Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

[St. Clown]

Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

Same phenomenon, different context: a few years ago everybody in hockey started talking about "the process." I don't remember where I first heard it, maybe a Mike Schafer press conference, but from the moment I first heard somebody use the term to the moment when it was omnipresent was seemingly instant. Certainly there was some selective perception, but even so I found it striking. I wondered whether some book came out, or a Scotty Bowman type started it, but it was just as you say -- as if they did a "Norman coordinate" and then everybody was uploaded with the patch.

I think it started with the language used in one of the rule changes - and I forget which - where refs had to judge whether or not the player was in the process of doing A when B occurred, thus determining whether or not to call the penalty. People latched onto it, either to make a point with the league or to try explaining away things during their press briefings.

[5mn_Major]

Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

Some feel that you can't believe in God if you don't believe in the devil in hard form. I tend towards disagreeing.

That's because one or the other (God/devil) could be less concrete; Indeed, God Him/Herself doesn't seem to be physically substantive. But when some try to make the devil too substantive, I believe Christians get themselves or faith into trouble.

When some in faith project the devil on situations, they do so because see a right and wrong aspect to an outcome. Often there is in fact from every human moral aspect known...a right and wrong side to that outcome. However, sometimes its not that clear...as in its opinion...and so the projection of the devil results in at best a 'greater than thou' attitude and at worst it causes the person to be totally ostrasized. Hence even if its not a hard concept, the devil has played its role of discrediting the Word just by its mere existence.

I'm shocked - *shocked* - that you would cherry-pick the good while ignoring the bad...

Not sure how you could interpret that post as a wholly positive view of Christianity...except in an effort to position a Christian in a negative light.

In reality, belief in God is fundamental and is among the top two commandments. Belief in the devil is nowhere on any Biblical list.

[Kepler]

Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

I think it started with the language used in one of the rule changes - and I forget which - where refs had to judge whether or not the player was in the process of doing A when B occurred, thus determining whether or not to call the penalty. People latched onto it, either to make a point with the league or to try explaining away things during their press briefings.

Hmm. That could be but that's not the way in which I heard "the process" being used. That was, "you have to trust the process" (as in, buying in to the system), or "the player is working through the process" (as in, adapting to a faster league), or "it's important for everybody in the locker room to be on board with the process" (as in have the same mentality and team goals). It's used as classic empty coaching jargon, and it just went from zero to a hundred overnight.

[The Sicatoka]

Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

God is an extraterrestrial.
Discuss.

[joecct]

God is an extraterrestrial.
Discuss.

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

However, what if the ETs also believe in (a) God(s)??

[Kepler]

Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

God is an extraterrestrial.
Discuss.

What does God need with a starship?

[burd]

Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

What does God need with a starship?

Because James T. Kirk has one, and it's been a pebble in God's sandal for some time.

[Kepler]

Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

However, what if the ETs also believe in (a) God(s)??

Then we know it's a stage of development not limited to humans.

Among humans, whose brains were evolutionarily developed to handle ape problems, understanding of causality has developed through these stages: superstition (the tallest mountain overlooks the world, therefore that mountain orders the world) --> religion (That particular mountain is not important. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with "mountainness", and the Word was "ultimate mountainness" --> philosophy ("Mountainness" is not important. What we mean by "ultimateness" is the unmountainified force that orders the world --> science (Nothing deliberately order the world. The particles and forces that order the world do so according to their particular properties. Teleology is a false reification) --> whatever comes next, which we are as blind to as each of the earlier stages was to its successors.

[joecct]

Then we know it's a stage of development not limited to humans.

Among humans, whose brains were evolutionarily developed to handle ape problems, understanding of causality has developed through these stages: superstition (the tallest mountain overlooks the world, therefore that mountain orders the world) --> religion (That particular mountain is not important. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with "mountainness", and the Word was "ultimate mountainness" --> philosophy ("Mountainness" is not important. What we mean by "ultimateness" is the unmountainified force that orders the world --> science (Nothing deliberately order the world. The particles and forces that order the world do so according to their particular properties. Teleology is a false reification) --> whatever comes next, which we are as blind to as each of the earlier stages was to its successors.

God should not be restricted to one intelligent race.

[Kepler]

Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

God should not be restricted to one intelligent race.

God comes from inside our heads, like justice or beauty. Other species may come up with God the way they might come up with any idea. Or they may not.

The odds are if ET develops in an environment with danger, and especially if it forms hierarchies of protection and power, then it will also come up with the idea of God. A pole implies a pole position.

[St. Clown]

Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

God should not be restricted to one intelligent race.

Then why did He only ever speak to one tribe of people? Why did He restrict Himself from the rest of the human race? Alien races are hosed. Or really, really lucky.

[leswp1]

Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

God should not be restricted to one intelligent race.

Listening to talk radio this is definitely NOT true. He obviously does not have intelligence as a prereq.

[Kepler]

Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

Listening to talk radio this is definitely NOT true. He obviously does not have intelligence as a prereq.

"Hey! Long time / first time God here, ..."

[joecct]

"Hey! Long time / first time God here, ..."

In 1950 James Whitmore and Nancy Davis were in a movie titled "The Next Voice You Hear."

http://m.imdb.com/title/tt0042786/

God does radio.

[FreshFish]

Re: Religion Thread: That's Me In the Corner...

Then we know it's a stage of development not limited to humans.

Among humans, whose brains were evolutionarily developed to handle ape problems, understanding of causality has developed through these stages: [so far]

You speak as if evolution has come to an end with us, many others might suggest that it is still ongoing and we are but a passing phase that will be replaced with another one in the future.

My surmise is that there is indeed a Deity of sorts, one that is not all-powerful, all-knowing, nor eternal nor infinite.

To a child, an adult seems really big, really strong, and really smart; then as the child grows up and becomes an adult, other adults lose that mystique.

However, just as no ant can survive outside an ant colony, nor a honeybee outside the hive, no human can survive outside of society either. In some real ways (e.g., swarms) the entire collection of bees has an existence on a higher plane than any individual bee exists.

I'm not familiar with Jung's concept of a "collective unconscious"...it sounds like there is some communal entity that imbues everyone of us yet resides no place that any of us can identify nor access directly. I'm not expressing this idea very well I guess...there is another plane of existence, not that any individual ever accesses, but that exists as a collective entity that is "greater than the sum of all of us" so to speak.

So atheists are missing something really important (the individual self is not the highest pinnacle of evolution), while religious literalists are overstating their case (the Deity is not necessarily the Creator at all, etc.).

In some fungi, there is a mass of mycelium underground that is extensive and pervasive; every now and then a piece of it sticks up above the ground and we see an individual mushroom. We think that mushroom is all that is there because that is all we can see; if a bunch of mushrooms stick up above the ground, we think they are all separate organisms*. There is so much more there than we can access through our senses.

You have the vanity to think that if you cannot sense it nor conceive it, it cannot exist. I prefer to live in the question rather than to assert I have all the answers. it is a lot more interesting that way, and leaves open the possibility of continued learning and growth.



* of course, for many mushrooms, they indeed are separate organisms, only a few of them are like the kind I describe.