BBC News - Al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden dead - Barack Obama
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yeah, and the meme machines are loving it
http://i.imgur.com/1krKD.png
http://i.imgur.com/KDssc.jpg
Osama Bin Laden really shouldn't have used his real address on PSN.
This had me laughing.Quote:
Originally Posted by ಠ_ಠ
Word is that Osama died an unhappy man because he hadn't had a chance to play Black Ops in over a week.
This was on my morning coffee and I loved it. Definitely the type of news that can make the day.
But I hope this doesn't give Obama a mandate to keep screwing with the American economy. His grace period has long gone.
And in case anyone is wondering... It's none of my business, and yet it is. When American economy (as well as financial institutions) can have such an impact on the world economy, don't be offended if it becomes anyone's business. Definitely it's Americans the one needing to solve their current gigantic problem, but don't expect everyone else to sit tight and not have an opinion on foreign domestic policies, or even criticize them strongly. I'm just adding this little disclaimer because... well, it was the sort of disclaimer I should have had at the beginning of a huge discussion I had with an American friend over this weekend that ended up with me getting a black eye (literally).
Probably Obama will be required to produce Bin Laden's birth certificate now.
where's the long from death certificate, what is he hiding!?Quote:
Originally Posted by mk27
So... like the birthers we are now going to have deathers out there?
probably, they already dumped his body into the sea, seems like they're just trolling conspiracy nuts at this point
So Osama has finally bin Laden to rest :)
Yeah, sorry, have my almost finished ripoff of Truly Madly Deeply as consolation
Code:This was our dream, our biggest wish
Our only fantasy
To get revenge after putting
'everyone v muslims' into ubiquity
We must be strong, keep our eyes open
'Cause now there'll be
New suprises
In more reprises
Like Maccy D supersized it yeah
We tracked you into the mountains
We tailed you into a cave
The pool on your brain weight opened
And now we've got your head to shave
And when you flew the planes into our towered two
We vowed never to rest until our operatives had found you
Pictures on videos leaking from Arab state TV
And interrogations of your devotees meant
We went from Afghanistan, to Pakistan
Now Queda's man is through
We tracked you into the mountains
We tailed you into a cave
We thought we'd have to wait for nature
But one shot put you to your grave
We saw you on Al-jazeera
We saw you on the net
We heard you called us infidels
Like this was some WWE vignette
We saw you stick two fingers up
We saw the bloodlust you had
All this could've been avoided
If you'd gone 'yeah, my bad'
I doubt he was really buried at sea. I have an image of him being boxed up and stored in that big room under the Pentagon (as per the final scene of Raiders of the Lost Ark). His remains will probably spend the rest of civilisation there along with the the jar that contains Hitler's missing testicle, the treasure of Atlantis and Obama's real birth certificate
....the conspiracy theories are getting more and more interesting....!
RIP Osama Bin Laden, world Hide and Seek Champion.
# mv /bin/laden /dev/null
# ls /bin/laden
ls: cannot access /bin/laden: No such file or directory
bush@/home/whitehouse#chmod +x /bin/laden
obama@/home/whitehouse#find / -name "laden"
/bin/laden
obama@/home/whitehouse#cd /bin
obama@/home/whitehouse#./laden
obama@/home/whitehouse#wall "I executed /bin/laden just now"
Huh, exactly what i've expected: No actual proof about his death!Quote:
Originally Posted by Salem
That's from an old rumour, Sipher.
You can now rest assured that since it is official, he's dead.
Well, considering he's now officially dead, one can expect to see no more of him - regardless of whether or not he really is.
Ahhh...so your worried about Zombie Osama as much as I am then? I mean...come on, he was pretty scary when he was alive...Quote:
Originally Posted by Yarin
unless it's just a ploy to win support for the next electionQuote:
Originally Posted by Mario F.
Bin Laden will wait until next summer, then appear on YouTube endorsing Sarah Palin from his secret cave in Alaska.Quote:
Originally Posted by ಠ_ಠ
Why would you want to see his dead body? Isn't it enough that the celebrations in New York made the whole country look exactly like some fundamentalist arab country celebrating the destruction of their satanic enemy? Complete with pictures burning, raised fists, children holding posters and Obama shouting "God Bless America"? Why add a morbid desire for pictures of dead enemies, when most of us couldn't ever tell if the corpse we are seeing is the person we are being told? I had enough of that idiocy with Saddam Hussein.Quote:
Originally Posted by Yarin
I'm just glad this arsehole is gone. But definitely not thrilled about the idea of seeing his dead body. I could already barely stand him alive.
I would hardly call those celebratory acts barbaric if even distasteful considering the circumstances when we do it or when "some fundamentalist arab country" does it. We're talking about a man that directly affected the livelyhood of those celebrating in New York. The same goes for the people who protest and celebrate in the Middle East...Quote:
Originally Posted by Mario F.
No no... when I think barbaric, I think of the President of Iran holding an event in which he throws a stone at Israel. I think about the national sport of Afganistan being a full-contact horse riding sport in which the knock around and score points with the carcass of a goat instead of, you know, a ball or something.
There are plenty of arguments as to why the middle east could be somewhat barbaric compared to the western world, but I never really found any of the nonsense you see the common people do in protests and celebrations to be overly barbaric simply because of the fact that I understood that we and any "civilized" nation would do the same thing in those circumstances.
Anyway, what i do agree with in your remarks is that I have no interest in seeing the body of Osama simply because, as you said, I'd really have no way of knowing if it really was him or just some guy that I believe looks like him. If the scientists want to tell me that they saw him and proved it was him prior to the burial then that's as much as I need to see or hear.
Don't ask, don't tellQuote:
Originally Posted by Mario F.
I don't know enough about Islam to say whether celebrating someone's death would be considered sacrilegious, but I am pretty certain it is WRT to Christianity.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mario F.
I would bet any amount of money the majority of Americans who condemn any form of abortion because it is wrong to take human life for any reason also joyously condone the killing of Osama Bin Laden. I'm not a Christian, so I have no qualms about condoning it, but stuff like this is a terrific demonstration of what really motivates the religious right wing (west or east).
I can't condemn the celebration because, while I think we should be above that as a people, I'll admit there are a few evil mfs around whose death I would throw a party for. Certain people are better off dead, and in some cases it would make me happy to see it.
But I think the partying and media frenzy about "death pics" will only further the (more or less accurate) impression many people in the third world have about Westerners (and Americans in particular) being decadent hypocrits. When it serves their interests, they are all about God and morality. When it doesn't, who cares?
I wasn't thinking about national sports or other cultural events when I was seeing those images in New York. Although, if you insist, we could. Personally the image of the carcass of a goat being dragged across the floor, isn't any more questionable than bullfighting in Portugal and Spain, or the UFL in USA. It depends on who's watching. Culture and history play a large role in how we witness domestic and foreign displays of violence and aggression and what we tag as "barbaric".
Instead, what I was witnessing a clear parallel between manifestations in Middle-East and central New York. I can understand this may sting a bit the national sensitivities. But truth is, stupidity is universal. And mobs are particularly stupid. Before you know it, we are behaving like chimps performing the exact same sad display we get to see done by our "enemies" and that just a few minutes ago we were using as a way to measure our civilizational superiority. I wasn't particularly happy either by seeing the president of the USA using the name of God. Another parallel that really could be avoided. Particularly knowing how sensitive the religious aspect is to this war, considering the fact USA is fighting religious fundamentalists fighting in the name of God. I understand "God Bless America" is the national meme, but finishing off a victory speech with a provocation could/should be avoided. If for no other reason, because God has nothing to do with this. That's, I heard, the thing that most annoys people about fundamentalist Islam (the use of God as a justification and a tool). Also, always found it particularly offensive to any Christian relating God with the murder of people. But I guess it isn't.
Anyways, this is just the ramblings of someone that felt kinda embarassed by the manifestations on New York and didn't thought for one moment they represented the actual spirit of most Americans (including New Yorkers). But I agree that couldn't be avoided giving the relationship of the city with this man. Just don't think anyone looked good in the picture.
That's a very audacious statement, and would be a sorry waste of your money.Quote:
Originally Posted by MK27
AFAIK, the majority of people who condemn abortion, do not think it's wrong to take human life for "any reason"[sic], including the few who condemn abortion under all circumstances.
And the very few (emphasis), who do believe it's wrong to take a life under any circumstance, don't "joyously" condone the killing of Laden. Could be wrong here, I haven't met or so much as heard of anyone that fits this description, but then again, I'm going to guess you haven't either.
Yes, the reason they condemn abortion is because they consider themselves pariahs whom God has chosen to rule over everyone else, and they are just exercising that right. ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by Yarin
I would win the bet, even if it is embarrassing to the hypocrits and pariahs I'm referring to. I have evangelical friends, certainly their very clear position is that abortion is wrong because murder is wrong, and a quick google "Why is abortion wrong?" confirms this:
Why is abortion wrong? | Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry
To be fair, this does also say, "We are allowed to take life under the prescribed requirements of law, such as self defense, war, execution, etc." but this is a thinly disguised piece of circular reasoning IMO.
Sorry, I find religion deplorable...can't get over it.
I don't think I have to look any further than the US Senate and House of Representatives to find plenty of examples of this; whether I have met them or not, they are very clear and outspoken about their absurd and reprehensible philosophies.Quote:
Originally Posted by Yarin
I'm not sure what you mean. Are you actually saying that anti-abortionists are people who try to control everyone else as per God's will?Quote:
Originally Posted by MK27
Yes, most everyone will readily agree with the strong difference between murder and "justified killing". Which is why it's wrong to say one is being hypocritical when they have a problem with murder, but not a problem with execution/self-defense. Think about it.Quote:
Originally Posted by MK27
I guess that would depend. I find points of view on this vary from person to person regardless of religion.Quote:
Originally Posted by MK27
Yeah, religion is like that - whether theistic or not.Quote:
Originally Posted by MK27
Again, I'm not sure there are any politicians who claim/have claimed that killing is wrong in all circumstances.Quote:
Originally Posted by MK27
Duh. Except as an atheist I would say -- well this is kind of obvious...maybe "God's will" is some paradox, or misunderstanding,* orQuote:
Originally Posted by Yarin
Religion IS THEISTIC. Any other use of the term is METAPHORICAL. I also use the term metaphorically that way, as in, "Your have these religious convictions about..." by which I mean "You have these totally irrational convictions about...".Quote:
Yeah, religion is like that - whether theistic or not.
Not to pry, Yarin, but I find it intriguing that someone who is religious? or defending religiosity? might, in some subtle jibe kind-of-a-way, use "religion" in this metaphorically pejorative way, to imply something like, "Yeah, well we all have our own emotionally/culturally/my-parents-whatever-atively way of clinging to preposterous belief systems, so really you are no better than me with yer politics and and yer open source mongering and yer high and mighty ethical style about things that are no more or less real and likely than GOD."
But maybe I am reading too much into all that, LOL.
ps. please don't mention all this to laserlight :D
* or socio-political power grabbing, which it obviously is.
This is getting more philosophical. Everyone is going to want what they believe to be right to be law, regardless of the fact that others disagree. I'm sure you do too, right? That's the way that works, theism aside.Quote:
Originally Posted by MK27
As for "God's will", yes, that one is almost exclusively used pretty much as you say - and plenty of times, a simple excuse for one's frailty or otherwise "preferred" course of action.
No. Wiki describes it decently well. For example, there are plenty of atheistic Buddhists.Quote:
Originally Posted by MK27
Really, your too hung up on "religion". If you actually mean theism, then you should say that instead, they aren't synonyms.
Again, this is more philosophical, yes I would say we all cling to beliefs (some to greater degrees than others) that we have simply because we were initially told so, and don't want to, or haven't got around to challenging them. But that's not was I trying to imply. (Though, I would also say that we're all religious to varying degrees, even if you try not to be. It's an integral component of culture.)Quote:
Originally Posted by MK27
There are people who want what they think is right to be the law and there are people who want religious doctrine to become the law. The religious right exist in America because of faith based politics. Whether it's appropriate for MK27 to point out hypocrisy in the faithful, well, I don't care.Quote:
Everyone is going to want what they believe to be right to be law, regardless of the fact that others disagree.
If I acted like New York did, I wouldn't be comfortable with myself right now. I'd think I'm not being impartial towards a stranger's death.
I'm sure anyone can get that virtue. I don't think geography excuses people.
Now that has to be an article with a lot of 10' poles in it ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by Yarin
I think saying "Religion is a cultural system that creates powerful and long-lasting meaning by establishing symbols that relate humanity to beliefs and values" is essentially equating religion with culture, and it is the kind of statement a pseudo-intellectual religious person would make in order to justify the continued existence of religion as something inescapable or universal, like culture. They are the "religious left", and I hope they have the good grace to die off quietly someday, instead of kicking a dead, badly dismembered and decomposing horse.
For starters, you would have to be theistic to believe that "beliefs and values" have some existence independent of "humanity" to which "humanity" could be related -- if they had religion. No dice. Beliefs and values are conceptual, categorical ways of understanding rational thought. Rational thought is an activity of the mind. Squirrels, which have a mind, and can reason, also have beliefs and values, and as a country dweller and bird feeder I have been struggling with these lately. But I will not credit them with religion. Or maybe I should say: they are "blessedly" free of it.*
I think non (or "a") theistic Buddhism (which I flirted with, heh-heh) derives from a time and place prior to, and outside of, Rationalism proper, which is a Western phenomenon. There are historical, pre-rationalist Western parallels (spun from gnosticism) and at least one other obvious non-Western, Islamic parallel (Sufism). These represent a struggle with with socio-linguistic constraints, which is why for such "athiestic" religious sects every statement becomes metaphorical or parable. That does distinguish them from theists, who ultimately must claim that God is literally real.
But this has nothing to do with the contemporary religious right, who are explicitly about literalism, even if they are blatantly hypocritical about it. The Bible literally tells them homosexuality is wrong, end of story. The Bible literally tells them "thou shalt not kill" -- well thou shalt now search one's concordances to find something to justify everything, because such people are EVIL (in an atheistic, non-religious sense) and that is what they do (manipulate, lie, kill, and then lie again).
* they are also blessedly free of technology, so I win :P
It is reasonable for people to celebrate but it is not in the benefit of anyone. Yes, you are reminding that the bad guy will be killed but also that a lunatic can cause so much damage that his death is celebrated by the whole country. You cannot win against terrorism, you shouldn't pretend so. The goal is to try to prevent it. Go, remove them and pretend that nothing happened. This is no an "honorable" war. It is killing a criminal for the benefit of the global society.
In other words I am glad but not satisfied. Won't ever be. It will be a black moment in history and nothing can fix that. Don't really see why to celebrate.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MK27
I think you read more into this than what is there, it says: "Religion is a cultural system.." not the only possible such system, and is therfor not assigning any universal truths to it. A universal truth is not dependent on "believers", religion is a human activity, separated from the eventual existance of a God.
Good point, but the rest of the sentence, "...that creates powerful and long-lasting meaning by establishing symbols that relate humanity to beliefs and values" makes that ambiguous; the "a" could mean not the only possible system that does this, or not the only possible "cultural system", but still that religion is the system which "creates powerful and long-lasting meaning by establishing symbols that relate humanity to beliefs and values".Quote:
Originally Posted by Subsonics
Otherwise, this is not a necessary and sufficient definition of religion, which is what Yarin seemed to be using the wikipedia reference as. A necessary and sufficient definition would include those characteristics which make religion distinct from other parallel systems that do the same thing. IMO, this certainly includes what kinds of beliefs and values religion creates symbols for. These are not just any kind of beliefs. Fundamentally, religion is about belief in a supernatural order -- ethics, naturalism and rationalism are also "cultural systems" that "create powerful and long-lasting meaning by establishing symbols that relate humanity to beliefs and values" but they are are not religious systems. My criticism of Yarin was to use the term religion to apply to ANY set of meaningful beliefs and values. That is an obfuscation and implies that being a rationalist, and having strong rational convictions about something, is no different in kind than being a Muslim, Buddhist, or Christian.
That is false. The point of rationalism is to not rely on the supernatural and other prejudices for explanations. This is why rational beliefs can be argued against one another, whereas religious beliefs often cannot -- particularly across cultures.
The wikipedia article downplays the significance of supernaturalism and theism to religion, so Yarin used it to support his argument that "religion can be non-theistic" which is also false. Of course, I am equating a belief in the supernatural (spirits, Gods, karma, etc) with Theism (more narrowly defined as "Deities only"), but rationally I do not see much difference in this context.
I agree but I have to say though, that rationalism (logic) often answers a different set of questions.Quote:
Originally Posted by MK27
Hmm... not sure if I understand what you mean. Rational thinking isn't something that is bounded by some kind of "field of expertise". You don't apply rational thinking to question A and not to question B. Rational thinking is universal in scope. It's not better suited for this or that, but equally fundamental. It's in fact at the core of human development.Quote:
Originally Posted by Subsonics
Ironically, judging from modern new faiths and how they are born -- and there's no reason to suspect they are any different from what was happening in antiquity -- I'm even lead to argue Rational Thinking is at the source of Religion. :p Besides, all religions try to support their dogmas by wrapping them around logical argumentation. Fallacious logic, but still there. The purpose is to naturally inhibit rational thinking within its bosom. Maybe that's what you mean when you say rational thinking doesn't provide answers to faith. But that warrants the following analogy:
If you are watching Macbeth you both enjoy the drama as be a critic of the titular character thirst for power. I mean, here we have Macbeth being told by the Three Witches he's going to be king. Yet, his thirst for power leads him to commit regicide. What bloody for!? You were going to be king anyways, you numbnuts! Result: He gets his head chopped of. Not before being King, of course. But his ruin was spelled the moment he killed the king. But if you are not a viewer and you are the actor playing Macbeth, your view of the universe is limited to the play. How it was constructed and the rules. And you will always kill the king and get Macbeth head chopped off. You live by a set of rules. And your Rational thinking is inhibited by either yourself or your director who will probably chop your real head off if you so much dare play a Macbeth who just sits it out until he becomes a king by lawful means.
So Rational thinking, like the outside viewer demonstrates, can try and offer answers to faith (and boy, did we!). It's unbounded, and doesn't accept the limitations of the little golden fishes that insist not leaving their bowls.
Ok, I should have added a bit more to that I guess. I'm not disputing that rational thinking is at the core of human development, at least technical development. When speaking about rational thinking here we are talking about making logical conclusions from a premise I guess. Applied logic (and math) do have bounds, in that a proof is only really valid within the system itself, strictly speaking logic can not prove the first premise by itself. And so when this is applied to gain knowledge outside the system, it falls back on establishing the premise by observations or measurements, and thus perception and our view on what is worth measuring and what we are able to measure and so on. It's interesting that attempts made to make this process more strict (cleaning up "fuzzier" sciences) also leaves a whole lot "outside" of what kind of questions that really can be answered while maintaining this strict definition of truth. Granted, this can be viewed as some kind of extreme skepticism or logical positivism I think there are fundamental questions that many humans ask them selves where science or our rational thinking doesn't provides satisfying answers.
Religion in Greek is tied with the meaning of God. It's meaning always involved God or of the divine. In the Wikipedia article you can see the Latin meaning is between those lines as well. I don't find why the etymology can differ from the actual meaning. The Wikipedia article contradicts itself.
If you believe in a higher power, but not follow any specific religion, you are in your way religious. If you follow a specific "order" that doesn't believe in a God or a higher power, you are not religious. You can be a believer, you can be faithful, but regardless, religious is not the most accurate word.
It is true that things have changed. Scientists could be considered more faithful in their believes than Christians in their religion in modern times. The fact that we tie religion with absolute faith is a misconception. The same goes when people label things as "philosophical" compare to "scientifical", where one came from the other.
Concluding, words should be used with their etymology, what they actually mean and where they come from. Not how they are commonly used. This just creates confusion and unnecessary disagreement.
How a word is commonly used causes development in the etymology of the word and can define what the word actually means, in the current time and place of its common usage, to the people that use it.Quote:
Originally Posted by C_ntua
Etymology means true/accurate meaning of the word. It doesn't really changes. It is defined preferably once. If you want a new meaning you can use a new word.
Commonly used is not a good way to go with the meaning of a word. Religion is commonly used differently for example.
Well, that's the etymology of "etymology", but that's not what etymology actually means in English. Etymology just means (in English) the derivation of a word, it's history of usage. But what a word meant before isn't always (I'm tempted to say isn't ever) what it means now.Quote:
Originally Posted by C_ntua
Still, I would be tempted to agree with C_ntua since I'm personally always very intolerant towards changes to the etymology of a word (I still hold a grudge to this day for the changes to the word hacker, for instance).
However, on this particular case I will have to disagree strongly with him. First and foremost the way a word is constructed isn't to be taken as a literal representation of its meaning. But essentially the fact that a word like Religion is, by the very nature of what it tries to represent, in constant adaptation and always inclusive. Drawing a parallel, the word science is inclusive of any new scientific fields that throughout history were discovered and added to it. We simply didn't decide, to preserve whatever ancient meaning the word might have had (which erroneously included philosophy, for instance), invent a new word whenever a new scientific field emerged with debatable practices. Science today includes all manner of scientific fields, some more arguable than others. So, why wouldn't Buddhism be considered a religion?
Then the meaning of "etymology", according to you, is "fantasy" :) Either that, or etymology is a concept only applicable to dead languages.Quote:
Originally Posted by C_ntua
The same word can have different meanings based on context. Indeed, taking a quick check of an online dictionary, I see that etymology means:
- the derivation of a word.
- an account of the history of a particular word or element of a word.
- the study of historical linguistic change, especially as manifested in individual words.
If you want to avoid misunderstanding, define your intended meaning of a word whose meaning may be in contention.Quote:
Originally Posted by C_ntua
Well, my mother language is Greek :) Which is an ancient, but not dead language. For English we can say that there is no etymology if you prefer for most of the words. But there is no sense of saying that the word etymology doesn't have a specific etymology. If etymology itself cannot be well defined then there is no point...
How you use a word and what is its etymology are different things. Astronomy and astrology as an example. Their etymology doesn't really tell you anything about the distinction of the two meanings the words have. But their use is different, one is considered a science the other not.
Everything taking under consideration, I would just say that most English words don't have an etymology based on English itself. You can track their etymology if you go to the initial language that the root is based of, but that is probably not really useful for a language. Main reason I don't like English...
But regardless, as a "preferred" use of the word religion I would say that it has to do with the divine. I will exclude God, since the meaning is different from divine in the English language. Now, what is considered divine is subjective. The emotion and the feeling though is common, that is why we have a word.
Which is a good thing. If a word is original to speakers then it is likely, if not always, a concept not directly translatable to other languages. Words like that might at least become loan words if said speakers can interact with the rest of us. If a language can't influence any other language for sake of its purity, you really are talking about a culture that is either gone or does nothing of interest to the rest of the world.Quote:
Everything taking under consideration, I would just say that most English words don't have an etymology based on English itself.
But still I find this to be a point of pedantry. Discussing etymology doesn't mean you have a point here. God or divine, it makes no difference, god exudes the divine. You literally define god in terms of being divine, doing divine things: like answering prayers, or world building, or managing the afterlife. Even animist religions, where things are godlike (at the least), don't exclude god.
Buddhism is a religion, and it includes supernatural beliefs. Traditional Buddhism has a pantheon.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mario F.
New age Buddhism tends to focus on pragmatic, conceptual use of terms like karma and maya, but this is still reification, which is a cornerstone of all religion.
Reification is not limited to religion, but it is often what we mean when we use the word religion pejoratively (to refer to beliefs based on flawed premises). However, not every form of belief or value is about reification. Which is why this:
Is an obfuscation. A religious person might have such a conviction, because they must compartmentalize their thinking, giving reason it's "proper domain" excluding the "spiritual". A pseudo-religious version would be to exclude "existential" questions of meaning and value from the domain of reason, but that is another prejudice and probably involves a lot of reification ;).Quote:
Originally Posted by Subsonics
It's not an obfuscation and it doesn't rely on conviction either, there are quite a lot said about it in the 20th century logic movement. But I can see how it can easily be mistaken as such. Any statement made about for example existentialism or religion, where no verifiable empirical observations has been/or can be made, can only be said to be neither true/nor false, and thus from a logical standpoint are meaningless nonsense. Trying to prove them, would be foolish and not rational.Quote:
Originally Posted by MK27
Let's put it this way, "truth" in an absolute sense only exists in purely analytical propositions, ie of the form "1 + 1 = 2" or "All triangles have three corners" they are tautologies, not useful to gain new knowledge. But I'm tired of arguing about this, but if your interested there is a lot said about it already, look up the Vienna circle which had members like Rudolph Carnarp, Bertrand Russel, Wittgenstein, Kurt Gödel the list goes on. I'm just going to paste in this paragraph of Nietzsche to end with. :)
Quote:
Once upon a time, in some out of the way corner of that universe which is dispersed into numberless twinkling solar systems, there was a star upon which clever beasts invented knowing. That was the most arrogant and mendacious minute of "world history," but nevertheless, it was only a minute. After nature had drawn a few breaths, the star cooled and congealed, and the clever beasts had to die. _One might invent such a fable, and yet he still would not have adequately illustrated how miserable, how shadowy and transient, how aimless and arbitrary the human intellect looks within nature. There were eternities during which it did not exist. And when it is all over with the human intellect, nothing will have happened. For this intellect has no additional mission which would lead it beyond human life. Rather, it is human, and only its possessor and begetter takes it so solemnly-as though the world's axis turned within it. But if we could communicate with the gnat, we would learn that he likewise flies through the air with the same solemnity, that he feels the flying center of the universe within himself. There is nothing so reprehensible and unimportant in nature that it would not immediately swell up like a balloon at the slightest puff of this power of knowing. And just as every porter wants to have an admirer, so even the proudest of men, the philosopher, supposes that he sees on all sides the eyes of the universe telescopically focused upon his action and thought.
Yeah, I'm aware of all that, but you are presenting one side of an argument as if it were the only side, which is more pejorative obfuscation. Wittgenstein changed his mind about this.Quote:
Originally Posted by Subsonics
The idea that one cannot make empirical observations about existential reality, or from an existential perspective, is foolish. Check out phenomenology -- Merleau-Ponty, Husserl, Heidegger, et. al. -- and the various things derived from it (the Frankfurt school, deconstruction, et. al.) which can be used to critique a naive application of logical positivism. Logical positivism works inside a box. That's "truth as tautology". The box does have a true ground (the real) within which tautologies make sense. Which is to say, the concept of tautology relies on some semantic presuppositions which can be exposed/deconstructed. One of those is the reification of the concept of truth. Truth is not meaningful without context; it's a rational tool, and it cannot be made "false" via the concept of tautology because you need the tool to do this. This is the paradox that leads to beliefs like:
There is a parallel naive reading of Nietzsche whereby his "revaluation of all values" leads to a nihilistic conundrum. This is an incomplete revaluation, implying there is some objectivity which trumps the objectivity of the subject and renders the subject "meaningless" or without rational tools.Quote:
"truth" in an absolute sense only exists in purely analytical propositions
Well, you just demonstrated how rational thinking also answers these questions. Haven't you? And you did so in a manner that no religious person would accept due to the limitations to rational thinking they impose to themselves. No true faithful can ever accept the rationalization you made on the first paragraph. But you make it because rational thinking is what allows you to debate the issue from the outside and to provide answers (true or false, more on that below) to a problem you identified.
Meanwhile, rational thinking and its results are entirely different beasts. The first is a process that doesn't guarantee correctness. It's not even about that. It's just a means to an end. It's through rational thinking that you build actual tools and methods to test your thoughts. Not being precise I think, but could be said that rational thinking is what drives you to create an hypothesis and what drives you test it. Whether your hypothesis ends up being right or wrong or your methods are adequate or not, is a largely unrelated thing. However, Religious doctrine is implemented not through the application of rational thinking, but by enforcing unproved, and unprovable, "truths"; dogmas. Here, rational thinking is inhibited, shunned even. You must accept what you are told and obey. Anyone caught in this context and accepting their faith, will surely think that Rational Thinking has no place answering their questions. They are wrong naturally.
No, I don't think so. I'm not denying that there is a place for rational thinking, what I want is to say there is also a place for intuition, compassion and tolerance.Quote:
Originally Posted by MK27
I'm not meaning to say that you can not make the observation, just that it's highly subjective. In fact my whole point here is to embrace this. Of course rational thinking is involved in anything we do as a tool, we would not be able to function without it.Quote:
Originally Posted by MK27
And regarding Wittgenstein he is the one figure that seemed to more point at the areas outside meaningful statement with an absurd reductionism as his method, it's the most interesting about this in general as far as I'm concerned. A clue is that he him self meant that regarding his thoughts as logic positivism was a gross misreading.
I'm aware of this too, tell me one school of philosophy that doesn't have another one disagreeing with it, you need to be aware of all sides to get a balanced view of it. But having said that, I have not made any claims where this is taken to the absurd just the most fundamental part that is hard to disagree with if you are honest. I don't know why you bring up Nietzsche's morality here, I have made no references to it at all. I don't really like the man generally speaking and can certainly agree with your point there. It's just that I happen to like this particular text, and I thought it was fitting here. :) that is about it, it's part of a 12 page rant basically leading to no conclusion. Here it is in it's entirety: http://imrl.usu.edu/6890/OnTruthandLies.pdfQuote:
Originally Posted by MK27
Of course. But if one side is wrong then the "balanced view" is the other and IMO you are promoting the wrong one, LOL.Quote:
Originally Posted by Subsonics
I think the attempt to compartmentalize reason by contrasting it with "intuition, compassion and tolerance" is socio-politically and emotionally motivated. It is used by people who want to insist that there is no objective way to make existential observations, or that (as you claim) such observations are "highly subjective", and therefore things like religion can serve just as well or better than existential reality as a foundation for morality, which it cannot. Religion simply co-opts and sabotages morality for it's own socio-political purposes. Morality is an existential phenomenon*; it is not something you can choose to not believe in any more that it would make sense to choose not to believe in the sky and the color blue. Notice both of those true statements are contextual; that does not make them "useless tautologies", either. And I don't believe the sky is blue because that is the color God chose; that is not true (an objective, empirical, existential observation).
I referred to Nietzsche because you did and I think he is very important WRT to modern conceptions of meaning and truth (but very much in contrast to anglo-american philosophy such as logical positivism).
Wow. I think that was (mostly early) 20th century philosophy 101, or 404, or whatever, in a nutshell -- thanks for engaging, Subsonics.
* the same is true for compassion, intuition, and tolerance, also easily co-opted/perverted by relativists. They can be discussed and analyzed objectively and rationally just like everything else.
I agree with some of that, unless you mean to include personal faith/conviction or a belief someone holds. Because it's the fact that it's an unprovable "truth" that requires faith as far as I have understood. Another issue here is that since it's unprovable, in what position is you or I to oppose it? I mean by what means can someone claim to have a better understanding of unprovable claims. And if nothing else, that it's a personal matter, and that showing tolerance seems rational.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mario F.
Heh, I must say that my view sometimes is, since there is so little agreement generally in philosophy, and by necessity opposing sides can not both be right, and there are more then two sides, more like hundreds, lol. Then maybe they are all wrong. :DQuote:
Originally Posted by MK27
Super Hero joke about OBL
http://twentytwowords.com/wp-content...o_escape_2.jpg
Star wars joke
Obi-Wan Kenobi Is Dead, Vader Says - Galactic Empire Times
Tim S.
I think there has to a separation on believing in a religion and having faith in a religion. The first can be seen as accepting it as the truth. The second is trusting that it is the truth since you cannot apply your logic.
Before you actually have faith in something you need to believe in it. There are a lot of things that can convince you to believe in something. But if you are a rational thinker you certainly will use rational thinking as a criteria. But there will certainly be a big emotional involvement as well.
The question is what happens when those emotions change or as you change your way of thinking thus the outcome of your rational thinking. Then you can obey what you believed or change your belief. Again there is no faith. Faith is involved when you actually believe in something. When you question something and you are a rational thinker, the later will play a big effect. Your fear of having been wrong about your religion usually will have a bigger impact, but the logical thinking part should't be diminished.
If you believe in a god and you pray to that god to help you then the faith part is to actually be positive and trust that you will be helped. Rational thinking here is irrelevant.
Concluding, religion doesn't limit rational thinking. If people use it as an excuse because they are lazy to think or don't care to think about a matter that is another story.
If you obey in a religion without you actually believing it, you are not faithful. You just don't believe in it. If you believe in it without being rational, then you are probably not a rational thinker in the first place.
Funny, because I always thought Faith had nothing to do with Belief.
The latter is a rational process acquired through analysis and thought that may be as lengthy and detailed as one wishes. Regardless of on the end it may resulting in a false belief, it still is however a cognitive process. Whereas Faith is exactly what happens when this cognitive process is dumped in the sewer. In other words, Faith is what happens when you failed at believing.
You cannot really have faith in something you don't believe. You can just be obedient.
It is quite apparrent you are not a Christian which is fine but it would be better that since you are not a said Christian you would not speak about it since you clearly have no clue what you are talking about. How did you bring abortion into this discussion at all? You clearly have many many hang ups and attempt to steer most every thread you respond to towards those hang ups. Sorry there is no correlation here.Quote:
I would bet any amount of money the majority of Americans who condemn any form of abortion because it is wrong to take human life for any reason also joyously condone the killing of Osama Bin Laden. I'm not a Christian, so I have no qualms about condoning it, but stuff like this is a terrific demonstration of what really motivates the religious right wing (west or east).
I do not mind the celebrations simply because in that area 3000+ people lost their lives due to this one individual. One very unfortunate side effect of the event is that it now makes our totally incompetent leader look a bit more competent and people are so stupid as to believe he had anything to do with it besides giving permission. Regardless his approval rating will probably jump a bit. In all truth the information for said raid came from the policies and practices of a previous administration and if we had not had that information then nothing would have happened. But as always credit will go to the wrong people and the news agencies will spin it into oblivion and the truth of the matter will never be known because we are too stupid to care and too brainwashed to research it.
More than the issue of credit attribution, I think people should focus on whether the death of Osama Bin Laden merits any kind of support for a president that on the other hand does very little (if anything at all) to solve the gargantuan debt in his country. Currently estimated at around 98% of GDP, growing around 2% an year. In other words, people are again mixing their priorities. A debt that when finally hits everyone in the face, will almost surely drag the rest of the world into yet another economic crisis (as if we didn't have enough of that). Oh... and with a little over 30% of the total debt in the hands of foreign banks, when the s... hits the fan, in comparison to what these banks will do, Osama Bin Laden will look like someone you wanted to invite for thanksgiving.
I think those sailors really need some etiquette training, I mean, here they are, guests in this nice man's house, and as the home owners stand up to greet them and offer tea, they shot 'em in the face!
RUDE!
What I find interesting is that the secretary of defense, featured in that famous photo in the 'situation room,' was formerly the head of Texas AnM university, which is where Bjarne Stroustrup invented C++. So, it's obviously apparent that C++ killed Bin Laden.
Obama has Texans in his office? And Defense, no less? Good grief!