I've some interesting ideas but I'll have to wait on writing them. They're all too long for today.
So, a parable of language.....
There once was a pack of beasts. These beasts tread the same paths they always tread, eating, sleeping and so on. But one day a beast who was more than a beast spoke and said, "Why do you tread these paths?" At this, the other beasts all turned and tore the beast who seemed to be no beast apart. Yet the word had already been spoken, all the beasts realized they could speak and even those who argued against it saying, "But we are just beasts would it not be nice to tread the same paths we always tread?" found themselves speaking to do so.
The victory of words had already been won by the one who spoke. On the day of speaking the beast who was no beast had changed all the others, whether they wanted it so or not.
Thursday, December 02, 2004
Wednesday, December 01, 2004
Generations and degenerations....
". . . .let me tell you what happened to one of my teachers, a great rabbi. On a trip to Israel, he found himself seated next to one of the headsof the Israeli socialist labor movement. Soon after the plane took off, one of my teacher’s students, seated several rows behind, came forward and said, 'Rabbi, let me take your shoes; I have your slippers here. You know howyour feet swell on the airplane.' A few minutes later, the student returned and said, 'Here are the sandwiches your wife sent. I know you do not like the airline food.' This went on in similar fashion for sometime, and finally the head of Israel’s socialist labor movement turned to my teacher and said, 'I don’t get this. I am so impressed with your son. I have four sons. They’re grown now. But in all my life I don’t recall them ever offering to do anything at all for me. Why is your son doing all of this?' And the rabbi said, 'He isn’t my son, he’s my student. Had my son been here you would really have seen service. But you must not blame yourself. Your sons are faithful to your teachings, and my sons are faithful to my teachings. It is simple, you see. You made the decision to teach your sons that you are descended from apes. That means that you are one generation closer to the ape than they. And that means that it is only proper and appropriate that you acknowledge their status and that you serve them. But, you see, I chose to teach my sons that we came from God Himself. And that puts me one generation closer to the Ultimate Truth, which means it is only appropriate that they treat me accordingly."
(America's Real War
By Rabbi Daniel Lapin
Multnomah Pub. Inc. (1999) :51-52)
(America's Real War
By Rabbi Daniel Lapin
Multnomah Pub. Inc. (1999) :51-52)
An interesting journey....
A woman is like another world, to which she is the tour guide. You're just supposed to get to know the tour guide before taking a tour.
The hip hop artist's attitude towards women seems different. They are always talking about pimping and buying or selling her. Maybe you already see the difference, they want to be the tour guide and not have her be the guide to her own world. These are those who want to use the body to sell the soul. They seem like adolescent boys. They are the boys of hip hop who just want to see hips, hop. One says of love, "I love you like a fat kid loves cake."
Yes, that seems accurate as far as their love. A fat kid looks at a cake through the baker's window and feels one thing, crass appetite. Oh, he might talk about meeting the baker of the cake and working or paying for the cake. Yet he really just wants to take the cake. Or maybe if he could just sneak in and stick his finger in the icing for a little taste of the cake. He may even pretend to say a little blessing about the cake before eating. But what he is really thinking the whole time is that he wants to just eat that cake right there and then, putting it on the floor to eat if he has to.
But he will find that he cannot have his cake and eat it too when trying to steal from the baker.
The hip hop artist's attitude towards women seems different. They are always talking about pimping and buying or selling her. Maybe you already see the difference, they want to be the tour guide and not have her be the guide to her own world. These are those who want to use the body to sell the soul. They seem like adolescent boys. They are the boys of hip hop who just want to see hips, hop. One says of love, "I love you like a fat kid loves cake."
Yes, that seems accurate as far as their love. A fat kid looks at a cake through the baker's window and feels one thing, crass appetite. Oh, he might talk about meeting the baker of the cake and working or paying for the cake. Yet he really just wants to take the cake. Or maybe if he could just sneak in and stick his finger in the icing for a little taste of the cake. He may even pretend to say a little blessing about the cake before eating. But what he is really thinking the whole time is that he wants to just eat that cake right there and then, putting it on the floor to eat if he has to.
But he will find that he cannot have his cake and eat it too when trying to steal from the baker.
Story tellers and their Big Birds...
Once upon a time there were some story tellers, so they told stories to other people. These story tellers were different. They called themselves scientists and expected their stories to be taken as true because....they called themselves scientists. They changed their stories as often as they wanted to but always expected each one to be taken seriously. For as long as it was science then it was true, or at least pretty close to being true.
They called one of their stories the tree down theory. One story teller made it up. He said, "Once upon a time there was a group of avian ancestors and they kept jumping from tree to tree. They jumped and jumped. They were quite jumpy little fellows. In the course of time they kept jumping and some fell down and died. The others did not stop jumping and eventually enough were killed that only the best jumpers were left. Oh, that's right. Just having good jumpers is not enough because a lot of things still jump in trees pretty good. Well, among the best jumpers they started growing one lil' feather and then another lil' feather! ....and their lil' arms, they started just a-changin'. Yep, the bone structure just went all different like. Then, their lil' lungs started to breathe on the in and the out so that they could get enough air. ...and their lil' mammalian lips, they started going harder and harder, like a lil' beak! Well...finally, one day, they just flew, flew on away!"
Another story teller said, "Man that is one of the dumbest things I have ever heard! Here, let me try...." For the story tellers did disagree with each other as long as it was the same type of story, in the end.
"Once opon a time there were some dinosaurs. They curled up when they slept and looked like a lil' bird. So, that means that birds came from dinosaurs! Here is how it happened. Their lil' scales just changed a little here and a little there until they became one lil' feather and then another lil' feather. Then, they jumped in the air some. They were jumpy too, all jumpy. Some of the ones that could not jump high enough died and the ones that could jump high lived. So they jumped higher and higher! Well, their bones switched around and their arms began to grow up out their back instead. Their hearts and lungs switched all around too. They began to flap the arms that grew up out their back, here a little and there a little, flap, flap. They kept on jumping, the jumpy dinosaurs. Finally, one day they flew up, up and on away, as a Big Bird!"
The other replied, "You just watched Sesame Street, is all. I still like my story about things jumping out of trees and killing themselves enough times that they flew away one day."
To which the second said, "Well, at least we can agree that our mommy Nature did it somehow. Otherwise we might have to tell a story about how some sort of Father God created things. And the divisiveness of that. I have the urge to merge!"
"Me too, what else can we try to merge together? I like my mommy Nature, she will merge everything for me."
For the real problem with these story tellers is that they are geeks. In reading the text of Nature and all the jots and tittles of it, they want only titillating tittles and refuse to read the jots. For the discrimination, the divisiveness and separation of the jots must be avoided for people of their psychology, regardless what the truth is.
But the truth is that you cannot necessarily just make up a Big Bird or a Big Rat. (see comments section) Putting lil' feathers on a T-Rex does not mean that birds came from dinosaurs, even if dinosaurs did have feathers. There are ancient paintings, carvings, engravings and the like that indicate "dragons" did look like birds in some ways. But evolutionists do not believe in ancient knowledge because all ancient peoples were just a bunch of primitives, I suppose. They seem quite smart about some things for being so primitive. Not to mention the fact that there is no explanation for innate mental structures and the pattern of universal prejudices that seem written in them.
They called one of their stories the tree down theory. One story teller made it up. He said, "Once upon a time there was a group of avian ancestors and they kept jumping from tree to tree. They jumped and jumped. They were quite jumpy little fellows. In the course of time they kept jumping and some fell down and died. The others did not stop jumping and eventually enough were killed that only the best jumpers were left. Oh, that's right. Just having good jumpers is not enough because a lot of things still jump in trees pretty good. Well, among the best jumpers they started growing one lil' feather and then another lil' feather! ....and their lil' arms, they started just a-changin'. Yep, the bone structure just went all different like. Then, their lil' lungs started to breathe on the in and the out so that they could get enough air. ...and their lil' mammalian lips, they started going harder and harder, like a lil' beak! Well...finally, one day, they just flew, flew on away!"
Another story teller said, "Man that is one of the dumbest things I have ever heard! Here, let me try...." For the story tellers did disagree with each other as long as it was the same type of story, in the end.
"Once opon a time there were some dinosaurs. They curled up when they slept and looked like a lil' bird. So, that means that birds came from dinosaurs! Here is how it happened. Their lil' scales just changed a little here and a little there until they became one lil' feather and then another lil' feather. Then, they jumped in the air some. They were jumpy too, all jumpy. Some of the ones that could not jump high enough died and the ones that could jump high lived. So they jumped higher and higher! Well, their bones switched around and their arms began to grow up out their back instead. Their hearts and lungs switched all around too. They began to flap the arms that grew up out their back, here a little and there a little, flap, flap. They kept on jumping, the jumpy dinosaurs. Finally, one day they flew up, up and on away, as a Big Bird!"
The other replied, "You just watched Sesame Street, is all. I still like my story about things jumping out of trees and killing themselves enough times that they flew away one day."
To which the second said, "Well, at least we can agree that our mommy Nature did it somehow. Otherwise we might have to tell a story about how some sort of Father God created things. And the divisiveness of that. I have the urge to merge!"
"Me too, what else can we try to merge together? I like my mommy Nature, she will merge everything for me."
For the real problem with these story tellers is that they are geeks. In reading the text of Nature and all the jots and tittles of it, they want only titillating tittles and refuse to read the jots. For the discrimination, the divisiveness and separation of the jots must be avoided for people of their psychology, regardless what the truth is.
But the truth is that you cannot necessarily just make up a Big Bird or a Big Rat. (see comments section) Putting lil' feathers on a T-Rex does not mean that birds came from dinosaurs, even if dinosaurs did have feathers. There are ancient paintings, carvings, engravings and the like that indicate "dragons" did look like birds in some ways. But evolutionists do not believe in ancient knowledge because all ancient peoples were just a bunch of primitives, I suppose. They seem quite smart about some things for being so primitive. Not to mention the fact that there is no explanation for innate mental structures and the pattern of universal prejudices that seem written in them.
Monday, November 29, 2004
Newtonian philosophy...
"The Book of Revelation exhibits to us the same peculiarities as that of Nature....
The history of the Fall of Man—of the introduction of moral and physical evil, the prediction of the Messiah, the actual advent of our Saviour, His instructions, His miracles, His death, His resurrection, and the subsequent propagation of His religion by the unlettered fishermen of Galilee, are each a stumbling-block to the wisdom of this world....
But though the system of revealed truth which this Book contains is, like that of the universe, concealed from common observation, yet the labors of the centuries have established its Divine origin, and developed in all its order and beauty the great plan of human restoration."
(America's God and Country Encyclopedia of Quotations
(2000) By William J. Federer :474)
The history of the Fall of Man—of the introduction of moral and physical evil, the prediction of the Messiah, the actual advent of our Saviour, His instructions, His miracles, His death, His resurrection, and the subsequent propagation of His religion by the unlettered fishermen of Galilee, are each a stumbling-block to the wisdom of this world....
But though the system of revealed truth which this Book contains is, like that of the universe, concealed from common observation, yet the labors of the centuries have established its Divine origin, and developed in all its order and beauty the great plan of human restoration."
(America's God and Country Encyclopedia of Quotations
(2000) By William J. Federer :474)
The parable of the atheist....
Once upon a time there was an atheist. Like most atheists they did not believe in God because they thought he was a Big Meanie. The argument looks a little like this, "God, why do you let these bad things happen? You know, if you keep letting bad things happen then I will not believe in you. Alright God, you just let another bad thing happen, so now I will not believe in you! You do not exist. So take that, God!"
The bad thing that happened to this atheist was a family member dying. Everyone dies but people get more upset when it happens in certain ways. So the atheist did not blame God for the general matter of death and dying, just that it happened in what they thought was the wrong way in their family. Their mother had died early and their father had already abandoned them at that time. So one earthly creator was not a very good witness nor representative for the Creator and the other died. All these things combined and this atheist piled every evil thing that they could think of high until they came to that point of denying the Creator's existence. It often takes a big mound of things to get there, like a littany of problems that they build in their heads.
One day, they were philosophizing with another man and he said, "The existence of a Creator is a fact, already you know you did not create yourself and so you know you had at least one type of creator. Aristotle just extended this type of thing out to argue for the existence of an ultimate unmoved Mover."
The other man replied, "Yes, there are creators. And I hate my father for abandoning me."
His friend said, "But, he does still exist."
"He's not all powerful like people say God is. If he's so powerful then he should do something. He's just abandoning me too. So even if he does exist he does not matter to me."
"Then be honest and just say that you do not like God, not that he does not exist. God is not your earthly father. In fact, by the complexity of Nature and things of that sort it seems like he is an ultimate Being who does what he wills."
"I know! So if he is all that then he does not matter to me. He's not all that to me if he abandons me and so many other people too. Duh!"
"You know I like to deal with things from a broad philosophical perspective. But as to these personal things, who did he abandon?"
"My mother, she died of cancer."
"Was your mother just matter in motion? If she was then death is just more matter, in more motion. Then it was a delusion that you were ever talking to or loving more than just matter in motion."
"Of course she was not, she was a human being!"
"Who created human beings and so who then ultimately created her?"
"Alright, if I say her parents did then you'll go all the way back to abiogenesis or the Big Bang or something. I know you. And I know you can make evolution seem silly somehow, I can't seem to defend it. So let's just say that God did ultimately make her or cause her to be like you want to. So what? He still abandoned her, just like me."
"Well, you're right that I'm not used to dealing with an argument that is purely emotional. Essentially, it seems that you're saying that God does not do things as you would have God do things and so you refuse to believe in his existence.
Doing some research I read a news account once of a Rwandan mother whose son was murdered in the genocide there. Yet she forgave the killers because of her belief in God. I can give you the account if you like. She seems the opposite of you, she trusts God inspite of her feelings that he is letting things happen that should not happen."
"Just as I say, she has been abandoned and should know it. Look around you, where is God? Invisible?"
"Not another issue....at least we resolved that God does exist but that you believe in disbelieving to punish him for abandonment. So the real issue is if he has abandons people and not if he exists. So you're not actually an atheist but are still anti-God."
"That's fine with me."
"Okay, that was interesting. Maybe we can talk more philosophy another time."
"Alright.....I'm going to think of more ways that God is evil."
"It's a little odd to say that the definition of Good and the Creator of it, is Evil."
"I define what is good!"
"We'll have to talk about it later."
(Continued...)
The bad thing that happened to this atheist was a family member dying. Everyone dies but people get more upset when it happens in certain ways. So the atheist did not blame God for the general matter of death and dying, just that it happened in what they thought was the wrong way in their family. Their mother had died early and their father had already abandoned them at that time. So one earthly creator was not a very good witness nor representative for the Creator and the other died. All these things combined and this atheist piled every evil thing that they could think of high until they came to that point of denying the Creator's existence. It often takes a big mound of things to get there, like a littany of problems that they build in their heads.
One day, they were philosophizing with another man and he said, "The existence of a Creator is a fact, already you know you did not create yourself and so you know you had at least one type of creator. Aristotle just extended this type of thing out to argue for the existence of an ultimate unmoved Mover."
The other man replied, "Yes, there are creators. And I hate my father for abandoning me."
His friend said, "But, he does still exist."
"He's not all powerful like people say God is. If he's so powerful then he should do something. He's just abandoning me too. So even if he does exist he does not matter to me."
"Then be honest and just say that you do not like God, not that he does not exist. God is not your earthly father. In fact, by the complexity of Nature and things of that sort it seems like he is an ultimate Being who does what he wills."
"I know! So if he is all that then he does not matter to me. He's not all that to me if he abandons me and so many other people too. Duh!"
"You know I like to deal with things from a broad philosophical perspective. But as to these personal things, who did he abandon?"
"My mother, she died of cancer."
"Was your mother just matter in motion? If she was then death is just more matter, in more motion. Then it was a delusion that you were ever talking to or loving more than just matter in motion."
"Of course she was not, she was a human being!"
"Who created human beings and so who then ultimately created her?"
"Alright, if I say her parents did then you'll go all the way back to abiogenesis or the Big Bang or something. I know you. And I know you can make evolution seem silly somehow, I can't seem to defend it. So let's just say that God did ultimately make her or cause her to be like you want to. So what? He still abandoned her, just like me."
"Well, you're right that I'm not used to dealing with an argument that is purely emotional. Essentially, it seems that you're saying that God does not do things as you would have God do things and so you refuse to believe in his existence.
Doing some research I read a news account once of a Rwandan mother whose son was murdered in the genocide there. Yet she forgave the killers because of her belief in God. I can give you the account if you like. She seems the opposite of you, she trusts God inspite of her feelings that he is letting things happen that should not happen."
"Just as I say, she has been abandoned and should know it. Look around you, where is God? Invisible?"
"Not another issue....at least we resolved that God does exist but that you believe in disbelieving to punish him for abandonment. So the real issue is if he has abandons people and not if he exists. So you're not actually an atheist but are still anti-God."
"That's fine with me."
"Okay, that was interesting. Maybe we can talk more philosophy another time."
"Alright.....I'm going to think of more ways that God is evil."
"It's a little odd to say that the definition of Good and the Creator of it, is Evil."
"I define what is good!"
"We'll have to talk about it later."
(Continued...)
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