flowperson

TV sucks !!

Music is life !!

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As that distinguished actor Mr. James Carey (sp?) would say when he has that green metal mask on his face

...SMMMMOKINNNN'.... !!!!!

flow....

p.p.s - flow- I'm toally going to reply to what you were writing about whether Islam brought reason and philosophy to the West in the tenth century, look for it tomorrow (Sunday in honour of Christ's Resurrection)

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Uhhh, I believe that I pointed out that Islam preserved and extended essential knowledge concerning science and mathematics into Europe, not reason and philosophy. Admittedly, it's hard to do quality science and mathematics without the ability to use reason and philosophical skills, but I was emphasizing knowledge transfer in a technical sense.

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By definition, all cities are "sin cities" but, yes, it appears that I live in the real one. But as I like to tell people who visit here, it is the place where nothing is as it appears; and yet, nothing is really hidden.

After all there isn't much else in S. Nevada.

By all means, come back to the scene of the crime.

We oldsters who live and work here look upon that process as job security.

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Wisdom is also something that is associated with the serpent in the asian subcontinent. ... The serpent was also a supposedly common symbol of power during the time of the OT stories. Moses reputedly had a staff of power with a "brazen" (brass) serpent attached to the top, which when touched to the area of a poisonous snake bite could nullify the poison and heal the bite.

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The snake, while eating its tale, grows at the same rate at which it consumes itself: Everlasting Life

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Of course the OT states emphatically that G-d hated serpents, and then there is Matthew 7, 9-11 which, in my opinion is one of the most enigmatic passages in the NT. It's highly symbolic and IMO touches upon the real meaning of the church being founded on the "rock" of Simon Peter.

Add to this the fact that the "orouboros" (sp?) or the serpent swallowing its tail was a sign placed upon the tomb markers of some very early Christians, up until about the third century a.d., and you have another of those strange convergences that should be explored in depth sometime by someone, but like I said, not me. There just isn't enough time.

I believe that it has something to do with symbolic interpretations of the meaning of sexual relations. But again, that's only an opinion. But wouldn't Pat Robertson or Jerry Falwell have a ball doing a sermon on the subject?

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About 60 degrees in sin city today. Sorry !!

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Scholarly pursuits have fixed upon Arabian and Persian lords as the probable identity of the wise men. I agree that the number of them was not known, but the gifts that they brought were of great intrinsic and material value at the time.

It has also been interesting to me that they were deemed "wise" men. Not rich men, regal men, or princely men, but wise men. Of all the virtues most highly valued by the peoples of Asia and the middle east was wisdom. The eldest men of the people were deemed to have seen and experienced the most in their lives, and were looked to for guidance by the people and their rulers.

Wisdom is also something that is associated with the serpent in the asian subcontinent. So metaphorically, to have wise (serpent) men see the looked-for sign in the sky and to then have responded by travelling to view the new king of kings while offering their gifts and respect would be an attribute of the story that could cast a wider net around potential believers of the new faith.

The serpent was also a supposedly common symbol of power during the time of the OT stories. Moses reputedly had a staff of power with a "brazen" (brass) serpent attached to the top, which when touched to the area of a poisonous snake bite could nullify the poison and heal the bite.

flow....

One of the truly profound aspects of Christianity is its powers of adaptation. It has been noted elsewhere here that the Catholic Church adopts local custom and ritual, to an extent, into its services when evangelizing missionary or native and indigenous communities. This probably has its roots in instances such as this.

Scholars have determined that Jesus was likely born in about 6 b.c. and was probably born in early March or late February. This would make him a Piscean, the symbol for which is the fish that swims two ways. This would have been an important symbolic sign to pagan believers that the king of kings was a transcendant, creative, and powerful soul according to zodiacal lore.

This was important in ancient times when much of belief was tied to superstitious and supernatural legends regarding things of the spirit world. Literacy based belief was only for the super rich and the ruling establishment. Ordinary people were still mostly driven by their superstition-based observances of the passing scene.

I believe that the aspect of this time of year, the end of December, is the most important determinant of the continuing appropriateness of the fixing of the celebration. Yes, the darkness begins to recede and the light begins to return. And it is very important that we remember that the pagan believers were mainly agricultural-community oriented people. To them the turning of the seasons and the fruitfulness of their pursuits in seeking their livelihoods was intimately tied to the cycles of planting, cultivating, growing, harvesting, and consuming the foods of their labors. That is why the OT and the NT are so chock full of agricultural allegory and metaphor.

As an aside, I'm not so sure Mithras was an exclusively Roman deity. My recollection is that the Greeks also celebrated his presence in caves and his ability to slay bulls. Corn also had someting to do with their rituals, but these largely remain a secret to us even to this day. By the way, corn was not known as a grain in Europe at this time since it was still the exclusive crop belonging to American natives until it was brought back to Europe after Columbus's visits, along with tomatoes. But the term was used generically beginning in the middle east from about 10,000 years ago to describe any variety of grain grown for consumption, yet another of those harmonic convergences that needs some research and explaining. But who's got the time?

Thanks for posting the historical information Beach. It broadened our collective search for meaning here .

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Chaos, Making a New Science, by James Gleick

 

I've owned it for about 6 years.

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Yes, but have you READ it?

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Reading and comprehension are two different things, but I'm sure it's been comprehended from what's been said on the thread.

Oh, I almost forgot to say that I met Mitch Feigenbaum once. The prototype frizz- haired, distracted scientist-mathematician, but seemed like a nice guy.

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Flow,

 

Only you could take us from Mandelbrot, to Ancient Egypt, to Sir Isaac Newton, and back again, in about four paragraphs.

 

I am aware that Newton had personal ties to "esoteric arts" like alchemy and freemasonry, but I don't quite see how they form the "foundational knowledge base out of which modern physics and chemistry have grown."  The more obvious tie seems to be to Enlightenment rationality and empiricism.

 

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Of course rationality and empiricism are the most important components of Physics and Chemistry in a modern or neo modern sense. But there is a line in the sand that happened about the time of Galileo, Copernicus, Kepler, Leewenhouck, Newton, etc. where ideation and conception transformed into formal experimentation as far as research-based science was concerned.

The importance of alchemy to the roots of science was to give great thinkers the impetus to look for the "causes" of material transformation in the world and universe around them, and to help them to invent the "tools" to do so. When they did the process of discovery evolved from the mystical incantations and rituals of the alchemical arts into the repetitive and rigorous practices of experimental routines, results, and duplication by others through the sharing of circulated papers of successful experimentalists.

So I believe we're looking at a process, like the evolving pattern of most important things in life, from feeling around in the darkness for the mystical roots of something to discovering the important aspects of its realities through experimentation, observation, and the sharing of information regarding its nature among ourselves over time. This is the process that makes the unknown generally known over time and helps to advance civilizations forward in time.

As I suggested elsewhere on the board, anyone interested in pursuing the origins of the new science of "chaos theory" should start by obtaining and reading the book, Chaos, Making a New Science, by James Gleick, a former science writer for the New York Times. The book was written in the 80"s but I believe that it is still in print and avaiable. Have fun smart people !!

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Ahh, nothing says majesty and wonder quite like a sausage biscuit.

 

I'm lovin' it!

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All of the majesty and wonder of the sausage biscuit began to give me moderate cases of acid and heartburn a while back, so I've switched to egg-onlys.

Haven't had one lately.

Maybe I'll celebrate Christmas with one since I'm working that day, and then, HEY !, I'll be in a sort of communion with the Willow Creek crowd. Maybe it'll almost be like being there in the narthex with them !

Wait a minute ! They won't even be there on Christamas ! Foiled again by the deceptions of money-changers !!! And I was all pumped-up to do some serious metaphysical mythologizing !!! GRRRR !!!

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I think the person who did "Green" Christmas was Stan Freeberg or something like that. I'm not sure though.

MOW

Lots of smart people on this Board !! You got it right brother !! Thanks !!

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Yes Fred.

Some time ago on another thread I observed that one could not love others until they had learned to love one's self.

Thank you for clarifying the spiritual message that I intended to convey but was not able to in that interpretation.

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Here are some really gorgeous images of regions of the Mandelbrot set.  There really is something mystical about it...

 

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Way cool guys !!! I call it complex systems theory, you call it chaos theory. Same difference. It is the analog intelligent design of things that emerge from nothingness, "creation ab nihilo".

Believe it or not the roots of these philosophies go back at least to the foundation of ancient Egyptian culture . The g-d Thoth, who introduced the magic of metalworking to the people would be considered the foundational character here. He also is attributed to have composed the basic rules of alchemy in a tract called "The Emerald Tablet" in the incarnation of Hermes Trigesmistrus (sp?) which contains, among other truths, the magical phrase detailing the "likeness of what is above to what is below".

Alchemy is thought to have originated in the middle ages in Europe where certain mystics believed that dross metals could be changed into gold and other noble metals through certain ritualistic manipulations. But the roots of alchemy and related practices extends back thousands of years earlier into the roots of the Chinese and the Indian civilizations. In each case the practice of alchemy is closely tied to the metalworking arts.

Alchemy formed the foundational knowledge base out of which modern physics and chemistry have grown, and Sir Issac Newton extensively studied alchemical principles and practices before changing our realities with his laws of physics. One of his best friends, George Stirk ( I think that's the name } was a well known practitioner of the alchemical arts.

The Mandelbrot sets, named after the mathematician Benoit Mandelbrot who first devised them, seem mystical because the spiral is the most prevalent form seen in natural systems and arises due to the prevalence of the use of Fibonacci series numbers in their design arrangements. DNA, chambered nautilus, planetary orbitals, storm systems and ocean currents, water going down a drain, galaxies, you see them everywhere in nature; and, it is one of the most prevalent decorative motifs on ancients pieces of pottery and stoneware. Spirals are definitely considered to be a sacred form by ancient cultures world wide. In SW American rock art it is extensively used as a sun symbol, and as I noted elsewhere here, it appears in grave mounds in neolithic Ireland as a sun sign.

Mystical indeed !!!

flow.... :

Annunciation scene, eh?

Wasn't that realistically depicted on another thread right here on this site?

You mean it's been done better than that?

In a church?

Not possible !!!!!

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Closed on Christmas, eh? Making a DVD available of the preceeding services, eh? How commercial, eh?

I'm not Canadian, and I will have to be working on Christmas. I try not to be judgemental about anything, but it seems incredulous to me that a church that has 20,000 worshipping believers will not hold a service on a Sunday Christmas.

I remember a radio spoof years ago that was played on radio about this time of year called "Green Christmas". I know some of you who have been around a while will remember it if you appreciate good satire. I want to say that it was Alan Sherman, but I don't think so. Someone help me out if you remember it. I can hear the guy in my head, but the name's not with it.

By the way, wasn't the pastor of Willow Creek one of the people Clinton looked to for spiritual guidance during the Monica thing ? Just thinking out loud again.

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Some of us who've been around for a while find the world we live in to be abstract and unnatural, especially in urban settings. Did you know that between about 1950 and 1980 the percentages of people living in rural areas vs. urban areas switched from about 50% vs. 50% to about 20% vs. 80% ?

Yeah, fer sure, abstract and unnatural. Why would urban people imagine it to be anything different if G-d truly does have the best time machine?

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Beach:

I view it as a form of religious facism.

The underlying philosophy of fascism is one of coercion through repetitive acts of exclusion, abuse, repression, and torture of others. If none of these punishments work then it is death.

These behaviors grow out of a deep-seated sense of jealousy and fear. Those who behave and operate in these ways in the world are probably going to be excluded from G-d's grace and G-d's kingdom in the end and they likely sense it. Their fear-based behaviors become increasingly impossible for them to change or control. Paradoxically, in order to prevent their eventual spiritual demise, they unconsciously set out to guarantee it through their acts against those that they despise and scapegoat. Think of the persecution and putting to death of Jesus as the primal metaphor for this well known set of behaviors within societies. And yet, according to the Gospel narratives, their forgiveness was requested in His mortal end... "for they know not what they do".

Scott Peck's second book is very enlightening for identifying those in religious life, or in any life endeavor, who have these behavioral problems. I believe that the issues that you are addressing here would be covered by what Scott Peck has to say in his book, People Of The Lie.

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Beach:

Those who love " include". Those who fear "exclude".

The ones whose lives are lived in fear will always try to argue obscurities to try and pull you into the dark abyss with them. Do not let them.

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sgb

Welcome to our little slice of sanity. Just sit back, look and listen, and jump in from time to time when the spirit moves you. It's almost a daily worship service of sorts if you enjoy novel thinking and well-crafted concepts, and best of all, where or when you are is of little importance in the greater scheme of things

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I have come to think of hell as eternal, opaque repetition; and, heaven as eternal, transparent change.

Or think of it as being a soul that either has an eternal case of acute obsessive-compulsive disorder (doing the same thing over and over without EVER getting it right ) as compared to being a musician who never runs short of the ability to perform novel improvisational riffs; or, maybe an artist or poet who never runs out of novel subject matter to create.

Again, I highly recommend the film, Defending Your Life, as an object lesson. To me it makes much more sense than ecclesiastical blather. I believe that it's all about being a courageous soul which seeks to create wellbeing for others through one's activities and beliefs in life.

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Vunderbar mein schatz !!!!

Zeig Heil !!! Achtung and gezhundheit !!! (my Italian's better better then my German, but it seems more appropriate).

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Prototypes of this kind of stuff was largely developed under corporate sponsorship at places like The Media Lab at MIT in the 80's and 90's which was under the directorship of a guy named Nicholas Negroponte at the time.

I don't know if he is related to the neocon John Negroponte or not (he's the uberintelligence guru that you haven't heard anything about since the Bushies appointed him earlier this year), but it sure would not surprise me if they weren't brothers or something. The darker side of human affairs really likes to stick with genetic lineages that they are familiar with in order to work their warped wonders.

John also was an ambassador appointed by Reagan to Nicaragua, Honduras, or some country in Central America when all the really bad stuff like death squads, etc. was going on there in the 80's. What a surprise, huh?

Innovative technologies are ALWAYS a two sided proposition. There is the light, and there is the darkness.

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Looks like something from Star Wars to me. But in such a squaresville world CAN the force be with him?

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Great eyes!!!

OK what's the ring-eyed dog saying in the box on his shirt? At least I think it's a dialogue box. I tried blowing it up on my zoom, but I still couldn't make it out.

You're a lucky Daddy and uncle!

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