind such thinking? At any rate, there are the secular laws to maintain civic behavior among individuals in society, while all one really needs to behave ethically is basic awareness that my freedom ends where another’s begins. Belief in God is not a prerequisite of this though.
 
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hrotha said:
Well, I still disagree. Humans are social animals. You can only get away with being selfish so much before you're kicked out of the pack.

Or they form their own pack, call them the uber wealthy. 10 Mansions, 15 yachts, 5 private jets, more is never enough for some people.
 
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Just a brief look at the thread so far.

Readings from rhuberome and retro active, quotes of the thread

Comments by me.

“ principium universitatis, in the Thomist sense” A good education?

“Philosophical materialism has become obese and is ready for a heart attack too”

More paralysis less analysis?

“The best moments I've ever experienced transcended reason. I'm really struggling to grasp where you're at.”

Your disappearing into each others intellectual parameters?

“Throw in the Chaldeans and Hyksos among many other Semetic tribes and the question of who the Jews were gets more interesting”.

The thread heading is “does god exist” framed as a poll :confused:.

“The more we learn about nature the more we exploit and abuse her certainly.”

Oh dear, knowledge is power, power corrupts. “I did it because I could” theorem.

“Furthermore you seem to think that in the absence of faith and religion, humans are like depraved and wild animals, without any conscience of virtue and vice, right and wrong in civil relations and beholden only to a vapid self-interest”.

Well, this is what the Pope thinks, take away religion and we descend into a pit of nihilistic despair.

“Your an intriguing fellow” I think this means you like each other.

"In fact incipient Christianity is Greek, not Hebrew, in both its etymological and cultural parameters." Origins of racism?

Have you ever studied Pythagoras at all rhub.? I'm taking a guess you both have...

“My head hurts”. Looks like you finally done each other over, intellectually speaking!

:rolleyes:

God alive! (no pun intended). This forum is extravagantly bipolar in nature, it swings like a pendulum from the sublime to the ridiculous or to put it another way from an intellectual quagmire to inane troll-dome. With little betwixt.
 
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horsinabout said:
Just a brief look at the thread so far.

Readings from rhuberome and retro active, quotes of the thread

Comments by me.

“ principium universitatis, in the Thomist sense” A good education?

“Philosophical materialism has become obese and is ready for a heart attack too”

More paralysis less analysis?

“The best moments I've ever experienced transcended reason. I'm really struggling to grasp where you're at.”

Your disappearing into each others intellectual parameters?

“Throw in the Chaldeans and Hyksos among many other Semetic tribes and the question of who the Jews were gets more interesting”.

The thread heading is “does god exist” framed as a poll :confused:.

“The more we learn about nature the more we exploit and abuse her certainly.”

Oh dear, knowledge is power, power corrupts. “I did it because I could” theorem.

“Furthermore you seem to think that in the absence of faith and religion, humans are like depraved and wild animals, without any conscience of virtue and vice, right and wrong in civil relations and beholden only to a vapid self-interest”.

Well, this is what the Pope thinks, take away religion and we descend into a pit of nihilistic despair.

“Your an intriguing fellow” I think this means you like each other.

"In fact incipient Christianity is Greek, not Hebrew, in both its etymological and cultural parameters." Origins of racism?

Have you ever studied Pythagoras at all rhub.? I'm taking a guess you both have...

“My head hurts”. Looks like you finally done each other over, intellectually speaking!

:rolleyes:

God alive! (no pun intended). This forum is extravagantly bipolar in nature, it swings like a pendulum from the sublime to the ridiculous or to put it another way from an intellectual quagmire to inane troll-dome. With little betwixt.

What on earth is going on! The problem remains the same: ignorance. I think we actually have more agreement than disagreement. We'd at least agree on nature, otium and wine.:cool: ...and that this human circumstance is fubar.
Does consciousness create matter or does matter create consciousness, 21st century "does God exist?".
Philosophy moves on though...
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/postmodernism/
"That postmodernism is indefinable is a truism." Prepare to be baffled by bullsh*t about how we're baffling eachother with bullsh*t.
I have better things to do, like the dishes.:)
 
horsinabout said:
Just a brief look at the thread so far.

Readings from rhuberome and retro active, quotes of the thread

Comments by me.

“ principium universitatis, in the Thomist sense” A good education?

:rolleyes:

God alive! (no pun intended). This forum is extravagantly bipolar in nature, it swings like a pendulum from the sublime to the ridiculous or to put it another way from an intellectual quagmire to inane troll-dome. With little betwixt.

Good education? Well, no, though I was just pointing to an argument. At any rate the bipolarity of this thread was a foregone conclusion, no?

On that, and in fraternal alliance with Retro, I shall have a glass of wine.

PS: In regards to what this current pope thinks, no. In la Repubblica there has been an ongoing open discussion between Pope Francis and the athiest Italian intellectual, Eugenio Scalfari, and the results have been surprising from the leader of the Catholic Church's point of view.
 
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rhubroma said:
Good education? Well, no, though I was just pointing to an argument. At any rate the bipolarity of this thread was a foregone conclusion, no?

On that, and in fraternal alliance with Retro, I shall have a glass of wine.

Sante! (I'm on the coffee shift but I'll catch up to you).
 
RetroActive said:
What on earth is going on! The problem remains the same: ignorance. I think we actually have more agreement than disagreement. We'd at least agree on nature, otium and wine.:cool: ...and that this human circumstance is fubar.
Does consciousness create matter or does matter create consciousness, 21st century "does God exist?".
Philosophy moves on though...
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/postmodernism/
"That postmodernism is indefinable is a truism." Prepare to be baffled by bullsh*t about how we're baffling eachother with bullsh*t.
I have better things to do, like the dishes.:)

Oh though art so passé, for we've already arrived at post-postmodernism in case you hadn't noticed.
 
rhubroma said:
How is not being a believer tantamount to being an egoist? This is pure and utter nonsense and rather insulting as well.

You said it yourself ! In a natural state we are all "egoists". I used the word 'individualist'.

If in a natural state we are all individualists, then the sociability would obviously lie in the supernatural.

God = Humanity, okay?

I don't even see what is so insulting about this. Usually individualists assume it perfectly.

Besides if you are talking of "so-called" religious people, that means they are NOT religious people because they are only "so-called". Religion remains the same whatever the culture. You can't adapt it to the evolution of time. That's what the Church did during the Vatican II Council, which means that the Church is no longer the Church. The religion however always remains the same !!

My belief is certainly more than just "my freedom stops where others' freedom start", which is just the liberal project in itself very hard to accept for some. My belief is that anyone should be able to have a decent living (access to decent housing, property, healthcare, instruction, etc.)
 
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rhubroma said:
Oh though art so passé, for we've already arrived at post-postmodernism in case you hadn't noticed.

Oh nose, what am I missing? I was reading some of this sort of thing a couple weeks ago: http://www.socialresearchmethods.net/kb/positvsm.php

There's some sort of full circle going on here.:)

I can appreciate all this to the degree that my unrefined intellect allows. I'm the sort that would rather be told yellow and blue make green and be allowed the freedom to play with it on my own as opposed to having someone pontificate ad naseum about all the variations of green and the oh so subtle distinctions, with a test at the end.

Just smart enough to drive myself crazy and certainly dumb enough not to know how to make it stop.

I prefer the larger framework of nature as a whole to the framework of ourselves. How many ways can you say neurosis?:p ...but what does that actually mean? Yes, but what does that actually mean? lmao. It means winter is coming and you better have stored enough food.
 
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rhubroma said:
Good education? Well, no, though I was just pointing to an argument. At any rate the bipolarity of this thread was a foregone conclusion, no?

On that, and in fraternal alliance with Retro, I shall have a glass of wine.

PS: In regards to what this current pope thinks, no. In la Repubblica there has been an ongoing open discussion between Pope Francis and the athiest Italian intellectual, Eugenio Scalfari, and the results have been surprising from the leader of the Catholic Church's point of view.

Well I refer you to the last Pope, the one that broke eticate and retired.

Cheers

RetroActive said:
What on earth is going on! The problem remains the same: ignorance. I think we actually have more agreement than disagreement. We'd at least agree on nature, otium and wine.:cool: ...and that this human circumstance is fubar.
Does consciousness create matter or does matter create consciousness, 21st century "does God exist?".
Philosophy moves on though...
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/postmodernism/
"That postmodernism is indefinable is a truism." Prepare to be baffled by bullsh*t about how we're baffling eachother with bullsh*t.
I have better things to do, like the dishes.:)

In my musings, I think matter and consciousness evolved...together over many millions of years that human's can barely comprehend.
But I do agree on pastime and wine. I am from the school of auto-didactic learning, not ignorance I hope. As the human condition is indeed fubar and hopelessly unequal it is advised that one must try to abstain from value judgements on this issue.

Does God exist? well as God is in all probability man made then (he) in the masculine exists because we do! Man's alter ego perhaps?
Thanks for the link I will read it in my otium time and get bored with Plato.

"That postmodernism is indefinable is a truism." Meaning we don't know sh$t yet.

You two are starting to scare me....go easy. As I said I am an auto didactic not and intellectual.

Cheers!
 
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horsinabout said:
Well I refer you to the last Pope, the one that broke eticate and retired.

Cheers



In my musings, I think matter and consciousness evolved...together over many millions of years that human's can barely comprehend.
But I do agree on pastime and wine. I am from the school of auto-didactic learning, not ignorance I hope. As the human condition is indeed fubar and hopelessly unequal it is advised that one must try to abstain from value judgements on this issue.Does God exist? well as God is in all probability man made then (he) in the masculine exists because we do! Man's alter ego perhaps?
Thanks for the link I will read it in my otium time and get bored with Plato.

"That postmodernism is indefinable is a truism." Meaning we don't know sh$t yet.

You two are starting to scare me....go easy. As I said I am an auto didactic not and intellectual.

Cheers!

I think you misunderstood what I meant by ignorance. Why are we here? Who am I? We appear to have a choice, within limited parameters, to answer these things for ourselves. We need a good narrative, we really don't have one so it's a cluster****.

The really scary part is that there are millions of "Christians" waiting for a man to literally appear in the sky and think they're literally going to float up in the air and meet him.:eek: Then there are "Muslims" that think they're going to have 72 virgins in paradise...It takes 72 years for the sun to move 1 degree in the precession of the zodiac and in the annual cycle Sirius moves below the horizon for 70 days. Thus the 72 names of God (there are number/letter games this refers to as well), 72 virgins. This is what I was meaning when I said we need to reclaim our heritage. We'll never convince people there's no God but at least there's a very slight chance the way they interpret their books could be reformed/informed closer to the original intent. They might realise there's not much to fight over and possibly they'd ask better questions.
 
Echoes said:
You said it yourself ! In a natural state we are all "egoists". I used the word 'individualist'.

If in a natural state we are all individualists, then the sociability would obviously lie in the supernatural.

God = Humanity, okay?

I don't even see what is so insulting about this. Usually individualists assume it perfectly.

Besides if you are talking of "so-called" religious people, that means they are NOT religious people because they are only "so-called". Religion remains the same whatever the culture. You can't adapt it to the evolution of time. That's what the Church did during the Vatican II Council, which means that the Church is no longer the Church. The religion however always remains the same !!

My belief is certainly more than just "my freedom stops where others' freedom start", which is just the liberal project in itself very hard to accept for some. My belief is that anyone should be able to have a decent living (access to decent housing, property, healthcare, instruction, etc.)

Yours is a world in constant fear of death. Though what did your faith do, historically, to assist to a decent living to everyone? Don't tell me it was "blessed are the poor, for they are God's children."
 
RetroActive said:
Oh nose, what am I missing? I was reading some of this sort of thing a couple weeks ago: http://www.socialresearchmethods.net/kb/positvsm.php

There's some sort of full circle going on here.:)

I can appreciate all this to the degree that my unrefined intellect allows. I'm the sort that would rather be told yellow and blue make green and be allowed the freedom to play with it on my own as opposed to having someone pontificate ad naseum about all the variations of green and the oh so subtle distinctions, with a test at the end.

Just smart enough to drive myself crazy and certainly dumb enough not to know how to make it stop.

I prefer the larger framework of nature as a whole to the framework of ourselves. How many ways can you say neurosis?:p ...but what does that actually mean? Yes, but what does that actually mean? lmao. It means winter is coming and you better have stored enough food.

Deconstruction usually leads back to the canon, though don't fret over it as much as you appear to be doing.
 
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rhubroma said:
Deconstruction usually leads back to the canon, though don't fret over it as much as you appear to be doing.

I usually wind up with a smile on my face in short order. The war drumbs can get me going though. Dumb and dumber...

A mathematician trying to explain the theory of the big bang ("give me one free miracle") to a sceptical lawyer (Thick target and viscount aero, begins around page 3):http://www.thunderbolts.info/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=14517 :D

Really cracks me up.
 
RetroActive said:
I usually wind up with a smile on my face in short order. The war drumbs can get me going though. Dumb and dumber...

A mathematician trying to explain the theory of the big bang ("give me one free miracle") to a sceptical lawyer (Thick target and viscount aero, begins around page 3):http://www.thunderbolts.info/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=14517 :D

Really cracks me up.

This is why Enrico Fermi was the Pope, while Ettore Majorana the Grand Inquisitor, other than war drums.

It's all just Greek to me.
 

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