Welcome to
Science a GoGo's
Discussion Forums
Please keep your postings on-topic or they will be moved to a galaxy far, far away.
Your use of this forum indicates your agreement to our terms of use.
So that we remain spam-free, please note that all posts by new users are moderated.


The Forums
General Science Talk        Not-Quite-Science        Climate Change Discussion        Physics Forum        Science Fiction

Who's Online Now
0 members (), 181 guests, and 2 robots.
Key: Admin, Global Mod, Mod
Latest Posts
Top Posters(30 Days)
Previous Thread
Next Thread
Print Thread
Page 43 of 120 1 2 41 42 43 44 45 119 120
Joined: Jun 2008
Posts: 1,249
T
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
T
Joined: Jun 2008
Posts: 1,249
Quote:
Posters: Can anyone explain to me what the above ambivalent, convoluted, personal and sermon-like comments have to do with the topic?

BTW, I have no objection to having a thread for personal and sermon-like comments, where anyone who chooses to do so can have a go.

BTW, I confess that I, too, can sometimes slip into being personal and can be a sermonizer. Anyone, just let me know if I offend. I will gladly apologize and work to do better. Nameste!


Namaste...Now there"s a word we can work with. "I see/recognise the God in You."
You seem to be having trouble with that when it comes to being a victim to circumstance.

You made exactly the same plea for help in the thread "Reinventing the Sacred".

The Plea you are making has everything to do with you and with the topic.

You see it as ambivalent, convoluted, personal and sermon-like. When I made a comment to your post, your wrote:
Quote:
Not being in the blame-and-judgment game, I will leave it there and go on to other things.

Is your comment (in your opinion) the blame and judgment game, or is your comment a different kind of comment?

And yes you are a sermonizer as you stated, but you can't help yourself, and I don't have any bad feelings nor is it confusing. It makes perfect sense.

And by the way we're still on Topic, this has to do with religions/sermons, philosophy...etc.

Last edited by Tutor Turtle; 07/25/08 08:36 PM.

I was addicted to the Hokey Pokey, but then I turned myself around!!




.
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 2,311
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 2,311
I have no problem with the concept "nameste". I have been comfortable with it since I was a student in the 40's-50's. When I started lectures in pneumatology, in 1964, I began teaching, and preaching about, the concept, openly. I consider nameste and the concepts withing pneumatology part of my philosophy of religion and, therefore, very much on topic.


G~O~D--Now & ForeverIS:Nature, Nurture & PNEUMA-ture, Thanks to Warren Farr&ME AT www.unitheist.org
Joined: Jun 2008
Posts: 1,249
T
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
T
Joined: Jun 2008
Posts: 1,249


Quote:
I have no problem with the concept "nameste". I have been comfortable with it since I was a student in the 40's-50's. When I started lectures in pneumatology, in 1964, I began teaching, and preaching about, the concept, openly. I consider nameste and the concepts withing pneumatology part of my philosophy of religion and, therefore, very much on topic.
I didn't say you had a problem with imagining the concept, only fitting the personally imagined concept into the reality of God as your experience.


I was addicted to the Hokey Pokey, but then I turned myself around!!




Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 1,490
E
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
E
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 1,490
TT said to Rev:
"I didn't say you had a problem with imagining the concept, only fitting the personally imagined concept into the reality of God as your experience."

---and whilst, in this case, I agree with the statement, I do also think that this is precisely what both believer and non-believers do by dialogue with others of different views. There will always be a gap between expectation and experience, and it is by exploring that gap that we develop our points of view. That is why it usually is best to not be too didactic.

Joined: Jun 2008
Posts: 1,249
T
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
T
Joined: Jun 2008
Posts: 1,249
I often find that when making statements, whether from personal experience or from conceptual imagery, if someone isn't in the mood to accept an opinion or comment that they can turn on you by making claims that you are preaching.
There is no cure for misinterpretation of intention or interest. One can continue forward or make a decision to compromise themselves in favor of negative criticism and the lack of comprehension.
Making apologies for someones inability to comprehend a situation is to me a compromise. Fearing to express ones self due to the teetering intelligence of codependent dysfunctionalism is not compassion, but more of a psychosis.


I was addicted to the Hokey Pokey, but then I turned myself around!!




Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 2,311
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 2,311
Originally Posted By: Ellis
... That is why it usually is best to not be too didactic.
Didactic. Ah yes, the inclination to want to instruct others--being teacherlike--is best avoided.

Thanks for your instruction, Ellis! laugh

But seriously, I agree with you. This is why, whenever I am tempted to be didactic, I like to preface my remarks with, "in my opinion..." (IMO).

Joined: Jun 2008
Posts: 1,249
T
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
T
Joined: Jun 2008
Posts: 1,249
Quote:
This is why, whenever I am tempted to be didactic, I like to preface my remarks with, "in my opinion..." (IMO).

I was always under the assumption that people were intelligent enough to validate information by personal experience, leaving all expression of experience free from preventive exorcism to ward off the evil spirits.

Last edited by Tutor Turtle; 07/26/08 06:58 AM.

I was addicted to the Hokey Pokey, but then I turned myself around!!




Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 1,490
E
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
E
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 1,490
Didactic def.2.
"Having a tendency to teach in autoritorian manner."

----which was what I was "suggesting" -(suggesting could never be an authoritarian mode of instruction) was not a good idea- and in this case it was used correctly by me regarding grammar.

Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 2,311
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 2,311
Ellis, as your last post wisely suggests: Being authoritarian is not a good way to teach anything, no matter how learned the teacher, or how valuable the subject.

Good teachers are ones who "know themselves" and help students know themselves, and to think for themselves. Thus they usually dialogue with their students, not dictate to them.

I am reminded of the Dialogues of Plato, which are all about what it means to:
KNOW THYSELF
http://plato-dialogues.org/plato.htm

A
Anonymous
Unregistered
Anonymous
Unregistered
A
Hey there. I'm new.
I believe that there is a "God" - if you will.
You know, an intelligent being that is immaterial.
This universe... "Why is there something instead of nothing?"
I mean, where did all this physical stuff come from?
Unified field theory has stated that space-time is an
illusion, and that everything is still touching. BUT,
we perceive from our senses that there are separate objects.
Sensory experience can be tricky. Cultures used to think that
the world was flat you know - because they believed their eyes.
Although, I do not want to follow any religion.

A
Anonymous
Unregistered
Anonymous
Unregistered
A
Religion can parade evil in a suit of good.
Religion has done many unethical things to
further it's agenda in the NAME OF GOD! Right...
Ok then, so shall we as people start taking the
authority as truth, instead of truth as the authority?
I think there are ways to KNOW the answers to 'life as
we know it'. The answers are there, here, everywhere.

Hard science can be extremely biased, since the more
objective that science gets can be the more subjective
that it gets in many experiments, mainly due to what
quantum physic's paradigms convey. For a good book on
non-physical things affecting physical things, I suggest
'The Hidden Messages in Water' by Masaru Emoto.

Science continues to attempt to map out the world with
our senses - of which an average person can receive about
ONE-BILLIONTH of the stimuli available to our senses.

Joined: Jun 2008
Posts: 1,249
T
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
T
Joined: Jun 2008
Posts: 1,249
So would you like to make your thoughts and ideas another religion or are you speaking out against religion as your thoughts and ideas?
Relative truths often find their way into becoming beliefs and religion. Truth beyond relative measure can only be described in relative terms that are the nature of duality and wandering levels of comprehension and sensibility.


I was addicted to the Hokey Pokey, but then I turned myself around!!




Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 2,311
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 2,311
Anon 1, and 2: Welcome!

We all want you to enjoy your experience with us. Presuming you are familiar with how this system works, feel free to send any of us a PM, if you have any questions. smile
WELCOME!!! And let no one put you down, OK? But be prepared to dialogue and be fair in your comments. Oh, BTW, the moderators are very fair, and supportive.


Last edited by Revlgking; 08/02/08 02:46 AM.

G~O~D--Now & ForeverIS:Nature, Nurture & PNEUMA-ture, Thanks to Warren Farr&ME AT www.unitheist.org
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 2,311
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 2,311
To get the joke, below, and the serious point which follows, one needs to know that we Canadians have the reputation for ending many of our comments, especially ones to which we seek a response, with the interjection-like question, eh?

We also like to compare ourselves with our American cousins. Naturally, we modestly boast about our accomplishments, like the telephone, radio with a voice, credit unions, Medicare, etc. But, most of all we love to bitch and whine about what we feel is unfair in our dealings with one another, whether it is true, or not.

Meanwhile, the East, which includes French-speaking Quebec, and the West, which includes British Columbia (my daughter lives here) and the prairie provinces (a sister lives here), are held together by a common feeling of--well you name it--for the central province of Ontario, includes Ottawa (our capital), and Toronto (capital of southern Ontario). We, my wife and I, my son and his family, live, happily, near Toronto.

Ontario, Canada's second largest province (in area) and the centre of manufacturing in Canada, is next to and just west of, Quebec. It is supposed to be one province--much larger, in area (412,000 square miles), than Texas (267,000 square miles)--but Northern Ontarians often feel more akin to the Manitobans, in the west, or to its northern Quebec area, in the east.

And let us not forget that there are vast areas with all kinds of natural resources (water, minerals, oil and gas, etc) in an area stretching from east to west to the North Pole.
=================================
HERE IS THE JOKE
One night, God listened to a certain lugubrious Canadian--who was, ironically, often also ludicrous--saying his prayers, which were filled with lots of whining "ehs?".

When he finished, God asked him, "Why are you Canadians always so down on yourselves? You live in one of the best countries of the world and yet you seem to love to wallow in bad news. And you are always asking me questions like, why me, God?"

The Canadian said, "Don't you understand, it is because most of us are practical eh?theists..."

Atheists? shocked If you're an atheist, why are you saying your prayers then?", God asked, in a state of shock.

"No, I am not an atheist. Here, let me write it for you...EH?theist...There, see that? We may be whiners, but at least we have faith enough to think that you just might be there, or here, or both ... eh?

"I get it." God said, with a smile and a laugh

"I also get the hint. You want answers, and not just ones filled with a lot of doom and gloom, the kind which, too often, make the lead stories in all the media. I must say that there are times when even I question which side they are on. Yeah, they alway argue that they have to cover all the news--the good and the bad--and be as objective about it as possible. Give me a break!
They remind me of the prophets of doom and gloom, especially that Jeremiah. Perhaps I need to tell them to cut it out.

Oh, Me! Oh, My! Jeremiah's book of LAMENTATIONS reads like he was the city editor of the Jerusalem Times, in 586 BCE. It is full of so much bad news.

"Yea! You're really the one with all the answers, aren't you? If so, now that we have the Internet, why don't you set up your own Web Pages and give us the truth as you know it. I for one will be all ears. You obviously know that I did some work in the media, eh?.

God said, "That's not a bad idea. Maybe it is time for me, using the Internet--web cams and all--to call together all the social leaders of the world--political, business and religious leaders, media moguls, educationalists, economists, unionists, philosophers, scientists, and the like, and put them together with all who claim to speak for me--all the synagogue, mosque, temple and church leaders.

Maybe they will be able hammer out a ... well let's go into such details at another time

"BTW, God," I have one final question, for now: "Where the #@%&^ are you speaking from, anyway? Or should I ask, eh?"

============================
As the Canadian walked away from his prayers--I mean, conversation with God--he thought to himself: I agree, we do need a new philosophy of theology, God and religion. I wonder what He...Or is it She?--has in mind? Perhaps the new thread will reveal it, eh?.


G~O~D--Now & ForeverIS:Nature, Nurture & PNEUMA-ture, Thanks to Warren Farr&ME AT www.unitheist.org
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 2,311
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 2,311
MY LAST POST TO THIS THREAD
===========================
As most of you know, by now, I started this thread Feb.2, 2007, using the name, Turner--my son's name. He is will be 50, next December.
Here is the first response. It was by
Quote:
DA Morgan, Registered: Sun Oct 17 2004
Posts: 1311
Loc: Seattle, WA
Philosophy of religion?

My philosophy is that there are two types of religion. One in which people have personal belief systems both moral/ethical and with respect to the nature of reality and their environment and the good sense and culture to treasure them as personal beliefs.

And then there are those who are self-annointed, self-righteous hypocrites that use people's inate "need" to know the answers to life's big questions to parasitize them for their personal financial gain.

Just once I'd like to find someone publicly proclaiming they have all of the answers with one hand who isn't holding out the other hand asking for money and the power to offer up advice on how you could improve yourself if you just did what they want you to do.

Let me give you a perfect example. We have a troll here in this group selling fuzzy thinking and vague ideas, on subjects of which he is truly as ignorant as my cat. He tries to quote authorless scripture he has never read with one hand while asking for money with the other.

And anyone who actually looks into the so-called Reverend's background quickly discovers that his actual skill set is as a hypnotherapist (well if that doesn't qualify him to speak about and for god I can't imagine what would).
That was Fri., Feb 02 2007.
Dam it!

Over 405,000 clicks later, I kinda wish that DAM had stayed with this thread. I was stimulated by his charming way of greeting new posters smile Regretfully, without having a DAM, here we are well over a year later.

========================================

But seriously, we need a philosophy of theology with a sense of humour, eh?

Let's give thanks to the gods, God, G?d, G-d, G$d, or GOD, whatever, for good humour. And for a theology which is not afraid to poke fun at itself, or to question Him? Or is it Her? smile

BTW, you secular atheists are free to call him/her "Nature". I am interested in knowing: Do you find it easy to deny there is such a thing as "Nature"? Go ahead, I dare you! smile

Me? I rather like the all-inclusive, "GŲD", as in my signature, if you know what I mean.
=====================
Meanwhile, if there are those who want to continue with this thread without my being directly involved--unless invited to answer questions--feel free to do so.

However, I will be carrying on--as long as there is an interest--in the latest thread: PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION--MINE, YOURS AND OURS...
As always, this new thread is not set up as debate; it is about dialogue and our reaching loving consensus.



G~O~D--Now & ForeverIS:Nature, Nurture & PNEUMA-ture, Thanks to Warren Farr&ME AT www.unitheist.org
Joined: Oct 2008
Posts: 12
L
Junior Member
Offline
Junior Member
L
Joined: Oct 2008
Posts: 12
I believe spirituality is when people have personal belief systems both moral/ethical and with respect to the nature of reality and their environment and the good sense and culture to treasure them as personal beliefs.

On the other hand religon is the desire to control people by manipulating their spirituality.

The garden of eden is a perfect image of manipulation and control through the principle of first, with holding knowledge, second, invoking fear and manufacturing guilt from meaningless associations. Thereby third, punishment is accepted and control relinquished.


Toggleit
Joined: Jun 2008
Posts: 1,249
T
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
T
Joined: Jun 2008
Posts: 1,249
Originally Posted By: lehe
I believe spirituality is when people have personal belief systems both moral/ethical and with respect to the nature of reality and their environment and the good sense and culture to treasure them as personal beliefs.

On the other hand religon is the desire to control people by manipulating their spirituality.

The garden of eden is a perfect image of manipulation and control through the principle of first, with holding knowledge, second, invoking fear and manufacturing guilt from meaningless associations. Thereby third, punishment is accepted and control relinquished.

People don't just become manipulated without first, stepping out from their own cognitive abilities and giving authority to the beliefs of a majority or an illusion already sympathized with.

The essence of spirituality is that spirit of all individuals is One and individuality a reflection of separation and ego.
When people create a ritual around their individual spirituality it automatically separates everything from the One Spirit within us all. It then becomes a thing to protect and worship, leaving the threat of possibility in difference as being subject to illusion and debate.

Tho God is within everything, and amorphous, it can only be personalized and made to take a shape by the illusions of the ego. Then it becomes sacred and ritualistic.

The story of the Garden of Eden is symbolic of mans insistence on making anything personal and subject to comparison and to relative measure of worth. Or the creation of the Ego as The authority of reality.

Man believes in his mortality and arbitrary rules such as death and taxes as being real within the manifest. Those ideals are derived from certain natural laws that support the manifest creation and how it thrives or dies, or comes into form and dissolves from its form. It's only because mans perfect memory becomes convoluted by the influence of fear and individual measures of worth and reality, that natural law becomes hidden by illusions that are egoic.
Spirituality then could be said to have a science to it rather than just something created from beliefs that conflict in individual assessment and imagination.

It is a science that supports all beliefs in individuality and illusion as well as being an open doorway beyond those illusions which create suffering and hell.
It is the individual who creates false authority, and it is the ego that never asks for help.

Only the Heart knows beyond all reasoning, but the intellect that is stuck within reasons of individual measure does not listen to the heart. It only listens to what it imagines is the heart that is attached to fame, glory, wealth, Sex and other illusions of sensory fulfillment. None of these are permanent.
The heart knows that, but it is overruled by egoic pride and prejudice. It is the ego that creates illusion from truth, it is the ego that creates religion out of spirituality and makes it individual and personal.


I was addicted to the Hokey Pokey, but then I turned myself around!!




Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 2,311
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 2,311
Quote:
...On the other hand religion is the desire to control people by manipulating their spirituality.

Iehe, as one who spent a life in a "religion"--I am now retired--I am inclined to agree with you. In the NOW lets us dialogue about what WE need to do to get us back to spirituality. Any suggestions?


G~O~D--Now & ForeverIS:Nature, Nurture & PNEUMA-ture, Thanks to Warren Farr&ME AT www.unitheist.org
Joined: Jun 2008
Posts: 1,249
T
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
T
Joined: Jun 2008
Posts: 1,249
Originally Posted By: Revlgking
Quote:
...On the other hand religion is the desire to control people by manipulating their spirituality.

Iehe, as one who spent a life in a "religion"--I am now retired--I am inclined to agree with you. In the NOW lets us dialogue about what WE need to do to get us back to spirituality. Any suggestions?


I could offer a suggestion.
To be in the now would be to give up any ideas relating to past impressions that would bind us to the same illusion and stepping out into a world that still has the idea of religion as being a way of controlling or manipulating.
To be totally in the NOW one would have to be cognizant of their own creatorship or spiritual reflection of reality. The awareness of all ideas being personal rather than actual.
Only then will all ideas of illusion based on the past not stick to you.

But then you would have to be cognizant of free will and the fact that all create their own reality.
In that there are no victims. Those who believe in manipulation, manipulate or are manipulated.
Those who know God, know that everything is created in perfect sync with the evolutionary stages of ones own spiritual or egoic awareness.

We (from the Ego ) can not change the destiny of those who belive life to be limited, nor can we change the free will or choice of those who are immersed in the fear of a world that is wrapped in manipulation.
We as spiritual beings can rise above it and allow it to be the choice of unconscious beings, and by the example of being conscious shed a light that might destroy the shadows of illusion as those who are ready to see come to their own evolutionary threshold of awakening.

But to immerse ones self in trying to make what is illusion change, WE become part of the illusion and part of the problem.

So to be in the NOW would necessitate letting agreement go regarding all belief in illusions, so that you are not trying to fix God unconsciously.


I was addicted to the Hokey Pokey, but then I turned myself around!!




Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 2,311
Megastar
Offline
Megastar
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 2,311
PERHAPS THIS POST SHOULD BE IN THE NEW THREAD, BUT I PRESUME READERS WILL READ IT HERE. SO HERE GOES:
=========================================
Interestingly, one of the adds which appears, now and then, on this site, and many others, is one for a DVD entitled THE GOD WHO WASN'T THERE--"The God Who Wasn't There is a 2005 independent documentary written and directed by Brian Flemming. The documentary questions the existence of Jesus and examines evidence that supports the Jesus myth argument against the existence of an historical Jesus."
(Wikipedia).

Long Before this we have the work of David Strauss--
http://www.westarinstitute.org/Periodicals/4R_Articles/Strauss/strauss.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Strauss#The_Leben_Jesu.
Others wrote before him.
==========================================================
Thirty years later there was Joseph Ernest Renan. He wrote his book on the life of Jesus:

"Widely regarded as one of the most important and revolutionary books of the nineteenth century, Renan's Vie de Jesus (1863; The Life of Jesus) was the first biography of Jesus that accepted his historical existence while rejecting the Christian belief that he was the son of God. Because it argued that “miracles are things which never happen, and, therefore, things which Jesus never did,” the book elicited a firestorm of criticism from church officials throughout Europe and America. It was denounced as blasphemous and, because of its popular appeal, was seen as a work that threatened to undermine the faith of Christians."
http://www.enotes.com/nineteenth-century-criticism/vie-de-jesus-joseph-ernest-renan
===========================================================

My opinion? I have been asked many times: If by means of a magical time machine you were transported back in time and as a result of that experience you became convinced that there was no such a person as the Jesus of history, what would it do to your faith?

My response: My focus is on the nature and meaning of the message, not on who was the messenger. I suspect that what we call the Golden Rule and other great love-based messages is the work of many great people. Perhaps several of them were called Jesus.

Last edited by Revlgking; 10/02/08 08:55 PM.

G~O~D--Now & ForeverIS:Nature, Nurture & PNEUMA-ture, Thanks to Warren Farr&ME AT www.unitheist.org
Page 43 of 120 1 2 41 42 43 44 45 119 120

Link Copied to Clipboard
Newest Members
debbieevans, bkhj, jackk, Johnmattison, RacerGT
865 Registered Users
Sponsor

Science a GoGo's Home Page | Terms of Use | Privacy Policy | Contact UsokĀž»­¾W
Features | News | Books | Physics | Space | Climate Change | Health | Technology | Natural World

Copyright © 1998 - 2016 Science a GoGo and its licensors. All rights reserved.

Powered by UBB.threads™ PHP Forum Software 7.7.5