Altruism as good as sex and chocolate?

[The Judge]

Rat Bastard wrote

Heh, I have this great visual at the moment...three atheists looking at some "evidence", and all three looking at each other in wonder, and saying, "Tsk, how does anybody believe this crap?". this is classic: :rolleyes:

I have a "vision" of a good Samaritan medic wondering the desert and coming across a convulsing S/Paul frothing at the mouth on the sand.

He then administers about 8mg of Buccal Midazolam to alleviate the seizure and places S/Paul in the recovery position.

After half an hour or so S/Paul comes to. Meanwhile, the good Samaritan has tended to him making sure he is comfortable, safe and warm…washed his feet or some such biblical bollocks and then he asks him how he feels.

S/Paul replies: “I started to have this really funky vision and it got all crazy, but then it all just faded away and I slept like log. I feel ok now thanks.”

And humanity is saved from the Pauline doctrine of xianity by a few milligrams of benzodiazepine.

Gnosital wrote

Do you honestly think that a doctoral candidate in neuropsych doesn't know that?

It doesn't sound like he does.

[Gnosital]

The Judge wrote

And humanity is saved from the Pauline doctrine of xianity by a few milligrams of benzodiazepine.

:lol::lol::lol:

Nice!

There's a screen play lurking in that idea!

[Gnosital]

Lily wrote

It doesn't sound like he does.

Oy vey.


Lilly, do you ever really let your guard down with anyone?

[The Judge]

Gnosital wrote

:lol::lol::lol:

Nice!

There's a screen play lurking in that idea!

Yeah: The Greatest Story Never Told.

Sure, it makes perfect sense that the creator of the universe, the knower of all, would give the most important message humanity would ever recieve in a form so incomprehensible and culturally biased that only the highest echelons of theological scholars could possibly comprehend it....

No.

This is what I would have done: I would have made Jesus the Pope, with the admonition that he be the Pope until the redemption. That way, in 2001, when the Pope is 2000 year old and has been alive for 2 millenium, he'd be able to explain what the fuck the book was really saying.

[Irreligious]

This why you get so frustrated here Lily. You are talking around Sterny's point. I'm sure such a brilliant man as he understands metaphor, allusions, poetry and idioms, at least, nearly as well as you do. The problem is, many people do not read the Bible as an artifact of the ancient minds that produced its volumes.

Still, even you believe that a Middle Eastern man who was borne of a teenage virgin some 2,000 ago was brutally murdered roughly 33 years later, and revived himself three days after his ostensible demise because he was, in reality, the supreme deity of the universe, and he did it to save the immaterial essences of individual human beings from an eternity of torment after their own deaths. That is the basis of the whole religion in its many forms. Even as a child, I struggled to understand how people could take this story literally. Surely, it was just meant to be a metaphor for something. Would you agree?

The Judge wrote

I have a "vision" of a good Samaritan medic wondering the desert and coming across a convulsing S/Paul frothing at the mouth on the sand.

He then administers about 8mg of Buccal Midazolam to alleviate the seizure and places S/Paul in the recovery position.

After half an hour or so S/Paul comes to. Meanwhile, the good Samaritan has tended to him making sure he is comfortable, safe and warm…washed his feet or some such biblical bollocks and then he asks him how he feels.

S/Paul replies: “I started to have this really funky vision and it got all crazy, but then it all just faded away and I slept like log. I feel ok now thanks.”

And humanity is saved from the Pauline doctrine of xianity by a few milligrams of benzodiazepine.

Better living through chemistry! Gotta love those benzene rings.

[The Judge]

Rat Bastard wrote

Better living through chemistry!...

[cockney accent]

When writing my song for Lindy while I was in Sanata Cruz I was going out of my head so I took a break until Friday, then I thought ‘the weekend starts here’ and I travelled to see my mate in his new club he just bought in Basingstoke.
Road was chocka with the world and his wife (cos everybody needs the A303 on a bloody weekend!).

When I got to the club it was invite only. The bouncer on the door said
“Name’s not down – not comin’ in!”

I said “My mate told me it’s in the mail.”

Bouncer said “Yeah the post is shit innit?!”

I replied “Aaaaw c’mon – guv. Give the Po’ Man a break he has to deliver down 10th & Crenshaw and you KNOW how dodgy it is down there!”

Bouncer took another look at me and realise the quality of the cut of me jib. He thought ‘nice guy! This fell’s gone from Punk to Funk in my opinion’…

“You’re alright you are” he says.
“…Come on in and get down to the sound of Milwaukee.”

But by the time I got to the bar they were playing Michael Jackson.
Long story short my mate turned up had a word with the bar keep; told him “Free bar for my mate ‘ere.”

“Cheers” I said and had a blinder of a weekend for next to nothing!

[/cockney accent]

The Judge wrote

[cockney accent]

When writing my song for Lindy while I was in Sanata Cruz I was going out of my head so I took a break until Friday, then I thought ‘the weekend starts here’ and I travelled to see my mate in his new club he just bought in Basingstoke.
Road was chocka with the world and his wife (cos everybody needs the A303 on a bloody weekend!).

When I got to the club it was invite only. The bouncer on the door said
“Name’s not down – not comin’ in!”

I said “My mate told me it’s in the mail.”

Bouncer said “Yeah the post is shit innit?!”

I replied “Aaaaw c’mon – guv. Give the Po’ Man a break he has to deliver down 10th & Crenshaw and you KNOW how dodgy it is down there!”

Bouncer took another look at me and realise the quality of the cut of me jib. He thought ‘nice guy! This fell’s gone from Punk to Funk in my opinion’…

“You’re alright you are” he says.
“…Come on in and get down to the sound of Milwaukee.”

But by the time I got to the bar they were playing Michael Jackson.
Long story short my mate turned up had a word with the bar keep; told him “Free bar for my mate ‘ere.”

“Cheers” I said and had a blinder of a weekend for next to nothing!

[/cockney accent]

:lol::lol::lol::lol:

I don't get half the references to place names, but funny nonetheless.
I gotta ask a language question- don't get too annoyed! Cockneys don't pronounce their aitches, and neither do the French, for the most part. Is that coincidence, or did one infect the other?

The Judge wrote

[cockney accent]

When writing my song for Lindy while I was in Sanata Cruz I was going out of my head so I took a break until Friday, then I thought ‘the weekend starts here’ and I travelled to see my mate in his new club he just bought in Basingstoke.
Road was chocka with the world and his wife (cos everybody needs the A303 on a bloody weekend!).

When I got to the club it was invite only. The bouncer on the door said
“Name’s not down – not comin’ in!”

I said “My mate told me it’s in the mail.”

Bouncer said “Yeah the post is shit innit?!”

I replied “Aaaaw c’mon – guv. Give the Po’ Man a break he has to deliver down 10th & Crenshaw and you KNOW how dodgy it is down there!”

Bouncer took another look at me and realise the quality of the cut of me jib. He thought ‘nice guy! This fell’s gone from Punk to Funk in my opinion’…

“You’re alright you are” he says.
“…Come on in and get down to the sound of Milwaukee.”

But by the time I got to the bar they were playing Michael Jackson.
Long story short my mate turned up had a word with the bar keep; told him “Free bar for my mate ‘ere.”

“Cheers” I said and had a blinder of a weekend for next to nothing!

[/cockney accent]

That could work! The fact that you ommitted your mate's name and the name of the club could get that story canonized into the year 4000AD version of the bible... there's enough material to translate horribly, but no way to track it down historically.

I would have added more rhyming slang, though... like "The club was 200 plates before a fight, any farther and you'll be in barney!" Just to really mind fuck the theological scholars in 2000 years.

Irreligious wrote

This why you get so frustrated here Lily. You are talking around Sterny's point. I'm sure such a brilliant man as he understands metaphor, allusions, poetry and idioms, at least, nearly as well as you do. The problem is, many people do not read the Bible as an artifact of the ancient minds that produced its volumes.

Still, even you believe that a Middle Eastern man who was borne of a teenage virgin some 2,000 ago was brutally murdered roughly 33 years later, and revived himself three days after his ostensible demise because he was, in reality, the supreme deity of the universe, and he did it to save the immaterial essences of individual human beings from an eternity of torment after their own deaths. That is the basis of the whole religion in its many forms. Even as a child, I struggled to understand how people could take this story literally. Surely, it was just meant to be a metaphor for something. Would you agree?

No.

As for Stern, he has asked me and, at least, 4 other theists (well educated ones) to my certain knowledge, the exact same questions and gotten virtually the exact same answers. He is either having fun with us or he can't understand our answers.

I am not talking about believing the Bible's claims about reality. I am talking about comprehending that the Bible is not one book, but many. I am talking about comprehending that those books were written in several different languages over the course of 1400 years (or 1200, depending on how far back you push Abraham) in a variety of genres and that those facts matter. The Bible isn't a science text and it isn't used properly when put to that use. (Please-- just don't. I know that there are people out there who think that it can be. They are mistaken.)

A favorite blogger of mine was ruminating on the constant demand by the scientifically educated for proof. The whole thing was interesting but this part really seemed pertinent to me in our current context:

Now what got me thinking ... is the common demand of the scientific skeptic for "proof" from God that would consist of, say, a description of a transistor in the book of Genesis or a discussion of Martian soil composition in Job. If only God would reveal something to primitive barbarians of the Bronze Age which they could not possibly know, and which correlates to modern discoveries, then, says the skeptic, I would believe.

Let us us suppose that some earlier scientific skeptic had made similiar demands of God. If he *is* God, says the medieval skeptic, then why has he never discussed the four humours of the body and unlocked the key to healing? The 17th Century skeptic might well demand why nowhere, in the length and breadth of Scripture, does God reveal the wonders of Newtonian physics, which is the ultimate truth about the workings of the heavenly bodies? In the early 19th Century, a scientific skeptic might well demand to know why God has never deigned to reveal what all know to be common scientific knowledge: namely that space is pervaded by aether. And, up until a few years ago, the skeptic could also have demanded that God have revealed in Genesis 1, that the universe is 12 billion years old or that the speed of light is constant.

The problem is that it is the glory of science to progress and a great deal of what we "know for certain" turns out to be only partial knowledge, till other facts come in. The purpose of revelation is not to tell us everything about everything. It is to tell us about the important things. ...

The hubris of the scientific skeptic is that he imagines his particular field of interest is the source and summit of wisdom when, in comparison to the matters discussed by Scripture, it is a small hobby--legitimate in its way and certainly important in its proper sphere--but ultimately not the Final Question. God is pleased with science well done as he is pleased with all human things well done. God enlightens the scientific intellect as he enlightens many other forms of intellectual pursuit. But the notion that if God does not answer our trivia questions about the composition of the earth's mantle or the age of the universe to our satisfaction, then he is failing some test--that's just silly. It's not that he's behind the times, it's that he's way ahead of us. Medievals who saw the four humours as the Latest in Human Knowledge eventually discovered that there was a greater knowledge than this. Dittos for devotees of Newtonian physics when Einstein came along. ...

Never mind. It does not compute.

Lily wrote

No.

As for Stern, he has asked me and, at least, 4 other theists (well educated ones) to my certain knowledge, the exact same questions and gotten virtually the exact same answers. He is either having fun with us or he can't understand our answers.

I am not talking about believing the Bible's claims about reality. I am talking about comprehending that the Bible is not one book, but many. I am talking about comprehending that those books were written in several different languages over the course of 1400 years (or 1200, depending on how far back you push Abraham) in a variety of genres and that those facts matter. The Bible isn't a science text and it isn't used properly when put to that use. (Please-- just don't. I know that there are people out there who think that it can be. They are mistaken.)

A favorite blogger of mine was ruminating on the constant demand by the scientifically educated for proof. The whole thing was interesting but this part really seemed pertinent to me in our current context:

Now what got me thinking ... is the common demand of the scientific skeptic for "proof" from God that would consist of, say, a description of a transistor in the book of Genesis or a discussion of Martian soil composition in Job. If only God would reveal something to primitive barbarians of the Bronze Age which they could not possibly know, and which correlates to modern discoveries, then, says the skeptic, I would believe.

Let us us suppose that some earlier scientific skeptic had made similiar demands of God. If he *is* God, says the medieval skeptic, then why has he never discussed the four humours of the body and unlocked the key to healing? The 17th Century skeptic might well demand why nowhere, in the length and breadth of Scripture, does God reveal the wonders of Newtonian physics, which is the ultimate truth about the workings of the heavenly bodies? In the early 19th Century, a scientific skeptic might well demand to know why God has never deigned to reveal what all know to be common scientific knowledge: namely that space is pervaded by aether. And, up until a few years ago, the skeptic could also have demanded that God have revealed in Genesis 1, that the universe is 12 billion years old or that the speed of light is constant.

The problem is that it is the glory of science to progress and a great deal of what we "know for certain" turns out to be only partial knowledge, till other facts come in. The purpose of revelation is not to tell us everything about everything. It is to tell us about the important things. ...

The hubris of the scientific skeptic is that he imagines his particular field of interest is the source and summit of wisdom when, in comparison to the matters discussed by Scripture, it is a small hobby--legitimate in its way and certainly important in its proper sphere--but ultimately not the Final Question. God is pleased with science well done as he is pleased with all human things well done. God enlightens the scientific intellect as he enlightens many other forms of intellectual pursuit. But the notion that if God does not answer our trivia questions about the composition of the earth's mantle or the age of the universe to our satisfaction, then he is failing some test--that's just silly. It's not that he's behind the times, it's that he's way ahead of us. Medievals who saw the four humours as the Latest in Human Knowledge eventually discovered that there was a greater knowledge than this. Dittos for devotees of Newtonian physics when Einstein came along. ...

I am going to be amused by Sterny's response. He slices, he dices, he even juliennes! :lol:

Lily wrote

No.

As for Stern, he has asked me and, at least, 4 other theists (well educated ones) to my certain knowledge, the exact same questions and gotten virtually the exact same answers. He is either having fun with us or he can't understand our answers.

I am not talking about believing the Bible's claims about reality. I am talking about comprehending that the Bible is not one book, but many. I am talking about comprehending that those books were written in several different languages over the course of 1400 years (or 1200, depending on how far back you push Abraham) in a variety of genres and that those facts matter. The Bible isn't a science text and it isn't used properly when put to that use. (Please-- just don't. I know that there are people out there who think that it can be. They are mistaken.)

A favorite blogger of mine was ruminating on the constant demand by the scientifically educated for proof. The whole thing was interesting but this part really seemed pertinent to me in our current context:

Now what got me thinking ... is the common demand of the scientific skeptic for "proof" from God that would consist of, say, a description of a transistor in the book of Genesis or a discussion of Martian soil composition in Job. If only God would reveal something to primitive barbarians of the Bronze Age which they could not possibly know, and which correlates to modern discoveries, then, says the skeptic, I would believe.

Let us us suppose that some earlier scientific skeptic had made similiar demands of God. If he *is* God, says the medieval skeptic, then why has he never discussed the four humours of the body and unlocked the key to healing? The 17th Century skeptic might well demand why nowhere, in the length and breadth of Scripture, does God reveal the wonders of Newtonian physics, which is the ultimate truth about the workings of the heavenly bodies? In the early 19th Century, a scientific skeptic might well demand to know why God has never deigned to reveal what all know to be common scientific knowledge: namely that space is pervaded by aether. And, up until a few years ago, the skeptic could also have demanded that God have revealed in Genesis 1, that the universe is 12 billion years old or that the speed of light is constant.

The problem is that it is the glory of science to progress and a great deal of what we "know for certain" turns out to be only partial knowledge, till other facts come in. The purpose of revelation is not to tell us everything about everything. It is to tell us about the important things. ...

The hubris of the scientific skeptic is that he imagines his particular field of interest is the source and summit of wisdom when, in comparison to the matters discussed by Scripture, it is a small hobby--legitimate in its way and certainly important in its proper sphere--but ultimately not the Final Question. God is pleased with science well done as he is pleased with all human things well done. God enlightens the scientific intellect as he enlightens many other forms of intellectual pursuit. But the notion that if God does not answer our trivia questions about the composition of the earth's mantle or the age of the universe to our satisfaction, then he is failing some test--that's just silly. It's not that he's behind the times, it's that he's way ahead of us. Medievals who saw the four humours as the Latest in Human Knowledge eventually discovered that there was a greater knowledge than this. Dittos for devotees of Newtonian physics when Einstein came along. ...

What you're missing is that we DO get that, the book (66 of them in the canonized set) are a collection of poetry, fiction, and other writing influenced by religious thought. They're stories based on fiction and metaphor. There is no reason to believe any of that shit ACTUALLY HAPPENED.

There would have been a million ways for the creator of the universe, the knower of all to have done a better job of getting his people with the program. No, the bset explanation, the one that best fits the data... is that it's just a bunch of books.