Christianity

[Harbal]

Numbers of immigrants is an economic and educational problem. Immigration of undesirable cultures such as modern slavery and drug addiction is a problem of policing. The latest news I read of such people they were Albanians. I have to suppose some foreign nationals are more suspect than others. Your selection process , AJ, is too blunt a knife.

The people I remember from my childhood and youth in Scotland includes Polish soldiers under the command of General Sikorski , and four or five Jewish or Gibraltarian refugees and evacuees. My "zeal" such as it is originates in my childhood and my childhood chums and friends. You?

I think the problem of immigration is more general than that, Belinda, or perhaps more generally specific, if there could be such a thing. I suspect that human beings are far too tribal by nature for the mixing of cultures and races ever to be unproblematic. For understandable reasons, immigrants, particularly those from less developed parts of the world, polarise to form their own, separate, communities within the host nation, and tend to keep themselves apart from and outside of its culture. Over time, very large areas can become almost completely populated by such communities. This is perceived as being alien, and even threatening, to a large number among the indigenous population. Tension and animosity is almost certain.

[Belinda]

Numbers of immigrants is an economic and educational problem. Immigration of undesirable cultures such as modern slavery and drug addiction is a problem of policing. The latest news I read of such people they were Albanians. I have to suppose some foreign nationals are more suspect than others. Your selection process , AJ, is too blunt a knife.

The people I remember from my childhood and youth in Scotland includes Polish soldiers under the command of General Sikorski , and four or five Jewish or Gibraltarian refugees and evacuees. My "zeal" such as it is originates in my childhood and my childhood chums and friends. You?

I think the problem of immigration is more general than that, Belinda, or perhaps more generally specific, if there could be such a thing. I suspect that human beings are far too tribal by nature for the mixing of cultures and races ever to be unproblematic. For understandable reasons, immigrants, particularly those from less developed parts of the world, polarise to form their own, separate, communities within the host nation, and tend to keep themselves apart from and outside of its culture. Over time, very large areas can become almost completely populated by such communities. This is perceived as being alien, and even threatening, to a large number among the indigenous population. Tension and animosity is almost certain.

During the war there was a Polish regiment stationed in and around the small town. Children have long antennae for adults' emotional reactions and the soldiers were nearly always liked and welcomed. I suppose this would be how refugees from Ukraine would be welcomed. During a war the enemy is known so Poles and Ukrainians would be viewed as people like us.
Religions tend to divide people, so religious Moslems form cliques like in Bradford. I have no personal experience of religious tribalism. Most people are not religious now, and education together with decent housing will I am sure allow people to be simply people. Immigrants from less developed parts of the world are a problem for schools and social services if they are uneducated and afraid of the host population. Maybe I'm underestimating the problem and should do some reading.

[Lacewing]

The arrogance of.../... God must have appeared epiphanally and communicated his will to you.../...You have a zealousness with evangelizing fervor.

Projections of Alexis, himself, onto 'Progressives'. Oh, the horror of THEM!

The mixing of disparates is the beginning of the end

The rejection of seeing and honoring integral connection is a disease. It's like cutting off a part of your body because it doesn't match or function like the other parts.

The journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step.

How do you know what's actually at the end of a thousand miles if you've not been there? And maybe your excessive baggage is taking you through swamps.

You pitiable, diseased people! And to think I have been called to rearrange your twisted outlooks.

Just what we need... another fucking self-righteous messenger to save us. Really??!!! FUCK YOU!

And Happy New Year.

[tillingborn]

I would recommend not starting a post like yours with an appeal to authority. You lost points there.

Given that the authority is myself, it seems an appropriate response to an appeal to wikipedia.

I have very little respect for the majority of the intellectual class of today. It amazes me that with so much training what yet comes out as a product is a being who can’t think freely. How do you explain that? Perhaps we’ll have time to come up with some answers.

I think your association with "the intellectual class of today" is the place to start. Then we might examine your belief that people who do not agree with you are somehow constrained.

I admired your ultra-pretentious tone as a rebuttal to my pretentious tone. However, I am an artist at it, you a mere dilettante!

Perhaps when your trip is over you might exercise a bit of reflection and see what I have written as something I believe to be true, rather than a projection of your own pretentiousness.

But my greatest appreciation is for your post formatting skill. I am still weak in that skill so I hope to learn from you.

Since the theme of pretentiousness is fresh, I will say how sorry I am that you can no longer ask Pele how he tied his boot laces.

As to Plato — or Socrates — when I translated the part when Socrates looked down into Alcibiades’ toga and (as it is euphemistically translated “caught the flame”) and understood that his man-thing took the upward leap — then I knew what I was dealing with. You simply cannot trust these people Tillingborn. What they are after, and what I am after, these are distinct.

Alcibiades and Socrates were certainly close and no doubt inflamed each other on many occasions, but I think the reference is to Charmides. Whatever the ancient Greeks did to make their man-things take the upward leap, it has as much bearing on the value of their thinking as your practises have on you.

There is not really much to comment back to you on. Your post was theatre. You seem an argument looking for a context.

Of course there is theatre, but there are also facts.

(Where has Immanuel got off too anyway?)

He'll be back. You have been here long enough that you should understand that he will patch whatever hole he's found and come back the same overly confident Immanuel Can he has mostly been these last 9 and a bit years. He's been around almost as long as you:

Hello there Tillingborn. If anything, and in the context of the 'apology' I am attempting, it is not an ivory tower in which I'd lock myself up in but (and let's not explode at the seams or anything, people!) but a religious institution of higher learning.

Fair enough. What exactly do you propose should be taught?

Nearly ten years, and you still can't do your laces up.

[Immanuel Can]

I do insist that humans did not evolve.

Then give us one good reason to believe that.

The burden of proof runs the opposite: unless we have sufficient reason to believe in a particular theory, we have no reason to believe. I don’t have to disprove your theory. You have to prove your theory. If you can’t, or can’t offer sufficient warrant for me to do so, I have no reason to think Evolutionism as it pertains to humans is true.

As for Creation, even as ardent an opponent of it as Dawkins freely admits the evidence, at first blush, favours it. And so do the vast majority of human beings, of all kinds, who have ever lived. So it looks like the ball is in your court. And lack of an overwhelming abundance of transitional forms would be very telling against your theory. So, to mix a metaphor, you’re also behind the. “8” ball, it would seem.

[Immanuel Can]

The practical point of all this is an individual who introspects with courage and sincerity loves their own soul and by extension, others' souls.

That’s not at all evident. When Nietzsche “introspected” with “courage and (presumably) sincerity,” he denied the very existence of souls, and the claims others are presumed to have on them. He saw heroism in the courage to embrace death and suffering…even the deaths and sufferings of others, caused by one’s own “Ubermenschen” choices.

I think, B., the human race is not as single-minded about these things as you suggest. Their experiences of “introspection” lead them to very different conclusions. And that, I think, is because “introspection” is, by itself, insufficient. It’s a piece of the necessary information, to be sure; but it’s far from all of the story, and far from enough of it.

[Immanuel Can]

So maybe we start talking about the part on which we agree, yes? You are thinking about human evils, and about malice. What are you thinking about them?

I think of the word “evil” as an indicator of extreme behaviour, such as extremely cruel or sadistic behaviour. Any excessive behaviour that falls within the category of malicious. It is only a word I would use informally, and certainly never if precision of meaning were called for.

When someone asks, “why is there evil in the world?”, it suggests to me that they think of evil as a malignant presence, or force, that is capable of infecting people with a desire to inflict suffering on others. The word has strong religious and biblical connotations, which is mostly why I have an aversion to it, but it is also why I think you are in a much better position than I am to explain exactly what evil is.

Fair enough. What you are suggesting, or at least intuiting, I think, is something I’ve been reading recently in Charles Taylor’s most famous book, A Secular Age. It’s that concepts like evil are fixtures of particular worldviews, in the sense that only particular worldviews can rationalize them as objective, or as a stable and definable concept. And perhaps that explains our difference of approach to using the word.

[Immanuel Can]

The whole idea of triathletes is steeped in ideals of competition and struggle;

Well, that’s nothing to do with my actual question. Regard it as a pure “thought experiment,” because nobody’s suggesting God’s going to make everybody triathletes.


Given that, let’s answer the question. Could God have sufficient reason for allowing SOME amount of discomfort, struggle, pain and suffering, IF there were some very valuable goods in view? Or is all suffering automatically evil?

Suffering is suffering. It is never good. Maybe if it's a punishment from God then suffering is produced for sufficient reason if it was something truly deserved by the recipient. Certainly many rare goods are, for some, only obtained through suffering through the competition for them. Others require suffering to create. Some goods require little if any suffering at all to acquire. But just about everything requires some degree of suffering to create. Would the world be a better place without suffering? You bet! It might even take away some of the reason human beings sometimes resort to evil in order to avoid suffering. But all this is what drives natural forces that shape and create who and what we are, according to Evolutionists. Maybe they're right.

What I mean, Gary, is this: you must have observed that having no challenges, no obstacles, no pains and no setbacks is not conducive to the creating of good humans, anymore than it is to making triathletes. No moral and character “muscles” develop for those who lack mountains to climb and races to run. So I’m not at all sure we can safely say that the world — and the people within it — would be “better” without any such things.

In any case, it’s far from obvious that such a world would create good human beings, or human beings capable of things like mercy, sympathy, love, unselfishness, grace, and even creativity and achievement. So I think it’s fair to accord at least some respect to the idea of a world in which there are at least SOME such setbacks and vexations.

We can, of course, argue over whether or not the current proportions are right: but can we really debate the truth that a world with challenges is at least possibly better than one without…at least for the project of making people of depth?

[Gary Childress]

Well, that’s nothing to do with my actual question. Regard it as a pure “thought experiment,” because nobody’s suggesting God’s going to make everybody triathletes.


Given that, let’s answer the question. Could God have sufficient reason for allowing SOME amount of discomfort, struggle, pain and suffering, IF there were some very valuable goods in view? Or is all suffering automatically evil?

Suffering is suffering. It is never good. Maybe if it's a punishment from God then suffering is produced for sufficient reason if it was something truly deserved by the recipient. Certainly many rare goods are, for some, only obtained through suffering through the competition for them. Others require suffering to create. Some goods require little if any suffering at all to acquire. But just about everything requires some degree of suffering to create. Would the world be a better place without suffering? You bet! It might even take away some of the reason human beings sometimes resort to evil in order to avoid suffering. But all this is what drives natural forces that shape and create who and what we are, according to Evolutionists. Maybe they're right.

What I mean, Gary, is this: you must have observed that having no challenges, no obstacles, no pains and no setbacks is not conducive to the creating of good humans, anymore than it is to making triathletes. No moral and character “muscles” develop for those who lack mountains to climb and races to run. So I’m not at all sure we can safely say that the world — and the people within it — would be “better” without any such things.

In any case, it’s far from obvious that such a world would create good human beings, or human beings capable of things like mercy, sympathy, love, unselfishness, grace, and even creativity and achievement. So I think it’s fair to accord at least some respect to the idea of a world in which there are at least SOME such setbacks and vexations.

We can, of course, argue over whether or not the current proportions are right: but can we really debate the truth that a world with challenges is at least possibly better than one without…at least for the project of making people of depth?

A marathon runner trains for a marathon because there are marathons in life. If there were no marathons in life then there would be no need to train for them. A person who works out often does so for reasons of avoiding bad consequences if they don't, such as clogged arteries and other diseases. If God had not made diseases then people wouldn't need to work out.

Setbacks and vexations are nothing more than setbacks and vexations. If a person is a masochist, then maybe they welcome setbacks and vexations. Otherwise, most people don't or else use them as excuses for thinking they deserve something more than someone who didn't go through the same obstacles. All of that is a celebration of strength, a celebration of the survival of the fit.

Also, I assume you've heard the saying, "hurt people hurt people"?

[Immanuel Can]

A marathon runner trains for a marathon because there are marathons in life.

I think not. A marathon runner trains for marathons because he/she wants to be a marathoner, or to win marathons.

If there were no marathons in life then there would be no need to train for them.

That is true. But then, there would also never be the character virtues of a marathoner.

A person who works out often does so for reasons of avoiding bad consequences if they don't, such as clogged arteries and other diseases. If God had not made diseases then people wouldn't need to work out.

That's one reason to work out...not a bad one, but hardly the most compelling. The other is to achieve some personal goal or form of excellence. To "work out," in any field, is to make a deliberate effort to be the best that one can be in that field. And that requires the acquiring of skills and powers one does not presently possess, except as potentialities.

Setbacks and vexations are nothing more than setbacks and vexations.

If that's how one reacts to them, then yes, that's all they ever are...and what a tragedy if a person chooses that course. Instead of taking the opportunity for growth and self-improvement, when such come, he chooses bitterness and failure instead. But need all setbacks and vexations be treated that way? Or can we take the opportunity to treat at least some of them as challenges not failures?

If a person is a masochist, then maybe they welcome setbacks and vexations.

Well, or if he's a marathoner. Or any person of courage and purposefulness. If he sees his challenges as mere temporary obstacles to a potential success yet to come, then he may win through. Even if he does not, he has the consolation of knowing he acted heroically and courageously in aid of a goal he believes in. But often, he does: because character actually determines an awful lot in life. And there is much more ability to overcome in an ordinary human being than most ordinary human beings realize. That's precisely why we view the winners-through as specially heroic.

Otherwise, most people don't or else use them as excuses for thinking they deserve something more than someone who didn't go through the same obstacles.

You think so?

I don't find that. I find that people who have overcome obstacles tend to be more humble than those who have faced few or none...and especially when the obstacles are many and formitable.

Also, I assume you've heard the saying, "hurt people hurt people"?

Bitter people hurt people.

People who have been hurt may love people. They may have mercy on others. They may be far more capable of sympathy and compassion than those who have not been hurt. They may have depths of soul of which the unhurt have no conception. They may even be much better people as a result of their understanding of what "hurt" really means.

Or, as you say, they may simply become resentful, cruel and hurtful.

The choice is theirs which of the two they do. The whole matter depends not on the fact of having been hurt, but on how one interprets and acts on the fact one has been hurt.

And have you not heard the old R.E.M. tune? Everybody hurts. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLlOeGeVih4

[Dontaskme]

And have you not heard the old R.E.M. tune? Everybody hurts. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLlOeGeVih4

You'd have to have been living under a rock all your life not to have heard of R.E.M

And yes everybody hurts because everybody is born a sinner.

Yes, the Bible teaches that we are all born sinners with sinful, selfish natures.

Nature is an unstoppable force of selfishness at it's root core, it eats and consumes itself in an endless futile battle of consume to survive, and survive to consume, it's painful and depressingly gross, and is not the work of intelligence. Rather, life should never have happened.

Yes, the Bible goes on to say unless we are born again by the Spirit of God we are a sinner. ( Well well well, what an absolute crock of lying bullshit) born again into sin is the only place known, any denial is futile, and a refusal to see the actual truth of life which is without purpose, meaning and is absolutely hostile, where everybody who is born, is born only to die, sometimes horribly without dignity.


It's so logically obvious to the only intelligence there is in this universe, that everybody who knows they have been born, is only born once, NOT TWICE.
So it looks like sin is going to be around indefinitely forever more. And so the very act of procreation already knowing we are inviting more sinners to come and live in this sin bin, when this intelligence that knows about sin can be prevented, is an utterly wreckless and selfish act.




.

[tillingborn]

I do insist that humans did not evolve.

Then give us one good reason to believe that.

The burden of proof runs the opposite: unless we have sufficient reason to believe in a particular theory, we have no reason to believe.

I have made the point before: the standard of evidence you demand for the theory you wish to be true is very low. That it says so in a book is sufficient reason for you to believe "The Lord God formed the man from the soil of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being...
So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep, and while he was asleep, he took part of the man’s side and closed up the place with flesh. Then the Lord God made a woman from the part he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man."
By contrast, the amount of evidence you demand of evolution is "an overwhelming abundance of transitional forms", this despite the fact that we know how rare it is for skeletons to fossilise because for all the creatures that die every day, we seldom find skeletons. Those we do find show quite clearly that there have been other species of hominid on Earth.

I don’t have to disprove your theory. You have to prove your theory.

The evolution of human beings is proven. That you have staked your immortal soul on an ancient myth means you can never believe it. If God created mankind, he didn't do it the way bronze age thinkers guessed.

[Belinda]

The practical point of all this is an individual who introspects with courage and sincerity loves their own soul and by extension, others' souls.

That’s not at all evident. When Nietzsche “introspected” with “courage and (presumably) sincerity,” he denied the very existence of souls, and the claims others are presumed to have on them. He saw heroism in the courage to embrace death and suffering…even the deaths and sufferings of others, caused by one’s own “Ubermenschen” choices.

I think, B., the human race is not as single-minded about these things as you suggest. Their experiences of “introspection” lead them to very different conclusions. And that, I think, is because “introspection” is, by itself, insufficient. It’s a piece of the necessary information, to be sure; but it’s far from all of the story, and far from enough of it.

What I mean by soul is not what you mean by soul. Every soul should have the opportunity to be Ubermensch.
Certainly introspection is insufficient. Praying may be superficially addressed to an old idol someone wrote about in a book.

[Alexis Jacobi]

Just what we need... another fucking self-righteous messenger to save us.

I wrote something deliberately exaggerating because I have noticed that when certain things are said or mentioned (in this case Renaud Camus and 'replacement') that in less than a blink of the eye one gets labeled in certain ways -- for example as Flash does with his Nazi tirades. I assume that you are aware that in the present political and social circumstances this sort of polarity is extremely common. What are your thoughts on that sort of polarization?

I wrote:

You pitiable, diseased people! And to think I have been called to rearrange your twisted outlooks.

And you responded:

The rejection of seeing and honoring integral connection is a disease. It's like cutting off a part of your body because it doesn't match or function like the other parts.

The thing to notice here (and I deliberately made an outrageous comment for effect) is that just as I am thinking about *disease* and *diseased outlooks* so are you (and I mean not only you-singular but the you-plural of the larger society). So for this reason it is interesting (more interesting than mere bickering) to examine why it is that we have these views. On what predicates are they based.

It is true that in the realm of ideas I do side with Renaud Camus*. And it is true too that anyone who has ideas like Camus is instantly and ferociously condemned for having them. To have such ideas, according to the popular way of assigning values, is to have a sickness that needs a *cure*. To think or perceive as Camus does is to show oneself a retrograde and reveal a deep immorality. But the curious thing is that ideas such as those of Renaud Camus were, and just a short while ago (a generation or two) the 'normal' way of seeing things. What came along to change the way that people see and, certainly, define moral views from those that are immoral? This seems to me the question that needs to be examined and the best tool to do so is a philosophical (i.e. thoughtful and examining) approach.

[* But in the realm of actual reality I live in an extremely mixed culture. I have both positive and supportive views of this *mixing* as well as critical views.]

So I must confess that I do see our present intellectual climate and atmosphere as being contaminated and controlled by coerced thought, not free thought. It has become a central tenet of the way I see things now. The more I look into it the more I am convinced (of the truth of what I perceive).

So though I was joking it is at the same time true that I do notice the presence or the intrusion of extreme forms of politically correct thought. And that is why I refer to 'disease'. If I do not clarify this it would not be very fair nor honest. I am aware that just as I (or *we* if you want) see and describe a range of attitudes ideas and behaviors as sick (unhealthy) or diseased, I am at the same time aware that views I express or have expressed are perceived in the same way: as evidence of social sickness.

I think this issue runs through everything we have been discussing for so many months now. So it is not inappropriate to bring it out here.

What is the solution do you think? When people have strong opinions it means they are coming from defined positions. The more that positions are defined (through clarifications of 'value & meaning) they more that their views are likely to come into conflict with others. So if no one had any defined ideas there would not be struggle, right? What happens in situations where people cannot any longer get along? I am curious to know how you see *the present* (which is certainly reflected in these pages though we are a tiny microcosm) and what you imagine 1) is happening and 2) where it is heading?

This is a general question for everyone of course.

[Alexis Jacobi]

Numbers of immigrants is an economic and educational problem. Immigration of undesirable cultures such as modern slavery and drug addiction is a problem of policing. The latest news I read of such people they were Albanians. I have to suppose some foreign nationals are more suspect than others. Your selection process , AJ, is too blunt a knife.

What I notice in what you says (what stands out) is the 'declarative' nature of your statements. You are going to make *declarations* to me about what they real issue is and this also involves minimizing or negating other views (and 'declarations') made by others which, given your responses and tone, you regard as either misdirected or immoral.

The issue in France (and also Denmark, Belgium, Sweden, The United Kingdom, Germany, Italy and numerous other countries) is not one that requires merely an "economic and educational" solution, but is one that affects the host country in myriad ways. It has to do with cultural identification, cultural history, cultural homogeneity, and many other issues which cannot be simply pushed to the side as if they are completely irrelevant.

It is very true though that the so-called *flood* of immigration certainly is related to economics.

My position is curious: I have friends here (in Colombia) who have described to me that numerous or many of their friends have opted to take what savings they have, or to borrow what money they could, and to fly to Mexico and then take buses up to the US frontier and to cross over to take up residence in the US. They receive information through the media that *the frontier is open* and seeing the thousands who enter illegally they choose to take the risk of entering that way, of being detained for a while, then released or bused to various cities where they receive all sorts of help in order to get established. What will happen to these hundreds of thousands? or will it be millions when finally the border is reestablished?

Why do they leave everything and choose to abandon their own country? Well, that is an issue that can be examined. Here, it is very hard to get ahead. You cannot trust the system to be just. There is tremendous corruption. The economy tends to improve and then tank. There is insecurity and crime. The police don't do their job. No one respects the laws anyway. They cannot really punish crimes because it costs way too much money to do so (and feed and house people while they are being prosecuted). So they have to let criminals go. The entire system is a mess. And there is so little one can do to change it that people become apathetic.

It makes sense then that people would examine their options and choose to abandon everything for a 'better life' in a more organized country. But that is certainly not a very good option for the country they abandon. Mexico has taken advantage of this social and political *escape valve* for generations. They social and political situation remains highly corrupt because of the existence of the escape valve.