Now take a look at an actor like Depp. Sure you can recognize him, but you could watch a whole movie without actually really noticing that he's in there.
No, no. That's Gary Oldman. Depp is still too flashy to blend seamlessly into his roles. The closest he came was ironically his flashiest role: Cap'n Jack Sparrow...and he was aided by copious accouterments and make-up to pull it off.
On the contrary. Star Trek I to VI were at least glorified fan flicks from insiders, from then on they tried to appeal to a more general public: Now they even lost that bit of appeal.
IV was pretty accessible on general principles, and VI was accessible to anyone who wasn't in a coma during the entirely of the Cold War.
1. Belief that it's all a metaphor doesn't necessarily make one any less religious. Saint Augustine argued exactly that: that the whole genesis is a metaphor and only an idiot would take it literally. He got sanctified by the Catholic Church. So...
Agree wholeheartedly. But if you're gonna take the creation metaphorically, then why take the deity literally...
2. (A possible) God doesn't have to obey his own rules, or exist _inside_ the universe he created.
Think of (a possible) God in terms of, say, a game programmer. Let's say you're this uber genius nerd in a CS university, you're bored enough one week and write the uber-universe simulation...(etc.)
The creator of a simulation is still restrained *as regards the simulation* by the parameters of that simulation. A human being, obviously, is not restrained literally by his or her creating an online avatar, but he or she *is* constrained in his or her ability to act with that avatar inside that particular virtual world by the rules governing avatars.
And if we were to extend the programming metaphor, if a creator/designer were to write himself up a world, he or she is still constrained by the relative power, expressiveness, and syntax of the language by which the world is written.
And, pointedly, this argument isn't happening in a vacuum (with hypothetical religions and hypothetical deities) but with actual posited deities of actual religions. Many of whom, I feel compelled to point out, argue that they are *consistent* and *do not alter their mind/decisions*. Which blows all to hell the fun intellectual exercise of a God who decides one day to change the rules.
Science has lots to say about the means by which such a being could act, and places restrictions on the time, place, and manner of such creative acts. Many of the things that science has excluded as possible means (barring massive deception on behalf of the selfsame being) are means that are expressed in religious texts.
As a religious scientist, one is restricted fairly strongly to believing those texts only metaphorically, or not at all.
This coming from a guy who made $4million last year and lives in a $1.5 million dollar house.
Like any good collectivist, Obama doesn't want war, he just wants your money and your soul.
Yeah, this success came after the twenty years he spent making $30,000 a year as a community organizer. Wow, what a hypocrite.
The five minutes comment was an exaggeration, and probably an unnecessarily crass one. For that I apologize. The intent of my statement was to say that a sober analysis of the text even on its face does not bear out the notion that the God of the OT and the God of the NT represent a deity of continuous immutable quality.
And there is no doubt that Jesus was a "buff guy", as you say, being as he was a laborer and carpenter and then an itinerant preacher. Not that that has anything to do with what we were talking about. Jesus as *God* may, since "Vengeance is His" as it is written, may do all sorts of things that humans may not, even according to the rules that He outlined. Jesus may kick over tables and lash the moneychangers, and this may be righteous, but that doesn't give license to regular ol' humans with imperfect judgment to do the same, and he says as much.
From other parts of the thread, it should be clear that I am not cherry-picking verses. However, the point stands that Jesus said that vengeance and violence are the purview of God, to be executed by Hisownself or on His specific instruction. Elsewise, when someone strikes you, do not raise a hand against them. When someone steals from you, offer even more. This advice is again repeated in the epistle to the Romans, from the pen of Paul, and is not restricted to a singular passage as you accuse me of doing.
The first passage simply extends my point: it is not in the purview of *humans* to visit violence upon one another; that, at best, is God's job. Same, BTW, for the third passage (vengeance is not *yours*; at best it rests with some God-ordained authority, if not God Hisownself). Also, it should be noted that the epistolary rulings diverge significantly from Jesus' teachings. Paul was a dirty revisionist, if you ask me.:)
The Luke passage, which is often trotted out in defense of a violent Christianity, is more likely than not a metaphor (one's beliefs are a sword that divides the good from the bad, etc.).
I appreciate that you think that my view is based upon an incomplete or ill-informed reading of the NT. It is not.
I agree, and that's a great way to approach this very difficult religion: as a striving towards an example (Jesus).
But it is an awful stretch to say that killing is merely a sort of "concession" or "compromise" with our natures that would be acceptable *at all* within the ethical/spiritual rubric that Christianity as it is presented in the Bible represents.
The NT doesn't negate the OT, it fulfills it. The nature of God doesn't change.
That's a cute notion, and all, but the text does not bear that out. Jesus instructed his disciples/students when struck to *not retaliate*. I've heard this canard about Christianity "completing" Judaism and maintaining a consistent nature for God, and it's an utter crock that reading the Bible for five whole minutes can put to rest.
Actually, I was referring to the New Testament (which any rabbi will tell you is simply Hellenic heresy, so don't ask a rabbi); e.g. turn the other cheek, etc.. That text repudiates the earlier rule that, it must be noted, governed a tribal people struggling to survive in an unpleasant neighborhood rather than a captive sedentary enslaved people living in Roman occupied territory.
So, yeah, the OT splits the distinction between killing and murder, as the many military campaigns throughout the books describe; the NT does no such thing (until the wild acid trip that is the Apocalypse of John, which most theologians through out Christian history have viewed with, at best, a jaundiced eye).
Uh, no, no. Some modern interpretations of Christianity hold only murder to be wrong, while many historical strains (and certainly the text!) argue for the stricter interpretation. Christian "just war" theory is a hotly disputed topic amongst even modern Christians, and for good reason: there is barely if any scriptural support for it, and many see it as simply a pragmatic concession to the fact that living as a Christian in a cruel, cruel world is rather difficult.
I would point you, for example, to Martin Luther King, Jr.'s early writings, where he explains the man reasons why he rejected the Just War theory that he held in his youth as he found it inconsistent with the Christianity he studied and believed in.
Is this better or worse than requiring a CD in the drive to play?
Worse. The state of my CD/DVD drive is my business and basically under my control, while my Internet connection is dependent upon staying in the good graces of a ISP company that may or may not have their shit together on any given day.
Yeah, I don't get it either. I mean, people being annoyed/apprehensive about GMO foods, that I get (the discomfort level, I mean, not the irrational fear that follows it). But clones? They're just twins, for goshsakes, a pretty common natural occurrence.
Being able to check if your vote was tabulated correctly is worth introducing another way for bosses to abuse power
I happen to agree. I just think many people (especially those with good IT jobs, or other jobs where their special skills, knowledge, or intelligence insulates them and makes them hard to replace) tend to be fairly flippant about the amount of power many bosses have over their employees' lives. Some of the responses above reveal this flippancy; off-hand comebacks about how the employee could sue, etc. betray how little connection some people here have to the world (that *real* one people sometimes talk about) that a great number of their fellow men and women live in. For many, the practical risk of initiating a suit against an employer, never mind the cost or the risk of losing, are absolutely prohibitive.
Well, the Newshour on PBS is still decent. Not, you know, Edward R. Murrow decent, but still. 60 Minutes also occasionally does a good bit.
And there's always the Daily Show. Except when the f*%#ing writers feel like striking. Someone should let them know that "fairness" and "consideration" are secondary to my fix!
What happens when people see minorities on wanted postings over and over?
I imagine the consequences will be about the same as those for minorities being oversampled as criminal suspects on the nightly TV news...people will unreasonably fear black and Hispanic males, and racial stereotypes will be carried forward in the national subconscious. COPS made the young black man the national face of crime; it needs no "white supremacist plot" to reinforce in the minds of people that different is bad and scary.
Note: Many, many more people are killed by dangerous/drunk/stupid drivers in the UK than by murderers, disturbed burglars and demented rapists.
And many more people in the UK are killed by coronary disease than by dangerous/drunk/stupid drivers. Quick! Ban McDonald's and boiled potatoes! It'll save lives!
Each "safety" measure must be balanced against the effect it has upon people's lives, liberties, and dignity. For my part, I do not wish for bored nosy strangers to record and view at their leisure my every public move on the off chance I might run a red light.
No, not the IT end, the whole program in the first place. Videotaped interrogations were not, IIRC, used in many jurisdictions on a consistent basis, and that was what he sought to change. The IT debacle and its solutions afterwards are an entirely different thing, basically unrelated.
Wow, I don't know exactly how you got your interpretation of what I wrote from what I wrote. When you read your own prejudices into someone's comments, make assumptions that are not in the text, and just generally assume the worst of people who state mildly provocative opinions, you aren't talking with or about your interlocutor...only a strawman.
What I said was:
A government should be "weak" enough that it cannot survive a determined effort from its citizens to change its form.
Parse: its citizens (collective, not "any political group" as you assert) if organized and persistent (a determined effort) should be able to make significant change in the manner and form of government. I don't know where you got "violent and bloody revolution" out of that.
I sincerely doubt that Paul's policies will "run the government into the ground", but even if they managed to I can't see myself getting very worked up about it.
Parse: I think it unlikely, but a crisis of government based on its inefficacy may be just what the doctor ordered.
Government has been running people into the ground for so long, it might do for a teensy change...
Parse: Government has used its power to the detriment of its citizens, but curtailing their liberties and limiting their options. I think this is a state of things that could use some reversal.
I do not support violent revolution, and I cannot imagine anyone getting from my comments that I do, unless they are already predisposed to think the worst of someone who is dissatisfied with the status quo especially vis a vis the power differential between the citizenry in this country and our government. I *do* support methods including but not limited to resisting the government's power through civil disobedience, supporting candidates and legislation that seek to reverse the troubling trends, and speaking out on issues of concern. Electing Ron Paul would be every bit as big a sea-change in the way America does business as any violent uprising is likely to deliver. And with much less blood, at that.
Competent and interesting ideas like more taxation, more spending, and bombing an ally?
Taxation: yeah, I'm not crazy about it either, but since all candidates but Paul are likely to bring the practical tax burden higher overall, I'd rather someone who had some ideas of what to do with the money rather than just dump more and more into military contracts.
Spending: coming off of the taxation line, yeah. He has ideas like using money to make government transparent (online documentation, minutes of dept. meetings, legislation in progress online, etc.) and make programs more efficient (online form filing and reports, dragging Medicare into the 21st century, etc.). One of the programs he was involved in back in Illinois was pushing for oversight in police interrogations by requiring them to be videotaped (to rule out coercion and abuse), which he was successful on, which tells me that: a. he is effective at getting his agenda passed, and b. he is not full of shit about caring about transparency issues.
Bombing allies: yeah, wasn't too crazy about the whole bomb Pakistan thing, either, but on the other hand, he in the same breath went out on a limb by saying that earnest diplomatic engagement *even with adversaries* would be a priority, which set him apart from many of his opponents. It's like a Teddy Roosevelt approach to foreign policy...not so bad as a person who is either unwilling to speak with others or unwilling to use force when necessary.
There are a few things I am not crazy about in his voting record (front and center would be his vote for dubious "bankruptcy reform"), but overall he is head and shoulders above the pack. In the squishier "sense of the person" points, he is very much not a typical politician; I found his musings on faith in politics in particular to be insightful and his willingness to talk about past errors and changes (former atheism, drug use, etc.) was refreshing.
He's not perfect, to be sure...not even close. But no human being ever is. I'm primarily a libertarian, but if I can't have a smaller government that doesn't tax me into oblivion and doesn't poke into every corner of my life and choices, I'd take an earnest person who has some decent ideas on how to spend my money over "more of the same" from either the left or the right...no, make that *especially* the right.
Actually, Paul is the exception to his statement. With his policies, he's so likely to run the the country into the ground that no amount of military budget reduction can offset it (unless he completely eliminates the military altogether, allowing the people to revolt against the quagmire government he'll create).
And you're against this...why? A government should be "weak" enough that it cannot survive a determined effort from its citizens to change its form. I sincerely doubt that Paul's policies will "run the government into the ground", but even if they managed to I can't see myself getting very worked up about it. Government has been running people into the ground for so long, it might do for a teensy change...
I support Paul and Obama at the same time. It goes something like this:
"I'd like the government to curl up and die [Paul], but if I can't have that I'd rather it be in competent hands with interesting ideas [Obama] than incompetent or malevolent ones [most other Democrats, all other Republicans]."
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Now take a look at an actor like Depp. Sure you can recognize him, but you could watch a whole movie without actually really noticing that he's in there.
No, no. That's Gary Oldman. Depp is still too flashy to blend seamlessly into his roles. The closest he came was ironically his flashiest role: Cap'n Jack Sparrow...and he was aided by copious accouterments and make-up to pull it off.
On the contrary. Star Trek I to VI were at least glorified fan flicks from insiders, from then on they tried to appeal to a more general public: Now they even lost that bit of appeal.
IV was pretty accessible on general principles, and VI was accessible to anyone who wasn't in a coma during the entirely of the Cold War.
But otherwise, I get your point.
CBS and FOX won't do it to Obama because they *like* Obama. They don't mind if Obama uses their videos to help him win the election.
Yeah, FOX *loves* Obama.
What, are you stoned?
1. Belief that it's all a metaphor doesn't necessarily make one any less religious. Saint Augustine argued exactly that: that the whole genesis is a metaphor and only an idiot would take it literally. He got sanctified by the Catholic Church. So...
Agree wholeheartedly. But if you're gonna take the creation metaphorically, then why take the deity literally...
2. (A possible) God doesn't have to obey his own rules, or exist _inside_ the universe he created. Think of (a possible) God in terms of, say, a game programmer. Let's say you're this uber genius nerd in a CS university, you're bored enough one week and write the uber-universe simulation...(etc.)
The creator of a simulation is still restrained *as regards the simulation* by the parameters of that simulation. A human being, obviously, is not restrained literally by his or her creating an online avatar, but he or she *is* constrained in his or her ability to act with that avatar inside that particular virtual world by the rules governing avatars.
And if we were to extend the programming metaphor, if a creator/designer were to write himself up a world, he or she is still constrained by the relative power, expressiveness, and syntax of the language by which the world is written.
And, pointedly, this argument isn't happening in a vacuum (with hypothetical religions and hypothetical deities) but with actual posited deities of actual religions. Many of whom, I feel compelled to point out, argue that they are *consistent* and *do not alter their mind/decisions*. Which blows all to hell the fun intellectual exercise of a God who decides one day to change the rules.
Science has lots to say about the means by which such a being could act, and places restrictions on the time, place, and manner of such creative acts. Many of the things that science has excluded as possible means (barring massive deception on behalf of the selfsame being) are means that are expressed in religious texts. As a religious scientist, one is restricted fairly strongly to believing those texts only metaphorically, or not at all.
This coming from a guy who made $4million last year and lives in a $1.5 million dollar house. Like any good collectivist, Obama doesn't want war, he just wants your money and your soul.
Yeah, this success came after the twenty years he spent making $30,000 a year as a community organizer. Wow, what a hypocrite.
Jackass.
The five minutes comment was an exaggeration, and probably an unnecessarily crass one. For that I apologize. The intent of my statement was to say that a sober analysis of the text even on its face does not bear out the notion that the God of the OT and the God of the NT represent a deity of continuous immutable quality.
And there is no doubt that Jesus was a "buff guy", as you say, being as he was a laborer and carpenter and then an itinerant preacher. Not that that has anything to do with what we were talking about. Jesus as *God* may, since "Vengeance is His" as it is written, may do all sorts of things that humans may not, even according to the rules that He outlined. Jesus may kick over tables and lash the moneychangers, and this may be righteous, but that doesn't give license to regular ol' humans with imperfect judgment to do the same, and he says as much.
From other parts of the thread, it should be clear that I am not cherry-picking verses. However, the point stands that Jesus said that vengeance and violence are the purview of God, to be executed by Hisownself or on His specific instruction. Elsewise, when someone strikes you, do not raise a hand against them. When someone steals from you, offer even more. This advice is again repeated in the epistle to the Romans, from the pen of Paul, and is not restricted to a singular passage as you accuse me of doing.
The first passage simply extends my point: it is not in the purview of *humans* to visit violence upon one another; that, at best, is God's job. Same, BTW, for the third passage (vengeance is not *yours*; at best it rests with some God-ordained authority, if not God Hisownself). Also, it should be noted that the epistolary rulings diverge significantly from Jesus' teachings. Paul was a dirty revisionist, if you ask me. :)
The Luke passage, which is often trotted out in defense of a violent Christianity, is more likely than not a metaphor (one's beliefs are a sword that divides the good from the bad, etc.).
I appreciate that you think that my view is based upon an incomplete or ill-informed reading of the NT. It is not.
I agree, and that's a great way to approach this very difficult religion: as a striving towards an example (Jesus).
But it is an awful stretch to say that killing is merely a sort of "concession" or "compromise" with our natures that would be acceptable *at all* within the ethical/spiritual rubric that Christianity as it is presented in the Bible represents.
The NT doesn't negate the OT, it fulfills it. The nature of God doesn't change.
That's a cute notion, and all, but the text does not bear that out. Jesus instructed his disciples/students when struck to *not retaliate*. I've heard this canard about Christianity "completing" Judaism and maintaining a consistent nature for God, and it's an utter crock that reading the Bible for five whole minutes can put to rest.
Actually, I was referring to the New Testament (which any rabbi will tell you is simply Hellenic heresy, so don't ask a rabbi); e.g. turn the other cheek, etc.. That text repudiates the earlier rule that, it must be noted, governed a tribal people struggling to survive in an unpleasant neighborhood rather than a captive sedentary enslaved people living in Roman occupied territory. So, yeah, the OT splits the distinction between killing and murder, as the many military campaigns throughout the books describe; the NT does no such thing (until the wild acid trip that is the Apocalypse of John, which most theologians through out Christian history have viewed with, at best, a jaundiced eye).
Uh, no, no. Some modern interpretations of Christianity hold only murder to be wrong, while many historical strains (and certainly the text!) argue for the stricter interpretation. Christian "just war" theory is a hotly disputed topic amongst even modern Christians, and for good reason: there is barely if any scriptural support for it, and many see it as simply a pragmatic concession to the fact that living as a Christian in a cruel, cruel world is rather difficult. I would point you, for example, to Martin Luther King, Jr.'s early writings, where he explains the man reasons why he rejected the Just War theory that he held in his youth as he found it inconsistent with the Christianity he studied and believed in.
And philosophically, could the Open Source community support one side in a competition such as this?
Killing is wrong, according to Christianity. Can Christians support one side of a war over another?
YES! Duh.
Is this better or worse than requiring a CD in the drive to play?
Worse. The state of my CD/DVD drive is my business and basically under my control, while my Internet connection is dependent upon staying in the good graces of a ISP company that may or may not have their shit together on any given day.
Yeah, I don't get it either. I mean, people being annoyed/apprehensive about GMO foods, that I get (the discomfort level, I mean, not the irrational fear that follows it). But clones? They're just twins, for goshsakes, a pretty common natural occurrence.
Being able to check if your vote was tabulated correctly is worth introducing another way for bosses to abuse power
I happen to agree. I just think many people (especially those with good IT jobs, or other jobs where their special skills, knowledge, or intelligence insulates them and makes them hard to replace) tend to be fairly flippant about the amount of power many bosses have over their employees' lives. Some of the responses above reveal this flippancy; off-hand comebacks about how the employee could sue, etc. betray how little connection some people here have to the world (that *real* one people sometimes talk about) that a great number of their fellow men and women live in. For many, the practical risk of initiating a suit against an employer, never mind the cost or the risk of losing, are absolutely prohibitive.
Your boss ordering you to bring your ballot stub into work the next day and put it on his desk.
Well, the Newshour on PBS is still decent. Not, you know, Edward R. Murrow decent, but still. 60 Minutes also occasionally does a good bit.
And there's always the Daily Show. Except when the f*%#ing writers feel like striking. Someone should let them know that "fairness" and "consideration" are secondary to my fix!
What happens when people see minorities on wanted postings over and over?
I imagine the consequences will be about the same as those for minorities being oversampled as criminal suspects on the nightly TV news...people will unreasonably fear black and Hispanic males, and racial stereotypes will be carried forward in the national subconscious. COPS made the young black man the national face of crime; it needs no "white supremacist plot" to reinforce in the minds of people that different is bad and scary.
Note: Many, many more people are killed by dangerous/drunk/stupid drivers in the UK than by murderers, disturbed burglars and demented rapists.
And many more people in the UK are killed by coronary disease than by dangerous/drunk/stupid drivers. Quick! Ban McDonald's and boiled potatoes! It'll save lives!
Each "safety" measure must be balanced against the effect it has upon people's lives, liberties, and dignity. For my part, I do not wish for bored nosy strangers to record and view at their leisure my every public move on the off chance I might run a red light.
No, not the IT end, the whole program in the first place. Videotaped interrogations were not, IIRC, used in many jurisdictions on a consistent basis, and that was what he sought to change. The IT debacle and its solutions afterwards are an entirely different thing, basically unrelated.
Wow, I don't know exactly how you got your interpretation of what I wrote from what I wrote. When you read your own prejudices into someone's comments, make assumptions that are not in the text, and just generally assume the worst of people who state mildly provocative opinions, you aren't talking with or about your interlocutor...only a strawman.
What I said was:
A government should be "weak" enough that it cannot survive a determined effort from its citizens to change its form.
Parse: its citizens (collective, not "any political group" as you assert) if organized and persistent (a determined effort) should be able to make significant change in the manner and form of government. I don't know where you got "violent and bloody revolution" out of that.
I sincerely doubt that Paul's policies will "run the government into the ground", but even if they managed to I can't see myself getting very worked up about it.
Parse: I think it unlikely, but a crisis of government based on its inefficacy may be just what the doctor ordered.
Government has been running people into the ground for so long, it might do for a teensy change...
Parse: Government has used its power to the detriment of its citizens, but curtailing their liberties and limiting their options. I think this is a state of things that could use some reversal.
I do not support violent revolution, and I cannot imagine anyone getting from my comments that I do, unless they are already predisposed to think the worst of someone who is dissatisfied with the status quo especially vis a vis the power differential between the citizenry in this country and our government. I *do* support methods including but not limited to resisting the government's power through civil disobedience, supporting candidates and legislation that seek to reverse the troubling trends, and speaking out on issues of concern. Electing Ron Paul would be every bit as big a sea-change in the way America does business as any violent uprising is likely to deliver. And with much less blood, at that.
Competent and interesting ideas like more taxation, more spending, and bombing an ally?
Taxation: yeah, I'm not crazy about it either, but since all candidates but Paul are likely to bring the practical tax burden higher overall, I'd rather someone who had some ideas of what to do with the money rather than just dump more and more into military contracts.
Spending: coming off of the taxation line, yeah. He has ideas like using money to make government transparent (online documentation, minutes of dept. meetings, legislation in progress online, etc.) and make programs more efficient (online form filing and reports, dragging Medicare into the 21st century, etc.). One of the programs he was involved in back in Illinois was pushing for oversight in police interrogations by requiring them to be videotaped (to rule out coercion and abuse), which he was successful on, which tells me that: a. he is effective at getting his agenda passed, and b. he is not full of shit about caring about transparency issues.
Bombing allies: yeah, wasn't too crazy about the whole bomb Pakistan thing, either, but on the other hand, he in the same breath went out on a limb by saying that earnest diplomatic engagement *even with adversaries* would be a priority, which set him apart from many of his opponents. It's like a Teddy Roosevelt approach to foreign policy...not so bad as a person who is either unwilling to speak with others or unwilling to use force when necessary.
There are a few things I am not crazy about in his voting record (front and center would be his vote for dubious "bankruptcy reform"), but overall he is head and shoulders above the pack. In the squishier "sense of the person" points, he is very much not a typical politician; I found his musings on faith in politics in particular to be insightful and his willingness to talk about past errors and changes (former atheism, drug use, etc.) was refreshing.
He's not perfect, to be sure...not even close. But no human being ever is. I'm primarily a libertarian, but if I can't have a smaller government that doesn't tax me into oblivion and doesn't poke into every corner of my life and choices, I'd take an earnest person who has some decent ideas on how to spend my money over "more of the same" from either the left or the right...no, make that *especially* the right.
Actually, Paul is the exception to his statement. With his policies, he's so likely to run the the country into the ground that no amount of military budget reduction can offset it (unless he completely eliminates the military altogether, allowing the people to revolt against the quagmire government he'll create).
And you're against this...why? A government should be "weak" enough that it cannot survive a determined effort from its citizens to change its form. I sincerely doubt that Paul's policies will "run the government into the ground", but even if they managed to I can't see myself getting very worked up about it. Government has been running people into the ground for so long, it might do for a teensy change...
I support Paul and Obama at the same time. It goes something like this:
"I'd like the government to curl up and die [Paul], but if I can't have that I'd rather it be in competent hands with interesting ideas [Obama] than incompetent or malevolent ones [most other Democrats, all other Republicans]."