Post #245,994
2/23/06 9:42:01 PM
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Interesting link
I count myself a "mystical agnostic" rather than an atheist because I'm still sorting out my conclusions from an odd transcendent experience early in my life, and because I think it presumptuous of us on this pellet of muck to assert that the cosmos isn't somehow sentient, if not necessarily "conscious." I do not say that there is any evidence that the cosmos is sentient—merely that I'm not prepared to dismiss the possibility out of hand. If it is sentient, though, I'm fairly confident that it does not take the exclusive form of a vengeful bronze age Bedouin chieftain writ large.
When the faithful of whatever stripe whine about the disrespect of non-believers, one can always advance something like the following riposte: "There are, let us say for the sake of argument, twenty major religious belief systems extant. You are certain that nineteen of these are false. I'm certain that twenty of them are. Our differences are accordingly merely of degree."
cordially,
Die Welt ist alles, was der Fall ist.
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Post #245,998
2/23/06 10:14:37 PM
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Re: Interesting link
I think it presumptuous of us on this pellet of muck to assert that the cosmos isn't somehow sentient, if not necessarily "conscious." I do not say that there is any evidence that the cosmos is sentient\ufffdmerely that I'm not prepared to dismiss the possibility out of hand. Well, that is pretty much the dividing distinction between atheist and agnostic. Though I must point out that the more rational atheists don't dismiss those things out of hand. Rather we say that given the infinite number of things that might be the case but for which we have no evidence and no real possibility of ever getting any, why worry about it? Jay
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Post #246,131
2/25/06 3:17:45 AM
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That's not 'atheism' -
As Meher Baba was fond of saying,
Don't Worry. Be Happy.
See? - you had a guru all the time!
And didn't even know his name.
('sOK though - he was noted for a rollicking sense of humour, too)
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Post #246,161
2/25/06 2:19:13 PM
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Yes it is
An atheist is one who lacks all belief in God or gods.
That is, if the Christian God (and every other deity you've heard of) is on par for you with the Easter Bunny, then you're an atheist.
This does not deny the possibility that there is a deity. But you just lack belief in one.
Cheers,
Ben
I have come to believe that idealism without discipline is a quick road to disaster, while discipline without idealism is pointless. -- Aaron Ward (my brother)
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Post #246,175
2/25/06 7:08:50 PM
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Possibly misquoted Pratchett:
"Oh, I know there is gods. But there is no call to go believe in them. It just encourages the buggers" - Granny Weatherwax.
------
179. I will not outsource core functions.
--
[link|http://omega.med.yale.edu/~pcy5/misc/overlord2.htm|.]
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Post #246,179
2/25/06 7:44:03 PM
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Well, if a one lacks all life-experience of the ineffable -
that one shall be an easy convert to the religion of a-theism.
Clearly, and as so many sages have observed - the sane interpretation, that of agnosticism (we may spare ourselves the re- redefinitions, I trust) - is the default locus for those who have grokked that there 'IS' more than the (maya) world-of-appearances and of boring old F=MA.
There are many orthogonal Dilbert-spaces and others not at all Dilbertian, reachable from that locus; meanwhile the Declared 'a-theist' has sent them all --> dev null, for perhaps.. a laziness of mentation? a curious inCuriosity? ..or maybe merely, an inhumanly mechanical set of base habits.
And then there's - -
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Post #246,193
2/25/06 11:17:38 PM
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Re: Well, if a one lacks all life-experience of the ineffabl
There are many orthogonal Dilbert-spaces and others not at all Dilbertian, reachable from that locus; meanwhile the Declared 'a-theist' has sent them all --> dev null, for perhaps.. a laziness of mentation? a curious inCuriosity? ..or maybe merely, an inhumanly mechanical set of base habits. There is more to existance then mankind knows or can know. But I refuse to spend much time thinking about the part that mankind can't know*. There is more in the part we can then I will be able to understand in my life anyway. Jay * Notice that I didn't say none. There can be some benefit in such musing, to learn better the process of learning or to use the study of the unknowable as a mirror to one's own mind. But the study of the unknowable is pointless as an endevor unto itself.
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Post #246,200
2/25/06 11:45:56 PM
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You're begining to sound like Donald Rumsfeld! :)
Via [link|http://www.slate.com/id/2081042/|Slate]: The Unknown
As we know,
There are known knowns.
There are things we know we know.
We also know
There are known unknowns.
That is to say
We know there are some things
We do not know.
But there are also unknown unknowns,
The ones we don't know
We don't know.
\ufffdFeb. 12, 2002, Department of Defense news briefing Alex
When fascism comes to America, it'll be wrapped in a flag and carrying a cross. -- Sinclair Lewis
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Post #246,201
2/25/06 11:50:36 PM
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I actually like that bit from Don.
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Post #246,202
2/25/06 11:58:45 PM
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Speaking of tautologies
But the study of the unknowable is pointless as an endevor unto itself. 'The Unknowable' is a predigested supposition. There are words like 'apperception', whose near-synonyms describe possible means of transcending learned habits of not Seeing very much around us. But only experiment ever takes these beyond mere word games, natch. (Still, poetry has a better chance than prose, in such matters.) Summing up for the precious few who have gone before, rather than accepting that the Sound Barrier cannot be broken - Always choose the difficult.-- Rainer Maria Rilke A Glimpse.. will tantalize - Two Glimpses? usually galvanize. YMMV
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