Haven’t those who reject morality just because of its religious roots ended up constructing another belief system

[Martin Peter Clarke]

I really needed to look up the following info about Logos:-

1. Greek Concept of Logos
In Greek philosophy, especially in Heraclitus, Stoicism, and later Hellenistic thought, Logos had several meanings:

Heraclitus (6th century BCE): Logos referred to the rational principle governing the cosmos. It was the underlying order and reason in the universe.

Stoicism: The Stoics developed this further. For them, Logos was the divine rationality that permeates and structures all reality. It was impersonal but essential to the coherence of existence.

Philo of Alexandria (1st century BCE/CE): A Hellenistic Jewish philosopher who synthesized Jewish theology with Greek philosophy, Logos became a mediating divine being—the intermediary between God and the world.

2. Christian Logos (Gospel of John)
In John 1:1, the famous passage begins:

"In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with God, and the Logos was God."

This is a direct borrowing of the term Logos but with significant reinterpretation:

The Logos is not an impersonal force but a person—Jesus Christ.

The Logos is eternal, divine, and incarnate ("The Word became flesh and dwelt among us" – John 1:14).

It bridges Greek philosophical ideas of rationality and order with Jewish concepts of God's creative and revelatory word (e.g., in Genesis 1, where God creates by speaking).

ChatGPT

Yep, knew that a lonnnng time before ChatGPT. Glad it agrees with me.

The Johannine school logos isn't known for transcendent Love. A cosmic Father who notes the death of a sparrow is a beautiful hint of that.

You did it again! Now I have to look up 'Johannine school'.
I am really glad you enjoy the Greek philosophical Logos .

I feel the Greek Logos is true. My difficulty remains of how to combine the Greek Logos with present need to break the Gaza blockade. Our hearts are with the crew of that brave little ship Greta Thunberg sails on to breaK Israel's blockade. Jesus would be aboard .

Edited a few hours later.
I put to ChatGPT a lot of questions and objections stemming from 'Joahannine Christianity ' which led to Philo of Alexandria.

Philo of Alexandria (c. 20 BCE – 50 CE) was a Hellenistic Jewish philosopher who lived in Alexandria, Egypt — a hub of Greek philosophy and Diaspora Judaism.

He attempted to harmonize the Hebrew Scriptures with Greek (especially Platonic and Stoic) philosophy.

He wrote in Greek, and his works aimed at interpreting the Hebrew Bible allegorically in terms of philosophical categories — especially logos, nous, and virtue.

Yes, the evolution of Yahweh was well under way in Jewish thought from the Nevi'im Akharonim. Isaiah 1 is the Labour Party manifesto. The only way to cope with the sick horrors of the evolving Chthulhu henotheistic/monolatrous tribal desert storm god is to allegorize them from the wrong end of the telescope. Which Christianity inadequately continues.

A fine empty gesture, again, by Greta.

[henry quirk]

I don't feel leashed by the law

Me neither...cuz I break it regularly.

due to my privilege

What privilege is that? Me, I have no privilege.

it can't protect me from determined predators.

Of course not...that's your job.

But I've got to be 70 and kept my looks.

A pretty boy? Was/is that your privilege? Me, ugly as a cross-eye'd hound.

Tho' not the contents of my shed recently.

Robbery?

In a high density population we don't need them.

Seems to me in the insanity that is metropolis a firearm is a good thing to have.

Farmers and grouse hunters have shotguns obviously. I only object to the latter on moral grounds.

Are you anti-hunting or are you anti-meat eatin'?

I'm an Imagine type: A hopeless idealist type. ...

Like I say: a hippy.

That cannot be owned. Period.

It can be and is. Full stop.

democracy is such a joke

No, it's a danger.

Natural 'rights'...guarantee it.

All natural rights guarantee is you havin' a substantial objection to murder, slavery, rape, theft, and fraud. Without natural rights any objection amounts to I don't like it!

I can object all I like

Not in a substantial way, you can't.

Let's test it: I am an awful slaver. I've got you and intend to sell you to a buncha blood-drinkin' republicans. I'm also a philo-minded guy and like to give my properties a chance to win their freedom. Here's what I say to you...

Friend, this here is your chance to walk free: convince me it's wrong I should treat you like a commodity.

What's your argument?

all of us, apart from the truly independently rich, and even then, are commodified already. One cannot escape being traded.

Oh my...you done been domesticated.

For social justice you need public luxury

You don't need social justice: you need less domestication and more principled unruliness.

no guns, a major high mortality health issue in the US

Only in the metropolis.

Fully participative democracy

Yes, let's give the mob (and its directors) even more power.

an unregressable, unpoliticized, revenue service.

Yes, let's empower the directors of the mob to take it all.

You are iron to my iron. That's what parliament - taking - should be.

My skepticism meter is goin' off.

as a libertarian

I'm not a libertarian; I'm natural rights libertarian. Mine is not a political position.

polemical

I've been known to, under the influence of just the right blend of caffeine and nicotine, polemicize with the best of 'em, so: no worries.

If there were one creator, for which there is no warrant that can be known (until Love shows itself as always having grounded being, which if it could have, it always would have), but desire, there would be infinite.

Not sure what this sentence is sayin'. Mebbe you can reword it? Love: what the hell does love have to do with the Creator?

Just as there are infinite multiverses.

There's just one universe.

[henry quirk]

I think you get the idea of natural rights from your own psychology.

Of course you do, B. You will not admit the metaphysical so all you can do is attempt to source what is truly metaphysical in the physical. For you it's all meat and workings of meat.

[Belinda]

I think you get the idea of natural rights from your own psychology.

Of course you do, B. You will not admit the metaphysical so all you can do is attempt to source what is truly metaphysical in the physical. For you it's all meat and workings of meat.

When you say "metaphysical" what you mean is supernatural. Supernatural is above the natural so I expect you think rights are supernatural.

BTW do you think natural rights are accompanied by natural responsibilities?

[henry quirk]

When you say "metaphysical" what you mean is supernatural.

Not exactly, but you won't appreciate the difference.

BTW do you think natural rights are accompanied by natural responsibilities?

The responsibility is: to recognize and respect the other guy's immutable moral claim to his own life, liberty, and property as he ought to recognize and respect yours.

[CIN2]

That's a thoroughly unhelpful "definition." If fails to specify what those "reasons" would be, what the "anti-response" would entail, and what would justify calling "reasons" "sufficient." In other words, it says absolutely nothing specific.


Then it also makes unclear what the real connection between "unpleasant" and "bad" would be. Many things that are "unpleasant" are good...like cough medicine. And things which some people find "pleasant," like theft or adultery, could be "bad."

So you've given nothing that informs us of anything.

Only if "unpleasant" and "bad" turn out to be the same, which even you now admit they are not...though even your claim that "unpleasantness" is involved with "badness" remains unclear.


That's just circular. Being "unpleasant" simply means being "disliked." The "avoidably" is also gratuitous: what would "avoidance" have to do with either?


Wait.

If "unpleasantness" "intrinsically provides sufficient reason" for an "anti-response," and that is also your definition of "bad" (see above), then you are saying homosexuality is bad, and "intrinsically" so. And the basis for that would be no more than that some people "unavoidably" feel an "unpleasantness" about it.

Which is not informative of anything, since all of the terms you use remain undefined. You've said nothing, essentially. We're no closer to knowing what you mean by "bad" than before, since we can't know what "provides sufficient reason" or "anti-reaction" or "unpleasantness" entail.

It looks like you're plugging for a very weak form of Emotivism, in which your own personal emotions determine whether things are "good" or "bad," and your own sense of "sufficient reasons" is all that's available for us to use in moral reflection: and that's just not good enough for anybody else, is it?

No. I'm saying the opposite. I'm saying that that is what YOU might need in order to make your case, but you can't have it. Pain is an effect, but it doesn't tell us the moral quality of the thing with which it comes packaged. Some painful things are good, and some painless things are bad. Pain actually has no ability to tell us anything about the moral situation, or goodness or badness, or justification.


No, I am definitely doing no such thing.

I'm pointing out, rather, that the presence of pain tells us nothing, morally speaking. And that in ethics, we aren't at all concerned with whether or not people happen to like or feel pleasantness about what they're doing; we're only concerned with whether or not what we're asking them to do is RIGHT, even if it causes them pain, or even if it offers any pleasure.

The same critiques still work. You can see that.
Are you asking a question? It needs a question mark, then.

I'd be interested in how you think your moral theory would answer this. That's why I asked.
So you haven't done anything to resolve the conflict between the theories that hold that "good" means "good intentions," as in Kant, and "good" means "pleasant outcomes or consequences," as per Mill et al. So we can't know whether or not dosing somebody with fentanyl is good or bad. This is what I mean about your theory being totally morally uninformative: we're no more clear on the situation than we were at the start, and your theory has added no useful information to our moral judgment at all.

Then it would mean you can't tell anything about goodness or badness until after all the participants are dead. And yes, that would be a very serious -- even terminal -- fault in any such theory. It literally could not inform any living person about the moral status of his/her situation. And it sure won't inform the dead.
Then you need to read Hume. He did. And I linked you an article that quoted not only him but a bunch of other authors reacting to Hume.

Are you not even aware that the word "ought" is essential to moral thinking? Ethics is not about what you feel you want to do, or what you can be able to do, or what you find convenient to do. You can know all three without knowing anything about morals or ethics at all...just by consulting your gut or your momentary disposition. But if ethics/morals are real things, then they have to do with what one should or ought to do, regardless of one's feelings in the moment.

If we say "It is moral to die for one's family," we are not asking, "Do you want to die?" We aren't asking, "Would you find it pleasant?" We aren't even asking, "Do you want to?" We're saying, instead, that it would be good/noble/courageous/admirable and right to do it, especially if you find it something you'd rather not do, and will be painful and hard, and you wouldn't otherwise do. In other words, something you "ought" to do, not something you feel like doing.

In that, all philosophers of ethics agree. It's you that has no ally on that. "Ought" is the essential term of all ethical/moral reflection...as also suggested by the OP here.

Did you even read the article?


I did them all. And you ignored all I did. If that's what you do, I can't stop you.
No. I'm pointing out that you can't even use "pleasant" as a mere indicator of goodness. The two are utterly unrelated, and only ever occur in each other's company by accident. That's what I'm pointing out.

Justify that claim. why is he "doing evil"? He likes it. He wants it. He can do it. And he finds it pleasant.

But he knows exactly what he's doing. And he finds it fun. How do you convince him he ought not to do it?


Are you actually suggesting that when an Atheist says, "That was a good meal," he means it was morally good? I'll bet he doesn't. He means by "good" something like "tasty" or "gustatorially fulfilling," or "aesthetically pleasing." He doesn't mean anything moral at all. So there's no such conflict. It's not a morality-implicating situation. The Atheist can have his "good meal" without even involving himself in ethics.

this is answered simply by the fact that God does not change His nature. You needed an "if" to get your argument off the ground; but it was an "if" even less possible than, "If I could flap my arms hard enough, I could fly." It's outright impossible. So no, it's not a live criticism. It's not even one that the imagination can fabricate without misunderstanding what the word "God" (in reference to the only God that actually exists) means.

Oh, that's easy to answer. Because the ultimate good of man is fellowship with God. It's both the thing best for man, and the thing for which he was designed. It's good in every possible way, in fact. So you should seek what is consistent with the nature of God so as to be a fit companion for God. And if you seek anything else, you'll only be seeking that which is evil -- that which is all three of, hurtful to you, damaging to your relationship with your Creator, and ultimately defeating of your own whole reason for being in existence.

I had prepared a detailed reply to this, but there seems little point in posting it, because it's clear that neither of us will ever convince the other.

I'm withdrawing from the debate.

Bravo.

Thanks, but I don't deserve your praise. I feel guilty about this. I consider IC's post to be riddled with errors, and part of me thinks I really should provide the forum, if not IC himself, with a detailed explanation of what the errors are. But I'm also trying to write a novel, and it's way more satisfying to add another few hundred words to that than to keep banging my head against someone else's immovable incomprehension.

Really I'm just being selfish.

[Martin Peter Clarke]

I had prepared a detailed reply to this, but there seems little point in posting it, because it's clear that neither of us will ever convince the other.

I'm withdrawing from the debate.

Bravo.

Thanks, but I don't deserve your praise. I feel guilty about this. I consider IC's post to be riddled with errors, and part of me thinks I really should provide the forum, if not IC himself, with a detailed explanation of what the errors are. But I'm also trying to write a novel, and it's way more satisfying to add another few hundred words to that than to keep banging my head against someone else's immovable incomprehension.

Really I'm just being selfish.

You do. You have done the only possible, reasonable, decent thing. Foe him and then provide us with a detailed explanation of what the errors are, if you feel the need, we don't. He cannot be provided with anything; you cannot help unhelpable people. They cannot be deprogrammed, it's a wetware problem. Not even love can fix it. Not in cyberspace. I'm sure we all wish him therapeutic love in real life. You have extracted yourself from a hopeless situation, we always feel the rebuke of that 'failure'; he can't be fixed. Self preservation has had to pay that price.

Put it in the novel!

[Martin Peter Clarke]

I don't feel leashed by the law

(i) Me neither...cuz I break it regularly.

due to my privilege

(ii) What privilege is that? Me, I have no privilege.

it can't protect me from determined predators.

(iii) Of course not...that's your job.

But I've got to be 70 and kept my looks.

(iv) A pretty boy? Was/is that your privilege? Me, ugly as a cross-eye'd hound.

Tho' not the contents of my shed recently.

(v) Robbery?

In a high density population we don't need them.

(vi) Seems to me in the insanity that is metropolis a firearm is a good thing to have.

Farmers and grouse hunters have shotguns obviously. I only object to the latter on moral grounds.

(vii) Are you anti-hunting or are you anti-meat eatin'?

I'm an Imagine type: A hopeless idealist type. ...

(viii) Like I say: a hippy.

That cannot be owned. Period.

(ix) It can be and is. Full stop.

democracy is such a joke

(x) No, it's a danger.

Natural 'rights'...guarantee it.

(xi) All natural rights guarantee is you havin' a substantial objection to murder, slavery, rape, theft, and fraud. Without natural rights any objection amounts to I don't like it!

I can object all I like

(xii) Not in a substantial way, you can't.

Let's test it: I am an awful slaver. I've got you and intend to sell you to a buncha blood-drinkin' republicans. I'm also a philo-minded guy and like to give my properties a chance to win their freedom. Here's what I say to you...

Friend, this here is your chance to walk free: convince me it's wrong I should treat you like a commodity.

What's your argument?

all of us, apart from the truly independently rich, and even then, are commodified already. One cannot escape being traded.

(xiii) Oh my...you done been domesticated.

For social justice you need public luxury

(xiv) You don't need social justice: you need less domestication and more principled unruliness.

no guns, a major high mortality health issue in the US

(xv) Only in the metropolis.

Fully participative democracy

(xvi) Yes, let's give the mob (and its directors) even more power.

an unregressable, unpoliticized, revenue service.

(xvii) Yes, let's empower the directors of the mob to take it all.

You are iron to my iron. That's what parliament - taking - should be.

(xviii) My skepticism meter is goin' off.

as a libertarian

(xix) I'm not a libertarian; I'm natural rights libertarian. Mine is not a political position.

polemical

(xx) I've been known to, under the influence of just the right blend of caffeine and nicotine, polemicize with the best of 'em, so: no worries.

If there were one creator, for which there is no warrant that can be known (until Love shows itself as always having grounded being, which if it could have, it always would have), but desire, there would be infinite.

(xxi) Not sure what this sentence is sayin'. Mebbe you can reword it? Love: what the hell does love have to do with the Creator?

Just as there are infinite multiverses.

(xxii) There's just one universe.

(i) In England you need planning permission to change your pillow cases. It's Islamic; that which isn't permitted is forbidden. I deployed big solid rubber wedges against the curb in to my drive. That was illegal it turned out. I got a letter from the council. Unbelievable. They haven't noticed the carpet gripper strips I've fixed to the top of my fence. Some thief might hurt themselves!! And I love trespassing, I've always been a natural trespasser and then I read this superb vindication of it https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/540 ... f-trespass. Not on little people's property of course. A vixen is calling in the night as I write. Wild thing. You'd shoot me on sight.

(ii) Education, fairy godmother perspective (I can't use it to make myself rich, but friends and family value it). As for you, you're a man of property. More than your fair share?

(iii) I'm mainly harmless. I'm 70 for heaven's sake. But I can look pretty damn intimidating in my drover's hat and coat. And there's always the knobkerrie. It scares even me! The cops saw me with it, walking through the park at night, and didn't bat an eyelid. I used to carry a telescopic cosh after being attacked for being the good Samaritan: no truly good deed goes unpunished. I'd prefer a quarter staff. But that would raise a policely eyebrow.

(iv) It's all part of the package that's gotten me this far. And I'm showing the sunny side up here. I would, being a 'sanguine'. With issues. And you have a handsome persona. Westerns, see?

(v) Yep. Got the guy on camera. Cut through my boron steel padlock with a battery angle grinder. He's back in Romania now (for real, the police ID'd him), with all my power tools. Should have upgraded my security system, but no point, I thought (due to personal circumstances; I don't have quite the charmed life befitting my silver fox looks), before this.

(vi) I have fantasized it. A Makarov off the dark web. An AK for the apocalypse collapse. When the internet goes sentient and commits suicide.

(vii) I'm anti privilege. Suicidal I know. I'm anti grouse moor. You really should read The Book of Trespass. In socialist Britain we pay billionaires to keep their heather cut and flood the workers who cut it.

(viii) Hippicrite.

(ix) Oh aye, it's the ironest clad reality in civilization, we cannot possibly evolve to Imagine otherwise. Our genetic shackles guarantee it.

(x) To whom? Apart from the forest that always votes for the axe because it has a wooden handle. The trees are commodified.

(xi) Well yeah, we're naturally wired to oppose such. That gives us the right. We're the most remarkably eusocial species evolution will ever come up with. If we weren't wired thus, if evolution had stopped 50, 80, 400 thousand years ago. But how could it. It's stopped now for us obviously. Civilization guarantees that.

(xii) ... well, I'll post this and edit later. And here we are. Convince you? Utterly impossible. I can only object with a shiv at your throat. All I like. Convinced? You should have checked my shoes. As I said. Mainly harmless. I used to go drinking with a couple of paras. One Jolly Crispin night Old Bob came in all of a fluster. I asked him what was wrong. He said he was coming in and a lad in the gutter, with buddies, asked him for a smoke. He took a long pull on his cigarette, exhaled, and said 'I don't smoke'. Bob then said to me, 'He stood up!'. He went further, 'So I showed him this', he pulled his coat open and revealed a Mick Dundee size Bowie knife and a set of nunchuks. 'Pensioner me, Martin. Pensioner!'. He was outraged, rightly so. He ended a confrontation at The Lamplighter by pulling a Browning semi-automatic Hi-Power out of his boot holster. He'd mellowed with age by then. His bulldog loved me. Been out in all weathers since I was 17, dear henry. Still like the Moody Blues. Back to your question. When King Charles I was arrested while playing golf under house arrest at Holdenby House, where I've stood, he asked by what authority. A Leveller levelled a musket at him. ''t'is a fine authority' he said. And played his shot. I admire everyone in that tableau. Authority? Argument? I'd never rely on just words.

(xiii) I look like I have been. I've used my teeth in a fight before now. The guy whose arse I bit attacked his buddies to get away.

(xiv) I like the idea of principled unruliness. More later.

(xv) Sandy Hook?

(xvi) More? The masses have none whatsoever, but limited spending power. The families of 30% of UK children can't afford breakfast. Give them (xiv).

(xvii ) As for the directors of the mobility, here we call them fascist scum. Tommy Robinson (nomme de guerre of Stephen Christopher Yaxley-Lennon). And their more obvious petit bourgeois betters. Nigel Farage. We have lamp posts we could decorate with them if it came to it. Heaven forfend.

(xviii) Skepsis is my territory. I don't doubt you. You have a consistent, impervious weltanshauung. As do I.

(xix) A fine distinction. With political implications. Like my left-libertarianism.

(xx) You, Sir, just can't help being a gentleman can you?

(xxi) Ah! If there were a ground of infinite being from eternity, They would be transcendent Love. They wouldn't be the primitive projected creation in the Bible. And His superfluous, particular, impossible, absurd, meaningless Son of (you may well agree, you're deist right?). They would be competent. They would metamorphose all suffering (redundant phraseology I realise) creatures for endless equality of outcome. Joy. In self actualization, asymptotically levelling out, in the moment, forever. And it would be obvious: My God's better than your God. Where do you make yours up from if not the Bible?

(xxii) If there were one infinite eternal universe, then we are in a finite attenuating vesicle within it, beyond which is the dissipating rest of it as a most 'outer' 'shell' (everything becomes metaphoric in expanding 4D), still cut off from the rest of the one universe that occupies all possible space geometries, occupied itself by infinite other infinitesimal practically eternally dying bubbles whilst only actually alive for a mere 200 trillion years. Which is imparsimonious (my idioslexis, as is that, or rather CharGPT's at my behest). If there could be one such mega/meta/verse, there must be infinite. An object that is a set of universes is a multiverse. This paltry blink of a universe, this scintilla, even with its unobservable 'shell', is not the universe. That's logically absurd by Kolmogorov complexity. But if you have to believe that, that's fine. Matters of unjustified, unwarranted, untrue belief are sacred.

As below, so above. As there are an infinity of multiverses having no influence on each other, there would be infinite Gods grounding them. In a transinfinte set of a transinfinite set of transinfinite sets. It's yer Cantor. Yer Hilbert.

So, is your single universe this finite one, observable becoming un-, only?

[Belinda]

When you say "metaphysical" what you mean is supernatural.

Not exactly, but you won't appreciate the difference.

BTW do you think natural rights are accompanied by natural responsibilities?

The responsibility is: to recognize and respect the other guy's immutable moral claim to his own life, liberty, and property as he ought to recognize and respect yours.

I've already agreed with you about what you call "natural rights", I agree on the basis that even a baby of 6-9 months shows evidence of the fairness instinct.

As for property rights, what property I have is my good fortune my good luck. There is no supernatural authority that laid down a law that said Belinda must not have her house bombed while while it's okay for some old Palestinian woman to be bombed out of house and home. The Creator you believe in and trust is two faced; He created good men and He created bad men and then said his creation was good. The Creator you believe made us to have natural rights and natural responsibilities to the degree that you claim , left us to work out for ourselves what is good and what is bad.

Then after a while along came wise men who explained how to live good lives, and some wise men such as Moses and Confucius wrote down codes of law. Rule of law is the mark of civilisation. Never in the human past have dictators written down codes of law which did not depend upon a myth specially composed to rationalise what they did and intend to do. Trump is a caricature of the latter;Trump 's specially- composed myth is for the purpose of roping in people who need to be told what to do. This is populism.

I think you are right concerning what you said somewhere on the forum to the effect that a rural population needs less intervention from government and the law than does an urban population. What you said actually applied to US gun ownership.

I don't know the situation about land use in the US. It's pretty bad in England where land use is actually feudal in certain places, and in other places land ownership pertains mostly to wealthy persons. While some wealthy persons are philanthropic or environmentally aware , other wealthy persons are like machines programmed for selfishness and greed. Come on, you must know this! It's the theme of most of the great Hollywood horse operas.

[Belinda]

Yep, knew that a lonnnng time before ChatGPT. Glad it agrees with me.

The Johannine school logos isn't known for transcendent Love. A cosmic Father who notes the death of a sparrow is a beautiful hint of that.

You did it again! Now I have to look up 'Johannine school'.
I am really glad you enjoy the Greek philosophical Logos .

I feel the Greek Logos is true. My difficulty remains of how to combine the Greek Logos with present need to break the Gaza blockade. Our hearts are with the crew of that brave little ship Greta Thunberg sails on to breaK Israel's blockade. Jesus would be aboard .

Edited a few hours later.
I put to ChatGPT a lot of questions and objections stemming from 'Joahannine Christianity ' which led to Philo of Alexandria.

Philo of Alexandria (c. 20 BCE – 50 CE) was a Hellenistic Jewish philosopher who lived in Alexandria, Egypt — a hub of Greek philosophy and Diaspora Judaism.

He attempted to harmonize the Hebrew Scriptures with Greek (especially Platonic and Stoic) philosophy.

He wrote in Greek, and his works aimed at interpreting the Hebrew Bible allegorically in terms of philosophical categories — especially logos, nous, and virtue.

Yes, the evolution of Yahweh was well under way in Jewish thought from the Nevi'im Akharonim. Isaiah 1 is the Labour Party manifesto. The only way to cope with the sick horrors of the evolving Chthulhu henotheistic/monolatrous tribal desert storm god is to allegorize them from the wrong end of the telescope. Which Christianity inadequately continues.

A fine empty gesture, again, by Greta.

But the Bible tells how Jahweh did actually evolve, whereas Cthulhu can't evolve. The history of God is the best description of the Bible. Historians interpret The Bible as a history of God, so please don't gather from what I wrote that I am some sort of Biblical literalist.

Greta Thunberg does not write poetry or act in plays to express herself and her moral stance.

[Martin Peter Clarke]

You did it again! Now I have to look up 'Johannine school'.
I am really glad you enjoy the Greek philosophical Logos .

I feel the Greek Logos is true. My difficulty remains of how to combine the Greek Logos with present need to break the Gaza blockade. Our hearts are with the crew of that brave little ship Greta Thunberg sails on to breaK Israel's blockade. Jesus would be aboard .

Edited a few hours later.
I put to ChatGPT a lot of questions and objections stemming from 'Joahannine Christianity ' which led to Philo of Alexandria.

Philo of Alexandria (c. 20 BCE – 50 CE) was a Hellenistic Jewish philosopher who lived in Alexandria, Egypt — a hub of Greek philosophy and Diaspora Judaism.

He attempted to harmonize the Hebrew Scriptures with Greek (especially Platonic and Stoic) philosophy.

He wrote in Greek, and his works aimed at interpreting the Hebrew Bible allegorically in terms of philosophical categories — especially logos, nous, and virtue.

Yes, the evolution of Yahweh was well under way in Jewish thought from the Nevi'im Akharonim. Isaiah 1 is the Labour Party manifesto. The only way to cope with the sick horrors of the evolving Chthulhu henotheistic/monolatrous tribal desert storm god is to allegorize them from the wrong end of the telescope. Which Christianity inadequately continues.

A fine empty gesture, again, by Greta.

But the Bible tells how Jahweh did actually evolve, whereas Cthulhu can't evolve. The history of God is the best description of the Bible. Historians interpret The Bible as a history of God, so please don't gather from what I wrote that I am some sort of Biblical literalist.

Greta Thunberg does not write poetry or act in plays to express herself and her moral stance.

Aye, the Bible is a history of the idea of God. It couldn't possibly be a history of an actual God. And I certainly don't take you for that much of a literalist : ) All Bible believers are to some degree.

Aye, Greta's moral expression is as good as any other, to the untouchable face of impunity.

[Belinda]

Yes, the evolution of Yahweh was well under way in Jewish thought from the Nevi'im Akharonim. Isaiah 1 is the Labour Party manifesto. The only way to cope with the sick horrors of the evolving Chthulhu henotheistic/monolatrous tribal desert storm god is to allegorize them from the wrong end of the telescope. Which Christianity inadequately continues.

A fine empty gesture, again, by Greta.

But the Bible tells how Jahweh did actually evolve, whereas Cthulhu can't evolve. The history of God is the best description of the Bible. Historians interpret The Bible as a history of God, so please don't gather from what I wrote that I am some sort of Biblical literalist.

Greta Thunberg does not write poetry or act in plays to express herself and her moral stance.

Aye, the Bible is a history of the idea of God. It couldn't possibly be a history of an actual God. And I certainly don't take you for that much of a literalist : ) All Bible believers are to some degree.

Aye, Greta's moral expression is as good as any other, to the untouchable face of impunity.

The nature of any modern history is compounded of scientific sifting of evidence and the historian's interpretation of that evidence. We take for granted that the world view of ancient peoples is not the same as our world view here and now. We are talking about a modern, post -enlightenment, approach to historiography.

As for Greta Thunberg and her activities, she is an artist for whom her own safety is risked in honour of expressing her ideas. At the least. At the most the little ship's life saving supplies may even get through the barricades.

[CIN2]

Put it in the novel!

Now there's an idea....

[henry quirk]

In England you need planning permission to change your pillow cases.

In some place here (the metropli mostly) it's the same.

It's Islamic; that which isn't permitted is forbidden.

Really? The islamists have penetrated that deeply?

I deployed big solid rubber wedges against the curb in to my drive. That was illegal it turned out. I got a letter from the council. Unbelievable.

Tell me you defied them.

You'd shoot me on sight.

Nah, I'd yell at you first get offa my lawn!. Then I'd shoot you. When I was a kid I was pretty adventuresome myself. Today, I'd shoot young me in the ass with birdshot.

Education

Oh, I was adequately taught in the mill, same as you, I guess. But what I learned was out of the classroom.

you're a man of property.

A tiny plot upon which sits a tiny house.

More than your fair share?

What is my fair share?

I'm mainly harmless.

I'm not.

I'm 70 for heaven's sake.

Well that's no excuse. Old men ought to be fear'd, not dismissed.

But I can look pretty damn intimidating in my drover's hat and coat. And there's always the knobkerrie. It scares even me!

There you go: fake it till you make it. Don't fear your tools, respect them.

The cops saw me with it, walking through the park at night, and didn't bat an eyelid.

Yeah but aren't Brit cops *ahem* pussies?

attacked for being the good Samaritan

You gotta tell that story.

It's all part of the package that's gotten me this far.

Yeah you are a sunny guy...kinda annoying (I kid! not)

you have a handsome persona.

I can be civil...it's work.

He's back in Romania now (for real, the police ID'd him), with all my power tools.

Son of a bitch deserved birdshot in the ass.

A Makarov off the dark web. An AK for the apocalypse collapse.

A shotgun is the finest, all-around weapon you can use. it's low maintenance and versatile. And legal for you, yes? Get one. A basic pump action or a double. Spicy times are comin'.

When the internet goes sentient and commits suicide.

LLMs ain't gonna do nuthin' but fade away once folks get that the things are mostly hype.

grouse moor

Where's the sport in those? What makes hunting hunting is the hunt. The possibility of goin' home empty-handed. Managed hunts = cheating.

Hippicrite

Our genetic shackles guarantee it.

There are no such things.

To whom?

To me, for a start.

Well yeah, we're naturally wired to oppose such.

We're metaphysically disposed to object.

That gives us the right.

Biology gives us nuthin' cept means. Motivation, reason, intuition, those are sourced in spirit.

We're the most remarkably eusocial species evolution will ever come up with.

We're hylomorphic free wills. Our sociability, nowadays, is a matter of choice. Evolution may have shaped the meat but it had nuthin' to do with the mind.

Convince you? Utterly impossible.

Not in scenario I offered, no.

Sandy Hook?

Part of the New York metropolitan area.

The masses have none whatsoever, but limited spending power

If that were so, politicians wouldn't spend the bulk of their time hoodwinkin' 'em and curryin' favor.

We have lamp posts we could decorate with them if it came to it.

It'll come to that, sooner or later.

Skepsis is my territory.

A pinch or two of salt.

If there were a ground of infinite being from eternity, They would be transcendent Love.

I can't see why this would be, have to be, so.

Where do you make yours up from if not the Bible?

Well, I didn't make Him up. He's there.

My particular take comes from reason and intuition...and Robert E Howard. God is just. Justice can be harsh and uncompromising.

If there were one infinite eternal universe

What there actually is: one, finite, reality. Essentially a big friggin' box.

is your single universe this finite one, observable becoming un-, only?

Nuthin' lasts forever.

[henry quirk]

I've already agreed with you about what you call "natural rights"

Yes, and I was shock'd...down right flabbergasted, I was.

what property I have is my good fortune my good luck

Me: I had to work for mine.

There is no supernatural authority that laid down a law that said Belinda must not have her house bombed while while it's okay for some old Palestinian woman to be bombed out of house and home.

Of course not. There is, though, a Creator who crafted the measure of right and wrong. We, free wills each, carry inherently that measure as a compass, always pointin' true north. We, as we each like, can ignore that compass.

The Creator you believe in and trust is two faced; He created good men and He created bad men and then said his creation was good. The Creator you believe made us to have natural rights and natural responsibilities to the degree that you claim , left us to work out for ourselves what is good and what is bad.

Uh, no, B. Not my God.

Rule of law is the mark of civilisation.

When it aligns with natural law/rights.

Come on, you must know this!

What I know: the forvever war is between the free man and the slaver.