What would it take to convince you that somebody is a prophet?

[bobevenson]

Bob doesn't do logic. Bob just does prophecy but he does it very secretively because I've never actually heard him predict anything.

After all this time, and after all my explanations on the definition of prophecy, you are still laboring over the idea that I'm talking about predictions rather than divinely inspired messages. Does it take a sledge hammer over your head to penetrate that thick skull of yours?

[Obvious Leo]

What fucking use to me is divine messages? I want to know what horse is going to win the Melbourne fucking Cup?

[bobevenson]

Like I figured, you're just a Neanderthal.

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

Australoarticulus tractus ...

[raw_thought]

OK,I'll bite.
Bob, reveal one of your devinely inspired insights. Please no pop psychology dressed up to look metaphysically profound!

[sthitapragya]

You are essentially asking seeker's questions!

There is no God to reveal anything and because there is no revealer, your focus in this area is absurd. That is your position.

What you don't understand, to all appearances, is that I already considered the ramifications of your rejection of the entire structure of questions and questioning, and then moved well beyond it to what these questions ultimately presage.

We are in a period of radical upheaval and redefinition in all arenas.

No. you are just evading the question in your usual flowery language. You are trying to tell me what my position is when I am asking your position. You are the theist looking for answers. I am asking you why God does not just tell you the answers instead of making you work so hard for it? And by you, I don't mean you personally. I mean all theists who are looking for answers. I am sure you think you are enlightened and do not need any answers. But you are an exception. Most theists are looking for answers. Why does God not just tell them? What stops God from telling them the answers? What could be the reason that God does not tell people the answers to the questions he himself wants them to know the answers to? Why this inefficiency on God's part?

Oh and what you call "radical upheaval and redefinition in all arenas" has already been dealt with by Adi Sankaracharya hundreds of years ago. So think about that for a while too. There is nothing new that you can come up with in religion, my friend. It has ALL be dealt with by someone or the other. There is no further progress to be made. It is a dead end now.

I am also getting a little tired of your " I know more than you" attitude. So let me tell you something. Whatever conclusion you have come to about God right now after all your reading and thinking, the one in your mind you think is the perfect and most logical form that God can take, is something I as a theist reached years ago and have rejected years ago. So just in case you think you know more than me, remember I know your non-existent God better than you do five years from now and I promise you 5 years from now you will have an even more refined version of God in your mind which I have rejected years ago.

See? the paragraph above does nothing for the topic at hand. It is just full of insults which I have thrown at you to get your goat up. Just as you put in a pointless paragraph to get at me. So please avoid statements like "What you don't understand, to all appearances, is that I already considered the ramifications of your rejection of the entire structure of questions and questioning, and then moved well beyond it to what these questions ultimately presage." They insult both your intelligence and mine and I promise you I can get back just as easily because I do know an awful lot about God for an atheist or for that matter most theists too.

[Hobbes' Choice]

I've left you a dictionary under your rock, open at the page which has "intrinsic" on it. Why not crawl back under your rock now and try your best to read it.

As a divinely inspired prophet, I have already stated the definitions of economics and intrinsic market value. My definitions are unchallengeable by anybody on Earth, or the entire universe for that matter.

If you are divinely inspired then God does not know the meaning if intrinsic either.

[Hobbes' Choice]

You are essentially asking seeker's questions!

There is no God to reveal anything and because there is no revealer, your focus in this area is absurd. That is your position.

What you don't understand, to all appearances, is that I already considered the ramifications of your rejection of the entire structure of questions and questioning, and then moved well beyond it to what these questions ultimately presage.

We are in a period of radical upheaval and redefinition in all arenas.

No. you are just evading the question in your usual flowery language. .

It's Gustav - that's what he does.
He mistakes verbosity for thinking.

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

I'd be very interested to read your thoughts on Shankaracharya and a comparison between his philosophy for religion and the European Enlightenment. That would be interesting indeed. If it has 'already all been done' I'd benefit from hearing about it.

[Lacewing]

...you are just evading the question in your usual flowery language. /... You are trying to tell me what my position is /...I am also getting a little tired of your " I know more than you" attitude. /... They insult both your intelligence and mine.

Wow... terrific post sthitapragya. You really nailed it. Any of us could behave in such a way -- but fortunately most of us don't. The strategy of telling other people who and what they are (in order to invalidate everything they say) is the only way for some people to maintain their own ideas. It's just impossible and too threatening for some to fathom or admit how much more is valid beyond their own ideas. So they go around striking people down in order to position themselves higher. They don't answer questions posed to them, they redirect and ask new ones in a "No, YOU answer THIS question for ME" tone. There is no real exchange of ideas. There is no desire to expand. There is only domination for the purpose of feeding ones insatiable and primitive ego in the stagnant pool it has chosen to have dominion over. Meanwhile, the universe continues expanding.

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

Once you have offended a woman's sensibilities you will never hear the end of it.
___________________________________

I guess I have a stronger structure of personality: Nothing anyone has said or can say can bother me. Why bother with 'tone'? Just respond back with ideas. Ah, but when people are invested in sentimentalism and emotional relationship to ideas, or sentimental self-definition, the conversation will always devolve to that. That is the purpose: emotional catharsis.

Everything I say on this forum, I stand behind and can defend. (Also, to describe my prose as 'flowery' is ridiculous. It is simple, descriptive prose and nothing more).

In the political/personality/war game that is played on PN, and as the Camps are established, fighting-factions are established and alliances formed.

Will Sthitapragya ally himself with the local 'Team Atheism' and perhaps even join up with Big Nurse Australoarticulus tractus? How will the Drama unfold? We just have to wait and see. It's hard to be patient when so much rides on it!

[Lacewing]

...I promise you 5 years from now you will have an even more refined version of God in your mind

This reflects how I think about what we think we know in life. We can each see how much we have evolved throughout our own lives... and we can see how humankind's understandings have evolved... so wouldn't it be "obvious and logical" to avoid becoming too intoxicated by what we think we know (or where we think we've arrived) at any given moment? Of course we need structure in order to function within this life... and sometimes we need much more of it than at other times... so we may build on (or cling to) certain things for awhile. I'm guessing it's this way for everyone. Which has led me (at this point in time) to think and respect that there are countless ways for everyone to go about it. There is not a single correct way or destination. I tend to think that other people can surely and reasonably consider this too. I guess we all think that about what we think.

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

This reflects how I think about what we think we know in life. We can each see how much we have evolved throughout our own lives... and we can see how humankind's understandings have evolved... so wouldn't it be "obvious and logical" to avoid becoming too intoxicated by what we think we know (or where we think we've arrived) at any given moment? Of course we need structure in order to function within this life... and sometimes we need much more of it than at other times... so we may build on (or cling to) certain things for awhile. I'm guessing it's this way for everyone. Which has led me (at this point in time) to think and respect that there are countless ways for everyone to go about it. There is not a single correct way or destination. I tend to think that other people can surely and reasonably consider this too. I guess we all think that about what we think.

It sounds somewhat nice, doesn't it? this soft, feminine, exploratory, open-ended philosophy. But with a twist and a turn it could become simple New Age tripe.

Possibly, you describe the road that you went down: from stultifying religious upbringing in fanatical American Christianity, and in this way makes a good deal of sense. And if I were coming out of reaction to a stultifying system I would likely also think in these terms. But I propose that there comes a time when one must begin to clarify one's understanding, and that it cannot remain forever open-ended. One has to make decisions.

The question is: Is there a bedrock in this creation? Are there absolutes? And what happens when a philosophy is defined in which no absolutes are possible? Have you considered this? I sense in what you write that for you there very much are absolutes. You can certainly say what you reject. That is decisiveness, too. Absolutes function in you. Yet seem to not recognise that in the absence of some bedrock (some absolute) that you could not make any decision at all. Not even the decision not to make any decision. And you are girlishly and childishly opposed to anyone who feels they can make definite statements. It twists you up.

[bobevenson]

I've left you a dictionary under your rock, open at the page which has "intrinsic" on it. Why not crawl back under your rock now and try your best to read it.

As a divinely inspired prophet, I have already stated the definitions of economics and intrinsic market value. My definitions are unchallengeable by anybody on Earth, or the entire universe for that matter.

If you are divinely inspired then God does not know the meaning if intrinsic either.

Intrinsic is a very simple word, so your mind is even simpler than that word.

[sthitapragya]

I'd be very interested to read your thoughts on Shankaracharya and a comparison between his philosophy for religion and the European Enlightenment. That would be interesting indeed. If it has 'already all been done' I'd benefit from hearing about it.

Just find his commentaries on advait and his masterpiece 'Vivekcudamani' or Vivekchudamani". You could also read his poem, Moha mudgara. Although it is a poem primarily telling one to pray to Krishna, if you ignore that some of the shlokas are just profound and give you some insights into how to control your own mind. Personally, I believe it is the greatest poem ever written.