romansh

Burl you gave us three steps ... without any reference to our concept of God. My question still stands why not leave everything up to God? Your statement like I said was without reference to any concept of God, I presumed you were referring to your concept of God, and you are on record as saying any concept we will have will be wrong. So for the moment your concept of God will do for your explanation. I don't see the problem. rom

And your explanation?

It's identical to yours in that you have only been wrong once and it was not about God.

Why not leave everything up to God, and we can get on with our lives and not worry about our orthodoxies and textual interpretations?

Over forty years ago as an engagement gift we got a set of Splades ...each could be used as a fork, spoon, and knife (not necessarily at the same time). The cutting utility was out of necessity fairly minimal. I think a spork would have been more descriptive. We still have the complete set. http://www.steelcitycutlery.com/partyforks.html

My apologies Burl, I did not recognize that you were in possession of the one and only true theological interpretation. Have a nice evening.

So I was sort of right ... but a variation of the no true Scotsman fallacy.

I went to the Wiki page om Muggeridge before I posted ... Cleese was complaining Muggeridge came in part way through the film and criticized it, where Palin said something like Muggeridge was being Muggeridge ... Palin must be a Buddhist ... acceptance of Muggeridge being Muggeridge.

I must admit I was never a fan of Muggeridge in my teens. We philosophically crossed paths. As youngster I went from the right to the left socially speaking. I remember watching Muggeridge on the religious chat stuff (BBC?) ... He was certainly erudite ... but the substance of his erudition for me was worrying. Having said that ... that would have been late sixties, early seventies - just a vague impression of the man

This requires omniscience on your part Burl. For all you (or I) know I might have a perfectly accurate visualization of god. Note I don't believe it ... but I can't assert it like you do.

There was a comment by some new members that they were looking for religious truths? If it were me I might have been looking for truths ??? Well OK to narrow it down a bit ... truths relevant to my existence. But then just about everything is relevant to existence. Now as supposed individuals we might not see that way? Why just religious truths? Interesting.

Are you suggesting these mercenaries are not muslims (ie think of themselves as muslims)? And how is muslims paying mercenaries to murder other muslims any different? Unless we are going down some no true Scotsman argument this makes no sense. If not, I would like to see the evidence.

. No not really ... another time I was eel fishing at night on a lake at night with my Dad ... saw the milky way for the first time (I was seventeen, and I lived in a big city in the UK). I went there and then to a "sacred space" or at least as close as I will ever get. I have seen the milky way again in Chile; I was at moderate altitude and the night sky was clear. Went there again. My colleague got out of a car to take a phone call and I got out to stretch my legs ... immediately was on my pilgrimage.

I can generally recommend Japan ... I thought a very civilized country and people. There seemed to be an inner peace. War for them must be such an aberration. The bus drive from the airport into downtown Osaka at night, I thought, was magical,

I don't know, but I am not sure it would be much different if I was healthy. Visit family?

They are both products of the universe Burl ... I have got over my self delusional narcissism. Having said that we are much better identifying narcissism in others ... I don't worry about it any more.

Here's my take. The Bible is not be taken literally with food or even water. The God as taken literally in the bible did not kill anyone, anymore than God killed 225 000 people in the tsunami of 2004. The Bible for me is a mixture of a fog of history, myth and metaphor. What ever God is it is not the personal God of literal interpretations we have, at least in my opinion.

Spiritual pilgrimage ... Peering down a microscope looking at a four-cell pre-zygote that could have been our child. Wasn't planning on going there, but went anyway.

No way on Earth did I suggest you had a free choice!

Thormas ... I could dissect your whole post line by line But I will pick on this one as it is close to my heart. I have been with my partner for over forty years ... I am happy with the way it unfolded (not that I am not choosing to be happy, I presume you are not choosing either, you just are.) We have had our ups and downs ... couldn't have kids and loss of an adopted son, and that our son for over ten years of his life suffered from serious bouts of epilepsy would count as some of the major downs. But without those downs I would not be the individual who I am today. [and for the benefit of Burl, my illusory intrinsic self]. We would not be the couple we are today either. Thinking damn it was not your illusory self that made the choice is at the heart issue. Evolution has imbued us with lots of emotions ... including guilt and pride. And I am sure they are quite "useful" in an evolutionary but pragmatic way. But as evolution is directionless and ultimately purposeless these emotions don't make sense in the light of day. Again when I met my partner back in '72, she was not my type. In Dec of '74 she made a pass at me ... suddenly she was my type. I was aware of the raging hormones passing through my body (as emotions) ... bonding my eddy with hers. There was no choice about it. And I am happy, again no choice, that it is the case. Can I suggest when you think or use the word choice, have in the back of your mind in what way is it a free choice? Is that choice somehow independent of your body chemistry?

Just turned the new year here .... Happy New Year from rom as well. With the sunrise ...

I don't think we do erect barriers to the connections. It is just the way the universe has unfolded makes it seem that we have.

On a similar note ... a few years ago I was doing some sanding and put up some polythene sheeting to minimize the dusting. As I walked in through a second door I could see polythene sheet move because I slightly pressurized the room by walking in. (and by inference depressurizing behind me). Now the sanding is done I don't "observe" the air movement. Do I believe it not happening ... not for 1 millisecond (more likely 50 ms on a brain timescale). To me this was a clear demonstration of the 'unseen' interconnectivity we have with our environment.

A better question would be is there vibration in the air? Noise is simply the brain's interpretation of the air vibrations. Similarly for the diffracted light ... the photons are there regardless of the existence of an observer. The brain interprets them as a colourful arc ... or rainbow. I don't think of photons as coloured. The rainbow is there but it is not as we perceive it. Freedom is an illusion Soma ... Freedom is simply a lack of awareness of the casual mesh we exist in. (At least "freedom" in the philosophical sense we are discussing here, not the every day trivial sense).

Interestingly ... according some if we add up all the energy in the universe (including matter, dark energy, dark matter, gravitation) the sum total is zero or at least within experimental error zero. This accords nicely with the first law of thermodynamics, that we don't get something for nothing ... though existence does seem like the biggest of free lunches we can expect. Regarding relativity (classical and Einsteinian) they are reasonable approximations and fit for purpose if used appropriately.