Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I Get that, too, but not one of your best. It is how I use it for a particular purpose - to spoof (as the FSM does the Bible) the theist habit of selecting Bibletext to underline some argument they make as though it somehow proved it. The practice began with Paul in Romans by the way.
Example of how I use it :
Gimli "The words of this wizard stand on their heads"
Frodo to Gollum "I think this food would do you good, if you'd just try. But I suppose you can't even try, yet".
Theoden "When you hang from a Gibbet for the spirt of your own crows, I will have peace with you".
But no fear that it will be used in the way you suggest. Not the way you butcher argument in pursuit of your duck -hunt against atheists who will not be quiet .
Lmao, no, the hobbit type stuff never will.
I am not quiet either.
I am not of the sect 'anti-religion atheism". I don't base a reasonable conclusion on a belief statement or rejection of a good law based on theist use it too. I most certainly will not distort, hide, or avoid conclusions on how the universe works because of an anti religion bias or omni-unicorn-god..
it is what it is ... regardless of how I feel about it, want it to be, or really wish it was.
Keep swiming? Where? Just round in circles like a goldfish? Nope, Carpe Jugulum as Pratchett put it. Metaphorically, of course.
Damn it's like Christianity where snippits of Bibletext are used as a support for the rival arguments.
Keep swimming ...it's like the old jok tweaked by me.
Animals..."Survive, eat reproduce"
My Tweak..Humans.. "Reproduce, eat, survive".
Because we have got a handle on our environment and don't need to put survival as a priority. And eating rather than a constant workday trying to hunt or forage enough to live on, we have to do no more than a trek to the shops. And "reproduce" is something of a priority, and for recreational reasons rather than any practical purpose.
And we ..well let me quote from another fave literary source.
"Heaven (read our own efforts) has given us so many good things; food for our bellies; clothes for our bodies. Yet we take these things for granted; spend them recklessly, even.." (Van Gulick The haunted monastery)
We do indeed take for granted, waste and even affect to despise, all the great stuff we have done for ourselves. And those like Tolkien who affect to despise all our Machines, while helping themselves to whatever bits of it suit them, are being unintentionally hypocritical (1). His telephone and tape recorder were fine, but our airliners and railways were wrong and evil.
This is why I love Tolkien's fantasy world, but I do not approve of his views.
Golden ageism is a fallacy, and advocating turning our backs on all we have achieved and back to the cave and jungle is not the answer. It is to swim with direction. Not just aimlessly. We know what's wrong with the world, and we know what we have to do. We just don't seem to be able to overcome our monkey -mind instincts.
And just not to mislead you, this was not so much a response to your post as using it as a springboard for general thoughts,
(1) Of course, he has a point. But there is an element of selfishness in his view 'You want to put a railway through MY countryside?" NIMBY (not in my backyard) is the problem of those who want to fly to New York but won't have the airport near where they are. And it leads to this deluded Luddite cult where the System or Materialism is sneered at by those pretending to be morally and philosophically superior, while helping themselves freely to all the benefits it offers. That is why, although I had emotional and even rational sympathies with the hippy movement, I never bought into it because I could see it was essentially only effective as a protest group and was impractical as an alternative System, because it was basically parasitic. That's what's wrong with Tolkien and venomfang and all those who decry our materialistic society while living it easy thanks to it. They are ingrate parasites on it.
Last edited by TRANSPONDER; 01-28-2017 at 05:07 AM..
Someone over on the Buddhism forum has started a thread claiming Lokeshwor is the lord of all realms, so if Tolkien was a Buddhist instead of Catholic you have to wonder how the Trilogy would have played out...
BTW... There is an argument developing on the same thread as to whether or not Buddhism is really just another form of Atheism when you boil it down if anyone cares to head over and weigh in...
Someone over on the Buddhism forum has started a thread claiming Lokeshwor is the lord of all realms, so if Tolkien was a Buddhist instead of Catholic you have to wonder how the Trilogy would have played out...
BTW... There is an argument developing on the same thread as to whether or not Buddhism is really just another form of Atheism when you boil it down if anyone cares to head over and weigh in...
I think it is kind of theism as it has a faith -belief in an invisible and unproven force that has discrimination, or it wouldn't know whether our deeds are good or bad other than based on what we thought about it; it would be human (not humanist) foibles and presumptions raised to divine level.
As to a Buddhist Tolkien, Galadriel would be a sort of Kuan -Yin figure and the Eldarin elves, Boddhisattvas. There would be a lot more hand -wringing about the regrettable need to wipe out even evil life, before sadly going ahead and doing it. But apart from that, not too different.
Keep swiming? Where? Just round in circles like a goldfish? Nope, Carpe Jugulum as Pratchett put it. Metaphorically, of course.
Damn it's like Christianity where snippits of Bibletext are used as a support for the rival arguments.
Keep swimming ...it's like the old jok tweaked by me.
Animals..."Survive, eat reproduce"
My Tweak..Humans.. "Reproduce, eat, survive".
Because we have got a handle on our environment and don't need to put survival as a priority. And eating rather than a constant workday trying to hunt or forage enough to live on, we have to do no more than a trek to the shops. And "reproduce" is something of a priority, and for recreational reasons rather than any practical purpose.
And we ..well let me quote from another fave literary source.
"Heaven (read our own efforts) has given us so many good things; food for our bellies; clothes for our bodies. Yet we take these things for granted; spend them recklessly, even.." (Van Gulick The haunted monastery)
We do indeed take for granted, waste and even affect to despise, all the great stuff we have done for ourselves. And those like Tolkien who affect to despise all our Machines, while helping themselves to whatever bits of it suit them, are being unintentionally hypocritical (1). His telephone and tape recorder were fine, but our airliners and railways were wrong and evil.
This is why I love Tolkien's fantasy world, but I do not approve of his views.
Golden ageism is a fallacy, and advocating turning our backs on all we have achieved and back to the cave and jungle is not the answer. It is to swim with direction. Not just aimlessly. We know what's wrong with the world, and we know what we have to do. We just don't seem to be able to overcome our monkey -mind instincts.
And just not to mislead you, this was not so much a response to your post as using it as a springboard for general thoughts,
(1) Of course, he has a point. But there is an element of selfishness in his view 'You want to put a railway through MY countryside?" NIMBY (not in my backyard) is the problem of those who want to fly to New York but won't have the airport near where they are. And it leads to this deluded Luddite cult where the System or Materialism is sneered at by those pretending to be morally and philosophically superior, while helping themselves freely to all the benefits it offers. That is why, although I had emotional and even rational sympathies with the hippy movement, I never bought into it because I could see it was essentially only effective as a protest group and was impractical as an alternative System, because it was basically parasitic. That's what's wrong with Tolkien and venomfang and all those who decry our materialistic society while living it easy thanks to it. They are ingrate parasites on it.
I understand. We differ in how we react. I do numbers, maybe to a fault.
if I am in a bowl, I am in a bowl ...just keep swimming.
If I am in the sea, I just keep swimming.
If i am in a river drying up, I just keep swimming.
I try and be the best swimmer I can.
Human have a handle do they? I think it its more like RUSH's view.
Old enough to know what is right,
Young enough not to choose it.
That seems to me an aimless and brainless way to live. Though by far the most usual one (1). We know we have to do better, even if we don't know how. Even if we do, we rarely do it. And I'm not a poster boy for Primate perfection, by any means.
But It seems to me that we can at least define on paper the ideal to work towards. Having it on paper at least puts the idea into peoples' minds, and being in mind can be taught. That's the way we learn ethics and morality, even though up to now it's been done without much direction. "Common sense" procedure as it is called.
I don't know..it may never work, and it may not be very good even if it does, but we know we are a journey, and at least it would be good if we knew where we hoped to get to.
Those who just want to swim round and round. can swim. Just so they don't obstruct or worse, attack, those who are asking for a map or trying to draw one.
(1) The face of the moon peers into our bowl
our porcelain world of swirling mist.
We trail our filmy roibes as we dart,
hither and thither in search of meaning.
I look to wine to cheer the soul,
the current of time I can not resist.
Before we drinkers are swept apart,
I ask the moon, are we waking or dreaming?
Last edited by TRANSPONDER; 01-29-2017 at 09:46 AM..
That seems to me an aimless and brainless way to live. Though by far the most usual one (1). We know we have to do better, even if we don't know how. Even if we do, we rarely do it. And I'm not a poster boy for Primate perfection, by any means.
But It seems to me that we can at least define on paper the ideal to work towards. Having it on paper at least puts the idea into peoples' minds, and being in mind can be taught. That's the way we learn ethics and morality, even though up to now it's been done without much direction. "Common sense" procedure as it is called.
I don't know..it may never work, and it may not be very good even if it does, but we know we are a journey, and at least it would be good if we knew where we hoped to get to.
Those who just want to swim round and round. can swim. Just so they don't obstruct or worse, attack, those who are asking for a map or trying to draw one.
(1) The face of the moon peers into our bowl
our porcelain world of swirling mist.
We trail our filmy roibes as we dart,
hither and thither in search of meaning.
I look to wine to cheer the soul,
the current of time I can not resist.
Before we drinkers are swept apart,
I ask the moon, are we waking or dreaming?
Yuppers, to a point for sure. Its just some maps are drawn by stupid. Or worse, people that think what they understand is all anybody should understand.
Just keep swimming doesn't mean ignore, it means do the next right thing no matter how crazy people are around you. Sometimes the next right thing is fighting, sometimes, not so much.
You and I have different "next right things",
so all I can do is "just keep swimming".
Like you, I aint sure either.
with either map, I can only hope we make it. But remember, I predict the next life form in 200 yrs or less. So I believe we already did.
Then we are not too far apart. But, given that we construct our own moral framework, understanding it and ourselves in needful and possible. The research is going on now, and I will stick my neck out and postulate that general animal social behaviour and particularly primate behaviour, is the basis of the way we live. But, just as (so it seems) we have adapted the natural to us, so it doesn't 'select' our species as it used to, and we have built on instinctive social behaviour to construct a morality that is needed for complex society, we can try to understand the rallying behind rulers, flags and holy books as tribal primate behaviour.
Religion, like politics, is instinctive and tribal, and needs to be regulated and robbed of power. Music, like science, is universal, and is non -combative. Though one is based on fact and is debated as a way of finding the facts and the other is a human invention and nobody is 'right'.
These and other inescapable truths (should I not be mistaken) dictate how we should treat them, and in the same way, we know what is right to do and what is not. I think with understanding ourselves, we will know the direction we have to swim. And, as a simpler and less cluttered society, it might not offend Tolkien too much, if he could come to see religion as an evolved instinct and a delusional one, at that.
It might not offend you, either, since in the end, global self regulation by consensus is not Big Government.
Then we are not too far apart. But, given that we construct our own moral framework, understanding it and ourselves in needful and possible. The research is going on now, and I will stick my neck out and postulate that general animal social behaviour and particularly primate behaviour, is the basis of the way we live. But, just as (so it seems) we have adapted the natural to us, so it doesn't 'select' our species as it used to, and we have built on instinctive social behaviour to construct a morality that is needed for complex society, we can try to understand the rallying behind rulers, flags and holy books as tribal primate behaviour.
Religion, like politics, is instinctive and tribal, and needs to be regulated and robbed of power. Music, like science, is universal, and is non -combative. Though one is based on fact and is debated as a way of finding the facts and the other is a human invention and nobody is 'right'.
These and other inescapable truths (should I not be mistaken) dictate how we should treat them, and in the same way, we know what is right to do and what is not. I think with understanding ourselves, we will know the direction we have to swim. And, as a simpler and less cluttered society, it might not offend Tolkien too much, if he could come to see religion as an evolved instinct and a delusional one, at that.
It might not offend you, either, since in the end, global self regulation by consensus is not Big Government.
I'm happy that you are not offended (I never intended that you should be) and am delighted that we seem to be agreeing - not that we need to agree to discuss intelligently an amicably and agree to differ, if need be.
After all, I'm only saying what my thinking is at the moment - I could be wrong.
Last edited by TRANSPONDER; 01-31-2017 at 05:56 PM..
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I Get that, too, but not one of your best. It is how I use it for a particular purpose - to spoof (as the FSM does the Bible) the theist habit of selecting Bibletext to underline some argument they make as though it somehow proved it. The practice began with Paul in Romans by the way.
.
