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Is there interest in a chapter by chapter discussion of the Tich Nhat Hanh classic? free image hosting https://www.amazon.com/Living-Buddha-Christ-20th-Anniversary/dp/159448239X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1470373571&sr=1-1&keywords=living+buddha+living+christ

GIMSYS, peace be unto you and to your house. Have you read how Jesus taught his disciples to spread the word in the synoptic gospels? Matthew 10, Mark 6, Luke 9. Jesus' teaching methods were different from other teachers and are quite interesting. This might be a more productive place to start. Your witness is rather erratic. I feel like I'm getting 'ding dong ditched' by passive-aggressive Jehovah's Witnesses.

Welcome, GISMYS.

I understand your idea of duality better now.

People do speak broadly at times. The orthodox, philosophical Christian definition of evil being the absence of good goes back to Aquinas and probably Augustine. When speaking of actions sin would be the Christian term. When speaking of the weather the term would be suffering. Sin is not necessarily suffering and neither are necessarily evil. My interest is in your spiritual conceptions. How does dualism get me closer to understanding those?

I am trying to get you to explain this dualistic thing. Antonyms don't make it understandable to me. Dualism has a specific meaning in Christianity of a struggle between two opposing forces. This is rejected. Evil is not the opposite of good, it is the absence of good. There is one good, but a large number of possible evils. Evil is like a shadow and has no essence, but can be easily observed under the right conditions.

Ok, I'll get back with you later.

Is it communicative/noncommunicative or communicative/vague?

What is a dualistic pattern?

Is that bad? And what is it?

Morally, ethically, spiritually. Completely responsible. What are you trying to leave out? I strongly suspect you are not a double predestination Calvinist :-)

I will look at Templeton, but it is a big site. Suggest a starting place or be prepared to wait a while for a response. On a scientific level, social psychology uses a 5% level to claim falsification of the null hypothesis. This is below six sigma and too low for credibility. The scientific standard is 1%. The real problem is that it is published in a widely respected popular journal. There is no link to the actual research that can be critically examined. People believe the article is truth based only on this stamp of an authority shouting out, "Science says . . ." assuming the MC is Science when it is really Steve Harvey.

Yes, I think people are responsible for their actions.

Marvelous topic! A popular selection often scored as a hymn. An 18C version by the American master William Billings sung by Netherlanders in English is at the end. I am the rose of Sharon, and the lily of the valleys. 2 As the lily among thorns, so is my love among the daughters. 3 As the apple tree among the trees of the wood, so is my beloved among the sons. I sat down under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste. 4 He brought me to the banqueting house, and his banner over me was love. 5 Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples: for I am sick of love. 6 His left hand is under my head, and his right hand doth embrace me. 7 I charge you, O ye daughters of Jerusalem, by the roes, and by the hinds of the field, that ye stir not up, nor awake my love, till he please. 8 The voice of my beloved! behold, he cometh leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the hills. 9 My beloved is like a roe or a young hart: behold, he standeth behind our wall, he looketh forth at the windows, shewing himself through the lattice. 10 My beloved spake, and said unto me, Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away. 11 For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; 12 The flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land; 13 The fig tree putteth forth her green figs, and the vines with the tender grape give a good smell. Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away. 14 O my dove, that art in the clefts of the rock, in the secret places of the stairs, let me see thy countenance, let me hear thy voice; for sweet is thy voice, and thy countenance is comely. 15 Take us the foxes, the little foxes, that spoil the vines: for our vines have tender grapes. 16 My beloved is mine, and I am his: he feedeth among the lilies. 17 Until the day break, and the shadows flee away, turn, my beloved, and be thou like a roe or a young hart upon the mountains of Bether. Song of Songs, 1:2

Alma is a parable or teaching story; a narrative which invites moral and spiritual interpretations and instruction, but has no clear conclusion. Yours is very good. Consciousness is an illustration. I don't usually see things in a dualistic pattern, so my view was a bit different.

I don't find it poorly written. The editor seems imminently qualified and obviously she does not either. I am interested in the citation for the 'higher power' study you mention. Not many researchers attempt spiritual topics, and if it convinced you it must be good. My opinion is that much of social psychology, including this study, is pseudoscience. It has aspects of all four factors I mentioned.

Please elaborate. I think we have demonstrated we are both capable of considering an idea even if we do not choose adopt it.

Very nice, Romansh. The idea of approaching conscious contact with the divine as the removal of intellectual barriers to truth rather than the erection of logical scaffoldings has a Popperian ring to it. I see the tower of Babel (one side of it, anyway) in the illustration. Alma shows the danger of egoism. I think she would have escaped the doll room if she had held the door open for the tricycle boy, and avoided the temptation entirely had she not stopped to write her name.

Should we classify this as Woo, Science, Faith or Scientism? Title: Scientists Find One Source of Prayer’s Power - Communing with a higher power increases self-control Publisher: Scientific American http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/scientists-find-one-source-of-prayers-power/

We go off into far stranger fields than curved space and radio analogues. Like social psychology >shudder<

Only the chalice is mine.

Should we then dismiss spirituality as mere woo and wonder because it is partially immaterial?

The disagreements about AGW is an example. It demonstrates a point about belief systems. My point is Science theory is logical, but in public practice and popular understanding it typically functions as a religion. AGW is a complex subject but instead of deliberate and measured reasoning most people's logic stops at, "An authority figure says it is a fact, so I believe it." This is closely related to the criticisms of spirituality discussed by Progressive Christianity.

I think there is compelling evidence the case for anthropogenic global warming may be grossly overstated. The data may be right, but the conclusions seem unjustified. Many informed scientists disagree with the AGW careerists. Here is a presentation by a Nobel laureate that made the methodologies and results seem logically inadequate, at least to my little peanut brain. The earth has huge natural variations, and valid measurement of worldwide climate change is a tall order. There was also the well-publicized scandal of deliberate and admitted data falsification and conspiracy by the AGW proponents several years ago. Granted, industry factions put their dirty fingers everywhere but that only increases the need for independent science distanced from corrupting influences. In spite of this there has been national and international clamor to make propounding climate change skepticism a crime. This is case of science attempting to insulate their dogma against any possible factual discovery and is not unlike the Roman pontiff's persecution of Galileo. This is what distresses me - seeing science move backwards towards scholasticism. When the politicians say that only science which supports their constituencies is valid and other scientists must be silenced we have a problem.