I've had it with Fundys

[Johnny Perkka]

Originally Posted by walter23

stupid religious convictions.

well, I'm sure the scientitsts who had the original wild idea that the earth was round, were called stupid and crazy, and you being a stone cold skeptic would have been one of those name callers...

There is nothing wrong with believing in different things, but calling others beliefs stupid is rather juvenile... You are making us non-believers look really bad...

[angelsfort]

Originally Posted by Johnny Heinonen

You are making us non-believers look really bad...

nah, not all of you... just himself

Edited to add: Walter, if this thread is starting to annoy you, perhaps you need to step back and take a breather? You're posts appear to be getting gradually more hostile...

[patterfr]

Originally Posted by walter23

One of the things you've said is that you literally believe the bible. I judge that as ridiculous.

The main reason is simply the fact that they believe ludicrous things which have the potential to physically, socially, artistically, or aesthetically endanger me in the future. I'm openly judgemental of that.

It's just getting harder and harder to take you seriously Walter. Truly.

Methinks thou dost protest too much, if you know what I am saying.

Noone asked my opinion here, but maybe it is time to take a breather, huh?

Happy New Year.

[Rain Lily]

Originally Posted by angelsfort

Edited to add: Walter, if this thread is starting to annoy you, perhaps you need to step back and take a breather? You're posts appear to be getting gradually more hostile...

Maybe the beer cans pile was gradually getting higher...

Smile, Walter - you can call me (and probably anyone else with strong religious convictions) stupid, and it's like water on a duck's back, just rolls right off. Because one of the great things about convictions are just that - they are convictions and name-calling doesn't change them.

Happy New Year to you, Walter!

[Padre]

A couple of observations; I'm surprised no one has entered the word 'mythology' into the discussion. And when I use the word I do not mean fiction or unreal. I'm using the word in the Joseph Campbell sense. Joseph Campbell - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Mythology is a collection of stories by which we order our lives. I believe this has been pointed out in previous discussion about families. We grow up in an enviornment and that environment which helps shape our beliefs. As children we observe and participate in various experiences which range from joy to trauma. Out of those events we take with us truths and perhaps untruths from those events into our future. Likewise the Bible, Koran, Torah, yada yada are all collections of stories about how people responded to different situations. We read a story, ponder its relevance to our life and perhaps a little bit of what we glean goes with us. Most of the stories in sacred text find someone needing 'salvation' , eternal or immediate. And of course each text supplies an ultimate and an intermediate figure to take care of that. Sometimes the figure is divine and sometimes it is our neighbor. Even movies reflect this theme, Gotham is under seige by the Joker and Batman becomes the salvation or deliverance. Now to get to a point lol; all of us play various roles in the mystery of life. Sometimes we are the failure, the traumatized, the victim, the sinner. And other times we are the saint, the one who brings hope, and some degree of deliverance or salvation. To use a Christian term, we are God Incarnate - we become God's love, hands, hugs, resources ect. So in a sense we are all human and divine living our lives based on a series of stories which constitute our life's story. I choose to be a Christian, not because I can, or even want to prove divine creation or anything else as a concrete point. I have made my choice based on the fact that those particular stories resonate with my life and in the reading and studying of them, I can navigate the way or path I feel is best for my life. While I am a Christian, I am also somewhat of a universalist believing the mythology I follow isn't necessarily that which will resonante with others. Therefore every person can choose from any number of paths and find truth for their life. Now I'm going to eat black-eyed peas

[walter23]

Originally Posted by angelsfort

nah, not all of you... just himself

Edited to add: Walter, if this thread is starting to annoy you, perhaps you need to step back and take a breather? You're posts appear to be getting gradually more hostile...

There's a difference between hostility towards people and hostility towards ideas. I've been very cordial and friendly with almost all of you (including someone who sent me a PM full of scripture quotes). Ideas are fair game for all manner of criticism.

[walter23]

Originally Posted by Rain Lily

Smile, Walter - you can call me (and probably anyone else with strong religious convictions) stupid, and it's like water on a duck's back, just rolls right off. Because one of the great things about convictions are just that - they are convictions and name-calling doesn't change them.

I didn't call you stupid, just a particular aspect of your beliefs. You may or may not be stupid, but for whatever reason you've been lured into the mass hallucination of Christianity. It's a pretty big cultural force so you can't exactly be held too personally accountable for it - you can't help where you were born and what your influences were.

I realize the last paragraph is incredibly condescending. But look: the debate isn't exactly going to change your mind, so I may as well just be forthright about what I think of literal bible interpretation. I think it's preposterous.

[Rain Lily]

Calling me a creepy Christian is sort of judgemental...

Although I think I probably am pretty creepy, but Jesus doesn't have anything to do with that

[Rain Lily]

Originally Posted by walter23

I didn't call you stupid, just a particular aspect of your beliefs. You may or may not be stupid, but for whatever reason you've been lured into the mass hallucination of Christianity. It's a pretty big cultural force so you can't exactly be held too personally accountable for it - you can't help where you were born and what your influences were.

I realize the last paragraph is incredibly condescending. But look: the debate isn't exactly going to change your mind, so I may as well just be forthright about what I think of literal bible interpretation. I think it's preposterous.

But you can't prove that the Bible and Christianity AREN'T true, or real, or factual, so you're no different than me in that respect. I think your thinking on this matter is preposterous! And narrow-minded. And stupid (this aspect of your non-belief, I mean). However I'm sure you are a bright, logical, systematic person - and I'm sure you are totally happy in what I think is your lack of understanding.

And just so you'll know...I haven't been spoon fed anything here, I've given it and still give it much thought and attention, and sought answers for myself - after all, God says "come, let us reason together" and I have reasoned life experiences, feelings, lack of feelings, faith, lack of faith, belief, unbelief, all those things - with and without considering the huge cultural influence around me...and still I come to the same conclusions over and over and over again...

And I claim personal responsibility for it. Totally. No brainwashing or anything, I wholeheartedly embrace it.

[k9ofkaos]

Originally Posted by Rain Lily

Calling me a creepy Christian is sort of judgemental...

Although I think I probably am pretty creepy, but Jesus doesn't have anything to do with that

Sis you're not the least bit creepy, but Chuck Norris is.

[walter23]

Originally Posted by walter23

Those passages could just as well be describing things you could not imagine that will happen 2000 years from today. Four horsemen might be like cybernetic robot war machines from 4027.

The human mind is almost programmed to draw connections between things. It serves us well - makes us smart and able to learn. But a lot of those connections are spurious - hence "deja vu", "synchronicities", and stupid religious convictions.

I'd like to revisit this point.

It's trivially easy to read almost any text and find connections between it and the world and thus judge it to be remarkably true. A good illustration of this is found in the fictional books by Robert Anton Wilson. He uses the number 23 as an illustration of how our mind draws connections between things. Start looking for the number 23 - you will begin to see it in all sorts of unusual places, and in all kinds of seemingly meaningful ways. If you really try and start really thinking about 23 a lot you will start to draw all sorts of amazing connections. Even in fundamental things like the construction of your body: there are 23 pairs of chromosomes in your cells. You've got 5 fingers on each hand (ie 2 + 3). You may find that something important happens and you look at the time and it's 2:23. You may find that you've got an important date on the 23rd of the month. Maybe your odometer will have 23 in it when you get in your car today. I can't really "trigger" the 23 syndrome with this paragraph but if you read one of his books you'll start suffering from it. The number will pop up everywhere and in all kinds of bizarre contexts. You'll probably see it (or "5", which is 2+3) on the next webpage you visit.

The reason is not that 23 is a magic number; the reason is that reading about how it's a magic number sets up your mind to start noticing it and drawing spurious (or perhaps not spurious, but no more special than with any other number!) connections. The same thing happens with biblical interpretation. If you spend your time studying the bible your brain will start to connect it with the world around you. This seems to be an important survival strategy; if we're thinking about things and drawing connections we're more likely to notice patterns that might help us live or die (for example cycles in crop productivity, the seasons, droughts, the behaviour of predators, places where food and shelter can be found, etc)... but it kind of misfires sometimes and lets us draw weird connections that aren't necessarily valid. Our minds are like (in a metaphorical sense) wet & sticky sludge that kind of sticks to various ideas or things in our world and forms a web between them. Sometimes this misleads us, sometimes it serves us well. But when people start going on about biblical prophecy, this is what I see - the human mind drawing connections between things and finding meaning. It's happened to me with the 23 syndrome, and I think I have a handle on how it works (at least within my own mind), and I can understand how compelling it can be when suddenly these connections start clicking into place.

So I hope you can understand that by coming at it from this perspective I can't take the bible seriously as a divine text (no more divine than the text on the back of a cereal box, anyway).

[patterfr]

Walter
Really.
In a discussion, shouldn't you at least believe what you are saying?

Suppose the next time I see you and say wow, I hate the way you look, or the way you act or the way you speak or the way you dress or the way you do anything. I actually hate everything you do and are. I mean I don't hate YOU though, so you shouldn't be offended, Doesn't that sound preposterous?
I mean those are all prodcts of your upbringing and experiences. So you shouldn't be offended. Right?

[walter23]

<deleted>

[Rain Lily]

Originally Posted by walter23

I'd like to revisit this point.

It's trivially easy to read almost any text and find connections between it and the world and thus judge it to be remarkably true. A good illustration of this is found in the fictional books by Robert Anton Wilson. He uses the number 23 as an illustration of how our mind draws connections between things. Start looking for the number 23 - you will begin to see it in all sorts of unusual places, and in all kinds of seemingly meaningful ways. If you really try and start really thinking about 23 a lot you will start to draw all sorts of amazing connections. Even in fundamental things like the construction of your body: there are 23 pairs of chromosomes in your cells. You've got 5 fingers on each hand (ie 2 + 3). You may find that something important happens and you look at the time and it's 2:23. You may find that you've got an important date on the 23rd of the month. Maybe your odometer will have 23 in it when you get in your car today. I can't really "trigger" the 23 syndrome with this paragraph but if you read one of his books you'll start suffering from it. The number will pop up everywhere and in all kinds of bizarre contexts. You'll probably see it (or "5", which is 2+3) on the next webpage you visit.

The reason is not that 23 is a magic number; the reason is that reading about how it's a magic number sets up your mind to start noticing it and drawing spurious (or perhaps not spurious, but no more special than with any other number!) connections. The same thing happens with biblical interpretation. If you spend your time studying the bible your brain will start to connect it with the world around you. This seems to be an important survival strategy; if we're thinking about things and drawing connections we're more likely to notice patterns that might help us live or die (for example cycles in crop productivity, the seasons, droughts, the behaviour of predators, places where food and shelter can be found, etc)... but it kind of misfires sometimes and lets us draw weird connections that aren't necessarily valid. Our minds are like (in a metaphorical sense) wet & sticky sludge that kind of sticks to various ideas or things in our world and forms a web between them. Sometimes this misleads us, sometimes it serves us well. But when people start going on about biblical prophecy, this is what I see - the human mind drawing connections between things and finding meaning. It's happened to me with the 23 syndrome, and I think I have a handle on how it works (at least within my own mind), and I can understand how compelling it can be when suddenly these connections start clicking into place.

So I hope you can understand that by coming at it from this perspective I can't take the bible seriously as a divine text (no more divine than the text on the back of a cereal box, anyway).

Wow, that was well written and I think you ROCK for putting it in another post and not editing it up in the first one. Seriously. Thank you.

And it is quite logical. But, what you see as the human mind making connections, I see as the human mind discovering what God has done. I think there are no coincidences (yes, I love that saying from Signs) and I think it's all mapped out - it's just up to us to see it, if we open up to it. I think every scientific discovery and every mathmatical equation and every bit of "chaos" is all actually well-ordered God stuff.

Sheesh, I told you this thread was addictive, LOL - I wasn't coming back to post anything else, and look at me

[Rain Lily]

Originally Posted by k9ofkaos

Sis you're not the least bit creepy, but Chuck Norris is.

[walter23]

Originally Posted by patterfr

Walter
Really.
In a discussion, shouldn't you at least believe what you are saying?

Suppose the next time I see you and say wow, I hate the way you look, or the way you act or the way you speak or the way you dress or the way you do anything. I actually hate everything you do and are. I mean I don't hate YOU though, so you shouldn't be offended, Doesn't that sound preposterous?
I mean those are all prodcts of your upbringing and experiences. So you shouldn't be offended. Right?

I'm not going to be baited into admitting that I "hate christians" because, with only a few exceptions, I don't. (Ted Haggard might be a great example of a christian whom I actually do viscerally hate, though he got his comeuppance when he was caught snorting meth with his gay prostitute ).

We're talking about ideas here. If you self-identify with your idea so strongly that it has become your entire identity then I can't help offending you when I tell you your idea is ridiculous.

[k9ofkaos]

Originally Posted by walter23

The fact that christians might judge me is not the main reason I distrust christians. The main reason is simply the fact that they believe ludicrous things which have the potential to physically, socially, artistically, or aesthetically endanger me in the future. I'm openly judgemental of that.

Walter no one challenged you on this statement, but I'd like for you to explain just how I am a danger to you. And I would appreciate documentable facts, not just rhetoric.

[Rain Lily]

Don't you mean "when I tell you I think your idea is ridiculous" Walter? Because you actually don't know that it is. Which I suppose is why you are agnostic?

[patterfr]

I'm not offended at all. It's as if you are trying to tell me that breathing all this oxygen is stupid and preposterous. My beliefs are as important and vital to me as oxygen. And I certainly am not trying to bait you into anything. I'm trying to follow your logic, but it's hard for me. Anyway, I'm going cold turkey on this thread. I think it's run its course for me. Enjoy. Hopefully I won't exhibit any human weakness here and return.

[Rain Lily]

I'm going to play like Bill O'Reilly and give Walter the last word, as far as it goes between me and Walter. Because I truly am feeling like we've started on a circular path and I'm getting tired of the same scenery.

So...Walter, away you goooooo! After your next response (the last word!) I'm not clicking here again, ok? But - no hard feelings, and I wish you the best. If you have anything specific you want to say or discuss, that's not the same stuff we've been saying, feel free to pm me.