Thursday, August 29, 2013

The Lords Prayer Condemns Most Christians To Hell

The Lord's Prayer
(traditional)

Our Father, which art in heaven,
Hallowed be thy Name.
Thy Kingdom come.
Thy will be done in earth,
As it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
As we forgive them that trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
But deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
The power, and the glory,
For ever and ever.
Amen.



Hello my droogies!

I was contemplating The Lord's Prayer for some reason, not even sure why exactly, when I noticed a clause in it that literally condemns most of today's Christians to eternal torment.

It's in these two lines:

"And forgive us our trespasses,
As we forgive them that trespass against us."

As we forgive them that trespass against us?

Let that sink in a minute.

This establishes an equivalency between Christians being able to forgive their enemies, and said Christians getting into Heaven!

Do today's Christians (or yesterday's Christians, for that matter) generally tend to forgive those that trespass against them?

Well, the very Forgiveness of The Lord depends on whether they do or not!

I don't know why I've never seen this before.

What is the Forgiveness of The Lord? What does that mean?

Not damning them to hell, that's what it means!

So those Christians that actually forgive the people that hurt them or insult them are the ones that get to go to Heaven.

Those that don't, don't!

Let's see now, the entire Tea Party?
Damned for all time.

Pat Robertson?
Damned.

Anti-Gay Christians?
Hellbound, the lot of them.

Logically, there's no way out of it.

Forgiveness of your enemies = Your own eventual forgiveness after you die.

This is no easy path, but hey, Jesus never said that it was. I mean, shit, you have to find it in your heart to forgive Bin Ladin.

Holy Fucking Shit, that's a LOT of damned Christians!

A few of them will make it, the ones that walk the Jesus walk. The rest, roast.

Too bad the latter dominate the airwaves, and get all the press.

Almost makes me wish their silly fairy tale was real. Imagine the looks on their faces when they realize what disqualified them for Paradise?

(Now I'm indulging in Good, Old-Fashioned Christian Schadenfreude!)

199 comments:

  1. Naw they have a loop hole - hate the sin but love the sinner. They love all those gay people who transgress against the laws of a nomadic bronze age culture. Their attacks are like chemotherapy or surgery- You have to hurt to heal. It's not personal against the sinner - just the sin which encrusts them.

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  2. Well, that's just nonsense. They can't hate the sin without punishing the sinner, and punishment is not forgiveness.

    Again, the only answer to them is a lion.

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  3. So the sin of pride can be cured by a pride?

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  4. Punishment isn't forgiveness? Have you been paying attention, Brian?

    Ain't you from a Catholic family?

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  5. Yes, and black is white. Christianity is the mental virus of backwardness.

    Doesn't matter though. They're still damned. Even without an afterlife they've damned themselves to a wasted life of no growth nor intelligence and glowering hatred and pettiness.

    It's right there in The Lord's Prayer for crying out loud, and I am. Crying out loud, I mean. Because it's fucking depressing as a member of the same species as these pathetic self-blinded atavisms to our vicious past.

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  6. You aren't really the same species B as you don't interbreed. That sort of is a definition of speciation ;)

    FYI - new comic up

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  7. Glad I'm not a Christian, there are things I find truly unforgivable, and really don't see any healthy benefit (physically or emotionally) to twisting yourself into a place of forgiveness of such things. Does Hitler need to be forgiven, the KKK, Ariel Castro, or the 1000's of other atrocities committed on a daily basis? I think not. Some things really just need outright rejection and condemnation...no pretzeling into being forgiving.
    I am always struck by the fact that the hyper-religious, hell bent on declaring their God and interpretation as the only way, the only right position, never even consider why they believe that to be so.
    It is by sheer happenstance that you are born into the family you get. You go to church with them, like they went to the same with their parents, and their parents before that. There is no investigation, discovery, education, deep insight that goes into "choosing" your beliefs, you are a Baptist, Mormon, JW, Catholic, whatever, because your great grandparents were. Very very few people consider all options for belief on their own. Conversely, I think non-belief actually is rooted in seeking answers. Amazing that so many people think dear old great great great Grandpa just happened to stumble across the one true church. Never mind that he got kicked in the head by a cow at 12, drank to excess, beat his kids by the woodshed, by golly he was a CHRISTIAN! LOL

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  8. Pliny, when I go to your site I see the cartoon from May....where is the new one, am I doing something wrong? I refreshed page, too, thinking that might be it, but it wasn't.

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  9. Jude not sure why that is. http://pictoraltheology.blogspot.com/ is the main page though

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  10. I was thinking again...

    "And forgive us our trespasses,
    As we forgive them that trespass against us."

    So if they 'hate the sin but love the sinner' and that rationale allows them to still want to punish the sinner they love for the sin they hate, that means that God, following the above formula, will still treat them as they have treated the sinner they were supposed to forgive. God will forgive them AS THEY HAVE forgiven the sinner. God will thus also "hate the sin but love the sinner" in the same way as per the above equivalency, which means of course, still punish the sinner for the sin, ergo they go to HELL.

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  11. Can you even imagine a Biblical parable of a good holy person being slighted, say someone stole their cattle, and they catch the man and bring him before the holy person, and the holy person says "I forgive you for what you did my son. Of course, I still need to bring you before the townspeople and have them stone you to death, but have no fear for I forgive you. Now go and be happy in your forgiveness so that you can face your painful death with peace of mind" or something like that?

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  12. I would therefore ask the Christian that says 'hate the sin but love the sinner' if that is what they expect from God after they die, since God will treat them as they have treated the sinner. Do they expect their God to hate their sin enough to still punish them for it, even though he loves them? Because that means hell, for sure.

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  13. They're always looking for loopholes in the Bible.

    Like "Judge not, lest ye be judged" can be interpreted as "If you feel that you can pass judgement now, that you are not sinning, then feel free to judge others because you have nothing to fear from you being judged."

    Never occurs to them that they will be judged FOR judging others, that that is in fact a SIN.

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  14. Aha Pliny...when I clicked what I saved in favorites it was the Tangent Du Jour coming up as the home page, now I have gone to Pictorial Theology, and that does the trick! I hope you are at least thinking about publishing a book, this is really great stuff.
    IMO religion would never have survived without loopholes. As long as they can interpret passages in ways to fit their behavior, they are able to say they are following the bible. For those really messy parts that have no loopholes, they can be relegated to parables and not really really the literal meaning of the passages.
    There was a super funny video I wanted to share with you, but for the life of me don't know how to put the link/address on here. It was from upworthy.com, and about how we should name hurricanes for science deniers. That sounds lame, but if you find the video, I think you might get a good laugh too. :-)
    btw Ian/brian, I answered you back on the other comment section after this one was already up. One of these days I'll get the hang of this.
    Last night, we went to our big area summer fair. We are a community that was once based on farming, livestock, etc., so the West End Fair is a huge deal steeped in tradition, old fashioned entries from all over for flowers, jams, pies, vegetables, the showing of cows, horses, rabbits, chickens. And of course all the usual fair type stuff. This is in NE Pennsylvania. The thing I absolutely HATE is the proliferation of confederate flags. Vendors have tents and stalls to sell their crafts, license plates, decorative items lawn ornaments...and the huge confederate flags flying from some of the stalls is horrifying to me. Which lets you know that you can get your flag christmas ornaments, license plates, scarves, etc. here. I look at the little black kids skipping along with their parents, all excited about riding the ponies and winning a goldfish...and just want to say to those vendors "What are you thinking, you morons." I don't know how this continues in 2013 and this far north of the mason/dixon line. I guess I'm back to my rant about hating free speech sometimes.

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  15. http://www.upworthy.com/this-is-probably-the-funniest-most-effective-way-to-deal-with-people-who-ignore-science-facts-ever-2

    Jude, wow... that was fucking funny. Seriously, way better than the concept sounded. And they really did a good job production-values-wise too.

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  16. I just signed the petition. Still laughing.

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  17. Another way that I think they see the "Judge not lest ye be judged" is "those homosexual-loving atheist socialist liberal democrat babykiller bastards are always judging *us* so they should listen to this phrase!"

    They can't see reality through their imaginary halos.

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  18. Sure they're hypocrites, they know they're hypocrites. Until the age of reason, about 6 or 7, they convince you that there's a guy in a red suit who visits all good children around the World, delivering gifts out of a sleigh pulled by nine flying reindeer.

    Sure, it's all in fun when you're old enough to know better but try telling your parents there's no Santa when you're supposedly too young to know or if they imagine that you're too smart to not keep your mouth shut? You'll find yourself with no gifts, maybe even no turkey dinner that Christmas.
    Because they know that Santa Claus is Jesus Christ for juniors! If you can fake it through that and see no conflict of interests, the truth versus, 'what people want to believe', you'll fake it forever.

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  19. It's this hypocritcal nature which led me to shun most religion from an early age. Love thy neighbor, but only if he stays off your lawn and returns that ratchet set you lent him a week ago. :P

    Far too much judging, not enough acceptance. If they lived what they taught the world would certainly be a different place. It seems you can come up with justifications for anything, bend any rule, twist any truth, and they seem to be masters at it.

    A lot of those prayers and songs I learned in school are full of contradictions. And those things stick in your brain, let me tell you. Get 'em while they're young and you get 'em for life. Indoctrination at its finest.

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  20. LOL! Good, you found it! Glad you liked that one, I know it got to me...yes very well done, and funny as hell.
    Hmmm, I'd never thought of Santa as the Jesus for toddler set, getting ready to set the stage for Jesus, but that makes sense! Yes the indoctrination must start early. When my oldest son was about 15, he had a girlfriend who invited him to go to church with her and her family. He had never been, but he really liked this girl and decided to go see what it was all about. So funny when he came home, he was having none of it, thanked me and his dad for never making him that way (!), and thought it so bizarre that they all believed the crap so deeply, that his GF seemed brainwashed and unable to question anything. A few months later she ended up breaking up with him because he refused to go again and told her he didn't believe in that stuff. He was not upset by the break up.
    My favorite family pretzeling story is when that same son was born and the frantic phone calls, berating, and bible passages about how badly he needed to have a christening. God WOULD send my baby to hell if I didn't do this, and they had the bible quotes to prove it! (We absolutely did not do this.) Well, by the time the 2nd son came along, they had all converted to mennonite, which does not believe in baby baptism, only adult. When I reminded them of how zealously they came after me with Son 1, the explanation was that the former church really didn't understand what the bible was saying, and NOW they had it right. That first interpretation didn't REALLY mean to have your babies baptized. (sigh)

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  21. " I guess I'm back to my rant about hating free speech sometimes."

    The Confederate flag is a symbol of hate, a symbol of segregation, of apartheid. Apartheid is a crime against humanity and no white supremacist apology about how black people enjoyed being slaves or how slavery brought them Jesus or how property is private and the owner should be allowed to refuse service based on his racism is going to change that.
    They flirt on the edge of outright racism by hoisting this flag, and they know it and are proud of it.
    In the end it boils down to, 'Are you being intolerant when you will not suffer(tolerate) the intolerance of others?'

    I have been told by a serious Christian pastor that I was being intolerant if I refused to tolerate a gay-hating pastor. He seemed to think this was a good argument. Apparently, to be truly tolerant you must be willing to put up with hateful bigotry and misogyny just as long as it is the belief of the hateful bigot that he is right to do it.
    I know, doesn't make any sense at all, but their answer is, as always, "Think of Jesus on the Cross, dying for your sins!"

    There, now don't you feel better? Less confused?

    NO? Then you are outside of their bubble and you're going to Hell, you are being influenced by Satan, why would they listen to you?

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  22. Hmmm, I'd never thought of Santa as the Jesus for toddler set, getting ready to set the stage for Jesus, but that makes sense!
    --------------------
    Santa Claus is Jesus Light. Along with the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy it's the first step in the indoctrination process. Santa in particular because he sees everything, knows when you are good or bad, gives you presents (heaven) when you're good and a lump of coal (coal = fire = hell) when you are bad, and can be everywhere at once as in on Christmas Eve when he hits all the Christian households in the world. When you first *see* this, it's incredibly obvious in retrospect.

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    1. Coal is also Black, which is *of course* evil, and it's dirty too, again evil. And without much value.

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  23. It's this hypocritcal nature which led me to shun most religion from an early age.
    ------------------
    Me too Dio. I think that's true for most of us here. I mean, it's not like it's *subtle* hypocrisy. It's in your face.

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  24. Back to Santa:

    By presenting "evidence" to the children (holy shit, there's presents under the tree!) (Santa came last night!)(The cookies have bites taken out of them and the milk is half-gone!) the parents teach the child that even though their own sense of logic says this should not be possible, shit, there it is right in front of them, their own eyes confirm it, so in spite of it being impossible it freaking happened, so WOW I guess Santa is real and can do the impossible and I shouldn't doubt anything my parents tell me about impossible-sounding things anymore...
    Oh, and never forget that you don't get to have any fun on Christmas until you've been to Mass on Christmas Eve...

    It puts David Kouresh to shame, makes Jim Jones look like a rank amateur...

    Once I saw this, and not so very long ago either, within the time I've had this blog, I wanted to slap myself, it was so obvious.

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  25. People say they want to let their kids believe in Santa because they have so much fun, it's such an innocent time in their lives, why spoil that?

    The day I realized that Santa Claus wasn't real (My sixth Christmas) was the day that I knew that my parents could lie to me, and did. It never even occurred to me before that. I mean, why would they?

    Logically speaking, there is no reason to ever tell your own child a lie about something so important as believing in things that are not real. It does them a disservice that has a lasting effect. With me, that effect led to not only my atheism, but since my parents lied to me a lot about a lot of things, eventual contempt and a lack of respect for them.

    My son will enjoy Christmas as a fun time with presents from his parents and others. Not as a stepping stone to empty-minded idiocy.

    Harrumph!

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  26. When my daughter was ten years old, I figured okay, she's old enough to have figured out that Santa isn't real and I should just drop the ruse and ask her what she wants from her parents for Christmas. She confessed that she knew Santa wasn't real for years, but was afraid to say anything because she thought if she didn't believe in Santa, or at least pretend, she wouldn't get any presents for Christmas :D

    I realized what kind of mistake I'd make with the Easter bunny, Tooth fairy, and Santa Claus. At least I had the sense to refuse to get her baptized and sent her to a public school where they don't force feed you religion from Kindergarten on.

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  27. Ok, Ian I am not more confused, it is clear as hell that I am intolerant. I do hate racists, anti-semites, gay bashers, misogynists, religious zealots, etc., and do not feel tolerant at all for their right to free speech to spread lies, stir up fear, and attempts to apply their evil positions to public policy.
    Santa Claus, omg, well NOW it's clear. It never occured to me to look at it in that way. It really does set up the indoctrination, but I'm not sure that parents even know they are doing that? I can't believe my parents put that much thought in it, had a master plan, or said out loud "now we do santa and they will believe in God". Again it seems...their grandparents did it, their parents,then them, and if there was a method in this, explaining the method got lost along the way. The results still happened, but no one realizes they are following some long ago script and why?
    As atheists, we did Santa, no agenda to lead to religion, just a seasonal fun time like you mentioned, and didn't go heavy at all on the Santa is watching you, or no presents if you're bad. We wanted them to have fun. We couched a lot in "as the story goes..." or "some people say". We did explain what Christmas and Easter was supposed to be about, but said "we don't believe that, but we love the presents and chocolate bunnies. Now who wants to find eggs?" LOL Jeez, they're all grown up, but now you've got me wondering if they resent it! nah. We still do Christmas with presents, a tree and ornaments every year, put the menorrah and dradles out at the same time (no crosses, tho) I cook a big dinner, and at Easter everyone still gets a good basket. We use all the fun stuff but never give a thought to the religious nature of those days. Has anyone else here made their holidays like this? Or do you reject all of it completely? Dio, did you get much family pressure to baptize? And where is Harvey..he hasn't weighed in on Santa!

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  28. Just re-read, and saw Brian that yes, you do have christmas fun time for your son...how have you handled Santa with him? And do you do more than presents..have the tree and lights and stuff?

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    1. Just the presents and some pretty lights... no tree as yet, but he's not really able to appreciate it as of right now... at this point his biggest pleasure of having a decorated tree would be in pulling it to the ground and destroying all the ornaments... what fun!

      When we eventually do have a tree, which we likely will, it'll be artificial (since we don't like killing things for no good reason) and we will call it a Christmas tree AND a Yule tree, and explain both ideas and the history of the holiday with it's pagan roots, but as of now, that's off in the future somewhere.

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  29. While mucking out stalls just now, the mind wandered to this conversation, and the broader "why we do the things we do", and it reminded me of a story.
    A ham recipe passed down through generations of a family, you had to do it EXACTLY how it was done 100 years ago in order for it to be perfect. No step could be skipped, each one was important to that perfect ham. So for years, step one was "cut off 3 inches from the end of the ham". Until one day, great great great grandma's recipe box was found in the attic, and the instructions said "cut off as much of the end as needed for the ham to fit in your pan."

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  30. Don't get me wrong, I still love "The Holidays". I'm the one putting up the Christmas tree a month early and driving everyone nuts with Christmas songs :) Decorations and holiday cheer. It just took me many years to realize that part of all this merry-making was actually brainwashing our children into believing in something unbelievable. That it can and does set them up for a belief in God or religion. Simply because it's all good-natured and fun it's that much more insidious.

    When my daughter told me she kept up the illusion on her own because she thought she wouldn't get presents it made me laugh. But then when I thought about it, I realized the same could be applied to a lot of people who go to church. They do it because they believe they will get into heaven. They put their Sunday best on and play the part of the good little Christian/Catholic and think that a couple hours a week will bring them salvation and eternal life. Seems so ludicrous but some of them really believe that's all there is to it.

    There was tremendous pressure from family to have my child baptized, even from my own parents who weren't exactly devout followers themselves. That's the part that shocked me the most. We didn't attend church, we didn't say a prayer before meals, we didn't do any of the regular Catholic religious stuff, apart from what was needed to be allowed into a Catholic school. I wasn't even baptized until I was eight years old when we moved to a new city and my mother wanted me to attend a Catholic school. I had my baptism and first communion in the same year. Then when I was thirteen, I had my confirmation. Apart from the prayers and masses at school, that was the extent of it.

    When my daughter was born, out of wed-lock mind you, my girlfriends parents were hell-bent on having their granddaughter baptized. Luckily my girlfriend was also as disillusioned as I was with the whole thing and politely refused. The first year at Christmas when she saw her extended family they attacked her to the point where she had to leave because she was so upset. She was an un-wed teenage mother who didn't want to have her baby baptized?! Blasphemy! Straight to hell!

    So the shocker came when I told my parents about how her family had acted. They said, in their sickeningly polite manner, "Well, maybe you should just go ahead with it to put an end to all this nastiness." "Well, maybe you should just to cover your bases, you know?" I said what the hell do you mean...this is my child and I don't want her being force fed this stuff at such a young age. I want her to make her own decisions. So because it's the "right" thing to do, should I also ask her to marry me? Cover my bases, so we all don't go to hell, you know? Ppppppfffffttttttt :P

    You're right Jude, the whole reasoning behind these imaginary stories has been lost over the generations. Perhaps intentionally. So parents just continue with the charade unknowingly, and their children and their childrens children...

    If I have more children I'll be sure to tell them right from the start that Santa Claus is not real, he's like the superhero of Christmas. He's just a fantasy, and it's really all the loving parents that go out and spend their hard-earned money to bring you awesome presents every December :) I mean, why shouldn't we take the credit? I want to be the one to eat the cookies and drink the milk dammit! :)

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  31. I have an advantage in this area, with disclosing that Santa is not real. My son is autistic. Now, that's an awful thing of course, but it does mean that nobody is going to judge him as harshly if he spills the beans to another autistic kid in his special needs class. Plus he isn't that verbal yet, although he's coming along nicely, so it's still a year or two off. (He's four now)

    If he were normal I'd already be coaching him on how a lot of people believe that Santa is real and it's very rude to try to tell them that they're wrong because their mommies and daddies believe it too.... but that can still fall through as kids will be kids and a kid loves to tall another kid that they're WRONG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    Society has basically put us in a place where if we do not tell this lie to them, we will get a backlash (or many backlashes) for it.

    I really don't care that much if other parents get their noses bent out of whack though... basically, fuck them, they're the ones wanting to lie to kids... So I'm sure we'd be popular among those other parents. Like smallpox popular.

    And yes Jude, the parents didn't think of this stuff... a bunch of macchiavellian christians thought of it all long ago.

    Christian propaganda is EVERYWHERE, not just in Christmas and the holidays.... try watching the Narnia series or reading them... beautiful fairy tales, right? Yah, but Aslan is Jesus. Hell, Santa even puts in an appearance! Sickening.

    Oh, and there's all that "good" propaganda, as in good, fun stories, plus all the BAD propaganda starting of course with the whole Satan thing, but that's in all vampire movies, a lot of horror stories, all over the place... The Exorcist.... The Omen... so many out there...

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  32. Christmas is also conditioning for the parents. That's why they aren't aware that it is conditioning; because it's targeted at them, too. They're taught that it's not a lie, it's a story, it's a tradition, and the kids love it so much, and blah blah blah... Plus, and this is brilliant, the parents get to use it to COERCE the kids into 'behaving' for them, on threat of no presents! Brilliant, really. So their coercive morality system (love me or else burn forever in righteous torment, amen!) is also introduced to the child at this point.

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  33. Ian, I live in RI in New England in the very liberal democratic Northeast, and about five houses up the road from me is this big house flying an American flag... and right beneath it, a confederate one.

    So sickening.

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  34. Back to Narnia:

    I've never read C.S. Lewis, but of course I know that he's a huge Christian apologist and propagandist... and in those movies, one theme repeats over and over again... the idea that if you're just good, and have faith, and ignore all the people that are doubting you, you will triumph in the end. And the converse as well, the brother Edward, who lacked faith and scoffed at the idea of having faith, was quickly seduced by the Evil Ice Queen.

    It's very interesting to me how Christianity represents evil.. Evil, with a capital "E"... The evil characters always look evil, act overtly evil, and most significantly, KNOW that they are themselves evil and are proud of it.
    In reality, this never happens. Evil people are almost always evil because they *believe* that they are good, and that frees them up to act in an evil manner, all the while truly believing that they are good. But they don't want Christians to see evil that way, because then they might realize that they themselves are evil. They want it to be something that's easy to spot, so that they can just demonize anything and the Christian masses will obligingly hate what you tell them to hate, as something evil to be destroyed.

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  35. Christianity simplifies the idea of good and evil into two stark opposed concepts, black and white, no middle ground. Black hats VS white hats. Thus believers in that system are often blind to real evil. Especially in themselves. I mean, they have their white hats, so they can't possibly be the bad guys...

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  36. I've often asked Christians, "Do you really think that Adolph Hitler woke up every morning, looked in the mirror, and said to himself, "My, what a spendidly eeeeevill man you are! ("And by the way, great moustache!")

    That's ridiculous. Hitler obviously believed with all his heart that he himself was a very good man, even doing the Lord's Work, and that while hey, you have to break a few eggs to make an omelet, he was only trying to do the Highest Possible Good in the world... shaping it into a better place for all (that are left after he pulled out the weeds of course)

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  37. When I lived in Amarillo TX for a while a nice young Christian guy that I worked with invited me to go see a movie with him and his wife... "The Passion Of The Christ."

    So I went...

    What a scene! I mean, this is Texas after all... people are CRYING, weeping openly, and saying things that I can hear like "He suffered so much, it's so sad..." or "WHY!!??" and there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth, and all the while on the screen this awful snuff flick was playing.... blood blood blood gore gore gore torture torture torture... the people in the audience were GETTING OFF on it somehow! It was so SICK.

    They took me, as I found out later, because their church told them to try to take unbelievers to see this film! It was literally an assignment!

    They asked me after the film what I though of it, and I told them that I thought it was an awful film that I would have walked out on if I'd not been with them, and that a MAN made this film out of his imagination but people all seem to take it as if God had made it, and as if it were an actual documentary film of Jesus' trials and crucifixion... and that I didn't see the point on focusing on the horrible way that he died when he supposedly wanted us to remember the way that he lived.

    They did not like me anymore after that night.

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    1. Wow, what a story. I applaud you, sir, for telling them how you really felt about that travesty of a film. I watched some of it when it came out years ago and I couldn't stomach it. That all these Christians were praising it, saying it was such a great film about Jesus. It was a film about his death and torture. Satanists probably loved it just as much as those twisted Christians.

      It's the hypocrisy and the "I need to save the unbelievers" that really get to me. They take you out to see this film to try to convert you, or make you see the light, or some other nonsense. Then when you disagree with them, tell them why it was so sickening, they stop talking to you completely. They don't accept that you have different views of the world than they do, they don't even try to convince you further. They just say to themselves, "Well, he can burn in hell for all I care." Real Christian attitude! Love your enemy as you love your friend? Isn't that what Jesus taught?

      And regarding Narnia...that one made me sick as well. I was obsessed with Lord of the Rings in high school. I even learned to write some of the Elvish languages. I was that nerdy about it all :) Someone recommended Narnia to me, telling me that Tolkien and C.S Lewis were friends and used to talk about their stories together and such. So I thought, well, maybe I'll give it a try. I did, and I couldn't get through it. I saw all the Christian symbolism injected into it and it made me sick. Tolkien at least didn't spoil his masterpiece with religious dogma. Even Frank Herbert who wrote Dune...he basically wrote a messiah story and it deals a lot with religion. But it does not paint it very pretty at all. It deals a lot with the negative aspects of blind faith and all the harm that religion can and does cause.

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  38. Christians all like to believe that if they had met Hitler in the early thirties they'd have immediately pegged him for an evil man and would have shunned him, when the real truth is that they would have been blind to his evil and would have cheerfully followed him, because he knew how to play their game and win it. He would have said all the right things to get their allegiance, and I can know that, because that's what he did. Some of the people they're following now, if they had the chance, would do what Hitler did with a smile.

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  39. What amuses/appalls me about the "Passion of the Christ" thing is that Christians watched it and it appealed to all their Superhero Christ stories, and they LOVED all the torture soooo much, and somehow that affirmed their faith for them... so they say to themselves "Now we have this movie that Mel Gibson made for us, and whenever we watch it it makes us feel gushy inside about Jesus and our faith, so let's show this to as many unbelievers as we can *because it will surely have the same effect on them." It's that last assumption that pisses me off. Because it hits all their triggers, they assume we atheists will also have those triggers, and it will hit us in the same way.

    Nope. As it turns out, we're not raving sadomasochists.

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  40. Okay.... now I just had a MAJOR synchronicity, just now while typing.

    Last night I was looking for movies to record on my DVR, and saw "The Forbidden Kingdom," with Jacky Chan and Jet Li. I didn't think that I'd ever seen it, but I'm a sucker for martial arts movies so I recorded it. In fact about an hour ago I went to my DVR list and noticed that it had recorded as planned, so I was thinking of watching it today, it being a rainy day.

    So while I was typing just now, my four-year-old autistic son, who had no idea that I had recorded anything or for that matter any idea what "to record" even means, who is nonverbal, and could have had no clue as to reading a movie title because hey, he's nonverbal, apparently went into my movie collection that I have in this old cabinet in the dining room, and took out one movie that appealed to him for some reason, and came to me and handed it to me to play for him. One movie that *I had completely forgotten that I owned.*

    Yes, you've got it. He just handed me "The Forbidden Kingdom." He had a hundred old movies to choose from, and somehow managed to pick the very one that I'd just recorded and didn't remember owning. Handed it to me. I mean, I'd just recorded it, and NO WAY he knew that, he was not in the room when I did it, and cannot read, and I was not talking about it, and even if I had he wouldn't have been able to connect the name of the movie with the movie in my collection because he cannot read.....

    This one, I give a seven. It's pretty huge.

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  41. BTW, he almost never goes into that cabinet... Maybe once every six months, seriously. It's hard to open.

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  42. Incidentally I remember watching it now... it's a fantasy retelling of the old Chinese "Monkey King" stories.... sucks fairly badly. Which is why I didn't remember *owning* it.

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  43. Our Father, which art in heaven,
    Hallowed be thy Name.
    Thy Kingdom come.
    Thy will be done in earth,
    As it is in heaven.
    Give us this day our daily bread.
    And forgive us our trespasses,
    As we forgive them that trespass against us.
    And lead us not into temptation,
    But deliver us from evil.
    For thine is the kingdom,
    The power, and the glory,
    For ever and ever.
    Amen.
    ###############################

    I think there are two versions of the Lord's Prayer in the New Testament, but they are pretty much the same. I believe a character named Jesus actually existed, and I think that the Lord's prayer might be one of the actual statements he made. It's usually the small, pithy statements which when repeated over and over again that end up being true statements from the original source.

    The Lord's prayer reads like what you would expect from an apocalyptic preacher. He and his followers were expecting the imminent establishment of God's Kingdom. This is why they were only concerned with a day's bread. It's actually a sweet little prayer............

    Of course these modern, knuckle dragging Christians are complete hypocrites. Actually, modern Christians have gnostic leaning beliefs. None of them dwell on the belief that humans are going to be resurrected out of the ground, which is what first century Christians believed. Modern Christians think they go immediately to heaven in spirit form, which is what the gnostics believed. The early church considered the gnostics to be heretics, and had a lot of them killed. Therefore there's an unspoken dichotomy between modern Christianity and the early church.

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  44. Yeah, I'm not even sure I believe that Jesus ever lived at all. Most 'evidence' that he did, is suspect. Josephus I truly believe was an early Christian forgery. They had all the motivation in the world to forge it, and other things as well. I'm not sure what the credibility of Tacitus is... I just do this simple bit of math in my head: Two thousand years plus of time, add in human nature, subtract news media and literacy and add in the propensity to believe in a lot of waaaay stranger shit that modern man would believe in even as gullible as we modern men are, and all the incredibly intense *motivation* they had/have to prove that their god is real, and you get NO JESUS. See, Christians like to lie. A lot.

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  45. I think the best evidence that Jesus existed are Paul's letters. He claims to have visited James (the brother of Jesus) and Paul. In his account, James was the leader of the very early church. The idea that Jesus' brother would lead it makes sense to most scholars.

    If Paul's letters (most of them, anyway) are legit, I don't think he would lie about visiting James and Paul. And if James and Paul existed, then it makes sense that someone named Jesus existed. In order for Jesus not to exist, Pail would have had to be a complete liar. He doesn't come across like a pathological liar. Anyway, no one today knows who the real Jesus was.

    Another thing pointing to Jesus' actual existence is the discovery of Pontius Pilate the Procurator inscribed on some stone somewhere that was dug up several years ago. Until they found that, no one had any evidence of an actual Pilate.

    Just because Jesus the miracle worker never existed doesn't mean that some wandering, charismatic preacher named Jesus who was crucified never existed.

    You're right, the long passage about Jesus in Josephus' book is probably a forgery. Josephus also wrote a little thing in the same book about James "the so-called brother of the Christ" who was also crucified by the Romans. That little passage doesn't really sound like a forgery, but maybe it is. If it was also a forgery, I would think that it would be more flowery.

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  46. In many ways I think Christianity followed a very prototypical course for an evolving religion. Start with a charismatic firebrand followed by individuals more adept at organization. For example - Jesus/Paul; Joseph Smith/Brigham Young; LRon Hubbard/David Miscaviage; Charles Taze Russell/ Joseph Franklin Rutherford, etc.

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  47. In order for Jesus not to exist, Paul would have had to be a complete liar.
    -Yes, he would have to be. So you admit that we must take the word of someone with a huge bias toward proving the religion is real, then. Someone that did more to form the religion than anyone else, for that matter. Some would say "malform."

    Just because Jesus the miracle worker never existed doesn't mean that some wandering, charismatic preacher named Jesus who was crucified never existed.
    -This is the same to me as saying that Jesus never existed. Nobody is claiming that Jesus was just a man; to prove that is the same as if you proved that he never lived at all, when you look at it from the point of view of the believers.

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  48. Dioxippus, Burningmouth,

    When I met you two nice people through my other blog and yours (Burningmouth) I didn't know that you were both politically savvy and interested in religion.

    BONUS! :-)

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    1. I grew up a Southern Baptist in South Carolina. I was totally indoctrinated into the Christian mindset. I remember sitting in the hard wooden pews, the ladies in their funky hats fanning themselves to ward off the muggy heat. I would look at my mom's bible with its gold lined pages and think, "Of course, this is the inspired word of God. I mean, look...the pages are lined with gold. It must be true."

      I also spent hundreds of hours at college libraries reading books on Buddhism.

      End result? Christianity is a crock of shit; and (sadly to say) Buddhism can be argued to also be a crock of shit.

      I'm very, very fascinated with what's going on with Syria. This is truly a major event in the history of the United States. It boils down to America's credibility (which is dropping on a daily basis) . And I just read that the Brazilians are pissed off at us because the NSA spied on their political leaders. It will be interesting to see how the Brazilians react to Americans during their Olympics.

      Delete
    2. I knew right away that you were awesome St. Brian :) We share a lot of views on some important things. Seems like the law of attraction is for real :)

      burningmouth, I've wanted to ask you personal questions for years, but I always stop myself for some reason. Some people don't like to talk about themselves too much. I used to be like that a lot, I wouldn't tell anyone anything personal. Obviously things have changed :) I'm not saying you're closed off or anything, but you just seem like a private kind of person.

      It's great to learn something like that about you. And it's also great to know that people truly can transcend their upbringing. Southern Baptist...whew. I remember reading that more than half the population of South Carolina are devoutly religious. Maybe not all Baptist, but certainly tons of church goers and bible thumpers.

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  49. Personally, I've always hated anything to do with politics. I mean truly despised it. I didn't even like debating in school because it seemed the ones who were good at it and drawn to it were the future politician types. I was basically an anarchist in high school :) Completely anti-establishment. Listened to a lot of punk rock.

    I've ignored everything for so many years. All the news media and politics and world issues. I find myself opening up to it more lately because there are important things that I feel I should be aware of. I think it's time I pulled my head out of the sand and took a look around. I've looked within for many years, now it's time to explore the external.

    I think everyone can relate when I say that all these current affairs are so negative and heavy. And I'm born and raised Canadian...we have the tendency to look away and ignore things that are important, especially if it's something negative or unpleasant.

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  50. Funny, I truly despise politics now, and that's why I pay so much attention to it! These assholes are in charge of us!

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  51. The Syria thing is complex... I am not sure that a military strike is a good idea. Too many unpredictables. We Americans are raised to love the fireworks, basically, but the last time we did this it was a poochscrew. I don't wanna screw any more pooches!

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  52. You're right, it's important to pay attention to those swine because they're the ones calling the shots that have a direct effect on our lives. It's just a cultural thing, I guess, for me to do my best to ignore it and feel helpless to make any real change. I'm sure people feel like that all over the world, but in Canada it seems a cultural thing to not upset "the norm" and to "keep the peace". We're peacemakers, after all :)

    I think war is complete nonsense and unnecessary, part of the reason I won't watch the news or pay attention to that sort of thing. I remember when I was eight or nine, when the first Gulf war happened. I remember seeing it on TV and thinking, "Why are they bombing each other? Why can't they just talk it out?" Obviously it's not always that simple, but I've always been a pacifist. War just doesn't make sense to me...

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  53. It's easy to despise politics...it's despicable. I've always been involved - at least since Reagan...he scared the hell out of me, there was something so sinister about him. His presidency IMO was the start of this crazy christian conservative politics. Tame when compared to now, but he laid all the groundwork. Over the course of Bush/Cheney, and now Obama (his mere black presence ratcheted up the frenzy), politics has successfully done away with anything coming close to "common ground." Republicans have wiped out their moderate versions with the tea party extremes. I am optimistic that the GOP is on their way out, they can't sustain a presence with such a minority of zealots, TPers, and tear down the gov't. types. Of course they can do so much damage in the meantime, some of what they've already done will affect us for decades, if not centuries. It's frustrating to see how successful they have been gerrymandering districts into GOP wins. Believe it or not, WE are the majority...this country really is more moderate than it appears. I get a vein pumping in my head when I hear people parrot the totally unsubstantiated myths that the GOP is fiscally conservative, better able to defend the US, or for that matter, has a "plan" of any kind, other than corporate profits. Facts should matter, but often don't. As long as they say "God has been taken out of our schools" a certain number will ignore everything else.
    Syria... definitely should not be ignored, the use of chemical weapons is intolerable. But...it is an international war crime, and I don't like Obama wanting to take it on as a soley US problem.
    This is the entire international community's problem, and should be dealt with on that level. I have no problem with us being a part of that larger league of nations, but after a decade of war, we don't have much left, do we? Thousands of lives, billions of dollars, we have depleted and spread thin our resources. Going into these conflicts has never turned out how we intend, we are not liberators, democracy (as we like to see it) does not spread, and often people end up in worse condition than before we start "helping." The countries in the region need to step up, too. Saudi Arabia can afford to bankroll anything that needs to be done.
    I'm tired, too, of having to display the resolve and might of the US, proving we will strike anyone anytime. Starting in war should not be a PR thing.
    Brian...cool synchronicity. :-)

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  54. Quote
    "The Syria thing is complex... I am not sure that a military strike is a good idea."

    Personally, I don't think we should strike Syria. If it's based on moral issues, then why don't we strike N Korea? Those people are cannibalizing each other because of a lack of food.
    Obama is coming across like a feckless fool. He could still turn it around and look like a genius. It's all a 3D chess game.

    While I don't think we should strike Syria, the primeval part of my brain would like to see a strike because it makes for great drama. I would rather follow the Syria story than the Miley Cyrus story.

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  55. Quote
    " I am optimistic that the GOP is on their way out,"

    It sure does look like they're on the way out. Here's why (and I'm treading on thin ice here)....

    The white race is becoming marginalized now that they are slowly becoming less and less influential on a demographic basis. Whitey has done a lot of good things, but they have a history of enslaving other peoples and cynically and ruthlessly exploiting other people's resources.

    Fifty years from now, the Hispanics will become a dominant player in American politics. Blacks might also rise up the food chain. If any one race deserves anything, it is the blacks because they have paid their dues.

    Educated whites are beginning to realize that the future might get ugly for them. There could be a lot of blowback, considering the centuries of exploitation. I think whites are going to circle the wagons and kiss the future of America goodbye. I really don't buy into an American future where the different ethnic groups hold hands and sing kumbaya.

    That's why all I want to do is find an apartment with great soundproofing - legally buy marijuana - acquire a 50 inch TV (with which to view the outside world) - play next generation video games until my fingernails grow two feet long, and die of a stroke caused by being baked by radiation from the wide screen.

    My last words will be a quote from the dude in "Aliens"...
    "Game over, man!"

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  56. Quote:
    "burningmouth, I've wanted to ask you personal questions for years, but I always stop myself for some reason. Some people don't like to talk about themselves too much. I used to be like that a lot, I wouldn't tell anyone anything personal. Obviously things have changed :) I'm not saying you're closed off or anything, but you just seem like a private kind of person."

    My life is pretty pathetic. I'm a failed truth seeker. I searched for the truth and found, not enlightenment, but en-dark-ment.
    But I have a really good sense of humor, and with the promise of that sweet, beautiful, green weed, I'll be OK.

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  57. Educated whites are beginning to realize that the future might get ugly for them. There could be a lot of blowback, considering the centuries of exploitation.
    --------------------------
    I don't think that will happen. I think many whites might expect it to, though. Blacks and minorities generally just want to be equal, not the masters. But even that's a long way off.

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  58. I really don't buy into an American future where the different ethnic groups hold hands and sing kumbaya.
    ------------------
    Well, I respectfully think that's a pretty dismal way to look at it. (endarkened?)
    Nobody wants kumbaya, just respect and tolerance and equality. You have to have a goal, and the obvious goal is perfection, unattainable and yet a necessary target to aim for so as to always improve. I envision world peace, not because it's practically attainable but because it's the right end of the war---peace number line to aim for. Same reason why I envision total equality.

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  59. Educated whites are beginning to realize that the future might get ugly for them.
    -------------------------------
    You mean 'educated white bigots.' The kind of whites who had thought that they'd always be *in charge* of this country.

    I'm educated and white and I totally don't feel anything like that. What I feel is the sooner that said white bigot types get shut down and go away the better it will be for the rest of us. And they're doing it to themselves.... They're slowly stewing themselves to death in their own hatred.

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  60. Quote:
    "Well, I respectfully think that's a pretty dismal way to look at it. (endarkened?) "

    That's a response I might expect from a Christian.
    "Endarkened, brother? Why don't you turn to the Lord, and you can join us holding hands in a future of 'equality under God'".

    I'm just being a realist. Another reason why the future might be bleak is global warming. That's why I specifically said 'educated whites'. The hillbilly whites will keep procreating no matter what. If there's equality in the future, it will be an equality of stupidity. LOL (just kidding),

    There are some smart guys out there who believe that the great revolutions of technology are over. The industrial revolution, consumer revolution and computer revolutions are behind us. We might be heading back to a period that existed for hundreds of years 1300-1800 where the standard of living was flatlined. I'm not saying I believe that, but it is intriguing.

    What's wrong with being endarkened?
    Endarkenment might be the true enlightenment. <can I copyright that statement?

    Don't take me too seriously. I'm just enjoying the art of discussion.

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  61. I don't want to be too much of a downer, but.................
    Our country is 17 trillion dollars (and growing) in debt. The govt needs tax revenues in order to survive. A lot of these new jobs being created are part time jobs with lousy if any health benefits. This is the new America we are entering. America has to compete with foreign countries which means our salaries will continue to adjust to the downside.

    The working class is getting tired of footing the bill for the 47 percenters who live on entitlements. There's no 'equality' in that scenario. And with smaller and smaller salaries, it's going to be very difficult to erase the nation's debt. These are the kinds of headwinds we have to deal with before we can live in a future society that's free and equal.

    Some day we might actually achieve that state of true equality. I would rather live in a world of idealistic St. Brians than an endarkened world full of burningmouths.

    "Endarkened world full of burningmouths". Now that DOES sound scary.

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  62. Well, either I'm too idealistic or you are too negative. Anyhow, it's a good discussion.

    Oh, and I may sound like a Christian, but the idea of hope is not solely in the province of the believers. I have hope. Sue me, fucker.

    ;-)

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  63. There's some classic burningmouth :D I love your musings man. Even if I tend to agree with St. Brian and hold onto at least a little shred of hope, I still fuckin' love your thoughts :D

    There very well be some race wars if the shit really hits the fan at full speed. I would hope it never comes to that. There it is again, that hope word. :D

    I went through a period of what you could call endarkment. It seems a transitional state. You just get overwhelmed with the desperation, the desolation of it all. Everything seems like a crapshoot, completely meaningless. I managed to emerge from it, I know you can too brother.

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    1. There very well be some race wars if the shit really hits the fan at full speed. I would hope it never comes to that. There it is again, that hope word. :D
      -------------
      If so, it'd be one race warring, not two. The rightwing white people. They're so ready for it, they'd be the ones to start it... and it would fizzle, except for a bunch of white people getting arrested in the end. I just don't see blacks rising up as anything other than a rightwing paranoid wetdream. (by that I mean that because they fear it so, and hate what they fear, and want to kill what they hate, they actually desire it)

      Delete
  64. There's nothing wrong with hope. I'm happy internally precisely because I've accepted endarkenment. To be endarkened means being able accept reality as it is........CHTTTZZZ
    >>>BLTTZZZ......QLAAAGGGGT !!!!!!! OH Crap. My brain just had a major electronic malfunction.

    "Accept reality as it is???"
    Shit. I'll never accept reality as it is. That's why I do hallucinogens: to find alternative realities. Hopefully better realities.

    Man. When I en-light-en up that legal joint next year, I will be released from endarkenment.
    The clouds will open up and a golden hand will reach down and give me a high five. It will be Jimi Hendrix. He'll say, "Shit, man. Check out this purple haze." purple haze .. purple haze.
    purplehazepurplehaze...................
    Wah, where am I? OH yeah, blogger discussion.

    So now "Molly" is in the news. I've never done Molly or ecstasy. I hear it's not so good for the brain.

    I bet those early Christians were into hallucinogens.
    "Oh shit. Peter is speaking in tongues again."
    "Peter. I told you to stay away from the mushrooms, man."

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  65. I wonder where Pboy is... He almost never is missing from the discussion for five days. Hope all is well, Pboy!

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  66. Lol... I'm fine too. Of course, I have to take my wife's word for that.

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  67. I commented on your "Race War" response above, Burningmouth, but hey, I happen to have the video:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HuP-Nv3hX4E

    Key and Peele... brilliant!

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  68. You know, it occurs to me that rightwing type christians have deified their own egos. Or their Ids, perhaps. They've made their own ego into their God, designed him after it, and that way they do not have to control it... so don't dare insult their god... OR ELSE!!!!!

    Bunch of spoiled children.

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  69. God is a way for people to believe that they're always right.

    Purina Ego Chow.

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  70. I suppose what I meant, and what I was thinking, when I mentioned race wars is more religious wars. Jihads. That crap is already going on and has been for a very long time, but I fear in a weakened state, collectively, a big war like that could decimate us.

    Molly is bad for your brain, but good for your emotional maturity. If that makes any sense. I used to be heavy into it and it helped a lot with self-acceptance and clearing away a lot of the sexual programming we're given. A man should be like this and feel like this and never show that, etc.

    Funny, I'm reading Graham Hancock's latest novel called "War God". In this story it tells a version of the Spanish conquest of Mexico in the 1500's where Monctezume and Cortes are both in communication with an entity which urges them to make war and maim and kill each other. Cortes believes that this entity is Saint Peter himself, he is actually presented to him in that way. Monctezuma is under the impression that it's the "War God" named Huitzilopochtli or "Hummingbird". Obviously playing on the nature of religious or 'divine' inspiration and the damage it causes. It's a very interesting and well written book so far.

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  71. Is that fictionalized or is there some record of them both believing in someone talking to them, egging them on?

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    1. I think it's fiction, as it is a fiction novel. The author does know a lot about the real history of the whole Spanish conquest, and uses that knowledge to make the story more realistic. And I do believe Cortes was known to have a special affinity to Saint Peter.

      In the book, Cortes communicates with this entity in dreams. Monctezuma uses psilocybin mushrooms to do it :)

      Delete
  72. I've been lurking, reading, thinking...so many variables and conflicting indicators on whether to be hopeful or not. In the end, I fall on hopeful side, with a realization that it will not be a straight shot up to everything being ok. Some of what ails us is trending in the right direction, religious involvement going down, TPGOP not mainstream, losing voters fast. Maybe they are not so dumb (at the top, anyway)...maybe all this recent religious fervor and desperate acts to change voting laws, grab all the profits possible, and forcing the general population into a situation of no jobs, benefits,etc. and bankrupting "everyone else" is a plan to stave off their soon to be minority position. Hanging on to power and priviledge by control of all wealth and policy decisions. Unfortunately that has been working, they have enough dupes voting for them to have allowed this to happen, and for a while they will put up a really good fight to keep it that way. Their problem will be (and is) that they caused so much collateral damage...the target may be minorities and immigrants, but they have destroyed lower and middle income whites opportunities along the way. The good news may be that they are encouraging a real common bond and goal between ALL displaced people, forget color...everyone wants fairness and equality and opportunity. OK, I'm a pollyanna, I admit it. :-)

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    1. Hey, I happened to really like that movie. Pollyanna.

      Spoiler alert: She gets crippled in the end!

      Delete
  73. PS: Full disclosure...although I care deeply about the condition of our country and life for everyone in general, which can be depressing when reading the news too much...I am annoyingly cheerful. LOL There is no wrong side of the bed. I don't do moods, cranky, angry, angst, temper tantrums or "that tone of voice." I save true upset for something wrong with kids/husband, sick dogs, sheep and horses, and the like. Broken water heaters, a coughing car, ripped couch or rude person at a store is completely ignored. :-) Having an I Don't Care attitude is good for your being, IMO. Most things don't matter all that much.

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  74. ....except if you fly a confederate flag with your free speech...then I'm annoyed. :-)

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    1. Yeah, I can't stand that either. I don't see how flying the flag of our old enemies the slavers is free speech. I'd rather we'd treated it like Germany did the swastika... outlaw it.

      Delete
  75. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1C8QYZIrBk

    Hey America, 'The World Policemen', this shit just got REAL!

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  76. How come we don't see that all over the news today, Pboy? It certainly should be, if true.

    Nothing on Huffington Post or Daily Kos or even Google News.

    It's disturbing. I'm hoping that congress prevents a strike, at this point.

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  77. Speaking of Team America World Police, one of my favorite sequences from the movie. Um, R rated for profanity.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32iCWzpDpKs

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  78. Oh, this is too funny... a restaurant in Amarillo, Texas (my old stomping ground, in the sense that stomping was one of the few things to do there) had to close its doors, and left a nice note on the door for their former customers, or lack thereof.

    I feel their pain. I think I approve.

    Check it out:
    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/06/sava-italiano-farewell-note_n_3880776.html

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  79. Funny youtube about Westboro Baptist Church
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbqiiY_Pam8

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  80. I liked it! "Where hate and love come together!"

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  81. "Well, the first day we met, the first thing he said to me was, 'God hates fags.' I did, it was beautiful." LMAO :D

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  82. Try to imagine who, in 2000 year ago Judea, is available to learn the stories of Jesus.
    Now the Roman province of Judea has been under the control of the Greeks for hundreds of years, as is my understanding, and the last thing God said to a 'Chosen People' prophet was, "Don't fuck with the bull, you'll get the horns!"
    Try to imagine a hundred years ago or a hundred years from now! Not easy, is it? Seems to me as if Yahweh was in some kind of daze, HE wasn't talking to his Chosen People through prophets, nothing. Meanwhile, the Greeks are conquering the known World, the Persians have been kicking some ass for a while, which, we hear, was recorded, but the story picks up after the Romans have totally kicked butt, so totally that the priests of The Chosen People are more worried about what the Romans will do to them than if they might be missing the one and only true 'coming Messiah'.

    Not only do they throw their own Messiah under the bus, which doesn't make any sense at all unless you're a Christian, they're DESTINED to throw their own Messiah under the bus. For all the old time prophecies, GOD is so damned mysterious, HE'S forgetting to tell the prophets that they're(The Chosen People) fucked.

    It's no wonder that the Scholastic philosophers punt to, "Well it's possible that there could be a GOD because it's more likely that this universe is intelligently designed, since it gives us 'purpose'.", they might as well say, "I have to hit my pinky toe with a hammer every time I think there is no divine purpose to my life, so that's just not going to happen!"

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  83. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJYvOadSG-c

    As per request, Sir Pboy...

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  84. Replies
    1. There is a line in that song, believe it or not, that goes, ".. believe it or not, bippity-boppity-boo!"

      Delete
  85. Brian, hope all is well with you. Am interested on your thoughts concerning Ted Cruz.

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  86. A dangerous hatemonger like McCarthy. A man that can do a lot of harm.

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  87. Some people on the right, a lot of them, are just stupid and ignorant and paranoid. Louis Gohmert, Michelle Bachmann, and Steve King come to mind.

    Ted Cruz isn't that. He knows what he's doing, playing to that element of paranoia in his party. I see people like Gohmert as passive evil, doing evil without realizing it, while believing it to be good.

    Mister Cruz is active evil. He knows exactly what he's doing. He plays them like a fiddle.

    Hell, he even looks like McCarthy. And no, he 'has no decency.'

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  88. And speaking of the Three Idiots (Gohmert, Bachmann and King) did anybody catch them on Rachel Maddow yesterday? Yes, apparently they all went to freaking EGYPT and gave this nice speech wherein Bachmann says that the Muslim Brotherhood were the ones that attacked us on, and I quote, "nine-one-one." (Apparently she thinks "Muslim Brotherhood" is just a generic catch-all term for any radical Muslims)

    I swear, there are pomeranians that are smarter than she is.

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  89. B latest comic reminds me of some of the family hx you have related over the years. Unintentional but after I posted it made me think of your hx.

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    Replies
    1. It was a bit like my situation at that, Pliny.

      And DAMN YOU! I just went to your pictorial theology page and spent twenty minutes going through your damnable drawings!

      Delete
  90. Brian, appreciate your answer about Cruz. I think the same, and agree he is a dangerous man. I heard his father, and it obvious where many of his idea comes from. It looks like if the rep have closed primary's he might get the nod.

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  91. Damnable drawings as in they suck or damnable in that that's where I'll end up ;)

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    Replies
    1. Neither one of course. Damnable in that they're engrossing and I can barely spare the time lately!

      Delete
  92. Maybe so Jerry, but I don't see him as having a chance in the national vote, no way. He's too radical. But he's dangerous in how well he 'mongers' hate. Soo smarmy sure of himself, as if he's the soul of rationality as he tears people down with his syrupy bullshit.
    Everybody has been saying that the Republican Party is tearing itself apart for years now.... I keep hoping that it will happen sometime soon.

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  93. So apparently the Colorado lawmakers that passed good gun control laws recently were RECALLED yesterday by teaparty NRA drones.

    Is it wrong to almost want this country to be bombed back to the stone age? Because it makes me sick.

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  94. The arms industry large and small(missiles and handguns) are driving this. I suppose they wouldn't mind an actual civil war between the States, good for business! LOL

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  95. It's getting to the point where I wouldn't mind it, either. Finish the job we should have finished in the Civil war. Because hey, these are just the same assholes 150 years later. The ones with the slaveholder mentality. (I'm not quite serious here, but still, I'm not too far from it.)

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    Replies
    1. That's exactly the mentality they have. To enslave and control. Not a stretch at all. And what better than a mass of slaves who don't even realize they've been sold into enslavement? Some even defend it with their lives.

      Delete
  96. Rand Paul is getting stupider in his quest for the Presidential run. How many points of view can he have in his head about one topic(what to do about Syria, all at the same time?

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  97. I know! Did you see Colbert's take on it! He's so dead-on. Paul is making no sense at all.

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  98. Hey! Look what I found buried out in the woods today...

    A coin!<------Link

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  99. Good one Brian. Still fighting yet no victory in sight.
    The fact is the Lords prayer is not dealing with eternal life at all but with the forgivness of sins commeted because of the Adam nature the christian people still have to contend with.

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  100. I see you have gained a few students since I was last here. lol Guess what else the Bible says Jesus said.... If the blind lead the blind they both will fall into the ditch. I see you are still stumbling around in the darkness. Thats a shame.

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  101. Replies
    1. What does this mean? Are you trying to say "Hello y'all"?

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  102. Still as snarky as ever, eh, Mike? Snarky for the LAWRD! lol

    Wonder how many Republican Christians read these lines, "And forgive us our trespasses,
    As we forgive them that trespass against us.", and imagine that they really do forgive those that they feel are trespassing against them?
    I think you're more of a , "For even when we were with you, this we commanded you, that if any would not work, neither should he eat.", kind of Christian, right Mike? Or at least you'd vote for somebody like that, which amounts to the same thing now, really, doesn't it?

    "TRESPASS

    tres'-pas: To pass over, to go beyond one's right in place or act; to injure another; to do that which annoys or inconveniences another; any violation of law, civil or moral; it may relate to a person, a community, or the state, or to offenses against God."

    http://www.bible-history.com/isbe/T/TRESPASS/

    Repent, Mike!

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  103. Oh my, snarky and smug! What a combination. Students? LOL I guess if your only frame of reference is being a "follower" and having a book of rules, and sitting in a church/cathedral/mosque/temple/chapel with a "teacher" telling you how to think, it's easy (and intellectually lazy) to assume that atheists discussing a topic are being led. There are no atheist leaders, by it's very nature it is born of independent thought. There is so much disarray and infighting among the faithful about how to interpret the bible (which tends to fall towards whatever your particular agenda is - power, money, bigotry, control,fear), atheists are a pretty cohesive bunch....reality, science and facts aren't up for that kind of interpretation. It is much more likely that your Jesus was warning about the likes of Pat Robertson, Benny Hinn, Jim and Tammy Baker, Westboro Baptist, Jimmy Swaggart, Michele Bachman, Oral Roberts and Sarah "tongues" Palin in his warnings, doncha think? He certainly was not having a problem with atheists in his time frame, they all believed in gods of one kind or another. All of the blind leaders and blind followers (students) were religious then and now.

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  104. Mike! Good to see you again! I missed you, dude. You add a lot to our discussions.

    I see you're still chasing the tiny plastic Jesus someone taped to your tail, huh? And I do love how you open with insults as per usual. None of that Jesusey nice guy stuff for you, huh?

    Yes Mike, you're going to the hot place, but look on the bright side: You're in total denial of it, so you won't have to start worrying about it until you finally die! Until then you can continue to hurt others as others hurt unto you with no qualms of conscience or guilt or fear of consequences! Imagine how much good work you can do for Satan till the point when you finally drop and he takes you as one of his own....

    Love you too dude. Muah!

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  105. If the blind lead the blind they both will fall into the ditch.
    -Funny how the blind never know that they're the blind ones and always accuse others of that, huh? That's the problem with that saying... It applies to a lot of people, ALL of which cannot SEE that it does! LOLOL!!

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  106. Good one Brian. Still fighting yet no victory in sight.
    --------------------
    Who's fighting, Mike? Not me. I have a group of friends here and we discuss what you believers are doing to the world and how sad it makes us, when we can even freaking believe it.

    Hint: As usual, it's precisely the opposite of what you *believe* that you're doing to it. Since you believe that you are so good, you never *question* yourselves, and that does free you up to be as evil as you are without ever realizing it.

    PS: The "welcome back" that I gave you was genuine. Even with you being "rude as a christian" in your first posts since you were here last. Hope you don't run away again... I mean, we don't bite. All in good fun, Mike. All in good fun.

    :-)

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  107. Wonder how many Republican Christians read these lines, "And forgive us our trespasses,
    As we forgive them that trespass against us.",
    -Pboy
    ------------------------
    Since they believe that they can both forgive a person *and* punish them at the same time, even put them to death, it's not a problem for them. As usual they've managed to change the meaning of a key term in the statement to suit themselves.

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  108. Now if only Eric would come back this place would really be hopping!

    ERIC! WHERE ARE YOU? Come home, all is forgiven.... or whatever you call it in your holy lawyer patois...

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  109. Why do Republicans think so intuitively, so illogically? Trickle-down is intuitive, isn't it? If you imagine a nation's economy like a household economy, if dad makes more money, he'll hire his kids so that they'll make more money, they'll hire two friends and so on, right?
    I think that Republicans don't know that there is an economy where the rich in a country get richer and an economy where the country is doing better because money is circulating more.
    They don't seem to want women to be in charge of anything and I think there's a simple reason for this, they get their ideas from their wives(or a woman that has their ear). Having a woman in charge of a department of government could be very bad since having an intuitive belief that one is right is easily defeated by another equally intuitive idea that that belief is wrong(even just an assumed 'intuitive' idea(that a woman believes it)).

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    Replies
    1. Trickle-down is intuitive, isn't it?
      ------------------
      It is a fantasy, and as such can only be believed by those with a predilection for belief in fantasies, those with too much uninformed (or even misinformed) intuition and not enough logic to regulate it or balance it. Believers.

      Delete
    2. Why do Republicans think so intuitively, so illogically?
      ----------------------
      Don't take it as opposites. Illogical thinking is not intuitive, because intuition can be very logical if it is trained and informed by logic. Intuition is merely lateral, nonlinear thinking. Illogical thinking is the product of not enough logical side (of course) but it is also the product of misinformed intuition, illogical intuition, or blind belief. I mean, ideally, informed intuition brings results that are also logical and correct. Hyper-logical scientists like Einstein have always had intuitive flashes... getting results in their dreams, or 'it just came to him one day,' that sort of thing. Their intuitions are logically trained, so they often produce correct results that the scientist's normal linear logical thought processes would likely not have thought of.

      Delete
  110. Brian:

    Mike cannot accept that any of us unbelievers can possibly "prosper" without Jesus (as Mike perceives him). His fascination with this blog and all of us involved therein points out his lack of certainty that he "has it right". Like all Christians, he is not concerned about our "souls"; only his own hoped for heavenly reward. His inability to get us to agree with his take on the next life shakes his very core beliefs, let alone that none of us has as yet been struck down by his God.

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  111. Well, since trickle down is not based on facts, statistical reality, or results...that does leave a fairy tale. Can you expound a bit more on your "women" theory? I have no idea what you just said there...either they are listening to equally delusional Repub. wives/women...or they dismiss their women because they don't trust a woman's ideas?
    In my earlier post when I listed just a few of the many "blind" leaders, it was such a stark reminder of how easily the groups and people of disgraced and certifiably insane of religion roll off the tongue, and how many more could be added. Hitler professed to be a christian, David Koresh, FDLS, Scientology, Applewhite and the shrouds...truly endless. And the fact is, there is NO corresponding atheist names. Can't think of a single atheist individual or group that in any way mirrors the insanity. Actually, aside from naming O'hare and a few authors, who makes a name or anything else out of atheism? Nobody. Christians try to disavow (sometimes) their outliers, but they can't, they have to own them. The specifics may differ, but it all falls under the general belief in god. You will never find an atheist allowing their young daughter to marry an old perv because a leader says so, or drink Kool Aid, or put on sneakers and a purple shroud to meet jesus. It truly takes "belief" to do that. Religion is and always has taken a horrendous toll on human beings.

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  112. Well Jude, I'm talking about the yin and the yang as Brian sees it, the idea that logic is 'countered' with 'intuition'. Of course many men are just as entranced by the idea that there are only opinions which are equally valid as there are men who think that too. But yin and yang can be thought of as manly and womanly don't you think? Maybe it's hard to 'picture' that if you aren't 'being' that?

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    Replies
    1. Yin and Yang are in everyone, to differing degrees. Believers think they are yang but are ruled by their yins.

      Uninformed intuition is stupidity. So too can be unintuitive linear logic. You need yin informed by yang (and vice-versa) to be balanced. However when one's intuition is trained and informed by one's logical side, that is most effective.

      Don't make the mistake of assuming that because yin is 'feminine" that it's only women that have it. *Generally* speaking women tend to have *slightly* more yin than yang, and men the reverse, but this is no hard-and-fast rule. Everybody needs BOTH to be balanced and thus, effective.

      Or so says metaphysics. I'm just relaying the message.

      Delete
  113. "Of course many men are just as entranced by the idea that there are only opinions which are equally valid as there are men who think that too."
    This is how much sense I make at 6 in the morning when I'm drinking rum and coffee.

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  114. Hmmm...I've never thought logic could be countered by intuition, I would see them as more being on the same side, not opposing principles. I suppose because to me intuition is not "just a feeling contrary to logic"...it is in conjunction with logic, an insight based on recognizing subtle clues that maybe you can't express in words, but the subtle offness of a situation predicts an outcome that you know in your bones to be true kind of thing. It's like a person declaring "I just know he/she is cheating on me, I don't know why, but it's true." Well, that has proven time and again to be correct and may "feel" like otherworldly knowledge, but in reality it is perceiving subtle changes and signs that you can't really vocalize. Yes, yin and yang could be thought of as manly and womanly now that you've pointed it out. :-)
    Harvey, good to see you! Your points play out in the darndest places, too. :-) I was on HP, story about a guy DUI in a wheelchair, saved from drowning by a baseball hit towards the ditch.
    You would not believe the number of people claiming "miracle, god was there, god saved him, god directed the ball there so he could be found." So one of my comments was "that's horrible, why did god put him in the ditch in the first place." You would not believe how many people responded to me with "I feel so sad for you", "I will pray for your soul" and "fool for rejecting god's signs", etc. LMAO! They really have no response other than "mysterious ways" to explain why if god was there he let it happen, why he was there to make a guy hit the baseball just so, but not there when the accident happened. Same thing with any tragedy...plane crash kills 304, 1 survives, it's a miracle, god's way of showing he is there. Wait..what? LOL They pick and choose at which point god is there, unfortunately it's never before anyone gets hurt, he just shows his presence after.

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  115. pboy, I "intuited" that you left a wo off one of those men in the sentence...seemed logical. LOL! Lay off the rum, I have enough trouble sorting all this out. :-)

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    Replies
    1. Lay off the rum? NEVER!!!
      It's the only thing that keeps me from going completely insane!

      Delete
  116. Jude, I don't think that Pboy likes it when I refer to 'yin and yang' or intuition and logic, as complimentary duality in our minds.

    Here's how I see it. Intuition without logic makes blind belief. Logic without intuition is stunted and limited in its vision.

    It's too mushy and metaphysical for him, methinks. He needs to work on his 'Yin' side. (lol)

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    Replies
    1. Work on my gin side you say? GAKK! I hate the taste of gin.

      Delete
  117. OK, I'm no yin-yang expert, but that never stopped me..... :-) My understanding of it is "2 sides of the same coin" or opposite ends of the same continuim. You might say light and dark are opposite, but they are just on different ends of the same spectrum, they are connected. Uh oh, PBoy may soon find me mushy too. Wait til he finds out I've seen a UFO! LOL (But not kidding..) I'm going to quibble though, Brian. I don't believe you can have true intuition without logic either, since I see it as drawing on some knowledge somewhere inside that you already know but don't recognize. You have a "feeling" about something, but don't know why. On the other hand, I think logic can stand on it's own, doesn't need intuition to be realized fully. Hey, saw an interesting program recently, made me think of you...a guy measuring the "global energy spikes" supposed to hone in on the collective mind set of the population. He could show huge spikes of global energy during world wide events such as 9/11, the Indonesian Tsunami, death of Bin Ladin and fukashima, that kind of thing. It was complicated, but it struck me as BIG BRAIN experiments in action. Although I'm not sold on any big brain stuff yet, it was pretty interesting.

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  118. As usual, I'm a bit of an outsider on this topic. Logic is often the tool used to support intuition. The problem is that intuition may be misleading which leads to the usual unsound but very logical defenses people use to promote their pet theories or beliefs. Said another way, intuition (or bias or wishful thinking, etc.) can lead to unsound arguments that sound very logical.

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  119. Logic must inform intuition, but logic *can be false logic.* (Eric knows all about false logic)
    How to tell if your logic is false? Intuition. Sharpened intuition. With intuition you sense how to train logic to conform to your ideals and to actual lived reality, to correct itself, all while your logic is training your intuition to do the same. It's like two knives being used to sharpen themselves. It is a mutual process. A delicate balance though. We are weak, and filled with egotism from birth, so it is difficult to see actual reality through all our false conceptions of it.

    Logic and intuition are two sides of the same coin. They are both tools to interpret reality. the primary difference (to me) is that intuition, being a much older form of mentation, is utterly nonverbal, and therefore pictorial and holistic and *lateral,* seeing a much bigger picture, but therefore more prone to misinterpretation of said picture due to the sheer number of data points that it necessarily must consider. Logic is VERBAL. It proceeds in a linear manner from A to B to C. Its weakness is it's focus. So is its strength.

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  120. You're right Pliny, that needed to be pointed out....intuition can be misleading if we find some logic to support it that is flawed. And the experiences we have that form the basis for our intuition has to be solid, not a fluke. My husband is 61 years old, and was abused by his brother for his first 16 years. If he gets feeling down, everything inside him tells him someone is going to smack him around, he tenses and prepares for it. This has not happened for the last 45 years, but he can't correct the lesson he learned early on. It still "feels" that way, and he "knows" it's going to happen. At this point it is NOT logical at all.

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  121. Logic is often the tool used to support intuition.
    -Pliny
    -------------------
    An astute observation. Emotions trump facts every time unless one is able to see beyond their own egos. It's a more primitive modality of thought and therefore "feels" more real.

    We use logic, but we *are* emotion, whether we realize it or not. All motivation is emotional in nature, even the motivation to be logical. It's a *desire,* and all of those are based in emotion, and all of those in ego.

    So the goal is not to kill the ego, but to tame it.

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  122. Logic may lead one to the truth, but only if the truth is what is truly *desired.* Few seem to actually desire to know the truth, because any seeker after it already realizes that finding it can diminish him or her. It can and often is painful.

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    1. because any seeker after it already realizes
      -------------------
      A mistake. Meant to say "soon realizes." Hopefully.

      Delete
  123. Thus logic can in some instances lead a person to desire to know the truth, even about themselves, painful though that may be. (Note the word "desire")

    However in most instances of truth-seeking, the individual is deluded by their own ego into seeking that nobility in an attempt to yet again aggrandize themselves.

    The ego is slippery.

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  124. Ideally, one is led to seeking the truth through such egotism, and then one sees enough of that truth to realize the falseness of said egotism and learns to abandon it.

    I'm an egotist. It's not easy to rid one's self of it. Knowing it is a start, but it's not nearly enough.

    Pain is. Pain is what teaches us. Here I speak of emotional pain.

    Holy Shit! Got me talking, I guess... sorry!

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  125. Holy Shit! Got me talking, I guess... sorry!
    ----------------------------------

    I thought that was the point ;)

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  126. Hey, don't be sorry, all good stuff, very interesting to contemplate. For me, it's all difficult to define and put in words, so many caveats spring up for each scenario. Logic tells us that no one definition fits all cases. Always a "but." :-) I'd make a case that everyone is an egotist...after all, we can never ever escape the confinds of our own minds, so by very definition everything really is always about us. Even being alturistic and serving of others is in some way serving ourselves. How many times do we hear "I couldn't live with myself if I didn't do ____ for ____." Can anything ever really be selfless generosity? I'm not saying that it has to be phony or not well intended or not have some sacrifice to it, but there is always a payoff to our own sense of ourselves. And I agree, pain is the teacher, at least the most efficient, longest held and quickly taught. Pleasure teaches too, but is the more vulnerable to be overridden by pain lessons.

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  127. ARggghhhh Pliny! It's that time of year again already? Avast!! Thanks for the reminder! LOL Now gotta do something other than chat all evening.... goodnight, Matey's!

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  128. The best kind of pain (in my opinion) to be our teacher is the pain of another, felt through a sense of empathy.

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  129. So should I die of scurvy on Thursday or something?

    Arrrr!

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  130. Jude:
    A logical case can be made that there are no "unselfish" acts.
    The philosophical school referred to as "Egoistic Hedonism" argues that man can only act so as to gain the most "good" or avoid the most "bad" in any situation wherein there is a choice of behavior avialable. I think this is probably largely correct, and if so, even our rare "selfless" behavior is really based upon how we believe (although sometimes erroneously) any behavior or refraining from said activity will result in either feeling good about what we did or in limiting how bad we will feel. I.E.: "I couldn't live with myself if I hadn't done _____ for ______!", pretty much sums it up.

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  131. I knew it Harvey...it really IS all about me! LOL I think that philosophy is correct, and hopefully in the majority of cases, the choosing the least "bad" for self is aligned with actually doing the right thing in general. But often times it doesn't, our own good comes at the expense of others, and avoiding bad places bad on someone else. Happy TLPD to all me mates on the port side of the dinghy! :-)

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  132. Pliny:
    I am continuing in practice of ENT three days a week, two of clinic and one for surgery. Thankfully, I no longer have to take night call (at age 74!!)except under extraordinary circumstances. I expect that I will stop any surgery by the end of this academic year, in July of 2014. I remain in surprisingly good health as the result of two open heart procedures, the most recent of which was ten years ago. My wife and I manage at least two medical missions every year (most recently to Honduras), which keeps me off the streets.
    How about you? How is your AI program progressing? I must say that although I miss some of your former written posts, your current cartoon efforts are really terrific.

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  133. Jude:
    The only problem with Egoistic Hedonism is that it is not really about morals or ethics. If one accepts the fairly obvious truth that we behave the way we do from a hard-wired survival need that has evolved with us, these "choices" are not really choices. Rather, we respond by reflex or instinct, if you will, only modifying our behavior from immediate self-interest to longer term "tribal" interest, since we have learned that we must sometimes do so to remain in the tribe. To me, "civilization" is simply learning that there is long term survival value in sometimes subjugating our immediate gratification to eventual more valuable rewards from group support.

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  134. Well, that wasn't a very well thought out comment about Republicans and women(or intuition, or yin).
    Nevertheless, I think that there is a high level of intuition concerning how government works and who one might vote for to solve some problem that your Congressperson/Senator/President is telling you that you have.
    I think that the right wing understand 'the masses', will say anything to get their vote including outright lies and innuendo(think 'DEATH PANELS'.)
    The right tend toward 'The Corporate State' where corporations control what happens in government, which laws get passed, simply by buying the election of a candidate who will go ahead and do their bidding, or buying government compliance at the government level(lobbyists). This, simply put, is fascism.

    If there were enough voters who knew what it was they were voting for/against, in stead of just imagining that it's all corruption, the fascists would have to crawl back into the woodwork and try to manipulate things from behind the scenes. There is no end to greed as far as human beings go so it's not as if we could stamp that out, right?
    If your political POV includes tropes like, "I am a self made man and the government has no right to STEAL my money and share it out to hungry losers.", then you're pretty much buying into the fascist notion that corporations ought to run your country for you, without realizing that although you may not be getting taxed on your income, you'll end up paying through the nose for sales taxes and so on anyways.

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  135. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/19/pope-francis-gay_n_3954776.html

    Pope Francis in a recent interview

    This guy is all right. My favorite Pope ever.

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  136. I would introduce another factor in "good" human behavior other than hedonism. Taking pleasure in the pleasure of others. Human empathy. I don't think (in it's best, highest form) that it's based in hedonism per se. It's based in the human imagination. One first imagines what it would be like to actually "be" the other person, and then one sees the other person's problems and imagines how the other person would *feel* if someone helped them to solve or ameliorate said problems, and then one helps the person, so that the other person feels happiness and relief and so forth, and then one enjoys the other's happiness and the feeling that one has contributed to the another's happiness and not solely to one's own. Is that actually hedonism? To take joy in being UN-sefish surely cannot be selfish, can it? Is it really all based in pure survival instincts? I mean, perhaps it is, but it seems nobler than that somehow. One takes joy out of the idea that one has helped not one's self but the world of humanity in general, contributing to it's general level of happiness, even at the expense of one's own.

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    1. I mean, I guess it's all based in hedonism in the sense of it having evolved through extending the original survival concept of self-interest. Even bees will kill themselves in defense of the hive. However I like to think that the human imagination (empathy) allows us to extend that out a lot more than mere self-interest would dictate.

      Delete
    2. Brian:
      You can call it empathy, self projection, or even "moral" behavior, but, in the end, one's decision to "put yourself in someone else's place" and, thereby, to decide to do something for the other's benefit still results in either some perceived self gratification or avoidance, perhaps, of feeling "bad" because you didn't help them out when you could have. Not that I think such empathetic behavior is not admirable and it certainly can result in pleasant personal feed-back, but it still boils down to obtaining the most "good" or avoiding the most "evil" as a result of our choices.

      Delete
  137. Oh, almost forgot:

    "Arrrr mateys, me parrot has a peg-leg!"

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  138. Nevertheless, I think that there is a high level of intuition concerning how government works and who one might vote for to solve some problem that your Congressperson/Senator/President is telling you that you have.
    --------------------------
    I think that is more blind belief than intuition, although both are emotional in nature. An incorrect intuition, often one that was *induced* by other parties with agendas and their lies and distortions, becomes a belief, immune to facts and logic. This can only happen in people that do not possess the ability of critical thinking and self-examination, but fuck, there's a shitload of that type walking around. Plus those 'interested parties' also do whatever they can to make sure that said believers never develop those abilities, again with lies and distortions.

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  139. Harvey, Glad to hear you are well and well occupied.

    I'm keeping busy. The project moves forward albeit slowly. The technology itself is pretty amazing. Just trying to navigate the political landscape of healthcare. Change is slow. Doing some interesting projects with it though, including some piloting of its use in medical training and certification.

    Thanks for the kind words on the cartoons - hard to know if anyone reads them, but they are good therapy, if nothing else.

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  140. I'm also glad to hear that all is well with you, Harvey. And Pliny, all you are lacking is a break, with those cartoons. They're good enough to get syndicated, if they got noticed by the right people. Just my humble opinion.

    I was just watching Rachel Maddow and I realized that whenever she makes a point, there are always three or more "terms" in her logical argumentation. Her logic is sound, but there is an inherent disadvantage to being limited to actual reality. You have to explain the complexity of it. Her 'opponents' on the right keep it simple, two terms, black and white, take your choice. They simplify reality to their advantage and dare the other side to be able to explain it to the various stoats and sheep and goats and lemmings that are their audience in a manner that will even be *visible* to them.

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  141. Thanks, Brian. Please note my recently posted response to your comments about empathy.

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  142. "An incorrect intuition, often one that was *induced* by other parties with agendas and their lies and distortions, becomes a belief, immune to facts and logic."

    Are you saying that 'correct' intuition is not 'induced' by other parties, like some kind of innate knowledge perhaps(?), with or without agendas, lies and distortions?

    Seems to me that intuition is a gut feeling about something.
    "Intuition is the ability to acquire representation or knowledge about things, apparently without reasoning or usage of reason in general.[1] Cases of intuition are of a great diversity, however processes by which they happen typically remain mostly unknown to the thinker, as opposed to our view of rational thinking."

    But of course the processes are not necessarily known to the intuiter(if that's a word) but might include tone of voice, body language, perhaps even pheromones, and that would be perfectly logical if it WERE brought into one's decision making using, say, subverbal recall.

    Thinks, "I've smelled that before, that man seems genuine but he smells funny, there's something wrong with that compared to his casual attitude!"
    Someone with that sense of smell but not knowing how to verbalize it would appear to know that something was up, by intuition, not reason, right?

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  143. I'm saying that one can train their intuitions, of course. Did Einstein utilize intuition in his problem solving? It is known that he did, often getting clues to the answers in down-time when not thinking about them. Or in a dream or whatever. When a person knows celestial mechanics and high-level physics and that's his or her skill set, these skills are what inform their emotional side and their intuitions. When a person denies reality and knows a lot about the bible and not much else, their intuitions have little to inform them so they aren't much good in complex situations. Surely you're not suggesting that all intuition is equal, and equally worthless?

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  144. Far from it Brian, there is, of course, a vast difference between Einstein having some kind of intuition about how his model of the universe is going to be found to work, and, some Bible thumper having an intuition that God caused some disaster because there are too many unpunished homosexuals roaming free.
    This seems to me to speak to the vagueness of the word 'intuition'.

    How about the 'intuition' that we just know that stealing is wrong and hurting people is wrong. All that morality stuff where the religious discount all the training we've given a child, scolding her for taking a toy or some food, scolding her for hitting another child, that kind of thing, then pronouncing that it's God's COMMANDMENTS that is the reason that stealing and the ultimate hurting, murder, is wrong.
    They're telling you that stealing, murder etc. is wrong because God says so, but they teach you, you just know that these things are wrong because of everyone telling you it's wrong as you're growing up.
    Then there are sociopaths who can't learn the lesson that anything is wrong and take their cues from society. They'd learn that getting caught stealing is not a good thing to happen to them, but if they are pretty sure they'll get away with it or 'the not good thing' that's going to happen doesn't bother them much, hey, it's all fair game.
    I think it becomes 'intuitive' for us to know that stealing is not the good thing to do, barring sociopaths, and just the word 'stealing' itself means, 'doing something bad', because of the 'moral grounding' that parents/guardians give their children. Then they pass it along that it is wrong because God said, because they're religious and they want to pass it along to their kids.

    Even before a child can speak, if it takes a toy that another kid was playing with, the other kid starts crying or maybe fighting, the adults in the room get angry and the child learns with very limited verbal understanding, that that is not allowed, it's going to upset everyone.
    So there's that kind of intuition which can lead the religious to believe that they've just 'always' known that stealing and hurting others is wrong, right? Even though it is perfectly logical.

    It's also perfectly logical for Einstein to gather the facts as best he can and for a solution to pop into his mind after thinking and thinking about how he expected things to be isn't panning out. That would be the opposite way of 'intuiting' something, instead of it just being 'ingrained' through childhood, breaking out of ideas that have been 'ingrained'.
    I don't really think that Einstein thinking out of the box really is 'intuition' at all, now that I have thought about that.

    Passing off the idea that, say, stealing is wrong, as intuition and Einstein thinking outside the box as intuition, seems to me to be a way to dodge around, "Oh, intuition is 'this', nono, it's 'that'.", it's the same moving of goalposts that is just bogus when you notice it being done to you.
    So were we talking about both using a word which happens to have a meaning that covers both, or what?

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    1. I don't really think that Einstein thinking out of the box really is 'intuition' at all, now that I have thought about that.
      -------------------
      No, it is. I'm not sure that early ingrained knowledge like "don't steal" is intuition. That's more like conditioning.
      If we were to use the terms "linear thinking" and "lateral thinking" would that be different to you? Because they're the same thing to me.

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  145. "I'm saying that one can train their intuitions, of course."

    And of course I'm saying that one isn't doing a bang up job of defining intuition.

    I mean, "The thing that Einstein did when he had all the facts and needed to fit his model to it."?

    Once again, it seems we're down to using logic until the facts themselves seem illogical, then thinking outside of the box and/or letting it 'marinade' in one's subverbal processes of the streaming consciousness, both awake and asleep, finally tweaking the model until the facts fit. Logically, they must fit.

    Far from being logic/intuition, it's logic/not necessarily logical machinations eventually creating a model that is logical.
    Don't you think?

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    1. Only in a logical mind. Only in a mind that subjects the results of it's intuitions to logical scrutiny before believing them.

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  146. I assure you that they're both intuition. That's what I've been saying when I talk about informed or trained intuition. Intuition is looking at your entire worldview and grasp of reality and collected knowledge and holistically processing it non-verbally to come up with an answer. If said worldview/grasp of reality/collected knowledge is small (as in a child) or stunted (as in a rightwing christian) it simply is less able to come up with right answers.

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  147. All intuitions are feelings, but not all feelings are intuitions.

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  148. Right now rightwing christo-republican fascists all are intuiting that the government is out to get their guns and that all liberals are commies and so forth. Those are not logical thoughts. They are intuitions. "Gut instincts." It's just that the minds that are intuiting here are filled with incorrect information that FEELS right to these people.

    And while intuition is not the same thing as early childhood conditioning, it does take said conditioning as part of it's data set when evaluating something, unless the person has learned enough to get beyond that in the intuiting process.

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  149. So, trying to clarify the meaning of 'intuition', one kind is mostly conditioning although not conditioning, another kind is 'holistic lateral thinking'?
    Is that right?
    Seems like gathering up as much info as possible, defining the problem and waiting for a solution to present itself. Which doesn't seem like something that one can 'train' to do better.

    Seems like, "Given the facts I know and the solutions I can think of, there's no good answer, yet. Let me think on that!"

    Um, yea, isn't that what everyone would do in that circumstance?

    Adding another meaning which is 'mostly conditioning', or coming to the same conclusion as those 'leaders' you like and parroting their talking points, isn't anywhere near the same as the other one.

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  150. Doesn't everything drivel down to conditioning though?

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    1. Maybe... and maybe I don't like admitting that to myself, who knows?

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  151. The more logical a person is in nature, the more it is likely that they would see no value in intuition. Another one of those yin-yang things.

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  152. Okay, here;s how I see it:

    "So, trying to clarify the meaning of 'intuition', one kind is mostly conditioning although not conditioning, another kind is 'holistic lateral thinking'?
    Is that right?"
    -Holistic (meaning taking a view of the whole of the situation, thus including all data, *including* any remaining early conditioning *and* any subsequent success one has had in overcoming same.
    So to me, all intuition is a form of holistic lateral thought, the variables being things like how much and how reliable the data is and all emotional baggage and literally everything about the person.
    Training your intuition thus requires that one improve oneself to the point where they have an accurate view of consensual reality, and then your intuition will "solve" problems in that "sensible" paradigm.


    "Seems like gathering up as much info as possible, defining the problem and waiting for a solution to present itself. Which doesn't seem like something that one can 'train' to do better."
    -However if one has good intuitive thought processes they can better consider the whole of the problem and process more factors than would be possible in a linear thought pattern. Enough factors that one would lose track of them if one had to assign a word or explanation to them all. One "grasps" the problem intuitively, meaning that one senses the meaning of it *non-verbally.* As a gestalt, as a whole. Once that happens, solutions can suggest themselves, drawing on a much larger, even an unconscious or subconscious database in order to solve it.

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  153. Non-Intuitive genius-level materials science expert: Gets a great job somewhere

    Hyper-Intuitive genius-level materials science expert: MacGyver

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  154. Sooooooo...

    An intuitive person, being intuitive, grasps the problem intuitively. Is that right?

    How about, 'A spiritual person, being spiritual and all, grasps the problem spiritually!'
    Same thing, no?

    Or, a logical person, being logical, grasps the problem logically!
    I understand that there is supposed to be a difference between linear and lateral thinking, a fair percentage of women WILL try to talk the shell off that egg, and then, when you fail to 'grok' them, they'll do a couple of hard rights and explain that you cannot, since one kind of excludes the other.

    But you cannot have both, 'supplements' and 'to the exclusion of' in the same meaning, unless you're being 'intuitive', unless you just want to have your cake and eat it too. Right?

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  155. MacGyver:- Trapped in a toilet, no problem, take one tampon and some baby powder, dynamite(including fuse!) LOL

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  156. Very logical types often have problems even believing that the emotional side can contribute anything, that intuition is even real. So now I get it. I'd been wondering why you argue so vociferously against it having any validity, and now I see it. I see that you simply don't see it!

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  157. Is that it? You actually don't believe in it? My definitions, they made no sense to you? It must have sounded like hogwash, then!

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  158. I believe emotions are real.
    I believe we are emotional beings.
    I believe that emotions are not necessarily fact.

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  159. I believe that emotional thought, with its capability to process many factors at once, can have value in problem-solving. Do you?

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  160. And at comment 198, I think it's time to start a new post.

    So, NEW POST is up... more room for commentary, nothing special.

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  161. Harvey said,
    Brian,
    Mike cannot accept that any of us unbelievers can possibly "prosper" without Jesus (as Mike perceives him). His fascination with this blog and all of us involved therein points out his lack of certainty that he "has it right". Like all Christians, he is not concerned about our "souls"; only his own hoped for heavenly reward. His inability to get us to agree with his take on the next life shakes his very core beliefs, let alone that none of us has as yet been struck down by his God.
    ______________________________________________

    Harvey those are your thoughts not mine.
    It would appear that you all do quite well for yourselves without God in your lives, but then again so does drug dealers / thieves / movie stars / and so on. What does this prove? Ambition and opportunity thrive in America….All who are willing can reap the benefits.
    Again you are wrong about my reasons for visiting this blog. Your belief or non belief rather has no impact on my faith whatsoever. In fact my faith is anchored in Jesus and His promises. Jesus was concerned enough about your souls that He was willing to die for you yet you could care less. So why criticize me when you are the one who cares not for your own soul. Why would God want to strike you down Harvey? We will all be dead soon enough…

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