Christianity

[Immanuel Can]

With all due respect, IC. You must surely be familiar with a lot of contemporary biblical scholarship. For example, December 25th may not even be Christ's birthday but rather a holiday picked up from Pagan traditions by Christianity in order to blend in with the social norms of the day.

It's the Saturnalia, actually.

Because it was the Day of the Sun already, it was converted into "The Day of the Son." Pagan to Christian. You know what else is converted from pagan to Christian? People.

So was there a point?

Do you really believe the Bible can be interpreted literally any more than the Egyptian book of the dead or any other religious beliefs floating around the middle east prior could?

That's like asking, "Do you believe a textbook can be believed more literally than a pulp novel? They're both books." Does anybody have to answer that question?

Then let's go back to evidence for two major stories in the bible (creation and the flood). I believe you stated there was plenty of evidence for those things. Where is all this evidence?

There's so much available online, in books, through apologetics organizations, in magazines, in academic articles...and so on...that it would be futile even for me to begin to try to summarize it all for you. It's all there. You don't even need my help to find it.

Now, if you have something specific you're worried about, maybe I can help. But you're asking for far too much. There's just so much available.

Almost nothing in the Bible is backed by contemporary science, last I heard.

Then I'm certain you didn't "hear" at all.

What in the bible is substantiated by modern science?

Gary, Gary...

It always amazes me when people think something like this. Almost any piece of remotely realistic writing is always more scientifically substantiable than it is questionable. For example, it's not at all under dispute that Christ existed, that he had disciples, that He was crucified, that his followers believed that He rose again, and that people have been more transformed by these facts than by any set of single facts, over the course of 2,000 years or so now. That much, at least, is obvious, empirical fact. It's only in some of the details...such as, "Did Christ do miracles," or "Did he teach precisely what John said," that there is any residual dispute...and in those cases, "modern science" has nothing to say: for science deals only with the natural and repeatable, and miracles are, by definition, unique events.

I want your words not a bunch of links to go spend all my precious spare time reading.

That's a pity for you, I guess. I'm not at all interested in repeating, at exhaustive length, what is so readily available to you, but you feel your time is too "precious" to investigate at all. I don't think somebody who feels his soul is a subject for his "spare time" is serious at all.

Is not my "precious time" equally too valuable to waste writing out things if your commitment to finding out is that dilatory and weak?

[Alexis Jacobi]

This creator god as you describe him was all very well for a small nomadic tribe under attack from every quarter, but the creator god as described by the parable of the Good Samaritan is more to the taste of people who have become civilised.

A small correction: when examined without bias it must be concluded that those nomadic people were not so much 'under attack from every quarter' as they were attacking.

And when the LORD thy God shall deliver them before thee; thou shalt smite them, and utterly destroy them; thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor shew mercy unto them: Neither shalt thou make marriages with them; thy daughter thou shalt not give unto his son, nor his daughter shalt thou take unto thy son.

It is interesting to note that in the parable of the Good Samaritan that the ethnocentric ethic inherent in Judaism, presenting ethnocentrism as a good and as god's requirement, was turned on its head. If you disobey that command -- note -- the same Yahweh will rouse up surrounding enemies and cause those enemies to inflict on you horrid cruelty:

The Lord shall bring a nation against thee from far, from the end of the earth, as swift as the eagle flieth; a nation whose tongue thou shalt not understand;

A nation of fierce countenance, which shall not regard the person of the old, nor shew favour to the young:

And he shall eat the fruit of thy cattle, and the fruit of thy land, until thou be destroyed: which also shall not leave thee either corn, wine, or oil, or the increase of thy kine, or flocks of thy sheep, until he have destroyed thee.

And he shall besiege thee in all thy gates, until thy high and fenced walls come down, wherein thou trustedst, throughout all thy land: and he shall besiege thee in all thy gates throughout all thy land, which the Lord thy God hath given thee.

And thou shalt eat the fruit of thine own body, the flesh of thy sons and of thy daughters, which the Lord thy God hath given thee, in the siege, and in the straitness, wherewith thine enemies shall distress thee:

So that the man that is tender among you, and very delicate, his eye shall be evil toward his brother, and toward the wife of his bosom, and toward the remnant of his children which he shall leave:

So that he will not give to any of them of the flesh of his children whom he shall eat: because he hath nothing left him in the siege, and in the straitness, wherewith thine enemies shall distress thee in all thy gates.

The tender and delicate woman among you, which would not adventure to set the sole of her foot upon the ground for delicateness and tenderness, her eye shall be evil toward the husband of her bosom, and toward her son, and toward her daughter,

And toward her young one that cometh out from between her feet, and toward her children which she shall bear: for she shall eat them for want of all things secretly in the siege and straitness, wherewith thine enemy shall distress thee in thy gates.

If thou wilt not observe to do all the words of this law that are written in this book, that thou mayest fear this glorious and fearful name, The Lord Thy God;

Then the Lord will make thy plagues wonderful, and the plagues of thy seed, even great plagues, and of long continuance, and sore sicknesses, and of long continuance.

Moreover he will bring upon thee all the diseases of Egypt, which thou wast afraid of; and they shall cleave unto thee.

Also every sickness, and every plague, which is not written in the book of this law, them will the Lord bring upon thee, until thou be destroyed.

And ye shall be left few in number, whereas ye were as the stars of heaven for multitude; because thou wouldest not obey the voice of the Lord thy God.

And it shall come to pass, that as the Lord rejoiced over you to do you good, and to multiply you; so the Lord will rejoice over you to destroy you, and to bring you to nought; and ye shall be plucked from off the land whither thou goest to possess it.

And the Lord shall scatter thee among all people, from the one end of the earth even unto the other; and there thou shalt serve other gods, which neither thou nor thy fathers have known, even wood and stone.

And among these nations shalt thou find no ease, neither shall the sole of thy foot have rest: but the Lord shall give thee there a trembling heart, and failing of eyes, and sorrow of mind:

And thy life shall hang in doubt before thee; and thou shalt fear day and night, and shalt have none assurance of thy life:

In the morning thou shalt say, Would God it were even! and at even thou shalt say, Would God it were morning! for the fear of thine heart wherewith thou shalt fear, and for the sight of thine eyes which thou shalt see.

And the Lord shall bring thee into Egypt again with ships, by the way whereof I spake unto thee, Thou shalt see it no more again: and there ye shall be sold unto your enemies for bondmen and bondwomen, and no man shall buy you.

It would appear that with the parable of the God Samaritan that the figure of Jesus of Nazareth openly opposed Yahweh's former decrees. Not just partially, not superficially, but thoroughly.

So in fact two *images of god*, two very different descriptions of god, and also very different ethical imperatives, come into view.

Often in theological treatises, the original god Yahweh is said to have *evolved* or been brought into *clearer focus* through the ethical revelations of the Prophets. But I do not think this is altogether right. The original Hebrew Christians essentially tried to wage a sort of socio-religious revolution against a psychopathic god-concept which meant, in fact, against a priest-class that invented, held onto and gave power to that dreadful god Yahweh.

[Immanuel Can]

That quote is given significance becuz Ozzy said it, not the Lord.

Ozzy's a plagiarist.

“'There is no peace,’ says my God, ‘for the wicked'" (Isaiah 57:21).

[Alexis Jacobi]

Gary wrote: Do you really believe the Bible can be interpreted literally any more than the Egyptian book of the dead or any other religious beliefs floating around the middle east prior could?

That's like asking, "Do you believe a textbook can be believed more literally than a pulp novel? They're both books." Does anybody have to answer that question?

To see the Bible accurately (I refer mostly to the OT) one has to see carefully and discriminatingly. So, on one hand one could be inclined (as indeed I am suggesting) to see this god Yahweh as a psychopath. An absolute lunatic-god. And one would be completely right to see in this way. But, the Bible is a compendium of many other currents that run completely counter to the psychopathy of that god-image -- an idea of god, a concept and a guilt-structure that is used to corral and control a people.

Gary is asking a question that Immanuel could not actually answer even if he wanted to. Immanuel cannot see the Bible in any other way except as a biblical literalist (with a few twists on that literalism). If Immanuel did not regard the Bible as a supreme and absolute authority he would, effectively, undermine the structure of belief that he holds to. If even one small concession were granted it would amount to the beginning of an *unraveling* of the cohesive narrative.

[Belinda]

With all due respect, IC. You must surely be familiar with a lot of contemporary biblical scholarship. For example, December 25th may not even be Christ's birthday but rather a holiday picked up from Pagan traditions by Christianity in order to blend in with the social norms of the day.

It's the Saturnalia, actually.

Because it was the Day of the Sun already, it was converted into "The Day of the Son." Pagan to Christian. You know what else is converted from pagan to Christian? People.

So was there a point?

Do you really believe the Bible can be interpreted literally any more than the Egyptian book of the dead or any other religious beliefs floating around the middle east prior could?

That's like asking, "Do you believe a textbook can be believed more literally than a pulp novel? They're both books." Does anybody have to answer that question?

Then let's go back to evidence for two major stories in the bible (creation and the flood). I believe you stated there was plenty of evidence for those things. Where is all this evidence?

There's so much available online, in books, through apologetics organizations, in magazines, in academic articles...and so on...that it would be futile even for me to begin to try to summarize it all for you. It's all there. You don't even need my help to find it.

Now, if you have something specific you're worried about, maybe I can help. But you're asking for far too much. There's just so much available.

Almost nothing in the Bible is backed by contemporary science, last I heard.

Then I'm certain you didn't "hear" at all.

What in the bible is substantiated by modern science?

Gary, Gary...

It always amazes me when people think something like this. Almost any piece of remotely realistic writing is always more scientifically substantiable than it is questionable. For example, it's not at all under dispute that Christ existed, that he had disciples, that He was crucified, that his followers believed that He rose again, and that people have been more transformed by these facts than by any set of single facts, over the course of 2,000 years or so now. That much, at least, is obvious, empirical fact. It's only in some of the details...such as, "Did Christ do miracles," or "Did he teach precisely what John said," that there is any residual dispute...and in those cases, "modern science" has nothing to say: for science deals only with the natural and repeatable, and miracles are, by definition, unique events.

I want your words not a bunch of links to go spend all my precious spare time reading.

That's a pity for you, I guess. I'm not at all interested in repeating, at exhaustive length, what is so readily available to you, but you feel your time is too "precious" to investigate at all. I don't think somebody who feels his soul is a subject for his "spare time" is serious at all.

Is not my "precious time" equally too valuable to waste writing out things if your commitment to finding out is that dilatory and weak?

Do sun and son share the same etymology?

[Immanuel Can]

...an idea of god, a concept and a guilt-structure that is used to corral and control a people.

I cannot help but notice your resort to the use of passive voice, in order to avoid specifying a doer of the action.

Well, let's see what plausibility that theory has.

Exactly whose "control" is served well by the God narrative? Let's make that doer explicit, so we can understand your claim.

Let's take what Gary and I were talking about. Who is getting "control" from "Thou shalt not commit adultery"? Is it a plot of women to control men? Is it a plot of priests to keep all the women for themselves? Is it a plot of husbands to keep their wives? Is it a plot of proto-Victorians to control the sexual proclivities of the rapacious?

Let's see the theory you float.

[Immanuel Can]

Do sun and son share the same etymology?

No. And the Saturnalia has no important continuity with Christmas, either. Christmas is an arbitrary holiday. It's nice, it's fine, but it's not core Christian theology to have a holiday on Dec. 25th. It's just a tradition.

Most likely, the real birthday of Jesus was in June. But nobody knows for sure. So a day was picked.

It just doesn't matter much.

[Lacewing]

Then let's go back to evidence for two major stories in the bible (creation and the flood). I believe you stated there was plenty of evidence for those things. Where is all this evidence?

There's so much available online, in books, through apologetics organizations, in magazines, in academic articles...and so on...that it would be futile even for me to begin to try to summarize it all for you. It's all there. You don't even need my help to find it.

Here’s an introduction to an extensive article exploring biblical claims. For the full article, including links to its many references, refer to: https://www.grunge.com/478229/parts-of- ... o-be-true/

IS THERE ANY PHYSICAL EVIDENCE THAT NOAH'S ARK EXISTED?

The story of Noah's Ark and the flood that destroyed the world is one of the most famous stories from the Bible. According to the Book of Genesis, God — who thought humanity had become so wicked that he had no choice but to wipe them all out and start over — tells Noah to build a giant boat and get his family and plenty of animals on board before he sends the killing flood his way.

Noah's ark story is not exclusive to the Bible, however. The Quran has a similar story in it, where Nuh (Noah) also builds a boat while trying to warn people of the imminent flood if they don't repent. According to both books, not a single person managed to stop being wicked on time — except for Noah and his close family, nobody else survived the flood once it came.

The flood narrative has fascinated researchers for centuries, and plenty of believers have looked for the ark — without much luck — over the years. To scientists, searching for the ark is akin to searching for Bigfoot or the Loch Ness monster — a fascinating idea, maybe, but also not one likely to be real.

Aside from faith, is there anything else backing the idea that an ark even exists?

NOAH'S FLOOD COULD HAVE HAPPENED

Was there ever a flood that destroyed most of the world? According to the Bible, Noah's flood was a global flood. It covered even the highest mountains on Earth (so Everest would've been underwater) with rains that lasted for 40 days. It took an additional 110 days before the waters receded enough that the ark reached land, which happened to be the mountains of Ararat. Still, the land was so wet (and presumably so muddy and slippery) that both humans and animals had to remain in the ark for "a year plus two months and twenty-seven days" waiting for things to dry up (via National Center for Science Education).

That's a lot of water for a long time, and a flood like that would've left plenty of scientific evidence behind. For example, NCSC points out that sedimentary rocks containing fossils around the world often also contain materials that can only form when exposed to oxygen in open air. Meaning, these fossilized rocks couldn't have occurred underwater. Plus, vanishing civilizations around the world would've left some kind of archeological footprint behind: remnants of buildings, bodies, artifacts. Still, nothing has ever been found.

It is possible, however, that a local (but massive) flood did take place in southeastern Mesopotamia in ancient times. With enough rain falling on the mountains around, the plains of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers could experience flooding of Biblical proportions —just a very localized one.

THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF THE ARK

The Bible gives specific instructions regarding the construction of the ark using cubit measurements (one cubit is around 18-22 inches). Using the smaller number (18), the ark is supposed to be 300 cubits long, 50 cubits wide, and 30 cubits high. That translates to a size in feet of 450 x 75 x 45 (via The Guardian). This would make the ark almost half the size of the Titanic, which was 850 feet long. It was also about one and a half football fields long, the length of three NASA space shuttles lined up nose to tail, or the size of three Olympic size swimming pools (per Answers in Genesis).

So how exactly did Noah manage to build a boat of that size with the materials and tools available at the time? According to the National Center for Science Education, Noah would have needed extensive knowledge of naval architecture, physics, calculus, and mechanics, as well as access to very specific materials to keep the hull watertight. It would also be almost impossible to harvest so much timber in a short period of time.

Then imagine being able to carry enough bamboo for the pandas, fresh fish for the penguins, and piles and piles of roots and grasses for the elephants. Then there's the need to separate predators, make space for animals with horns (like rhinos that could destroy the hull if left to roam), and keep anything venomous contained. In short, the construction of a viable ark sounds pretty impossible.

SEARCHING FOR THE REMAINS OF NOAH'S ARK

In 1876, historian and politician James Bryce climbed Ararat and claimed to have found "a piece of wood about four feet long and five inches thick, evidently cut by some tool, and so far above the limit of trees that it could by no possibility be a natural fragment of one" (as quoted in the book The Quest for Noah's Ark).

Official searches started in the 1940s with no results. Then in 1973, author Violet M. Cummings declared in her book "Noah's Ark: Fable or Fact?" that the ark had been found on Mount Ararat (it had not), and in 1993, CBS interviewed somebody who claimed to have seen the ark (turns out he hadn't). By 2006, intelligence-gathering satellites were taking photographs of a geological anomaly on Mt. Ararat that (sort of) resembled the shape of the ark. That wasn't it either (via Live Science).

In 2012, "Baywatch" star Donna D'Errico joined a documentary film crew in search for the ark. She quit along the way, citing fears for her safety. The crew didn't find the ark either (as reported by Live Science).

The search for the ark became so popular that a new word was coined along the way. For creationists, Arkeology (the historical search for the ark) represents a lot more than searching for a boat — if Noah's ark is found, this would mean the story of the flood and the creation narrative are more than a myth (per NSCE).

THE POSSIBLE NOAH'S ARK EVIDENCE HOAX

Perhaps the most significant claim is the one from 2010, when a group of evangelical explorers and filmmakers associated with Noah's Ark Ministries International (NAMI) claimed to be "99.9%" sure they had found the ark on Ararat. They had plenty of ways to prove this, such as results of carbon dating the wood — it was 4,800 years old and high up on a mountain with no trees, so it couldn't be anything but the ark. They also claimed to have walked into the ark-like structure and seen compartments or rooms, lots of plank-like timber, and wood fragments (per Fox News).
But rumors started circulating soon after about the discovery being a hoax. One of the archeologists in the original expedition claimed the wooden beams had been planted on Ararat. Even the pro-ark Institute for Creation Research reported the location looked too much like a movie set rather than historical remains. Plus the wooden pieces found seemed "too well-preserved," the ark looked too small, and some local Kurdish men claimed to have been hired to haul the wood up the mountain. The whole "project" took over two years, during which time several expeditions from NAMI visited the sites, took suspiciously blurry photos, and gathered "proof" that they would then reveal in 2010 (via Christian Science Monitor).

Plagued by accusations of organizing a hoax, NAMI has refused to reveal the location of the "ark" until more evidence could be gathered. The group has been quiet about the whole thing for over a decade.

PARTS OF THE BIBLE THAT SCIENCE HAS CONFIRMED TO BE TRUE

Serving as both a history book and a life manual of sorts for nearly a third of the global population, the Bible is one of the most frequently read and widely distributed books in the entire world. In a 2014 survey conducted among more than 2,000 British adults, the Bible was named the world's most influential book. This is hardly surprising since, according to The Economist, about 100 million Bibles are either given away or sold each year.

That said, it's inevitable for doubts to arise about the accuracy and authenticity of a book with over 30 authors (and whose oldest chapters are at least 2,700 years old). Given how some believers take everything written in the Bible as absolute truth, a number of skeptics have questioned just how credible its words are, particularly with regard to scientific accuracy.

(For more of this article, including links to all references: https://www.grunge.com/478229/parts-of- ... o-be-true/)

[Alexis Jacobi]

This is an interesting thing to consider and question. The concept of a 'mind' is surely based on a human. Many things we see in nature cooperate and work together as groups... trees, bees, ants, birds, fish, etc... without possessing or using 'minds' as imagined or defined by humans. Rather, they function and flow and grow through their connectivity. Why do we apply a human idea onto the 'order behind things' rather than reassessing ourselves based on the connection and order we see in nature?

Based on our human education and understanding? How does that even come close to understanding the workings of our Universe and beyond? Throughout our brief human history on Earth and in the cosmos we continually explore our known world/understanding to discover new levels of connectivity and expansiveness that we previously had no clue of. Yet, we think we can accurately guess (at any point in time) what's behind it all?

Why do we need to do this? Instead of guessing about such a thing, why don't we notice and respect how nature works, and strive to be more in-tune with it as a part of it? We often disrespect and work against it, aiming to control it and rule over it with our own ideas of a personified 'master controller', who we are uniquely in association with. We are at odds with that which we are naturally part of and that doesn't seem to concern us. We're more focused on 'knowing' better.

One of the things I have noted in the statements you make (as I am sure you will remember) is that you ask questions, which are rhetorical, but then you do not seem to ever answer your own questions!

You seem to say that *human mind* is just a contrivance and, I gather, cannot be relied on to form ideas about the structures around us and into which we are subsumed (and out of which we arise). Then, you refer to an ecological order where beings that are more like nature's robots act in ways (unconsciously, without specific intention) and as a result create a functioning *system* (which is to say simply Nature). So are you proposing that human being give up their human mind? Or are you proposing some sort of alternative to the arbitrary results of man's intellectual activities?

I could suggest examining a far older and I think more influential sort of *understructure* to the human notion of 'order' which Henry refers to and which is part-and-parcel of the Christian concept of 'divine order' upon which the picture of the Great Chain of Being was conceived:

In the Vedic religion, Ṛta (/ɹ̩ta/; Sanskrit ऋत ṛta "order, rule; truth; logos") is the principle of natural order which regulates and coordinates the operation of the universe and everything within it. In the hymns of the Vedas, Ṛta is described as that which is ultimately responsible for the proper functioning of the natural, moral and sacrificial orders. Conceptually, it is closely allied to the injunctions and ordinances thought to uphold it, collectively referred to as Dharma, and the action of the individual in relation to those ordinances, referred to as Karma – two terms which eventually eclipsed Ṛta in importance as signifying natural, religious and moral order in later Hinduism. Sanskrit scholar Maurice Bloomfield referred to Ṛta as "one of the most important religious conceptions of the Rigveda, going on to note that, "from the point of view of the history of religious ideas we may, in fact we must, begin the history of Hindu religion at least with the history of this conception".

So let me propose the following and see how it flies: It is a tendency of man's mind to examine the world, to examine nature, to examine the surrounding world and the cosmos, and divine out of it an overarching or underlying order. What the ancient peoples did (referring to Ṛta) was to have built a social and cultural world upon their ideas about what the larger, macrocosmic world, seemed to demand.

Are you proposing that this should be done away with? That people should not make this effort? That they should become more like *trees, bees, ants, birds, [and] fish*?

If we did not rely on our human mind -- what else could we possibly rely on? It is as though you are referencing a possibility that you don;t bring into focus. Yet the idea that you present operates in a number of different ways. One as an idealism or a romanticism. And Two as an opposition to the sort of ordering which (I gather) you are opposed to.

Based on our human education and understanding? How does that even come close to understanding the workings of our Universe and beyond?

What then could come closer to "understanding the workings of our Universe and beyond"?

Curiously, in the New Definition of what *the world* is (what resulted from the scientific revolution) a whole other picture emerges, and thus a whole other *order*. To imitate that order would be to reduce the human being to a sort of robot (like a bee or an ant) within a structure (industrial society and its management-system) that is a reflection of the socio-scientific grasp of things. I am not at all sure if it is a world we would really appreciate and thrive in. It would be a world of absolute control over the human protoplasm.

[Lacewing]

Based on our human education and understanding? How does that even come close to understanding the workings of our Universe and beyond?

What then could come closer to "understanding the workings of our Universe and beyond"?

Short answer: Getting our nonsense out of the way. Specific answer: How can we replace one specific nonsense answer with another one? But that is what you want, it seems -- because without it, you can only imagine robots. Or perhaps you need specific answers to be stated so that you can then argue with them to show that your specific answer is better. Talking with you isn't always worth the effort. (You haven't yet responded to the other post I directed to you.) But I may reply more if I find it a thoughtful exercise to do so. I just don't have time right now. So later, maybe.

[Alexis Jacobi]

...an idea of god, a concept and a guilt-structure that is used to corral and control a people.

I cannot help but notice your resort to the use of passive voice, in order to avoid specifying a doer of the action.

Well, let's see what plausibility that theory has.

It is beyond doubt, it seems to me, that a priest-class invented, intoned, managed, and wielded the god-image of the terrifying Yahweh. So the 'doer of the action' is that class.

Now, I am supposiing that you actually believe that god -- the god Yahweh -- actually intoned the worlds that are ascribed to him, am I right? These words were *heard* and then written down and then repeated. This fits because you are a *believer* and I might also add a *true believer*.

I am not a true believer I am a person engaged in a critical project which, on one hand, tends to deflate or undermine the way that these texts are taken, but at the same time points to what I refer to a *the metaphysical*: ideas that arise out of our own perception, our own mind, but which are (as I often say) part-and-parcel of the world's manifestation.

However, I am not an *anti-believer* by any means. What I have said is that we concoct or assemble *pictures* and with these pictures we educate our children. But the picture is just a picture and cannot *be* or *replace* what is represented.

Does my *theory* have plausibility? Well certainly! But could it be plausible when received by you as a religious fundamentalist? Of course not. It is not only implausible it is simply wrong. Your proof?

Romans 1

This is all that need be said, my child.

Obviously, I am not speaking to the sensibility of sexual or other codes peculiar to the Hebrews. There are far better and much more complete explanations as to why obsessive sensuality is better avoided. (Here I make a reference to Gary's original questions). In my view those explanations are found in Vedanta writings. Thus it seems to me that they came up with a more comprehensive and intelligible 'picture' that is more believable and more communicable than that of traditional Christian moralism.

Do you have any other questions?

[Alexis Jacobi]

Short answer: Getting our nonsense out of the way. Specific answer: How can we replace one specific nonsense answer with another one? But that is what you want, it seems -- because without it, you can only imagine robots. Or perhaps you need specific answers to be stated so that you can then argue with them to show that your specific answer is better. Talking with you isn't always worth the effort.

Why are you so opposed to the questions I ask? They are questions that necessarily arise out of the statements you make. They are inevitable. You propose alternatives but you never fill out what theose alternatives are tangibly. There is a vague reference but what you propose is never clear.

Eventually you will have to do this. And when you do it you will have redefined an *order* to live in relation to. Though I guess you could forever remain in a sort of idea-limbo.

You missed the point I made about *robots*. Bees and trees and fish are natural robots. They exist within the natural system and have no say of any sort. If you propose imitating bees and trees and fish it means becoming like them. It means turning back to non-thought. This is where I do not understand what you are proposing.

Talking with you isn't always worth the effort.

Who do you talk to here who repays the effort best?

[henry quirk]

there are some things which are clear signs of a Mind bein' behind, or bein' responsible for, that order.

This is an interesting thing to consider and question. The concept of a 'mind' is surely based on a human.

As we have (are) minds (we reason, are [self]aware, we imagine, we plan, we self-direct, etc.) and as we create and invent, and re-direct the matter and forces around us, it's reasonable, for those who posit a Creator, to look for commonality between ourselves and that Creator.

*

Many things we see in nature cooperate and work together as groups... trees, bees, ants, birds, fish, etc... without possessing or using 'minds' as imagined or defined by humans.

Yes, there's a whole whack of bio-automation out there. Unthinking life that does nuthin' but follow a program. Some of us understand ourselves to be sumthin' more than, sumthin' other than, bio-auotomata. We're persons. We can self-direct, self-rely, are self-responsible. We perceive a moral aspect to our being. And as we consider the qualities and character of a Creator, it's sensible we consider such a Being would also be sumthin' more than an underlying process, that He would be a person.

*

Why do we apply a human idea onto the 'order behind things' rather than reassessing ourselves based on the connection and order we see in nature?

Why should we not? We know we exist, know ourselves to be persons, know we have or are minds. If we consider the possibility of a Creator, why would we begin from a place where He is, forgive the snark, a giant ant or ant colony?

*

if there's a Creator, we can make some educated guesses as to what He's about.

Based on our human education and understanding?

Yes. Why not? Reason is not a dirty word. Reasoning is not a disreputable act. The application of reason, for example, makes this conversation between us possible. Reason, it's application, the products of it: these are good things.

*

How does that even come close to understanding the workings of our Universe and beyond?

I, for one, never said we have a comprehensive understanding of our universe and beyond. But, certainly, we know more today about such things than we did a quarter million years ago. Most importantly, though, we know we don't know it all. We're not ignorant of our ignorance. It drives us to fill in the blanks.

*

Throughout our brief human history on Earth and in the cosmos we continually explore our known world/understanding to discover new levels of connectivity and expansiveness that we previously had no clue of. Yet, we think we can accurately guess (at any point in time) what's behind it all?

Why shouldn't we be optimistic? As I say: we know more today about the workings of Reality than we ever have. It's an incomplete knowledge, a fragmented understanding, yes, but we have it and we got it fair & square. Why shouldn't we look past the horizon with confidence?

*

Why do we need to do this?

We need no reason outside of we can, we want to, we will. Curiosity is its own justification. I'm, of course, talkin' about reasoning and not rationality or rationalness.

*

Instead of guessing about such a thing, why don't we notice and respect how nature works, and strive to be more in-tune with it as a part of it?

Becuz we are self-directng beings. We're points of creative & causal power. We're not meant to harmonize with the world. We're meant to make use of it.

*

We often disrespect and work against it, aiming to control it and rule over it with our own ideas of a personified 'master controller', who we are uniquely in association with.

Yes, some of us do. Obviously, such folks are the exception, not the rule.

*

We are at odds with that which we are naturally part of and that doesn't seem to concern us. We're more focused on 'knowing' better.

Yes, some of us are.

[Gary Childress]

...an idea of god, a concept and a guilt-structure that is used to corral and control a people.

I cannot help but notice your resort to the use of passive voice, in order to avoid specifying a doer of the action.

Well, let's see what plausibility that theory has.

Exactly whose "control" is served well by the God narrative? Let's make that doer explicit, so we can understand your claim.

Let's take what Gary and I were talking about. Who is getting "control" from "Thou shalt not commit adultery"? Is it a plot of women to control men? Is it a plot of priests to keep all the women for themselves? Is it a plot of husbands to keep their wives? Is it a plot of proto-Victorians to control the sexual proclivities of the rapacious?

Let's see the theory you float.

Priests may not keep all the women to themselves so to speak, that's not their end game--to have sex with as many women as possible, but they do control their "flock" (notice the continual references to shepherding used in Christianity.) What does a shepherd do? A Shepard "protects"/controls his flock from predators (in this case, a predator would be a person outside of the tribe or one who refuses to join the tribe) but he also raises sheep for their fur and their meat. It can be a symbiotic relationship but a shepherd literally "controls" sheep. There are Christian themes and references up the wazoo about that. You asked who is getting control. Anwer: the clergy. Who else?

[Alexis Jacobi]

Priests may not keep all the women to themselves so to speak …

Solution