Attachment 9771Quote:
Originally Posted by Pompey Bum
In case anyone doubts that I have a BA in Engish.
Attachment 9771Quote:
Originally Posted by Pompey Bum
In case anyone doubts that I have a BA in Engish.
Washington, huh? Suddenly it all makes sense. [ :) ]
The thing about that is there are always multiple possible interpretations of events, and depending on the observers personal philosophy one interpretation will always be more likely than another. Personally, I like to leave myself a little latitude, a measure of wiggle room for my conclusions. When it comes to religion or science I am largely convinced but with reservations. I have my doubts about the accuracy of both. I find that in cases of extreme credulity or incredulity what most subjects boil down to are the bedrock issues of probability, justification, and warrant.Quote:
Originally Posted by Pompey Bum
Interestingly enough, I've read studies where atheists were more likely to believe in the supernatural than theists were. There appears to be a psychological replacement going on. When they reject religion they replace it with a belief in magic, ghosts, psychics, aliens, lucky charms, the evil eye, etc. Conversely, the more religious and orthodox a person was, the less likely they were to believe in such things. Sometimes, I wonder if the Inquisition was an attempt by the Church to impose rationality on superstitious peasants, and cleanse Europe of all irrational belief in magic or fairies rather than a witch hunt like it's often portrayed.
One of the things I've noticed in the atheist community is their unwillingness to trust authority figures or subscribe to the official explanation on certain subjects. This leads large numbers of people to believe in some very far fetched things. I've long wanted to see statistics on the religious beliefs of 9/11 truthers or people who think Oswald didn't shoot Kennedy, just to confirm this hunch, but to my knowledge nobody has gathered that data yet. There are so few studies done on the beliefs of atheists compared to the massive data pool on believers. It's really a shame how little we know about this interesting minority of society.
I admire Lenin's conception of true morality which is based on class interests not on superstitious nonsense. This is the truth. This is what's real!!!
Lenin said:
"But is there such a thing as communist ethics? Is there such a thing as communist morality? Of course, there is. It is often suggested that we have no ethics of our own; very often the bourgeoisie accuse us Communists of rejecting all morality. This is a method of confusing the issue, of throwing dust in the eyes of the workers and peasants.
In what sense do we reject ethics, reject morality?
In the sense given to it by the bourgeoisie, who based ethics on God's commandments. On this point we, of course, say that we do not believe in God, and that we know perfectly well that the clergy, the landowners and the bourgeoisie invoked the name of God so as to further their own interests as exploiters. Or, instead of basing ethics on the commandments of morality, on the commandments of God, they based it on idealist or semi-idealist phrases, which always amounted to something very similar to God's commandments.
We reject any morality based on extra-human and extra-class concepts. We say that this is deception, dupery, stultification of the workers and peasants in the interests of the landowners and capitalists.
We say that our morality is entirely subordinated to the interests of the proletariat's class struggle. Our morality stems from the interests of the class struggle of the proletariat.
The old society was based on the oppression of all the workers and peasants by the landowners and capitalists. We had to destroy all that, and overthrow them but to do that we had to create unity. That is something that God cannot create."
By the way, do you know that the U.S. invaded the Soviet Union???? I wonder if any of you are aware of this little item of history?
Quote:
Originally Posted by YesNo
I'm still waiting for an answer to the question I posed about the U.S. invading the Soviet Union. In the interim I will leave you all with a little reflection about why the Russians clamped down on Eastern Europe from 1945-1989.Quote:
Originally Posted by YesNo
Of course it is not possible for the people of an un-bombed, un-invaded nation really to understand what happened to the Russians. The Nazis and their allies occupied Soviet territory in which 88,000,000 people had lived. They destroyed, completely or partially, fifteen large cities, 1,710 towns, and 70,000 villages. They burned or demolished 6,000,000 buildings and deprived 25,000,000 people of shelter.
They demolished 31,850 industrial enterprises, 65,000 kilometers of railway track and 4,100 railway stations; 36,000 postal, telegraph and telephone offices; 56,000 miles of main highway, 90,000 bridges and 10,000 power stations. The Germans ruined 1,135 coal mines and 3,000 oil wells, carrying off to Germany 14,000 steam boilers, 1,400 turbines and 11,300 electric generators.
Any reflection on these figures by American city dwellers will undermine the idea that Russia can have no motive in the world except aggression. Farm people, too, will see another possibility when they think of the meaning of 98,000 collective farms and 2,890 machine and tractor stations sacked and the following numbers of livestock slaughtered by the Germans or carried away by them: 7,000,000 horses, 17,000,000 cattle, 20,000,000 hogs, 27,000,000 sheep and goats, 110,000,000 poultry. What would the American countryside be like if this kind of scourge had passed over it? And what feelings would be left behind?
The Germans and their satellites were no more tender with Soviet cultural institutions. They looted and destroyed 40,000 hospitals and medical centers, 84,000 schools and colleges, and 43,000 public libraries with 110,000,000 volumes. Some 44,000 theaters were destroyed, and 427 museums. Even the churches did not escape, more than 2,800 being wrecked.
In this country these figures do not burn holes in the page, but in Russia what they represent has been burned so deeply into the minds of the people that generations of safe living would be required even partially to eradicate them. There are between Nashville and Atlanta some people who still feel deeply about what General Sherman did on his march to the sea nearly a hundred years ago. What would our feelings be if the United States had been ravaged, as Russia was, from the Atlantic to the Mississippi, with 15,000,000 people killed, twice as many made homeless, and 60,000,000 treated to every degrading and brutalizing experience that the fascist mind could invent? Only then could we really know how the Russians feel about their security from future attack through East Europe.
The Rule of Fear and Hindsight in World Politics
D. F. Fleming
The Western Political Quarterly
Vol. 3, No. 4 (Dec., 1950), pp. 528-537
Published by: University of Utah on behalf of the Western Political Science Association
http://www.jstor.org/stable/442512?s...n_tab_contents
Oh, I'm completely open to ghosts being demonstrated under laboratory conditions with repeatable results. I'm not holding my breath, though. And I am of the opinion that YN is deliberately lying about his aunt (or whoever it was supposed to be). But if I found out that he wasn't lying, I would apologize.Quote:
Originally Posted by mortalterror
I have noticed that sort of credulity among some internet anti-theists. But most of the atheist intellectuals I have known--or at least the ones I have discussed the subject with--pooh-poohed ghosts and such things. But of course my experience is not a randomized one, as presumably a study would be.Quote:
Originally Posted by mortalterror
No doubt some of the friars in the field believed that's what they were doing, but the institutional goal was the promotion of unanimity and uniformity (that is, orthodoxy) by the destruction of dissent (that is heresy). But orthodoxy is not synonymous with theism or even Christianity. Indeed, many an unorthodox/heretical Christian went into the flames.Quote:
Originally Posted by mortalterror
For the sake of context I am including the link of the whole discussion about the faith in the supenatural which I found quite interesting:
http://www.online-literature.com/for...69#post1263969.
Personally, in spite of considering myself a predominantly rational person, I feel that the uncanny is present around us. And it is well so: without it neither the fairy stories nor the horror stories based on supernatural issues would ever affect us. And there wouldnīt be any nightmares either.
Thanks, Danik. This is from November 29, 2014. It is remarkably similar to what I just said to MT:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Pompey Bum
But that is only to say that the irrational mind is a part of the human experience. Take a stand, Danik. Do you or do you not believe in ghosts?Quote:
Originally Posted by Danik 2016
I myself didnīt have this experience. But I heard storys including one of a person of my family, that is very close to me. So I believe yes that there are sensitive people with visions and forebodings. You yourself describe an experience in the same thread that might have an rational explanation or not.
No, as I said at the time, there was nothing supernatural about it. But your sudden conversion is interesting. If you believe there are "sensitive people with visions and forebodings" then you must think there is something that their sensitivity allows them to perceive. So despite your professed rationalism (and consequent rejection of religion), you do accept things that may not have a widely accepted rational explanation. Are you only a rationalist when rejecting a point of view you don't particularly like? Or are you just in the closet about being superstitious? :)
No conversion here. When I say I am racional I merely am saying that I approach issues more often with the head than with the heart.
And I also donīt reject religion, I donīt know what one thing has to do with the other. I try to keep an open mind for things I donīt understand. Thatīs all.
And that is all I have to say on that matter. I donīt feel that religious discussions are fruitfull.
Okay, fine. I mean, I remember you telling me once that "we" had moved beyond religion, which is probably how got the idea you rejected it. But I certainly respect your privacy and your opinion.
I was unaware of the US invading the Soviet Union. As far as whether I would support such a thing, I am more or less a pacifist and so I would say that I would not although I don't know the details.Quote:
Originally Posted by Red Terror
I donīt remember the particular issue or thread. We had an discussion about the use of "we". It was in fact an language issue, something I only noticed when you objected to it. In Portuguese one often uses "we" when one means one. Since that discussion I always have used one to avoid the appearance of indignant bunny ears under my post. ;)
I wasn't lying.Quote:
Originally Posted by Pompey Bum
Also you can search for "shared death experiences" or "after death communication" for information about other people who have seen "ghosts".
Also, you might want to read your own sacred texts if you need evidence for "ghosts". Christianity is based on the ghost stories of people who saw Jesus after his death.
Okay look, you said you didn't want to pursue this, and now you're pursuing it. I walked away and you kept going. You are telling me now that when you said we you meant I because of Portuguese idiom. That's fine, but it also means that when you said "we" had moved beyond religion, you meant that YOU had moved beyond religion. So can you also say that you don't reject religion (for yourself, I mean)?Quote:
Originally Posted by Danik 2016
I think you are trying to have things both ways. If you believe in ghosts but you don't believe in God, then fine. You have a right to your opinion, so stand by it. But straight answers please. Your hemming and hawing is driving me nuts.
So let's try this again:
Do you believe in ghosts?
Do you believe in God?
And may I suggest that if you "don't feel religious discussions are fruitful" you might not want to post on discussions in the religion forum? :)
Do you mean the American Expeditionary force Siberia http://www.worldwar1.com/dbc/siberia.htm ? That's all I found on Google. Hardly "an invasion of the Soviet Union". Or did I miss something?Quote:
Originally Posted by Red Terror
That website is a whitewash!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! What else can one expect of those "winners" who "write history". Fourteen foreign armies invaded Soviet Russia during these years: USA, England, France Japan among others --- a little over 100,000 troops invaded Russia and you call that "hardly an invasion"????Quote:
Originally Posted by mona amon
Imagine if the opposite had happened; you would never hear the end of it in the USA. Instead we are treated to great Hollywood productions like Red Dawn (starring Patrick Swayze and Charlie Sheen, and C. Thomas Howell) showing how the Soviets, the Cubans and the Nicaraguans all invade the USA and are repulsed by a handful of teenage guerrillas in the Rocky Mountains. Television movies like Invasion USA and Amerika also depict America being invaded by the commies. The Americans and their allies, contrary to the claims of that website, were not "acting nobly" or were "protecting Russians." They were trying to restore the tsar to power and were committing atrocities in the process.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allied...sian_Civil_War
"The boys of capital, they ... chortle in their martinis about the death of socialism. The word has been banned from polite conversation. And they hope that no one will notice that every socialist experiment of any significance in the twentieth century-- without exception-- has either been crushed, overthrown, or invaded, or corrupted, perverted, subverted, or destabilized, or otherwise had life made impossible for it, by the United States. Not one socialist government or movement-- from the Russian Revolution to the Sandinistas in Nicaragua, from Communist China to the FMLN in El Salvador-- not one was permitted to rise or fall solely on its own merits; not one was left secure enough to drop its guard against the all-powerful enemy abroad and freely and fully relax control at home."
Its as if the Wright brothers first experiments with flying machines all failed because the automobile interests sabotaged each test flight. And then the good and god-fearing folk of the world looked upon this, took notice of the consequences, nodded their collective heads wisely, and intoned solemnly: Man shall never fly." Killing Hope by William Blum
http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/Einstein.htm
https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon....8L._UY250_.jpg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hCczioWiZk
I don't get how you can move beyond religion any more than you can move beyond science. Religion is basically just rituals and philosophy that enrich the inner life of man. It's spiritual technology meant to take one to the core of his being the way that a rocket ship takes men to the moon. Saying we could move beyond it is absurd, like saying we'd move beyond music, literature, or art.Quote:
Originally Posted by Pompey Bum
^ I think so too.
Also Pompey brings up something I hadn't really considered in how many people who are outright disdainful of religion are also huge advocates for all sorts of spiritualism or other supernatural beliefs. I see this all the time with people around my age or a bit younger; if you asked a roomful of kids aged 19-24 at my school whether or not they were religious I think fewer than 1 in 5 would raise their hand, but you'd get a lot of chatter about Gnosticism and Deism and what they personally believe. I think it's a flattering self identity thing: "Religious people are dumb idiots who can't think for themselves but I've developed my own theology that centres around like... nature so I'm better than that...", is, I think, what they're going for.
Are there many students in your school who might take views similar to Red Terror's? I assume those views would be a form of atheism.
Sometimes people will present philosophic views claiming everything is deterministic, with some uniform randomness thrown in just in case. They get this from mathematical models of the universe. In those views, no one and nothing makes a "choice" and so no one and nothing can be conscious. Any subjectivity or consciousness is an epiphenomenon on top of unconscious matter. That implies that both religion and spiritualism are delusions.
That would be the kind of view that I could see claiming "religious people are dumb idiots who can't think for themselves".
Yes, I think Red Terror would fit in rather well lol
To be fair to Danik, I was only paraphrasing him. He may have said we have moved beyond religion or we have put religion behind us or maybe something else. My recollection is that he was speaking in progressive political terms. We hadn't known each other long and frankly I think he was breaking out the PC to see if I'd flinch. (About the same he censured me for using the word chastity in a post--apparently it's bad for women if you say chastity). I told him, probably too sharply (sorry Danik), that he didn't speak for "we" where religion or anything else was concerned. But I don't think there was anything more to the conversation than that. We weren't discussing theology.Quote:
Originally Posted by mortalterror
"We" (Charles Wallace and I) have moved beyond religion. Ok. Maybe not. But "we" need not include you, Pompey.
Ecurb, from WiFi in the back country, so I may not respond. Plus, I hate typing on my phone.
Just then ecurb was eaten by the grizzly bear of silly equivocation. :)Quote:
Originally Posted by Ecurb
I'm in Jasper national park. Every trail has warnings, suggesting one travel in groups of 4 or more and carry bear spray. I'm solo, and I haven't bought bear spray.
Nonetheless, "we" is lousy writing, if it is vague. But it isn't "incorrect"
P.s. I only responded because pompey once assumed that my "we" (English is my native tongue, however little this may be evident) was incorrect. I bagged Mt. Edith Cavell yesterday. You can't have more fun than that.
Nobody was talking about the grammar.
Enjoy the moon.
Except of course RT (as he says) is middle aged with a master's degree in Shakespeare. You have to respect that. Heh heh.Quote:
Originally Posted by Clopin
You should change your name to Casey's Top 40 because answering your troll-posts allows me to send my threads to the top of the list again. If you were smart you'd shut your lid ... But it appears that I'll be moving up a notch ... Thanks ... keep up the bad work ...Quote:
Originally Posted by Pompey Bum
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casey_Kasem
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgCBvIMWs7E
No doubt, no doubt. But your posts ARE fun. It always brings me a smile to see them there. :)
So how come you lied about your age and education?
I haven't. There you go again. I'll be moving up a notch.
Interesting. I mean, I'm not trying to be confrontational (and, trust me, I don't care what notch you move to--is there some reason I should?). I've just never met a grown up who says things like "Dude, what's your problem????" and "Sweet trolling." So at this point, you're just trying to get out and save face, right? That's fine. Be well, Little Terror. ;)
Get that c_ck out of your hands so you can type more legibly and we can understand you better!Quote:
Originally Posted by Pompey Bum
I think religion should be a private matter between an individual and his conscience. Enough said.Quote:
Originally Posted by mona amon