Societies don't have to be secular to be modern

Started by citizen k, October 23, 2009, 02:15:53 AM

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Barrister

#570
October 28, 2009, 11:10:52 AM
Quote from: Viking on October 28, 2009, 04:37:51 AM
To me the who question of morality from the bible is just so nonsensical and stupid. Yet this is what you consider the major part of your religion. Either you are deluded, or I am.

I don't think either of us are deluded.
Posts here are my own private opinions.  I do not speak for my employer.

grumbler

#571
October 28, 2009, 12:59:02 PM
Quote from: Malthus on October 28, 2009, 11:02:52 AM
Heh, something I have always thought: one of the most harmful of all sins is "idolitary" - not the literal worship of idols, but the mistaking of what is symbolic for what is real. Most religious conflict is caused by this - the clash of symbols, where the reality behind those symbols (if only their follows would realize it) is not particularly different.
It is kinda ironic to be reading and participating i this discussion while teaching the AP Euro unit on the Reformation and Wars of Religion, and noting the exact same thing about the "religious disputes" back then; they were over symbols far more than over reality.
The future is all around us, waiting, in moments of transition, to be born in moments of revelation. No one knows the shape of that future or where it will take us. We know only that it is always born in pain.   -G'Kar

Bayraktar!

Malthus

#572
October 28, 2009, 01:06:23 PM
Quote from: grumbler on October 28, 2009, 12:59:02 PM
Quote from: Malthus on October 28, 2009, 11:02:52 AM
Heh, something I have always thought: one of the most harmful of all sins is "idolitary" - not the literal worship of idols, but the mistaking of what is symbolic for what is real. Most religious conflict is caused by this - the clash of symbols, where the reality behind those symbols (if only their follows would realize it) is not particularly different.
It is kinda ironic to be reading and participating i this discussion while teaching the AP Euro unit on the Reformation and Wars of Religion, and noting the exact same thing about the "religious disputes" back then; they were over symbols far more than over reality.

Not to totally hijack the thread or anything, but I just picked up this book (just published this summer):

http://www.amazon.com/Europes-Tragedy-History-Thirty-Years/dp/0713995920/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1256752284&sr=8-2

Haven't had time to crack it open yet. It claims to be the first comprehensive history of the 30 Years War in a generation, in English. Have you checked it out? Heard anything? 

The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane—Marcus Aurelius

ulmont

#573
October 28, 2009, 01:15:59 PM
Quote from: Malthus on October 28, 2009, 01:06:23 PM
Not to totally hijack the thread or anything, but I just picked up this book (just published this summer):

http://www.amazon.com/Europes-Tragedy-History-Thirty-Years/dp/0713995920/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1256752284&sr=8-2

Haven't had time to crack it open yet. It claims to be the first comprehensive history of the 30 Years War in a generation, in English. Have you checked it out? Heard anything?

Check the book thread and ask Syt: http://languish.org/forums/index.php?topic=124.msg79546#msg79546

Malthus

#574
October 28, 2009, 01:20:53 PM
Quote from: ulmont on October 28, 2009, 01:15:59 PM
Quote from: Malthus on October 28, 2009, 01:06:23 PM
Not to totally hijack the thread or anything, but I just picked up this book (just published this summer):

http://www.amazon.com/Europes-Tragedy-History-Thirty-Years/dp/0713995920/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1256752284&sr=8-2

Haven't had time to crack it open yet. It claims to be the first comprehensive history of the 30 Years War in a generation, in English. Have you checked it out? Heard anything?

Check the book thread and ask Syt: http://languish.org/forums/index.php?topic=124.msg79546#msg79546

Woah, I'm impressed with your memory.  :D I'll do just that.
The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane—Marcus Aurelius

grumbler

#575
October 28, 2009, 01:58:28 PM
Quote from: Malthus on October 28, 2009, 01:06:23 PM
Not to totally hijack the thread or anything, but I just picked up this book (just published this summer):

http://www.amazon.com/Europes-Tragedy-History-Thirty-Years/dp/0713995920/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1256752284&sr=8-2

Haven't had time to crack it open yet. It claims to be the first comprehensive history of the 30 Years War in a generation, in English. Have you checked it out? Heard anything?
Haven't checked it out yet, but will.  Parker was the last such history I got, and I see that was '84, so it is time!  :lol:

As an aside, all of my students (even those in my World History courses) know what "defenestration" means.
The future is all around us, waiting, in moments of transition, to be born in moments of revelation. No one knows the shape of that future or where it will take us. We know only that it is always born in pain.   -G'Kar

Bayraktar!

garbon

#576
October 28, 2009, 02:12:45 PM
Did you defenestrate them?

Also, defenestration is one of those cool words that kids like to use to show how smart they are.
"I've never been quite sure what the point of a eunuch is, if truth be told. It seems to me they're only men with the useful bits cut off."

I drank because I wanted to drown my sorrows, but now the damned things have learned to swim.

Malthus

#577
October 28, 2009, 02:20:47 PM
It's an interesting comment on the politics of the time that it inspired an actual word for that.  :D
The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane—Marcus Aurelius

Pat

#578
October 28, 2009, 02:28:48 PM
Quote from: grumbler on October 28, 2009, 07:31:14 AM
Quote from: miglia on October 27, 2009, 09:50:16 PM
:huh:

I'm not saying "this is right because Freud says so" - I'm saying "this is what I think but Freud puts it into words better than me".

Chrissake grumbler.
:lol:  Sure.  Your gambit fails, and now you claim it was just an accident that you were telling everyone to heed the words of Freud on the subject.

Chrissake miglia, have the balls to own up to your mistakes when caught out, rather than blatantly weaseling like this.  No one believes a naked weasel.


:huh: I could just have said "anyway I don't believe ethics based on religion work very well to keep people from doing bad things, since they are so easy to reject" (which is a variation of what I did write earlier, and hence why I referred to "my earlier post"). But that's a nicely written passage, which is why I included it. What's wrong with that? :huh: I don't think anyone here is buying that I should "own up to my mistakes".

If anyone, that would be you, since I could go back in this thread and find mistake after mistake of yours you haven't owned up to.



Valmy, I'll answer you in a sec

grumbler

#579
October 28, 2009, 02:30:31 PM
Quote from: garbon on October 28, 2009, 02:12:45 PM
Did you defenestrate them?

Also, defenestration is one of those cool words that kids like to use to show how smart they are.
It is also a word that kids who love words love to love.  Not only does it siound great, the meaning is both precise and peculiar.

Merkin is the word cool kids like to use to show how smart they are.
The future is all around us, waiting, in moments of transition, to be born in moments of revelation. No one knows the shape of that future or where it will take us. We know only that it is always born in pain.   -G'Kar

Bayraktar!

Malthus

#580
October 28, 2009, 02:42:05 PM
Quote from: grumbler on October 28, 2009, 02:30:31 PM
Quote from: garbon on October 28, 2009, 02:12:45 PM
Did you defenestrate them?

Also, defenestration is one of those cool words that kids like to use to show how smart they are.
It is also a word that kids who love words love to love.  Not only does it siound great, the meaning is both precise and peculiar.

Merkin is the word cool kids like to use to show how smart they are.

Only slightly harder to work into one's essay on the 30 Years War.  ;)
The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane—Marcus Aurelius

crazy canuck

#581
October 28, 2009, 02:52:16 PM
Quote from: grumbler on October 28, 2009, 07:42:36 AM
Quote from: Viking on October 28, 2009, 04:37:51 AM
To me the who question of morality from the bible is just so nonsensical and stupid. Yet this is what you consider the major part of your religion. Either you are deluded, or I am.
The mistake is to believe that this is a zero-sum game, and that Beeb has to be wrong for you to be right (and vice-versa).  The fact of the matter is that we will never know who is right... and that lack of knowledge will harm no one, unless someone chooses to get worked up over someone else's beliefs.

I have no more respect for the people who say "heaven doesn't exist because no one can prove it exists" than I do for "my god exists because no one can prove that she doesn't exist."   Though no less, I suppose.

No one needs to be deluded to believe that religion has had both a beneficial and a detrimental impact on human history.  One does have to be deluded to think that only one or the other effect is true, but Marti is the only one arguing that and he doesn't believe it himself.

So, I think we can dismiss the delusion concept and, if anyone cares to argue the abstract concept of the level of evidence necessary for each of us to "have faith" in un-evidenced things, that is a more interesting conversation than trying to decide who is deluded.

Well put!

I find my discussions with BB about why he has faith and why I do not much more enjoyable and intellectually satisfying then arguments over whether one or both of us are deluded because we believe as we do.

Eddie Teach

#582
October 28, 2009, 03:21:43 PM
Quote from: garbon on October 28, 2009, 02:12:45 PM
Also, defenestration is one of those cool words that kids like to use to show how smart they are.

My favorite is "crepuscular."
To sleep, perchance to dream. But in that sleep of death, what dreams may come?

Malthus

#583
October 28, 2009, 03:26:52 PM
Quote from: Peter Wiggin on October 28, 2009, 03:21:43 PM
Quote from: garbon on October 28, 2009, 02:12:45 PM
Also, defenestration is one of those cool words that kids like to use to show how smart they are.

My favorite is "crepuscular."

The crepescular whore defenestrated the john at sunset for making fun of her ratty-looking merkin?  ;)
The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane—Marcus Aurelius

crazy canuck

#584
October 28, 2009, 03:41:38 PM
Well done Malthus.  You get to go to the head of the class. :D
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