trish123 Forum Posts (13,724)

RE: Where Did "Morals" Originate??

haha, thanks but I copied it

RE: Where Did "Morals" Originate??

500 BC: the Rational Revolution takes place -- miraculously -- simultaneously in the fundamentally unconnected worlds of China, India, Persia, Judea, and Greece; a brand new sophistication and consistency in thought inaugurates the world's first Age of Reason -- altho' full rationality doesn't actually form and triumph except in Greece; there, true full philosophy and morality are born

250 BC: there is a surprising and depressing dialectic reaction against reason and philosophy across almost the whole Old World; people experiment with, and turn to, the nemesis and antithesis of rationality and philosophy: newly-invented pure irrationality and religion; this is especially true in Greece, as was probably natural and ineluctable; but world culture and morality suffer immensely; people become fixated on, or even obsessed with, excessively long-term personal enjoyment and social over-cooperation; neither goal is much achieved; it gets to the point where the individual -- the meaning and purpose of the universe -- gets very little pleasure or happiness short or long term; the man in the city street focuses on interpersonal cooperation to the point of self-sacrifice and self-immolation; the Sacred Self virtually abandons all-important personal morality in order to serve his monolithic bureaucratic Society -- an abstract institution and entity which doesn't much even exist; the newly-invented "god" is so evil he practically stands ethics on its head; morality is so perverted, subverted, and tortured by the hyper-evil of religion that it actually becomes the individual's enemy (a shocking situation which still obtains to this day); the holy Self and his Society suffer horrifically; poorly defined and explained "selfishness" and "greed" become highly condemned while bottom-feeding religiosos promote the ambiguous concepts and ideals of "duty" and "obligation"; these last two get interpreted almost exclusively as social concepts and become two new hateful words and enemies of the individual and his society

500-750 AD: religion and the judeo-christiano-islamic ethic have sadly triumphed; true philosophy and morality lie crushed

500-1500: social duties and obligations -- even including counter-productive charity -- continue to dog and torture the individual and society in Europe; fortunately, philosophical and ethical hypocrisy and corruption reign in both government and religion; thus, neither the Sacred Self nor his derivative society perish during this seemingly endless monstrous Dark Age

1300-1500: reason returns to Italy; the false god and anti-philosophy of religion goes into steep decline; individualism and humanism emerge vigorously, while the loathsome god-based morality (sic) of altruism retreats; the selfish virtues of classic Greek "excellence" and classic Roman "manly power" reascend strongly

1500-1700: more of the same, but this time much further, and thruout the whole of Europe

1700-1800: the Enlightenment and new Age of Reason take place culturally, philosophically, and morally; the value of the individual, individualism, and individual happiness are somewhat realized and reach their historic zenith; self-centered and rational ethics see to it that human society and culture are never higher, sweeter, or better

RE: God...fact or fiction?

definately, a surfiet of gasses and hot air is a no no

Hey, Gilly will be happy now - we were all aliens all the time and just didnt know it

RE: God...fact or fiction?

I always knew it was all down to the chemicals babe

RE: God...fact or fiction?

I have just seen that this was published in 2002, do you have any updates Ashore ?

I really should read that New Scientist more often

RE: God...fact or fiction?

woweeee - thanks for this, I just found it on the NASA site - it also said this "This finding suggests that Earth may have been seeded with amino acids from space in its earliest days," said Jason Dworkin of Ames and the SETI Institute. "And, since new stars and planets are formed within the same clouds in which new amino acids are being created, this increases the odds that life also evolved in places other than Earth."

How flippin good is that - they said this too " Previously, the team demonstrated that irradiating interstellar ice ‘look-alikes’ generated compounds called amphiphiles that can organize themselves to form membranes; and molecules called quinones that play important roles in the metabolism of all living organisms on Earth. The next step, they say, will be to tackle the issue of left- and right-handed amino acids. Both forms exist in space, but only the left-handed forms are used by life on Earth".

oh this is so exciting hahaha

RE: God...fact or fiction?

haha, not particularly neutrinos no, could be antimatter, quarks, mesons - any number of things - it is deep and extensive research - but what I was getting at is that school is out on the whole 'proof' thing either way, neither the particle physicists nor the theists can provide satisfactory proof for the others school of thought - so attempts to prove the other wrong or to ridicule can only backfire on the claimant.

Actually, I go back to an earlier statement that I made which is that if somebody claims that something exists and i ask them for proof which they then fail to provide, I will wait a while to give them a chance but exactly how long should I sit in waiting? The burden of proof is on the person making the claim.

My own stance is against theism, whether that be mono, deistic or pantheistic or even animism - all attempt to control mankinds inate goodness and to assert that we need to believe in their schools of thought for our salvation - it is obviously not so as many are surviving in denial of these postulations

RE: God...fact or fiction?

each of those points deals with an area of theistic doctrine - to my mind, extremely relevant

RE: God...fact or fiction?

have a look into particle physics Omega, its far too complicated for me to start explaining - its comparatively new research, less than about 100 yrs or so but they are sure coming on with their findings

RE: new to this

Helloooooooo

RE: whats the real meaning of life ? part 1.. did anybody ever get past the' following souls' bit ?

maybe I would cook some soup 'for' the Aliens if they were to visit and wanting to try some of our earthly fare I wonder what they would make of roast lamb? maybe they would scan it with their antenna and complain about it being full of farmyard antibiotics hahaha -

RE: Insurance Money . .

RE: whats the real meaning of life ? part 1.. did anybody ever get past the' following souls' bit ?

I love the whole dimension thing when souls get mentioned.

Theres a science fantasy book that I really enjoyed with a good description of a storage system, it actually was for dead people but assuming they have 'souls' then these were intact in them cos when they got 'resurrected' they had all their previous knowledge of themselves - but they had to make it from scratch in a more primitive environment.

The storage system was a vast repository of everybody who had ever died, something like the imagined heaven but with an endless storage systen of these deceased people - that is, till they started to get reborn onto a setting which had been constructed by some form of higher being who had organised it all hahaha.

The booK is a series called Riverworld by Philip Jose Farmer and one of the best reads I ever had, it was pretty eye opening to come across such a convincing alternative proposal for - all this

Mornin Gilly

RE: have you ever wondered what its like at the edge of the universe ?..because it must end somewhere ?

I really never thought I would be agreeing here but the below stuff is from this weeks New Scientist;

IN AUGUST, radio astronomers announced that they had found an enormous hole in the universe. Nearly a billion light years across, the void lies in the constellation Eridanus and has far fewer stars, gas and galaxies than usual. It is bigger than anyone imagined possible and is beyond the present understanding of cosmology. What could cause such a gaping hole? One team of physicists has a breathtaking explanation: "It is the unmistakable imprint of another universe beyond the edge of our own," says Laura Mersini-Houghton of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

I cant wait to find out if they confirm this - but theres a bit of an argument brewing in my head on the semantics of all this - surely, even if it is another universe they have found, it is part of the whole 'oneness' thing

RE: whats the real meaning of life ? part 1.. did anybody ever get past the' following souls' bit ?

whats the 'following souls' bit Gilly?

RE: Exclusive dating

I couldnt be more happy for you and really hope all your dreams come true

RE: God...fact or fiction?

I will have to get back to you tomorrow Omega - I had already signed out and came in to answer haha

Im happy you came through your ordeal of an operation

RE: God...fact or fiction?

well said Omega - I wasnt saying anything about your personal position, i was more making a general reference to the condition of freedom - or lack of, but in general rather than personal terms.

Im happy to hear that you dont chastise yourself too and that you are content with your lot

RE: What exactly does "Atheist" mean?

Exactly Ambrose, I cant think of anything worse than basing a friendship on some of the superficial stuff that goes on around here - I never comdemn any threads though I do have opinions on many - my motto is simply 'live and let live'.

I want to know how somebody ticks on lots of levels before even contemplating getting further involved, especially the levels at which disagreements would inevitably arise if not figured out before hand - as you say too, romantic or otherwise

RE: What exactly does "Atheist" mean?

I had such a hard job of fighting my way out of it all - I really feel for people who are surrounded with family and friends and whole communities of believers - it must be so difficult fight out of such a tight knit congregation - however, more and more are doing it thankfully

I dont know about where you live but here in England, many churches have been sold and turned into private houses, nightclubs or even supermarkets - the congregations which are left are mainly aged believers.

I would like to add that I think its important to, and surely the whole purpose of a dating site, that like minded people can speak on subjects which they mutually agree upon. I simply do not understand why this criticism always rears its head when an athiest thread crops up. Nobody forces anybody to comment, much less to look in on the progress

RE: What exactly does "Atheist" mean?

curiously enough Ambrose, there was a similar reaction from my children to the same book - I did let them grow enough to read things for themselves before introducing them to the concept (actually, I had no choice, it was sending them to school when I had to start fielding the questions) - I guess with your cat it must have been some sort of second sight

RE: What exactly does "Atheist" mean?

Well pointed out Ambrose - its a total philosophical conviction in my case. The article mentioned also has the bit about chilldren in an earlier paragraph, I've copied and pasted it in below for you - I omitted it earlier, albiet probably mistakenly, simply because the piece was already too long and I had a visitor at the door and a friend on the phone


"By the same token, infants cannot properly be said to have beliefs about anything. In spite of rites like infant baptism and christening, it is wrong to describe a child as a member of a particular religious faith. Infants and small children simply don’t have the knowledge needed to comprehend such things or to have beliefs about them. Again, though it may be trivially true to say such infants are atheists (because they lack theistic belief), it’s also misleading. That atheists lack belief in the existence of gods does not mean they are ignorant of the concept, just that they place no credence in it. Even if all an atheist knows about gods is that there are other people who believe in such things, there is a recognition that such a thing as god-belief exists and one doesn’t have it. That is a far cry from the mental state of an infant who has no ideas about things like gods or religions and no notions of belief or disbelief".

RE: What exactly does "Atheist" mean?

these are the words of George A Ricker - he says it so much better than I could

Those who want to discredit or undermine atheism go to great lengths to insist that only the very narrowest definition of atheism is correct. By insisting that only those who claim to “know” a god doesn’t exist qualify as atheists, they ensure that the numbers of atheists will always be minimized. If I declared that only fundamentalist extremists were Christians, I would be, quite rightly, criticized for unfairly characterizing Christianity as consisting solely of attitudes and ideas that, in reality, are not shared by most Christians.

Yet, many people commit the same error when talking about atheism. It’s a strategy that works quite well for those who want to minimize or trivialize atheism. When atheism is confined only to those who are willing to declare they know no god exists, then the number of atheists is diminished. Few people are willing to make such absolute statements. But if atheism is seen for what it really is, the lack of belief in a god or gods, then the number of atheists is much larger and probably growing.

Mere atheism reflects the basic point of agreement shared by all atheists, that we don’t believe in a god or gods. The atheist who simply lacks belief in a deity is not less an atheist because he or she does not flatly deny the possibility of such entities. The atheist who declares he or she “knows” no god exists is not more of an atheist for having done so.

Finally, atheism is not about being angry at god or religions or religionists. Although the popular mythology frequently evokes the “angry atheist,” the truth of the matter is that atheists are no more likely to be angry than the members of any other groups. One of the things that does tend to make us angry is the misrepresentation of atheism itself.

In fact, if I had to sum up the prevalent attitude toward religion that seems to be shared by most of the atheists I have known or read, I think the most applicable word would be “bemused” rather than “angry.” Many atheists are genuinely puzzled, and somewhat amused, by the rabid orthodoxy of some among the religious. Many of us wonder how essentially Bronze Age mythologies could have so many followers at the beginning of the 21st century. Then too, some of us are frightened by the attacks on reason, science and democratic government that seem so prevalent in so many parts of the world today, including these United States of America.

The lack of god-belief does not lead to the impoverished, stunted existence of one who is controlled by anger. On the contrary, the liberation of the mind and the human spirit made possible by mere atheism can result in a life that is rich, productive and joyful.

Mere atheism is neither an answer nor a conclusion. It is nothing more or less than a beginning.

I’m not so presumptuous as to suppose this will be the last word on this matter. Unfortunately, we atheists seem to get as hung up on how to define ourselves as some theists are in how to define their positions. The question of the meaning of the words “atheist” and “atheism” is the thread that never dies on the usenet newsgroup alt.atheism.

Personally, I think it’s unfortunate we waste so much time debating labels. I’m an atheist because I have no belief in a god or gods. That’s it. In my view, that is all atheism requires. Mere atheism needs nothing more. I recommend it for your consideration.

© 2007 by George A. Ricker

RE: should candian people pay more taxes to help build more roayal residencies in england ?

I dont think I have either - they are generally really beautiful people - but I think this is all a bit tongue in cheek and they are so beautiful that they are taking it brilliantly - thats why Im so amused at the whole thing

RE: should candian people pay more taxes to help build more roayal residencies in england ?

I think I gonna start calling you Gilly magic mind - you come up with some brilliant threads my friend - you many times brighten a dull day

RE: should candian people pay more taxes to help build more roayal residencies in england ?

me too

signed...... a UK citizen

RE: should candian people pay more taxes to help build more roayal residencies in england ?

Gilly where are you coming from with this one

RE: Horses: The Ride

haha, thats left me gasping for breath - so exciting BB

RE: God...fact or fiction?

Thanks Dom, I hadnt seen the film but had heard that it was very a sensationalised tale. Like you say, similar to the Guy Fawkes effigy stuff.

Maybe they sensationalise things like this to scare people from looking into it - who knows - not me

RE: Horses: Draft One

I can just close my eyes and see this all happening - magnificent