BarrenPneuma Forum Posts (1,561)

RE: Films adaptation of a novels

The Matrix trilogy (entertaining but unfaithful to the literature from which it was lifted) came from a 66 issue comic book series from a brilliant writer named Grant Morrison. The comics are infinitely better.

What Is Destiny?

How Is One To Become Intelligent?

The moment you try to become intelligent, you cease to be intelligent. This is really important, so give your mind to it a little bit. If I am stupid and everybody tells me that I must become intelligent, what generally happens? I struggle to become intelligent, I study more, and I try to get better marks. Then people say, "He is working harder," and pat me on the back; but I continue to be stupid because I have only acquired the trimmings of intelligence. So the problem is not how to become intelligent, but how to be free of stupidity. If, being stupid, I try to become intelligent; I am still functioning stupidly.
You see, the basic problem is that of change. When you ask, "What is intelligence and how is one to become intelligent?" it implies a concept of what intelligence is, and then you try to become like that concept. Now, to have a formula, a theory or concept of what intelligence is, and to try to mould yourself according to that pattern is foolish, is it not? Whereas, if one is dull and begins to find out what dullness is without any desire to change it into something else, without saying, "I am dull, stupid, how terrible!” then one will find that in unraveling the problem there comes an intelligence freed of stupidity, and without effort.
~ Krishnamurti

What Is Destiny?

Do you really want to go into this problem? To ask a question is the easiest thing in the world, but your question has meaning only if it affects you directly so that you are very serious about it. Have you noticed how many people lose interest once they have asked their question? The other day a man put a question and then began to yawn, scratch his head and talk to his neighbour; he had completely lost interest. So I suggest that you don't ask a question unless you are really serious about it.
This problem of what is destiny is very difficult and complex. You see, if a cause is set going it must inevitably produce a result. If a vast number of people, whether Russians, Americans, or Hindus, prepare for war, their destiny is war; though they may say they want peace and are preparing only for their own defence, they have set in motion causes which bring about war. Similarly, when millions of people have for centuries taken part in the development of a certain civilization or culture, they have set going a movement in which individual human beings are caught up and swept along, whether they like it or not; and this whole process of being caught up in and swept along by a particular stream of culture or civilization may be called destiny.
After all, if you are born as the son of a lawyer who insists that you also become a lawyer, and if you comply with his wishes even though you would prefer to do something else, then your destiny is obviously to become a lawyer. But if you refuse to become a lawyer, if you insist upon doing that which you feel to be the true thing for you which is what you really love to do - it may be writing, painting, or having no money and begging - then you have stepped out of the stream, you have broken away from the destiny which your father intended for you. It is the same with a culture or civilization.
That is why it is very important that we should be rightly educated - educated not to be smothered by tradition, not to fall into the destiny of a particular racial, cultural or family group, educated not to become mechanical beings moving towards a predetermined end. The man who understands this whole process, who breaks away from it and stands alone, creates his own momentum; and if his action is a breaking away from the false towards the truth, then that momentum itself becomes the truth Such men are free of destiny.
~ Krishnamurti

What Is Jealousy?

Jealousy implies dissatisfaction with what you are and envy of others, does it not? To be discontented with what you are is the very beginning of envy. You want to be like somebody else who has more knowledge, or is more beautiful, or who has a bigger house, more power, and a better position than you have. You want to be more virtuous, you want to know how to meditate better, you want to reach God, you want to be something different from what you are; therefore you are envious, jealous. To understand what you are is immensely difficult, because it requires complete freedom from all desire to change what you are into something else. The desire to change yourself breeds envy, jealousy; whereas, in the understanding of what you are, there is a transformation of what you are. But, you see your whole education urges you to try to be different from what you are. When you are jealous you are told, "Now, don't be jealous, it is a terrible thing". So you strive not to be jealous; but that very striving is part of jealousy, because you want to be different.
You know, a lovely rose is a lovely rose; but we human beings have been given the capacity to think, and we think wrongly. To know how to think requires a great deal of penetration, understanding, but to know what to think is comparatively easy. Our present education consists in telling us what to think, it does not teach us how to think, how to penetrate, explore; and it is only when the teacher as well as the student knows how to think that the school is worthy of its name.
~ Krishnamurti

RE: What book are you currently reading or have just finished...

Behold the Man ~ Michael Moorcock
Screwtape Letters ~ C S Lewis (again...)

RE: bumper stickers...

I believe that all of nature's creatures have a place... right next to the salad and potatoes.

RE: Geneva Experiment - End of The World?

Hoping the effects of these experiments do not create strangelets as we surely do have quite enough of those already on this side of the pond.

Why I Like Faith (a thread for believers to share their views in a peaceful setting)

You are so very wise beyond your youthful years, and a fine lady at that to boot.

Why I Like Faith (a thread for believers to share their views in a peaceful setting)

It appears that reading about faith does not incur opposition. More of that seems to adulterate the supposition that faith is incorrect.
By keeping the faith we each have individually we have managed to maintain coherence, with a very polite face of decorum.
Bless you all.

RE: TGIF!!

A long walk in the forest to seek solace and the sounds and smells of nature. I do so Love the smell of the world in the early precursor to Fall. I'll likely make a fire and read a book whilse I am there. So tranquil and healing I just hope the weather permits.

RE: Hi

When the hell did the US absorb Munbai? I never heard of that district in New York? Do you have directions? Do they have specialized foods? OMG I am so filled with questions about this fascinating new discovery please do tell...

Oh BTW it is sure to settle in your heart as your new homeland, but it too does not appear on a map adjoined to any other nation.

RE: America

Denmark is a country, the United States is a country. Massachusetts is a state not a country.. I do not follow your point here... Apples/Oranges sort of thing it seems...
So by inference China being four times as large in population in comparison to the US makes it 4 times as important? Or even worse I live in Canada where China is 40 times larger by population... OMG we are so inferior... I'm gonna go have a good cry now... Thankd for this horrible news...

Why I Like Faith (a thread for believers to share their views in a peaceful setting)

Ask true believers of any faith to describe the most important thing that drives their devotion, and they'll tell you it's not a thing at all but a sense—a feeling of a higher power far beyond us. Western religions can get a bit more doctrinaire: God has handed us laws and lore, and it's for us to learn and practice what they teach. For a hell-raising species like ours, however—with too much intelligence for our own good and too little discipline to know what to do with it—there have always been other, more utilitarian reasons to get religion. Chief among them is survival. Across the eons, the structure that religion provides our lives helps preserve both mind and body. But that, in turn, has raised a provocative question, one that's increasingly debated in the worlds of science and religion: Which came first, God or the need for God? In other words, did humans create religion from cues sent from above, or did evolution instill in us a sense of the divine so that we would gather into the communities essential to keeping the species going?

Just as a hurricane spins off tornadoes, this debate creates its own whirlwind of questions: If some people are more spiritual than others, is it nature or nurture that has made them so? If science has nothing to do with spirituality and it all flows from God, why do some people hear the divine word easily while others remain spiritually tone-deaf? Do such ivied-hall debates about environment, heredity and anthropology have any place at all in more exalted conversations about the nature of God?

Even among people who regard spiritual life as wishful hocus-pocus, there is a growing sense that humans may not be able to survive without it. It's hard enough getting by in a fang-and-claw world in which killing, thieving and cheating pay such rich dividends. It's harder still when there's no moral cop walking the beat to blow the whistle when things get out of control. Best to have a deity on hand to rein in our worst impulses, bring out our best and, not incidentally, give us a sense that there's someone awake in the cosmic house when the lights go out at night and we find ourselves wondering just why we're here in the first place. If a God or even several gods can do all that, fine. And if we sometimes misuse the idea of our gods—and millenniums of holy wars prove that we do—the benefits of being a spiritual species will surely outweigh the bloodshed.

~ Time Magazine

RE: America

What about Magog?

Why I Like Faith (a thread for believers to share their views in a peaceful setting)

Faith is the glue that binds us all together. Faith is the divine providence of seeking the good in all, and the moniker of Hope and Love.
Faith is the ability to reside in oneself completely through trust, and confidence.
Faith is often misrepresented to be the sole property of religion, but in essence religion is the means of those without faith to attempt to impose dominance over those who do believe.
Faith is a positive thing that does not seek to segregate others, but rather to gather them in harmony for their beliefs.

RE: America

In defense of the American voice (which i have little right to do really), they are a relatively new nation with very little in the years of history as compared to the European nations. And likewise an unknown feeling for such an act on their own soil. All nations in Europe have experienced war on their own soil from foreign interests at one time or another. The European ability to deal with this in a quiet fashion is quite mature but it is to be expected from nations who have had and seen this sort of thing for eons. A little desensitized but in essence a more mature (as in developed and experienced) attitude about the nautre of such atrocity. The United States and Canada are children in comparison regarding this loss. Much akin to children suffering a terrible loss, as compared to adults. While both feel the loss in their own way and similar depth, one has the ability to deal with it in a more passive manner.

JMO (cause we all know I do have a rather vocal one)

No offense sweet lady just a continuance of a light debate of sorts...

RE: America

Nothing he said in and of itself was particularly hurtful but the manner and timing was not well thought out. He saw how it was received and continued to submit ideologies that would best have been posed in another thread and perhaps on a different day. It was the persistence that was more offensive than the words.

RE: America

If on the anniversary of some specific horror in your life, oh lets say your child passed, how would you perceive the words of a person coming to you and espousing all the little or big things that they did wrong in their life?
Imagine for instance "Oh Johnny was so young to have been taken so soon..." and your response is "yeah but remember how Johnny smoked pot and he did like to drink back in the day." "Hell everyone knows that smoking kills, you should have expected him to die!" "I never like Johnny, so I am kind of glad to see him go, he was a bit opinionated for my liking anyway."
Your first post here was rude and crude... Why? (in response to I Love you!). No country is perfect and neither is any person, but no one with any sort of decency deems it their business to point it out on a day like this. Just put your head down and try to remember the dead and lost on that day, how would any of them feel about your words? They cannot respond any longer but you can with some respect.

RE: God is always with us

As opposed to just being ignorant I guess. Rude not unaware just to be clear as you do so Love your clarity. Acting in such a manner is also not a good thing young man. Do try to shake yourself clear of this self-absorbing idea that you and only you are right all the time.

RE: happy 9/11?

Forgetting what occurred is not the right answer. I am a Canadian and our day of Remembrance is not a national shopping spree. Those who remember and those who need to be reminded of the tragedy of war and death all come together and share a silent vigil. We all go to work or school or whatnot and the day continues as usual because in essence it is a reminder that you never know when it will happen. There is no honour to the fallen or lost from 9/11 to make this some sort of materialistic endeavour. There are enough holidays for shopping. Unless you mean buying food or supplies for the families of others affected by similar horrors such as Katrina?
Just imagine 50 years from now and you being someone who lost a loved one, how would you feel to see them scampering about, frolicking and shopping rather than remembering what happened?

JMO

God rest their souls, those who died so needlessly on 9/11.

RE: America

Thank you ladies but I do not speak to gain any sort of recognition, merely to bring this thread back to its intention as some small sort of comfort and voice of reason during a time when all nations should mourn their losses to tragedies such as these. Everyone who died during this terrible time was someone's child and much more in many cases. The day should be remembered not only for them but also for those who were left behind.
to all

RE: America

As a fellow Canadian I do feel you are misrepresentling our nation. Our greatest export is friendliness and you come here to extrapolate misery. One sentence banter to rile up a nation that is trying to overcome a horrible day. I am embarassed to live in the same country at times with such simple-minded hatred. The people here are no more responsible for the deaths in any war as you are unless you personally pulled the trigger. Why cast blame and push their faces in your own perception of what is right or wrong?
And then you attempt to slander them based on any other credo you can manage to sum up in yet more ignorant pundits. Congratulations on providing the missing link. Others will be very happy to study your progress in life to prove their evolutionary theories. This is a thread in dedication to those lost have some respect and drag your club back to whatever cave you crawled from please.

RE: The top 100 things about the great country of Denmark:

~ All college education in Denmark is free.
~ Hans Christian Andersen is known beyond Denmark for his fairy tales, such as The Emperor's New Clothes, The Little Mermaid, and The Ugly Duckling.
~ Søren Kierkegaard philosopher.
~ Denmark is a highly free market, capitalist economy, ranking 11th of 162 countries in the Index of Economic Freedom 2008.
~ From 2006 to 2008, surveys ranked Denmark as "the happiest place in the world," based on standards of health, welfare, and education.
~ In the 2008 survey, the Global Peace Index ranks Denmark as the second most peaceful country in the world, after Iceland .
~ In 2008, the capital and largest city, Copenhagen, was ranked the most liveable city in the world by Monocle magazine

RE: The top 100 things about the great country of Denmark:

If you look at a map, they are the funniest part of it. I mean what exactly is the donkey head of Sweden Norway and Finland attempting to insert into its mouth...?

And hey my relatives were Danes so I can say that... and not be too embarassed about it... I think...

RE: The top 100 things about the great country of Denmark:

Well that's a start.

RE: The top 100 things about the great country of Denmark:

What about iced wine and Vikings?

RE: America

I am not an American but damn pleased to have such amiable neighbours. Much more pleasant than the fruit juice piss that sqeezes its way out of Russia for sure. Literate, Compassionate, Understanding, Wonderful country that you are. Thank God for tectonic shifting that pulls us away from that horrible wasteland to the west of Alaska.

I Love You guys too!!!

RE: God is always with us

How can you not see consumerism as the new religion? Is it because you ascribe to it yourself and would hate to fall under the sway of something you unknowingly are dominated by?

You said:Religion is (noun 1. a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.)

Consumerism is a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature and current purpose of the world. It is everywhere and all consuming.
It invloves many devotional rituals and observances. Christmas, Birthdays, virtually every holiday has been subsumed by it. The television has the most prominent place in most homes that have one and constantly spouts the rhetoric which indoctrinates the masses to its unholy terrors.
The moral code though not concurrent with what may seem moral by reason is that if you are not of the masses you are against the masses or unworthy at best.
Created by the conglomerates who rule the world my friend. Faceless entities who steer us in any direction they wish by changing the colours of todays fashions and selling us more crap than any man woman or child could ever possibly need in a thousand lifetimes.

Your t-shirt in your picture proclaims you a merchant of this fine religion, and a very loud proponent against all others is depicted by your insular words throughout any thread that threatens your little aerie of solitude.

RE: God is always with us

Excuse me miss I am in no way opposed to the plight of the Irish. I have heritage there. I just deemed it closer to mister crotalus' heart than any other plight. I understand what happened and is happening in Ireland and I feel for those people on every side. I was using it as a metaphor for his stance of slamming any post that occurs on this site with even the slightest insinuation of the Bible (whether real or imagined). I do not dislike the man himself but enough slander is enough.
When I say fine nation I do believe that Eire is a beautiful country with beautiful people.
And for your information I do not know it all far from it or I would have stopped looking for answers and reasons long ago.