Faith In Action: Bringing Hope to the Planet

[indie]

test

[geo]

test

Hi all,

If you click on a thread and come to a blank screen, it means the previous page has filled up and the system has generated a new blank page. To get to the latest posts you unfortunately have to go to the forums page and find the thread in question and click on the second to last page to get to the actual dialogue. I think this is a new glitch, perhaps some change Chris made?

[indie]

test

Hi all,

If you click on a thread and come to a blank screen, it means the previous page has filled up and the system has generated a new blank page. To get to the latest posts you unfortunately have to go to the forums page and find the thread in question and click on the second to last page to get to the actual dialogue. I think this is a new glitch, perhaps some change Chris made?

Hi geo, you're spot on in describing the issue, thanks for posting about it. It's definitely related to one of the recent changes, and we're working to solve it now. That's why my test post was here to begin with actually.

We'll inform the board when this is resolved, accept my apology for the inconvenience in the meantime.

[Dissident Heart]

geo: ...we humans tend to make things needlessly complicated.

And, we have the capacity to force simplistic explanations, not as a way to better understand phenomena: but to determine allegiences and solidify alliances. Obfuscation and equivocation are as tedious as crude reductions and over simplifications are tyrranic. Tyranny sees complex explanation as equivocation, because tyrants only care which side you are on: disagreement is a matter of disloyalty, is cowardice...get to the point: are you with me or against me?

geo: Einstein's special relativity can be summed up as...

And from that theory should one become socialist, anarchist, republican, or democrat...marry, divorce, stay single...join the revolution, support the reactionaries, hide away, or leave town...execute felons, offer amnesty for undocumented workers, legalize marijuana, line up dissenters on firing line to be shot, or bring back the public guillotine?

[ZachSylvanus]

For your assistance, DH: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analogy

[Interbane]

DH: "And, we have the capacity to force simplistic explanations, not as a way to better understand phenomena: but to determine allegiences and solidify alliances."

We have that capacity DH, but I haven't seen a post here yet with the motive of asking you for a more concise answer just to understand your allegiances. When I, personally, ask you to shed the fat from your explanations, that's exactly what I mean. You can most definitely simplify your posts to help us better understand. If it's oversimplified and misunderstood to your detriment, quote this very paragraph from me, then expand on the misunderstanding.

Many of your posts are quite well worded and flowery, but I think they are a better fit in the poetry forum than here. In philosophy when asked for an explanation of what you mean, it's expected you get right to the point rather than use iambic pentameter and exhaust a thesaurus.

[DWill]

No doubt I'm oversimplifying things, but I can't help but feel that we humans tend to make things needlessly complicated.

Perhaps, but my two cents worth is that simplicity/complexity doesn't truly exist out there. It's a perception of our minds. We can make a common sense agreement on one level that two objects are at different locations on a simpilicity/complexity continuum, say a bicycle and an automobile, but this holds true only in a relative sense, and it doesn't work well to replace objects with things mental. In a debate about religion, if we rule out the existence of any metaphysical plane, sure, we perceive the matter as pretty simple. But if we believe that metaphysics is real we might think the situation is not so simple at all. We are only really asserting our perceptions in so many cases, but maybe our mistake is to believe that we're onto general truth when we do so.

[Frank 013]

DWill
But if we believe that metaphysics is real we might think the situation is not so simple at all. We are only really asserting our perceptions in so many cases, but maybe our mistake is to believe that we're onto general truth when we do so.

I don't see what any of this has to do with DHs reluctance to tell us weather he believes the bible is more than a book in his opinion.

It really is a simple yes or no question, either the bible is a normal book to him or it is something more; there really is no middle ground.

Assuming that DHs answer is yes, the bible represents much more than a common book to him, then the why question is where things may become complicated.

But I suspect that even that answer is not very complicated, it will most probably involve lack standards of evidence, giant leaps of faith and claims about truth etc.

But to go on and on about seeking allegiances and alliances is just silly... I suspect that most of us know DHs allegiances already.

If we are wrong about DHs allegiances than answering the question could only help clear up the problem.

Later

[Dissident Heart]

FRank: It really is a simple yes or no question, either the bible is a normal book to him or it is something more; there really is no middle ground.

The Bible is hardly a normal book, whether you believe it sacred or not...it is arguably one of (if not the ) most influential texts in history: few books elicit so much interest (for and against) or generate as much debate and discussion; few are referred to as often in other books by other authors; few command such a presence in the literary shelves of libraries in universities across the planet; few provide the venue for such profoundly opposed and diverse positions, revolutionaries and reactionaries, moderates and reformers, who each claim this text as their guide and source; few have shaped the language, culture, legal system, music, art, architecture, kinship structures and morals of so many people across the planet. There is nothing normal about this book: it is extraordinary in all of these ways. None of this makes the text sacred or true or better: but it surely rules out normalcy...as it should silent desire for simplistic definitions...but, for those who are in this for the battle and struggle to escape religious intolerance and ecclesiastic abuse: just shut up and answer the question...nuance, difference, complexity, diverse opinions and uncertain conclusions avoid the real issue: are you helping religion or hurting it?

[Interbane]

DW: "Perhaps, but my two cents worth is that simplicity/complexity doesn't truly exist out there. It's a perception of our minds."

That is true in the same sense that the number two doesn't truly exist out there. What we have when we deliberate are abstractions of reality, and we must use quantitative or qualitative adjectives that though subjective, are necessary to manipulate those abstractions within our heads, and within our conversations.

The context is ultimately important. The theory of relativity for example, it's perfectly fine to summarize it in every day conversation. To explain the whole thing would be overcomplicated in almost all situations. But for a PhD class studying the theory, that overcomplication is then merely sufficient and not overcomplicated at all.

DW: "But if we believe that metaphysics is real we might think the situation is not so simple at all."

It can be explained in varying amounts of complexity, could it not? Even a complex system can be explained in a matter that is overcomplicated.

DH: "The Bible is hardly a normal book,..."

You appeal to the influence it has had on our history and world, without referencing anything about it's contents or origin. I agree that in that context, it's not normal.

How would you answer Frank's question with respect to the contents of the bible, or it's origins? I believe that was what he was looking for.