Clinton, Obama, McCain: Human Beings, Not Moral Paragons

To Pam -- brilliant response to TTW---. Keep it up. even if he/she never gets it, others reading here will.

From E Fave - eternal optimist.

Arminius – reminder – are you going to get back to me on how questioning strengthens your faith?

IN REPLY TO (IRT)
Jackie:
“RELIGION IS NO BODY’S BUSINESS?”

IRT:
“… a part of a political campaign demonstrates how far we have wandered from the basic tenets of our system. When the Republican party got "into" kowtowing to the right-wing religious vote, they lost me.’’

ANS:
Jefferson said, “To whom do we seek for our moral exigencies if not the Church?” In addition, Jefferson wrote “"Religion, as well as reason, confirms the soundness of those principles on which our government has been founded and its rights asserted." --Thomas Jefferson to p. H. Wendover, 1815. Me 14:283

Further, "Can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are a gift of God? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that His justice cannot sleep forever"--Thomas Jefferson. We should know what the candidates’ convictions are about God.

You might try looking at what happened to the Dem Party when they thought religion should be banned from the Public Square. The basic foundation for all Civil Laws went out the window when the Court banned the Ten Commandments and all displays of our duty to God from the Public Square.

Hence, the Dems gave birth to the Sexual Revolution, and the Culture of Death. Human body parts have become a commodity on the open market. Loma Linda Hospital was keeping encephalitic little new born on respirators to keep them alive long enough to harvest their organs when needed.

Two doctors, some time back, wrote in the AMJ that we should test the Swine Flew Vaccine on the invalid orphans in New York orphans home. They wrote that these invalid children served no legitimate purpose to society.

You should familiarize yourself with the writings of a Godless madman, Dr Joseph Fletcher, who chaired the Ethics department at the University of Virginia. He believed it was morally ethical to murder children up to the age of reason (about seven years old) and to eliminate anyone who proved an embarrassment to society.

Hitler thought anyone a burden to society could morally be murdered. Both Fletcher and Hitler believed in neither God nor Christianity.

So in the end, religious belief in politics does matter, and it mattered to the Founding Fathers who wrote that all men are CREATED equal by a God who endowed all men with their inalienable rights.

IN REPLY TO (IRT)
Jackie:
“RELIGION IS NO BODY’S BUSINESS?”

IRT:
"The TV show on examining the faiths and belief systems of Senators Clinton and Obama was appalling. I thought we had a government of separation of church and state."

There is no separation of Church and State; that’s a fictitious manipulation the Court used to transgress the laws of the Constitution. You cannot separate religion and morals from government. The Clintons tried by claiming they had a political moral life and a private moral life. We know what that wrought.

Thus, they argued what they did in their private lives didn’t matter in their public lives. On the one hand, they could lie, steal, commit perjury, rape and molest women, and ignore their oath of office if they acted in private. The Dems defended their ignominy.

Hence, the Dems argued that it was licit to be a Jekyll and Hyde. To the contrary, man, unless insane, is an individual responsible for all his acts both public and private and they bear upon his moral integrity private and public because man is the same both private and public.

IRT:
“What business is it of any American to know, let alone dissect the very personal beliefs or lack thereof of a candidate?"

ANS:
The Constitution was based upon our Judeo-Christian heritage. In the Declaration of Independence, the Founding Fathers wrote that all men are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights. They are not given by man but by God. If you think they aren’t, remember what man gives man can take away.

Now I think that it is a good idea to know does the candidate believe in God and if he doesn’t, then he’s not fit to be President.

There are many godless nations and their consequences are opprobrious and nefarious. These tragedies are personified in Marxism, Fascism, Nazism, and Hinduism, Buddhism and all other materialistic paganistic beliefs that are proffered as truth.

We have a Court that has legalized the murder of the unborn, making it a Constitutional right. Now one might not care that over 48 million unborn have been murdered by abortion, but the children that were murdered in the womb did.

Unfortunately, many of the mothers regret their abortions, only it too late after abortion. A mistake made in abortion is irretrievable.

Though in some botched abortions, the child survived to have the butcher doctor drown the child in the mother’s blood or strangle it to death.

A slippery slope is being visibly proliferated by those who do not believe in the sacredness of human life. From abortion, we've justified partial birth abortion, euthanasia, the murder of the defenseless, and the comatose. Newborn invalids are left to die in hospital utility rooms. The old and senile are injected with overdoses of drugs to cause their death, and was admitted to by some 35 percent of anonymous doctors in one survey.

I like to know what is a candidate's religious view of human life and how do they perceive God, as a pantheist, an agnostic, or are they atheists.

Obama is an unmitigated abortionist. So is Hillary. Every one should know if they believe in the First Commandment, a belief in God, the Fifth, laws against murder, in the Ninth and Tenth, do not covet one's wife or goods?

Are they against adultery? Do they believe in the Seventh and Eighth, against lying and stealing, and the Fourth, the honor of family?

Are they against the undermining of the tradition family and do they believe in Homosexual Marriage? Our nation depends on these principles; they are the basis that America’s greatness was built on.

Maybe to you, it’s not any of your business that the Court under the tutorship of Justice Stephens, wrote in Lawrence v. Texas that traditional moral values served no legitimate purpose to the State, but they are my business.

“Stevens’ declaration in his Bowers dissent, that the fact that the governing majority in a State has traditionally viewed a particular practice as immoral is not a sufficient reason for upholding a law prohibiting the practice,” ante, at 17.

What has the Court done? Justice Scalia replies, “State laws against bigamy, same-sex marriage, adult incest, prostitution, masturbation, adultery, fornication, bestiality, and obscenity are likewise sustainable only in light of Bowers’ validation of laws based on moral choices. Every single one of these laws is called into question by today’s decision [that rejected Bowers].

Scalia: “This effectively decrees the end of all morals legislation. If, as the Court asserts, the promotion of majoritarian sexual morality is not even a legitimate state interest, none of the above-mentioned laws can survive rational-basis review—Scalia."

IN REPLY TO (IRT)
SUSAN JACOBY
“Clinton, Obama, McCain: Human Beings, Not Moral
Paragons “
IRT
“I cannot imagine any political process less suited to finding out whether a candidate is either honest or trustworthy than the American way of running for the presidency in an era when "character" is defined by shrinking sound bites and endless video loops on blogs.”

ANS:
Nor can anyone with the least modicum of intelligence comply with that definition. Those who subscribe to that definition are either shallow, disinterested, lazy, and irresponsible or all the foregoing.

Moreover, there is no reason that such a definition be acceptable by the vast majority when there is so much available information out there as web sites that will give you the records and answers on any active politician that is running for office.

However, sound bites and blogs are getting their succorance from the liberal left-wing media, like the NY Times, Newsweek, LA Times, the Boston Globe, the Cleveland Plain Dealer, the Atlanta Journal Constitution, and the Miami Herald.

The dumbing down of public education figures as another factor. How many lower grade schools and high schools teach Civics?

How many college students can’t read or write on a 5th grade level? I saw a report on TV some time back that checked the knowledge of college students. At Florida State University over half the students couldn’t find Florida on a world map. of course, any one can watch the questions asked on the street by Jay Leno about who are Cheney, Rice, or Reid and get blanks.

http://www.rmhiherbal.org/review/2003-4.html#uhs
A PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE:
"Bemoaning the decline in U.S. educational standards has become a popular public sport. American students' embarrassing ignorance of world geography, basic science and math, and declining literacy is the profitable subject of government committees, philanthropic foundations, corporate think tanks, armies of consultants, and educational bureaucracies, who all continually demand more resources and money even as the problem worsens.

"Perversely, it seems that the severity of the problem has become proportional to the amounts of money and effort devoted to studying and "fixing" it.

“Until very recently, I believed that the quality of herbal education, as well as of general and university education, was merely a function of determining the right curriculum and teaching methods and then convincing the proper authorities to adopt them.

"Only in the last few years have I gradually come to the conclusion that the system of American public education itself is so deeply and irreversibly flawed that it cannot be fixed”

The Respected Senator John McCain would “Never,” even consider such an absurdity “the MAN is a US War Veteran,” and Senator Obama you could learn a thing or two from John McCain.

Citizens living in Hawai’i are having fits “absolutely outraged,” writing endless letters and commentaries (Comments) to both the Honolulu Advertiser and Honolulu Star Bulletin since they printed that the appointed junior Senator is coming to Hawai’i possibly giving a speaking engagement inside Punchbowl National Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu, Hawaii. It’s a Veteran’s National Cemetery not Obama’s personal “Soap Box,” to stand on and rant; it’s a place for those resting in peace. The people of Hawaii are angry at the thought of this and have every right to be at the report he’s planning this – it’s a disgrace. Punchbowl would NOT be a "wonderful backdrop." Talk about crass -- speechifying in a national cemetery during a political campaign. Imagine this: thousands of enthralled Obama supporters rushing around the cemetery to get close to the man, trampling over the graves of men and women who've given their lives in service to their country. The reactions posted in Comments still, when the idea of a Punchbowl speech was first floated are from angry families whose loved ones rest in peace. National cemeteries are no place for political speeches. Makes you wonder about the maturity and integrity of the people who proposed such a preposterous idea in the first place.

Senator sell your socialism opinions on Capitol Hill, Hawaii’s questioning and lost respect for the “so-called,” junior appointed Senator who’s turned into another Washington D.C.*Wanna-bee* just allot of talk nothing more. You’d make a great car salesman NOT A PRESIDENT you seem to sell plenty of B.S. to those not wise enough to read between the lines of a script written performance; every word out of your mouth is written by a paid staff member whose worked the D.C. circuit for years like the well known Mr. Rove,” Yes, he too, could write a good speech and America bought it; just look at our current sitting “Bobble head,” in the oval office.

Webster’s Fourth Edition describes Barack Obama as a “HYPOCRITE,” His own Pastor taught Trinity Church words of hate and racism while the Senator and his air-head-of-a-wife passed the tithe platter not giving even as 20 year members. He doesn’t support any causes really, not even his own Church “just the views of Reverend Wright’s anti-White; anti-Israel; anti-American points of view. A “greedy,” Senator is described in the Bible as a “HYPOCRITE,” as well. He’s a Racist Elitist Marxist or the Antichrist reading his well written speeches. the *Wanna-bee* Washington Politician has in less then 12 months become a disgrace to Christianity– He’s not a Christian man of his word; a poor excuse for one.

The Punchbowl National Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu, Hawaii is a sacred place for the many lying in Peace, Those US Military young and old, Men and Woman who gave their lives to this country will turn over in their graves at the sound of Obama’s political performance if he speaks there. Punchbowl Cemetery it’s not a place for a campaign rally “The Senator should keep his political performances with its Washington Socialism undertones to an area more suiting for “HYPOCRITES,” Senator your always welcomed to rant at Neil Abercrombie’s headquarters, but Punchbowl Cemetery is a resting place of peace and should remain so for those who rest there, - not an arena for your personal political agenda; Show some decency and class moron.

The TV show on examining the faiths and belief systems of Senators Clinton and Obama was appalling. I thought we had a government of separation of church and state. What business is it of any American to know, let alone dissect the very personal beliefs or lack thereof of a candidate? The arrogance of people to even suggest that this be a part of a political campaign demonstrates how far we have wandered from the basic tenets of our system. When the Republican party got "into" kowtowing to the right-wing religious vote, they lost me. Now, I hear Hillary speaking out of both sides of her mouth on the subject of "pro-choice."
Not for her, but, but, but...... She panders......and the saddest part is she probably "has to" to ever have the slimmest chance of elect ability. It seems "no one" in the news speaks to this melding of religion in our country. Europe long gave up trying to moralize after the horrors of WWII. How could a god let the atrocities happen? As a middle age white woman, born and raised a Catholic, this makes me wince. What I believe in or what spirituality brings me comfort is so profound and personal is none of anyone's business. Where are you America????

Gerry wrote "There were big laughs here!"

That is suppose to be the purpose of the book - to solicit laughter. But I didn't expect the dumb would find it funny too. That's an indication that it could be a best seller. Thanks for the encouraging comment. I could be laughing all the way to the bank. HAHA

DILTD:

This is in reply to your post on the previous thread.

Thank you so much for your comments. The book you mention sounds very interesting. Can you give me the title?

Basically, what I am trying to say you have said.

As for the Bible, what I'm saying is that there is, as you know, biblical scholarship. It involves, arcaheology, text studies, mythology, linguistics, etc. It has raised many questions about the Christian Bible (OT/NT). However, the "scentific" study of the Bible is contentious. It has also left questions unanswered. Yet, people with various agendas grab at what's handy to make premature cases.

Another point is that "science" does not proceed in a vaccuum. What gets funding, i.e., atomic weapons, what does not, is often not in control of scientists. The ability to replicate findings is often hampered, and all too often the "scientific" community accepts them prematurely for various reasons. Etc. I am not against science, just to its deification and the notion that it is purely cognitive in nature.

As we have both noted, scientists, mathematicians, Nobelists think otherwise.

I enjoy reading your posts as well. This last one, the parts on intuition, I would like all my fellow atheists to read. Perhaps, you will paste it on this thread.

Yours,
M. Anonymous

Thanks, Anonymous, for the comment on Spiderman's "stupid" and "intelligent" answers! A double confirmation of my little limerick. There were big laughs here!

Dear Spiderman

I had 51 credits of math in college, which is more than most math majors. But that does not prove anything about our arguments, just that you do not know anything abould the people that you belittle.

Perplexed wrote "There are engineers and then there are engineers".

True. Iam an engineer and you are not.

Daniel den "Spiderman could just as easily doubt that the earth is round".

That was before I became an engineer. Evolutionists are more inclined to believe that the earth is flat because upto now, Paleoanthroplogists are not taught the relationship between the roundness of the earth or moon to gravity.

Fate, it's not called medical discovey based on evolution. It's simply called discovery thru experiments.

Everett, what do you not understand in the phrase "many factors"?.

Fate, how did kangaroos hopped to australia? I like that question and I'll ponder on that. But Im very sure bacterias didn't turn into kangaroos coz if that were true, there would be lots of kangaroos in your head by now. Remember , you said that your brain came from a bacterias.

Daniel Den, had you encountered algebra or any math field? I really wonder how you passed it if you had. Science is not Intuition. do you understand that?

HOW DID SOIL TURN INTO BRAIN? Guys, you disappointed me.

Merry Anonymous

I like reading your posts, because you seem thoughtful, but I am still not sure what you are meaning.

For example, even though I was raised in a Christian family, and I was raised on the Bible, and know it pretty well from beginning to end, I do not know much about this kind of Biblical scholarship that you are referring to. Bascially, all of the references are unknown to me.

Perhaps this demonstrates that even though there may be many intelligent people posting here with many intelligent and valid things to say, we all have such utterly different backgrounds, experiences, and interests that it is sometimes difficult for us to understand each other.

You said that science posits false beliefs and does not correct itself for centuries. I am aware of this. That is why scientific truth should not be thought of as objective truth, but it should be thought of as the consensus of opinion among scientists on scientific matters. And then, it is wise, not to have blind faith and trust in this consensus of opinion, but to try and understand the reason behind this consensus of opinion.

You also mentioned the intuitive aspects of science. I am also aware of this. So it is said, and I believe, that Isaac Newton had a sudden insight into gravity and the laws of motion, and then he sought to prove them. It is also said, that Albert Einstein had a sudden insight into the nature of "relativity," that an absolute speed of light implies weird things happening to space and time. Louis deBroglie was not even a physicist; his brother was; but he chimed in with his insight about the wave-particle duality of matter, and won a Nobel prize for it. Archimedes had his sudden insight on how to measure the mass of something by the water it displaces, while he sat in a bath-tub, and then jumped up and yelled, "eureka;" meaning, "I've got it."

A few years ago, I read a book which referred to this moment of insight as "metanoia" which the author described as "a sudden restructuring of thought." So, I believe, that most of the great scientific innovations in the way that we think about the world came not from the "scientific" method, but from this strange metanoia, in which, for a moment, a single person, is able to perceive some fundamental aspect of reality, that other people cannot see.

That is why I say putting together a picture of the world is really more of an artful judgement, and not necessarily so methodical as people may idealize science to be.

I had a bunch more things to say here, but they have all suddenly slipped my mind (reverse metanoia).

PaganPlace:

I wasn't thinking of you when I mentioned false idolatry. (I prefer "idoling.") I was thinking of the last four or five hundred years. And, really, have no fear that I see religion and science as equivalent.

I thought I had made that clear in my posts. Certainly, I do not see them as interchangeable. On the other hand, it is hard to argue with Adorno (at least for me) in his argument that myth already contained enlightenment, enlightenment myth.

Nothwistanding the huge critiques mounted against Cartesian tninking by Adorno and others, I do maintain that the "commandment" to doubt is of lasting importance. That goes to Science, as well, however, to the myth that we are somehow evolving. As I look around, I fear we may evolve ourselves into extinction.

I don't know if I'm being clear. "Scientifically," we are in one place, morally, culturally, in another. Also, as an atheist, I have watched other atheists talk to those who believe in different religions as if they were benighted morons. THe one does not necessarily follow from the other. Moreover, one can quite easily be benighted and an atheist, as I'm sure you know.

And then too there is the complexity of religious belief. In speaking with Christians, Catholics, Muslims and Jews, whose degree of observance varies, I have been repeatedly struck by the number who are highly skeptical when it comes to an afterlife. Of course, Judaism has little to say on the matter, but not so, the other religions I mention. Religious Muslims, Christians, and Catholics, have said, sometimes quite humorously, that, no, they do not expect their "souls" to be going anywhere at any time post mortem.

It is the contempt I sometimes hear among fellow atheists that disturbs me. Where were they in South America when priests were risking their lives, dying to free people from some of the horror around them? The contempt sometimes bothers me.

The faith that we are moving ahead, the astonishment at the huge progress "we've" made. Who is we? Someone said he wondered where we would be today if, say, in the 1600s, we had the internet, etc. I responded that genocide was underway against indigenous peoples in that century, notably here. If the indigenes had had the internet, cell phones, access to explosives....

Who knows....maybe, the other commenter was right. Maybe, they would have won, and we would be living in a better world. But, seriously, I do not think that he or she had included them in his/her "we."

You are quite right to worry about false equivalencies. So do I. But I think that worry about false idols is also justified. (As is worry about gnosis)

M. Anonymous :)

I worry about *false equivalency,* Merry. Which is actually our real and present problem.

As for my 'idols' I assure you there's no falsity involved. As fun as it is for others to claim otherwise. :)

PaganPlace:

Thank you for your thoughts. Actually, you will have to define what you mean by the "scientific method," a concept introduced centuries ago, that is less and less universally understood as specialization and subspecialization continue apace.

No, I don't think I'm confused on the points I make. Science may be used to signify a set of beliefs, principles, values, as it has been quite consistently on these threads, or instrumentally, as it has been every great once in awhile. You might want to think of these two senses as Science and science.

Science (and science) does not dispense with intuition as has been remarked on this thread. Quite the contrary.

I worry about false idolatry, an ongoing problem in our culture and in many others.

At all events, I wouldn't personalize. It quite defeats the purpose of this discussion.

"Another thought: When people posit Science, a perfect set of beliefs and practices, they are placing there faith in something that does not exist. They are idealizing."

No... this is not science. This is what religious people who insist science is a rival 'religion' *believe in their religion* about science.

Science neither accepts nor denies 'faith.' This is not what science is *for.*

Science is a tool, and a body of observation. No more, and abso-smurfly no less. Science and the scientific method itself is not confused on this point. Someone else is.

DILTD,

Another thought: When people posit Science, a perfect set of beliefs and practices, they are placing there faith in something that does not exist. They are idealizing.

Their views are optimistic, based on success. They lose sight of all that is tragic in our actual history with science.

Theirs is an act of faith. It really is the binaries that bother me, not that there is no distinction to be made between science and religion. Of course, there is.

Hi, Arminius! :)

"It is SO real that sometimes I feel I must have been there. No reason or history can explain this; I suppose it is some tremendous empathy born of my 'inner knowledge'."

Used to be, there was some folks called that 'Gnosis.' Kind of overstacked the deck. Things got sticky.

My lil' tribe like to call it 'mythic consciousness' or suchlike.

Careful yer myths, you might just find they ..become... you.

Capiche, my friend?

Dear DITLD,

Thanks for your comments.
I guess the best I can do is say I agree. What troubles me in this and the last thread is the polarization between "belief" and "reason," never clearly defined.

Empiricism and reason are not the same. There is a definitional distinction. Where some religions, not all, say believe, science says doubt. This, I think, is among its invaluable contributions to human thought.

But science also involves belief, does not necessarily correct itself for centuries, etc., is highly fallible. Some beliefs end up in what scientists call "intuitive leaps," also evident in mathematical invention. The double helix comes to mind.

It is the binarism that troubles me. We have evidence. You have superstition.

As for the Farnaz business, what I was trying to say is there seemed to be an investment in this new document as (a) somehow indicative of a group's or sub-group's core understanding (it is not), and that its selection of articles is definitive (they are not).

Biblical research, especially of OT/Tanakh, is complex. Problems remain with unexcavated sites, sites that have been destroyed. Myths of the region are extremely important (for NT research as well.) The identities and periods in which various learned men wrote these accounts, etc., etc., etc. What to do with conflicting accounts.

How to answer the lingering questions about why certain elements of the OT are literally unique in epic myth.

This last question does not attest to the existence of a supreme being, of course. But it is an important question, that, thus far, has not been answered.

How Judaism evolved throughout the centuries of the OT/Tanakh before the door was shut permanently.

The Judaic impulse toward interpretation. The dismissal of a much earlier belief system which Christianity took up.

Christianity as a reform impulse re Judaism. Islam as a reform impulse re Christianity.

Typology, its relation to racism, nationalism, imperialism, etc.

Religion and patriarchy. (Some religions, that is.)

The questions of most interest, at least to me, are these.

The more biblical research we do, the more we can understand the evolution of belief and some of the strangely accurate material in the OT. The more we understand when and how certain interpretations became institutionalized in the various religions, the better we can understand how they maintained or lost influence, how that influence evolved, the shape it took, the interests it advanced.

I am an atheist. However, I cannot say with absolute certainty that my way is the better way, that without religion, we'd have one less false belief system to deal with, a salutary development.

Here is a silly game. Suppose tomorrow the world was re-created without religion and every human being in it was pink.

What then?

Merry Anonymous

Dear Merry Anonymous

I am not quite understanding what you were saying. When Farnaz was posting, I understood almost nothing that she said. She made many references unfamiliar to me, so I do not think I commented at all.

I have this to say about your comments on belief. It is said that we believe some things, and we know other things. We use these words casually and easily, as though they are simple verbs, describing "actions" with easy meanings. And often, it is not important to make a distinction between one or the other.

But then, later on, when you try to decide what is the difference in the things you believe and the things you know, then it is not so easy to say what these two words mean; but if you think about it a little harder, surely, you could make the distinction. But when you think about it a little harder, then the obscurity of these words grows and intensifies.

And so, that is why I say I believe in almost nothing, and I also do not think that I know much either. I have judgements on what I think may be true, or is probably true, and I derive these judgemnets from thinking about things in many different ways.

People say that we believe in religion, according to what has been taught to us, but we know science because we do experiements to prove science. But do we really? No, not really. Somebody does scientific experiments, but most of us do not bother to prove all of scientific theory and knowledge ouselves. Instead, we hear about science from what other people write or tell us, and then we believe it is true or we do not believe it is true.

Everything that we do not know from our own senses, we know because someone else has told us. And often, our own senses give a wrong impression of things, so that we must depend on what other people tell us to supercede what our senses tell us. For example, our senses tell us that the world is flat, but scientists tell us that it is round, and if they have a good enough argument, and we trust them, then we agree, that their opinion is more true than our sensory perceptions.

And so, putting together a picture of what the world is like, is actually a kind of art, in which we collect chuncks of belief, and chunks of knowledge, scattered thoughout the landscape of the world which we inhabit, and available to us in the various settings into which we have been born.

Some people have a great interest and appreciation for the collection of these chunks of belief and knowledge, and can arrange them artfully and beautifully, just as one might collect art. But, others, are not good at it; do not care much; find it in fact, boring.

Some people accept this landscape in which we dwell, and perceive it with animal senses, without curiousity, and they accept the religious beliefs handed to them from the previous generation, without effort or stress, and that is good enough for them.

I am not meaning to trivialize belief, but only say that I have a hard time saying what it is, only that is an expression of an inner will.

I am not a scientist although I do have limited expertise in certain religions. That said, a number of discussion points on this thread trouble me. First, it seems to me that the most convincing hypthesis for any phenomena is the extent to which it either explains other phenomena or can be superficially or synthetically replicated.

Using these criteria, which offers the better hypothesis: creationism or evolution?

A second problem I see here is the notion that "belief" is somehow trivial. I believe in equal rights for all Americans. Had that profession of belief not been made and remade and made again, where would be now? And we have a long, long way to go. We are nowhere near the point at which we might say I believe in equal rights for all the world's citizens.

Third, occasionally, and no offense intended, some statements made here seem reductive to me. The idea that science invitably brings progress or proceeds directly from the ether is one.

A fourth goes to matters religious. I emphatically do not want to be involved in or to ressurect the Etz Haym discussion, but I do recall feeling for Farnaz, who was patiently trying to explain that archaeological evidence does not account for everything. From my own studies, I can tell you that this is the case. There are many other kinds of evidence, as she tried to say. As well, the presence of unexcavated sites truly does make some of Etz Haym problematic, as does the tossing of questions that will not go away in religious studies. That is what Etz Haym did. It simply discounted a couple of questions that many in religious studies refuse to discount.

Just thinking....

Asking her if she accepts or rejects/agrees or disagrees, etc., disallows answers containing any subtlty.

Given the paucity of evidence, given that many Christians and Catholics believe that their way is contained in the NT, it would be much simpler to do this sort of thing with that document. And it would be very important, very important for many Christians and Catholics to know when certain interpretations were introduced, "canonized" and institutionalized. Priests have acknowledged openly that they do not believe in the literal existence of the trinity, that there is no such thing as hell, which, incidentally, has been assigned a specific above-ground location. Why not share with the faithful?

With respect to religion, one can retain a spiritual kind of thinking and accept cautiously those findings that should be accepted, AS well AS their limitations, the latter from a more "scientific" perspective.

E Fav,

Missed a post of yours, found it while searching for something else. Here goes:

#1 - I won't call you 'dear Lady' again. It was meant as a term of respect, but I defer to you.

#2 - As to having my own 'inner knowledge' of God, and then diving into the Gospels and the teachings of Jesus - well... the quest continues. That 'inner knowledge' lit a fire in me to see what was available out there. To have my faith in God and not see how it fit into the world as perceived, into history, into my relations with my fellow humans, would be a fruitless cop-out! I have no intention of spending the rest of my life sitting on a mountain and contemplating my navel. Anyway, I am a naturally curious person. I find no contradiction here, I think it is a natural path to follow, just as I find no contradiction between belief and science. Yes, I have found acceptance of the Gospels, and of Jesus. It was His words that did it. Took four readings of the Gospels. And yes, His passion, death, and resurrection are real to me. I don't yet know how to handle that. It is SO real that sometimes I feel I must have been there. No reason or history can explain this; I suppose it is some tremendous empathy born of my 'inner knowledge'.

Best I can do for now. Keep it coming.

Arminius

Sputterman2's post on CD vs. LP was so stupid and uninformative that I feel compelled to respond. He basically said, "all things considered, perfect reproduction of sound is better than imperfect reproduction." Well, that's a big help.

LPs introduce distortion related to the deterioration of the signal as it is carved into the master, copied to the presses, and stamped into the final LPs. There is also distortion introduced by imperfect speed of the turntable, warping of the LP, groove and stylus contaminants, scratches, and wear of both the groove and the stylus. As Mr. Mark correctly indicates, some of these distortions are pleasing (e.g. the "warmth" of low-frequency noise). Some are now used to great effect in "Trip Hop" music (e.g. pop and hiss).

CDs introduce "digital noise," which is the difference between the original signal and the piecewise step function that is encoded on the disk. Since the sampling rate is high, this frequency of this noise is also high, and has a quasi-sawtooth waveform. Personally, I'm not sure if I can hear it, although I have heard audiophiles complain about it sounding "harsh".

I recorded some of my LPs to CD, and as far as I can tell the "warmth" is still there, which suggests that it is due to distortions in the LP format rather than a part of the legitimate signal that is lost in the CD process.

All in all, I prefer CDs. Just think how pissed you would be if you bought a CD that had all the noise we used to just accept in LPs.

And besides, Perplexed, it doesn't even matter if an engineer does not accept evolution; it does not even matter if a scientist does not accept evolution; the consensus of opinion remains as it is, or changes, according to the opinions, findings, observations, and explanations of many people, not of any one person.

As I said in an earlier post, you know some things by your own senses, and you know other things by consensus, by what other people say, and of those other people, whom you decide to trust, and why you trust them, who among them have credibility, and who does not.

I do not think that anybody should feel compelled to put all their blind trust and faith in everything that science says. Yet, science has earned a great deal of trust, and is overall, pretty trustworthy.

Spiderman wants me to prove evolution to him, like proving how much something weighs, by weighing. But evolution is a sophistocated concept; to understand it requires some degree of intellectual capacity, and some degree of sincerity, in seeking truth and knowledge, and an energetic curiousity; without any of these qualities, what really is the point in knowing something of a complex and sophisticated nature?

Spiderman could just as easily doubt that the earth is round; he could say "prove it" and then what would I do to prove it?

Rather than try to prove it to someone like him, I would be inclined to say, "suit yourself; the world is flat."

We've said this before, and apparently it will have to be said again for the benefit of those 'engineers' that dispute evolution as a well-established scientific reality.

All the hard sciences are represented in this pursuit - computer science, physics and astro-physics, genetics, chemistry, biology, mathematics, and the general field of medicine are all among the various fields of science that now contribute greatly to our ever-evolving knowledge of the processes of evolution.

Without the electron microscope, for example, we'd know far less about the fundamental role of DNA in disease processes, inherited characteristics, medical anomalies, and the life-affirming spectral process of evolution itself. And who actually builds electron micro-scopes from the complex physics 'blueprints' required for the construction of these useful gadgets??

I suppose we have to give optical engineers and other engineering specialites working in tandem a certain amount of credit for actually fabricating these amazing devices.

And as far as we know, none have refused to build electron microscopes because the DNA information thus obtained leads to knowledge that runs counter to the biblical understanding of the origins of life - and for that we are most fortunate!

There are engineers and then there are engineers.

I realize that it is late in the discussion to bring this up again, but I can't resist. I always thought that E Fav was a woman. Her scrupulously gender neutral posts were, to me, the very thing that made me believe that she was a woman. My wife used to post on various boards before she died, and she was always gender neutral. She said that people then had only the words with no gender-based biases.

I also thought of E Fav as quite chic. Jill Sander power suit with maybe Christian Louboutin pumps.

And for everyone else

I am not really arguing with Spiderman, whom I do not regard seriously. He is a good foil, that helps clarify my own thinking, by pondering how wrong he almost always is on just about everything.

Angela whined: "Also, why is it that if someone believes in creation they are dehumanized on this post: well, again, human depravity...."

I haven't seen much in the way of dehumanizing, just asking where the evidence is for it or why you ignore evidence against it. If its all based on faith, fine! Faith cannot be proved. A belief is a belief and if you want to believe in biblical creation, or the flying spaghetti monster, that is ok with me, just don't expect to tell me its true and be surprised when I don't believe it when the evidence against both is overwhelming. If you were to tell me the world was created last Thursday and will be destroyed this Thursday I could not disprove it but I would still say you have nothing to back it up and it is just as much of a belief as the biblical creaton and apocholyptic stories.

For Spiderman

It's called a joke; look it up.

Columbus thought he was in the Indies. Where do you think the aboriginal name "Indian" came from?

But Columbus was not really a scientist, and he never realized that he had discovered a New World. But the pseudo-scienctific consensus of opinion (for in those days, there really was no institutional science such as we have now) quickly morphed into the realization that they had not travelled to India but had discoverd a New World.

And what of people who refused to believe in the New World, saying, but it can't be; how can it be? It's not in the Bible; all the world there is to know is already known; there can't be any New World' it just can't be.

That is where Spiderman would enter the conversation.

Spiderman2 wrote: "To prove my point that this man is a quack, let him list down the MEDICAL DISCOVERY based on evolution. What are they? Im very interested to know."

Here are a few:

-The drop in iron in the blood during a fevor is seen in all mammals when they have fevors. Evolution says that this must be beneficial to the organism since it is being retained through the evolutionary tree, but before evolution it was considered harmful since you need iron to be strong. Scientists test the hypothesis that depriving bacteria of iron slows down their growth and find it to be true. So a drop in iron helps battle an infection.

-Similarly, since a fevor is a response to an infection and seen in all mammals it must be a beneficial response to infection for it to be retained through evolution. Scientists test the hypothesis and show that sure enough, raise the tempurature on some bad bugs from 98.6 to 102 and they slow down. So taking aspirin to lower a fevor may lead to a prolonged infection. This was not understood until the realization that animals have this same response, and that evolutionary theory does not retain what is useless or harmful led researchers to understand that adding iron or aspirin to a patient may do more harm than good.

-You can also look at the understanding of sickle cell anemia. The question was always "why would evolution allow sickle cell anemia to exist"? If you have both genes for it you die very young. If you have just one gene (and thus one normal gene too), you live but with the pain and sickness of sickle cell anemia. Evolutionary theory says this disease is a very recent mutation or that the gene actually provides some benefit. Following up on that benefit idea researchers discovered that the malaria parasite dies in the veins of those with sickle cell anemia, making them less prone to malaria. And guess where we find people with the gene for sickle cell anemia? Right in west africa, where malaris exists. Evolution thus helped explain why sickle cell anemia exists.

Spiderman2 wrote: "All the advancement in medicine like stethoscope, CAT Scan, etc are done by engineers and not by paleontologists or anthropologists."

As an engineer I'll take that as a complement. But medicine is not fed by only one science. Evolutionary theory is just one science helping medical research in areas like tissue transplantation research, neurological research and all animal studies since the link from animal to man must be understood to be sure the animals are good models for that experiment being done on a human. This involves the evolutionary links.

Now, Spiderman2, I'm waiting for the answer to my question: How did the kangaroos hop off the ark at Mt. Ararat to Australia?

How can we justify that lying, hypocrisy and other moral depraved issues politicians have give us the excuse to say; well, no one's perfect. Well, what about character refinement and not just excusing one's personal human deficiences. In a nutshell, this country is probably in the worst moral decay it's ever been in and I wasn't around when Abraham Lincoln was president but my take: none of the candidates exemplies Abraham Lincoln's courage, faith and determination for this country. Since I will not stay home on election day, I guess I'll take the less of all 3 evils. Also, why is it that if someone believes in creation they are dehumanized on this post: well, again, human depravity....That's the mission statement here...

Somebody asked, which is better a CD or an LP record?

From an engineer's point of view : CD is a digital recording while LP is an analog. Our ear captures sound in an analog way so theoretically speaking if nothing was lost or added to the purity of the original sound as it was recorded analogously, it is always ANALOG that is better.

In the real world, Im not sure if that can be achieved so it becomes subjective. Meaning, a CD can be better or an LP record can be better depending on many factors.

C ya later guys. Class is over. Continue throwing chalks and don't catch them with your mouth.

"we are in India!"

What they thought as India, was actually South America. If that is your kind of scientist, NO WONDER you guys are LOST.

Dear Sir or Madam Pseudo,

I can tell you based on some truly miserable years of study, as can others now engaged in same activity intellectual,the man remains enormously influential. HIs imprint is universal and not only in linguistics. If you are involved in computational linguistics, you've seen it there as well.

One of his strongest influences was his teacher, whom some say he simply made comprehensible. Everyone who followed der Fader followed der Fader.

Pseudo, my regardful comrade, Bewildful has inquired if he might be among the regarded. What say you?

Regard,
Merry Anomymous

I hate to drop this great big bomb on Spiderman, BUT an engineer is not a scientist; an engineer is an engineer.

It's like this:

When Columbus came on his voyage to the New World, the engineers are the ones who built the ships, and navigated the way; the scientists were the ones who stepped ashore in the New World, and proclaimed in tremulous awe, "we are in India!"

Should be:
"For neighbour our good man writes neighbor."

Oh dear. Neighbor just looks so wrong to me.

What dunce was it who did maintain
Speed and myself were just the same?
Besides contrasts too great to tell
The man does not know how to spell.
For neighbour our good man writes neighbour
And labour he inscribes as labor.
A man of few words it is true
And, as it seems, few letters too!

Dear Pseudo and MA,

It is my most considered opinion--assuming that one's opinion *can* be considerate for in some sense is not an opinion *against* one's good adversary as well as *for* one's good self *not* considerate? (I only ask)--that your exchange of posts was indeed honourable. I would hope that in future you could carry on in this enlightened method. I also will strive to duplicate your honourable methodology. In this fashion I hope to endeavour to distinguish myself from the aforementioned Speed123 who, whilst of course sharing our ancient Catholic faith, is rather more direct in his missives.

Yours faithfully,
Mary Cunningham
London

Fate wrote : "But how primitive life, bacterial like organisms, turned into brain is known through evolution."

That can only be true if your brain is as small as a bacteria. In that case, we have nothing to contend about.

Holly Dunsworth wrote "I believe evolution. It's easy. It's my life. I'm a paleoanthropologist."

I am an Engineer. I am more of a scientist than paleoanthropologists are. Paleontology and anthropology is a mixture of science and intuition. Intuition is NOT science. In my field, intuition is discarded. We only accept PURE SCIENCE that can be PROVEN mathematically AND can be PROVEN in the lab. NO TRICKS, JUST PURE SCIENCE.

HOW DID SOIL TURN INTO BRAIN? Unless it can't be shown in the lab, it's purely INTUITION and in my field, it is as good as GARBAGE.

Holly Dunsworth wrote "My health is better because of medical research based on evolution."

To prove my point that this man is a quack, let him list down the MEDICAL DISCOVERY based on evolution. What are they? Im very interested to know.

All the advancement in medicine like stethoscope, CAT Scan, etc are done by engineers and not by paleontologists or anthropologists.

spiderman2 asked: "HOW DID SOIL TURN TO BRAIN?"

Soil did not turn into brain. You need to understand that first. The first life is not known and scientists admit that, though they have ideas, but how the first life "happened" is not known, yet. But how primitive life, bacterial like organisms, turned into brain is known through evolution.

Now, may I ask you a question: HOW DID THE KANGAROOS HOP FROM AUSTRALIA TO THE ARK, THEN AFTER THE ARK LANDED AT MT. ARARAT, HOW DID THE KANGAROOS HOP BACK TO AUSTRALIA?

For Spidey -

Maybe this will help:

I Am Evolution
by Holly Dunsworth

Weekend Edition Sunday, May 11, 2008.

I believe evolution. It's easy. It's my life. I'm a paleoanthropologist. I study fossils of humans, apes and monkeys, and I teach college students about their place in nature.

Of course I believe evolution.

But that is different from believing in evolution.

To believe in something takes faith, trust, effort, strength. I need none of these things to believe evolution. It just is. My health is better because of medical research based on evolution. My genetic code is practically the same as a chimpanzee's. My bipedal feet walk on an earth full of fossil missing links. And when my feet tire, those fossils fuel my car.

To believe in something also implies hope. Hope of happiness, reward, forgiveness, eternal life. There is no hope wrapped up in my belief. Unless you count the hope that one day I'll discover the most beautifully complete fossil human skeleton ever found, with a label attached saying exactly what species it belonged to, what food it ate, how much it hunted, if it could speak, if it could laugh, if it could love and if it could throw a curveball. But this fantasy is not why I believe evolution — as if evolution is something I hope comes true.

After all the backyard bone collecting I did as a child, I managed to carve out a career where I get to ask the ultimate question on a daily basis: "Where did I come from and how?"

If our beliefs are important enough, we live our lives in service to them. That's how I feel about evolution. My role as a female Homo sapiens is to return each summer to Kenya, dig up fossils, and piece together our evolutionary history. Scanning the ground for weeks, hoping to find a single molar, or gouging out the side of a hill, one bucket of dirt at a time, I'm always in search of answers to questions shared by the whole human species. The experience deepens my understanding not just about what drives my life, but all our lives, where we came from. And the deeper I go, the more I understand that everything is connected. A bullfrog to a gorilla, a hummingbird to me, to you.

My belief is not immutable. It is constantly evolving with accumulating evidence, new knowledge and breakthrough discoveries. For example, within my lifetime, our history has expanded from being rooted 3 million years ago with the famous Lucy skeleton, to actually beginning over 6 million years ago with a cranium from Chad. The metamorphic nature of my belief is not at all like a traditional religious one; it's more like seeing is believing.

So I believe evolution.

I feel it. I breathe it. I listen to evolution, I observe it and I do evolution. I write, study, analyze, scrutinize and collect evolution. I am evolution.

Independently produced for Weekend Edition Sunday by Jay Allison and Dan Gediman with John Gregory and Viki Merrick.

This article is from the Richard Dawkins website.

My Dear Merry Anonymous:

"Except for the Chomsky part. From that first "Apples are good to eat" to the present, it's been Chomsky all the way."

John Backus advanced BNF to describe the syntax of the International Algorithmic Language (Algol 60). Chomsky picked up on that kind of grammar and tried to describe the syntax of English with it. Using a syntactic device from computer languages to try capture semantics of human language didn't work very well.

Best Regards,

Pseudo

Spiderman2 vs the global scientific community on the question of evolution - somehow this doesn't seem like a fair fight.

And I have to agree - spidey is a textbook example of a resident living in the State of Denial. If he had spent less time throwing chalk in school he'd have passed English 101 and gone on to much bigger things. Perhaps as a paleoanthropologist or evolutionary biologist, instead of a biblical fundamentalist - but then, I guess we'll never know.

I said

"The whole thing comes down to an artful judgement of what is more probably true than not true."

You have a tin ear, with no artful judgement, when it comes down to sorting through the chunks of knowledge that we have gathered over the past few thousand years.

You do not accept the consensus of science, and that is how you think. But sciece continues on, despite your artless judgement.

You keep bringing up your nonsense question, how did brains come from dirt? Are you saying that all matter comes from the same source? And is this your reason for disproving evolution?

But posing a theorectical thought-question of what might be, or could not possibly be, cannot change the consensus of scietific opinion. Evolution is real, but for no reason that we know of. If something is real, then it just is, and disproving its reality by questioning how could it possibly be real, is a form of denial.

So, I would say that Spiderman's babblings are rooted in profound denial, and how anyone argue with that?

Spiderman2,

It's quite amusing that you like "Intelligent answer no 1" but you don't like "Stupid answer no. 2." It testifies to the truth of both answers that you don't see that they're the *same*! Read Intelligent answer no 1 again. Carefully. Ha ha ha!!!

Intelligent answer no 1 -

We hear Spidey persistently pound,
“Evolution? To hell it is bound!
They are searching in vain
To turn soil into brain”!
Spidey proves: It’s the other way ‘round!

Stupid answer no. 2 - "Um... in your case... it didn't."

HOW DID SOIL TURN INTO BRAIN?

Stupid answer no. 1 - "The brain is the topsoil in the human head".

Intelligent answer no 1 -

We hear Spidey persistently pound,
“Evolution? To hell it is bound!
They are searching in vain
To turn soil into brain”!
Spidey proves: It’s the other way ‘round!

Stupid answer no. 2 - "Um... in your case... it didn't."

Intelligent answer no. 2 "When I lived in Manhattan, there was a butcher on B'way in the 80s who has a sign in his window: 'We Only Have Brains on Thursday!' "

Stupid answer no. 3 - "Surely Spidey is not right, my mind is not dirt.... aaarrrgh. "

***
Daniel Den, I'm sorry to tell you but Science is not Philosophy. Evolution is Philosophy that is why you're confused. Many Philosophers want to be called "scientists" and there's where the problem lies.

The question I raised above is not a Science question but a Philosophical one. Science can't answer that but Philosophy can. Evolutionists are so stupid that they don't even know how to classify their type of inquiry.

***
HOW DID SOIL TURN INTO BRAIN?

I hope I can get a thousand answers so I can make a book and title it, "LOOK MA, NO BRAINS.

With the rate the answers are coming it may take 2 years to finish the book. Please hurry up. Keep it coming fast.

My publishers want it out before election day so we can use the book's income to bankroll Mickey Mouse's candidacy. His platform will be :

LET THE MONKEYS VOTE COZ THEY ARE OUR RELATIVES. Let "Science" Rule. If we allow people with no brains to vote, then why not our monkey relatives who I assume has more brains. It's not an easy feat to climb a tree as fast as they can. We could use their climbing skills to climb fast the corporate ladder and steer our economy back into top shape.

Jihadist, Jihadist, Jihadist,

You continue the normal "fluff" and again fail to address the "fems" of Islam with said "fems" being the major threat to global peace.

You admit to knowing said "fems" by your statement:

"By the way, all organised and institutionalised religion is human and humanity based with flaws and all, just like humans are."

So what are they????????

Dear Sir or Madam Bewildful,

Speaking exclusively for my own person and not the person of Perspective, whose reply I eagerly await, I would say you more than qualify.

I condole and earnestly hope that you were not struck by flying aporias whilst at your study thesis-wise.

M. Anonymous

Dear Merry Anonymous and Pseudo,

Recently I read a very meritorious contrivance thesis-wise. I was further enlightened as I discovered a remorseful but vitriolic character identification, imperially speaking. Gaps abounded, some of them tendentious.

I hope this meets your criteriousness for language sportsmanship.

Dear Pseudo,

I hope you noticed that I was being most regardful in my last post, that I proceeded in good faith, irregardlessly, and, truth be told, I hope, impactfully, that is, if you are one who takes kindly to impactfulness.

Also, I tried my best to be interfaceful and interactive, employing, in the process, all manner of family values.

I welcome your reply.

Regardfully yours,
M. Anonymous
Language Sport :)

My Dear Pseudo,

Touche! Except for the Chomsky part. From that first "Apples are good to eat" to the present, it's been Chomsky all the way. This is not to say that there haven't been endless developments, revisions, most of them necessary, salutary. Still, truth be told Noam is to linguistics what Perry Miller is to the "Puritans." One could look back to Chomsky's greatest influence, but one will not, not this one, anyway, quite irregardless.

Warmest regard,
M. Anonymous

What I am trying to say, is that religion has reason and philosophy has reason, but science has no reason.

Science is not philosophy, and is not based on any philosophy, and any philosophy that is devised to describe or explain science is not actually science, and is not necessary for science to operate.

Since there is no reason about science, then there is actually no way to argue against it by any reason, because no matter how many times you argue agaisnt it with your reason, science remains, without any reason to explain it.

Get it? Spiderman?

And science is not the perfected description of existence; it is merely the consensus of scientists, which a non-scientist, may put all his faith and trust in and believe, or may seek to understand, and then agree with, or may reject.

But the utiility of science, all of the ways in which science has expanded the experiences of our lives, all of these things can be incorporated into a person's landscape, and be regarded almost as "natural things" but being regarded as part of the landscape by someone who also, at the same time rejects science.

That's all I'm trying to say.

There seem to be only a few of us left.

What if I were to say that I believe in God, but I do not believe in anything else?

And what if I were to say that in believing or not believing in something, that I am not really all too sure what I mean by the word "beleive," and that when you get right down to it, isn't there a confusion over what it is to believe, and what it is to know?

And when you get right down to it, there is no reason behind science, and no reason why science should work, and no reason why we should give credence to science. That is why people like Spiderman can argue against science, and reject science, and dance circles around any scientific characterization. The whole thing comes down to an artful judgement of what is more probably true than not true.

When I say that there are no laws of nature and there are no laws of sciene of of physics, people argue with me, that I must not be a very good scientist, if that is what I think. But if there are laws of physics, then what are they? What phenomenon are we describing? What thing or effect are we describing when we put all our faith in laws of nature and laws of physics? No one has ever said, because no one knows.

The existence of such things is merely speculative philosophical assumptions; but science operates, even when we abandon these assumptions; it operates without reason because it is our perceived reflected concept of physicial existence, which is emperical, and without a necessary reason.

I believe that in the contest between religion and science, that science has a more modest goal, and that science never contradicts religion, but religion often contradicts science.

Merry Anonymous:

In regards to:

"Please do not write "in regards to." One "regard" suffices. Best would be regarding."

Irregardless of your regard for my regards, I regard grammar as Pseudo Pscientific, really. Regard Noam Chomsky, for example. He spent a career regarding grammar and found nothing regarding truth. Only deep structures that can only be regarded as, well, shallow.

Best Regards,

Pseudo

Or disregard my regards if you if you wish to be regardless.

Arminius -

I love the bagpipes. They're especially thrilling heard live. Recordings can't do them justice.

I like bluegrass a little. I like the blues a lot. I despise gospel music. I know it's not PC to say that, but there you have it.

Classical is my real passion. It's what I listen to at work all day, what I listen to 99% of the time. If I have to drive a couple of hours, I'll pop in an opera or two. I have to make an effort to listen to music that isn't classical, and I don't seem to make the effort very often.

My good!

Jihadist,

"Look Ma, No Brain!" is an American saying, and has no connotation of a butcher. But I am open for an alternate title. Especially if we include Islamic fundies, or others, such as Hindu or (shudder!) even Jewish. THAT would be a can of worms!

Sleep well, I'm about off of here myself.

Arminius

Hello Arminius,

As someone pointed out, "Look Ma, No Brain!" sounds like we're at a butcher, who said, "Yes, we have no brains today". People would think it's a recipe book without brains as an ingredient.

So, can go along with your clarifying subtitle: "The Negative Mentality of the Christian Fundamentalist", but I'd add Muslim fundamentalist to it too.

I love Charlie Daniels Band' song, "The Devil went down to Georgia." I did say I don't like country music, but did not say I don't listen to them or dislike them all. I dislike especially, Tammy Wynette's "Stand By Your Man". She weeps on both side of the microphone when she sings. Quite a feat and talent to do so actually.

Oh, I love Weird Al's music spoofs, especially James Bond movies' theme songs. I've not heard his version of "The Devil went to Jamaica". Thanks for sharing the lyrics. It is hilarious.

Signing off the blog now.

Regards

"J"

Jihadist,

The book that we should co-author, as equals:
Title: "Look Ma, No Brain!"
Subtitle: "The Negative Mentality of the Christian Fundamentalist"

We can draw on my Christian liberalism and spiritualism, your razor-sharp Islamic mind, and also many here on the web, including our non-believer friends, and others.

What say? A best seller, for sure!

Arminius

Hi, Jihadist,

Your knowledge of things western, indeed, of things everywhere, is very impressive indeed!

But let me add to it, if I may. You said: "Hell, we even heard from Charlie Daniels Band that the devil went down to Georgia!"

OK, yes. Well, I live in Georgia, but that is beside the point.... did you ever hear that wonderful musical satirist, Weird Al, sing 'The Devil went to Jamica'? Oh, my....

The Devil went to Jamica
He was lookin' to sell some weed
He was doin' fine
They were standing in line
It was excellent weed indeed.
But then he saw this young man
Who was likewise peddling pot
So the Devil slid down the beach to the boy
And said, 'Kid, let me tell you what'....

Johnny roll a ball of hash
And make sure it's the bomb
'Cause the Devil has the kind of stuff
They smoked in Viet Nam.....

-----
Ah, well,

Arminius

Hello Spidey,

Still into making fun of people here? As like in high school, throwing chalks and all that? Come to mama.

You ask : Mr. Mark, can I use this qoute for my future book? "How Did Soil Turn into Brain?"

Some other possible titles for your future book:

* The Muddied Brain of an Aranchno

* The Soiled Brain of an Insect

Hello Daniel in the Lion's Den,

Yes, my real given name is Julia. Hope your head feels better soon.

Regards
"J"

**************************************************
Mr. Mark : "In fact, the term could become so neutered that we end up with something like...like...Christian Rock!!"

We believers have Christian Rock as a reaction against Satanic Rock. Rock is the music of the devil, so our priests said. It is for cretins, so Sinatra said.

We can't beat the devil with his music, and the cretins who listen to them. We can't stop the Rolling Stones from singing their symphaties for the devil, or acknowledging their satanic majesties's request. We can't stop Van Helan from running with the devil. Hell, we even heard from Charlie Daniels Band that the devil went down to Georgia!

So, Christian Rock it is, to rock the Devil and his cretinous followers off their rockers.

We not only have "Jesus Christ Superstar" but "Godspell" too. Show me a devil's rock opera! Ooops! I mean musical. "Rock opera" is the Who's "Tommy" for one.

Cheers
"J"

Sir Merry Anonymous,

You said: "will say this. I have had uncanny, quite unlooked for experiences, many. I chalked two up to intuition, which I believe exists as much as scientist do, and they do. Intuition explained nothing about these experiences, but being a rational empiricist, that was the best I could do."

We have something in common, my friend.

My spiritual experience was one thing, albeit much the most important. But I did have another. I had a dream... no, alas, not an MLK dream, but a bad one. I woke up in bed, and knew, then, as surely as I knew my own name, that at that very moment, it was coming to pass. And, as I found out later, that was true. No explanation. Also, this was long before my spiritual experience. I will say no more.

Arminius

Arminius

Dear Gentleman -

#1 – Please don’t call me “dear lady”

#2 – here’s the part you didn’t answer:
“Meanwhile, you tout the role of Christianity in human civilization in your recent comments here. Also, in earlier posts, you mention that you were satisfied, at some level, with the gospel accounts of Jesus. Another time here, you expressed a strong interest in studying the historical Jesus.

To me, all this seems quite different from an inner knowing. You don’t just know there is a God; you know there is a Christian God, who has an human existence which you’ve studied and accepted to some extent and to whom you give some credit for the expansion of human civilization. If you care to, I’d like to hear some of your thoughts on this.”

Again – if you don’t want to answer, fine, just say so.

Jihadist,

I have not looked at this blog since Sat, so, it seems I have missed quite alot. I would like to throw in my thoughts, except after reading all the posts to get caught up, now my head hurts (a little).

I do not read all of your posts all of the time, but I read alot of them alot of the times, and I do indeed remember that you are married with children. And your name is Julia, isn't it? I seem to remember that it is.

I will just stop here, and collect my breathless thoughts, maybe for later.

EXCUSE ME?? Christian-Rock is what Jesus would do. Don't knock it.

Hello Arminius and Mr. Mark,

I agree with you both, to make everything better is what we should strive for at the personal level or in the public square as the case may be. If we want to. Utopia is a fiction after all.:)

We are not talking about "perfection" in political, economic, social and religious systems. It is human originated and decided. Thus impossible to be pitch perfect.

There is also not quite "perfection" in science and technology. Imperfect theories/hypotheses can be replaced. Technology, no matter how perfect, can broke down, be replaced and constantly improved.

Only mathematics is "perfect" when the answer is right. Even applied mathematics as in statistics or calculations measurements for this and that can be wrong. After all, it is calculated by and decisions are made by less than perfect humans. Okay, machines nowadays doing calculations, and yet, perfect calculations and engineering does not stop a building from being an eyesore if the architecture is bad.

There's also one's private notion of "perfection". Say, finally getting to the top of Everest after dreaming of it for so long. A Sunday afternoon picnicking with one's one and only love one.... As for Placindo Domingo, prefers Jose Carreras.

Imperfections and flaws in music are called "improv", and mostly in freeform jazz, and can never be duplicated. Whatever kind of drugs and drinks they were having before they go on stage to fuel that surge and flow of creativity. Just kidding.

**************************************************

SC Cromett:

You : "Science is a method to understand the natural world, a tool, not an end in and of itself, unlike religion which does claim to have all the answers."

No disagreement on the first part on science, but perhaps to look again on the second.

Did religion claim to have all the answers? Or did someone claim that religion has all the answers? Just as much as a stretch to say that as "religion poisons everything".

I do believe not a single religion claim to have all the answers, or to claim to have all the truth" on everything. Only one saying, "I am the Truth", which is another theological and philosophical discussion altogether.

The claim for "truth" (which incidentally is specific to one faith), is on the message that there is a God. Other faiths focus more on everything from personal Enlightenment to the Right Path. This has nothing to do with claims to have all the answers. Rather, how to live right at the individual and community level.

The Ten Commandments is a good example of a set of guidelines for a "civil society". Discounting it just because it orginates from a Burning Bush is to discount the fact that organised religion is also concerned with law, justness and values as a means to a better and just society.

The "truth" about the religious religious texts are that all focus on the "truth" of human nature in all its faults and virtues, what are the consequences of the negative faults, and urging on the positives. It is apparent in stories, in anecdotes, in maxims found in the religious texts which are human-focused.

Of course all those bits about rewards of heaven if one is good vs threats of hell if one behaves hellishly on earth. The religious texts are not "solutions". Rather, from the Bhagavad Gita to the Bible to the Dhammapada to the Bible to the Qur'an, they provide guidelines and consequences of what will happen to man if he gives in to his basers instincts. Hell is a deterent. Heaven is an incentive. God is the personal conscience.

All those stories on sex and violence, greed and vanity, fear and courage, honesty and trustworthiness as stated in the Bible, are human virtues and errors that are still with us and we still capable of committing.

Religions and religious texts don't claim to have all the answers, including what was Lindsay Lohan thinking. But it did offer paramenters on how men should live to minimise discords in himself and with others.

I hope we are not confusing religion claiming to have all the answers with what believers' answer to any given question. Everyone has answers for everything. Right or wrong is another matter.

Perhaps we need to reread all the religious texts from the perspetive and angle of "Guides on Human Nature - Warts and All, and What Happens to Them with Such Warts". Science still don't have all the answers on human emotions, needs, pains nor have the means to control them effectively. Most medications are good for a while. But are temporary solutions. They may, or may not cure everything. Like science and technology.

Cheers
"J"

Noble Arminius:

I will say this. I have had uncanny, quite unlooked for experiences, many. I chalked two up to intuition, which I believe exists as much as scientist do, and they do. Intuition explained nothing about these experiences, but being a rational empiricist, that was the best I could do.

Two other much later experiences, twenty years apart could not be explained this way. I recognized that while they were happening. I spoke to the most logically positivistic people I know, including an astro-physicist. They all tried to talk me out of what I was feeling/fearing/dreading, which had nothing to do with yours truly.

Both events came to pass within days of my experience. No one could explain it. Even the astro-physicist hesitated before faltering with "Perhaps, some day we will understand...."

There are more things on heaven and earth....

I did not and do not take these experiences as evidence for the existence of God, but on an experiential as well as a social note, I caution against too many certainties, too much faith in "progress," better living brought about by technology, science, etc., too ready dismissal of that which cannot be verified.

DNA was a model, after all.

Cordially,
M. Anonymous

E Fav,

Dear Lady, I actually did reply about my 'knowledge of God'. It seems to have not made it. Another victory for the mindless censoring software. I'll try again.

I 'know' that God IS, and that He is with me. I realize that 'know' as used here is not the usual definition of 'know'. So yes, in that sense, it is internal. But it came to me from outside.

This was a spiritual experience, as I related to you before, E Fav.

To the usual critics: Sorry, no conversation with burning shrubbery, no Road to Damascus, no voices, etc.

Arminius

Arminius: "- there is no substitute for live music. Especially opera."

I'm feeling more goose bumps!

PS, are you going to respond to my post about your knowledge of God? Of course, you don't have to, but I'd like to know if you intend to.

Arminius: "- there is no substitute for live music. Especially opera."

I'm feeling more goose bumps!

PS, are you going to respond to my post about your knowledge of God? Of course, you don't have to, but I'd like to know if you intend to.

" That said, I can't bring myself to countenance errors when they become so entrenched that they are beyond hope of ever being redeemed. "

Mr. Mark, can I use this qoute for my future book? "How Did Soil Turn into Brain?"

Mr. Mark,

You write to Noble Arminius: The fusion stuff doesn't do much for me, I must admit.

It was I who mentioned fusion. Interesting. A close friend is a jazz expert. Writes for all the magazines, etc., turns up his nose at the mere mention of the "f" word. Other jazz aficionados, musicians are tepid in their response, at best.

It might just be a lightweight taste, musically speaking.

M. Anonymous :)

Mr Mark,

Well, I got another beer. I did not recognize your facetiousness. My bad.

Well, our span of music appreciated is pretty close, but not perfect. Give me anything from the medieval to now and I will, with some exceptions, be at home.

I have no particular use for big band.

I have a strange love of heavy metal.

If Christian (note the spelling) rock is decent music, why would you ignore it, anymore than you would ignore Bach's Mass in B minor?

My memory of jazz is a concert that will live in my mind forever: Dave Brubeck with an orchestra. To see and hear the Master perform 'Take Five' was a jaw-dropping, pie-eyed experience.

Sinatra, the Mafia mouthpiece, sucks.

What do you think of Bluegrass? Hear that live, ya gonna dance!

How about blues? An old black man, maybe Leadbelly with his 12 string guitar, singing it like it is?

Oh, yes. If you start criticizing bagpipes, we are at war. No surrender accepted.

Arminius

Dear Arminius -

Surely, you realize I was being facetious in my last post about Xian rock? You may need another beer, my friend.

As far as:

"I am beginning to suspect you are as hidebound about music as a fundie is about religion. Please don't be a snob here, either in music or religion. Open up."

I listen to music written from c. 800CE to the present day. Yes, it's true that most of the music I listen to was written between 1400-the present, but that's quite a lot of music, wouldn't you say?

I'm not necessarily a fan of pop music from the past two decades. If that's "limiting," then I stand convicted as accused. Ignoring 20 years of music out of a 1200-year history isn't bad, right? Especially if it's Xian Rock I'm ignoring.

BTW - I do like jazz, but not all jazz. I like Big Band, for instance, and own the complete recordings of Sarah Vaughn, Ella, Billie Holiday, Glenn Miller and Art Tatum (a particular fav of mine). I like Bud Powell a lot. Ditto Earl "Fatha" Hines. I have a lot of Sinatra - all of the Columbia and Capitol stuff, for example. The fusion stuff doesn't do much for me, I must admit.

Mr Mark,

Oh, good grief. Forgive me, but I am beginning to suspect you are as hidebound about music as a fundie is about religion. Not quite there yet, though.

You said: "Because that would lead us down a road fraught with unspeakable dangers!"
HUH! SAY WHAT? Anathema? Blasphemy?

Rock jazz? So what? You must know that Bach can be played as jazz, and is absolutely beautiful. Why not rock jazz? Jazz is pretty damned flexible.

Christian rock? It exists. Its quality depends not on the words but the music.

Please don't be a snob here, either in music or religion. Open up.

Arminius

spiderman2 sez:

"Mr. Mark wrote "In my book, there's nothing there to "attain" on the Utopian front. "

Nobody asked what's the title of that book. Can I know?"

Why, "The Gospel According to Mr Mark," of course!

Mr. Mark wrote "In my book, there's nothing there to "attain" on the Utopian front. "

Nobody asked what's the title of that book. Can I know?

Mr. Mark:

Alas, there is Christian rock. Also, remember fusion? Lonny Liston Smith, et al?

M. Anonymous

Arminius writes:

"So, sir, and believe me, I respect your opinion on this subject, just why can't there be a rock opera?"

Because that would lead us down a road fraught with unspeakable dangers!

Allow for rock opera, and what's next? Rock jazz? Hell, we could get to the point where the entire rebellious connotations one draws from the word "rock" were totally negated, leading to certain vested interests usurping the previously rebellious term to add artistic verisimilitude to their own dismal and uninteresting creations.

In fact, the term could become so neutered that we end up with something like...like...Christian Rock!!

...and I know that none of us wants THAT!

;)

Noble Arminius:

I am well prepared to keep the top on said can.
Worms have always been a problem for me. (No offense to worms.)

M. Anonymous

Sir Merry Anonymous,

Some may accept the gospel of Judas as 'authentic'. Most do not. I do not.

This is a true can of worms, and I am not qualified to go there. I do seriously suspect anything Gnostic.

Arminius

Mr Mark,

Actually, 'opera' is from the Latin 'opus', and is the plural in Latin.

You said: As far as what constitutes an "opera" - well, if you have to add an adjective to the word to describe it (ie: "rock"), it's probably not a real opera. ;)

So, sir, and believe me, I respect your opinion on this subject, just why can't there be a rock opera?

Arminius

Mr. Mark:

Thanks for the tip. I'll try it. It really is weird. Voices sound sharper--not just the music.

MA

Noble Arminius:

I beg to differ. When I say authentic, I mean veracious. It has been accepted by some as factual.

Arguably, there is gnosticism in the NT, but in the name of all the powers that be, from that discussion, please spare me.

Yours,
M. Anonymous
Gentleperson

Arminius -

The word "opera" derives from the Italian, and simply means "work" - like, a work of music.

So, I guess every piece of music is an opera (work), but not every opera is an opera, just as all "classical" music wasn't written in the classical era.

As far as what constitutes an "opera" - well, if you have to add an adjective to the word to describe it (ie: "rock"), it's probably not a real opera. ;)

Sir Merry Anonymous,

Re the Gospel of Judas. What 'authentic' means is the scholars accept that the manuscript is truly ancient. The 'authentic' label does not mean that it is included in the canon of the NT. Plus, the Gospel of Judas is Gnostic, a group totally rejected by mainstream Christian scholars. Of course the weirdness of Gnosticism is one thing, but the idea of Judas being necessary for the sacrifice of Jesus is another matter. I ain't no theologian....

Arminius

Mr Mark,

You said, about J C Superstar, "I gave props to "JC, Superstar" in my last post. I know it's a "rock opera," whatever that is."

OK, let's get it going. Please define 'Opera'.

If anybody here can do it, you can.

Arminius

Noble Arminius:

Well, okay. I guess it may not be too troubling. Here goes. A number of clerics, including priests have accepted the authenticity of the Gospel of Judas.

As you know, from my earlier posts, in my view, and I'm far from alone, there is less evidence for the NT than there is for some of the Tanakh/OT, but that is not at issue here.

If the Gospel of Judas is authentic, then it would undermine much of the NT, would it not? The one who will betray was assigned that role by Jesus. AT the same time, broader acceptance of the Gospel of Judas might, of course, add credibility to the existence of an actual man Jesus, which at this point, Q Gospelly speaking, remains without much in the way of evidence.

M. Anonymous

Merry Anonymous said:

"For some reason, records sound sharper to me. That is, the sounds seem to have more clarity."

I think it's often a matter of presence. LPS tended to have the "gain" set at a higher level. This allowed for the music to be audible at all dynamic levels, even as the loudest and softest parts were rolled off following the standard equalization curve.

CDs, with their ability to capture a wider dynamic range, eschew the same level of equalization. I often find that I must listen to a CD at a louder volume setting to get the same "presence" that the LP counterpart had. The problem is that when it gets loud, I find myself turning down the volume as it gets to be too much.

Try this as an experiment: play an LP you like. Then, play its CD version, but increase the volume a bit (say, 1/8 on the dial - if you have a dial) from where you normally set it for an LP. You may find that the "clarity" of the CD is magically improved, and that it pretty much matches the LP experience...until it gets loud, where it gets too loud.

Mr Mark,

My bad, I missed your reference to J C Superstar.

Still one of my favorites. Classical is much my old home, but I am very fond of most forms of rock.

Arminius

Arminius -

I gave props to "JC, Superstar" in my last post. I know it's a "rock opera," whatever that is.

Fun fact: I used to sing a church gig in NYC with Bob Bingham who portrayed Ciaphas in the JCS movie.

More fun facts: I once met Andrew Lloyd Webber at a reception at Radio City Music Hall. Everyone was dressed nicely, except for Sir Andrew who was clad in an ill-fitting, brown polyester suit.

It occurred to me at the time that Sir Andrew and Ronald Reagan are the only two men in history who have owned more than one brown suit at a given time...

Sir M Anonymous,

Ask your question. Sorry for no poetic reply.

Arminius

Mr. Mark:

Thank you for your reply. For some reason, records sound sharper to me. That is, the sounds seem to have more clarity. This, then, is probably only a subjective response? I'm really curious.

M. Anonymous

MA asks:

"Why is it that CDs do not seem to my dull to have the same quality as ye old 33 rpm record albums?"

It's not the same. It's a different quality.

All things being the same (ie: ASSUMING the original recording sessions were well produced by people who knew what they were doing, even though it's not always true), I find that CDs provide a much-more honest and life-like reproduction of what music sounds like in a live situation. I find that analogue recordings - no matter what media they are played through - can sometimes seem "warmer," but I believe that's because they can't capture sound with the same degree of accuracy and tend to round off the edges that digital recording captures so well.

LPs are also extremely noisy sound carriers, and that added noise inherent in the media (rumble, etc) can add another level of warmth to the listener's perception.

All of the above my considered opinion, of course.

However, at age 54, my hearing can not possibly be what it once was. The higher partials are now inaudible to me, as they are for anyone of my age. A teenager would have a different experience whilst listening to the same recording.

The truth seems to be that the record companies that made great-sounding analogue recordings also make great-sounding digital recordings. I much prefer CDs over LPs. You probably think the opposite.

Noble Arminius:

To there, I wish you had not gone.
Unless, I hear back from Mr. Mark anon,
I shall have to ask you a questeeon
Regarding a problem with that supersong.

Mr Mark,

Jesus in opera? Of course. 'Jesus Christ Superstar', a rock opera. Sez so right on the label. One of my all time favorite works. At one time I had the entire libretto memorized - a lot of it is still there.

I can see clearly now - At last, all too well
I can see where we all soon will be
If you strip away the myth from the man
You will see where we all soon will be
Jesus! You've started to believe
The things they say of you
You really do believe
This talk of God is true.....
- Judas, the intro aria

Mr. Mark:

You are indeed instructive on music. Perhaps, you can help me with this one. I am appallingly ignorant where you are quite knowledgeable, so be patient.

Why is it that CDs do not seem to my dull to have the same quality as ye old 33 rpm record albums?

MA

Dear Arminius -

Funny how the church looking down on opera pretty much kept any composer of import from writing an opera based on the life of Jesus. Wagner considered it, but wrote Parsifal instead (I wouldn't put ALW and his "JC, Superstar" in the 'importnat composer" category).

The OT, on the other hand, was OK to set in the opera house (Nabucco, etc).

Plenty or oratorios on Biblical themes, of course, but even modern composers don't seem to be interested in Jesus as operatic subject matter. One imagines that one would be hard-pressed to find a male singer willing to expose his physique on a cross in any crucifixion scene.

Oh, hell, losing my mind. That last post was meant for Mr Mark. Surely Spidey is not right, my mind is not dirt.... aaarrrgh. Sorry, Mr Mark.

Arminius

Gerry,

I find all your music posts very interesting, being rather ignorant on the subject. Even though I simply can't survive without music. Your stuff on recording is an education. I will submit, and I know you and Mr Mark will agree - there is no substitute for live music. Especially opera.

Arminius

Gerry -

I made an unfortunate edit in my last post, deleting a few sentences that explained that through amplified sound and field processors, one can now create any "acoustic" one wishes in any hall imaginable, thus opening an avenue to homogenize the basic performance into some perceived perfection. Nothing you don't know, but I'm sorry that I made that cut through hasty editing.

Dear Gerry -

The idea of the "perfect, not to be altered" performance of music is a modern conceit, a conceit that has been deeply influenced by the performance of music thru amplification.

Before electronic amplification, musicians needed to be very attuned to the acoustic differences of the spaces in which they performed. One acoustic might be particularly dead, which might mean taking faster basic tempi so the music has a better sense of flow. A particularly live acoustic (especially one with an extended die time on the reverb end) would necessitate slower tempi so the music didn't get lost in the wash of resonating notes.

Being an opera lover, I can tell you that most opera performances on CD have slower tempi than those done live in the house by the same performers, simply because the studio removes the human element of endurance from the picture. Long phrases that would be dangerous to accomplish at slow tempi in the house are easily achieved in the studio, especially when the splicers and dicers get a hold of the master tape.

All of this influences our perception of what is "perfect" in a performance. In the past, it could truly be said that every performance was a unique performance. That's still true today, but the removal of certain factors that were once primary considerations of performance has led to a more-homogenized performing history.

And that's a shame.

Mr. Mark,

agreed, of course. My notion of "perfection" includes the ability to modify according to expression. The classical "perfection" notion of many students implies one single "perfect", unchangeable version of a piece. And that is what breaks down on stage, or becomes stale, if its flexibility has not been included in the practicing stage.

Arminius - regarding your violinist story - I get goose bumps just hearing about you getting goose bumps.

Gerry writes:

"Mr. Mark, being a professional instrumentalist myself I don't like the term "perfection": A person who has practiced something to technical "perfection", and now, on stage, wants to add additional expression to it, will often find out that his "perfection" breaks apart, if not installed as "flexibility", improvisation, communication."

Rostropovich once said that there are two sides to every musician: the technical side, and the emotional side, and that - for better or worse - the technical side always governs what the emotional side can do.

I find that that particular maxim extends to most of life in general.

And, let's face it, flexibility, improvisation and communication are not possible if technique is underdeveloped. I think we both agree that technical expertise ALONE often leads to sterility in musical expression, but that only proves that technique is but a necessary aspect of music performance, not a sufficient one.

Mr. Mark writes:

" In fact, I often contemplate where we would be in 2008 had religion not held back human learning and development for all those centuries."

Hard to say where we would be. Would the human race still be extant? Hard to know. Nagasaki and Hiroshima have tales to tell. Indigenous peoples who were undergoing genocide in the seventeenth century would have had access to the internet, WMDs, etc.

Yes, we are all in need of some modesty regarding our positions.

"Beware of false idols. Replace one not with the other."

That's a concept for which religion is a necessary enabler. Some of us don't have a concept of "worship," and, as such, having "idols" isn't an option.

Once you understand the religionist's need for worship, you understand the necessity to have some object to worship. In the religionist's case, that worship is directed at their god. The religionist illogically assumes that all humans must participate in the act of worship (as does the religionist), and then makes the further illogical jump to think that a non-religionist must replace his god-idol with some other non-godidol: man, science, Milk duds, whatever.

The truth is that one can be idol free, but if you believe that worship is a necessary imperative to the human condition, then you'll never be idol free.

M.A.,

indeed, we are not very far apart. I only vehemently oppose the ides that religion and honest "scientific", reasonable thinking (I prefer this expression to "science", which, as a "philosophical category" in some circles already has a bad reputation; creationists use it as an insult) draw from the same levels of our brains.

There is and there always was and will be a distinct difference between a posited "truth", originating from individual or group imagination, as in religion, and honest, corrigible, flexible thinking, originating from nature and its observation.

Mr. Mark, being a professional instrumentalist myself I don't like the term "perfection": A person who has practiced something to technical "perfection", and now, on stage, wants to add additional expression to it, will often find out that his "perfection" breaks apart, if not installed as "flexibility", improvisation, communication.

Atheists all strive for a better world, in this life. Religionists also strive for a better world, provided it is built around their imagination and their hope for individual preservation in an utopian, later life. Beware of all eternal truths!

As soon as we strive for the best possible world, we are in deep trouble. Maybe a grain of modesty might even help. "Better" is better than "best".

Arminius: I think I can with some empathy follow your "God" knowledge. As a boy, my home town was bombed to smithereens; my school burned down, which, as a child fire fighter I had no means to stop. When walking home (to the suburb) with the stench of the smoke in my nose, the impossibility to understand, I experienced the most beautiful sunset in my life. I was elated, close to god, in an undescribable emotional transformation. No intellect involved. I "knew" ehm, ah - something. If you want to call it god, fine. Still, the term "god" does not really semantically describe anything. It can be attached to any emotional experience. It does not explain anything.

MA writes:

"Again, utopia isn't the point. A better world is the point."

If that's your point, then I feel more than comfortable advocating that science has done much more to bring about a better world than has religion. All things considered, it's really no contest. In fact, I often contemplate where we would be in 2008 had religion not held back human learning and development for all those centuries. Imagine if computers had been developed in the 1600s.

And, yes, I believe the world would be much better off without religions. Not perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but better, just as it's always better to dispense with other childish notions and replace them with reasoned solutions.

Poor, poor Jihadist, she at first notes the following: "By the way, all organised and institutionalised religion is human and humanity based with flaws and all, just like humans are"."

But then instead of listing said flaws to enter the realm of Rushdie and Ali, she goes on and on about non-specific religious history, atheists, use of alcohol, etc and to top it off a another reminder about her koranic financial expertise.

Conclusions: She continues to fear the Malaysian Islamic "truth squads" and/or she still cannot free herself from 1400 years of Islamic brainwashing of the Muslim masses.

Again we come to her aid with the Five Point Program for Deflawing Islam:

Using "The 77 Branches of Islamic "faith" a collection compiled by Imam Bayhaqi as a starting point. In it, he explains the essential virtues that reflect true "faith" (iman) through related Qur’anic verses and Prophetic sayings." i.e. a nice summary of the koran and Islamic beliefs.

"1. Belief in Allah"

aka belief in God, Yahweh, Zeus, Jehovah, Mother Nature, etc." should be added to your cleansing neurons.

"2. To believe that everything other than Allah was non-existent. Thereafter, Allah Most High created these things and subsequently they came into existence."

Evolution and the Big Bang or the "Gib Gnab" (when the universe starts to recycle) are more plausible and the "akas" for Allah should be included if you continue to be a "creationist".

"3. To believe in the existence of angels."

A major item for neuron cleansing. Angels/devils are the mythical creations of ancient civilizations, e.g. Hittites, to explain/define natural events, contacts with their gods, big birds, sudden winds, protectors during the dark nights, etc. No "pretty/ugly wingy thingies" ever visited or talked to Mohammed, Jesus, Mary or Joseph or Joe Smith. Today we would classify angels as fairies and "tinker bells". Modern devils are classified as the demons of the demented.

"4. To believe that all the heavenly books that were sent to the different prophets are true. However, apart from the Quran, all other books are not valid anymore."

Another major item to delete. There are no books written in the spirit state of Heaven (if there is one) just as there are no angels/"pwtfft"s to write/publish/distribute them. The Koran, OT, NT etc. are simply books written by humans for humans.

Prophets were invented by ancient scribes typically to keep the uneducated masses in line. Today we call them fortune tellers.
Prophecies are also invalidated by the natural/God/Allah gifts of Free Will and Future.

"5. To believe that all the prophets are true. However, we are commanded to follow the Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him) alone."
Mohammed spent thirty days fasting in a hot cave before his first contact with Allah aka God etc. via a "pretty wingy thingy". Common sense demands a neuron deletion of #5. #5 is also the major source of Islamic violence i.e. turning Mohammed's "fast, hunger-driven" hallucinations into horrible reality for unbelievers.

Five added steps are available if this Five Step Program is not completely successful.

Spidey:
'Ihope I can get a thousand answers so I can make a book and title it, "LOOK MA. NO BRAINS" '

When I lived in Manhattan, there was a butcher on B'way in the 80s who has a sign in his window:

"We Only Have Brains on Thursday!"

S. C. Cromett:

Yes, I have already said (posted) as much. You must have missed a comment.

JAC,

Re: Your post to me:

But you're thinking strictly among Marxist lines. Here in the US (everybody gets a Mercedes), organized religions number among the faithful, working class, middle class, wealthy people, as well as those who are without.

M. Anonymous

"Beware of false idols. Replace one not with the other. I suppose I am seeking to extend this discussion. Removing religion will not bring about peace in our time, nor will it end world hunger. Neither will science, although it could--end hunger, that is. Tomorrow."

Science is a method to understand the natural world, a tool, not an end in and of itself, unlike religion which does claim to have all the answers.

And science HAS, effectively ended hunger, or at least would ahve. It is politics and economics (so often treated like a religion itself) that prevents food being distributed to those in need. The capability of feeding all is there, we just choose not to use the power that scince gives us.

Jihadist,

Sure, we should strive to be better, much better, but of course utopia/perfection would be boring. People would start revolutions simply out of boredom.

Musical utopia, however, is different. My example is a concert done by a third-tier symphony orchestra with a world-class violinist. (Can't remember his name, too many years. But he had a Stradivarius). The orchestra rose heroically to the occasion. When the violinist hit the first notes of Tchaikovski's violin concerto, I got goosebumps. There could have been a tank battle in the street outside, and no one would have budged.

Arminius

Chris E:

Re: Your 7:54 AM post

Yes.

M. Anonymous

Dear Jihadist -

I don't believe that perfection is attainable, but that doesn't mean it's not a goal worth pursuing. This is no where more true than in musical performance where the best one can hope for is a performance "close to perfection." Even there, one person's perfection is another person's anathema.

Case in point: when it comes to opera singers, I can't stomach Placido Domingo. I find the very sound of his voice annoying, and it only gets worse when his high notes constrict (there's more I dislike, but why go on?). Yet to many, Domingo is the near-perfect opera singer. Go figure.

So, yes, I'm very "accepting of imperfections, flaws and errors." That said, I can't bring myself to countenance errors when they become so entrenched that they are beyond hope of ever being redeemed. Case in point: Spidey's way of thinking.

Spidey:
'Ihope I can get a thousand answers so I can make a book and title it, "LOOK MA. NO BRAINS" '

A great title for your autobiography!

E Favorite writes to Mr. Mark:

"I've heard believers say that atheists are seeking an earthly Utopia, but I've never heard atheists say that themselves."

Again, utopia isn't the point. A better world is the point. I've heard both "believers" and atheists say they wish it. As for atheists, if they don't think dispensing with organized religions would lead us to a better world, why dispense with them?

Mr. Mark : Some of us (like me) don't bother with the concept of Utopia. Ditto Nirvana, heaven and eternal bliss. That goes for the afterlife or the "only life" (as in, the only life we actually know that we have).

In my book, there's nothing there to "attain" on the Utopian front."

Not looking for any perfection in anything, eh? Not having a vision of political or social perfection here on earth eh? Quite existentialist stand there. You, Sisyphus, you.

Being accepting of imperfections, flaws and errors? Be off key or miss a note when performing in a concert and I'll either kill you, or demand my money back. I want musical Utopia sometimes!

Socrates : to do is to be
Sartre : to be is to do
Sinatra : oh do be do be do.......

"Attain" musical perfection when performing music in concert!

Cheers

Mr Mark: "In my book, there's nothing there to "attain" on the Utopian front."

Ditto

I've heard believers say that atheists are seeking an earthly Utopia, but I've never heard atheists say that themselves.

Mr. Mark writes:

"Some of us (like me) don't bother with the concept of Utopia. Ditto Nirvana, heaven and eternal bliss. That goes for the afterlife or the "only life" (as in, the only life we actually know that we have).

In my book, there's nothing there to "attain" on the Utopian front."

There is nothing to be gained if one takes the concept literally. However, striving for a better world would seem to be what this thread goes to.

Compared to much of the rest of the world, we are living in Utopia (everybody gets a Mercedes). Our "democracy," our super-high standard of living comes, in part, at the cost of the misery of others. Unless we extend our "utopian" thinking economically and politically, our utopia will surely become hell on earth.

Technology is in the hands of those who coud produce it. WE are far from the only culprits in the exploitation game, but we had better take note. No need to seek a prophet of doom. Downtown Manhattan provides ample archaeological evidence.

Jihadist writes:

"Believers and non-believers have different roads to attain Utopia."

Some of us (like me) don't bother with the concept of Utopia. Ditto Nirvana, heaven and eternal bliss. That goes for the afterlife or the "only life" (as in, the only life we actually know that we have).

In my book, there's nothing there to "attain" on the Utopian front.

Merry A.,

One of the factors that will affect the future of organized religions is the economics behing its model. No money no infraestructure for the organized religion.

But the demise of the organized religions as they exist today won´t happen overnight, unless I have missed information on some concrete trends in this regard. Most of the religious organizations have good economic standing today.

But it will happen, slowly but it will happen. The demand for products and services with more quality, without superstitions and supernatural concepts, will grow.

It will be a long process of individuals, groups, organizations and nations getting apart from religion by replacing it following other type of organizations that can satisfy the needs with products and services of higher value.

Science as a general concept will not be the answer. "Idolized science¨ will not be the new idol to replace God, thanks god!!! Science is more like a tool instead of a philosophy about life or a creator of moral concepts.

I believe that spinoffs from the current religious organizations are the more likely candidates to start making offerings to replace the role of the traditional religions.

Do personal and individualized solutions, like a personal and private religion, have any chance to prosper? No IMHO. If this ever happens in a massive way it wont be significant in the coming decades, probably centuries.

SOURCES: my own elaboration using basic business principles. No citations, just applied business intuition. Consequently these ideas are open to be discussed, enriched or discarded.

Peace to all and best wishes,

JAC

Couldn't help but notice that God's been hard at it again slaughtering thousands of buddhists in asia for nor believing in Him. When will they EVER learn?

You better believe brother. You too sister. The Lord thy God is a jealous God and an angry one too.

God is saying "NOW do you believe?"
I am saying "YES SIR, GOD! I BELIEVE. Please don't Tsunami me or Earthquake me, because I LOVE YOU GOD. Truly I DO. I even tell my friends how wonderful you are, I really DO God, so please don't Hurricane me or Cyclone me or Volcano me, or any of my family. We are good people God, we pray all the time.

Love to You and all the other Gods, Nic Brady.

Jihadist:

Yes, that is my point, precisely. Science has an instrumental function. It becomes idolatrous when we forget this.

M. Anonymous

Gerry, Jihadist:

Sorry, my last post should have been addressed to Gerry, not Jihadist, to whom I erroneously attributed your statement.

I suspect we are not in much disagreement.

It is the false binarism of Religion/Science that I object to, admitting that in the case of Creationists of various sorts, it is not so false.

Pace Adorno, Enlightenment was always in myth, myth always in Enlightenment. Not the best of all possible worlds, this one.

E Fav,

I 'know' that God IS, and that He is with me. Of course, this is not the usual 'knowing'. In that sense it is an inner knowing. But He is eternal, so I believe.

For those who ask - E Fav, I told you about it once, as I think you will remember - this is the result of a spiritual experience. Sorry, I did not hear voices, did not converse with burning shrubbery, and did not have my own Road to Damascus. Anyway, I am not your typical Christian, since I came back into it from the outside, so to speak,

Yes, E Fav, as we have discussed, I believe in the historical Jesus, and I am aware of the lack of direct historical evidence. I work on this from time to time.

Hello Merry Anonymous,

Believers and non-believers have different roads to attain Utopia. One with, the other without God factored in. And disagreeing on this in not getting anyone closer to any Utopia here on earth. That much is certain.

As for science, I agree with you that it would not solve nor resolve everything. As a human endeavour, science is not master of man or the solution in itself. It is a means to a solution to understand life, nature, the universe. To facilitate daily living and work, improving production and such.

Believers don't really have any problems with science and technology but for some with specific aspects of science's findings (evolution) and scientific research and possible applications(stem cell, cloning of humans) that is against their religious creed or values. And do certainly use the fruits of science (ICT) to fight against those parts of science they don't agree with.

Regards
"J"

Jihadist writes:

"the fact that science can be and has been terribly misused and has all sorts of flaws does not automatically morph it into a "false idol" or into any idol. It has shown, through all flaws, that it has the capacity to improve, which religion, by definition, has not. So, your recommendation not to exchange one false idol against another false idol, misses the point, sorry!"

Not at all. My recommendation is the point. The idea that Science is in some sense a pure abstraction that proceeds with truth has been "proven" false from the "Enlightenment" to the present. To the extent that if one mixes certain chemicals together one will get an explosion, science is factual. Eugenics is not factual. That women have the same heart attack symptomology as men is not factual. Science does not exist in the ether.

Beware of false idols. Utopias: Thomas Moore--No one needs or should have a Mercedes. Francis Bacon--Everyone gets a Mercedes.

2008--

Jihadist,

You:
"Moi : Surely no one is "forcing" you to be an atheist or stopping you from being one. It was your own choice and based on your reasoning. My parameters are different. I do think it is wider and broader in having more reach in the community of believers. By that, I mean believers for a just, compassionate and humane world for everyone."

J, that is not quite honest. The use of the word "force" (a facon de parler) means "induces me", "brings me to", "convinces me". I didn't say anybody "forces" me, as you somewhat disingenuously allege.

And: Why should an atheist like me be less of a (quote) "believer for a just, compassionate and humane world for everyone" than you? What a strange logic. Did any atheist in possession of his senses ever argue that a world without religion would be "free from flaws and errors"?

A straw man kind of arguing: Alleging that somebody else "thinks" something, then bashing on it. I thought you where above such strategies.

PS. (Not very important) You have not answered my curious linguistic question...
PS. 2: Again no mention of the "truth", the content question. The fact that "you believe" doesn't touch it. The fact that you think "you have more reach" doesn't mean your belief has more, or any, truth.
PS. 3: Any comment to JAC's quotation from the NYTimes? It could be helpful for the discussion. I am curious how you would insert it into your "believer for a just, compassionate and humane world for everyone" claim.

Merry Anonymous,

the fact that science can be and has been terribly misused and has all sorts of flaws does not automatically morph it into a "false idol" or into any idol. It has shown, through all flaws, that it has the capacity to improve, which religion, by definition, has not. So, your recommendation not to exchange one false idol against another false idol, misses the point, sorry!

Voice

Cacophany of emissions from confused minds
Seeking control of the Others
Bathe the battle field with their blood
It’s dirtier than mine
So it’s justified
My voice is louder
I come from a higher order
I have political power

serenity

when all around you is noise
and deep is the cut into your sides
from stabs by foes, worse yet by 'firends'

it's easy to shout Victory
when you ride on the energies of Others
you reap the harvest
Others planted the seeds
and fertilised the land
You only raise thy Voice

I've seen it all
so I climb back into my silent room
of my mind
away from all these hypocitical Voices
of Victory on others'
blood, sweat and tears

give me back my soul
unto my inner sanctuary of
Serenity
where i still can differentiate
noise from my own voice inside me
praying:
gift me serenity
maybe i'll touch eternity
away from such Noise
a man's soul'd destr'y

Dr. Mahathir Mohamad

Jihadist writes:

"Opiated" or "deluded" does not seem to be a state one sees in the daily actions of believers. Buddhist monks from Vietnam to Burma to Tibet are too aware of reality. Catholic priests from Brazil to the Philippines likewise. So are Muslims clerics from Maghreb to Mindanao. They are not "deluded" on what is happening to their communities and countries, and too much involved in the realities of this world. And I have not spoken on lay believers as yet."

I could have added this to my last paragraph. Utopianism, or a better world, is the end point of this discussion, in my view. Yet here we are off to the Olympics as some monks who have not yet taken to suicide bombing have been reporting that they are unhappy being annexed to an "edenic" Communist regime. One could add to the list.

There are, of course, those who did not, have not been able to fight back, more on them later. Science, please?

One does produce one's enemies. And the production, of course, is not only by us.

Chris E, et al:

I make your point in the sense that science in the abstract looks to interpret nature accurately.

In the concrete, as socially situated and institutionalized, it (a) does not do so or (b) misapplies or (c) wrongly applies its own findings.

A curious case in point is childhood epilepsy. Many people are unaware that in the 1940s Johns Hopkins developed at fat-based diet that none but a child epileptic could tolerate. It has a nearly 100% success rate and continues to this day.

Most physicians are aware of it, and yet prescribe medications that do not work for many and have serious side effects. When asked why they don't refer their patients, most gave no answer, others too riciculous to post here, and one, my favorite offered this: "Someone will have to sell it to the drug companies."

As for Communism, ask those who lived under Communist regimes. Ask someone who has escaped from the People's Republic of China.

It would be absurd for me, an atheist, to argue that science does not offer better explanations for many phenomena or that religion does not promote distorted thinking in many. However Science ias and has been a false idol, much as Communism is and was. As for Capitalism, downtown Manhattan is one reply.

Capitalism/Imperialism was a Necessary although Not Sufficient cause. We had promised Osama, whom we trained, that we would exit Saudi Arabia....

Beware of false idols. Replace one not with the other. I suppose I am seeking to extend this discussion. Removing religion will not bring about peace in our time, nor will it end world hunger. Neither will science, although it could--end hunger, that is. Tomorrow.

Chris Everett : It was Communism that defeated the Nazis and put a man in space.

* Yes! The Soviet commies whacked Nazi Germany from the east! The commies put the first man in space - Yuri Gagarin!

Chris Everett : It was Communism that produced some of the greatest ballet dancers, musicians and chess players the world has ever seen.

* Yes. The Bolshoi Ballet was great! Rudolf Nuruyev was great! Anna Ahmetova was great! But the pay was lousy! Defect they did if they can!.

Chris Everett : And it was Communism that rid the world of the scourge of Communism by tearing down that wall. Communism is GREAT!

* Yes. Gorbachev got rid of communism with with glasnost and perestroika! Darn believers from the Mujahideen in Afghanistan to the Catholics in Eastern Europe too! That Pope John Paul II too helps the commies to tear down the Berlin Wall!

* Yes, communism is great! Marx is great! Religion is the opiate of the masses! Workers of the world unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains!

* Yes communism is great! It came from the west! It is a fruit of western civilisation and intellectual development! It is exported to all the world! There is China! There is Cuba! There is North Korea! There is over one billion commies with us!

Communism is Great! One sixth of humanity!

Hello Gerry,

You : My expression "distortion of reality" corresponds pretty exactly to Chris Everett's phrase "Therefore, the faithful user of reason must actually CORRUPT their rational faculties in order to square the various circles." I think you understand at least my point of reasoning.

Moi : I do further "corrupt" my "irrational" faculties on matters related to faith. For one, in pursuing Islamic banking and financial services as a reaction of what I see as "corruption" in ethics and values in the business world and the larger world.

It is considered something of a bid'a (innovation) of Shariah, and we do turn circles into squares, rectangles, pyramids in devising new financial instruments and services by using "reason" based on political, economic, social, religious development and reams of economic-social stats.

You : I realize and appreciate that for intellectual seriousness you experience your religion more in historical, social, individual, political terms than in regard to its "truth" contents, which you seem to avoid at any cost.

Moi : The history of religions is important to know for its obvious impact and effect still and what to do about its more interesting elements. With or without belief in God, human nature will never allow a utopia here on earth.

Obviously, knowing the history of faith helps one to understand better the impact and effect of organised and institutionalised religions currently. Look at history and we see how wars over theology are really wars over plain control for land and resources.

Now the conflicts are over ideologies. Religions are side-players or coated as justifications and rationalisations of and for conflicts, be it over values or over lands and resources.

Oh, I never hide my belief in God or have the need to assure, appease or comfort anyone who don't by saying I don't, or have doubts on my belief there is a God, or should reconsider my belief and such.

Nor did I feel ashamed to tell I went for the Hajj or embarrassed to say that it was a transporting spiritual experience for me. Even without using drugs. Christopher Hitchens and Sam Harris would die on that expression of personal and mass delusion. Tough for them.

I am aware atheists are disquieted by the persistence of humans to believe in what they call the "supernatural", and that religion is the root cause of all that is wrong with the human condition.

Certainly not quite looking outside the context of questionable and should be questioned practices associated with religions to see faith as a personal human inspiration and spiritualism -an extended and ongoing meditation so to speak, and as a balm in times of stress and duress. To read some posts by some atheists, one would think that is a no-no for people in seeking strength and comfort in anyway they want and best for them.

I do sometimes think, from reading some posts by some atheists, that some can never imagine it is possible for believers to have a meaningful life. Or that they implied a believer is happy because they are "opiated" by a delusion. Or it was a projection of their experience with belief.

The assertion that believers are "opiated" or "suffering" or "suffocating" or "afraid" needs to be reviewed. Those are subjective human emotions and can be for any reason and not just due to reliigous belief. Faith do help overcome those for believes. And one would think people would be more afraid of other humans more then they do of God - bosses, wives, police etc.

"Opiated" or "deluded" does not seem to be a state one sees in the daily actions of believers. Buddhist monks from Vietnam to Burma to Tibet are too aware of reality. Catholic priests from Brazil to the Philippines likewise. So are Muslims clerics from Maghreb to Mindanao. They are not "deluded" on what is happening to their communities and countries, and too much involved in the realities of this world. And I have not spoken on lay believers as yet.

I can never tell if some atheists are more "afraid", or more "despairing" of belief in God/s and people being members of organised religions, or are leery and wary of believers who are driven, passionate and indefatigable in questing for what they believe in the public square.

You : However, the core of all these discussions is the "truth" question, which, accepting many of your parameters, simply forces me, for the same intellectual seriousness, to be an atheist. (The term "spiritual atheist" has caused too much stir, so I skip this here.)

Moi : Surely no one is "forcing" you to be an atheist or stopping you from being one. It was your own choice and based on your reasoning. My parameters are different. I do think it is wider and broader in having more reach in the community of believers. By that, I mean believers for a just, compassionate and humane world for everyone.

If some "strident atheists" want to state that not believing in God/s and being members of organised religion is the criteria for a perfect man and humanity, and a world of logic and reason free from flaws and errors, I would reason that is not rational, logical and just eloquent nonsense in the face of facts we have and know on human nature.

Cheers
"J"

Arminius - You say that you ‘know” that God exists. It’s an inner knowing, right? You just know and don’t call it anything but that.

Meanwhile, you tout the role of Christianity in human civilization in your recent comments here. Also, in earlier posts, you mention that you were satisfied, at some level, with the gospel accounts of Jesus. Another time here, you expressed a strong interest in studying the historical Jesus.

To me, all this seems quite different from an inner knowing. You don’t just know there is a God; you know there is a Christian God, who has a human existence which you’ve studied and accepted to some extent and to whom you give some credit for the expansion of human civilization.

If you care to, I’d like to hear some of your thoughts on this.

HOW DID SOIL TURN TO BRAIN?

Stupid answer no. 1 - "The brain is the topsoil in the human head".

Intelligent answer no 1 -

We hear Spidey persistently pound,
“Evolution? To hell it is bound!
They are searching in vain
To turn soil into brain”!
Spidey proves: It’s the other way ‘round!

Stupid answer no. 2 - "Um... in your case... it didn't."

Chris E – Good point: “Substitute "Communism" for "religion" and you'll see how great it was.”

And don’t forget all those remarkable communist Olympic athletes – selected in childhood for their superior natural abilities and trained for greatness for the glory of the state. And don’t forget how many of them attempted to defect first chance they got.

At least these days there’s some better place to defect to. When the church was in charge, poverty and/or death were the alternative choices to expressing human talent for the glory of God.

Sputterman2 asks:

"This is the question: HOW DID SOIL TURN TO BRAIN?"

Um... in your case... it didn't.

E Favorite said:

"Hi, Arminius - I wouldn't say religion "helped out" science, art or music in the middle ages, I'd say religion paid the bills. Religion was in charge then and as such, it was the main, if not only, vehicle for human creativity. The only educated people, outside of royalty, were priests and monks, so of course they were the writers, scientists, etc. The only way an artist or musician could thrive was to produce for the church. In fact, I'd way it was the other way around - human creativity helped out the church, by expressing itself only in religious terms for such a long time."

Indeed. Substitute "Communism" for "religion" and you'll see how great it was. It was Communism that defeated the Nazis and put a man in space. It was Communism that produced some of the greatest ballet dancers, musicians and chess players the world has ever seen. And it was Communism that rid the world of the scourge of Communism by tearing down that wall. Communism is GREAT!

Merry Anonymous,

I said:

"Therefore, the faithful user of reason must actually CORRUPT their rational faculties in order to square the various circles. This never happens in science, because (in my mind) reason is an evolutionary codification of the rules of nature. Any contradiction between nature and reason would LEGITIMATELY indicate a need for an improved system of reason."

To which you said:

"This is factually incorrect. Throughout history science and reason have been at odds with each other, if, in reason, we are to include empiricism, as Chris apparently does. Hence, we had Eugenics, well funded at Rockefeller, Carnegie, etc.

For more recent examples, we look at the assignment of male heart attack symptomology to women, despite the oft-remarked differences between the sexes, and the countless number of women's lives lost, as a result of the sexist science."

You misunderstand my point. I agree that bad things can be done in the name of science, and that scientific models can be sufficiently inaccurate that disaster results from applying them. But my point is that NATURE is unequivocally the source of objective truth, and that, since science is, by definition, deferential to nature, it must be in harmony with the truth, at least IN PRINCIPLE. All contradictions are to be decided in favor of nature and rolled up into a revised science. In fact, your examples MAKE MY POINT.

In contrast, religion, which holds itself to be the source of truth, cannot REASONABLY address contradictions between dogma and evidence. They either have to deny the evidence as being, say, an illusion cast upon our eyes by Satan, or else fall into obscurantism, asserting unseen levels of complexity and interpretation that numb the rational faculties until they say "Uncle" and simply accept the truth of the dogma on faith, just to make the pontificator shut up.

We hear Spidey persistently pound,
“Evolution? To hell it is bound!
They are searching in vain
To turn soil into brain”!
Spidey proves: It’s the other way ‘round!

Op-ed published today May 12 in the NYT by Edward N. Luttwak:

"With few exceptions, the jurists of all Sunni and Shiite schools prescribe execution for all adults who leave the faith not under duress; the recommended punishment is beheading at the hands of a cleric, although in recent years there have been both stonings and hangings."

Are we in the year 2008? Any comments?

Peace to all,

JAC

PS: JAC is JAC. I do not post with other alias.

Jihadist, Jihadist, Jihadist,

The "fems" of Islam are making you a bit paranoid emphazing the need for that Five Step Program for Deflawing Islam. The Program is free at your request. We could expand it to a Ten Step Program if you feel you need it.

J,

thanks for your extended, "multi-topical" reply to my post. Yes, it has occurred to me that you seem interested in some of my points, thank you.

For sheer linguistic curiosity - could you give me one single example of similarity or even identity of language thumb print between CCNL and me? Moreover, I feel very proud that you don't confound me with Spiderman2.

Funny how humans create a picture of someone and then mold all incoming information to fit into that picture. I am not CCNL, "Concy". "Pussycat", and I am not American.

My expression "distortion of reality" corresponds pretty exactly to Chris Everett's phrase
"Therefore, the faithful user of reason must actually CORRUPT their rational faculties in order to square the various circles." I think you understand at least my point of reasoning.

I have come across your cucumber examples many times in the shape of cauliflower and other vegetables, lol!

I realize and appreciate that for intellectual seriousness you experience your religion more in historical, social, individual, political terms than in regard to its "truth" contents, which you seem to avoid at any cost. However, the core of all these discussions is the "truth" question, which, accepting many of your parameters, simply forces me, for the same intellectual seriousness, to be an atheist. (The term "spiritual atheist" has caused too much stir, so I skip this here.)

Oh there "Reality Challenged" and Obfuscating Jihadist,

Same old "obfusing"!!!! You "have" a list of the flaws, errors, muck and stench of Islam but you will not share the list with non-Muslims. The old Mohammed's command to treat infidels as less than human of course!!! How indeed for you continue to yammer about equality and fairness and still cling to this warmongering, illiterate, greed-lust driven, hallucinating, long-dead Arab's passages in the koran.

As requested the "fems" (flaws, errors, muck and stench) of Islam for comparison to your secret list of "fems":

Mohammed was an illiterate, womanizing, lust and greed-driven, warmongering, hallucinating Arab, who also had embellishing/hallucinating/ plagiarizing scribal biographers who not only added "angels" and flying chariots to the koran but also a militaristic agenda to support the plundering and looting of the lands of non-believers.

This agenda continues as shown by the assassination of Bhutto, the conduct of the seven Muslim doctors in the UK, the 9/11 terrorists, the 24/7 Sunni suicide/roadside/market/mosque bombers, the 24/7 Shiite suicide/roadside/market/mosque bombers, the Islamic bombers of the trains in the UK and Spain, the Bali crazies, the Kenya crazies, the Pakistani “koranics”, the Palestine suicide bombers/rocketeers, the Lebanese nutcases, the Taliban nut jobs, and the Filipino “koranics”.

And who funds this muck and stench of terror? The warmongering, Islamic, Shiite terror and torture theocracy of Iran aka the Third Axis of Evil and also the Sunni "Wannabees" of Saudi Arabia.

The muck and stench of Islam you ask?

The Sunni-Shiite blood feud and the warmongering, womanizing, hallucinating founder.

DTLD noted awhile back that the questions posed on this blog lead one in many directions, far, far, from the inquiry. That is a happy development, he notes, since the queries range from the asinine to the absurd and are dispensed with rather quickly by us.

DTLD also suggested that we ask whether more substantive issues could be raised. That seems to me a good idea. Susan's essays are at least intelligently provocative, which is why they probably attract us. Still, one can go on but for so long remarking on that which probably didn't deserve all that much attention to begin with.

Sans outside assistance, we could go our own way from question to question: poetry, art, music, philosophy, engineering, architecture, etc.

Screaming, yelling, name-calling seem to dominate most blogs. It all seems scarily microcosmic, as if we'd have nothing to say to each other unless we were locked in verbal combat.

So cheers to the liberal arts, sciences, and varied applications! Yes, Hamlet, there is more in heaven and earth than we dream of!

Cheers!
A Very Merry Anonymous

or maybe "Feast of the Holy Dysentery"

Sounds like Monastery.

"I'm sure the Xians would make their own holiday out of it."

Something like "The Feast of the Quick Feces of St. Lourdes"

E Fav noted:

"Mr Mark: regarding New Years day – It does have religious significance – it’s the feast of the circumcision - a week after the birth of Christ."

It's not the only holiday the Xians have usurped for their purposes. In fact, there's quite a cottage industry in Xians usurping holidays.

If someone came up with a holiday celebrating industrial-strength diarrhea, I'm sure the Xians would make their own holiday out of it.

I told you I enjoy making fun of people. I miss my high school days. Im sorry if you perceive it as below the belt.

Im game for as long as the other side enjoys it too. If you're not enjoying it, that's sad. I thought I can relive my high school days back again.

Back in high school, we were throwing chalks until it hit the teacher right on his head as he was writing on the board. One accidentally catched it with his mouth as he tried to take cover.

Merry Anonymous leaves with these words by one of great talent and wisdom.

Brotherhood

Homage to Claudius Ptolemy

I am a man: little do I last
and the night is enormous.
But I look up:
the stars write.
Unknowing I understand:
I too am written,
and at this very moment
someone spells me out.

Octavio Paz

Merry Anonymous returns to work, leaving all with verses from a Octavio Paz, the better poet, he.

Hermandad Brotherhood
Homenaje a Claudio
Ptolomeo Homage to Claudius Ptolemy

Soy hombre: duro poco I am a man: little do I last
y es enorme la noche. and the night is enormous.
Pero miro hacia arribo But I look up:
las estrellas escriben. the stars write.
Sin entender comprendo: Unknowing I understand:
tambiŽn soy escritura I too am written,
y en este mismo instante and at this very moment
alguien me deletrea. someone spells me out.

Spidey: "I hope I can get a thousand answers so I can make a book and title it, "LOOK MA. NO BRAINS"

First to say that, and now to say Arminius to be the main author and moi the co-author? And followed by unbecoming remarks about Arminius?

Honesty and trustworthiness?

Sorry. Mama Jihady's vacation ends today. Can't indulge you and Concy's posts too much. Hopes Farnaz comes back to chat with you.

* A mind is a terrible thing to have - Dan Quayle
* A mind is a terrible thing to waste - NAARCP
* A mind to have is a waste of the brain and the head - Jihadist

Good day and cheers

Jihadist, not only acknowledgment but "co-author" if you can contribute a hundred more. Arminius can be the main author.

If he would allow me, I hope I can put his face as cover picture of the book. A balding old man like a "scientist".

Do I dare to interrupt, intersperse, eat a peach?
At least, mermaids may sing each to each, with any luck, to us as well.

Prospective Immigrants Please Note


Either you will
go through this door
or you will not go through.

If you go through
there is always risk
of remembering your name.

Things look at you doubly
and you must look back
and let them happen.

If you do not go through
it is possible
to live worthily

to maintain your attitudes
to hold your position
to die bravely

but much will blind you,
much will evade you,
at what cost who knows?

The door itself
makes no promises.
It is only a door.

Adrienne Rich

Hello Spidey,

Thanks. Glad I could help with your book. Don't forget to mention me in your acknowledgement as a contributor.

**************************************************

Hello Concy,

My list is much longer, very different and sober. For my fellow Muslims of course.

You are, of course, free to continue to repost your own lists in short and long versions in On Faith for "newbies" to glean their thoughts and reactions from them.

Quack, quack, quack.

Stupid answer no. 1 - "The brain is the topsoil in the human head".

I hope I can get a thousand answers so I can make a book and title it, "LOOK MA. NO BRAINS"

Jihadist, Jihadist, Jihadist,

You again continue to "duck" the specifics. For example,

You noted "By the way, all organised and institutionalised religion is human and humanity based with flaws and all, just like humans are."

But fail to list these flaws even though your statement indicates you know them.

Some assistance needed?? Sure, glad to help out e.g. the "fems" (flaws, errors, muck and stench) of Islam:

Mohammed was an illiterate, womanizing, lust and greed-driven, warmongering, hallucinating Arab, who also had embellishing/hallucinating/ plagiarizing scribal biographers who not only added "angels" and flying chariots to the koran but also a militaristic agenda to support the plundering and looting of the lands of non-believers.

This agenda continues as shown by the assassination of Bhutto, the conduct of the seven Muslim doctors in the UK, the 9/11 terrorists, the 24/7 Sunni suicide/roadside/market/mosque bombers, the 24/7 Shiite suicide/roadside/market/mosque bombers, the Islamic bombers of the trains in the UK and Spain, the Bali crazies, the Kenya crazies, the Pakistani “koranics”, the Palestine suicide bombers/rocketeers, the Lebanese nutcases, the Taliban nut jobs, and the Filipino “koranics”.

And who funds this muck and stench of terror? The warmongering, Islamic, Shiite terror and torture theocracy of Iran aka the Third Axis of Evil and also the Sunni "Wannabees" of Saudi Arabia.

The muck and stench of Islam you ask?

The Sunni-Shiite blood feud and the warmongering, womanizing, hallucinating founder.

RE: Spiderman(men)

Spiderman or Spidermen is or are interesting. He, she, or they have eclectic interests: that old-time religion, Milton, Rihanna.

Spidey : "Jihadist, I'm tired talking to stupid people and that includes you if you're still not aware of that."

Moi : Ah. Still talking to me I see. Don't wear yourself out. Just stop and take a rest.

I thought you want to leave On Faith becuase of stupid people like me?

The brain is the topsoil in the human head.

Cheers

Re pseudo humourist,

Medieval, Renaissance sense of humour? There's Dante's "Divine Comedy". Very unfunny. Perfect for a Hollywood horror movie.

There was the Dark Ages. perhaps we are on the cusp of a new Dim Ages with its paticular sense of humour.

Jihadist, I'm tired talking to stupid people and that includes you if you're still not aware of that.

This is the question: HOW DID SOIL TURN TO BRAIN?

Why should I repeat that again and again? Can someone explain without using the word stupid?

Jihadist, I'm tired talking to stupid people and that includes you if you're still not aware of that.

This is the question: HOW DID SOIL TURN TO BRAIN?

Why should I repeat that again and again? Can someone explain without using the word stupid?

PS. Pseudo:

Please do not write "in regards to." One "regard" suffices. Best would be regarding.

Pseudo writes:

As an occasional observer and humorist here--

A pseudo humorist?

Or as in the Medieval and Renaissance sense? Then, spleenish? Phlegmatic?

Arroint Thee!

Yours,
M. Anonymous
Gentleperson

Hello Pseudo,

"Pseudo" as in false? Love your handle. Give me an idea for my remark to Arminius next.

--------------------------------------------------

Hello Arminius,

There is the "true" Spidey. There is the "false" Spidey. And there is the "true-false" Spidey. Whatever it is, all Spideys are seem to be psuedos as a "true believer" or as a parodist/spoofer of the "true" Spidey. If there ever was one.

You do know some posters have more than one handles. And some do admit to it.

You also do know some "stole" the handles of others to parody or spoof them. Canyon Shearer did complain about that once. So did others.

--------------------------------------------------

Hello Spidey,

Come. Call me what you want. Leave Arminius alone.

You : Show me science and not magical words.

Moi : And I had thought you are a "true believer" into Armageddon and signs of the end of the world and such.

You : Gooshh, when can I escape from these fools?

Moi : Can't. I'm still here. Want an aspirin, bandage, morphine etc to lessen and heal your "hurt" because of me? Practice ethical culture. It can be good for you.

Having fun like in high school?

Do let it rip. We'll play along as and when we do.

Cheers
"J"

Arminius:

In regards to Spiderman2's comment:

"Didn't you notice, you're the start of every quarrel here? First with Chris and then with Mr. Mark. Now you want to start it with me."

As an occasional observer and humorist here, I must say that what Spiderman2 says rings true. You frequently start fights using personal attacks and name calling. You are often hostile, and indulge your self righteousness to the detriment of logical debate and free expression by those who differ from you. You really need to work on that.

Arminius, a noble soul you be
A formidable poet, along with Chris E.
Undaunted, I continue, you see
Aloft on the wings of poesie.

M. Anonymous,
Gentleperson

Believers "suffering" because of their beliefs?

I never knew believers are "suffering" because of their beliefs until someone said so here.

People suffers over poverty, hunger, disease, natural disasters, oppressive regimes, wars, conflicts, bad movies, bad food, bad music, bad governance etc but not because of their faith.

I saw victims of Katrina praying for resolve and strenght to overcome their predicaments. Or for their friends and families lost. Is that "suffering" because of their belief?

Am I just reacting to "suffering" as understood in Christianity and Buddhism?

Cheers

"J"

Hi, Arminius - I wouldn't say religion "helped out" science, art or music in the middle ages, I'd say religion paid the bills. Religion was in charge then and as such, it was the main, if not only, vehicle for human creativity. The only educated people, outside of royalty, were priests and monks, so of course they were the writers, scientists, etc. The only way an artist or musician could thrive was to produce for the church. In fact, I'd way it was the other way around - human creativity helped out the church, by expressing itself only in religious terms for such a long time.

Arminius, You are indeed a stupid person. I have apologized a number of times. The ones I didn't apologize for, it's called heated debate. Insults were thrown back and forth during those debate. And by the way, the word stupid or idiotic were invented to describe stupidity.

Evolution is stupidity. And so is the belief "that all beliefs are acceptable". I don't want to elaborate. You won't understand it anyway.

The word "fool" is one of the most common words in the bible. Is it a bad word? No, if it's coupled with the reason why a person is called as such.

I still can't call you a bald bulldog coz I don't think you can learn if I call you as such.

But you are indeed stupid and so are all the evolutionists here. Im still waiting for an answer how can soil become a brain? And explain it not with terms like natural selection but give me a scientific process that can be demonstrated in the lab and not just some poetic "long long ago" poetic words.

Show me science and not magical words.

Gooshh, when can I escape from these fools?

Hi, M Anonymous,

Interesting stuff there. I'm glad that someone here finally stated that science and reason have always, from time to time, been at loggerheads. Fortunately, it has a tendency to correct itself. Unfortunately, it always pops up again. Whack-a-mole revisited. Or, in the immortal words of Yogi Berra, 'Deja vu all over again.' Science is not the pure and monolithic structure that many here imply that it is. Like all human endeavors, it is imperfect.

Religion is not always anti-progress. In many areas it helped out in the middle ages. Keeping learning alive, and not only by copying and distributing religious texts - many ancient works were preserved. And religion made great contributions to music, art, and architecture. And technology - specifically, metal working. Why? Church bells. The art of casting large objects was brought to near perfection by those working for the church. Further along, of course, when gunpowder became known, the secular crowd began copying these casting techniques to make cannon. And thus metallurgy was born, as they searched for stronger metals. When the casting of iron was discovered, or possibly learned third or fourth hand from the Chinese - it was unknown to the Romans - technology really took off. Without that, the industrial revolution would have been impossible.

Oh, yeah - you delightfully said, "On the other hand, we have those such as Arminius, a noble soul, who does not seem to have suffered from his beliefs."

Noble? Sorry, ya got the wrong person! But thanks. And you are right, I don't suffer. But I struggle.

Arminius

Chris Everett wrote:

A point is being missed: knowledge OF the world comes FROM the world. To me, this is the basic difference between science and religion, and it's different from the reason vs. non-reason debate. And it gets to the "human limitations" angle being discussed. In particular, human intuition is limited. The ability to interpret anecdotal experience is limited. In short, if it comes from the human mind instead of nature it is AT BEST the STARTING POINT of knowledge. Of course, it is a strong hubristic human desire to have one's every pronouncement be absolute truth, but in truth, this is vanity, and refusal to seek confirmation in nature is cowardice.

As for reason, it is wielded in religion in the form of apologia. Unfortuantely for the religious user of reason, religious premises, taken as a set, are inevitably self-inconsistent and filled with absurdities. Therefore, the faithful user of reason must actually CORRUPT their rational faculties in order to square the various circles. This never happens in science, because (in my mind) reason is an evolutionary codification of the rules of nature. Any contradiction between nature and reason would LEGITIMATELY indicate a need for an improved system of reason. In religion, this type of contradiction simply indicates a "mystery" that can be "explained" at a "deeper" level by whomever is venal and ambitious enough to spin the next level of convolution.

______________________________________________
I dropped out for awhile, partly due to work/play needs and partly due to fear that my comments and questions were distracting and/or, for some reason, intimidating. I return, if only briefly, to remark on Chris E.'s post, having read JAC's inviting comment: "I enjoy your challenging line of conversation."

BUT: Any offense I may cause most certainly originates with me and the offended.

As I have said, I am an atheist, but as was remarked earlier, science is socioculturally and socioeconomically enmeshed. Regarding Chris E.'s post, magic and religion, had numerous starting points, among them the desire to interpret nature.
It is true that Christianity, in particular, held science back with the scholastic attempt to find within nature "proof" of the then prevailing Catholic biblical interpretation.

Chris E. writes:
Therefore, the faithful user of reason must actually CORRUPT their rational faculties in order to square the various circles. This never happens in science, because (in my mind) reason is an evolutionary codification of the rules of nature. Any contradiction between nature and reason would LEGITIMATELY indicate a need for an improved system of reason.

This is factually incorrect. Throughout history science and reason have been at odds with each other, if, in reason, we are to include empiricism, as Chris apparently does. Hence, we had Eugenics, well funded at Rockefeller, Carnegie, etc.

For more recent examples, we look at the assignment of male heart attack symptomology to women, despite the oft-remarked differences between the sexes, and the countless number of women's lives lost, as a result of the sexist science.

Science, may, in time, correct itself, but the reasons for self-correction are often sociocultural and socioeconomic in nature. Nazism helped to eliminate Eugenics, although it is still with us in dark alley ways.

Educating M.D.s on male/female symptomology differences is still underway.

There are other problems with science. Scientists withold information, discoveries, for fear someone will beat them to the bigger punch.

Funding is often politically or economically dependent.

Findings are occasionally accepted without replication.

Scientists publish prematurely due to funding or other needs, and, in the process, mislead.

The list goes on. Steven Gould loved to play with this sort of thing.

Organized religion and science are, of course, not the same. Notwithstanding what I said in an earlier post, I agree with those who say that beyond the former's ongoing and often effective attempts to control secular life, it often gives rise to primitive thinking.

On the other hand, we have those such as Arminius, a noble soul, who does not seem to have suffered from his beliefs.

Yours,
MA

I'm still not sure how many Spideys we have here, or, worse, how many personalities one single Spidey might have.

Hello Gerry,

Thanks for your post. Sure you're not CCNL using another handle? You do use the same phrases, words and terms as CCNL. But then it could just be a coincidence. A person's writing style is like a thumbprint. He or she can never avoid not using certain words and phrases. But don't get all twisted up on that. I am just wondering and speculating aloud. After all, atheists, like believers do use similar words and phrases particular to them when speaking on faith.

As for what you stated in your post, hard to see how I could maintain "reality distortion" on faith as I live in Asia - the most diversified region in the world in terms of ethnic, religious and non-religious, culture and traditions, as well as on political, economic and social systems.

You do remember there is at least a billion atheists in Asia, and mostly in China and North Korea though both are not democratic regimes which don't encourage religions. If you include Buddhists who don't quite have a belief in deity, add another at least 400 million in Sri Lanka, Indochina, Korea and Japan. That is at least 1.4 billion people without belief in God/s as in the Abrahamic faiths and Hinduism.

Religion in theory and practice is so much different, specifically the difference between individual belief and that as in organised and instutionalised religion. Specifically on rites associated with group expression of devoutness. The rites were formalised for familiarity and continuity and for group cohesion.

As for that "secret" part you implied, there is no secrecy involved. Like Christians, Muslims do express their thinking and feelings on the Shariah, nor do they all practice the Five Pillars. There are Muslims who drink alcohol and gamble when they should not. Or don't pray or fast when they are supposed to etc. Of course, some Muslim states' enthusiastic religious authorities may get you and fine you for drinking and not fasting in public during Ramadan.

You : "...."there is no god but god" is very elegant, can serve as a mantra, but it doesn't mean anything.

Moi : Of course it does for me. As much as the atheist mantra, "There is no God", "God is a delusion", "Religion poisons everything" is for atheists. It is the timeless larger question of who are we, why we are here, what started it all etc.

You : "If I say "there is no sun but the sun" you see what I mean. (The sun is real, god is not)."

Moi : It simply means there is only one ultimate source, one ultimate cause of it all in the universe. And let the debate continue on, "If God caused or created all life in the universe and on earth, who created God?". It makes for great discussion.

You : I would have to regard it as an insult to you to lump you together with some of those Islamic "moderates", desperately trying to defend or at least downplay (Victoria) the awful implications of their creed.

Moi : Victoria is an American Muslim. What she is reading in the posts are mostly by her fellow Americans. American Muslims are a very small religious minority in the US. Much less than 3% of the population.

Now, having read posts by majority religious and non-religious groups on Mormons and Jews, do you really think she would feel assured by the posts of her fellow Americans on her faith group living in the US?

Victoria is not personally responsible for, nor accountable or answerable for what is happening in the wider Muslim world. Her faith is her own. What those other Muslims did, they are personally responsible for their words and actions and be taken to task, or let the law go after them.

I do read but did not make many comments on what non-Muslims say on Islam and Muslims in these threads. I am more interested in the patterns of thoughts, perspectives, views and why.

You : ".... with some of those Islamic "moderates", desperately trying to defend or at least downplay (Victoria) the awful implications of their creed.

Moi : It is Muslim, not Islamic "moderates" as termed by the western academia and media. One hopes they would give a defination of what they really mean by that. I have never heard of Hindu, Buddhist, Christian, Jewish "moderates".

I prefer "mainstream Muslims". And have not problems if anyone labelled specific individuals and groups of Muslims as extremists, fanatics and fundamentalists.

As for what you said about "downplay", specifically on those bits of Islam and certain Muslims which obsessed the west, it is, to my mind, "overplayed" in parts for specific reasons.

For example, Al Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah etc are real problems. Instead of tackling them as smart targetting of why they come into being and on what they have done or did not do, their conflicts is conflated as the whole world against the whole of Islam, or rather Muslims.

And got hold of any stats that shows less Muslim men practice polygamy than western men in adultery? Or that Muslims have lower cases of STDs and suicides notwithstanding the suicide bombings compared to other religious groups?

Or that Mr. Sam Harris is concerned about female circumcision but not male circumcision among Muslims? Or that female genitalia mutiliation is also practiced by non-Muslim Africans etc and not other parts of the Muslim world?

Or that Mr. Sam Harris said Muslims like to watch videos of beheadings like pornography. Muslims would rather watch videos of Hollywood movies. For Muslims in Iraq or Afghanistan, it could be them next. Or they knew someone who was beheaded. It is not appetising to be watching them like pornography. Blame YouTube for putting it on and has lots of hits by morbid Americans into slasher movies and Hostel I and II perhaps.

Or to overplay the conspiracy of Muslim migrants in the west being a fifth column of eventually Muslim global domination etc.

Just a very few examples of "overplaying" as opposed to "underplaying".

To remind, I live in Asia. The reality of the human condition is right in your face. Americans know the Middle East better than other regions due to endless conflicts there the US is involved in and hourly and daily coverage of the region in the media. It does not subsume the fact that there are too many abuses of humans by other groups in Asia, some ongoing for over half a century.

The Middle East is far to me as it is to you physically. We are both culturally, ethnically, different from the Middle Easterners nor quite fully grasped their concerns and conflicts. I understand a Buddhist Thai or Filipino Catholic better as I am more familiar with them due to more contacts made and been to their countries more often than I do to most Arab states.

I have no illusion that just because Victoria and Ahmed from Bahrain are Muslims, what their faith means for them is the same as mine and other Muslims.

Do I care if anyone wants to call Al Qaeda the scum of the earth or worse? No, and go ahead.

Do I care if anyone wants to hunt Al Qaeda down to the last man? No, and by all means, go ahead.

Do I care when someone say all Muslims are terrorists? Let us try this one out:

* All Muslims are terrorists

* All terrorists are Muslims

* All Muslims are terrorists, but not all terrorists are Muslims.

* All cucumbers are vegetables, but not all vegetables are cucumbers.

I should care, but such a singular waste of time with that sort of "reasoning" or "logic".

Cheers
"J"

Well, Mr Puppy, aka Spidey,

Once again, you are paranoid. You said: "Didn't you notice, you're the start of every quarrel here? First with Chris and then with Mr. Mark. Now you want to start it with me."

Yes, indeed, I started quarrels with Chris and Mr Mark. I also soon realized that I was out of line when I did so, and apologized. I believe that Chris and Mr Mark said 'not to worry, it's OK.' So I am still friends with them.

You have started quarrels with damn near everyone on every thread in On Faith, calling them stupid, idiots, fools, and condemning them to hell.

Have you ever apologized? HAVE YOU? How many friends do you have here? Ever think about that?

Arminius wrote "Take that, puppy and pussycat!"

Maybe it's time we hear jokes about "good" episcopalian too? I assume you were a better person if you had not become "religious". Didn't you notice, you're the start of every quarrel here? First with Chris and then with Mr. Mark. Now you want to start it with me.

With exception lately to Jihadist, my way of debate may be course, but Im still careful not to attack the person but the stupidity on the person.

Sure that would require surgical accuracy. There's no bloodless surgery, is there? The aim is to get the tumor out and not to kill the person.

Arminius, I now realize that's it's not debate that you're here for but socialization. In that case, I'll not take it from you.

Let's just be friends and not debate. I mean, don't comment on my posts and vice versa.

Im here for an intelligent debate. I was just hurt when Jihadist whom I thought to be intelligent didn't realize that and thinks Im a trouble maker.

For me a heated argument is still an argument. Those who think I'm a trouble maker should not comment on my post. They are only courting trouble and I don't want to engage in a lengthy non-sense.

Don't engage with fools, King Solomon said. It's ironic that those who claim to be "religious" here are the ones Solomon was talking about.

Im almost done in this thread. In fact this could be my last post here, unless of course, I see some signs of intelligence again sprouting --the perception that an intelligent ear is just around the corner waiting for an answer.

But I can be foolish sometimes. If you can assure me that what we're doing here right now like name calling is just for fun, I might be game to that.

We can do it just for fun. I miss my high school days.

Arminius wrote "Take that, puppy and pussycat!"

Maybe it's time we hear jokes about "good" episcopalian too? I assume you were a better person if you had not become "religious". Didn't you notice, you're the start of every quarrel here? First with Chris and then with Mr. Mark. Now you want to start it with me.

With exception lately to Jihadist, my way of debate may be course, but Im still careful not to attack the person but the stupidity on the person.

Sure that would require surgical accuracy. There's no bloodless surgery, is there? The aim is to get the tumor out and not to kill the person.

Arminius, I now realize that's it's not debate that you're here for but socialization. In that case, I'll not take it from you.

Let's just be friends and not debate. I mean, don't comment on my posts and vice versa.

Im here for an intelligent debate. I was just hurt when Jihadist whom I thought to be intelligent didn't realize that and thinks Im a trouble maker.

For me a heated argument is still an argument. Those who think I'm a trouble maker should not comment on my post. They are only courting trouble and I don't want to engage in a lengthy non-sense.

Don't engage with fools, King Solomon said. It's ironic that those who claim to be "religious" here are the ones Solomon was talking about.

Im almost done in this thread. In fact this could be my last post here, unless of course, I see some signs of intelligence again sprouting --the perception that an intelligent ear is just around the corner waiting for an answer.

But I can be foolish sometimes. If you can assure me that what we're doing here right now like name calling is just for fun, I might be game to that.

We can do it just for fun. I miss my high school days.

I notice a wave of self revelation here, following my own. How interesting.

Just a bit more about myself: I have a full head of hair and it’s any color I want. Of course, that’s the case with most women.

Mr Mark: regarding New Years day – It does have religious significance – it’s the feast of the circumcision - a week after the birth of Christ

Float like a butterfly
Sting like a bee
The burst of an H-Bomb
The words of Jihadist-i

(Take that, puppy and pussycat!)

Arminius

I see that a post of mine has been taken off. lol

That is, if anyone is wondering what Concy, Spidey, Mr. Mark and Gerry what post of mine they were referring to.

Ah, yes, the post was very, very "offensive" in being subjective on music among others and most tasteless.

I assure you all that WaPo did not pay me "kill money" as they did for Sam Harris. But then, they commissioned Sam Harris to write a piece and decided not to publish it as that essay "Anonymouse" posted way below in this thread as from Sam Harris stated. That one by Sam Harris, if really by him, really needs serious editing by him. Ah, another "offensive" comment. Report!

I am still in a "bait and hunt mode" to see who Spidey and Concy really are. A little poke here and there and they show their true colours.

Let the great unhinging and unraveling be for you. Be free! Soar! Fly!

Let there be the Mother of All Blog Battles!

Let there be the Battle of Godliness vs Godlessness!

Let there be a Deflawer Thumper!
Let there be a Stupidity Stomper!

Sting like a butterfly.
Float like a bee.
Sink like a stone.
In this Thrilla in Blogilla

Go ahead. Report this as offensive.
WaPo can always chose to take it off too to protect delicate sensibilities.

Their blog their right. But....

* Give Spidey his freedom of expression!
* Give Concy his freedom of expression!
* Give Thomas Baum his freedom of expression!
* America is the land of the free and home of the brave!
* America is the beacon of democracy!

..........and so forth.

Okay done with that cry for freedom of expression rights vs. freedom not to publish rights.:)

Cheers
"J"

**************************************************
Hello Mr. Mark,

A New Year's Day party every year that revolves around the concert b'cast from Vienna and music of the Strauss family et al? That sounds great. You do know about the annual Mozart festival in Salzburg. Lots of music tourists there.

You : God may be busy favoring one team over another in every game and living room in the country, but not at my place.

Moi : God is into sports now? And a partisan fan and supporter of one team over another? Did some not say before that God is a Democrat? Or was it Republican?

You're right. New Year is a celebration that is not "religious" at all and celebrated by most everyone regardless of faith and race (if they do have parties) with all sorts of themed and no-theme parties to usher the new year in. I'd love one with big bands playing. Boom, boom, boom, blare, blare, blare, swing, swing, swing. Very exuberant music.

Regards
"J"

Gerry,

First, I have no problem with your atheism, having been a non-believer for three decades before coming back to belief. I understand exactly where you are coming from.

Next, "reality distortion" is a good description of what happened to me. But not as you think, it was not induced by childhood training. I was in my '50s. It certainly distorted - expanded - my view of reality. It in no way touched my respect and faith in reason and science.

Third, and this is the hardest - cannot be proved, cannot even be properly explained - you cannot understand 'There is no God but God' until He reaches out and touches your life.

Best I can do. No proof. But I know it is true.

Arminius

I can imagine a possibility that you maintain all your humanity-based assets, morals, insights, social benefits, but shed the "reality distortion" part (the basic condition of every organized "faith") at least secretly for yourself.

As you said, the statement "there is no god but god" is very elegant, can serve as a mantra, but it doesn't mean anything. It does not contain any cue about the existence or non-existence of god, and it does not describe any quality, feature or property of such an un-asserted god. If I say "there is no sun but the sun" you see what I mean. (The sun is real, god is not).

Unfortunately, I was running through some of the Claire Hoffman posts. Appalling. I would have to regard it as an insult to you to lump you together with some of those Islamic "moderates", desperately trying to defend or at least downplay (Victoria) the awful implications of their creed.
(Remember: I am an a-theist for ALL creeds!)

J,

I can imagine a possibility that you maintain all your humanity-based assets, morals, insights, social benefits, but shed the "reality distortion" part (the basic condition of every organized "faith") at least secretly for yourself.

As you said, the statement "there is no god but god" is very elegant, can serve as a mantra, but it doesn't mean anything. It does not contain any cue about the existence or non-existence of god, and it does not describe any quality, feature or property of such an un-asserted god. If I say "there is no sun but the sun" you see what I mean. (The sun is real, god is not).

Unfortunately, I was running through some of the Claire Hoffman posts. Appalling. I would have to regard it as an insult to you to lump you together with some of those Islamic "moderates", desperately trying to defend or at least downplay (Victoria) the awful implications of their creed.
(Remember: I am an a-theist for ALL creeds!)

More from the letters of Isaac Asimov...

"All those who say that you cannot look at the sky (or at a leaf or at a gazelle or a mountain) without realizing that God must exist, don't consider that the hypothesis has already been put in their minds.
As children they are taught that God exists and that they will go to hell if they doubt it. If their parents don't tell them, their teachers or their playmates do. ( Lots of children learn about God from the gutter.)

When they grow up, they seize on any seemingly rational excuse to make their beliefs non-superstitious. The real test would be to take someone who has grown up in a completely material philosophy and who has never heard of God. Let him look at the heavens ( or a turtle or a delicate rose) and let me hear him say, "Why, there must be some supernatural power that has created us all."

If he does, I will be shaken, but I am perfectly confident he will say, "My, Look at the heavens or turtle or rose; how pleasant to know a little about astronomy or zoology or botany so that I can truly appreciate the marvelous natural phenomenon." pp318

I would not be satisfied to have my kids choose to be religious without trying to argue them out of it, just as I would not be satisfied to have them smoke regularly or engage in any other practice I considered detrimental to mind or body.

No scientist in speculating on the origin of the universe offers the answer "God made it." He searches for an answer of another kind on the usually unspoken assumption that the existence of God is irrelevant in this respect. pp319

from "Yours. Isaac Asimov, A Lifetime of Letters".
Pub.Doubleday NY

Just reading the letters of the late great science-fiction writer Isaac Asimov. Here he is on religion;

"Religions may have been actively involved in the easing of the human condition, but I am more aware of conversion by the sword (the first case being that of the Edomites by the Jews in Maccabean times) and of burning at the stake and of Inquisitorial suppression of dissent. The benefits are a matter of theory; the harm is clear and present.

I am prejudiced against religion because I know the history of religion, and it is the history of human misery and of black crimes.

I have written on religion and science and have never made any secret of the fact that I am an atheist. My feeling is, quite simply, that if there is a God, he has done such a bad job that He isn't worth discussing".

Isaac Asimov. from "The Letters of Isaac Azimov".pp319

SPIDERMAN2 sez:
"Im not here to make enemies."

And yet, you seem so singularly adept at and devoted to doing just that.

Go figure.

Dear Jihadist -

I agree that classical music isn't great for BBQs. One needs background music for such affairs, and the so-called classical composers stopped writing dinner music once Beethoven came on the scene. Most classical fare makes too many demands on our attention to be serviceable as background music. Music with a wide dynamic range is particularly unsuitable as wall paper, as is most vocal music.

I throw a New Year's Day party every year that revolves around the concert b'cast from Vienna and music of the Strauss family et al. But that's a unique situation that at this point in my life has assumed the conventions of ritual. I like this holiday the best of all because there's no need for any religious overtones to intrude their fatuous heads, especially as we don't watch any of the college football bowls. God may be busy favoring one team over another in every game and living room in the country, but not at my place.

In many respects, this holiday tops even Thanksgiving in its broad appeal and its absence of religious baggage.

"Are you and Concy ever sorry for what you said in your posts and to others? "

More false accusations. Im not here to make enemies. Maybe this is a case of reading comprehension disorder?

"I was still on a bait and hunt mode for a pussycat and a puppy."

Hmmm, let me picture that out. A woman in a black robe covered from head to foot with suicide bomb strapped inside.

Jihadist wrote "There is no god but god (Allah)".

Simply put, "no book but the koran". Suicide bombings for the prize of 72 virgins,etc. These guys are sick to admire such a book like that.

And what a stinky lecture on morality. You can see the centerpiece of that kind of morality if you visit their countries like Saudi, Iran, etc. The rapes and abuses done in these "allah lands" are simply indescribable. "These guys deserve it", was what a former migrant worker described it when America started bombing Iraq. He worked there for some time and got the impression that these people are animals. These people hate pigs coz they are the real pigs. I may have a new term here. Jihapigs - short for jihadist pigs.

"There is no good muslim but a dead muslim". I have heard those words quite often. Maybe not all muslims but it sure is true if that muslim believe in slogans like "There is no god but god (Allah)".

If you hear those words repeatedly spoken several times by a person, you should take cover. Most likely he/she is gonna explode. BOOM. There goes the "good muslim". Good for society that he's dead?

NO wonder God prophesied that peace on earth for a thousand years will be preceeded by a scenario of millions of "good" muslims.

Jihadist, Jihadist, Jihadist,

Now that Music Appreciation 101 is finished,

Again:

Is that you saying "By the way, all organised and institutionalised religion is human and humanity based with flaws and all, just like humans are."

OK!!!!!

So far so good. Now what are the specific flaws of Islam especially the flaws in the Qu'ran/koran?

Hah! Gerry's back!

Hello Gerry.

I believe there is a God. I surrender to that belief. Live with that. Deal with it. There is no God, but God. What an elegant statement for me to ponder from now to eternity - how and why.

Deal with it. Live with it. I am a stranger to you in more ways than you know and don't on my belief and those of other believers at the personal and group level.

Good exercise for you and atheists in trying to understand human logic and illogic, reason and unreason, hopes and fears, insecurity and security, certainty and certainty, morality and immorality and all that.

I'm enjoying the ruminations of atheists on God/s, religions, reason, logic, life, music.....

**************************************************

Hello Daniel in the Lion’s Den,

Pardon me for thinking you lie in Texas. You did not say, “I live in Texas” or “I’m from Texas” in your post. Only “in Texas”.

By the way, I’m married with children. Don't “miss” this fact now that you know:).

Regards
“J”

**************************************************

How’s my puppy and pussycat doing today?

Spidey,- You being a Godly-good fellow?
Concy, - You being a goodly fellow?

Come to mama. I’m used to children, men and man-childs like all women.

Congratulations. If you have not realised it by now, by your “personal” posts to me, you’ve given me a license to respond in any way I chose or do not chose to.

Now Spidey, about “sorry”. Are you and Concy ever sorry for what you said in your posts and to others? Methinks not and never.

I am not even sorry to think you both can be boorish in your posts and to use more than one "handles" in On Faith. I have no idea who the real Spidey and Concy is/are.

It doth seem that the both of you are more sorry for yourself if others don’t agree with you or see your points, and reacted rather gracefully by using exciting English terms and creative sentence constructions.

Come now, you’re big strapping fellows who can take care of yourself in this blog. Surely you both don’t have to resort to taking shelter like wounded manimals under the umbrella of anyone or any group for what you said in your posts?

Surely you are not expecting anyone to feel sorry for you both, the paragons of civil discourse as obvious in your posts. You both are not sorry for what you say and do, and can’t expect others to feel sorry in what responded in their posts to your posts. Simple logic.

If you like, Newton’s Third Law – for every action there is an equal but opposite reaction. Or something like that. Yo both do know in reality of human interactions – for every action there may or may not be an equal and opposite reaction. Sometimes the reaction is more, sometimes less, sometimes none at all. Simple logic.

And thus end my little moralistic lecture for today. Or was it on manners? Ooops, I forgot. It was just you both merely excercising your freedom of expression, freedom of thought, freedom of belief and such, no?

Oh, and it seems I was just exercising mine too! Ah well, live with that, then.

for every action there is an opposite reaction
we see it everyday in all human interactions
some less, some more, some none in retaliation
it is up to you how to handle any situation

cool reason has no real place
in the i us and them human race
we're always reacting in haste
and laid all good to waste

humans are prone to self-destruct
logic is sought as an instruct
to find a life of clear construct
only to destruct on best consruct

Cheers

To Mr. Fundamentalist,

Thanks for joining the conversation.

Could you elaborate what you mean by "created being's learned trust of God and His creation", and its relationship with reason.

Peace to all,

JAC

Mr. Chris Evert

"reason is an evolutionary codification of the rules of nature."

Reason is the created being's learned trust of God and His creation. It is consistent, and beautiful, and sustaining.

Again, "topic stuff":

Global warming is complex. Peruse en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming.

Hillary Clinton is not as complicated. Peruse

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hillary_Rodham_Clinton and en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_positions_of_Hillary_Rodham_Clinton

Neither is Barak Obama. Peruse

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barack_Obama and en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_positions_of_Barack_Obama

Neither is John McCain. Peruse

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McCain and
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_positions_of_John_McCain

Now we can vote!!!!!

Gerry,

You said:
"Reason can be applied - or ignored. Thus, amiable people like Arminius and Jihadist are virtuosi in switching reason on and off, according to a given occasion. Their moral is humanity-based, not religion-based."
My reply:
I appreciate this, thanks. To a great extent, you are right.

You also said:
"If Arminius will do the next step in his life, he certainly will not lose his morality."
My reply:
If this means what I am pretty sure it does, then you might be interested to know that I was a non-believer for over three decades before returning to the faith.

Arminius

Merry Anonymous,

I enjoy your challenging line of conversation.

There is no doubt that with or without religion the irrational will always be with us humans. Just don’t give the animal side of the human an easy and powerful excuse to behave...well like an animal. This is the point I tried to emphasize.

If I understand correctly Gerry puts more emphasis on “superstition“, the one promoted with an agenda in mind, agenda that has nothing to do with the content of the false truth within the superstition.

Superstition mixed with supernatural, a powerful motivational tool to make otherwise good people to do bad things: doctors in UK put bombs to kill people and people in US put bombs to kill doctors.

But yes, religion has no exclusivity on this. Secular dictators -as in communist states- still will keep pushing people to do bad things in the name of good patriotism or another cause.

Peace and the best for all,

For the record, I am a man.

I have been dashing all day, but stopped for a minute to look at the comments. Wow. This has gotten so interesting. I am being called to supper now, so I cannot say much.

Miss Jihadist, you got it wrong; I do not live in Texas, I just thought they could use a good English teacher there.

Mr. Mark; yes I am the one with hair clogging up the sinks.

And is Chris Everett a man or a woman? That name Chris, could go either way, like Pat, or Dale, or Les.

Chris Everett,

I like your phrase "reason is an evolutionary codification of the rules of nature."

Thus the idea of development of our brain with all its faculties can be seen as compatible with a clear evolutionist stance without falling into the "ID"- trap. It "mirrors" nature to a certain, evolving degree.

On a personal level, may I add that this sort of thinking has infinitely more appeal to my mental and emotional being than the stale religious prayer mills and superstition rituals.

A point is being missed: knowledge OF the world comes FROM the world. To me, this is the basic difference between science and religion, and it's different from the reason vs. non-reason debate. And it gets to the "human limitations" angle being discussed. In particular, human intuition is limited. The ability to interpret anecdotal experience is limited. In short, if it comes from the human mind instead of nature it is AT BEST the STARTING POINT of knowledge. Of course, it is a strong hubristic human desire to have one's every pronouncement be absolute truth, but in truth, this is vanity, and refusal to seek confirmation in nature is cowardice.

As for reason, it is wielded in religion in the form of apologia. Unfortuantely for the religious user of reason, religious premises, taken as a set, are inevitably self-inconsistent and filled with absurdities. Therefore, the faithful user of reason must actually CORRUPT their rational faculties in order to square the various circles. This never happens in science, because (in my mind) reason is an evolutionary codification of the rules of nature. Any contradiction between nature and reason would LEGITIMATELY indicate a need for an improved system of reason. In religion, this type of contradiction simply indicates a "mystery" that can be "explained" at a "deeper" level by whomever is venal and ambitious enough to spin the next level of convolution.

Mr. Mark,

I don't quite see where you find so much resistance to my statements. We completely agree: We have developed for survival, and having arrived at this point we can think philosophy, a "purely human function", to quote you, which at an earlier stage was not yet possible. As you always point out, evolution is not "aimed" at anything: it occurs. Thus, all I said, is that we have not evolved IN ORDER to be able to think philosophy. That would be very close to ID, and we both are far away from this "teleology".

So, your last paragraph coincides completely with my statement, which maybe was not exact enough.

Reason is open and grows, as compared to religion, which "a priori" is prevented from developing. As reason grows, there are, for the time being, limits to insight.

I should have said every human being, reasoning honestly, arrives at a point where he must hope that future generations will exceed this point. This creates, for the time being, a limit to his reasoning ability, or a lack of knowledge, just as our present reasoning ability and knowledge exceeds that of former ages (at least for the sharply thinking crowd, to which I count you and myself).

My main point was, btw, that religion puts and always has put a fake proxy into the gap where our present knowledge ends. Could you agree with that?

Please don't assume that I think that survival instincts and philosophy would be mutually exclusive. I never would maintain such silliness.

"Reason is of the Devil". Martin Luther claimed he never said that. He said that if some people can twist Christ's words, it is easier to twist his words and make it appear erroneous.

The mistakes that I find in many atheists' beliefs is that they are as blind as false religion worshippers themselves. They make wrong interpretations of the Bible also.

Also , atheism is a result of faulty science. Just consider any flower you can see. They are perfect and so full of mystery. Nobody can make a flower using the doctrines of evolution. In engineering, no doctrine can be accepted unless proven mathematically or in the lab. We can duplicate all our "doctrines" anytime.

On the contrary, evolution has not invented any single device because non of its doctrine is usable. Not usable coz they are simply fantasies just like Peter Pan flying, defying gravity for NO REASON.

"Reason is of the Devil". Martin Luther claimed he never said that. He said that if some people can twist Christ's words, it is easier to twist his words and make it appear erroneous.

The mistakes that I find in many atheists' beliefs is that they are as blind as false religion worshippers themselves. They make wrong interpretations of the Bible also.

Also , atheism is a result of faulty science. Just consider any flower you can see. They are perfect and so full of mystery. Nobody can make a flower using the doctrines of evolution. In engineering, no doctrine can be accepted unless proven mathematically or in the lab. We can duplicate all our "doctrines" anytime.

On the contrary, evolution has not invented any single device because non of its doctrine is usable. Not usable coz they are simply fantasies just like Peter Pan flying, defying gravity for no REASON.

Gerry -

How can rational-thinking people acknowledge that reason has limits?

Rationality and reasoning are purely human functions. As such, they are limited only by where we happen to be in our evolution and in our acquiring knowledge. The more knowledge we amass, the more reason we have to draw upon. It's obvious that many people are far more advanced in their reasoning than is the general populace.

Maybe I'm not catching your drift here, but your statement on reason seems akin to saying that every humane person must acknowledge that being humane has its limits.

As far as saying our brains have evolved for survival, not philosophy: that statement is false on its face. Again, philosophy is a purely human enterprise. Obviously, it evolved out of our brains. Obviously, survival instincts and philosophy aren't mutually exclusive. Some philosophies, in fact, aid in our survival.

A more accurate statement would be to say that our brains have evolved to the point where we can philosophize, but that we retain the parts of our earlier brains that were mainly survival oriented.

Gerry,

The limits of your thinking are not obvious, at least not to me, or I wouldn't have asked the questions.

M.A.

P.S. I hope you have a sense of humor. Gas at my local station is ten cents down from yesterday. You say a priest prayed for lower gas prices....

M.A.

every honest rational thinking person must acknowledge the limits of reason. Our brains have evolved for survival, not for philosophy. (Are you sure we will survive? Species are known to have become extinct.)

The limits of my thinking possibility about nature, universe, life, society, evolution, death, are obvious; they might be seen as bordering on the "irrational". But this "honest irrationality" is far from being identical with superstition, which creates false proxy "insights" to conjure up knowledge where there is none - maybe none yet.

Gerry, JAC, et al:

Yes, there's the rub, often, at all events. What would be the social function in which "superstition" would not play a role?

Actually, there are some. There are Catholic Church run schools in a couple of Muslim countries, in which Catholicism is not taught. Of course, it wouldn't in said lands be a good idea to attempt to add to the faithful, but the church has not packed up and gone home.

M.A.

JAC,

Thanks for your reply. I agree with you about the tendencies of religion to promote irrational or nonrational thinking. This does not, of course, mean that all members of a church, mosq, synagogue, etc., are irrational or nonrational and that all atheists are keepers of an enlightened flame.

However, with or without religion, I suspect the irrational will always be with us, the nonrational, etc., hence my questions about "Reason."

One looks at the various past and present communist states, etc.

Best,
M.A.

If there were a complete separation between state(s) and religion, I would not "oppose" the personal belief of any fellow human being. I simply wouldn't care.

Still, there would be the intrinsic paradoxical problem with religion: In order to fulfill its (maybe plausible, even acceptable, even in some cases helpful) social function as I tried to describe earlier, it has to ignore facts and invent fairy tales instead, declaring them "truth" - and enforcing this "truth"! Distorted truth as a helpful social function? Not for me.

Religion thus has to rely on the immature tendency of people to confound the "post hoc" with the "propter hoc", creating a causality where there is none. In other words, it has to rely on superstition.

I "oppose" superstition as unworthy of "spiritual" (in the philosophical sense of the word) dignity of human beings.

I just had a bitter laugh watching a priest together with his "flock" praying for lower gas prices on TV. See what I mean? (In Europe the price is exactly the double of the US. Should Europeans also pray?)

Since no one can take this humbug seriously, it does require quite a mental effort to take the purveyor of the humbug seriously. But I try....

Merry Anonymous,

Being any religion based on unproven supernatural beliefs, it creates an excuse to stop reasoning, which may have disastrous consequences as history indicates. But each religion, denomination or sect has it own balance of other different goods and harms.

The benefits from dispensing with it could be dependant of how society do it. More than eliminating religions they should be pressed to transform in secular bodies that provide a set of services to the individual and the society.

Best wishes to all,

JAC

Gerry, JAC:

Let me put it this way. I oppose organized religion because of its continual interference in the life of this and other nations. In our country, the primary culprits are Catholicism and Protestantism.

Why should any church have any say in stem cell research? Why was the Pope asked his views? The man wasn't even a citizen.

Why should any church have any say on abortion, etc.

Can you add to this argument? If we radically separated church and state, if organized religions could be kept out of government, hypothetically speaking, would you still oppose them?

Gerry:

I raise the matter of reason because I'm trying to understand your arguments. What do you see as the harm religion does, and how do you think we would benefit from dispensing with it? I have to say I think defining reason is more than a matter of semantics. Your thoughts, too, JAC?

Very truly yours,
M. Anonymous, Atheist,
Devil's Advocate, Gadfly, etc.

PS. Gerry, glad to hear you're also still alive, although I was dead certain of it.

JAC,

my "Amen"! was a try at an ironical affirmation of your original, very spot on ironical observation! We simply don't seem to know each other well enough yet!

No irony now: Thanks for going along with my point!

To Gerry again,

A muslim says > “If it’s different from my religion it’s positively and unequivocally false.”

A christian says > “If it’s different from my religion it’s positively and unequivocally false.”

A catholic says > “If it’s different from my religion it’s positively and unequivocally false.”

Keep adding... it just reinforces, in an ironically sense, that there is no independent criteria to qualify a religion as true or false.

My bad. If an irony needs to be explained it was a lousy irony. I just wanted to go along with your point.

JAC = no way Amen!!!

Peace and the best to all

Merry Anonymous,

punishable by death THEN (in Christianity, Inquisition etc.), and even NOW (Islam): Remember the poor fellow in Kabul who converted to Christianity? He would have been executed, as an apostate, if Karsai had not intervened, on pressure of world opinion.

And: Fine, discussing semantics (even on "Reason") is "reasonable", discussing religion is not: You either "believe" or you don't.

Gerry, atheist, also still alive

Gerry:

Punishable by death? But I'm not dead--yet, anyway.

Also, define "Reason." (I've got a dictionary, so no need to quote from there.)

Yours,
M. Anonymous, Atheist,
Devil's Advocate, etc.

Devil's advocate:

Right. The difference: Reason is open to correction (even Adorno can be openly discussed!), religion is "eternal" truth, change being punishable by death.

JAC: Amen!

To Chris Everett on marriage:

Agree and let me add some comments:

Changing the actual status of marriage in the society has, among other things, legal, fiscal, cultural and religion implications. But also we must not forget that for organized religions, it is a source of revenue.

Any non-traditional union not accepted by a church on belief grounds, will be sealed elsewhere and they will lost of that revenue. This is on top of lost of control of their flock and potential desertions.

To Gerry, on true or false religion:

There is a clear criteria to know if a religion is false: “If it’s different from my religion it’s positively and unequivocally false.”

Peace to all and best wishes,

JAC

"Reason" may also be a false idol. (See Theodor Adorno.)

Very truly yours,

M. Anonymous
Devil's Advocate

Mr. Mark,

may I join in your argument that there is no such thing as a "false" religion, since every religion, being unprovable, is completely arbitrary. There simply is no criterion for "true" or "false". With some fantasy anybody can come up with a new religion any day, provided one finds a few followers. And it actually does happen all the time. I have come across at least three small religions recently in my surroundings. One religion is as "true" or "false" as any other religion.

Of course, for mental comfort and simplicity of living one's life one can stick to the particular religious brand of one's tribe (family, friends, group, clan, area, club, union, party, congregation, parish, tradition, or any other social connection, inherited or volunteered). But since religion is based on "unprovability" ("I believe BECAUSE it is absurd", credo quia absurdum, Tertullian), one religion is as "true" as the other. An "absurdity" only describes the absence of reason, nothing else, not even any particular "religious" rituals. (Luther also: "Reason is of the Satan".)

Which basically and logically means that there is no such thing as truth in any religion - setting aside the "truth" of its existence.

Reason can be applied - or ignored. Thus, amiable people like Arminius and Jihadist are virtuosi in switching reason on and off, according to a given occasion. Their moral is humanity-based, not religion-based.

If Arminius will do the next step in his life, he certainly will not lose his morality. ("J" will not do the next step, the risk is too great, lol!)

Chris E:

I missed a logic step in my previous post to you. The health care problem stemmed from the nonrecognition of marriage here. So, yes, marriage rights are paramount. And, yes, the state should get out of the business, but it is big business.

Yours,
M. Anonymous

Chris Everett:

I agree with you entirely on the marriage business. In the meantime, in my state, generally considered quite liberal, gay marriage isn't recognized. Of course, you are right about registering sexual identities. What prompted my proposal to my liberal senators was the desire not to get back from them the same BS I'd received three times.

Further, marriage isn't the only problem. Despite urgent protests in which the majority of those at my place of employment participated (gay and straight), gay partners were not covered by health care insurance in our most recently negotiated contract.

The protests continued, and some limited coverage was obtained.

As for the founding fathers, I don't know which fathers Susan was referring to when she mentioned the Enlightenment. It's noteworthy that the Enlightenment, certainly Locke (see Perry Miller), figured heavily in the thinking of the country's foremost "religionists," as well as in that of the likes of Franklin, and, Jefferson, not "religionists." Thomas Paine, self-proclaimed atheist, blatantly called religion "superstition."

The earliest English ravagers, marauders in the "US", the "Pilgrims," wished no state control over religion, since they feared interference from the state. Their tradition continued. Might that be what Susan refers to?

Persecution of gay people, discrimination against them, verbal and physical violence directed against them is the same as religious, racial, ethnic, sexual persecution, etc.

It won't end until an all out campaign is introduced to end it with education, the media, etc., involved. Unfortunately, that means the government will have to do more than merely stop actively discriminating, itself.

Very truly yours,
M. Anonymous

PS. I admire your poetry.

Mr. Mark,

It is DITLD's hair that is clogging up the drain. I am 45 and the competition has only just begun between graying and balding. So far it's a dead heat.

Yes, Guinness is the definitive beer for me. I still remember my first one - I couldn't finish it, but once I acquired the taste I was hooked.

Classical music, not so much. I grew up on rock, especially the Beatles, and I tend to like psychedelic/new wave the best (Dylan, Grateful Dead, Pink Floyd, Bowie, Talking Heads, X-Ray Spex, Echo & the Bunnymen, etc.). After rock comes Jazz (Miles Davis, Coltrane, Mingus, Dexter Gordon, etc.). Classical is way down on the list. I like Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata. Opera isn't even on the list.

Back to the topic of the week:

Global warming is complex. Peruse en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming.

Hillary Clinton is not as complicated. Peruse

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hillary_Rodham_Clinton and en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_positions_of_Hillary_Rodham_Clinton

Neither is Barak Obama. Peruse

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barack_Obama and en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_positions_of_Barack_Obama

Neither is John McCain. Peruse

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McCain and
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_positions_of_John_McCain

Now you are ready to vote!!!!!!

Dear Arminius -

Weekend greetings.

I was surprised to read that what really ticked you off about my recent posts was my saying that Scientology was a religion. I think we're dealing with a semantic problem here. My dictionary defines "religion" as:

"1. the service and worship of God or the supernatural: commitment or devotion to religious faith or observance; 2. a personal set or institutionalized system of religious attitudes, beliefs, and practices; 3. a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith."

The way I read it, Scientology is most definitely, "a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith," which, to me, makes Scientology most definitely a religion.

Going by this same dictionary definition, it occurs to me that you (Arminius) seem to fall into the category of definition 2, " a personal set or institutionalized system of religious attitudes, beliefs, and practices." I base that on your other posts here where you cite beliefs and practices that could make other Xians question how you practice your faith (ie: you don't tithe, you support gay rights, etc).

From my perspective, I would say that most American Xians fall somewhere in this category, accepting the basic tenets of the Xian faith, but having strong disagreements with certain aspects of their sect's particular doctrines and dogmae.

That leaves the question of what constitutes a "false" religion. On the one hand, there can be no false religions as religion by definition is a faith-based proposition. On the other hand, I've yet to encounter what I would consider a fact-based religion, so I have to conclude that all religions are opinion-based.

In such a scenario, what is true and what is false? As there's no objective measure available to measure a subjective enterprise, there can never be an answer.

Chris Everett -

I will be 54 in September. Like Arminius, I am also balding, so I fall into the category of those who got brains instead of hair. That said, I'm old enough to have enough senior moments to negate any advantage I might have in brain power. On the whole, I'd rather have the hair.

As far as your having to clean hair out of the tub trap all the time - well, boo-frickidy-hoo. I had to do that myself yesterday, but the worst part is that we just moved into a new house and it wasn't even my hair or that of my family. Yechh! That'll spoil your appetite, even for a beer.

When I was younger, people told me I looked like Jon Voight. Nowadays, not so much.

It seems that many of us here like our Guinness and our classical music. Too bad we don't all live closer to each other. We could have some good times. I've even got a pool and a hot tub in the back yard. You could all wear your Speedos...or not.

;)

Jihadist,

Sorry is not a bad word, you know. Learn it before you explode yourself.

Blaming me for the quarrel of others or blaming the U.S. for the ills of your tribe is not a good trait.

Your whole tribe will burn coz you people don't understand what REASON is all about.

The years can be counted with your fingers. In 10, 9, 8 ... 0 years, your tribe is gone so good luck with your tribe and your "blessed" Koran who will put you to that abyss.

ella ella a a. Under my umbrella.. . Dyeing hair is not bad. Suicide bombing is. BOOM !! There's your culture... the end of your civilization.

The countdown begins now.

You can stand under my umbrella, ella ella a a. It can be a forgiveness song but learn to say sorry first.

Just admit it. Is that so hard to do? Isn't it part of your culture to say sorry?

Is that the reason why Israel is never forgiven by your tribe coz there is no sorry in your vocabulary? You rather die than feel ashame? tsk tsk

Oh there "Reality Challenged" and Obfuscating Muslims,

The "fems" of Islam again for your perusal and comments with or without rhyme.

Mohammed was an illiterate, womanizing, lust and greed-driven, warmongering, hallucinating Arab, who also had embellishing/hallucinating/
plagiarizing scribal biographers who not only added "angels" and flying chariots to the koran but also a militaristic agenda to support the plundering and looting of the lands of non-believers.

This agenda continues as shown by the assassination of Bhutto, the conduct of the seven Muslim doctors in the UK, the 9/11 terrorists, the 24/7 Sunni suicide/roadside/market/mosque bombers, the 24/7 Shiite suicide/roadside/market/mosque bombers, the Islamic bombers of the trains in the UK and Spain, the Bali crazies, the Kenya crazies, the Pakistani “koranics”, the Palestine suicide bombers/rocketeers, the Lebanese nutcases, the Taliban nut jobs, and the Filipino “koranics”.

And who funds this muck and stench of terror? The warmongering, Islamic, Shiite terror and torture theocracy of Iran aka the Third Axis of Evil and also the Sunni "Wannabees" of Saudi Arabia.

And again some "reality poetry"by Kola Boof for Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama's perusal :

"I Still Hear the Lion"
by Kola Boof
(a poem for Theo Van Gogh...in loving memory)

"Silence is the sky...of the Brood.

Nothing drowns, because

this lake is the lake of memory

---and on the day that the Lion decides

to throw himself on the sword,

My blood is dead blood/my voice, like a killing sound,

all eternal...and this is the Sky of our sermons.

Surely as the wind blows---I become the Eyes

in his head.

I am his daughter who can see to the bottom

of the lake.

And yet....it has no floor.

The sweetly flowing Arabic of this Brood of scarlet robes.

Through each and every pregnancy.

Dear lake, my face on your surface...

This Sky has been coming forever.

Rippling...

The swan of his stroke.

His long white arms, reaching like thunder

swimming into the footpaths

the footpaths...of those who

walk on water.

I am underwater/Fully

And yet I still hear the lion

--I

the one who is listening.

Through gun-fire and moody wind

and Pain raining deeper than the bluest night in Amsterdam

---I hear the sound of that which cannot die.

The coming of man/the coming of my father.

For surely MAN always comes.

And will come again---through me."

Hear and see Kola at doorofkush.50megs.com/about.html

I've come to say
There is a way
What you must do
Is be true

Sad to say
They've lost their way
The thief he lie
Just let him cry

When your love
Is from above
That's the way
I've come to say

Take care, be ready, see you when I see you.

Sincerely, Thomas Paul Moses Baum.

Go to see
One, two three
Dis da door is for thee

What you perceive
Is a tree
Not the end
So let us send

This for all
Oh, the fall
The plan rolls on
Amid the scorn
Life is worn

Verily I say
Is this the day
Come with me
Till you see
Oh what must come
Roiling some
Yet the day will come, for you and for me

Take care, be ready.

Sincerely, Thomas Paul Moses Baum.

Merry Anonymous,

I disagree with your approach of effectively registering one's sexual inclination with the government for tax purposes. The root of the current problem is the inconsistency between state-sponsored, state-defined marriage and individual liberty. If you ask me, the government should get out of the marriage business altogether.

Having read Susan's books, I'm struck by the similarity of the current gay marriage issue and the issue of religious freedom debated at this country's founding. It was partly due to the "sacredness" of religion that various Christian sects joined the Enlightenment founders to fight for a secular government. Similarly, I'm surprised that more hay isn't made of the "sacredness" of marriage and the need to get it out of the hands of the state. The current desire to have the state "protect" marriage should be seen in the same light as colonial heresy laws designed to "protect", say, Puritanism.

"Marriage is a SACRED institution, created by GOD. The government should pass NO LAW respecting the establishment of marriage, effectively erecting a WALL OF SEPARATION between MARRIAGE and STATE. FREEDOM OF MARRIAGE is an inalienable RIGHT, as an act of CONSCIENCE fundamental to the LIBERTY of man."

Ohhh...how's my puppy and pussycat doing tonight?

Here Spidey, Spidey
always so unready
Here Concy, Concy
always so antsy

Now Spidey, be a good ethical culturalist.

Now Concy, do your Crossanization project well or your "uncle" will be displeased.

So sweet. At long last, the both of you now united in a common purpose instead of bickering with one another, harassing other posters, and to focus their mutual obsession on moi.

come to mama and whine together
not to others be a bother,
more disciples as yet to gather
you both have not earned any feather

Goodnight puppy and pussycat

Cheers

Oh there "Reality Challenged" and Obfuscating Jihadist,

Now that you have the basics of poetry conquered, you can convert the "fems" aka the flaws, errors, muck and stench of Islam to rhyme.

Once again as a "fems" reminder:

Mohammed was an illiterate, womanizing, lust and greed-driven, warmongering, hallucinating Arab, who also had embellishing/hallucinating/ plagiarizing scribal biographers who not only added "angels" and flying chariots to the koran but also a militaristic agenda to support the plundering and looting of the lands of non-believers.

This agenda continues as shown by the assassination of Bhutto, the conduct of the seven Muslim doctors in the UK, the 9/11 terrorists, the 24/7 Sunni suicide/roadside/market/mosque bombers, the 24/7 Shiite suicide/roadside/market/ mosque bombers, the Islamic bombers of the trains in the UK and Spain, the Bali crazies, the Kenya crazies, the Pakistani “koranics”, the Palestine suicide bombers/rocketeers, the Lebanese nutcases, the Taliban nut jobs, and the Filipino “koranics”.

And who funds this muck and stench of terror? The warmongering, Islamic, Shiite terror and torture theocracy of Iran aka the Third Axis of Evil and also the Sunni "Wannabees" of Saudi Arabia.

Jihadist,

"Under my umbrella, ella, ella, a a " is a song.

Just in case you're too busy reading your Koran and don't know what it is.

Spidey and Concy:)

I have two "fans" now. From both sides of the faith divide no less - CCNL, a name-calling and labelling non-believer. Spiderman2, a name-calling and labelling believer.

What a great honour and singular pleasure to see my posts can lead to fits of fury among some and expressed in bad English by them.

You both can't put out even simple, basic two or three or four lines verses in your own mother tongue? Even very easy two liners such as:

Jihadist is really so stupid
wallowing in a belief so rabid

Jihadist is such an idiot
full stop and period

Here's a very, very simple and painless way on how you can do it.

- Think of what you want to say

- Take that line as the core

- Build other lines around it by running through you head words that rhymes.

- Then put it all together.

It is like a mathematical construction or musical composition. We can do arithmetic and mathematics in our heads. We can do melodies in our heads.

You can see numbers and music notes in you mind's eye. So, why not words? Why not see the natural link of words in a sentence as you would for numbers in additions, and notes in music?

No one here is looking for your verse to be perfect, arithmetic to be right, music not to be missing a note that makes them perfect. But really, there is a simple logic in maths, music and words.

As for the both of you and the substance of your comments in your respective inimitable English usage and unique prose style, stick to cutting and pasting, and reposting them as pre-prepared posts which are gleaned from both dubious and credible sources. Your original notions are quite.....

So, cheers

**************************************************

Hello Daniel in the Lion's Den,

You're from Texas! Land of the ten gallon hats and stetsons. They pronounced oil as "all" in Houston. So my ears heard. I had some "mountain oysters" when there too. You know what those are, so don't have to ask.

No, English is not my mother tongue. For a non-native speaker like me who also uses other languages, it is too easy for my English to be mixed with words and grammar of other languages.

About E Favorite being a woman instead of a man we thought she was, remember Norrie Hoyt? We all thought he was a woman. He has to clarify several times to different poeple he's not.

Regards
"J"

Jihadist wrote "Cheers"

Jihadist, adist adist t t. Cheers, ers ers s s.

Yuck, Give me back my umbrella, ella ella a a. That's better.

No wonder they explode themselves. You can't use their name for any song.

Jihadist wrote "Men don't get "hurt". They get only "upset" or "angry". "

Uh, Uh Under my umbrella, ella, ella, a a. They are called muslim men not americans. We're the good guys, did you forget?

Muslims men are always angry. If they don't shout in the streets of London or anywhere else, they explode themselves.

Here's the Uh Uh Umbrella, ella ella a a. Use it as a bomb. a a BOOM.

Jihadist wrote "And what is with the slur about blondes being dumb and only applied to women? I only heard it in the US and no place else. "

It means everything here in the U.S is good. If you get a dumb person, at least she's pretty and blonde.

In your place, Im not so sure. There must be a reason why they all cover their heads and faces. Are they ashamed coz they are BALD AND HAS NO TEETH? And try not to let them sing or else you'll get these lyrics ;

"HELLO HO AKBAR !! ALL YOU IN THE BAR !! say ho !! HELLO HO AKBAR !!

Hmmm, not bad.

Jihadist wrote "Never saw so many women dye with their shoes on. That must be an omen of the End of Days and Armageddon. "

Never seen so many muslim women with headscarves (dye?)DIE for 72 virgins in their so called paradise. Male virgins? Doesn't matter as long as they're not pigs - real pigs. (they treat pigs as dirty as if pigs are capable of suicide bombing? what's more dirtier than that? YUCK - you are the dirty women, not the blonds(dyed) nor the pigs)

If these idiot have nukes, don't you think they'll not use it? End of Days and Armageddon? I don't worry much about it. I "might" enjoy it as it happens. Stupidity has to end. If these muslim suicide bombers want to make it bigtime like using nukes, GO AHEAD. I'll make them a bigger strap so it could fit on their bodies.

And don't worry, I'll dye the straps and not their hairs. They're not interested in dyes. Not that one. It's DIE that they are after. YUCKS. What's more dirtier than that? Not the pigs of course. They're too cute to be called dirty especially the little ones.

DUMB ISLAMIC RELIGION, DUMB FOLLOWERS. What do you expect? What do I expect?

This girl won't say sorry. She's too dumb for that.

Hi E Favorite

I keep thinking about you like this, "I can't believe he is a woman."

So you see, my involuntary pronoun for you is still "he."

I posted my thoughts about what I thought you looked like, but I think it must have got blocked.

I said that you were 19 to 22 years old, and that you were very kind and polite to everyone. I said that you seemed like a nice young man.

Now I am wondering about Mr. Chris Everett, if indeed, he is a man; the name "Chris" is sort of androgenous.

I will be 54 in less than a month. That makes me about the same age as Mr. Mark, I think.

When I was alot younger, a number of unrelated people suggested that I looked like Mr. Spock. Maybe I did look more like Lenard Nimoy, since my ears are not pointy. Now, more recently, I have been told that I look like Clark Kent. Maybe it is my new black framed glasses that I got in November. (They're Italian!)

My skin is transclucently white, like a red-head, but my hair is black, not red with a few grey hairs that have recently appeared. I have the same amount of hair that I had when I was 18. In fact, that is all that I have left. (A friend of mine made me get the black framed glasses because of my black hair).

And Jihadist is right, bald men don't know how lucky they are. My sinks are always clogged up with hair, and I spend a fortune on shampoo.

Now that my hair seems to be turning grey, I am very interested in looking at myself in the mirror every morning to see what is going to happen. Soon, perhaps, my black hair may be transformed to grey or even white. It seems very strange.

Oh there "Reality Challenged" and Obfuscating Jihadist,

Being "unbuffed" could be the cause of your "obfusing", restrictive ways and indicative of your lack of textural courage in addressing the "fems" of Islam considering the textural courage of the "buffed" and "googled" Kola Boof.

Again please address the global terror crises fomented by followers of the koran, that book based on the hallucinations of one illiterate, warmongering, womanizing, greed and lust driven Arab and his biographers and the "pretty, wingie, talking, flying, fictional thingie" behind it all.

And how is that Five Point Program for Deflawing Islam coming??

Hi, Daniel ITLD,

You said, "This is the second time that I have laughed out loud on this blog."

Only the second time? I've lost count. Many of the laughs have been from Jihadist. On occasion, she has reduced me to weeping, convulsive basketcase status.

Arminius

Chris E:

I think I understand what you meant about my self-revelation. I'm not gay, but being straight does not, as you know, make one a moral moron.

Gay rights go to citizenship. If gay men and women cannot have the same rights as everyone else, they should not be required to pay taxes.

I have written my senators proposing tax exempt status for gay women and men, based on lack of citizenship or even resident alien rights.

I haven't heard back from them yet, but it's only been a few months.

Very truly yours,
M. Anonymous

Jihadist said

"Went to the hairdresser. Never saw so many women dye with their shoes on"

This is the second time that I have laughed out loud on this blog.

Jihadist, am I correct in assuming that English is not your native language? You have become very clever with your words.

I think that you are now qualified to give English lessons. I think they could use you in darkest Texas.

Hello Arminius,

The verse you shared on hair, bald, brains is giving me some ides for quick takes on "honesty" and "trustworthy". The original topic we've almost forgotten in between Concerned the Christian Now Liberated coming out to say he likes looking at women without any dress at all, and then E Favorite coming out to say she is a woman in a dress after all.

there are plain and sublime truths
i'm not lying through my single tooth
never let the truth be given the boot
or treat it as such a moronic hoot

honesty is not given much currency
and too much on the secondary trustwothy
both virtues are not quite unworthy
to be trifled like seperate activity

the fact plain is bald
truths can the mind scald
honesty be regarded as a herald
of people to be held in high regard

hair or no hair, brain or no brain
everyone can be on the same train
all the hairsplitting is in vain
honesty and trustworthy is not a pain

I'll see you when I see you.

Cheers
"J"

Chris E:

The revelation obsucre it be
But you are a better poet than me.

Very truly yours,
M. Anonymous

Arminius:

"Within this vale...
of toil...
and sin...
your head grows bald...
but not your chin...

Burma-Shave.

Chris,

Damnit, you got me drooling - a 22 oz bottle of STONE Old Guardian Barley Wine Style Ale. I am a great lover of ale, never had that one, but it's gotta be good. However, I have never been known to pass up a Guinness.

Arminius

Merry Anonymous,

In view of your self revelation and a 22 oz bottle of STONE Old Guardian Barley Wine Style Ale (though I'm a Guinness man through and through - I even named my dark dark brown cat Guiness years ago - not my current cat - named 'Kitty', 'cause how can you top Guinness), I MUST revisit your limerick:

And they're passing amendments to vex us.

OR

And it gets even worse down in Texas

OR

And I'm finding it somehow infectious

OK. That's enough. Ta ta

Hi, Jihadist,

At one time I was a tweed sports jacket type. I taught at the college level as an assistant for a few years.

Bald? Proud of it:
The Lord is just
The Lord is fair
Some men got brains
The rest got hair.

(NOT my creation, alas!)

Arminius

Hello Arminius,

Thanks for that physical profile of yourself. For some reason, I pictured you as a tweed sports jacket wearing fellow.

And, ah, balding never comes to my mind at all for you or anyone here. Some men are quite sensitive about getting bald.

Less hair to wash and really saves on shampoo, and more of your face to be kissed by the wife.

best regards

"J"

-------------------------------------------------

Ah Spiderman2,

Not, not, not fair. Using "please" to ask me to read your post. So I did.

You : It hurts when somebody you think is intelligent is really a fool. What I thought as a bright student was actually an idiot.

Moi : Being a fool should hurt me more that it hurts you. You're not a woman, are you? Men don't get "hurt". They get only "upset" or "angry".

You : You are an intelligent lady made dumb by your false religion.

Moi : Being dumb lets the smart ones get ahead. It is an act of charity on my part in line with one of the Five Pillars of Islam. The cheapest, in fact, free charitable act. We are prone to "suicide bombing", and we are prone to "suicide dumbing down" too.

Unfortunately, I am not a blonde. May need to dye my hair as such to make sure everyone knows I'm dumb by sight. Went to the hairdresser. Never saw so many women dye with their shoes on. That must be an omen of the End of Days and Armageddon.

And what is with the slur about blondes being dumb and only applied to women? I only heard it in the US and no place else.

Cheers
"J"

M. Anonymous:

Thanks again.

Anonymous:

You wrote:

May I ask you a few other questions? Are any of the NT Q(ueer) Gospel crew Catholics or former Catholics? Are they mainly gay? Last question: Might one find any at Georgetown?

I answer your questions in the order posed:

1. Those I know are Catholic reformists, former Catholics, Protestant reformists, former Protestants, and atheists.

2. Self-identified gays are among the "faithful," but do not predominate as far as I know. (I don't know every adherent.)

3. About Georgetown, the best answer I can give you is if you are a student there or new faculty member, be very, very careful.

The thrust of NT Q(ueer) Gospel Theory is skepticism about the 2S hypothesis and the intolerance and hegemony of Catholicism and Christianity.

Very truly yours,
M. Anonymous

M. Anonymous:

May I ask you a few other questions? Are any of the NT Q(ueer) Gospel crew Catholics or former Catholics? Are they mainly gay? Last question: Might one find any at Georgetown?

Hi, Jihadist,

You said to E Favorite:
"Sorry for thinking you're a beer-bellied guy with a baseball cap, three day old beard, plaid shirt, jeans and combat boots, a sixpack and giant sized bag of pork rinds on hand while you blog here."

Not my picture of E Fav. I always had a much more sophisticated image. But let me describe, just for fun, myself:

Starting to get a beer belly. No baseball cap, but I wish I had had one last Sunday at the baseball game - my head got sunburned, I am bald! Beard? Not three days old, but three decades old. Trimmed rather short. Sixpack? Hell, yes!!! But no pork rinds.

Keep it coming, dear Lady.

Arminius

Anonymous:

Sorry it took me so long to reply. I've been tied up and was away from this site.

Yours truly,
M. Anonymous

Spidey,

There will be no further trouble between Mr Mark and me. We understand each other better now. We agree to disagree. Mr Mark, even though I often disagree with him, and, yes, get angry, is a gentleman at heart, and he has my respect. It was his calling $cientology a religion that set me off. It is not one, even by my very liberal definition.

Arminius

M. Anonymous:

Thank you very, very much for your reply. I was beginning to fear you wouldn't respond, not that I would have blamed you. Queers do make a lot of people nervous.

On the other hand, Arminius was overreacting from Mr. Mark's comment. He should have known Mr. Mark's views a long time ago.

I too was caught offguard by his reaction.

It felt like "What? you don't know that? "

Jihadist, please read this again. A post from Arminius. It's far from what you thought that I started it. Your false religion corrupts your intelligent thinking.

Arminius:
Mr Mark,
I owe you an apology for overreacting - badly, at that. Yes, you made me angry, I was very tired, and at least one beer over the limit. But there is no excuse for it.
Arminius

Anon, I like CCNL when he post against Islamic extremism. He is not annoying if only for that reason.

While CCNL makes the same number of posts against me and Jihadist, I don't quarrel with him. Maybe Jihadist is disturbed with CCNL because there is some truth to his tirade against Islam. For me, it doesn't affect me coz his accusations against true Christianity are just wrong interpretations of the Bible.
I said true Christianity coz there are false Christianity and he is right in telling those flaws.

I think I understand Arminius now when he blew his top. He had not expected a "friend" like Mr. Mark to turn against him when he bunched all religious people in the same bucket. It's not the trashing but it's the perception of a "friend" trashing you.

I felt the same way when you (JIhadist)trashed me that way. I really thought you were an intelligent lady. After that comment of yours, it changed everything. It hurts when somebody you think is intelligent is really a fool. What I thought as a bright student was actually an idiot.

That is where the hurt came from. You are an intelligent lady made dumb by your false religion. And you know what, this world is GOING TO BURN mainly BECAUSE of the stupidity OF YOUR FALSE RELIGION.

PALESTINA ARE THE ARAB STATES AND THEY ALL ARE GOING TO BURN. That is the prophecy.

DISSOLVED. PEACE ON EARTH FOR A THOUSAND YEARS COZ ALL THE IDIOTS ARE DISSOLVED. That's the prophecy.

Unless Mr. Mark got the lesson of not "CARPETBOMBING" the whole place, there would be another bout like this with Arminius in the future.

Stupidity will somehow start trouble and you will see that soon in the world stage - A GRANDIOUS TROUBLE.

Anonymous:

You wrote:

The hypothesized Q Gospel is also the source of a great deal of humor among many other scholars.
Is the humor what I think it is?! Could one find it on the web? (BTW: Crossan does rely on it.)

&

I asked about the Q Gospel as a gay man, an angry former Catholic gay man, who still has a sense of humor and probably some Catholicism.

-----------------------------------------------
Are you familiar with Queer Theory, a part of
Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, and Intersex Studies?

I don't know if you can find Q Gospel humor on the web and although I'm sorely tempted, I am resisting, at least for the moment, posting some here. Christianists of every stripe have done all they can to preserve some NT illusion, some while congratulating themselves on their honest disposal of myth.

I wouldn't care if they were not among a wider powerful group that constantly seeks to dominate secular life, even on threads.

There are plenty of Jesus jokes, as you, no doubt know, since you say you are a former Catholic. The Queer stuff, truthfully, I think people are afraid to come out with.

Homosexuality makes a lot of people nervous. Interesting, since both priests and lay theologians have accepted the authenticity of the Gospel of Judas, while still clinging desperately to "Q" and remaining terrified of queers, although some of said hypocrites are obviously gay. It's all self-contradictory silliness. I'm straight, by the way, not that it should matter.

The most hilarious assault I have ever heard on said "Gospel" was at a conference I recently attended, in which a presenter's satire led to some storming out in a rage, and others, I, among them nearly sobbing with laughter. Unfortunately, efforts to persuade the presenter to publish his paper in the Conference proceedings or anonymously on the web have thus far failed.

Should we manage to convince him, I will certainly post the web address here. I, for one, am hopeful, since several of his colleagues have been proposing a NT Q(ueer) Gospel site.

Very truly yours,
M. Anonymous

Hi, E Fav,

Nope, nothing wrong with being a man - or a woman. I apologized, I guess, for feeling rather stupid that I did not see the truth. But, given your neutral language, that is understandable, I guess.

Arminius

Oh, Chris – tell me more about the E Favorite of your imagination. Is he tall? Does he have massive biceps that bulge through his crisp white shirt?

You got the personality right, though – the only thing that showed through the ethernet. I’m a “rational” temperament type, more common among men than women. It’s probably what made it easy for me to become atheist, once I started to think seriously about religion.

Arminius – apologize for what? thinking I’m a man? Nothing wrong with being a man, is there?

Hi, Chris, you said:

"Religion is to the mind what smoking is to the lungs."

It might interest you to know that I am a heavy smoker. 65 years old, and going strong. Yes, I know smoking is stupid.

As to $cientology - it is not their beliefs that I object to, even as bizarre as they are. It is what they DO that I virulently oppose. Read it all on the web.

Also, I do not tithe.

Arminius

E Fav -

You are a woman! Holy you-know-what! Boy, was I fooled. Please accept my apologies. Actually, knowing that you are female makes you all the more interesting.

Arminius

M. Anonymous:

I asked about the Q Gospel as a gay man, an angry former Catholic gay man, who still has a sense of humor and probably some Catholicism.

Mr Mark,

A Guinness it is, and it's on me.

Arminius

M. Anonymous:

You wrote: The hypothesized Q Gospel is also the source of a great deal of humor among many other scholars.

Is the humor what I think it is?! Could one find it on the web?

(BTW: Crossan does rely on it.)

Dear Arminius -

Thanks for the kind words. No apology was expected or necessary. Perhaps someday we'll have a beer together. I'm not much a drinker these days, but if there's Guinness about, I'm game.

The historical St. Paul is reviewed in two rather recent books:

In Search of Paul by Professors JD Crossan (an On Faith panelist/NT exegete) and Jonathan Reed ( a well-known archeologist) and

Rabbi Paul by Professor Bruce Chilton.

See amazon.com for details.

A few points:

1 Cor 7: 32-34 as per JD Crossan and Reed, p.111: St. Paul was not interested in marriage because he assummed the second coming was imminent. Fortunately for us, he was wrong.

Professor Chilton pulls no punches in criticizing one of the founders of Christianity. Basically Paul was a "prude". An excerpt for Chilton's book,

"He (Paul) feared the turn-on of women's voices as much as the sight of their hair and skin..... At one point he even suggests that the sight of female hair might distract any angel in church attendance (1 Cor. 11:10). Simply add Paul's thinking about women to the list of flaws in the foundations of Christianity.

Professor Chilton btw is a Professor of Religion at Bard College and a priest at the Free Church of St. John in Barrytown, NY.

And Paul (or his "wannabees") the Prophet? Hardly, he could not even get the timing of Jesus' second coming correct but it did serve to dramatically increase both the conversion rate and the coffers. Hmmm, contemporary preachers/fortune tellers/Mormon "profiteers" still use that con game.

Mr Mark,

I owe you an apology for overreacting - badly, at that. Yes, you made me angry, I was very tired, and at least one beer over the limit. But there is no excuse for it.

Arminius

Hmmm, annoying????

The truth is annoying especially for those that suffer from the Three B Syndrome, i.e. Bred, Born and Brainwashed in their religion. As the bible, koran and book of mormon are continuously thumped here so shall the truth. Deal with it!!!

Merry Anonymous – re false idoling and assuming I’m a man. I‘d say it was more a case of presumptive identity – and not just by atheists, but by Christians and Muslims here and maybe Jews, too. In other words - not a narrowly religious reaction, but a broadly human reaction.

Re CCNL’s evidence for Jesus – I’m with you on that.

False idoling is hardly the strict domain of atheists. Presumptive identity, in my view, may go to FI. Why was it assumed your sex was male, not female.

Mr. Mark refers to "that guy Speed123," B12, thehereandnow, and Mary Cunningham. All are one, and we shall no doubt hear the denial and protests quite soon.

As for CCNL: I have no wish to deprive him of his spiritual advisors, Dominic Crossan, et al. If he needs his current church membership, fine.

I will forgo a lengthy disputation of his "evidence" because he needs to believe. However, this much I will say:

Tacitus took his evidence from Josefus, much of which has been dispensed with.

Much of Matthew and Luke was taken from Mark. Mark and Matthew mention two trials. Luke mentions 1 trial, and John mentions none.

In the nineteenth century, desperate scholars, trying to deal with the similarities/descrepancies among Mark, Luke, and Matthew hypothesized a Q document (common source of Jesus' sayings). This is still accepted, even by Crossan, if I'm not mistaken, and is ludicrously referred to as the Q Gospel.

The hypothesized Q Gospel is also the source of a great deal of humor among many other scholars.

While Paul remains problematic, he was never Saul, most agree.

The Sanhedrin never dealt with matters of heresy and never met on Passover. Most scholars believe its part in the Gospels is fiction.

I could go on and get more and more detailed, but that is not my wish.

MY ONLY PROBLEM WITH CCNL IS THAT HE CONTINUALLY SEEKS TO DOMINATE THREADS. ANON WROTE THAT HE WAS MORE OF A PROBLEM THAN SPIDERMAN, AND SOMEONE REPLIED HE GENERALLY IGNORED CCNL, WHILE ANOTHER SAID SOME OF CCNL'S REMARKS TO JIHADIST OFFENDED HIM GREATLY.

JIHADIST, FOR HER PART, HAS ASKED THAT OTHERS STAY OUT OF HER DISPUTES WITH CCNL. JIHADIST COULD FACILITATE THAT BY KEEPING OTHERS OUT OF HER POSTS TO HIM.

HE OFFENDS A LOT OF PEOPLE, AND THROWS A TANTRUM IF HE CANNOT CONTROL THE THREAD.

ANNOYING. CONVERSIONISTS ARE ALWAYS ANNOYING REGARDLESS OF WHETHER THEY ARE ATHEISTS LIKE YOURS TRULY, SPIRITUALLY ADVISED LIKE CCNL, OR MEMBERS OF ORGANIZED RELIGIONS.

Yours truly,
M. Anonymous

DITLD writes:

"I feel as though I have done that, because alot of people I know tell me that I am an atheist, even though I tell them I am not."

Perhaps the issue could be made clearer by Jeff Foxworthy. I see a new routine in his future: "You might be an atheist..."

;)

Dear Mr. Mark

When I was in college, a fairly long time ago, I would often be accosted by Christians, trying to "convert" me. Nevermind that I was already a Christian and had always been a Christian. But when they would speak to me, and find that I already knew all of the Bible verses that they quoted to me, and that I already had Biblical and relgious opinions on all these things that differed from theirs, this was always their parting commentary on my life, a college aged young man: that I should commit suicide, and that they really urged me to do so.

While I was in college, I met many Christians on many occaisions who encouraged me to commit suicide, because, according to them, a person with beliefs such as mine could not ever be happy. Of course, I should be the one to say if I am happy or sad, and I should be the one reserving thoughts of suicide to myself.

So, I expect, ever since those unpleasant days, I do have some bitter feelings towards people who call themselves Christians, and am always suspicious of any Christian's true motives and attitudes. Many Christians, by their very own deviant actions and deeds, have really damaged the reputation of Christianity, and made it difficult for anyone to call himself a Christian.

Why am I saying all this to you? I am just trying to point out that it is not just atheists whom many Christians seem to hate; in fact atheists are the least of the enemy; this is something that you might teach your children about Christianity; but the real and true enemy is the apostate or heretic, the believer who believes wrong; I know from my experience, that there is alot more animosity directed at rival Christian groups than there is directed at atheists.

I, too, thought E Favorite was a man, and in fact I had a fairly well-developed image of "him". Based on "his" consistently rational, level-headed and on-topic posts, I saw E Favorite as a 45 year old "establishment" white male, probably wearing a starched white shirt and charcoal gray wool slacks. Neat and clean - like a scientist hero in a 1950's era sci-fi movie.

I think it says something about religion (in addition to whatever it says about me). We have a natural inclination to "fill out" our experience when the data is sparse. Our minds don't work will with abstractions - we need to concretize things, usually in an anthropomorphic direction. We also have nothing to use but our imaginations, which are filled with pre-existing concepts and categories we use as templates of interpretation. In the case of E Favorite her clear and logical style resonated with my "white-collar establishment scientist" template, so for me that's who she was. Now I feel a bit wierd. ;)

As for DITLD's statement about being a "minimalist", I think that gets to the heart of the matter. When we apply these templates to our experience, we bring along all the stuff that's in the template but not in the experience itself, so that when we reflect on the experience we may be reflecting more on the template. I think this is why people who have near-death experineces see "heaven" or "Jesus" - they're the templates that resonate best with what must be a very alien experience (in fact, some see "aliens"!). I see DITLD's minimalism as an effort to bring as little template-based garbage into the interpretation of experience, in order to percieve it more directly. This would explain why DITLD comes across as such a master of introspection.

E Fav -

That's a good observation. My kids are not being religiously indoctrinated, but they still have to deal with it. My 9th grade son was confronted in the hall of his HS last week by 2 Xians who started giving him a religious spiel. Rather than walk away, he countered their arguments and left them sputtering. What started out as a "friendly" approach from the Xian kids ended up as an "aren't you afraid of burning in hell for eternity?" threat.

Personally, I wonder how many people would gladly desert their religions if the threats of hell were taken away. I'd guess the majority. For all the talk of "god's love" I get the distinct feeling that most religionists treat their faith as some kind of insurance policy against what horrors might be in store for them after death.

Hi, Daniel ITLD – I’m not sure exactly what you’re saying to Mr Mark and Arminius, but will respond anyhow.

My feeling is that if people were not originally indoctrinated into the beliefs and stories about their religions, they would never have to go through the adult exercise of trying to get it to all make sense. Maybe this is another way of expressing what Mr Mark said.

For Mr. Mark

Regarding religion, let us just say, I am a "minimalist."

You said that religious people should try walking around in an atheist's shoes; I feel as though I have done that, because alot of people I know tell me that I am an atheist, even though I tell them I am not.

So, it is strange, is it not, that everybody else wants to tell you what you are, but what you say you are does not count for much.

Often, the "ism", or the "ist" that is applied to someone's behaviour or belief's does not even exist, but is just assigned as an insult, like being fat, or being lazy. That guy, Speed123, always calls me a relativist, like he is calling me ugly, or fat, since I do not claim to be a relativist, and would not know how to be one; it is not what I am, as far as my belief is concerned.

But he says that is what I am, because he has been taught that it is something bad, and so, it is a handy thing to call me, if he wants to hurt my feelings.

Dear DITLD -

I appreciate what you're saying, but there are those of us who go through the exercise you've outlined and find ourselves echoing La Place, and saying "I don't find god necessary to this hypothesis."

Daniel, ITLD - regarding your reaction to learning my gender, I think you’ve raised something very important here that I hadn’t thought of. Not sure what it is, but am fairly sure it has implications relating to religious belief.

I was originally bemused that people here mistook my gender. Then I started feeling a little guilty and deceptive, though I’d done nothing purposely or actively to deceive – just at some point did nothing to correct misconceptions. Knowing what was going on, I decided to be passive. But when my masculine image was continually reinforced here, it became uncomfortable and I “came out.” I suppose if I had a different personality or had some specific motives, I could have used the opportunity to influence people somehow – if only to be something I’m not. It helps me see how easy it is to affect people’s impressions and beliefs.

Your thoughts?

This is for Mr. Mark and Arminius

I think of it like this:

There is primitive religious belief and sophisticated religious belief. It is not just a matter of the entrenchment of the old ways versus the avant-guarde new ways.

Part of being sophisticated is accepting the knowledge of ones own church and theological origins, and not necessarily going along with what is "traditional" or "orthodox" merely because it has become culturally entrenched, but rather, thinking it all through, and comparing your feelings about your religious upbringing to your feelings regarding the world, in general, and trying to get all of this going in your mind, at once, in a balanced sychronization.

Dear E Fav -

I also assumed you were a man. I blame my background in opera which led me to believe that anybody using the name "Favorite" had to be male, as a female would have referenced the opera by Donizetti and called herself, "La Favorita."

E Favorite is a woman; this is "yooge," to quote the Donald.

When I said that E Favorite was a masculine name, I was not serious; I know that it is a neutral name.

I just feel kind of funny about the whole thing; that I do not know any of the people that post here, yet my mind automatically fills in alot of details about what they must be like, so much so, that I do have some sort of sense of what they might be like, even though that sense comes from inside of me, and not from the people themselves. And so now, such a minor thing as gender regarding a person whom I do not really know, and have never seen, seems to mean a great deal, so I have to do a little mental adjustment to comprehend it.

The good and the bad thing about this blog, specially in Susan Jacob threads (disclaimer: I don't read the others much), is that sometimes it morphs into a light chat site about poetry and music mixed with serious and profound postings about religion, no-religion, science, pseudo-science and politics.

Suddenly someone cross an unknown line, emotions explode and relationships among chaters get affected. Hopefully the flow will get back in track. All frequent visitors and posters will continue benefiting with the wisdom and stupidity that we all as humans share here.

The best for all,

JAC

Once again:

Besides the Josephus reference (earlyjewishwritings.com/josephus.html), NT exegetes use the following attestations to Jesus' crucifixion as proof he existed.

Crucifixion of Jesus:(1) 1 Cor 15:3b; (2a) Gos. Pet. 4:10-5:16,18-20; 6:22; (2b) Mark 15:22-38 = Matt 27:33-51a = Luke 23:32-46; (2c) John 19:17b-25a,28-36; (3) Barn. 7:3-5; (4a) 1 Clem. 16:3-4 (=Isaiah 53:1-12); (4b) 1 Clem. 16.15-16 (=Psalm 22:6-8); (5a) Ign. Mag. 11; (5b) Ign. Trall. 9:1b; (5c) Ign. Smyrn. 1.2.-

Were these stories embellished? Yes, but the crucifixion is the same throughout.

The Jesus Seminar after reviewing all the scriptural and non-scriptural documents from the time period, voted red (the event occurred) as follows:

Jesus was crucified

Jesus was crucified under Pontius Pilate

Jesus was crucified with the participation of the highest Jewish authorities

Jesus was crucified in Jerusalem

Jesus was crucified at Golgotha

From Professors Crossan and Watts' book, Who is Jesus.

"That Jesus was crucified under Pontius Pilate, as the Creed states, is as certain as anything historical can ever be.

: “ The Jewish historian, Josephus and the pagan historian Tacitus both agree that Jesus was executed by order of the Roman governor of Judea. And is very hard to imagine that Jesus' followers would have invented such a story unless it indeed happened.
WaPo blog blocked this paragraph for some reason “While the brute fact that of Jesus' death by crucifixion is historically certain, however, those detailed narratives in our present gospels are much more problematic. "

“My best historical reconstruction would be something like this. Jesus was arrested during the Passover festival, most likely in response to his action in the Temple. Those who were closest to him ran away for their own safety.

I do not presume that there were any high-level confrontations between Caiaphas and Pilate and Herod Antipas either about Jesus or with Jesus. No doubt they would have agreed before the festival that fast action was to be taken against any disturbance and that a few examples by crucifixion might be especially useful at the outset. And I doubt very much if Jewish police or Roman soldiers needed to go too far up the chain of command in handling a Galilean peasant like Jesus. It is hard for us to imagine the casual brutality with which Jesus was probably taken and executed. All those "last week" details in our gospels, as distinct from the brute facts just mentioned, are prophecy turned into history, rather than history remembered."

See Professor Crossan's reviews of the existence of Jesus in his other books especially, The Historical Jesus and also Excavating Jesus (with Professor Jonathan Reed doing the archeology discussion) .

Other NT exegetes to include members of the Jesus Seminar have published similar books with appropriate supporting references.

Part of Crossan's The Historical Jesus has been published online at books.google.com/books. There is also a search engine for this book on the right hand side of the opening page. e.g. Search Josephus

See also Wikipedia's review on the historical Jesus to include the Tacitus' reference to the crucifixion of Jesus.

From ask.com,

"One of the greatest historians of ancient Rome, Cornelius Tacitus is a primary source for much of what is known about life the first and second centuries after the life of Jesus. His most famous works, Histories and Annals, exist in fragmentary form, though many of his earlier writings were lost to time. Tacitus is known for being generally reliable (if somewhat biased toward what he saw as Roman immorality) and for having a uniquely direct (if not blunt) writing style."

Jihadist, Jihadist, Jihadist,

Once again:

Your belief in "angels" and demons of the demented is of course a tenet of Islam. Without this tenet Islam collapses into the warmongering, womanizing cult that it actually is. You know this but are so brainwashed and/or afraid of Islamic "truth squads that you remain quiet knowing full well that this folly continues to bring 24/7 terror upon the world. Hirsi Ali and Kola Boof have shown the courage to fight the "fems" of Islam and religion. Hopefully someday you will do the same.

If you have some evidence that Mohammed was not hallucinating in the "Gabe Cave" then please bring it to our attention.

Jihadist – except for the beard, you could be right about me.

Merry Anonymous – re false idoling and assuming I’m a man. I‘d say it was more a case of presumptive identity – and not just by atheists, but by Christians and Muslims here and maybe Jews, too. In other words - not a narrowly religious reaction, but a broadly human reaction.

Re CCNL’s evidence for Jesus – I’m with you on that.

Thank you Susan, for interjecting common sense into a discussion that has repeatedly veered off into the land of the crazy people. Politicians are not perfect; how could they be, considering what they have to do on a daily basis? And why do we expect them to be? Hold yourself up to that same harsh spotlight and if you're honest with yourself you'll see a whole bunch of unpleasant blemishes. It's about whether you feel it's worth the pain and agony of public scorn to serve your country. I applaud all who run for that willingness, even if I cannot tolerate John McCain's policies and flinch whenever Hillary Clinton references race.

Thank you Susan, for interjecting common sense into a discussion that has repeatedly veered off into the land of the crazy people. Politicians are not perfect; how could they be, considering what they have to do on a daily basis? And why do we expect them to be? Hold yourself up to that same harsh spotlight and if you're honest with yourself you'll see a whole bunch of unpleasant blemishes. It's about whether you feel it's worth the pain and agony of public scorn to serve your country. I applaud all who run for that willingness, even if I cannot tolerate John McCain's policies and flinch whenever Hillary Clinton references race.

A bit of straightening up:

1. Jews do not "believe in Yahweh." YHWH is a construct, unpronouncable in Hebrew and in any other language. Hello!? Get it? It is the tetragrammaton. The current distortion was brought about by nineteenth century secular Protestant Bible scholars. Being ethnically Christian, what could they do but assimilate a radically different religion to the metaphysics of their own religio-ethnic metaphysics?

2. Assuming that E Favorite is a man based on the name? Was that really the basis of amazement? Or, perhaps, atheists are capable of false idoling as much as everyone else. Take the case of atheist support for Barack Obama, for example. No offense: I'm an atheist and support Obama. But idoling is idoling.

3. The wisdom of CCNL: There is only textual support for the existence of Jesus Christ and that is extremely limited. There is no archaeological evidence AT ALL. NONE. The textual is Josefus, increasingly in doubt, Crossan and Chilton notwithstanding. Much of Josefus was dismissed in the 1950s. Tacitus borrows from Josefus. Eusebius presents another problem. The actual writers of the Gospels are yet a third textual problem. In summary, Jesus' actual historical existence is no more certain than that of Moses, pasted pages of CCNL notwithstanding.

AND, THEREFORE, Quite possible there is no 30%. CCNL desperately wants to believe in something, so the words of the living man Jesus serve him. He also must have a church. At the same time, he must convince himself that HE has dispensed with false idols.

He gives atheists a bad name in any number of ways.

Best ignored and left to struggle with his demons unless he asks for help.

Very truly yours,
M. Anonymous

Jihadist wrote:

"Sorry for thinking you're a beer-bellied guy with a baseball cap, three day old beard, plaid shirt, jeans and combat boots, a sixpack and giant sized bag of pork rinds on hand while you blog here."

This is the first time that I have ever actually laughed outlout at anything on this blog.

Daniel IHLD, et al

A few months ago I noticed a couple of references to me as masculine and I wondered, why do they think that? Certainly nothing I’d said. Then I realized that I reacted that way too – if a poster’s name didn’t reveal gender, I unconsciously assumed the person was male and was surprised to then hear a mention of a husband or some other gender give-away.

Although I admit I liked the idea of being gender-neutral, I did start feeling a little disingenuous as the masculine references mounted here. I intended to reveal soon, and welcomed the opportunity to do so in verse.

Regarding my handle, I chose to use an initial rather than full first name simply to protect anyone with a similar name from showing up on Google with views unrepresentative of her own. I never meant to hide my gender. It just worked out that way. Interesting, eh?

Hope you don’t treat me any differently now that you know I’m a member of the gentler sex.

Hello Chris Everett,

My bad. Thanks for the clarification.
Hey. I like Arminius too.

*************************************************

Hello E Favorite,

Yes, we assume you are a "he"
so presumptious are we
it not an insult you see
we all see what we want you to be
it is a compliment really
that don't diminish you in reality
and here and there practically

Sorry for thinking you're a beer-bellied guy with a baseball cap, three day old beard, plaid shirt, jeans and combat boots, a sixpack and giant sized bag of pork rinds on hand while you blog here.

Just kidding:)

Cheers
"J"

Regarding my previous post about CCNL, I said:

"I think alot of people have assumed that CCNL is an elderly gentleman. But you know what? he might be a tall, slim, and strikingly statuesque blonde, about 32 years old."

Once again, I seem to be navigating a mind field of assumptions.

I meant to suggest, comically, that he might be a woman, but then, I didn't really say that did I? I should have said, "...strikingly satuesque blonde WOMAN, about 32 years old."

It occurs to me that perhaps Arminius and others are shocked to learn that atheists make no differentiation between gods, which is odd, because it you allow for even a single god, then you cannot in any way consider yourself an atheist.

As Chris pointed out, Judaism and Christianity have an advantage over newer religions because they were formed back in the centuries where information was transmitted orally (for the most part), and the beliefs and "historical" aspects of their tales were accepted as fact for many, many centuries. This - coupled with the mystic fog of being ancient - adds a patina of respectability to these beliefs that has a way of morphing into a perceived truth.

In the worst case scenarios, we have people who actually believe that ancient and lost civilizations were even more advanced technically and spiritually than are we today. This is based upon nothing more than a feeling that isn't supported by any tangible evidence. Go figure.

While I'm thinking about it, there's one very important aspect of the Christian faith that must be considered when reading the responses to my previous posts where I self-identify as an equal opportunity disbeliever in gods of all stripes, and that is the very heavy influence in the Xian experience of the parable of the Prodigal Son. The Prodigal Son ignores the wisdom of his father, sets out on his own and returns chastened and broken. The father welcomes him back with open arms.

I get the feeling that Xians look at we professed atheists and really believe that we don't actually believe that there are no gods, but that we are simply being rebellious; that we are out sowing our wild oats, but that we will return eventually to the Xian god, chastened and humbled, and that Jesus will welcome us back to the flock with open arms. Why else the sign-off from our friend Thomas Baum ("be ready"), or the constant threats from the lunatic fringe that we're going to hell...or even the more-benign sentiments from an Arminius ("I know God loves me and he loves you, too."). One needs ask: would they make the same appeals if the god we were rejecting was confined to Zeus? I don't think so.

I'll close with an exercise for the Xians on this blog: look back on your posts to the atheists, and reread them to yourself, but as you read, have in your mind that the god that you are speaking of is Zeus or Odin. Perhaps then you will react to your posts in the same way that atheists react to your posts when the god you're championing is the Judeo-Xian version.

A short walk in the shoes of the atheist perspective could go miles to understanding where we're coming from.

E Favorite

You are a woman? I am very suprised, because I thought you were a man. I just assumed it, I suppose. Don't you think that E Favorite sounds like a man's name, like Bill, or Jimmy, doesn't it? Or am I just imagining that?

But this just proves my point, or helps support it at least, that there are many, many, MANY (did I say many?) things in life which we perceive with rock-solid certainty, that turn out to be of a nature that is quite different than we had believed, and that even in our most certain perceptions of the world, there is much in our understanding that is completely wrong, and much more that is only approximate and incomplete.

Remember when you were telling us about how certain kinds of classical music affect you? And then Jihadist replied that this kind of music is often favored by caucasion males? So, see? it is really her fault that I thought you were a man; she lead me down the wrong path.

I think alot of people have assumed that CCNL is an elderly gentleman. But you know what? he might be a tall, slim, and strikingly statuesque blonde, about 32 years old.

A spyglass?

Hello Spiderman2,

By all means, continue your own battles and wars on what you believe will be the end of us all. And to be on a warpath against those who would not agree with you, or to join in battles with you.

Your choice in the form and content of your posts is yours alone and your right. The reactions of others and however they chose to respond in form and content is their right. It is also their right to let your post pass for more substantive and beneficial discussions with others.

Cheers

"J"

I never once said I’m a “he.”
It’s what was projected on me.
It’s not quite an insult,
It’s just plain the default,
In our ambiv’lant socieTY.

Jihadist wrote "

This the real Spiderman2?

Sorry if my tone is different but yes, this is me.

***

Spiderman2 : In my case nobody believes "my" doctrine. Nobody is defending me.

Moi : And why is that?

It means I don't influence their minds. Their quarrel is theirs alone so you should not falsely accuse me as the bone of their contention.

***

Spiderman2: Your thinking is affected by your false religion.

Moi : I know. Terrible is it not? I love being member of an evil religion. Keeps everyone spooked. I'm okay with people calling my religion stupid and false and evil and I deluded and such if it makes them feel better about themself. Anything to help other people in enhancing their self-worth and self-regard. Do go on. I let CCNL do and indulged him. So, no reason why I should not let you.

I judge your religion by it's fruits. Make a research about lowly migrant workers and see who abuses them the most. Comparing the U.S as against the whole of Arab countries, for every abused lowly worker in the States, my estimate is that there are about 1000 abused workers in Muslim Arab countries. 1 : 1000 ratio or maybe even more. So many physically abused and raped migrant workers in these muslim countries. If the Bible prophesy that Arab countries will burn I think I know the reason.

Brain cloud! Make that $100,000 not $1,000,000. Measure twice, cut once. See Sipdey, I really AM stupid!

Jihadist,

Welcome to the ranks of the stupid. Some of the best people are here.

As for your comment:

"Ahhhhhh.....some posters doth poison once cordial blog relationships between bloggers.

First between Chris Everett and Arminius on CCNL.
Now between Mr. Mark and Arminius on Spiderman2."

I strongly beg to differ. The dust up between Arminus and me over our differing opinions of CCNL was part of the FORGING of a cordial blog relationship. Things got heated, but communication remained open and in the end I think we understood each other (and perhaps even ourselves) a little better.

This the real Spiderman2?

Spiderman2 : In my case nobody believes "my" doctrine. Nobody is defending me.

Moi : And why is that?

Spiderman2: Your thinking is affected by your false religion.

Moi : I know. Terrible is it not? I love being member of an evil religion. Keeps everyone spooked.

I'm okay with people calling my religion stupid and false and evil and I deluded and such if it makes them feel better about themself. Anything to help other people in enhancing their self-worth and self-regard.

Do go on. I let CCNL do and indulged him. So, no reason why I should not let you.

Cheers
"J" - the Proudly Stupid, Unrepentent Idiot and Unteachable Moron.

An atheist woman's a gem
There seem to be so few of them
So let's give a shout
E Favorite's come out
And all raise a glass to her hem

sorry daniel. it was a mistaken post. sorry

Arminus,

I suggest you look at religion and Scientology in the same way that western societies are now looking at smoking. Clearly, if someone wanted to market some sort of new ingestable, intoxicating poison, they'd have a hard time getting past the FDA and avoiding lawsuits. But that's exactly what cigarettes are. The only difference is the prior cultural acceptance. However, when consciousness is raised and smoking is seen FOR WHAT IT IS, people recoil and culture shifts.

The same with religion. Scientology has no prior cultural acceptance so it's easy to see it clearly. But in its essentials it is no different from religion. You recoil at the $500,000 price tag of Scientology (that's the figure I've heard for its "courses"), but a 10% tithe of a $50,000 salary for 20 years is $1,000,000.

Religion is to the mind what smoking is to the lungs.

Daniel den wrote "I agree alot with Jihadist's last post. "

What's new? You also agree that your brain came from soil all by itself thru time. What do I expect from that kind of brain?

I agree alot with Jihadist's last post. But there are a few terms that people commononly use that bug me.

I do not like the term "faith" when used to mean "religion," even though that word is actually part of the title of this forum, "faith forum." I think that it is a somewhat contrived media term, and not the way most people think or talk about religion. Faith is the most watered-down and blandest way to refer to religion, and always used in a sort of pink, fuzzy, feel-good, innocuous, way, as though "faith" is good, and there is no dark side to it, but we all know there is a very, very dark side to it. So I do not like the disengenuous contrivance that this word always conjures up, whenever I hear it.

I also do not like the words "believer" and "non-believer." I believe in God. But I just make that simple statement as a kind of linquitic short-hand for something that is much more complex; and I do not want to be mistaken, as a believer, to be someone who prays to God to find a parking space, or thinks that it is a blessing that the tornado skipped over my house while all of my neighbors were killed; I do not want to be mistaken for a believer who is awaiting Jesus's return with a trumpet blast from the clouds, and who will take me up to a Heavenly City of Gold. And I do not want to mistken as a believer who hates atheists, but not as much as I hate other believers who believe differently than I.

I am reading a book called "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter." (I am only half way through, but I am sensing tragedy). There is a charcter in the book, set in the Depression, in the south, who is a black doctor. He had 4 children, and he had wanted to raise them to understand that they must have a great purpose in life, but they turned out to be just 4 plain people, trying to get along, and they did not understand the great purpose in life that their father had for them. This was a source of un-ending sadness for him, that he could not communicate his great feelings to them in a way that they could understand, but they had instead, become separate people, beyond his control, and simply merged themselves into the bitter, sad, and unjust world into which they had been born.

I have, as this doctor had, a sense of a great purpose, and a vision that others cannot see, and that I have been unable to communicate. And so, I do not feel any special kinship with people who say they are believers, nor any particular alienation from people who say they are not.

Jihadist wrote "Medals to CCNL and Spiderman2 then, for posoining "blogfriendships" across faith and no faith here. "

What a stupid comment. In the case of CCNL, one approves of him while another does not, so they quarreled.

In my case nobody believes "my" doctrine. Nobody is defending me. They are both fighting because of their own foolishness. And I don't have an enemy in this blogosphere, do I? If ever they hate me, well I don't hate them.

This is for the same stupidity that I teach. This world will crumble because of the ignorance that engulfed this world.

Jihadist, sometimes you're intelligent in your discussion. Well, this time I find you very idiotic. Maybe a result of what CCNL is doing to you.

Islam is a very evil religion. I judge it by how they treat lowly migrtant workers around the world.

CCNL is crazy about bunching all religions as evil but I believe he is right in depicting Islam as VERY EVIL.

Your thinking is affected by your false religion.

Ah. As we are in dispute, we have to understand the "Other". So assist my fellow believers in a small way:

A Believer's Subjective and Non-Scientific Refresher Guide to Non-Believers

(May or may not help believers to distinguish non-believers in their exchanges)
--------------------------------------------------

The following is an informal and random guide to species of non-believers as observed by their habits as well as by self-identification and self-characterisation. Some species remain hidden and unidentified.

Atheist:
Garden variety, run of the mill non-believer. Also a term used as umbrella, as a big tent for the supernatural non- believing "community". Both terms - atheist" and "community", still debated within the, er, community.

Bright:
Non-believers using the term as ironic, so they said. Or as self-aggrandising as thought by believers. Used to distinguish themself as atheists who are bright enough to see the fallacies of belief in the supernatural, Santa, tooth fairies, ghosts, gremlins, fairies. Terms applied to believers - morons, idiots as some are also MENSA members. So they said.

Agnostic:
The limbo group. An above it all, above the fray types in disputes between the temporal supernaturalists and the afterlife supernaturalists. Thinks God leave the world alone, is indifferent to it, has better things to do than to speak with Bush, and for us deal with whatever it was and is we have to deal with. Puts God on KIV.

Apatheist:
Non-believers who could not care less on and about believers and non-believers' discussions and disputes on God or no God, or whether organised religion is good or bad or ugly or all three for an individual, a community, a country, the world. Thinks of it as a singular waste of time and a yawn.

Anti-theist:
The shocktrooper, the stormtrooper, the carpet bomber in the atheist community in the war to purge all belief in God and organised religion from the face of the earth, the solar system, the Milky Way galaxy, the universe as poisoning everything.

Secular humanist:
The heart, the humane side of atheism with emphasis on humanism, ethics and seperation of church and state and into civil discourse and civil society.

Spiritual humanist:
Usually conflated with Buddhism, specifically Zen Buddhism, and into meditation and not necessarily vegetarian.

Secularist:
Non-believers who are into seperation of church and state. Adopts a generally benign 'live and let live' attitude towards believers until one group of believers put the Christmas creche in their front yard.

Militant atheist:
Does not exist in the western free world. Only in commie countries. Must have arms, or at least Molotov coctails, and willingness to be anarchistic and to kill.

Doctrinaire atheist:
Does not exist in the western free world. Only in polemicist tracts as repeated in On Faith threads by disciples of atheistic doctrinists and polemicists.

Strident atheist:
Does not exist in the western free world and not to mistake vocal or shrill atheists with srident atheist as found elsewhere. Such as the repressiv, oppressive, authoritarian Bolsheviks, Leninists, Stalinist, Maoists and Khmer Rouge et al. Must force people not to believe in the supernatural by sustained repression, torture, persecutions, executions.

Jewish atheist:
Non-believers who are culturally Jewish, or identifies themself as an "ethnic" group which encompass Jews in and from Africa, Asia and Europe with skin tones ranging from dark to brown to beige to yellow to white and everything in between. And food ranging from matzo balls to falafels eaten at home.

Muslim atheist:
None. Called "apostates(murtad)". Offensive to atheists who are former Muslims, and non-Muslims who consider that a slur like "infidels(kafir)". As innocous to Muslims as "gentiles" were or are to Jews and Mormons, or as "non-believers" are in times of peace. Used as slurs in times of conflict, even within and among Muslims. Lobbed as smart targeting missiles for exceptional sting of the targetted nowadays.

Christian atheist:
Err, ummm, ahhhh...

And special mention -

Crossanization:
???????????????????????

Cheers
"J"

Back to topic:

John Hagee “collects” a Rolls Royce,
His gullible masses rejoice,
They see that the phony
Religious baloney
brings money: It must be God’s voice!

But then we have Johnny McCain
Who shacks up with the Hagee insane,
He shows no remorse and
Loves Hagee’s endorsement!
The public asks: Where is his brain?

McCain of course is a hero,
No matter his IQ is zero.
He performed such a stunt,
Calling Cindy a c..t,
Armageddon’s already here, oh!

Oh there "Reality Challenged" and Obfuscating Jihadist,

Your belief in "angels" and demons of the demented is of course a tenet of Islam. Without this tenet Islam collapses into the warmongering, womanizing cult that it actually is. You know this but are so brainwashed and/or afraid of Islamic "truth squads that you remain quiet knowing full well that this folly continues to bring 24/7 terror upon the world. Hirsi Ali and Kola Boof have shown the courage to fight the "fems" of Islam and religion. Hopefully someday you will do the same.

Again,

Until the "tinkerbells" are "detinkered", no one is safe.

And again the "fems" of them all i.e. thumping the truth to counter the millennia of religious mumbo jumbo:

1. Abraham founder/father of three major religions was either the embellishment of the lives of three different men or a mythical character as was Moses, the "Tablet-Man" who talked to burning bushes and made much magic in Egypt.

Many of the 1.5 million Conservative Jews and many of their rabbis have relegated Abraham to the myth pile along with most if not all the OT.
simpletoremember.com/vitals/ConservativeTorah.htm
The muck and stench in Judaism you ask?

Belief that that the Jews are god's chosen people and its resulting consequences.

2. Jesus was an illiterate Jewish peasant/carpenter/simple preacher man who suffered from hallucinations and who has been characterized anywhere from the Messiah from Nazareth to a mythical character from mythical Nazareth to a mamzer from Nazareth (Professor Bruce Chilton, in his book Rabbi Jesus). Analyses of Jesus’ life by many contemporary NT scholars (e.g. Professors Crossan, Borg and Fredriksen, On Faith panelists) via the NT and related documents have concluded that only about 30% of Jesus' sayings and ways noted in the NT were authentic. The rest being embellishments (e.g. miracles)/hallucinations made/had by the NT authors to impress various Christian, Jewish and Pagan sects.

The 30% of the NT that is "authentic Jesus" like everything in life was borrowed/plagiarized and/or improved from those who came before. In Jesus' case, it was the ways and sayings of the Babylonians, Greeks, Persians, Egyptians, Hittites, Canaanites, OT, John the Baptizer and possibly the ways and sayings of traveling Greek Cynics. earlychristianwritings.com/theories.html

For added "pizzazz", Catholic/Christian theologians divided god the singularity into three persons and invented atonement as an added guilt trip for the "pew people" to go along with this trinity of overseers. By doing so, they made god the padre into god the "filicider".

The muck and stench of Catholicism you ask?

Pedophiliac priests, atonement theology and original sin!!!!

3. Luther, Calvin, Smith, Henry VIII, Wesley et al, founders of Christian-based religions, also suffered from the belief in/hallucinations of "pretty wingie thingie" visits and "prophecies" for profits analogous to the myths of Catholicism (resurrections, apparitions, ascensions and immaculate conceptions).

The muck and stench of non-Catholic Christian churches you ask?

Adulterous preachers and atonement theology.

4. Mohammed was an illiterate, womanizing, lust and greed-driven, warmongering, hallucinating Arab, who also had embellishing/hallucinating/ plagiarizing scribal biographers who not only added "angels" and flying chariots to the koran but also a militaristic agenda to support the plundering and looting of the lands of non-believers.

This agenda continues as shown by the assassination of Bhutto, the conduct of the seven Muslim doctors in the UK, the 9/11 terrorists, the 24/7 Sunni suicide/roadside/market/mosque bombers, the 24/7 Shiite suicide/roadside/market/mosque bombers, the Islamic bombers of the trains in the UK and Spain, the Bali crazies, the Kenya crazies, the Pakistani “koranics”, the Palestine suicide bombers/rocketeers, the Lebanese nutcases, the Taliban nut jobs, and the Filipino “koranics”.

And who funds this muck and stench of terror? The warmongering, Islamic, Shiite terror and torture theocracy of Iran aka the Third Axis of Evil and also the Sunni "Wannabees" of Saudi Arabia.

The muck and stench of Islam you ask?

The Sunni-Shiite blood feud and its warmongering, womanizing, hallucinating founder.

5. Hinduism (from an online Hindu site) - "Hinduism cannot be described as an organized religion. It is not founded by any individual. Hinduism is God centered and therefore one can call Hinduism as founded by God, because the answer to the question ‘Who is behind the eternal principles and who makes them work?’ will have to be ‘Cosmic power, Divine power, God’."

The caste/laborer system and cow worship are problems when saying a fair and rational God founded Hinduism."

The muck and stench of Hinduism you ask?

The caste system and cow worship.

6. Buddhism- "Buddhism began in India about 500 years before the birth of Christ. The people living at that time had become disillusioned with certain beliefs of Hinduism including the caste system, which had grown extremely complex. The number of outcasts (those who did not belong to any particular caste) was continuing to grow."
"However, in Buddhism, like so many other religions, fanciful stories arose concerning events in the life of the founder, Siddhartha Gautama (fifth century B.C.):"

Archaeological discoveries have proved, beyond a doubt, his historical character, but apart from the legends we know very little about the circumstances of his life. e.g. Buddha by one legend was supposedly talking when he came out of his mother's womb.

Bottom line:

There are many good ways of living but be aware of the hallucinations, embellishments, lies, muck, stench and myths surrounding the founders and foundations of said rules of life.

For my fellow evolutionists:

'A lion ran into a lemur
a thorn in his paw made him meaner;
Oh, please Mr. Lion,
I don't want to be dyin'
when a simple extraction
through prehensile action,
would greatly improve your demeanor'.

Dedicated to Charles Darwin and our distant forebearer - the humble lemur......who made all
things possible. Even Scientology.

Ahhhhhh.....some posters doth poison once cordial blog relationships between bloggers.

First between Chris Everett and Arminius on CCNL.
Now between Mr. Mark and Arminius on Spiderman2.

Medals to CCNL and Spiderman2 then, for posoining "blogfriendships" across faith and no faith here.

It only takes a couple of extremists, whatever their belief or non-belief, irritating one or the other, before the conflict widens into the larger group.

Voila! Spiderman2 is all believers.CCNL is all non-believers. And "they are all the same to me" kind of mind.

- Blessed are the peaceniks, the peacemakers and the peacekeepers

- Damned are the inciters, the conflicters the warmakers where once was "peace" or rather "detente".

This "glasnost" was too good to last? Or just a temporary thaw before it freezes over again until hell freezes over?

**************************************************

Concerned the Christian Now Liberated,

There are angels and demons. They exist. Believe.

I am the demon who demented you with my posts.
I am the angel who tolerated your posts.

there are angels and demons
within me I can summon,
to make concy the lemon
or peel him like an onion

concy is not too versed
in everything he makes it worse,
never a response he deserse
only those that are adverse

--------------------------------------------------

spidey infuriates marky
concy irritates jihady,
their exchanges exasperates everybody
and these four remain foolhardy

--------------------------------------------------

And Scientologists? A Scientologist is just scientist with the "otolog" taken out. They are quite into auditing and tabulating and counting and such. How could they be religionists?

For one, we religionists don't do our own auditing, counting or tabulating of our own sins.

We religionists disassociate ourselves from these Scientologists. They are too scientific. Can't have that. So there.

--------------------------------------------------

E Favorite,

You're a woman? Really, truly?

Hah! You deserve some verses to make you regret letting on you're a woman. But I already like you before you said so here. Live with it, sister.

oh so you a woman, a lady in a dress
so said you putting my wondering to rest

oh so you a woman like me and eve
it takes so long for you on that to give

oh so you a female like me and condi
but we're not like her or hillary

oh so you of the distaff side with your own choice of sides
whichever side you choose i'll never take you aside

oh you are a female a woman like me
but so cool so considered unlike me

A good weekend to you.

Cheers

"J"

Mr Mark, that is precisely the reason anti-theism is ineffective. If lumping all the religions together and condemning them uniformly is the best you can do as an anti-theist that is really not much.

Before joining the debate (in the best case scenario for you) between Christians and Scientologists as one who sides with Scientologists make sure to read what Mr Cupboard had to say to his followers in his science fiction (the "religion" is hence called Scientology). Compare that with what is actually written in the New Testament about the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. The only problem is that you would have to pay something like half a *million* dollars to read the most expensive science fiction ever written - in stages, while you get brainwashed at each stage before you can proceed to the next - and sign loyalty for a *billion* years to their cult business enterprise before you can even begin reading. Your best case scenario Mr Mark.

Not a single Christian has read in the New Testament in the past two thousand years about Jesus instructing His followers to abuse children sexually. Catholic priests were surely following instruction from the Bible or at least Church doctrine. BTW, almost seventy per cent of reported case of sexual abuse of children occur in families and friends of the family that the children trust - irrespective of race, ethnicity, class, religion, education... The reported cases represent only the tip of the iceberg with regard to sexual abuse in families. It is family members who cover up the crime when it occurs within families. Some religious book must instruct families to abuse their children sexually and cover it up... or is that an atrocious assumption.

Dear Arminius -

I thought I made it quite clear that I don't lump you into the same bucket as other believers. What I lump together into the same bucket are the religious beliefs themselves, which IMHO are constructs of the mind of man, not the inspired or divinely given ethos of a supernatural being.

As I stated quite clearly, I believe that there are decent people in all religions, and that believers of every religion on earth in some way, shape or form, do some good in the world. But I was clear that this good is done irrespective of the fallacies upon which their belief is built, and that is belief in the supernatural to some degree or other.

Now, being VERY familiar with the Episcopal church in America, I have long admired their liberal side. But being a fantasy based enterprise, there are still grand problems in the Episcopal church today. Where I live (in CA), the Episcopal Church in the San Jaoquin Valley has split over the issue of gay rights, with an ultra-fundamentalist sect breaking away from the church and, eventually, being excommunicated from the same. This anti-gay faction is very strong in the Church, and it may well rend the Episcopal Church asunder. This sits in strong contrast to your PERSONAL beliefs as a Christian who happens to be an Episcopalian.

So, while I will not lump you into the same spit bucket as the homophobes, I must look at the situation in my state and conclude that these people are not only followers of your religion but communicants in your sect. Are we to "judge" Xians and Episcopals by the actions of an officially sanctioned (until recently) rector and his homophobic flock, or by the acts of an individual like Arminius, who would most likely be pro-gay rights if he was Lutheran, Methodist or Muslim, for that matter?

In other words, not only do I not lump you in with the Taliban, but I cannot even lump you in with the Christians OR the Episcopalians! So, to what extent am I to assign your insightful and admirable HUMAN qualities to your religious beliefs, and to what extant do I chalk it up to your being in touch with the empathy of your very humaness?

Not believing in the unnatural, I assign it to your humanness.

The next issue to tackle is how deeply you believe that this "humanness" is influenced by your belief in a supernatural god, but that's for another time.

It's late. I must go.

Best to you, my friend.

Dear Anon -

Boy, you are one confused, biased and unthinking puppy.

How, may I ask, would a person identified as an "anti-theist" (like me) "differentiate between religious beliefs?" That would be akin to asking an anti-slavery person to "differentiate between the various forms of slavery."

Anti-theism is all-inclusive of ALL religions. If one is required to "differentiate" between the theisms, then one becomes a religious bigot, does one not?

I must say that reading this in your post: "propagates a dangerous kind of anti-theism," sent chills down my spine. Dangerous? Let me ask you: as ALL anti-theism is inclusive of ALL religions, what, exactly, would you consider a "safe" form of anti-theism? Let me guess: the kind that exempts your religion and yours alone from its anti-theism.

A final thought: yes - I could imagine myself siding with the Scientologists over the Xians, but I would opine that that would be a "best case" scenario, not a worst case. After all, taking such sides would be based upon the merits of the argument, would they not?

So, for instance, I would readily take the side of the Scientologists v the Christians if the subject at hand was the rape of children by their respective clergy. Or, I would readily take the side of the Scientologists over the Christians if the subject was the historic burning witches or torturing people to death.

What's so hard to imagine about that?

Mr Mark,

This is very difficult.

First, yes, I believe. But NO, I do not think I have the only true religion. There are many paths up that mountain. Mine is one. There are many others. In its own way, non-belief is one of those paths.

Next, you are guilty of dumping all of us believers in the same spit bucket, thinking we are all the same. Look, friend, don't judge by what people believe, judge by how they live their lives. In your own way, you have fallen into Spidey's method of calling all who disagree with him as stupid. So you condemn all who believe as stupid. Look, man, at how we believers try to live our lives. Am I, a progressive Episcopalian, one who supports gay rights and the rights of non-believer, pro-choice, on and on, - am I the same as the Taliban? Why do you throw me, and so many others, in the same cesspool as the Taliban and the $cientologists?

If you for a nanosecond think that I and the $cientologists and the Taliban are the same, then you are as ignorant as Spidey.

You really disappoint me. I don't expect you to agree with my belief, I just hope you will accept that I follow a good path. Do not try to paint a thin veneer of tolerance over your inner condemnation of me and others. You are better than that - I hope.

Intellectually lazy anti-theists add confusion to a religious debate. They do not consider it worth their time to invest effort in differentiating between religious beliefs. Hence someone like Mr Mark who says very confidently that there is no difference between Christianity and Scientology propagates a dangerous kind of anti-theism. In a worst case scenario, one could even theoritically imagine him taking sides with Scientologists in a Christian - Scientologist debate simply by saying that both religions are the same. Too bad!

Dear Arminius -

I really don't know how to respond to your last two posts. I have given an honest assessment of MY outside-looking-in take on religions. I am being quite honest when I say that I see little difference between Scientology and the major religions.

When you say, "most 'religionists' do not jump up and down on couches, or believe really whacked-out crap," I must ask which of the major religions you are exempting from such behavior? Have you never been to a born-again revival where people not only jump up and down but fall over fainting while babbling incoherently? Have you never been to a Catholic or Protestant service where the clergy dress in funny robes, make strange arm gestures and close their eyes and mumble at the appropriate times? Have you never seen an Islamic funeral or watched as members of many religions throw themselves prostrate in what can only be described as a crazed frenzy? What about the Christian sects who reenact the crucifixion, complete with actually nailing people to crosses?

As far as believing "really whacked-out crap," I'm sorry, but I put belief in gods in the category of whacked-out crap. Even more so the belief that some guy died and came back from the dead and took the "sins" of the world upon him. In the realm of everyday living in our natural universe, THAT qualifies as really whacked-out crap.

When you say, "Do not even think of lumping the likes of Tom Cruise, Spidey, and holy rollers in the same spit bucket as so many decent believers. Or me, for that matter...that sort of attitude is close to bigotry - you know, 'they all look the same to me'," you beg the question: who has the bigoted attitude? Surely, you would allow that the majority of Scientologists are "decent believers," would you not? Surely you can accept the fact that if you feel that Tom Cruise is a typical example of a person who believes in the "evil and false religion" of Scientology that someone else could easily believe that Spidey represents your typical Xian who believes in a religion that is as OBJECTIVELY false as is Scientology?

When you say that, "$cientology is an evil business, not a religion," I must ask two questions: 1) how, and 2) compared to whom? How is it any different for a church to request a yearly tithe of 10% of one's gross income as an "offering" and Scientology's fees of upwards of $400,000 to complete their training? If you're filthy rich, Scientology gives you a much better deal on your dues, wouldn't you say?

I don't mean to offend, Arminius, but here's what it comes down to: you believe that you are following the ONE true good and the ONE true religion. You believe that when push comes to shove, all other religions are at their base false, except for yours. There is nothing in the historic, archaeological or scientific record to support your claim. By the same token, every other religionist in the world - including the Scientologists - feel (to one degree or another) exactly as you do.

This doesn't mean that you believe the followers of these religions are bad people. Neither do you deny that every religion on earth (including Scientology) does some bit of good to one degree or another.

And here's where we differ, for my non-belief in ANYTHING supernatural (be it Yahweh, Mohammed or Xenu) does not permit me to cut slack for ANY religion that bases its claims to truth on the supernatural. All I can do is to remove the supernatural superstitions from the world's religions and ask on a human, ethical and moral level if those human constructions do good in the world. And - from my outside position - I must say that they all do some good, including Scientology.

But doing good on a human level in no way validates or adds verisimilitude to their claims that THEIR supernatural power is THE supernatural power in the universe. Moreover, such human endeavors in no way validate that there is ANY supernatural power of any kind in the universe, imagined, discarded or yet to be imagined (or found, for that matter).

As I've said before and I'll repeat for this discussion: religion is nothing less than the absolute highjacking of our own innate and hard-won HUMAN morals. To think otherwise is to insult the REAL blood that was shed in the development of our species and to mistakenly believe that some imagined agent paid the price for that which we ourselves have achieved.

I have a feeling that we will never agree on this point, but I must be firm in telling you that this is absolutely the way I feel about it. Perhaps that's too much to bear, and our relationship-from-afar will suffer for it, but that is the reality as I see it.

My best to you.

And while you're at it, Mr Mark, get on the 'Germany and Scientology' blog. Claire Hoffman made a pathetic and pandering defense of those (long string of expletives deleted) $cientologists. Over 400 replies appeared overnight, 99% damning the article and that false religion. Quite an education.

In the future, please do not equate piranha with goldfish.

Arminius

Mr Mark,

Dude, you are out of line here. Do not even think of lumping the likes of Tom Cruise, Spidey, and holy rollers in the same spit bucket as so many decent believers. Or me, for that matter.

First, Tom Cruise is NOT a religionist. $cientology is an evil business, not a religion. Do a bit of blogging.

Next, most 'religionists' do not jump up and down on couches, or believe really whacked-out crap. That sort of attitude is close to bigotry - you know, 'they all look the same to me'.

You are better than that, Mr Mark.

Arminius

Let's not forget that Tom Cruise is an ardent religionist.

Let's not forget that his religion's claims to legitimacy are no less than any other religion's claims.

Let's not forget that from the outside looking in, he doesn't act even a smidgeon differently than any other religionist (are his actions on Oprah any loonier than the weirdness you'll see at an Xian revival meeting?).

Tom Cruise. I'm surprised that Spidey doesn't see the obvious kinship with his fellow believer. How strange.

Tom Cruise on Oprah and elsewhere is more reminiscent of Manic Depressive psychosis than anything else. The anger, paranoia one occasionally sees may also indicate this conditions.

One thing for sure: mentally stable, he is not.

Run, Katy, run.

"For example, observing Tom Cruise in Oprah’s couch anybody can establish a solid hypothesis that Tom and humans in general are very close related to jumping monkeys."

The same SOLID HYPOTHESIS evolution was built on. Very Funny. Really, I did have a good laugh at that. Thanks for the joke.

To S2:

I don't need to be a scientist to know that building skyscrapers require more applied science than theoretical science. Also is well known that in some scientific fields you might need equations and in others no. The common denominator and the key element of the science is the scientific method.

A frequently used scientific method is observation. For example, observing Tom Cruise in Oprah’s couch anybody can establish a solid hypothesis that Tom and humans in general are very close related to jumping monkeys.

Peace to all and best wishes,

JAC

Spidey's ignorant rants and attacks,
Are well known to his foes (armed with facts).
The professed engineer,
Holds to science so queer,
That he may find himself some day sacked.

But until his beliefs out are found,
His employer will think him quite sound,
Until Spidey's design,
Which was thought of as fine,
Builds a thing that comes crashing all 'round.

Yes, we hear from this self-confessed genius,
That we haven't a brain wave between us,
That our world's greatest minds
And their non-faith-based finds
Are simply put forth to deceive us.

So let's bow to superior thought,
We've been tested and bested - besought,
Religion's the way,
Hail, Spidey! I say,
And our science can just go and rot.

If there are Godless zones around the world, majority are catholic countries with marxist rebels trained and indoctrinated by marxist catholic priests fighting "freedom wars" and killing everyone who hinders their way. The Irish Terror group (IRA) who has killed thousands thru their bombings are catholic fanatics.

If they really want a "Godless-free" zone, then start abolishing the seat of Satan, the Vatican.

" British public life cannot be a "God-free zone", the head of the Catholic church in England and Wales warned last night."

And what is the God-Zone? The Vatican? The seat of Satan?

Charles Darwin Responds to "Dialog"

Folks used to just call me Charley,
Then things got a bit quarrely
I never did say
I gave God away
So no need to be yelling and brawley

Dialog: Interrelations of Man, Nature, Darwin,
and the One above

Just heard this from Dear JAC:
"You are just like that ancient oak tree."
Well, Mr. C., that sounds phony to me,
Since humans did come from the sea.

The sea is for fishes and such
Who don't care for humans that much
They'd rather be swimmin'
And don't like religion
Which is why they're so peaceful and stuff.

There was a fish who believed in God
He was never at mercy of fishing rod
He never did blog,
Fearing great fog,
It so cheered him not to get scrod.

There once was a fellow named Darwin,
Who thought all his views folks were harmin.
REad my book and you'll see
All about me
And maybe you will find it calmin'

Know this: The fish who believed,
I did eat this night.
I found him to be a tasty bite
He hemmed and he hawed all about gawd
And never considered Heaven's Reward.

Fin

* Riazat Butt, religious affairs correspondent
* The Guardian,
* Friday May 9 2008

About this article

This article appeared in the Guardian on Friday May 09 2008 on p4 of the UK news section. It was last updated at 00:41 on May 09 2008.

British public life cannot be a "God-free zone", the head of the Catholic church in England and Wales warned last night.

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor said he was unhappy about attempts to "eliminate the Christian voice" from the public forum. He urged Catholics to prevent the country from becoming a "world devoid of religious faith" through a deeper engagement with God by praying, studying and performing charitable acts.

Speaking in a lecture at Westminster Cathedral, he said there was "considerable spiritual homelessness", and even if people wanted to believe they felt faith was not an option.

"Many people have a sense of being in a sort of exile from faith-guided experience. This is the effect of the privatisation of religion today: religion comes to be treated as a personal need. You cannot banish religion to the church premises. There are social currents that want to isolate religion from other forms of knowledge and experience in order to marginalise it."

The cardinal said modern culture prevented people from expressing their aspirations, and that their spiritual and religious impulses were not being channelled because there was a "pervasive message" that committing oneself to God was to "take a step back from being independent and mature".

He suggested, however, that Christians were partly to blame for the prevalence of modern atheism, which was a product of a "distorted kind of Christianity".

"What did we do to generate unbelief? We need to examine what we might have done to give people a misleading idea of God. Faith in Britain might be improved by a deeper grasp of the mystery of God on the part of our believers."

He also called for a better dialogue between believers and non-believers based on mutual esteem, rather than a rejection of difference, in order to address the split between the Gospels and culture. He then questioned the grounds on which some prominent atheists attacked faith.

"The interesting question about atheism is, what is the theism being denied? Have you ever met anyone who believes what Richard Dawkins does not believe in? The God that is being rejected by such people is a God I don't believe in either."

The cardinal's lecture was the last in a series on faith and public life in Britain. Other speakers have included Tony Blair, who said religion needed rescuing from extremism and irrelevance, and the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, who said religion could provide a solid foundation for human rights. Williams takes a more flexible approach than his Catholic counterpart to a multicultural and multi-faith Britain.

Murphy-O'Connor has been outspoken in his attempt to secure the place of Christianity in society. He has attacked the caricature of the Catholic church as "some heartless, insular institution that wants to deny people their freedom", describing it as a distortion to persuade people the church had no constructive role to play.

Last month, in an interview with the Guardian, he hit out at the representatives of an "aggressive secularism" he said was gaining ground in the UK, defended the church's role in the debate over "hybrid" embryos, and argued that Christian leaders should hold a privileged position over the leaders of other faiths when it came to their input into public policy in Britain.

He has also accused the government of being motivated by anti-religious thinking over adoption laws and single faith schools.

I think "J" means "naff" instead of "nuff".

Oh there "Reality Challenged" and Obfuscating Jihadist,

As usual you failed to address the "angel" issue. Once again:

How very disturbing that so many live in the shadows of these angel fictional thingies making significant errors especially in regard to Islamic issues, mistakes that are causing so much global agony and grief.

i.e. No one is safe until the tinkerbells are "detinkered"!!!!!!

Just a comment (JAC),

Thanks for the "evolution poem". It's pretty but where's the chemical equation and lab demonstration?

In poetic fashion they would reply. It's HIDDDEN in the LENGTH OF TIME. UNDISTINGUISHABLE MINUTE CHANGES. WE ALL COME FROM ONE, FROM THE ROSES' THORNS TO HUMAN HAIR SPIKES, FROM JUMPING MONKEYS TO TOM CRUISE'S JUMING ON OPRAH'S COUCH.

Tall buildings are not built by poems, it needs equations. Show us the equation OR ELSE there WILL BE NO FUNDING for the building to rise. THAT IS SCIENCE.

Merry Anonymous:

I spoke to your cousin Tim as you suggested. He muttered something about some dame.

There’s something that I must confess:
I’m often seen wearing a dress.
It’s nothing so strange,
Not the least bit deranged,
It’s because I’m a woman, no less.

This is a non-religious poem from the web site "Understanding Evolution":

"An Introduction to Evolution

The definition
Biological evolution, simply put, is descent with modification. This definition encompasses small-scale evolution (changes in gene frequency in a population from one generation to the next) and large-scale evolution (the descent of different species from a common ancestor over many generations). Evolution helps us to understand the history of life.

**************************************
Leaves on trees change color and fall over several weeks. Mountain ranges erode over millions of years.
A genealogy illustrates change with inheritance over a small number of years. Over a large number of years, evolution produces tremendous diversity in forms of life

**************************************
The explanation
Biological evolution is not simply a matter of change over time. Lots of things change over time: trees lose their leaves, mountain ranges rise and erode, but they aren't examples of biological evolution because they don't involve descent through genetic inheritance.

The central idea of biological evolution is that all life on Earth shares a common ancestor, just as you and your cousins share a common grandmother.

Through the process of descent with modification, the common ancestor of life on Earth gave rise to the fantastic diversity that we see documented in the fossil record and around us today. Evolution means that we're all distant cousins: humans and oak trees, hummingbirds and whales."

Peace to all,

JAC

'A lion ran into a lemur
a thorn in his paw made him meaner
Oh, please Mr. Lion
I don't want to be dyin'
with my hand I'll improve your demeanor'

Concerned the Christian Now Liberated,

concy likes seeing ladies in the buff
especially those in the printed stuff,
it would cause some to be in a huff
loving pornography is just so nuff

Got to leave.

You dirty-minded, mangled-minded old pussycat, you!

Cheers

Arminius -

You THINK you “know,” (I'd say “decided”)
That God inside you hath resided.
And inside me, too,
Which I think isn’t true:
Human love is the thing that’s abided.

Oh there "Reality Challenged" and Obfuscating Jihadist,

Hmmm, your "poetry" is added proof that there are no Islamic "pretty, wingie, flying, talking thingies giving you any kind of assistance. Hmmm, maybe Kola Boof might be able to help you? Or maybe you could quit your day job, become a full time poet (with the assistance of Ms. Boof of course) with book publications and your revealing photo on the back of each book ala Boof in the Buff.

Hmmm, The Jihadist in the buff?? OK bloggers out there what sayest thou?? "Me thinks" it would be a great final point in her Five Point AA (Angels Anonymous) Cleansing Program.

Maybe Mrs. Clinton should try poetry and "buffing" in her next job??

Back to Reality: Again how very disturbing that so many live in the shadows of these angel fictional thingies making significant errors especially in regard to Islamic issues, mistakes that are causing so much global agony and grief.

i.e. No one is safe until the tinkerbells are "detinkered"!!!!!!

"It shows that you not only don't know what science actually says. It shows that you don't want to know."

In Engineering, which is pure science, every "doctrine" we have has to be proven mathematically and in the lab. When I read Darwin's Descent of Man, there was nothing of both. No math equations nor lab testings. NOTHING and most of its supporters are people whose brains are trained to memorize and not analyze.

You ask them what is evolution, they give more "play of words" like "natural selection" but not a single chemical equation nor any lab demonstration.

For me, it has become a DUPING ART -- a cousin of racketeering. The "science" world is now divided into the duped and the "unduped".

Quite similar with false religions. They dupe and milions obey. The world is now divided into the religious duped and the non-religious duped. What a funny world. But what's funnier is that THEY LOVE BEING DUPED. For many people, fantasy is a better world. What they don't know is that the "fantasy maker" has something for them in the end --- a disastrous end.

Lion and lemur poem is mine. Forgot to sign.

Anon,

The palely loitering Knight could be my cousin, Tim. He never knows what to do with himself between jousts, tourneys, wars, and such. As for his wan complection, his helmut makes it hard for him to get much sun. Pity. He's not bad looking.

Anyway, he's really a stand-up fellow--no need to call the police. You'd be doing him a great kindness if you asked him how things are going.

Sincerely,
M. Anonymous

Thanks Anonymous, Chris E., and George G. for your help with my homo erectus limerick. I'm still fiddling with it. Here is a nature-related limerick. Editing suggestions welcome.

A lion ran into a lemur
And said, "Ill make a toothpick out of your femor."
"Oh please, "Mr. Lion,
I don't want to be dyin'
So to your intentions, I demur."

Concerned the Christian Now Liberated:)

Uhhh! Pussycat! You:

"Poet" on and on,
You are still so very, very wrong!!!

concy says just two lines
in thoughts semi-refined,
they seem quite confined
to his crossanized lines

AA is for dismal drunks
who thinks and act like skunks,
concy says angels are bunk
yet his posts without them are sunk

politicians are no angels
in every and all angles,
so don't get into tangles
with the politicians' finangles

There's a knight loitering. Palely, I would say. Yes, he's out there, palely loitering.

Don't see a cop anywhere.

Pam's post caused me all kinds of twitchin's,
"You're off topic!" came her rude b*tchin's,
If she thinks my rhymes
Are wasting her time
She can always read Christopher Hitchens!

Hi, E Fav,
Glad you are here. I reply, but limericks can't handle it:

Please don't say that it is drugs
Do not turn back with sighs and shrugs
God did not talk especially to me
I felt his touch, to me and thee
It was then I knew two paths to go
Both science and faith, this I do know
This I say, in truth, to you
God IS divine, but earthly too.

Warm welcome to new poet here
E Fav's arrived, so let's all cheer
Yet not complacent shall we be
He's come to limerick, we will see
He'll hammer us all, let that be clear!

To Arminius

Why is feeling a bolt from the blue,
seen as God talking specially to you?
Could be something inside,
Or those drugs that that you tried.
Seems divine, but is earthly, ‘tis true.

Muslim, Christian?
Allah, God?
Mohammed, Jesus?
Koran, Bible?
Mosque, church?
Mecca, Jerusalem?
Paradise, Heaven
Crescent, cross?

New York, New York?
London (England), London (Ontario)?
Canton (China), Canton (Ohio)?
Cairo (Egypt), Cairo (Illinois)?

Smith, Jones?
Iceberg, Goldberg?

What's the difference?

Arminius, Chris Everett and Mark
Went prancing through Limerick Park
Often not being
Attuned to agreeing,
But oh what a fabulous lark!

To Pam M:

Don't like what you read here, you say?
And that Susan should change that today?
Why not do it yourself,
Like a good little elf,
Or just loosen up some and just play!

On behalf of TPMB, who seems to be blocked:

I came here to sound the alarm
I hope that you all remain calm
No time to be petty
Take care and be ready
Sincerely, Thom Paul Moses Baum

Dear Arminius:

The difference 'tween "know" and "believe"
Is simple...if I might proceed.
We "know" things called facts,
While "belief" is a trap,
Where a "fact" is whatever you please.

Parallel paths to logic and reason,
Are faith's, which doth change with the season.
For Spring's "god du jour,"
Becomes Fall's "false poseur,"
And the faithful fall prey to such teasin'.

The Great Duel continues!

Let me make this perfectly clear
Do not label me shackled with fear
God's with me, I know this is true
Not rumor, he's also with you
Do not believe all that you hear.

Once again we're together inspired
But I do not want to get fired
I'm nearing the brink
And I shudder to think
What will happen when I am retired

Susan I know you are one of the people that actually read your posts. Can't you talk to WAPO about how they monitor these sites??? So much garbage these days. Out of all of the posts on here they may be half that actually are on topic. Please do something so I can return to posting on a site that really "WAS" good. Thanks

You fear dread as if it were a tumor
So you choose to believe divine rumor
But rejoice and be free
In life's uncertainty
The absurd is the source of its humor

Mr Mark, can't do this with a limerick:

I say 'Yes!' to both science and logic
But a second path also I tread
Parallel to that road of pure reason
It's full of God's love, but no dread
There's no conflict here I can find
In those two trails I carefully wend
God gave us Himself and our minds
Parallel lines will, yes, meet at the end.

Dear Arminius -

You have my respect, that is right,
We discuss, as opposed to, "we fight,"
I once shared your delusion,
And I've reached the conclusion
That you, too, might see logic's light.

Schmoozealert needs disinfection
To accept our genetic connection
Mutation is chance
But the cause of advance
Is the pressure of nat'ral selection

Mr Mark and Chris,

Gotta reply in prose here for a moment. Man, you dudes put out good limericks! I had a good laugh over both.

What is crucial here is that we agree to disagree. I think there is mutual respect, I certainly respect you two.

Arminius

Dear Arminius -

You reject other gods, that I see,
Hanging on to the Biblical "Three."
We're not that far apart,
On the "that god's false" chart.
So, why not take that last step with me?

Arminus says, filled with pride
He can bridge the religious divide
But I'm at a loss
As to how one might cross
When he's planted both ends on one side

It's not Zeus or Poseidon or Cthulhu
None of these do I ever hold true
I know God is with me
It's a shame that you can't see
'Cause I know that God's also with you.

SCHMOOZEALERT writes:

"Seriously, anyone who believes we all came from an amoeba or some close facsimilie of ..all the way to the complex organism we are now - all by fate and chance..,"

Do you know nothing at all about evolution? Your posts seem to indicated that you haven't a clue.

What does "fate" have to do with evolution? Who ever said that evolution was "all...chance?" Not reputable scientists. That crap comes from the truth deniers in the ID crowd. In fact, reputable scientists AGREE with your cartoon assessment of evolutionary theory. They reject it as do you, BECAUSE IT HAS NO RELATION TO THE ACTUAL THEORY.

Look, I know that you prefer to cling to your non-factual lies about what evolution ISN'T, but I feel embarrassed for you when you haul out these infantile bromides. It shows that you not only don't know what science actually says. It shows that you don't want to know.

IF you want to learn about what evolution theory actually proves, then check out Berkeley's "Understanding Evolution" or the "Talk Origins" websites. I know you won't be bothered as the god delusion is strong with you. but at least you've been given a path to enlightenment.

Arminius says, "God is true,"
A statement he'll probably rue.
What of Zeus and Poseidon,
And a field that widens
To include ALL of man's "my God" crew?

BLOG BLOCKERS

Is it because someone has something to say that does not fit your political correctness the grounds that you use for blocking?

It is pretty obvious that hatred and slander have nothing to do with things being blocked. I know that it is your blog and you have the right to block but I was wondering what are you so afraid of?

Thank you, take care, be ready.

Sincerely, Thomas Paul Moses Baum.

There's Spidey's 'Science Sucks!' endless song
And the Atheists claim religion's all wrong
But science is true
And God? Yes, He too,
This conflict has gone on all too long.

Spiderman

First, your poem was, not bad. Was that really you who wrote it?

Second, the chemical processes that enable the evolution of life, is just plain old chemistry involving carbon, oxygen, phospherus, simple elements like that. It is the nature of matter, that the way that atoms and molecules exist that enable what seems to our small minds an infinite complexity of chemical combinations. If you do not believe that atoms exist, and interact in chemical combination with each other to form molecules, and that these things compose all elelemts and all compounds, if in short, you do not believe in chemistry, which is a well-established and settled theory by now, then of course, then, evolution might not make much sense.

Chemistry is not superstition. Even if you are not a chemist and do not know anything about it, it seems that you would acknowledge that is has some validity, in the synthetic fibers of your clothes, or the plastic in your coke bottle.

And also, I do not have a den where I lure people. It is just a name. And in the metaphor that the name conjures, Daniel in the Lion's Den means, "Daniel in great peril" doesn't it? It doesn't mean Daniel is a Lion in a Lion's Den.

Spidey's grand view of life comes to this:
"I know everything! Your view's amiss!
"Your great science? A crock!
"Jesus Christ is my rock!"
Though there's no proof he really exists.

Yes, we have no Reality
We have no Reality today
We have endless multiple Spideys
And Concerned's inane trivialities
But yes, we have no Reality
We have no Reality today.

Oh there "Reality Challenged" and Obfuscating Jihadist,

"Poet" on and on,
You are still so very, very wrong!!!

Some great news for you though !!!!

AA is not only the abbreviation for Alcoholics Anonymous, it also is the abbreviation for Angels Anonymous. We signed you up along with Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama (and his preacher Jerimiah).

AA's Part 1 to their Five Step Program to Conquer Angelic Desires and Addiction:

"It is all about the founders of the major religions and their favorite "tinker bell(s)" aka angel or pretty, wingie, flying, talking fictional thingie.

The Abraham-Moses myths had their Angel of Death and other "no-namers" to do their dirty work or other assorted duties.

Jesus and his family had Michael, Gabriel, and Satan, the latter being a modern day demon of the demented.

Mohammed had his Gabriel and Jinn. (more Islamic plagiarism from the ancient religions.)

Joe Smith had his Moroni.

Jehovah Witnesses have their Jesus /Michael the archangel, the first angelic being created by God;

Contemporary biblical and religious scholars have relegated these "pretty wingie thingies" to the myth pile. You should do the same to include deleting all references to them in your religious operating manuals e.g. bible, koran. Doing this will eliminate the prophet/profit/prophecy status of these founders and put them where they belong as simple humans just like you.

Some added references to "tinker bells".

"Latter-day Saints also believe that Michael the Archangel was Adam (the first man) when he was mortal, and Gabriel lived on the earth as Noah."

Apparently hallucinations did not stop with Joe Smith.

From: newadvent.org/cathen/07049c.htm

"The belief in guardian angels can be traced throughout all antiquity; pagans, like Menander and Plutarch (cf. Euseb., "Praep. Evang.", xii), and Neo-Platonists, like Plotinus, held it. It was also the belief of the Babylonians and Assyrians, as their monuments testify, for a figure of a guardian angel now in the British Museum once decorated an Assyrian palace, and might well serve for a modern representation; while Nabopolassar, father of Nebuchadnezzar the Great, says: "He (Marduk) sent a tutelary deity (cherub) of grace to go at my side; in everything that I did, he made my work to succeed."

Catholic monks and Dark Age theologians also did their share of hallucinating and "thingie" naming:

"TUBUAS-A member of the group of angels who were removed from the ranks of officially recognized celestial hierarchy in 745 by a council in Rome under Pope Zachary. He was joined by Uriel, Adimus, Sabaoth, Simiel, and Raguel."

And tinker bells go way, way back:

"In Zoroastrianism there are different angel like creatures. For example each person has a guardian angel caled Fravashi. They patronize human being and other creatures and also manifest god’s energy. Also, the Amesha Spentas have often been regarded as angels, but they don't convey messages, but are rather emanations of Ahura Mazda ("Wise Lord", God); they appear in an abstract fashion in the religious thought of Zarathustra and then later (during the Achaemenid period of Zoroastrianism) became personalized, associated with an aspect of the divine creation (fire, plants, water...)."

"The beginnings of the biblical belief in angels must be sought in very early folklore. The gods of the Hittites and Canaanites had their supernatural messengers, and parallels to the Old Testament stories of angels are found in Near Eastern literature. "

"The 'Magic Papyri' contain many spells to secure just such help and protection of angels. From magic traditions arose the concept of the guardian angel. "

For added information see the review at:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel

T'was a birdless morn
and a cloudy noon.
Little drops of rain,
Wets the sun dried grain.

Anon:

Weather reports have it that birdlessness event is due to sedge having withered from hedge--latest meteorological report....

Best,
George

'Twas a birdless morn.

Daniel den wrote "The chemical processes that enable the evolution of life operate on a molecular level"

Lest others might be entrapped in his den:

Just what exatly that chemical process is and what chemicals are involved, NOBODY KNOWS and yet everybody believes. SOUNDS LIKE SUPERSTITION.

LIKE MAGIC. In the old times, they are called witch, now they are called evolutionists. How magical is time, that's why evolutionists use the length of time to hide their magic or witchcraft.

Look at me and don't blink. In time, thru length of time, I'll be me.. yes...I'll be Spiderman.

VOILA!! ohhlala

This is for Brambleton's reply to Gerry:

You speak casually about going to Hell, in the same way that you would speak of going to the store, and you speak casually about sinners, as though this is something that we all understand and know about, when, really, it is your speculation, and everyone's speculation, which are all different.

And you speak of God loving the world, in a casual way, as though you know exactly what God is, and what God thinks and feels, and what motivates God, yet we cannot even know these things about our inner selves, nor about each other; how then can we know these things about God?

What you are describing is man's theology, a sort of road-map to the world of "God" which is written in detail even greater than real road maps to real places. I, at least, am aware of the things that I cannot know, and do not lust and quest after knowledge, which I know, is, by the very nature of existence, sealed off from us, forever inaccessible, and realizing that, I am ok, just living in this world into which I have been set.

Dear Anon, Schmoozie & Spidey -

As I read your religious insight,
Seems like fear is your one guiding light.
Fear of non-Christian nations,
Or eternal damnation,
Or worse - fear the atheist's right.

Gerry,

1) You don't go to Hell because you are a sinner. We are all sinners. Every single Christian living and breathing in this world is a sinner. You go to Hell because you reject God's love and Christ's atonement for your sin.

2) You don't go to Heaven (which occurs at the 2nd coming) because God loves you. God loves everyone. John 3:16, "For God loved THE WORLD..." Notice, it doesn't say, "For God so loved all the Christians."

3) God doesn't punish your sin by sending you to Hell. Saying otherwise is foolish, and more importantly, non-biblical.

No birds sing

Again, Spidey quotes his old book,
Truth be told, that's as far as he'll look,
Not for him advanced learning,
Or he might end up burning
In hell, by his god long forsook.

SCHMOOZEALERT

Just because you would not expect to see inanimate objects come to life and assemble themselves into robots, does not disprove the scientific consensus regarding the validation of the evolution of life.

The chemical processes that enable the evolution of life operate on a molecular level, which no one can see or discern with their natural and unaided senses.

Concerned the Christian Now Liberated,

Ahh...that deserve more bad prose and verse from moi.

Hello pussycat
that was that,
throw a bite
and here on site

One doth imagine Kola Boof says all her prayers as:

I'm tired, I'm tired, I'm tired
I want, I want, I want, I want

One hopes she would then not be tired, tired, tired enough to go out and actually work to get what she want, she want, she want.

Kola can have her own religion
and work too for her own region,
her weariness and wants are legion
so much so it is now legend

Kola wants her real mother
oh why is that such a bother,
mothers are always none other
those who cares for us together

Kola seeks some sanity
but indulge she did her vanity,
the journey to reality
is for her most grim and gritty

the Five Step Program is a scam
it is mostly really a sham,
Crossanization is so crammed
all its disciples can do is wham

from a wit to a twit
to wit it'll cause a fit,
all you should do is to sit
and see what happens in a bit

so hither and dither
let there be titters,
does it really matter
blogs are a splatter

slay me
sway me
flay me
play me
pray for me?
I don't
I don't want
I don't want you
I don't want you or anyone to.

Zen for the masses:
Lights, Camera, Action!
Tree falls in forest.

Merry Anonymous,

And still the religious reject us!

Merry Anonymous,

The science museums collect us.

Merry Anonymous,

But we're dead so it doesn't affect us

Seriously, anyone who believes we all came from an amoeba or some close facsimilie of ..all the way to the complex organism we are now - all by fate and chance...I ask that anyone to put a pile of wires, transistors, steel and a motherboard or two in the middle of the floor somewhere and then give me a holler when it starts forming some resemblance of the shape of a robot or something.

The mere thought that there cannot be anything greater than mankind is the very reason why this worlds ills are getting worse and worse. We live in a world that is starting to spin more and more out of control folks....and it is so not because schmoozie says so....read the headlines, look between the lines, be objective in how those in authority across this globe do not have all the answers. There is a dire need for a change. Most will be suprised how that change will come.

Alarmist? Defeatist? Trouble-maker? No. Realist.

All the best to all. Schmoozie will bow out now.

Seriously: The trouble with most religions (the Abrahamic religions at least) is they can prove just anything, right together with its absolute contrary. Two contradictory statements cannot contain any truth - at least one must be wrong, or the whole system is worthless:

1. You are pious and happy - God rewards you (now), because he loves you. (The richer, the more pious, obviously).
2. You are pious and unhappy (poor, sick etc.): God tests and uses the rod (now), because he loves you (maybe rewards you later).
3. You are a sinner (non-believer, wrong religion etc.) - you go to hell (later), because god did not enlighten you (?).
4. You are a sinner (New Orleans etc.), god punishes you (now), because he is furious - no future: Hell.
5. You are a sinner (now) and Christ died for you - you go to heaven (maybe later), because god loves you.

It is all so ... (insert opinion).

Some people think two square is four
Not less and not very much more.
For going to heaven
you must think it is seven,
Or else, for you hell is in store.

Spiderman2, I love your response to this poster....too bad he will not get the "just" of what it really means.

spiderman2:
Mr Mark wrote :

"" The believers cry, "Atheist dolt,"
"God is real, you're in for a jolt!"
Yet, I blaspheme away,
Hell, I do it all day,
And I've yet to be struck by a bolt. ""

Well that's sad because Christ has said in Rev. 3:19

"As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten."

"If there has been no bolt,
It's not that there is no God, That's what He told.
It could be a sign of trouble,
That His love to this person, He hath withhold."

The "Reality Challenged" and Obfuscating Jihadist says she gets Kola Boof's message i.e.

"I am tired of Jesus and Mohammed.
I am tired of man's foot.
I am tired of the White man's mother.
I am weary...from doing nothing about it.

I want my own religion.
I want my real mother."

so this means that the Jihadist's journey to the new Reality is nearing an end?? We again come to her aid in these final steps with the Five Step Program for Eliminating 1400 years of Islamic Brainwashing.

To wit:

Using "The 77 Branches of Islamic "faith" a collection compiled by Imam Bayhaqi as a starting point. In it, he explains the essential virtues that reflect true "faith" (iman) through related Qur’anic verses and Prophetic sayings." i.e. a nice summary of the Koran and Islamic beliefs.

"1. Belief in Allah"

"aka as God, Yahweh, Zeus, Jehovah, Mother Nature, etc." should be added to your cleansing neurons.

"2. To believe that everything other than Allah was non-existent. Thereafter, Allah Most High created these things and subsequently they came into existence."

Evolution and the Big Bang or the "Gib Gnab" (when the universe starts to recycle) are more plausible and the "akas" for Allah should be included if you continue to be a "creationist".
"3. To believe in the existence of angels."
A major item for neuron cleansing. Angels/devils are the mythical creations of ancient civilizations, e.g. Hittites, to explain/define natural events, contacts with their gods, big birds, sudden winds, protectors during the dark nights, etc. No "pretty/ugly wingy thingies" ever visited or talked to Mohammed, Jesus, Mary or Joseph or Joe Smith. Today we would classify angels as fairies and "tinker bells". Modern devils are classified as the demons of the demented.

"4. To believe that all the heavenly books that were sent to the different prophets are true. However, apart from the Quran, all other books are not valid anymore."

Another major item to delete. There are no books written in the spirit state of Heaven (if there is one) just as there are no angels/"pwtfft"s to write/publish/distribute them. The Koran, OT, NT etc. are simply books written by humans for humans.

Prophets were invented by ancient scribes typically to keep the uneducated masses in line. Today we call them fortune tellers.
Prophecies are also invalidated by the natural/God/Allah gifts of Free Will and Future.

"5. To believe that all the prophets are true. However, we are commanded to follow the Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him) alone."

Mohammed spent thirty days fasting in a hot cave before his first contact with Allah aka God etc. via a "pretty wingy thingy". Common sense demands a neuron deletion of #5. #5 is also the major source of Islamic violence i.e. turning Mohammed's "fast, hunger-driven" hallucinations into horrible reality for unbelievers.

Jihadist, the Persons of the New Reality are "praying" for you 24/7 therefore your salvation is near!!!

Merry Anonymous:

Not my best work, but on such short notice, I offer this:

It's not right to so disrespect us.

Should have been:

And all the while crying 'elect us'.

Thank you.........

Ooops! About the Boof poof, how could I forget about the "tired" bits?

i am tired of being tired
i am tired those who are tired,
i am weary of those who are wary
i am leery of those who are airy,
i am proud of my white woman mother
i am tired of those who blame the "other"

"There's no mayonnaise in Ireland"
Oops, sorry, I mean, "No man's an island".

Moi the stalking big cat: ROOOOOOAAARRR!!!!!!!!!
Boof the scampering small cat: meow

While all the while crying 'elect us'.

S O S S O S S O S S O S S O S S O S

LIMERICK ASSISTANCE NEEDED:

A closing line for the following is urgently requested:

I once met a Homo Erectus
Who said, "Heaven help and protect us.
They're ruining our homes,
Digging up our bones,

For those of you who might have missed Pat Condell, check it out here. He's hilarious.

http://www.freethinker.co.uk/2008/02/27/laughing-religion-off-the-planet-an-interview-with-pat-condell/

Mr Mark wrote :

" The believers cry, "Atheist dolt,"
"God is real, you're in for a jolt!"
Yet, I blaspheme away,
Hell, I do it all day,
And I've yet to be struck by a bolt. "

Well that's sad because Christ has said in Rev. 3:19

"As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten."

If there has been no bolt,
It's not that there is no God, That's what He told.
It could be a sign of trouble,
That His love to this person, He hath withhold.

Concerned the Christian Now Liberated,

What's up, pussycat? What now, pussycat? That Kola Boof poetry reposted again? I got her point the first time.

i want i want i want i want i want
sounds like a whine so wan,
we all live under the same sun
you’re not the only one with want and wants,
what i want may not be what you want
others too have other wants,
food, shelter and clothing are in want
for many are the ones with such wants,
to say i want, i want i want i want
is not what you should want,
it blinds you to your own wants
as the one and only want

Moi the stalking big cat:ROOOOAAAAARRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!

Boof the scampering small cat: meow.

Take it easy pussycat:)

I should point out that I died in 1824. I've taken up lodgings on this thread and feared the return of one with dread. Hence, my Southey travesty. (Not that I turn from Kola, a worthy singer, she.)

Your servant,
George Gordon, Lord Byron

Having written one original poem on this thread, and one original poem on the previous thread, I have to say that even bad poetry is not easy to write. So, what can I say?

Gee, I am so impressed, by this explosion of creativity; I always knew there was alot of something pent-up here; I just didn't know what.

So, maybe if Susan could prolong this a bit, she could collect all the best poems and have them published, and we would all become RICH!

I think we have forgettin the question at hand, because, it is not particularly worthwhile or thougt-provoking.

Susan, perhaps you could let WaPo powers-that-be know that the questions are consistently not holding people's attention.

From my travesty: The Vision of Judgment

(It was after A Vision of Judgment by the Poet Laureate, Robert Southey. A very recent post called it to mind.)

Here concludes the debate on what to do with Southey's ghost, whom St. Peter doesn't wish in heaven. Negotiations have been awhile underway with Lucifer.

Now the bard, glad to get an audience which
By no means oft was his case below,
Began to cough, and hawk, and hem, and pitch
His voice into that awful note of woe
To all unhappy hearers within reach
Of poets when the tide of rhyme's in flow;
But stuck fast with his first hexameter,
Not one of all whose gouty feet would stir.

XCI
But ere the spavin'd dactyls could be spurr'd
Into recitative, in great dismay
Both cherubim and seraphim were heard
To murmur loudly through their long array:
And Michael rose ere he could get a word
Of all his founder'd verses under way.
And cried, 'For God's sake stop, my friend! 'twere best --
Non Di, non homines --- you know the rest.'

XCII
A general bustle spread throughout the throng.
Which seem'd to hold all verse in detestation;
The angels had of course enough of song
When upon service; and the generation
Of ghosts had heard too much in life, not long
Before, to profit by a new occasion;
The monarch, mute till then, exclaim'd, 'What! What!
Pye come again? No more -- no more of that!'

XCIII
The tumult grew; an universal cough
COnvulsed the skies, as during a debate
When Castlereagh has been up long enough
(Before he was first minister of state,
I mean -- the slaves hear now); some cried 'off, off!'
As at a farce; till, grown quite desperate,
The bard Saint Peter pray'd to interpose
(Himself an author) only for his prose.

XCIV
The varlet was not an ill-favour'd knave;
A good deal like a vulture in the face,
With a hook nose and a hawk'd eye, which gave
A smart and sharper-looking sort of grace
To his whole aspect, which, though rather grave,
Was by no means so ugly as his case;
But that, indeed, was hopeless as can be,
Quite a poetic felony, 'de se.'

XCV
Then Michael blew his trump, and still'd the noise
With one still greater, as is yet the mode
On earth besides; except some grumbling voice,
Which now and then will make a slight inroad
Upon decorous silence, few will twice
Lift up their lungs when fairly overcrow'd;
And now the bard could plead his own bad cause,
With all the attitudes of self-applause.

XCVI
He said -- (I only give the heads) -- he said,
He meant no harm in scribbling; 'twas his way
Upon all topics; 'twas, besides, his bread,
Of which he butter'd both sides; 'twould delay
Too long the assembly (he was pleased to dread),
And take up rather more time than a day,
To name his works -- he would but cite a few --
'Wat Tyler' -- 'Rhymes on Blenheim' -- 'Waterloo.'

XCVII
He had written praises of a regicide:
He had written praises of all kings whatever;
He had written for republics far and wide;
And then against them bitterer than ever;
For pantisoracy he once had cried
Aloud, a scheme less moral than 'twas clever;
Then grew a hearty anti-jacobin --
Had turn'd his coat -- and would have turn'd his skin.

XCVIII
He had sung aginst all battles, and again
In their high prise and glory; he had call'd
Reviewing 'the ungentle craft,' and then
Become as base a critic as e'er crawl'd --
Fed, paid, and pamper'd by the very men
By whom his muse and morals had been maul'd:
He had written much blank verse, and blanker prose,
And more of both than anybody knows.

XCIX
He had written Wesley's life: -- here turning round
To Satan, 'Sir, I'm ready to write yours,
In two octavo volumes, nicely bound,
With notes and preface, all that most allures
The pious purchaser; and there's no ground
For fear, for I can choose my own reviews:
So let me have the proper documents,
That I may add you to my other saints.'

C
Satan bow'd, and was silent. 'Well, if you,
With amiable modesty, decline
My offer, what says Michael? There are few
Whose memoirs could be render'd more divine.
Mine is a pen of all work; not so new
As it once was, but I would make you shine
Like your own trumpet. By the way, my own
Has more of brass in it, and is as well blown.

CI
'But talking about trumpets, here's my Vision!
Now you shall judge, all people; yes, you shall
Judge with my judgment, and by my decision
Be guided who shall enter heaven or fall.
I settle all these things by intuition,
Times present, past, to come, heaven, hell, and all,
Like King Alfonso. When I thus see double,
I save the Deity some worlds of trouble.'

CII
He ceased, and drew forth an MS.; and no
Persuasion on the part of devils, saints,
Or angels, now could stop the torrent; so
He read the first three lines of the contents;
But at the fourth, the whole spiritual show
Had vanish'd, with variety of scents,
Ambrosial and sulphureous, as they sprang,
Like lightning, off from his 'melodious twang.'

CIII
Those grand heroics acted as a spell:
The angels stopp'd their ears and plied their pinions;
The devils ran howling, deafen'd, down to hell;
The ghosts fled, gibbering, for their own dominions --
(For 'tis not yet decided where they dwell,
And I leave every man to his opinions);
Michael took refuge in his trump -- but, lo!
His teeth were set on edge, he could not blow!

CIV
Saint Peter, who has hitherto been known
For an impetuous saint, upraised his keys,
And at the fifth line knock'd the poet down;
Who fell like Phaeton, but more at ease,
Into his lake, for there he did not drown;
A different web being by the Destinies
Woven for the Laureate's final wreath, whene'er
Reform shall happen either here or there.

CV
He first sank to the bottom - like his works,
But soon rose to the surface -- like himself;
For all corrupted things are bouy'd like corks,
By their own rottenness, light as an elf,
Or wisp that flits o'er a morass: he lurks,
It may be, still, like dull books on a shlef,
In his own den, to scrawl some 'Life' or 'Vision,'
As Welborn says -- 'the devil turn'd precisian.'

CVI
As for the rest, to come to the conclusion
Of this true dream, the telescope is gone
Which kept my optics free from all delusion,
And show'd me what I in my turn have shown;
All I saw farther, in the last confusion,
Was, that King George slipp'd into heaven for one;
And when the tumult dwindled to a calm,
I left him practising the hundredth psalm.

Some real poetry for Clinton and O'bama to read. Ditto for the rest of us.

"Born on the Nile River in Sudan, KOLA BOOF is an exciting new voice in literature. Her remarkably beautiful (but controversial) poetry collection, "NILE RIVER WOMAN" is now available at Amazon.Com. Some of the classic poems from that collection are printed right on this page!! Also see her tribute to her slain friend, Theo Van Gogh: poetwomen.50megs.com/catalog.html

Published in Africa/1997:

"BINT IL NIL"

I want a new religion.
The one our mothers had in the river.

I am tired of Jesus and Mohammed.
I am tired of man's foot.
I am tired of the White man's mother.
I am weary...from doing nothing about it.

I want my own religion.
I want my real mother.

Africa, I want you.

Make me pregnant with God.
Our own perfect babies...Black as perfection.
Tall as the sky. Healthy as light sparkling on
clear water.

I want my own religion.
I want my own voice.
I want my own face.
I want my own hair.
I am Naima/the one who is victorious
the one

who is praying"

An atheist I am I say
Yet love my neighbor in every way
To nonbelieve is not to despise
A few simple words for the self-deemed wise.

The believers cry, "Atheist dolt,"
"God is real, you're in for a jolt!"
Yet, I blaspheme away,
Hell, I do it all day,
And I've yet to be struck by a bolt.

Once there was a Spiderman,
Who belived in one from Bethlehem.
There were those who despised him
Yet mainly reprised him
Though they thought their harps aeolian.

Alternatively put: Best to picketh on those one's own size, or even better stated: Love thy neighbor.

The proof that your god is not real,
May be found in the following spiel:
Any god with a plan,
Who made Spidey "da man,"
Would instantly lose his appeal.

There you go Spiderman2,

You're on your own now. No, the world will not end today. Have fun with prose and verse. It's not a "sin in us". Whatever that means.

--------------------------------------------------

Merry Anonymous:)

all for one and one for all
an always the natural call
of manimals to make a prey fall
and which no one can stall

Got to go.

Cheers
"J"

As a regular fan of this site,
I have noticed a curious plight,
Posts to atheist columns,
Draw volumes and volumes,
While response to believers is slight.

Recently, this is my favorite prose.

With great power comes great responsibility
This is my gift , my curse.
Who Am I?
Im Spiderman2

To erase stupidity is my duty
Or else they'll live in their folly
Like the thief on the cross, nothing is required
But to say Im sorry, and start to live holy.

One against all, now, is/was it?

And so it is now to be all against one? Or some?

Hmmm....Where have I seen this before?

Spidey, oh Spidey, how sad you are
Our Lord did preach peace, yet you wish for war
'Love your neighbor' he said, did you not hear?
Why is it that your neighbors you fear?
Why is it you hate, when Jesus taught love?
The God we worship is not hate, He is all Love.
You think it's really all cast in stone
You think that the Word is said and done
Can you not see He's not through with us yet,
We need guidance and teaching, on that you can bet
We've messed up the world that God made for man
He'll sneak in once more to teach us again
His Word is dynamic, more teaching he'll send
His plan still unfolds, we can't know to what end
But know this now, God is the judge
It's not your task to do
Stand fast, just as a rock,
Love God, and your neighbor too.

Oh what a man, oh what music
Phil Spector's the one to seek
River Deep Mountain High's the peak
cause your body of sex to reek

--------------------------------------------------

Spiderman2. One against all here?

Well, I'm going to hell by you book too. But, that's okay. I'm giving you some moral support here to boost your morale against these "stupid" scums of the earth, non-God fearing louts, irreligious riff-raffs and what not. Sort of if you want so:

Oy Spidey oh Spiderman
Oh ye a believer, and so amen
taking here words like cement
and from you still no comment

let the bloghogs taste your flogs
it won't turn any into frogs
make more points that seem like fog
and let come too Gog and Magog

tell them all you have a God
taunt them they're all they've got
their words' not cast in gold ingots
for some are just Spidery bigots

say to them your God is great
nothing they say will ever grate
tough for them if they can't take
for heaven and hell is at stake

let fire and brimstone come
from purgatory to hell and then some
angels, satan and demons are the sum
of all the fears that is not welcomed

the tooth fairy is not for fools
the unicorn is really beautiful
Santa really keeps one hopeful
the Flying Spaghetti Monster makes one drools

they have no life after this life
the second chance of the afterlife
what is there for them to like
so you can tell them to take a hike

put them all to the stakes
especially the ones who are fakes
let there be no mistake
you'll be back to cause more quakes

From Don Juan

Sagest of women, even of widows, she
Resolved that Juan should be quite a paragon,
And worthy of the noblest pedigree
(His sire was of Castile, his dam from Aragon):
Then for accomplishments of chivalry,
In case our lord the king should go to war again,
He learn'd the arts of riding, fencing, gunnery,
And how to scale a fortress- or a nunnery.

But that which Donna Inez most desired,
And saw into herself each day before all
The learned tutors whom for him she hired,
Was, that his breeding should be strictly moral;
Much into all his studies she inquired,
And so they were submitted first to her, all,
Arts, sciences, no branch was made a mystery
To Juan's eyes, excepting natural history.

The languages, especially the dead,
The sciences, and most of all the abstruse,
The arts, at least all such as could be said
To be the most remote from common use,
In all these he was much and deeply read;
But not a page of any thing that 's loose,
Or hints continuation of the species,
Was ever suffer'd, lest he should grow vicious.

His classic studies made a little puzzle,
Because of filthy loves of gods and goddesses,
Who in the earlier ages raised a bustle,
But never put on pantaloons or bodices;
His reverend tutors had at times a tussle,
And for their AEneids, Iliads, and Odysseys,
Were forced to make an odd sort! of apology,
For Donna Inez dreaded the Mythology.

Ovid 's a rake, as half his verses show him,
Anacreon's morals are a still worse sample,
Catullus scarcely has a decent poem,
I don't think Sappho's Ode a good example,
Although Longinus tells us there is no hymn
Where the sublime soars forth on wings more ample:
But Virgil's songs are pure, except that horrid one
Beginning with 'Formosum Pastor Corydon.'

Lucretius' irreligion is too strong,
For early stomachs, to prove wholesome food;
I can't help thinking Juvenal was wrong,
Although no doubt his real intent was good,
For speaking out so plainly in his song,
So much indeed as to be downright rude;
And then what proper person can be partial
To all those nauseous epigrams of Martial?

Juan was taught from out the best edition,
Expurgated by learned men, who place
Judiciously, from out the schoolboy's vision,
The grosser parts; but, fearful to deface
Too much their modest bard by this omission,
And pitying sore his mutilated case,
They only add them all in an appendix,
Which saves, in fact, the trouble of an index;

For there we have them all 'at one fell swoop,'
Instead of being scatter'd through the Pages;
They stand forth marshall'd in a handsome troop,
To meet the ingenuous youth of future ages,
Till some less rigid editor shall stoop
To call them back into their separate cages,
Instead of standing staring all together,
Like garden gods- and not so decent either.

The Missal too (it was the family Missal)
Was ornamented in a sort of way
Which ancient mass-books often are, and this all
Kinds of grotesques illumined; and how they,
Who saw those figures on the margin kiss all,
Could turn their optics to the text and pray,
Is more than I know- But Don Juan's mother
Kept this herself, and gave her son another.

Gerry,

Of course, welcome to the group - a good post there.
The muse has temporarily abandoned me, so I can't reply in verse. I must need another beer.

Arminius

In NC, Obama trashed Hillary
Her campaign was made to look silliery
She'll creep back to Senate Hill
With her hubby, Wild Man Bill
They're now both be known as Wild Billary

Mr. Mark, Chris E. and Arminius,
I don’t think it would be ignominious,
to rev myself up
By joining your club,
Even if I’m no poetry genius!

Thus:

The pious hell manager Spidey,
is trying to serve God Almighty,
distributing the ticket
for the good and the wicked
(a job, god knows, needs not a brighty!)

Two thousand times year after year,
the Christians cry „Jesus is near“!
These fear monger fellas
are trying to sell us
„to hell you go, if you are queer“!

I wonder if there’s an audition
For getting to heaven admission,
‘cause teaching the harp there
Would be awfully sharp there,
What a great angels’ orchestra vision!

After 2000 musical years
Of harping I do have some fears
That just for a change
The artistical range
from hell could use a few cheers!

Has anyone any good public news to share? Limericks, burlesques, etc., welcome.

Good news: The news the papers deem unfit to print.

Dueling limericks, what could be more fun?
And it's great when the battle is done
You've skewered your foe
He moans with great woe
You're King of Verse Hill, you the one!

Schmoozie whines that it's "three against one,"
Like his god - Father, Ghost and the Son.
But these poetry battles,
Within which he prattles,
Are sources of infinite fun.

Schmozzie's poetry let's us all see,
That he won't use an apostrophe,
It's as plain as his nose,
That he best stick with prose,
Unlike Chris, friend Armini and me!

SCHMOOZEALERT:

Chris, Mark, and me, that does make three
Two atheists one believer, that's me
We pursue different ends
Yet still we are friends
'Love your neighbor' - I'm sure you can see.

Everywhere, Christians see sin
Like the circling Great White's fin;
They can't have no fun
Till God's work is all done,
And the atheists have all given in.

Here we see schmoozers banded together
Once again its true
Like bullies on a neighborhood playground
3 against 1...nothing new.

Hey..some of us can stand on our own..some cant

:-)

The masters of limericks are three
Chris Everett, Mr Mark, and then me
Schmoozie's out in left field
To his betters he must yield
He's Stravinsky of rhyme, we can see.

(Mr Mark, your reference to Igor really made me laugh!)

While the atheists greet the new dawn,
The Christians here harp on and on,
How they do us a favor,
With news of a "Saviour"
Named "Jesus" - who's long dead and gone.

Schmozzie's poetry tries are quite stinky,
His meter is all off and clinky,
Such inelegant phrasing,
Is really amazing,
And reminds me of Igor Stravinsky.

I'm so sad that our friend Chris must leave us,
And our On Faith discussion of Jesus,
But, we'll hook up soon,
Perhaps, 'morrow at noon,
Or whenever the spirit doth seize us.

Marky sez he's met the new dawn
He sees it on his green lawn
But, alas, its but a cover
And soon he will discover
The atheist new dawn will be gone

Mr Mark,

Sorry, I thought that was from Chris. I looked up Phil Spector, and you are right. I certainly like rock, if done after the mid '60s. I was never into the producers of it though.

Arminus/Mr. Mark,

These limericks have been such good fun
As for rhyming, you're both #1
I'd sure like to stay
I could do this all day
But I think that I really must run

Arminius -

Chris hit it on the head. Phil Spector is a god among pop music fans as one of the most-famous producers of hit records, ever.

Sorry if my reference was a bit obtuse.

Chris,

I know that God IS, but can't prove it
That's the rock where I stand, you can't move it
You say God's nowhere in sight
That's your absolute right
Have you the guts to say you can't prove it?

Arminus,

You say "Well, color me dumb, I really don't understand the reference to Phil Spector. I sorta know who he is, but am at a loss about how it fits."

Welcome to MY world. About God.

Well, color me dumb, I really don't understand the reference to Phil Spector. I sorta know who he is, but am at a loss about how it fits.

Arminus you're one hell of a gent
But as for your last post, get bent
And regarding your bridge
Let me move it a smidge
All you need to know, God ISN'T!

;)

Friend Arminius could be a rector,
"God IS," he says, full of conjecture.
The agnostic's head shakes,
"More sense you would make
"If you said you were really Phil Spector!"

Pascal makes abundantly clear
We should base our beliefs upon fear
And the greatest conceived
Is by Christians believed
And to think that they hold it so dear!

At peacemaking I'm not such a whiz
But I'd like to build a great bridge
Between atheists and fundies
You've both wads in your undies
All you need to know is, that God IS.

The Christians assault us with threats,
Saying, "Atheists! Best hedge your bets!
"Your soul is in danger,
"So, heed Pascal's Wager!"
Yet, religion's as wrong as it gets.

Schmoozie warns, "the awakening is near!"
As he lives a life crippled by fear,
But the atheists yawn,
Having met the new dawn,
That our science makes perfectly clear.

Schmoozealert seems to believe
That the godless will win a repreive
When the Lord shows his face
We'll be frozen in place
Until then I'll remain undeceived

SCHMOOZEALERT:

You mean the Great Pumpkin really is coming?

The atheists throw out the smear
Toward anyone who holds faith in God dear
They mutter, they moan..cant leave it alone
But their awakening is soon, yea near.

NOW thats nothing to schmooze about! Hang in there, atheists!

CCNL has made some very bad attacks on Jihadist. That bothers me very much. Otherwise I ignore him.

CCNL doesn't bother me. He cuts and pastes and repeats the same things over and over again; he is just part of the landscape; usually, I don't even read him.

Spidey has made it so clear
That the end of all days is quite near
But he could not be wronger
We need wait no longer
Rejoice! The Great Pumpkin is here!

It appears He committed a gaffe
Making Spidey too stupid, by half
But don't question the Man
It's a part of His plan
You'll admit that he's good for a laugh

For Brambleton:

"Clinton had Foster killed!" Limbaugh says,
All the while popping pills from his Pez.
His opinions bear watchin',
With a large dose of caution,
Don't forget - he extols bush as prez.

To Arminus and Mr. Mark
Your limericks sure are a lark
At keyboards you sit
Weaving wisdom with wit
While Spiderman sits in the dark

SPIDERMAN2

What I said was that the Catholic Eucharist is Jesus. Actually, in the bible, Jesus says very plainly that: "This is My Body and This is My Blood", and it also states that many people stopped following Him then, does it not?

Another thing that it says in the bible is: "Many are called, but few are chosen", being chosen doesn't mean that someone is better or anything like that, it just means that, that person is chosen by God, as it also says, "Remember, I have chosen you, you haven't chosen Me", does it not?

Take care, be ready.

Sincerely, Thomas Paul Moses Baum.

Merry Anonymous:

Sorry for not replying. I'm still puzzling over your entries..... must be too early!

Arminius

DTLD:

Can someone help CCNL? Bring him back from over the edge? Is that the point of this thread?

Andrew

I noticed awhile back that David T and Angela often used the exact same words and phrases that are not common, and I wondered if they might be the same person.

Canyon Shearer seems a little more polished and intelligent, but also, often much more threatening. He has made personal threats of violence several times on this blog; I think the Washington Post has banned him, but he sometimes makes an appearance as Karusso. Obviously, Jesus preys on his mind all the time, and sometimes, he gets carried away.

Then there is this Spiderman guy. He seems to have a pretty bad problem. Sometimes he is manic and sometimes, he seems genuinely stressed. However, I cannot tell if he is like this just when he posts, or is he like this in his true personality, and in everyday life?

I have a close relative who has manic-depression, and this guy Spiderman has some of the symptoms. When someone has this disorder, the real threat is of suicide. I know. I have been though all this. When you have a love-one with this illness, your life is a constant misery while they are in the grip of an episode, that any minute of any day, something terrible might happen.

Anyway, I wish he would stop worrying us, and go to someone he knows, and ask for help. No one here can help him.

Spidey rejects Evolution
With logic that's pure convolution
Like "It has to be wrong"
"'Cause it takes far too long"
Leaving God as the only solution

Re Spiderman2

Youre right Andrew, that accounts for the dejavue over and over again. He gets all the attention all the time, and is still getting it. Look at all the posts here right now, all about Spiderman.

Its ridiculous.

Right you are, Arminius! I have labored suffered much under the tutelage of E. A. Robinson for you. Are you not going to reply, worthy foe?

I heard a Fly buzz (465)
by Emily Dickinson

I heard a Fly buzz – when I died –
The Stillness in the Room
Was like the Stillness in the Air –
Between the Heaves of Storm –

The Eyes around – had wrung them dry –
And Breaths were gathering firm
For that last Onset – when the King
Be witnessed – in the Room –

I willed my Keepsakes – Signed away
What portions of me be
Assignable – and then it was
There interposed a Fly –

With Blue – uncertain stumbling Buzz –
Between the light – and me –
And then the Windows failed – and then
I could not see to see –

Chris,

You write good limericks!
The current poetry-writing Anonymous is not Spidey.

Arminius

Spiderman's Bible predictions
Are some of his strongest convictions
He claims that he knows 'em
But he never shows 'em
For fear we'll expose them as fictions

Andrew:

I see no more reason to ignore Spiderman than to ignore CCNL. In fact, if we were to team up and agree to ignore anyone, I would vote for the latter, who has found the one and only way, and has crossed the line numerous times.

Then, too, we might team up and ignore all whose atheism represents the unvarnished truth, the one and only hope of mankind, as is evidenced in Iraq.

We are all free to reply or not to reply to whomever we wish. Perhaps, we should leave it so.

Andrew,

Spidey doesn't sound like Angela to me. He should, though, read a bunch of science. He doesn't have to dump the Bible, he should just get out of Revelation and the OT and stick to the Gospels. But he won't do either. He is a sad case.

Arminius

Fellow Poets:

Worthy versifiers, all! I, the Arminius See/Shall Merry Anonymous be.

Arminius;

You've probably realized by now that spidey is also known as David T.,Angela and all manner of other names going back months if not years, on this thread.
He seems to have dropped most of the aliases recently(it must be tiring) and sticks more to the Spiderman ID.
He was the dude we spoke about months ago, as an attention craving weirdo, to whom we all gave our attention...to no avail. Remember...the thread turned out to be all about Spidey all the time, or Angela B, or David T etcetra, etcetra. He's obvious by his desire for attention, and his childish belief that the Bible is the historical truth...and we are all dumb idiots for not realizing it.

If we ignored him he might go away, but don't hold your breath. He lives here and has nowhere else to go. This is probably the only social life he's got. He is lonely and afraid. Only if we all start believing in the bible and a protestant god would Spidey feel better about life. He hates that nobody sees things as he does. He needs the validation of others with similar views, and is not finding it here among the brighter nonbelievers.
I feel sorry for him. He should garbage the bible and read books on science, philosophy and evolution. It would make a new man of him.
But of course he won't; he's too locked in to the wholly babble.

In Spiderman's post, do I see
A suggestion of humanity?
I can't help but grope
At this glimmer of hope
'Till the real Spidey says "It's not me!"

Spidey says evolution is "magic,"
A view that is really quite tragic,
It appears Christianity,
Has fed his insanity,
Which at this point is really quite manic.

Spiderman, Prophet of Doom
Says "End Times are coming, and soon"
At logic and science
He sputters defiance
Which shows that he's just a buffoon

Brambleton says, "I know the truth hurts,"
While his Rush-given fables he spurts,
The tales are rotten,
Perhaps, oxycontin,
Is the real thing driving their birth.

With apologies to Alfred Noyes

Still of a winter's night, they say, when the wind is in the trees,
When the moon is a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
When the road is a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor,
A Spiderman comes writing-writing-writing
A Spiderman comes writing, up to the old blog door.

Brambleton:

Do you not believe in pizza, then?

Brambleton:

Ah! There is no truth, but verse.

Cute poem. Empty as a retort, but then again, I know the truth hurts.

Arminius
(With Apologies to Edward Arlington Robinson)

Whenever Arminius lurched downtown,
We people on the pavement fled from him.
He was an ugly man, who always frowned,
With grisly beard and spindly shin.

And he was always gaudily arrayed
And he would always deafened when he squawked
But most we feared him when he ordered pizza
The place would smell funny when he bought.

And he was grimy, grimiest of all
And missing much in every sense.
In sum, we did not think him tall,
And wished he'd go and dwell behind a fence.

So on we worked, and we waited the dawn,
And lived in dread, but tried to be brave
And fearsome Arminius, one warm Spring morn
Went home and took a shower, had a shave.

Poor Brambleton's brain's turned to mush,
Spouting stories he heard straight from Rush,
With horrible tales,
Of Clinton, he rails,
The facts? History says, "not so much."

A spider poem, by Emily Dickinsen

The spider holds a Silver Ball
In unperceived Hands--
And dancing softly to Himself
His Yarn of Pearl--unwinds--

He plies from Nought to Nought--
In unsubstantial Trade--
Supplants our Tapestries with His--
In half the period--

An Hour to rear supreme
His Continents of Light--
Then dangle from the Housewife's Broom--
His Boundaries--forgot--

Is the Spiderman clinically sane?
I'd say, "no," his posts make it quite plain,
As he rails against science,
Through his Bible compliance,
All the while seated right on his brain.

Grashnak,

No, Clinton was responsible for 3,000+ Americans being killed because he was too scared to confront terrorism. Bomb U.S. embassies in Kenya & Tanzania? Our response - a cruise missile strike on a Sudanese pharmaceutical plant. Way to send a powerful message Mr. Clinton. If you kill/terrorize American citizens, expect to have an empty warehouse in some remote country reduced to rubble.

Oh, and by the way, we'll apologize for destroying your warehouse later and also send you restitution so you can build another one. I'm sure Bin Laden and his boys had a nice laugh over this one.

"You're PEOPLE WHO HAVE LESEER MINDS,"
At least, that's what Spiderman finds,
As he mixes his Bible,
With rants close to libel,
While religion his intellect binds.

Spidey's made it all perfectly clear
With predictions he posted right here
The Bible doth say
In a roundabout way
The Great Pumpkin is coming this year!

Just listen to Spiderman's din
As he rants on the wages of sin
Through his hatred and fear
There's one thing he makes clear
It's the hell that he's already in

Evolution uses the length of time like "billions of years" to hide the magic attached to their doctrine.

True science does not hide in time. It can be demonstrated at any given time. But where is the actual demonstration? NADA

The "best" thing they have done to recreate life is to copy existing bacteria block by block. They don't even understand why those blocks (nucleotides) are arranged that way.

They copy it like a kid who misses a lesson in class and copy his seatmate's exam paper word for word, INCLUDING HIS SEATMATE'S NAME.

Afterwhich he pronounces, "I knew it !!" I KNOW IM SMART.

How do you think the teacher would react to such antic? Probably, he would throw a heavy book to that "bright" student.

Guess what? I feel the same.

Swooosh, "fire in the hole!".

Run for your lives, the room is infested. The book has a grenade in it.

***

Everett, you're barking at the wrong tree. That's not me. It could be you pretending to be me.

My bad. I should have known better than to attribute something human to Sputterman.

Spiderman,

You say:

"Maybe its because Im scared of dying and going to hell. Or worse, just being dead and not living anymore like atheists say.
There MUST be a God to save us from being dead like animals are dead. I want to stay alive forever and only God can make that happen."

Thank you for your honesty. The need for something to be a certain way is a powerful thing.

Spidey always reminds me why I don't hate religion, but why I just don't give a damn. If apathy makes me stupid, so be it. At least I have a life outside of a message board.

Hey Holy Cow,

See, your comment about Lewinsky is exactly why I don't understand people like you. Ms. Lewinsky was an adult who chose to have a sexual relationship with a married President. He didn't do anything TO her, he did things with her.

Infidelity is something between the two people in a relationship. For all you know, Hilary would rather someone else provide those, um, services. May not be your moral thinking, but so what.

On the other hand, Clinton didn't get 4000+ Americans killed by lying to the country. Perhaps you could get upset about that moral lapse...

"After reading Jacoby's article here and seeing how "many" people hold the same view, it proves her point that there's REALLY a segment in American society whose god is the god of UNREASON and Anti-Intellectualism.

Who would have thought Americans would believe a doctrine that soil can become intelligent forming to be a brain if left alone for billions of years exposed in extreme weather?

UNREASON TO THE HIGHEST DEGREE. AN EPITOME OF STUPIDITY."

Wow, Spiderman2...I guess you showed me, what, with your straw man argument against evolution...worthy of Ben Stein. It's no wonder nobody takes you seriously.

I've been inspired, by all you blogging muses.

There is wingnut named spidey
Whose logic is totally untidy
He rants and he raves
And thinks that he saves
But but his arguments are completely flighty

"They speak in metaphors in which PEOPLE OF LESSER MINDS can't fathom. "

Obviously, looking at your example. Who died and made you a prophet? Beware of false prophets!

For Spiderman

No, actually, I hadn't noticed that you had stopped answering me. Most of my posts aren't about you, and I have never appreciated you calling me stupid, and so, if you have stopped answering me, then I would say, "good."

Is there any way we can lure Spiderman2 and MaryCunningham into a discussion on Catholicism??

Now that I would pay good money to see........

Spiderman2 aka Canyon Shearer, Bible Thumper, Fortune Teller and Severely Brainwashed in that Old Time Religion,

Fools are those who have read only the bible. God cannot be proud of such lazy creations!!!!

And what "voodooer of the hoodoo" blessed you with such stupidity in the field of fortune telling and interpretations of said stupidity???

The reality of it all is that the "pew sitters" and "bowers" are coming to grips with the flaws, errors, muck and stench in their religions and in ten years the religions of today will be unrecognizable or extinct as the "pretty and ugly wingie flying thingies" are finally buried in the piles of more utter stupidity.

Mr. Mark, I've said this before and just for it to sink into your mind, I'll say it again.

"The Bible said that you're NOT QUALIFIED. It's not a book done by a single ordinary person but numerous great people whose words converged.

They speak in metaphors in which PEOPLE OF LESSER MINDS can't fathom. King Solomon's proverbs are well repected thru-out history."

In response you claim that the Bible is contradicting itself and quote the following verses :

"26:4 Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest thou also be like unto him.
26:5 Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own conceit."

Now let me explain the meaning of it. It means that you don't answer a fool coz whatever method you use, you would become a fool yourself or he becomes "wiser" in his foolishness. One will never win discussing with him.

Maybe my intention is not to convert you guys but it's for the other readers not to be trapped in the follies mentioned here. What do you think?

I told you not to quote Bible verses. They are way up beyond your scope of intelligence. Don't blame me coz I warned you earlier. Solomon won't be King if he were an ordinary person like you.

Daniel, did you noticed why I stopped answering you? Maybe I followed Solomon's advice but I continue to engage with Mr. Mark coz I still find him having sense and still on the borderline. If you'll be back in your senses, I might engage you again.

Farnaz, thanks for the poem.

Everytime I speak against Catholicism, the fake spiderman2 appears. The following response to Daniel in den did not come from me.

******
Daniel in the lions den

you really wanna know why I hang out here trying to make you people see the truth of the bible and God?
Maybe its because Im scared of dying and going to hell. Or worse, just being dead and not living anymore like atheists say.
There MUST be a God to save us from being dead like animals are dead. I want to stay alive forever and only God can make that happen.
The proof is in the Good book Gods Holy Bible.
God hates people who dont believe in him. To believe is smart.if you want to live forever that is.
Why insult god by not believing in Him? Thats asking for trouble.

*****

and just as I promised, I would end my post with these statements whenever somebody impersonates me.

** The pope is the embodiment of lies

** the Vatican is the seat of Satan

Hi Spiderman,

From Ibn Gabirol of long, long ago.

The World to Come

Lord, who shall do deeds like unto Thine?
For Thou hast established under the throne of Thy glory
A standing-place for the souls of Thy saints,
And there is the abode of the pure souls
That are bound up in the bundle of life.
They who were weary and faint here await new strength,
And those who failed of strength may here find repose;
For these are the children of rest,
And here is delight without end or limit,
For it is The-World-To-Come.
And here are stations and seeing-places for the standing souls,
Whence, in "mirrors of the serving-women,"
They can behold and be seen of the Lord.
In the palaces of the King do they dwell,
And at the King’s table stand,
And glory in the sweetness of the fruit of Intelligence,
For He giveth them of the dainties of the King.
This is the rest and the heritage
Whose goodness and beauty are endless,
Such is "the land which floweth with milk and honey and such the fruit thereof."

Good night, Spiderman, my friend.

Farnaz

Daniel in the lions den

you really wanna know why I hang out here trying to make you people see the truth of the bible and God?
Maybe its because Im scared of dying and going to hell. Or worse, just being dead and not living anymore like atheists say.
There MUST be a God to save us from being dead like animals are dead. I want to stay alive forever and only God can make that happen.
The proof is in the Good book Gods Holy Bible.
God hates people who dont believe in him. To believe is smart.if you want to live forever that is.
Why insult god by not believing in Him? Thats asking for trouble.

Believers like Daniel and Arminius,
I like!, for they care not about all the "sin in us,"
While Anon and friend Spidey,
Are so filled with pride-y,
That their babble exceeds supercilious.

Anonymous posts on and on,
Unaware he's mythology's pawn.
Like his friend Spiderman,
His views need to expand,
But they can't, as he's stuck on the can.

Spidey attempts to demonstrate the "wisdom" of the Bible by quoting King Solomon:

"Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own conceit. "

Wow. Brilliant! So brilliant, that it sent me to Proverbs to look up said saying of Solomon, where I found these two CONSECUTIVE verses:

"26:4 Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest thou also be like unto him.

26:5 Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own conceit."

??????????

Geez, Spidey. Why didn't you bother quoting the contradictory verse?

Bible Idiocy Class meets in 10 minutes. Be There!

Oh there "Reality Challenged" and Obfuscating Jihadist,

We trust all your "rantin and ravin" about politicians included the global collection especially the fruitcakes of the Shiite terror theocracy of Iran.

And during your next "googling" exercise, enter "fems" flaws errors muck stench Islam . Hmmm, hold on, you do appear to be very busy with that Five Point Program for Escaping your Three B Syndrome (i.e) your Breeding, Birth and Brainwashing in Isalm, so we will list the "fems" for you yet once again for your perusal and commentary as time permits with your busy schedule:

1. Belief in "pretty/ugly wingie thingies".

2. Belief that an hallucinating, illiterate Arab did actually talk to the "pretty Gabriel" in the hot "Gabe" cave and therein received the warmongering and anti-female words and resultant laws now listed in the koran.

3 That Shiites are less than human or Sunnis are less than human depending on what Islamic cult you belong to.

4. That Islam is perfect and the koran inherently condones no sin even though the 24/7, 800 year-old blood feud between Sunnis and Shiites gives significant credence that greed, hate, suicides, assassinations, maiming, and murder are condoned by the koran. Having multiple wives also gives significant credence to the sins of rape, adultery, lust and polygamy. The condoned treatment of these wives gives credence that the koran allows the sins of hatred, anger and greed.

Anonymous,

Good night - looking forward to your return broadside.

Arminius

Bravo, Arminius! Until the morrow.

GaryD

I am not aware of any bald face lies that Obama has told. When you make up stuff about Obama that is not true, what can I think, but that you have a problem with his skin color? Of course, you are not going to admit it, but isn't that the case? Isn't that the problem with the Republican Party since about 1970? that it is the party that black people avoid like the plague? And why is that I wonder?

The Charge of the Verse Brigade
(With apologies to Tennyson)

1.
Half a verse, half a verse,
Half a verse onward,
All in the valley of poetry
Rode poor Anonymous.
Forward the Verse Brigade!
Charge for Arminius, he said.
Into the valley of poetry
Rode poor Anonymous.

2.
Forward the Verse Brigade!
Was poor Anon all dismayed?
Not tho' the poor bloke knew,
Someone had blundered;
His not to make reply,
His not to reason why,
His but to do and die:
Into the valley of Poetry
Rode poor Anonymous.

3.
Arminius to right of him,
Arminius to left of him,
Arminius in front of him,
Volley'd and thunder'd;
Storm'd at with poetic rhyme,
Boldly he tried to keep time,
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell
Rode poor Anonymous.
....

(Enough is enough!)

Jacoby makes another excellent point. The truth is usually somewhere in the gray. It's just easier to understand the black and the white.

Thanks, Arminius, wothy opponent. I await thee.

Inconsistency is one thing but lying for effect another. Worse is lying when there is no need to do so. I expect that people given facts that differ with their original conclusion to change their minds. That isn't lying or flip-flopping that is being sensible and logical.

Both Obama and Hillary have now told bald face lies to the American people in circumstances where the truth would have served them better. Obama in his speeches concerning the lamentable Reverend Wright, and Hillary at least twice. Once about her experience in Bosnia, and the other whenever her lips move.

Anonymous,

Oh my God, you've rolled out the heavy artillery! I gotta think hard.... now, then, where's that fatted bullock to sacrifice to the Muse?

Good comeback, Anon!

Arminius

For Spiderman

Why are you posting here at all? What is your point? We know you hate atheists; we know you hate non-Christians; we know you hate Catholics; now we see that you hate almost all other Christians as well.

We know that you think that we are all stupid, and that stupid people are all going to hell. We know about your predictions that missiles will soon fall on us and kill us and you are awaiting that day with joyful anticipation.

We know that we are not smart enough to read, understand, and interpret the Bible, and so we should just not bother. So, then why do you keep quoting it to us? If we are all so stupid, and our extreme stupidity is so irriating to you, then why do you keep coming here? Aren't you just subjecting yourself to unnecessary stress?

I think that you should find someone that you know in your family, or among your friends and aquaintances, at work or in the neighborhood where you live, and ask for help. Because you do not seem well to me, and I am fearful that something bad may be happening to you.

Who Arminius is, I do not know
His house is in the village though.
He will not see me typing here
To make his poesie weep with woe.

His smarter self must deem it qeer
That he remains within the Apollonian sphere.
Between the woods and frozen lake,
No muse to him will soon appear.

He gives his shrinking wit a shake
Hoping thus to make it wake.
The only other sounds the sweep
Of well-worn words and crumbling cake.

This blog is lovely, dark and sweet,
But I must work. Life is not cheap.
And miles cost gas, which is not cheap.

Arminius,

Moi aussi.

Jihadist writes:

"Lessons never learnt - to be seen to take sides against CCNL. It really upsets the CCNL."

And the upset is important because...?

Susan:

Voters are not the ones distracting and sensationalizing. Indeed, we have repeatedly called for an end to it. It is the media's doing, and until the media is owned by the public, the problems will continue.

Consider this a declaration of war:

Arminius, he never does whine
He comes after you every damn time
He'll lock and load for sure
'Cause he's goin' right to war
You'd best find a more peaceable clime.

(By the way, nothing personal here, I am hugely enjoying myself.)

A blogger there was named Arminius,
Who oft times was much too contrarious.
He'd shriek for a time,
Then retire and whine,
When his betters proved more adversarious.

Hello Arminius,

Blush. You are overstating re my posts.

And careful there. My fave pussycat may maul you for that poetic post of yours with him/her/them mentioned. CCNL can try to maul or gnaw me all him/she/they want.

Lessons never learnt - to be seen to take sides against CCNL. It really upsets the CCNL.

Anyway, I was just peeking in to see what's up here and there's a new topic. Got to go.

Cheers :)

"J"

OK, Spidey,

You've gone too far this time with your sick attack on my friend Thomas Baum. You are truly despicable, and need professional help - not a priest, but a shrink. Get help before it is too late.

There once was a Lady, Jihadist,
Whose satire was up with the finest
'Concerned' she did skewer
To the glee of the viewer
She's rated now up with the wisest.

Thomas Baum wrote "ARMINIUS, Hi, hope you're doing fine, don't worry about anyone doing any harm to Christianity."

Are your surnames STOOGES? Where's the other one? Do you still believe that the bread the priests gave you made you holy?

When the priests threw the crumbs of those bread, the cows mistook it for the grass. The cows are now in India and they are called HOLY COWS.

Don't eat those cows or you would sin. Be good to the cows, would you?

Also, please don't touch their feces which which contained those holy bread. They are now HOLY FECES.

Jihadist!

Two thumbs up! Drum rolls, trumpet fanfares! I laughed til tears streamed down my face! MORE!

Arminius

Concerned the Christian Now Liberated:)

Ooops pussycat! How could I forget you?

What! No Gerry and Jimbo as yet on your heels? No "fems"(whatever that is), the Three Bs and the Five Step Programme as yet for me?

I await with bated breath for them. Meanwhile, as for your new list. "Millstones"? Good one.

Clinton's millstones:

major # 1, Her dishonest, lying, cheating husband whom she should have dumped years ago. Having him in the Whitehouse again would percolate the stench of adultery and womanizing on a 24/7 basis for four more years.

* Dump him! Leave him! For another man, or woman, or dog, or cat. Whomever keeps her heart and bed warm.

major #2, Her disrespect for unborn children.

* We now have to respect frog's tadpoles and chicken eggs too?

major #3, Not recognizing the flaws and errors of contemporary religions.

* Did she really know the tenets of all religions at all to be knowing where to find flaws and errors?

minor #1, "forgetting" the details of trip to Bosnia.

* Ah, she's can't tell that trip to Bosnia from the trip she made to Pakistan with Chelsea. The world is a village. It takes a village. They all look the same.

Obama's millstones:

major #1, The "Reverend" Jeremiah Wright.

* Who is reverencing Wright anymore?

major #2, His failure to immediately condemn Wright's recent speech.

* Keeping options open. Can't alienate all of the people all of the time during election bids.

major #3, His disrespect for unborn children.

* What about disrespect for animals' offsprings, both unborn and just babies? Ban caviare! Ban quails' eggs! Ban roast sucking pig! Ban spring lamb! Ban veal!

major #4, Not recognizing the flaws and errors, of contemporary religions.

* Can't see, won't see, won't judge even the "flaws" and "errors" of a reverend as flawed and errored by others, much less would go into the flaws and errors of contemporary religions.

Spidey, who posteth stuff here,
Doth think he is quite a seer
But the Great Pumpkin came back
Showed Spidey as a sad quack
Methinks Spidey doth need one more beer.

Hi, Thomas Baum,

As always, good to hear from you.

Right you are! Christianity can't be harmed by mere mortals. I did not word my reply to Spidey correctly; I should have said that he is not attracting anyone to Christ by his tirades.

I always thought Christianity was about humility, which means humility to God and one's fellow man. Apparently Spidey has not grasped that quite yet.

God bless,

Arminius

Mr. Mark,

The Bible said that you're NOT QUALIFIED. It's not a book done by a single ordinary person but numerous great people whose words converged.

They speak in metaphors in which people of lesser minds can't fathom. King Solomon's proverbs are well repected thru-out history.

Now here's a man who can't understand its metaphors and claims that the Bible is not credible. He tried to discredit it by pointing to the old testament but was derailed off his tract by what Apostle Paul said.

Isn't that UNREASON TO THE HIGHEST DEGREE? AN EPITOME OF STUPIDITY.

Jacoby is doing a great disservice to America if somehow these people are influenced by her thoughts.

A quote from King Solomon :

"Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own conceit. "

Timeless. These people are a proof of that word of wisdom.

ARMINIUS

Hi, hope you're doing fine, don't worry about anyone doing any harm to Christianity. Christianity is just part of God's Plan and Christianity is not trying to cram the bible down other people's throats.

Another thing that Christianity is not, is getting a holier than thou attitude and plenty of people seem to have that whether they call themselves Christian or not.

Take care, be ready.

Sincerely, Thomas Paul Moses Baum.

Limerick Wars!!!! I LOVE it!!!!

Anon, with his twisted world view,
Did love his strange words here to spew
He attacked Mr Mark
With no bite, just bark,
His poetic virtues are few.

There once was a man, Mr. Mark,
Who thought himself terribly smart.
In love with his views,
He spewed and he spewed,
'til even he couldn't bear his loud bark.

There once was a blogger named Anonymous,
Whose take on the world was erroneous,
He blasted Obama,
With the skill of a fah-mah,
Knee-deep in the waste from his Brahma.

Another topic already!? :)

Oh, why not? For a bit of a dark, dim and unenlightened view of politicians. Really random, rambling and cheap shots as the hapless revenge of a voter barraged by, assaulted with and insulted by the antics of our politicians everyday on the media.

Ah, the "me", the "I" politicians putting their "I" and "me" into the "we" and "us" to get us into the car with them they are driving for a ride.

Politicians are also inadverted entertainers in articulating and hanging on to their skewed ambition, single-minded obsession, unquenched passion and hubristic egotism.

They have the vision thing, the certainty of their destiny, and the righteousness of their mission to lead us all to salvation here and now by just getting it on with them in getting there and there. Wherever and whatever there is. Only they know how to get us there.

Never mind how we get there. Or "there" is really a mirage. They have the car paid for by our taxes, the road map, and they are the driver. We are the captive passengers. Not a good idea to leave the driving to one who draws the roadmap and looking at it, and more often, not at all, at the same he was driving. Accidents happens. Getting lost happens.

Only they, and only they alone, knows what is wrong with and how to fix the car they are driving us to the destination if it stalled. Or not at all, and we to pay with our taxes to get a new car again on the road to somewhere and nowhere with distance to destination lengthening or unknown. Or the destination keeps changing.

They have the energy, energy and more energy to never stop, to never say die, and are never, never, never ever wrong. Only misunderstood by us, and we, the people, just simply can't keep up with them or to see their vision. Or we to understand why they have to lie to protect us from "them" and from ourself.

Honesty and trustworthiness? Is there any real difference? Are they not inter-related? Does it have to do anything with morals and ethics at all?

Is honesty and trustworthiness part of the elastic ethics of politicians as a necessary survival tool to maintain adaptability and flexibility in the face of the fluidity of situations?

Samples of honesty and trustworthiness in the statements of budding and real politicians with very slight variations of what is actually said to protect the honest and the trustworthy who said them:

* The dog ate my homework.

* I never cheat on my wife.

* The check is in the mail.

* Father, I cannot lie. I chop the cherry tree.

* I am not a crook.

* Peace is at hand.

* Read my lips. No new taxes.

* We are witnessing the birth pangs of a new Middle East.

* I smoke, but did not inhale.

* I have lusted after women in my heart.

Politics 101:

- who gets what, when and how (one's own way basically).

- the means justify the ends (whatever it takes to get off the heat and the hook and the noose).

Leadership 101:

- I will lead you into hellfire, I will lead you to heaven, I will lead you to death and destruction, I will lead you to peace and prosperity.

- I will follow you to hellfire, I will follow you to heaven, I will follow you to death and destruction, I will follow you to peace and prosperity.

- I will see the sun shine, ripening crops and tanning people, and will take credit for it. I will see a hurricane wreak death and destruction and blame God or mother nature for it.

- I will take credit for the robust economy, even if due to the policies of my predecessor. I will blame my predecessor if the economy is dismal and due to my indifference and policies or no policy.

Poetic aspect:

- Are their words lyrical and uplifting enough?

- Do what they said strike a chord?

hear me, trust me
they all said for all to see,
honesty is not all it's made out to be
so they may have to lie with glee

Musical aspect:

- is the composed piece good and great and grand and pleasing and appealing enough?

- is it musically appealing and not jarring to the ears?

- can they sing well?

- can they carry a tune?

- can they hit all the notes?

- can they hit all the right notes?

Not the singer, but the song and the singing.

Alas, some are too much into heavy metal (more weapons, more weapons, more weapons) and some are into death metal (more wars, more wars, more wars).

- Obama is Cat Stevens? (Peace Train)

- Clinton is Tammy Wynnette? (Stand by Your Man)

- McCain is Merle Haggard? (An Okie from Muskogee)

And there's the urban legend/rural myth in third world countries of what mealy-mouth and smarmy, smarty pants politicians, in their bids to be elected for legislative seats, said to voters whom they think are the ignorant, unwashed and inconvenient masses in attaining the grand project that is themself:

"If you don't like me, put a cross by my name on the ballot paper."

No worry. We can vote them in. We can chose not to vote them in. We can vote them out too.

Enough already!

Cheers
"J"

There once was a man named Barack,
Whose speeches were always a crock.
Still, he looked like a winner,
Although a beginner.
Surprise! Voters rejected his schlock.

Dear Spidey -

Oh, I read your entire post the first time you posted it, and in multiple threads, I might add.

I didn't address the quote you provided from Corinthians as a FAVOR to you, ie: a circular argument is still a circular argument, no matter how many milleniae it has been around, and the circular argument known as "the Bible is correct because it says so," has gained not a shred of credibility since men first began to doubt their own wisdom and, instead, put their trust in illiterate and illogical snake-oil salesmen.

I don't mind addressing your posts on their merits, but there are no merits in quoting the Bible as a self-endorsing authority on itself. I stopped doing that when I grew tired of debating whether or not the ladies executed in Salem, MA, really were shape-shifting witches after all.

Hog swallow is still hog swallow, no matter how many "thees" and "thines" attend its utterance.

;)

Spidey, you improperly said,

"A case in point is Arminius who holds Linus in the 'Peanuts' comic strip MORE CREDIBLE than the Bible."

Please do NOT put words in my mouth. I did NOT say that. I said that Linus makes more sense than YOU do. Very different. But I don't expect you have the mental ability to see that.

Arminius

A case in point is Arminius who holds Linus in the 'Peanuts' comic strip MORE CREDIBLE than the Bible.

AN EPITOME OF STUPIDITY.

Dan78 wrote "I recently finished your excellent book "The Age of American Unreason" as well as Richard Hofstadter's "Anti-Intellectualism in American Life" (a bit dated, but good nonetheless). "

After reading Jacoby's article here and seeing how "many" people hold the same view, it proves her point that there's REALLY a segment in American society whose god is the god of UNREASON and Anti-Intellectualism.

Who would have thought Americans would believe a doctrine that soil can become intelligent forming to be a brain if left alone for billions of years exposed in extreme weather?

UNREASON TO THE HIGHEST DEGREE. AN EPITOME OF STUPIDITY.

Dan78 wrote "I recently finished your excellent book "The Age of American Unreason" as well as Richard Hofstadter's "Anti-Intellectualism in American Life" (a bit dated, but good nonetheless). "

After reading Jacoby's article here and seeing how "many" people hold the same view, it proves her point that there's REALLY a segment in American society whose god is the god of UNREASON and Anti-Intellectualism.

Who would have thought Americans would believe a doctrine that soil can become intelligent forming to be a brain if left alone for billions of years exposed in extreme weather?

UNREASON TO THE HIGHEST DEGREE. AN EPITOME OF STUPIDITY.

Spidey,

Sorry, dude, but Linus in the 'Peanuts' comic strip made more sense with the Great Pumpkin than you are making with your rants. Your babble has done great harm to Christianity on these blogs.

Arminius

There once was a woman named Hillary,
Whose opponent she just loved to pillory.
But Obama was tough
The voters cried 'Enough!'
And now Hillary's stuck with just Billary.

Mr. mark, Im not sure if you read my whole comment. Im reposting it so you can read it again. It's not my words that stated why atheists are NOT QUALIFIED to interpret the bible. It is the bible itself. READ AGAIN

****

I hope this answers questions why many in the old testament (including some in the ten commandments) should not be taken literally and not to be read by unbelievers of Christ. That includes all the false religions and atheists. They should not quote the scripture coz they are NOT QUALIFIED to interpret it. It's been a problem since the time of Apostle Paul and here is the reason he gave :

"And till Moses had done speaking with them, he put a VEIL on his face. "(Exodus 34:33)

" Seeing then that we have such hope, we use great plainness of speech: 13 And not as Moses, which put a veil over his face, that the children of Israel could not stedfastly look to the end of that which is abolished: 14 But THEIR MINDS WERE BLINDED: for until this day remaineth the same VEIL UNTAKEN AWAY IN THE READING OF THE OLD TESTAMENT; which veil is done away in Christ. 15 But even unto this day, when Moses is read, the veil is upon their heart. 16 Nevertheless when it shall turn to the Lord, the veil shall be taken away. " (2 Corinthians 3:12-16)

****

There once was a woman named Hillary,
Whom the media loved to pillory.
In spite of their spite,
She put up a good fight.
Her opponents now run a distillery.

In woman may be an honest feminist and remain married to a man who has publicly humiliated her."

Cheap shot, Susan, very cheap--Costco pricing. There are several persons, institutions that should have been humiliatd by all of that nonsense, starting with Bill Clinton and ending with the press.

Hillary Clinton was not publicly accused of being an adulterer, did not sensationalize. Why would she be humiliated? WaPo on the other hand certainly should have bee.

As for Obama your romanticizing of he "affection" for his pastor is absurdly paternalizing, very white of you.

You support him--fine. Then show some respect for the man. I support him, too, and he is not, I assure you, a sentimental, idiotic fool.

The main job of the next President will be to restore the public trust and the trust of the rest of the world in the desecrated American ideal of liberty for all. Anything less than a great president will be a failure. There is no chance that McCain would be that president. There is a snowball's chance that Hillary would be that president. There is a fighting chance that Obama would be that president. I'm voting for Obama.

Reasonable Not Hateful,

If history is any guide, experience is no predictor of greatness. Abraham Lincoln was an inexperienced congressman who became a great (perhaps our greatest) President. But of course, Lincoln didn't go to church.

Dear unReasonable -

Get over it.

Clinton's policies had everything to do with the economic boom of the 90s. Perhaps you've forgotten how the Republican supply siders wailed that Clinton's proposals would wreck the economy. When they were passed and instituted, they came up with a new meme: it was the RW-controlled Congress who was responsible for the economic boom!

So, unReasonable must also insist - INSIST! - that Saint Ronnie had nothing to do with the boom and bust of the 80s...that W has nothing to do with the disastrous economy today. May as well throw in the wars for good measure. It's all cyclical!

Amazing how Republicans bring the same denial of reality to their politics as they do to their embrace of religion. Cowards all.

I hope you enjoy the 8 years of Obama that are just around the corner.

I have read at least seven posts here, and have decided that I'm qualified to pronounce you all idiots.

Thank you.

"Perspective" has it all wrong .

McCain - what he did was get an endorsement. He did not, however, attend the church as the "great savior" Obama did at Rev. Wright's church. This is a red herring, straw man argument that does not hold water. McCain does not attend his church as a member of the congregation.

And Mr Mark- for you to link the economy with Clinton or ANY politician in power- Pub or Democrat, illustrates lack of knowledge of how our economy works. Bubba had NOTHING to do with the 90's economy. I note also that the Dot com bubble is not mentioned there. Government and economy are not tied to the degree you want to take credit for the Dems, or blame to the Pubs. Economic cycles are what they are.

Honestly, those of you who think that a unproven, inexperienced Senator that is good at speeches but has not real details on how he is going to unite us, or how he will fix our broken government, is beyond me. Anyone that would sit in that church for 20 years and listen to Wright's crapola does not have the judgement to be President or have the proper ideology to do so.

As for Daniel in the Lion's den- I agree- the last thing I would want is my kids thinking it is okay to have sex with anyone they want , when they want, especially if they are married.

Want experience and honesty- vote McCain.

I am told that the hit movie series "The Matrix" was written by an Atheist. More interesting to me is the plot that an adult Nero joined the Matrix in the end to invoke change. Was pointed out through the movie of a synergistic dependence by man and machine.

Obama has a synergistic dependence on a political party, Congress and the People right now. He did not start a populus movement. History may one day find that American Federal Institutions and their leaches drifted from Democracy itself. Restoring trust in government is probably an exercise in restoring democracy itself. And no one can be part of that process from being completely outside of the system him or herself.

I myself, am unwilling to post on Washington Post Message boards. I would be much more comfortable singing with the choir or operating a tractor. Well, that is not true, I have never sung in a choir but that is a metaphorical reference, you understand. And I have yet to own a tractor although I do rent backhoes and run bulldozers on occasion. Some people call owning a gun Patriotism.

Now other people just practice independence everyday of their lives. To those people practicing independence, outsourcing could be an Obamanation I would think, wink-nod.

My bad.

Take a look at what Chris Everett said, a few comments back:

"There's a dissonance associated with power and responsibility. The president, inevitably an egomaniac, is expected to act without regard for his (or her) own self interest. It seems to me that in return for this kind of burden, the public should make an extra effort to RESPECT THE PRESIDENT'S PRIVACY as a sanctuary in which he (or she) can act in their own self interest - something the rest of us can do 24/7."

The modern American President has morphed into a heaving, gigantic, self-absorbed thing, like the old French Kings, or better yet, the Roman Emperors. We know, underneath it all, the President is still, just a human being, but also, more than any monarch in the world today, the President's personl life and personality merge into the office of the Presidency; they become and control each other. I cannot think of a more unpleasant way to live out my life.

If you are the President or the President's spouse, you cannot tool around the neighborhood in your car; you cannot browse the stores, to see if maybe there is something you would like to buy; you cannot even go into the bathroom and sit on the toilet, without the man standing guard nearby, for your safety. You can never, ever scoot away to the sidelnes, and be with yourself, in solitude.

All of the many little pleasures of life, which depend on privacy and solitude, are lost completely to someone like the President, who is so totally merged with the office that he holds.

To Mr Mark: Thanks. I couldn't have said it better myself. Hillary is pandering because she knows full well that only those that live under rocks will be taken in, and there are a good many folks like that (also there's not a ghost of a chance that Congress will introduce it much less GWB will sign it). Also, GTB failed to say that Obama voted to REPEAL the tax rollback later. Seems that half-truths and ignorance lives. These are the folks that follow Hillary. May God have mercy on those that are too lazy or biased to do just a little research on their own.

SteveD:

You are absolutely correct: Obama voted for the Illinois measure to lift gas taxes, and then saw that it did no good except to the oil companies. And one more thing: he also saw that it took money away from highway and bridge repair. Of course Hillary sez she will regain that money with a windfall tax measure.... sure... right. Hell, Congress will cut its own pay before they stop bowing to King Oil.

Arminius

"This whole issue about Hillary's gas tax cut has me perplexed. Economists say no. The public says yes. And, above all, Obama lambasts it altogether. Maybe he doesn't want the public to know that when he was in the state senate in Illinois, he too was part of a plan to eliminate the gas tax for a period of time in Illinois. That was in 2000. Was that another example of Obama's "untruthiness"? Guess what folks? The gas tax cut was well-received and it worked."

If you watched Obama on "Meet the Press" the other day, he was specifically asked about this. Obama freely admits that he voted for it in the Illinois State Senate. Six months later, when the Senate re-examined the gas tax holiday, they discovered that the oil companies had raised the price of gas that much higher in Illinois, in order to continue to make the same profits. So no, it didn't work.

Besides, where is all the money to repair our crumbling infrastructure going to come from? The gas tax actually HELPS the economy by paying construction workers who are building and repairing roads, truckers who are hauling freight on those roads, and ourselves. We don't want any more bridges to collapse like the one in Minneapolis did.

GAS TAX BLUES says:

"This whole issue about Hillary's gas tax cut has me perplexed. Economists say no. The public says yes."

????

The Gallup Poll yesterday said over 70% of the public thinks the gas tax holiday is worthless. 64% say politicians pushing it are doing for THEIR benefit, not the public's.

Yet, here's GTB making a statement that flies in the face of the statistics. I guess we're all supposed to believe him as he put it in a "yes-no" equation.

I'm not surprised. The media gasbags are all doing the same thing. MSNBC had a panel the other day who insisted that the gas tax BS would be a net gain for Hillary EVEN THOUGH most Americans saw through the smoke and mirrors. Their take? Hillary wasn't appealing to the majority who are in the know, but to the stupid clod busters for whom "$30 is still a lot of money" (Mike Barnicle said that one).

So, GTB, I'd say the economists AND the public says no...unless you have polls and statistics that say otherwise.

To Gas tax blues:

Your analysis is only half-right, and your conclusion is totally wrong. Obama backed the original rollback, but found out that IT DIDN'T WORK. Please read this again: IT DIDN'T WORK. I could give you a number of references, but the fact is the oil companies brought the price right back up, and the consumer gained NOTHING. Obama stated the whole episode completely recently and hid nothing. He knows from experience these rollbacks are a gift to the oil companies. Hillary knows this and is still pandering to the her base of (and I'll be very kind here) the folks that won't do a little research. I hope you'll take the time to check out what I've just posted. I wouldn't think you'd cast your vote knowing the whole truth, would you?

I think you are presenting a false choice between character and ability. The President is one person out of roughly 150 million adults. Why can't we have both -- character AND ability?

I do agree, though, that our political system is set up to elect the best liars to office. Nearly all campaign pledges are obvious lies, because nobody wants to hear the painful truth. When citizens start demanding the truth DURING the election, we will not have to worry so much about the truth AFTER the election.

Well said Mr. Mark, and Daniel in the Lion's Den.

New to the forum, I'm not sure how much is allowable, but it's been my distinct impression that the purpose of the Republican party over the last 15 (or more) years has not been to govern the people, but to "rule" them, and doing so in such a way as to effectively eliminate legitimate government process. Short of that, to rule it in a way that makes it the least helpful and effective and just.

Regarding the focus and passion we Americans have for "sex" and it's associated Judeo-Christian taboos, (ie still focusing on Clinton's BJ, and the prior poster who was worried that her children would succumb to the moral abyss by following the president's lead,) my favorite moment in televised history had to be when Frech president Nicolas Sarkozy left the CBS set when, among all the things that could have been discussed, Lesley Stahl decided to ask him about his sex life. I share the rest of the world's fascination about our American fascination of the evils of sex.

I agree with the bulk of your essay, Susan. Candidates should be picked based on abilities and positions, not personal habits or minor shortcomings (my own annoyance with Bush, for example, stemmed from his inane foreign policy positions and attempts to create his ill-conceived "ownership society" rather than his inability to pronounce the word "nuclear" or his past problems with alcohol and cocaine).

I recently finished your excellent book "The Age of American Unreason" as well as Richard Hofstadter's "Anti-Intellectualism in American Life" (a bit dated, but good nonetheless).

This whole issue about Hillary's gas tax cut has me perplexed. Economists say no. The public says yes. And, above all, Obama lambasts it altogether. Maybe he doesn't want the public to know that when he was in the state senate in Illinois, he too was part of a plan to eliminate the gas tax for a period of time in Illinois. That was in 2000. Was that another example of Obama's "untruthiness"?

Guess what folks? The gas tax cut was well-received and it worked. I suppose Obama supporting it now, only *after* Hillary announced it, would only make Hillary look good. Tsk. Tsk. Can't have that, lest people decide to vote for her. HRC 2008!

Is it the candidates we should be concerned about trusting, or the media that tells us what we know about them? John McCain's campaign is being run by the same lobbyists who lobby for the major news networks. They lobby the FCC to lift restrictions. In the case of the media, they want FCC restrictions lifted that keep giant media outlets from monopolizing the news in entire markets. Without these rules in place, everything we read, hear, or watch on TV would be controlled by a few conglomerates, forcing independent media out of business. John McCain has used his influence for the same lobbyists running his campaign to sway the FCC to show them leniency. Having the media's financial interests tied directly to a presidential candidate is an enormous conflict of interest. Looking at the stock values declining it is no stretch to assume that Big Media outlets such as FOX and CNN are looking for anyway they can to up their profit margins. As far as conflicts are concerned, the media is yet to report anything about their own involvement in using military advisors as "analyists" on their talk shows who were scripted by the pentagon to promte the Iraq war. Many of them simaltaneously were involved in contracts for profit from the pentagon. If the media will ignore that conflict, ignoring McCains lobbyists and there association with the same media outlets should come as no surprise.
As an avid WaPo reader, I have watched as day after day, negatively slanted articles are published about Obama/Clinton while John McCain's many integrity issues are ignored completely or excuses are made for him. Democracy is in trouble in America if the candidates we are to vote on are not given equal and fair coverage. I won't trust any major media (WaPo included) until they report about the media's conflicts with anylists and with McCains FCC lobbyists.

Susan you are right on! It's time most Americans stop acting like they are moral Heavyweights & make a presidental decision. Let's let God do the judging!

When you think about it,it is incredible that all these politicians are supposedly motivated and propelled by an irresistible urge to serve the public.And if you conside the wealth of the average politician at the end of his career it all becomes more incredible.Without a great deal of hypocrisy and lots of make believe there can never be democracy as we understand it.

DITLD writes:

"If you remove the 18 cent tax on gas, then wouldn't the price just float back up by 18 cents, since there would be no real change in the supply of gas, or the basic economics of the whole thing?"

As all of the economists have pointed out, the slight drop in gas prices would only encourage people to drive as much if not more than they do now. That added demand puts pressure on limited supply and the market compensates by raising the price. That $.18 savings would be wiped out within weeks. Once the "holiday" expired, the $.18 would be added on top of the now-inflated price.

But Hillary and McCain don't listen to economists, so why should the rest of us?

Although there is signicant doubt that Jesus' actually said,

"If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea", Mark 9:42,

wiki.faithfutures.org/index.php/198_Millstone_for_Temptation,

it is, however, a great passage for judging leadership qualities.

Clinton's millstones:

major # 1, Her dishonest, lying, cheating husband whom she should have dumped years ago. Having him in the Whitehouse again would percolate the stench of adultery and womanizing on a 24/7 basis for four more years.

major #2, Her disrespect for unborn children.

major #3, Not recognizing the flaws and errors of contemporary religions.

minor #1, "forgetting" the details of trip to Bosnia.

Obama's millstones:

major #1, The "Reverend" Jeremiah Wright.

major #2, His failure to immediately condemn Wright's recent speech.

major #3, His disrespect for unborn children.

major #4, Not recognizing the flaws and errors, of contemporary religions.

George writes:

"the American people are actually quite reasonable, which is why they have lost faith in a political process which no longer represents them at the Federal level."

Indeed. The distinction is that Americans have not lost faith in their form of government, nor in their belief that government isn't a problem when run intelligently, but they don't trust a political process where the media is an enabler of bad government and helps to keep in power those in government who loathe the very concept of a working government and do their damndest to make government fail.

But throwing out the baby with the bathwater isn't the solution, any more than one would desert the good modern medicine does for the world based upon the bad experience one had with an unqualified hack of a doctor. The solution to bad medical practice isn't to dismiss the medical arts entirely and embrace witchcraft or faith healing, it's to get better doctors who know what they're doing.

Funny how people weren't "fed up with government" when Clinton was president and the economy was lifting all boats and we weren't engaged in senseless wars. As Americans, we owe it to ourselves to demand that our politicians serve us and our democracy well, and to avoid the easy trap of blaming the system for ills created by those dedicated to destroying the system and enriching themselves and their buddies in the process.

I'm not fed up with democracy or our Constitution, but I am fed up with Americans installing incompetents like bushco in positions of power. THAT must change.

Vote Obama.

Susan writes, "It is time for Americans to grow up and stop pretending that we are electing a moral exemplar instead of a president."

I disagree. Morality is precisely what is needed in a president. The question is, what IS morality when it comes to the presidency. Is it sexual prudishness? A propensity for condemnation? Jingoism? I don't think so.

Insead, we need a president who perceives the world from an ethical perspective and who is capable of using the levers of executive power in the service of ethhical action. The great eras in American history have been made by men and women who have persisted through trials because they knew the cause was just.

There's a dissonance associated with power and responsibility. The president, inevitably an egomaniac, is expected to act without regard for his (or her) own self interest. It seems to me that in return for this kind of burden, the public should make an extra effort to RESPECT THE PRESIDENT'S PRIVACY as a sanctuary in which he (or she) can act in their own self interest - something the rest of us can do 24/7. But instead, we do the exact opposite - we squeeze the president's private realm down to a size that is incompatible with human needs and human foibles, and then take judge his (or her) presidency in terms of the human behavior that leaks out.

Is this moral of us?

A great antidote to the self-important and self-righteous nonsense on the TV and blogs. Great piece.

I'll be 54 when I vote for Obama this November - and I'll be writing his name in on my ballot if Hillary somehow steals the nomination from him. I'm a lifelong Dem who would have been happy voting for Hillary had she not adopted the worst traits of the Republicans to use them against a fellow Dem, but she's given all of us a clear preview of how she'd run the country, and it will be a la Rove.

Hillary's McCain-inspired BS gas tax holiday ploy reminds me of her Iraq vote, except in this case, she DOES "know at the time" that the gas tax holiday will HURT the country because every leading economist is telling her so. But Hillary prefers to not listen to the economists today, just as she couldn't be bothered to listen to those of us (Obama included) who told her that bush's war would also hurt this country.

Her cynicism is even worse - she knows this gas tax BS hasn't a prayer of making it through Congress, but she'll push it because all she cares about is the nomination that she thinks she's entitled to, and if that means a false promise to a family of four that her gas tax holiday will buy them a whopping 1.75 trips to McDonald's, so be it.

I started out very skeptical of Obama, but he has won me over, no more so than when he adroitly shrugs off the BS media attacks that would have long ago killed off other politicians.

Obama's just too smart for them, including Hillary.

Speaking of honesty and trust-worthiness, here is a for-real example:

If you remove the 18 cent tax on gas, then wouldn't the price just float back up by 18 cents, since there would be no real change in the supply of gas, or the basic economics of the whole thing? Don't prices, in general, including the price of gas, float to a level of equlibrium between supply and demand?

If people would drive less, or drive smaller cars, then that might put some brakes on the rising price of gas. Isn't that more realistic?

Contrary to what Ms. Jacoby states, the American people are actually quite reasonable, which is why they have lost faith in a political process which no longer represents them at the Federal level. When peoples basic values are trampled upon, when jobs are taken away by unrestricted immigration, when the military that is supposed to defend us gets dragged into foreign military adventures at the behest of powerful special interest groups, when politicians spend money on pork barrel projects and corporate welfare while basic infrastructure continues to decay, then it is no wonder that those few left who are still interested in the political process often cling to unrealistic expectations which are pandered to by politicians of various stripes. If it weren't for our state and local governments, we would now be a third world nation.

I feel like many, like Someone and Holy Cow (just as examples), are not understanding what type of leadership is here. A person's morality by Christian standards (or a business for that matter) does not play as much into what makes a good President as they would wish. As has been pointed out, JFK was a womanizer (FDR probably was too), yet they are two of the best presidents of the 20th century. Nixon, Carter, and W are examples of Presidents that lived more along the lines of 'proper' conduct, yet these are easily 3 of the worst Presidents of the 20th century.

People are acting like it is government (and specifically the President) that sets the standards of morality, when that is as far from the truth as we can get. It is society that sets the proper standards of morality, and our politicians are as much a part of that society as anyone else. What separates them from us is their ability to govern effectively. They have faults like the rest of us, but sometimes we must look beyond those faults to see the greater good they were doing. Surely one could look past FDR's faults to see that he was the right man for WWII (certainly better than the more moral Lindbergh), and its not exactly rocket science to figure out that JFK was better than Nixon.

My point is, certain issues of morality are overblown. Should a politician be allowed to be a cannibal? Of course not. Should a politician allowed to go to a church and be inspired there, even if at times the pastor said things that were extremely bigoted and hateful? Yes, we all live with those people (myself being Jewish, I have friends that I know still have deeply anti-semitic thoughts, but I do not disown them for it. If they betrayed me, however, then there is reason to disown them). What makes a man good for the Presidency is his ability to lead and inspire, much like a leader in the business world, and people can and will follow a leader with faults (we all do). It is advancing one's country's interests and making sure your country (like a business) and its citizens prosper that makes one a good President.

Finaly, let us also not forget that in the past, it is when we have asked the government to act in the world of morality that we have seen some of the ugliest moments in US history. It was to protect the 'innocence of white women' that helped bring Jim Crow laws into effect, devout Christians brought about Prohibition and the violence that came with it, and it was these same moral types that brought about both Red Scares, most notably the McCarthyism of the 50s. We are placing more emphasis on morality, and less emphasis on the liberty of that person to act within the legal realm, and that makes people hypocrites.

Here is a test: If you had two people running, and you knew the better candidate (the best person to be President) was openly gay and did not hide his partner, would you still vote for him?

If your answer is no, then you would be sacrificing liberty at the altar of your own morality, and defacing everything this country stands for.

Calling the young people who support Obama fascists, yet ignoring OberSturmbanfuhrer Frau Hilary’s demand for Democrats to “Do It Her Way (or else?)” is truly farcical. I am white, over 68, and I’m still working (because I have to). I didn’t come into a $109 million over the last 7 years so I work to support my family. Any working class stiff who thinks Hilary is in their corner must have been sniffing some kind of fumes for too long.

Spidey wrote:

"Mr. Mark,

"I hope this answers questions why many in the old testament (including some in the ten commandments) should not be taken literally and not to be read by unbelievers of Christ. That includes all the false religions and atheists. They should not quote the scripture coz they are NOT QUALIFIED to interpret it."

Dear Spidey -

Thanks for the last response.

Yes, I can see VERY CLEARLY how that explanation would suffice for someone with both a limited worldview AND an agenda biased towards accepting speculation and conjecture as sufficient answers, but the rules of logic are not so easily suspended in the search for knowledge and truth.

In short, you are jumping through hoops to make sense out of what cannot be made sense of. Black is white and up is down may work fine when disbelief is suspended and the bludgeon of faith provides one with a wild card to play whenever simple logic overwhelms the blatant ignorance of "divine" knowledge...but we all know that. The atheists among us just don't accept it as a truism while - apparently - you do.

I think I'm done here.

Tim, you commented, "My personal breaking point has been reached with Obama. He can not be trusted. And I believe most Americans will conclude the same thing by the time this election is over. The democrats had better nominate Hillary if they want any chance of winning."

There are plenty of on-the-fence supporters for whom the Wright affair was a deal-breaker. They were never real Obama supporters, as far as I'm concerned. There are millions more that are standing with him, because he's the only candidate that has the ability to bring a real change of tone to Washington. These folks are smart enough not to buy the sound bites and other "reporting" that passes for political coverage these days.

If you and others that consider Obama untrustworthy decide to break for Clinton, McCain, or just for staying home, and Obama loses, get ready for $4 a gallon gasoline (or even $4.50 or $5), more deaths from Iraq (which is an economic issue because so much American money has been spent on it), an economy that continues to stagnate meaning more lost jobs, another conservative named to the Supreme Court, and a long list of continued problems in this country.

If, as Susan posits, you want someone who's morally perfect, you and others like you would probably be best staying home. Let the millions of us that want real change outnumber you at the polls and bring it about.

Right on the money, Susan! I think Andy Rooney said the same thing in other words in a column he wrote years ago. The American political process is such that the country wants candidates to lie to them - that is, to tell them what they want to heear - and rewards those who lie most convincingly.

Some days I don't think we're not much higher up than barbarianism. We're certainly getting there these days!

Luis Workman

I think you are mistaken in comparing Obama to Hitler or Mao. Such a comparision, more or less, ruins your credibility on other things. And just because a person likes Obama enough to vote for him, that does not make a person a fascist, and just because someone contradicts you on this thread, that does not mean there is a campaign afoot to police your thoughts.

It's the skin color, stupid.

Luis Workman:

"fascism: a governmental system led by a dictator having complete power, forcibly suppressing opposition and criticism, regimenting all industry, commerce, etc., and emphasizing an aggressive nationalism and often racism."

Please explain how people supporting Obama as a candidate are fascists?

Who (currently ruling) might better reflect the definition of fascism above? Democracy in decline?

And where has Obama aspired to become the next god-like Hitler and Mao? (..that's way out there...)

Why would anyone want to "police you" on how to read and think? (Your vote counts like anyone else's, do you think you're different?)

For someone who "knows what he's talking about," I find your logic difficult to follow. Please, enlighten me....

Bravo, Susan, for re-stating, in these unsettling times, the real meaning of trust. As the quote -- " I don't think much of a man who is no wiser today than he was yesterday" -- attributed to Abraham Licoln so eloquenly spells out, TRUST, in the sense of willingly surrendering our better judgement, in changed circumstances, to a paralysing commitment made on an antecedent occasion when circumstances were different, is the most stupid value to hold any intelligent person accountable for. Trust, rightly valued means the ability and determination to rise to the occasion and do the right thing under the circumstances prevailing at the time the decision to act is being made.

Great commentary on the problem of honesty and perception. The process we put candidates through is horendous. I wish we could rethink it, but instead we just get sucked into it further each election cycle.

Re Susan Jacoby's piece about candidate honesty -- what she points out is true, has always been the case, yet voters persist in judging candidates on whether they are "down to earth" or "someone I'd like to have a beer with." We should not judge politicians on the same set of criteria by which we judge actors in television dramas -- their likeability, or looks, or how friendly they seem to be. We should judge them by their brains, their record, their intellect and whether they agree with you on the issues. But of course, hardly any voters do that.

Kelly Miller,

I know perfectly well what I am talking about. This article makes a general principle that applies perfectly to Obama supporters, who keep arguing how perfect their candidate is and any criticism of him need to be suppressed. I have seen plenty of left and right wing stupidity and the Obama supporters reinforced my view. You can keep your idea to yourself and there is no way you can change mine. This is still a democracy until you young fascists get to power. Don't try to police me on how to think or read yet.

Perspective wrote "and finally a self-admitted pro-Israeli evangelist in the biblical apocalyptic tradition. "

Whoever becomes president, be it Micky Mouse, America's liberal/secularist are doomed according to the scriptures.

Enjoy your life while it last. Next is Iran or North Korea whether you like it or not. It's in the scriptures. It won't be over until unbelievers will realize their error.

Just to show how accurate the scripture is, I might have to vote for Mickey Mouse.

Louis Workman,

I think you've got it all backwards. Those sound bites that people are clinging to, those are from the media and Hillary and McCain, about Obama. Obama's not pandering hope, as you might think. Hillary is pandering lowering the gas tax, so the oil companies can get more profits.

I am an Obama follower and I don't think that comparing him with Hitler or Mao is in any way productive or accurate. I think maybe that you have miscontrued what Ms. Jacoby is trying to say.

Louis Workman,

I think you've got it all backwards. Those sound bites that people are clinging to, those are from the media and Hillary and McCain, about Obama. Obama's not pandering hope, as you might think. Hillary is pandering lowering the gas tax, so the oil companies can get more profits.

I am an Obama follower and I don't think that comparing his with Hitler or Mao is in any way productive or accurate. I think maybe that you have miscontrued what Ms. Jacoby is trying to say.

I had a similar line of thought lately. For states that rely heavily upon a sales tax, many also have legislated a "use tax". It works like this - buy something over the internet where you don't pay sales tax, and you should voluntarily submit your use tax - the same percentage as the sales tax - to the state. Yeah, sure.

How many people in the legislature - you know, the ones who actually passed that law - "walked the talk"? Hard to say, but I guess it would be next to none.

"spiderman2:
Cromett, The presidency is not a one-man decision making body. You are dreaming if you think you can be perfectly nice with your enemies.

You're a hypocrite. Why would you want the President to be nice with America's enemies and yet allow him be be morally corrupt doing crazy things like hurting his family by playing around?

This discussion is over. You're day dreaming. Soon you will know what reality means when missiles start falling down in the U.S Mainland."

I'm sure you are looking forward to a day when the missles fall, in your apocalyptic silliness. Rational people don't.

I never said anything about playing nice, I said follow the laws of war that WE as a nation, due to our own sense of integrity have committed us to and which have evolved over time to protect the lives and rights of innocent people. Clearly you don't feel that moral law has any place in the the world, the same arguments our Nazi, Imperial Japanese, and Stalinist enemies made. You have the same sort of self-righteousness they did and with no more basis in reality.

I love your writing that can alway see through the irrational perfectionism in American politics. Politics by definition is about people, and people are not perfect.

What Obama is doing is trying to pander to the irrational need of the left wing public with the illusion of a perfect candidate that can rise above politics and reach to the level of a religion. This is exactly what Hitler and Mao Zedong succeeded, who effectively made themselves into gods. The behavior of Obama followers have proven my point. Democracy is in grave danger as its participants have lost the ability of critical thinking and resort to sound bites and beautifully crafted speeches.

Gaby, I have to agree with you. Never a republican, I was an early Hillary supporter that lost the faith. In the end, she acts like someone that believes it's her historical birthright to become president - time, place, and person all come together in Hillary's self-centered mythology.

And of course, with Bill as her role model, how could she fail to believe this? Early on, the republicans didn't believe for a minute that they had one chance in a thousand of ever landing the White House again after Bush and his nefarious bunch. Now they have new hope......

And further, I'm willing to bet that if Hillary were to get elected, relatively little would change in Washington - compared to McCain, the lesser of two evils to be sure, but not really good enough for our present needs by a long shot.

Yes, McCain is re-born as a viable candidate, and of course Hillary promises to fight on to the bitter end - a delightful scenario for the republicans, all in all.

Clearly, Jeremiah Wright has been used as a bludgeon to dismantle Obama's candidacy, and with some obvious effect as the Indiana and North Carolina primaries loom into focus.

And were thinking people to weigh Rev. Wright's thinking against that of McCain's 'spiritual advisor' Rev. Hagee, for example - we'd see the difference between a fiery black orator that panders to his congregation and to his 15 minutes of fame, as contrasted to a fundamentalist whitebread dumpling that advocates bombing Iran, running all the gays out of town, keeping all the women barefoot and pregnant, and basically calling down God's wrath all the the unrepentent and wrong-thinkg 'evil-doers' in the world - and finally a self-admitted pro-Israeli evangelist in the biblical apocalyptic tradition.

And to think the McCain courted this guy's support for over a year before he finally got the fundamentalist right-wing nod. And cynically speaking, don't we all think that McCain and his 'spiritual mentor' should get the same kind of press that Obama and Wright have received?

Of course McCain is staying as far away from Hagee as he can possibly get at the moment - and who could blame him now that he's assured of the right-wing whacko fringe vote?? McCain's next book should be titled, "How I Sold My Soul Without Ever Getting Elected" - it has nice ring to it.

In the mean time, Obama is the only game in town that will do any of us much good down the road...

Nixon had Watergate and Clinton had Monica. Kerry, we say was swift boated. Rev. Wright has been tossed under the bus by Obama. Nice move Obama. Way to treat you spiritual advisor and the guy who probably produced the votes necessary for you to win your first public office. The good Reverend has been Husseinanated. As Obama climbs the ladder he has Husseinanated many along the way and there are many more to be dealt with so the Rev. might feel special but he really is not.

Trent Lott had a great career until he made what was perceived as a racial remark. He was tossed under the bus and even Bush turned his back on him. This demonstrates that the race card is perhaps the most potent weapon in America to end someone's career based on so called character and moral issues.

The list of people who have been race carded, swift boated, and Watergated from acceptable morals and character one day into un-acceptable character and morals the next day goes on and on and it grows every day. The list is not as much about the character or morals of the people as it is is is about reaching a limit with a person which causes an irreparable break in trust. You can even go back to Old Testament times and find that Moses pushed God to the breaking point when he struck a rock rather than spoke to a rock to make water for the Israelites. God told Moses that he could not see the promise land, leading to the very first recorded Watergate. Moses begged to get back into God's good graces but it was too late and God eventually told Moses to never again bring up the subject.

Moses was the same man before his Watergate and after his Watergate. Nixon was always a crook and most of us knew it or suspected it. However, something changed on that day we found out Nixon broke the law so blatantly. Did the man's morals or character suddenly change? No. So what did change? Nothing really other than the fact that the event exposed and focused us so intently on his failing that it caused a breach of trust so large that the gap can never be filled. Trust is what we want and look for because we know every man has faults. When trust is broken we often say that a person has faulty morals or character flaws. What we should say is that we just don’t trust that individual anymore. Trust is something that takes a long time to build but can be undone in a moment of passion, stupidity or disobedience. Once the bond of trust is broken it is either irreparable or takes twice the time to build back to the starting point.

For most marriages, one incident of infidelity causes the trust to go out the window to never be retrieved again. In other cases it does not. The point is that each of us has varying degrees of flexibility, but we all have our limits. To use Nixon as an example again, the whole of American had had enough when we learned about Watergate. It was over quickly, he knew it, and he resigned.

My personal breaking point has been reached with Obama. He can not be trusted. And I believe most Americans will conclude the same thing by the time this election is over. The democrats had better nominate Hillary if they want any chance of winning. We know Hillary and there is not much if anything that can be vetted with regard to Hillary that has not already been brought to the light of day. We can vote or not vote for Hillary or McCain based on issues and it won’t be about trust. We don’t know that much about Obama and what we learn additionally each day is not very good. How many more skeletons are in Obama’s closet? I don’t really care anymore but for those who are still evaluating things my guess is that “You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet.”

Cromett, The presidency is not a one-man decision making body. You are dreaming if you think you can be perfectly nice with your enemies.

You're a hypocrite. Why would you want the President to be nice with America's enemies and yet allow him be be morally corrupt doing crazy things like hurting his family by playing around?

This discussion is over. You're day dreaming. Soon you will know what reality means when missiles start falling down in the U.S Mainland.

Could not have said it better myself. Americans are the biggest hypocrites ever. Vote for the Iraq war and not join to fight. These candidates are only human beings and make mistakes...unlike the current dunce in office now. Given the current state of affairs, you would think the lesson had been learned.

Susan writes:

"My guess is that anyone who is willing to endure what all American presidential candidates must endure is operating at a level of egotism and ambition beyond the imagination of most voters. That is why they are candidates for office and we are not."

Bingo!

And, yes, it would be nice (not to mention fair) if the media spent a 10th of the time examining McCain's closet skeletons as they do the Dems.

McCain's relationship with the insane hate-monger Rev. John Hagee is a case in point. Outside of Keith Olbermann and Jon Stewart, who in the media has spent even a nanosecond on this story? No one.

My prediction - when the Dems finally choose Obama as their candidate, the media will float the meme that, "the American people are weary of the media's obsession with the religious associations of the candidates. Time to move on." And, voila! McCain will be given yet another free ride on an "issue" that the media treated as all-important just a few months earlier.

You heard it here first.

Stayed tuned for more adventures in the John McCain/media "Free Ride Express" saga!

"It is time for Americans to grow up and stop pretending that we are electing a moral exemplar instead of a president."

"Growing up", that is, becoming mature, responsible adults, is precisely what U.S. society has come to make into an "against-all-the-odds" prospect.

"Grow up"--- easy to recommend. How is that done in U.S. society where reading, thinking and introspection are the preserve of a dwindling minority?

HOLY COW:

“If the enemy does not abide by any rules, it's hard to play by the rules and yet America is trying hard to stick to those rules. Get real. “

It is not at all hard to play by the rules. It is the mark of a true professional soldier to abide by the laws of war. That is what makes our army different than Al Qaeda. Under the Geneva Convention, all soldiers are required to obey the Laws of War at all times. Anyone who violates then is a war criminal period.

“American soldiers, although not all, are the best soldiers in the world. During WW@ , they put Japanese kamikaze fighters inside coffins before they throw them to the sea as a sign of respect. With the kind of morality you prefer, I bet you would burn those dead bodies before you throw them to the sea.”

They did not, however, water board or otherwise torture Japanese prisoners. Despite the many Japanese atrocities, WE did not make it public policy to violate the Geneva Convention, unlike the Japanese or President George W. Bush and Dick Cheney and their criminal associates.

“I believe the U.S soldiers in Iraq needs you so there would be somebody who can throw those dead bodies more efficiently. I suspect, you would burn them all. After all there is no moral standard which hinders you not to do so.”

I’m NOT the one claiming that the war in Iraq has to be fought by rules different than the ones followed in World War II against far more effective and ruthless enemies. YOU are. I feel that all American officials should be held accountable for their actions and not arguing from expediency that the law should be thrown out in this case. Professional armies have been handling insurgencies since there have been insurgencies.

It is a virtual impossible for any human being to be !00% truthful. Examine your past 24 hours and think about how many times you wisely avoided telling the absolute truth. We've created a political system that necessitates created fabrications and fudging if you want any chances of being elected.

Perhaps the greater flaw in our political system is the constant scrutiny of 24-hour cable news. My goodness, this morning I watched one reporter interviewing another reporter about what I (the American voter) is feeling about a candidates recent body language. Please, if I can't think for myself, I shouldn't vote. These candidates are mere human being. Cable news, in its quest for ratings, has examined every facial expression as if it were a qualifier for the presidency. Rumor has it that these candidates actually go to the bathroom just like the rest of us.

It is a virtual impossible for any human being to be !00% truthful. Examine your past 24 hours and think about how many times you wisely avoided telling the absolute truth. We've created a political system that necessitates created fabrications and fudging if you want any chances of being elected.

Perhaps the greater flaw in our political system is the constant scrutiny of 24-hour cable news. My goodness, this morning I watched one reporter interviewing another reporter about what I (the American voter) is feeling about a candidates recent body language. Please, if I can't think for myself, I shouldn't vote. These candidates are mere human being. Cable news, in its quest for ratings, has examined every facial expression as if it were a qualifier for the presidency. Rumor has it that these candidates actually go to the bathroom just like the rest of us.

No deflawing and declawing?

No deprograming?

No purging the "Koran"?

No setting everybody straight?

CCNL, Boy, where have ye gone?

Thank you. I may have to check out your book.

S C Cromett wrote " Like being a set of war criminals who violate the Geneva Conventions and feel they are above the law? "

If the enemy does not abide by any rules, it's hard to play by the rules and yet America is trying hard to stick to those rules. Get real.

American soldiers, although not all, are the best soldiers in the world. During WW2 , they put Japanese kamikaze fighters inside coffins before they throw them to the sea as a sign of respect.

With the kind of morality you prefer, I bet you would burn those dead bodies before you throw them to the sea.

I believe the U.S soldiers in Iraq needs you so there would be somebody who can throw those dead bodies more efficiently. I suspect, you would burn them all. After all there is no moral standard which hinders you not to do so.

S C Cromett wrote " Like being a set of war criminals who violate the Geneva Conventions and feel they are above the law? "

If the enemy does not abide by any rules, it's hard to play by the rules and yet America is trying hard to stick to those rules. Get real.

American soldiers, although not all, are the best soldiers in the world. During WW@ , they put Japanese kamikaze fighters inside coffins before they throw them to the sea as a sign of respect.

With the kind of morality you prefer, I bet you would burn those dead bodies before you throw them to the sea.

I believe the U.S soldiers in Iraq needs you so there would be somebody who can throw those dead bodies more efficiently. I suspect, you would burn them all. After all there is no moral standard which hinders you not to do so.

This is a very weird statement that was posted earlier:

"The last thing I want is my kids to grow up thinking its ok to have sex with whomever you please and get away with it..."

The person who made this statement is thinking a little too much on containing and controlling other peoople's sexuality. This ridiculous and absurd statement is even weirder when you look at the context; this is a question about the perceived honesty and trustworthiness of the 3 Presediential candidates. How on earth could anyone possibly twist up a reply so that it would include references to supposed, nefarious sex partners, of ones children, no less, at some undetermined time in the future?

Sexual conduct is only one part of morality, and not the most imporanat part; and sex is not wicked, evil, or bad, and also, it is not a sin, or a sinful thing; moreoever, trying to contain and control other people's sex lives is a weird past-time; and besides, it is also a hopeless and lost cause.

from SAM HARRIS.

Geert Wilders, conservative Dutch politician and provocateur, has become the latest projectile in the world's most important culture war: the zero-sum conflict between civil society and traditional Islam. Wilders, who lives under perpetual armed guard due to death threats, recently released a 15 minute film entitled Fitna ("strife" in Arabic) over the internet. The film has been deemed offensive because it juxtaposes images of Muslim violence with passages from the Qur'an. Given that the perpetrators of such violence regularly cite these same passages as justification for their actions, merely depicting this connection in a film would seem uncontroversial. Controversial or not, one surely would expect politicians and journalists in every free society to strenuously defend Wilders' right to make such a film. But then one would be living on another planet, a planet where people do not happily repudiate their most basic freedoms in the name of "religious sensitivity."

Witness the free world's response to Fitna: The Dutch government sought to ban the film outright, and European Union foreign ministers publicly condemned it, as did UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. Dutch television refused to air Fitna unedited. When Wilders declared his intention to release the film over the internet, his U.S. web-host, Network Solutions, took his website offline.

Into the breach stepped Liveleak, a British video-sharing website, which finally aired the film on March 27th. It received over 3 million views in the first 24 hours. The next day, however, Liveleak removed Fitna from its servers, having been terrorized into self-censorship by threats to its staff. But the film had spread too far on the internet to be suppressed (and Liveleak, after taking further security measures, has since reinstated it on its site as well).

Of course, there were immediate calls for a boycott of Dutch products throughout the Muslim world. In response, Dutch corporations placed ads in countries like Indonesia, denouncing the film in self-defense. Several Muslim countries blocked YouTube and other video-sharing sites in an effort to keep Wilders' blasphemy from penetrating the minds of their citizens. There have also been isolated protests and attacks on embassies, and ubiquitous demands for Wilders' murder. In Afghanistan, women in burqas could be seen burning the Dutch flag; the Taliban carried out at least two revenge attacks on Dutch troops, resulting in five Dutch casualties; and security concerns have caused the Netherlands to close its embassy in Kabul. It must be said, however, that nothing has yet occurred to rival the ferocious response to the Danish cartoons.

Meanwhile Kurt Westergaard, one of the Danish cartoonists, threatened to sue Wilders for copyright infringement, as Wilders used his drawing of a bomb-laden Muhammad without permission. Westergaard has lived in hiding since 2006 due to death threats of his own, so the Danish Union of Journalists volunteered to file this lawsuit on his behalf. Admittedly, there is something amusing about one hunted man, unable to venture out in public for fear of being killed by religious lunatics, threatening to sue another man in the same predicament over a copyright violation. But it is understandable that Westergaard wouldn't want to be repeatedly hurled at the enemy without his consent. Westergaard is an extraordinarily courageous man whose life has been ruined both by religious fanaticism and the free world's submission to it. In February, the Danish government arrested three Muslims who seemed poised to murder him. Other Danes unfortunate enough to have been born with the name "Kurt Westergaard" have had to take steps to escape being murdered in his place. (Wilder's has since removed the cartoon from the official version of Fitna.)

Wilders, like Westergaard and the other Danish cartoonists, has been widely vilified for "seeking to inflame" the Muslim community. Even if this had been his intention, this criticism represents an almost supernatural coincidence of moral blindness and political imprudence. The point is not (and will never be) that some free person spoke, or wrote, or illustrated in such a manner as to inflame the Muslim community. The point is that only the Muslim community is combustible in this way. The controversy over Fitna, like all such controversies, renders one fact about our world especially salient: Muslims appear to be far more concerned about perceived slights to their religion than about the atrocities committed daily in its name. Our accommodation of this psychopathic skewing of priorities has, more and more, taken the form of craven and blinkered acquiescence.

There is an uncanny irony here that many have noticed. The position of the Muslim community in the face of all provocations seems to be: Islam is a religion of peace, and if you say that it isn't, we will kill you. Of course, the truth is often more nuanced, but this is about as nuanced as it ever gets: Islam is a religion of peace, and if you say that it isn't, we peaceful Muslims cannot be held responsible for what our less peaceful brothers and sisters do. When they burn your embassies or kidnap and slaughter your journalists, know that we will hold you primarily responsible and will spend the bulk of our energies criticizing you for "racism" and "Islamophobia."

Our capitulations in the face of these threats have had what is often called "a chilling effect" on our exercise of free speech. I have, in my own small way, experienced this chill first hand. First, and most important, my friend and colleague Ayaan Hirsi Ali happens to be among the hunted. Because of the failure of Western governments to make it safe for people to speak openly about the problem of Islam, I and others must raise a mountain of private funds to help pay for her round-the-clock protection. The problem is not, as is often alleged, that governments cannot afford to protect every person who speaks out against Muslim intolerance. The problem is that so few people do speak out. If there were ten thousand Ayaan Hirsi Ali's, the risk to each would be radically reduced.

As for infringements of my own speech, my first book, The End of Faith, almost did not get published for fear of offending the sensibilities of (probably non-reading) religious fanatics. W.W. Norton, which did publish the book, was widely seen as taking a risk--one probably attenuated by the fact that I am an equal-opportunity offender critical of all religious faith. However, when it came time to make final edits to the galleys of The End of Faith, many of the people I had thanked by name in my acknowledgments (including my agent at the time and my editor at Norton) independently asked to have their names removed from the book. Their concerns were explicitly for their personal safety. Given our shamefully ineffectual response to the fatwa against Salman Rushdie, their concerns were perfectly understandable.

Nature, arguably the most influential scientific journal on the planet, recently published a lengthy whitewash of Islam (Z. Sardar "Beyond the troubled relationship." Nature 448, 131-133; 2007). The author began, as though atop a minaret, by simply declaring the religion of Islam to be "intrinsically rational." He then went on to argue, amid a highly idiosyncratic reading of history and theology, that this rational religion's current wallowing in the violent depths of unreason can be fully ascribed to the legacy of colonialism. After some negotiation, Nature also agreed to publish a brief response from me. What readers of my letter to the editor could not know, however, was that it was only published after perfectly factual sentences deemed offensive to Islam were expunged. I understood the editors' concerns at the time: not only did they have Britain's suffocating libel laws to worry about, but Muslim physicians and engineers in the UK had just revealed a penchant for suicide bombing. I was grateful that Nature published my letter at all.

In a thrillingly ironic turn of events, a shorter version of the very essay you are now reading was originally commissioned by the opinion page of Washington Post and then rejected because it was deemed too critical of Islam. Please note, this essay was destined for the opinion page of the paper, which had solicited my response to the controversy over Wilders' film. The irony of its rejection seemed entirely lost on the Post, which responded to my subsequent expression of amazement by offering to pay me a "kill fee." I declined.

I could list other examples of encounters with editors and publishers, as can many writers, all illustrating a single fact: While it remains taboo to criticize religious faith in general, it is considered especially unwise to criticize Islam. Only Muslims hound and hunt and murder their apostates, infidels, and critics in the 21st century. There are, to be sure, reasons why this is so. Some of these reasons have to do with accidents of history and geopolitics, but others can be directly traced to doctrines sanctifying violence which are unique to Islam.

A point of comparison: The controversy of over Fitna was immediately followed by ubiquitous media coverage of a scandal involving the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS). In Texas, police raided an FLDS compound and took hundreds of women and underage girls into custody to spare them the continued, sacramental predations of their menfolk. While mainstream Mormonism is now granted the deference accorded to all major religions in the United States, its fundamentalist branch, with its commitment to polygamy, spousal abuse, forced marriage, child brides (and, therefore, child rape) is often portrayed in the press as a depraved cult. But one could easily argue that Islam, considered both in the aggregate and in terms of its most negative instances, is far more despicable than fundamentalist Mormonism. The Muslim world can match the FLDS sin for sin--Muslims commonly practice polygamy, forced-marriage (often between underage girls and older men), and wife-beating--but add to these indiscretions the surpassing evils of honor killing, female "circumcision," widespread support for terrorism, a pornographic fascination with videos showing the butchery of infidels and apostates, a vibrant form of anti-semitism that is explicitly genocidal in its aspirations, and an aptitude for producing children's books and television programs which exalt suicide-bombing and depict Jews as "apes and pigs."

Any honest comparison between these two faiths reveals a bizarre double standard in our treatment of religion. We can openly celebrate the marginalization of FLDS men and the rescue of their women and children. But, leaving aside the practical and political impossibility of doing so, could we even allow ourselves to contemplate liberating the women and children of traditional Islam?

What about all the civil, freedom-loving, moderate Muslims who are just as appalled by Muslim intolerance as I am? No doubt millions of men and women fit this description, but vocal moderates are very difficult to find. Wherever "moderate Islam" does announce itself, one often discovers frank Islamism lurking just a euphemism or two beneath the surface. The subterfuge is rendered all but invisible to the general public by political correctness, wishful thinking, and "white guilt." This is where we find sinister people successfully posing as "moderates"--people like Tariq Ramadan who, while lionized by liberal Europeans as the epitome of cosmopolitan Islam, cannot bring himself to actually condemn honor killing in round terms (he recommends that the practice be suspended, pending further study). Moderation is also attributed to groups like the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), an Islamist public relations firm posing as a civil-rights lobby.

Even when one finds a true voice of Muslim moderation, it often seems distinguished by a lack of candor above all things. Take someone like Reza Aslan, author of No God But God: I debated Aslan for Book TV on the general subject of religion and modernity. During the course of our debate, I had a few unkind words to say about the Muslim Brotherhood. While admitting that there is a difference between the Brotherhood and a full-blown jihadist organization like al Qaeda, I said that their ideology was "close enough" to be of concern. Aslan responded with a grandiose, ad hominem attack saying, "that indicates the profound unsophistication that you have about this region. You could not be more wrong" and claiming that I'd taken my view of Islam from "Fox News." Such maneuvers, coming from a polished, Iranian-born scholar of Islam carry the weight of authority, especially in front of an audience of people who are desperate to believe the threat of Islam has been grossly exaggerated. The problem, however, is that the credo of the Muslim Brotherhood actually happens to be "Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader. The Qur'an is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope."

The connection between the doctrine of Islam and Islamist violence is simply not open to dispute. It's not that critics of religion like myself speculate that such a connection might exist: the point is that Islamists themselves acknowledge and demonstrate this connection at every opportunity and to deny it is to retreat within a fantasy world of political correctness and religious apology. Many western scholars, like the much admired Karen Armstrong, appear to live in just such a place. All of their talk about how benign Islam "really" is, and about how the problem of fundamentalism exists in all religions, only obfuscates what may be the most pressing issue of our time: Islam, as it is currently understood and practiced by vast numbers of the world's Muslims, is antithetical to civil society. A recent poll showed that thirty-six percent of British Muslims (ages 16-24) believe that a person should be killed for leaving the faith. Sixty-eight percent of British Muslims feel that their neighbors who insult Islam should be arrested and prosecuted, and seventy-eight percent think that the Danish cartoonists should have been brought to justice. And these are British Muslims.

Occasionally, however, a lone voice can be heard acknowledging the obvious. Hassan Butt wrote in the Guardian:

When I was still a member of what is probably best termed the British Jihadi Network, a series of semi-autonomous British Muslim terrorist groups linked by a single ideology, I remember how we used to laugh in celebration whenever people on TV proclaimed that the sole cause for Islamic acts of terror like 9/11, the Madrid bombings and 7/7 was Western foreign policy. By blaming the government for our actions, those who pushed the 'Blair's bombs' line did our propaganda work for us. More important, they also helped to draw away any critical examination from the real engine of our violence: Islamic theology.

It is astounding how infrequently one hears such candor among the public voices of "moderate" Islam. This is what we owe the true moderates of the Muslim world: we must hold their co-religionists to the same standards of civility and reasonableness that we take for granted in all other people. Only our willingness to openly criticize Islam for its all-too-obvious failings can make it safe for Muslim moderates, secularists, apostates--and, indeed, women--to rise up and reform their faith.

And if anyone in this debate can be credibly accused of racism, it is the western apologists and "multiculturalists" who deem Arabs and Muslims too immature to shoulder the responsibilities of civil discourse. As Ayaan Hirsi Ali has pointed out, there is a calamitous form of "affirmative action" at work, especially in western Europe, where Muslim immigrants are systematically exempted from western standards of moral order in the name of paying "respect" to the glaring pathologies in their culture. Hirsi Ali has also observed that there is a quasi-racist double-think on display whenever western powers trumpet that "Islam is peace," all the while taking heroic measures to guard against the next occasion when the barbarians run amok in response to a film, cartoon, opera, novel, beauty pageant--or the mere naming of a teddy bear.

Have you seen the Danish cartoons that so roiled the Muslim world? Probably not, as their publication was suppressed by almost every newspaper, magazine, and television station in the United States. Given their volcanic reception--hundreds of thousands of Muslims rioted, hundreds of people were killed--their sheer banality should have rendered these drawings extraordinarily newsworthy. One magazine which did print them, Free Inquiry (for which I am proud to have written), had its stock banned from every Borders and Waldenbooks in the country. These are precisely the sorts of capitulations that we must avoid in the future.

The lesson we should draw from the Fitna controversy is that we need more criticism of Islam, not less. Let it come down in such torrents that not even the most deluded Islamist could conceive of containing it. As Ibn Warraq, author of the revelatory Why I Am Not a Muslim, said in response to recent events:

It is perverse for the western media to lament the lack of an Islamic reformation and willfully ignore works such as Wilders' film, Fitna. How do they think reformation will come about if not with criticism? There is no such right as 'the right not to be offended; indeed, I am deeply offended by the contents of the Koran, with its overt hatred of Christians, Jews, apostates, non-believers, homosexuals but cannot demand its suppression.

It is time we recognized that those who claim the "right not to be offended" have also announced their hatred of civil society.

This country was founded on very high ideals, it has never lived up to them and never will. This does not mean that it should not try to live up to them.

Sometimes people seem to get the ideals of a country and the reality of a country mixed up. This really seems to be the case when talking about the past, especially when the past, that some speak of, is before they were even born.

The people that are running for president are running for president, they are not running for the "job" of God, that position is God's and it is going to stay God's.

Take care, be ready.

Sincerely, Thomas Paul Moses Baum.

"Holy Cow:
"S C Cromett,

There are many of that kind (morally corrupt but law abiding leaders) in third world countries.

The people has no moral standards that is why corruption flourishes. If that is the country you want, you are free to migrate. Join them.

What makes America great is because the people can't stand immorality from their leaders."

Like being a set of war criminals who violate the Geneva Conventions and feel they are above the law? I'm talking abour OUR president, vice president, and their cronies here. If I had a daughter and she was of legal age and wanted to imitate Monica, that would be her business, not mine. I wouldn't approve, but frankly, in the scheme of things, it really doesn't matter tio the job.

Half of the presidents of the 20th Century have been unfaithful to their wives, such as FDR, Eisenhower, and Kennedy. Others, like Nixon and Jimmy Carter have been faithful. What difference has that made to how well they have done as president? That is the real question. The answer is: not squat.

Grashnak,

Would yo be pleased if the future president makes a Lewinski with your daughter? Get real.

We all want a moral president and at the same time a qualified one.

Someone wrote:
"The last thing I want is my kids to grow up thinking its ok to have sex with whomever you please and get away with it, because if the PRESIDENT OF THE US can get away with it, who can't? Morality, trustworthiness, honesty, and other moral issues are and SHOULD be an issue in EVERY presidency, and I'm glad it is with this one. "

Yes of course, because your kids are using the President as their role model. *rolls eyes*

Are you living in 1950? With all of the problems surrounding the US, most of them caused by the ignorance and incompetence of the current president, are you really more worried about who the president sleeps with than his or her ability to actually run the country?

Besides, who appointed you the guardian of morality? Who gets to decide whose behaviour is moral?

Barrack Obama is the first person in a very long time who appears to have the qualities I am looking for in a president. Yes, he might be an egoist and very ambitious, but I also feel that he is genuinely concerned with where this country is going.

Just watching his body language when he speaks with people tells me that he is actually interested in what they have to say. Quite unlike Hillary, who laughs too much and too loud, and frankly, her body language tells me that she listens because she has to if she wants your vote. Not because she is interested in your views.

All of this hullabaloo over Wright's pulpit remards are vastly overplayed and overrated. He is no different than may of the white so-called preachers who made statement at least as offensive as Wright's.

Although I am somewhat concerned about his rather liberal domestic agenda, I believe that in foreign policy he might be invaluable.

S C Cromett,

There are many of that kind (morally corrupt but law abiding leaders) in third world countries.

The people has no moral standards that is why corruption flourishes. If that is the country you want, you are free to migrate. Join them.

What makes America great is because the people can't stand immorality from their leaders.

Does competency every matters to the American voter?

The reason many voters focus on "morality and character" is because they wrongly believe that if you are a good person, then that qualifies you for any job. Nothing could be further from the truth. How many of your dear good friends and family would you hire to do open heart surgery on you? Or would you rather have a competent surgeon do it, even if he cheats on his wife?

We have to start voting on who is or will be COMPETENT at the job. Once you narrowed the field to the competent ones, make sure they will work to advance the things you care deeply about, which I sincerely doubt is the freedom of the Iraqis or the oppression of the Afghanis, or the profits of the Halliburtons of the world, or the sex positions of gay couples. It is more likely you care about having a job that pays for your family's health care and education needs, in addition to a safe roof over your head and nutritious food on the table.

“SOMEONE:
Susan: "It is time for Americans to grow up and stop pretending that we are electing a moral exemplar instead of a president"
It is this kind of thinking that has destroyed what once was a very moral and 'good' country. I don't care if you believe this or not, but Americans ought to elect a president not only on issues, but also on moral guidelines. The presidency is not just a job of making decisions...its LEADERSHIP. The last thing I want is my kids to grow up thinking its ok to have sex with whomever you please and get away with it, because if the PRESIDENT OF THE US can get away with it, who can't? Morality, trustworthiness, honesty, and other moral issues are and SHOULD be an issue in EVERY presidency, and I'm glad it is with this one. With all due respect Susan, you're just wrong. Yes, no one is perfect. Read Romans. But 'character' does matter in the sense that I will not vote for someone who sits in Jeremiah Wright's pew for 20 years and then claims he didn't know where Wright stood on these issues. That makes BO either 1. A liar or 2. A naive and ignorant fool who does not deserve the greatest and most powerful job in the universe (besides God of course). “

Personally, Id rather have someone competent at the job than someone who is chosen for sexual fidelity. The current president may be faithful to his wife, but he is also the enable of war criminals and probably a war criminal himself. Personally, I’d rather have someone who is faithful to the constitution and to the law and public justice rather than to his wife, if I had to choose the between two. Frankly, I don’t care what an elected official does in his private life as long as it doesn’t create a conflict of interest with his (or her) public duties, any more than I care what you do. It’s none of my business. If a person is such a poor parent that what the president does has more influence on the sexual morality of his or her children than he or she does, then he or she has no business being a parent.

I do not think Barak Obama is a liar, and I do not think he is a naive and ignorant fool. These characterizations could not be more off-base. I think he just has the wrong color skin for alot of Americans; it is pretty simple, and pretty clear.

Susan: "It is time for Americans to grow up and stop pretending that we are electing a moral exemplar instead of a president"

It is this kind of thinking that has destroyed what once was a very moral and 'good' country. I don't care if you believe this or not, but Americans ought to elect a president not only on issues, but also on moral guidelines. The presidency is not just a job of making decisions...its LEADERSHIP. The last thing I want is my kids to grow up thinking its ok to have sex with whomever you please and get away with it, because if the PRESIDENT OF THE US can get away with it, who can't? Morality, trustworthiness, honesty, and other moral issues are and SHOULD be an issue in EVERY presidency, and I'm glad it is with this one. With all due respect Susan, you're just wrong. Yes, no one is perfect. Read Romans. But 'character' does matter in the sense that I will not vote for someone who sits in Jeremiah Wright's pew for 20 years and then claims he didn't know where Wright stood on these issues. That makes BO either 1. A liar or 2. A naive and ignorant fool who does not deserve the greatest and most powerful job in the universe (besides God of course).

Mr. Mark,

I hope this answers questions why many in the old testament (including some in the ten commandments) should not be taken literally and not to be read by unbelievers of Christ. That includes all the false religions and atheists. They should not quote the scripture coz they are NOT QUALIFIED to interpret it. It's been a problem since the time of Apostle Paul and here is the reason he gave :

"And till Moses had done speaking with them, he put a VEIL on his face. "(Exodus 34:33)

" Seeing then that we have such hope, we use great plainness of speech: 13 And not as Moses, which put a veil over his face, that the children of Israel could not stedfastly look to the end of that which is abolished: 14 But THEIR MINDS WERE BLINDED: for until this day remaineth the same VEIL UNTAKEN AWAY IN THE READING OF THE OLD TESTAMENT; which veil is done away in Christ. 15 But even unto this day, when Moses is read, the veil is upon their heart. 16 Nevertheless when it shall turn to the Lord, the veil shall be taken away. " (2 Corinthians 3:12-16)

Susan has made a good point about the inconsistency of people, in general.

Being inconsistent, or stating opinions in response to questions, which later you cannot even remember, is not quite the same thing as lying, and it is not the same thing as being dishonest. And making a campaign promise, which later turns out to be impossible to implement because of unforseen complications is also not the same as lying. I consider lying and untrustworthiness to be a pattern of pre-meditated deception.

My problem with Hillary is that, she does not ever seem to have courage, to step out in front of any possibly controversial issue, and say what she thinks about it, and what should be done; she waits a bit, and sees what people are saying, so that maybe she can lead the discussion along the lines of what her audience wants to hear.

She might be a good President, who knows? But I do not think that she would be a very good leader, for a leader is the person, whom people want to follow; that is the definition of a leader. President Bush is not a good leader, and I do not imagine that Hillary would be a good leader, either. Of course, having a leader is a psychological need, and perhaps, when you think about it, it may not be so important or critical, after all.

Some people have compared Obama to Abraham Lincoln. Maybe that is an exangeration. But if I were to compare Hillary to someone of that era, I would compare her to General McClellan, who was always preparing for the battle, and was never ready, because there was always more preperation to be made.

It's been 20 minutes. Where's Farnaz?

What, no Farnaz?