Libertarian: So if Osama bin Laden has a vision that he, subjectively, is convinced comes from Allah, and that vision tells him that blowing up Xians is a Good Thing, his vision is just as valid as everyone else’s? If not, why not?
And I have been meaning to ask you for some time just how your ideas about closed reference frames differ from solipsism. Can you explain? (In standard English if possible.)
Mapache, the idea that we cannot directly share experience (closed frames) doesn’t demand that reality is only in our heads (solipsism). The acceptence of a real world, and the acceptence that subjective truth could match objective truth, and that human may share impressions with a reasonable (though not perfect) amount of certainty, dashes solipsism axiomatically. No?
Mapache, Usama bin Laden’s vision is valid. That isn’t to say that it isn’t evil. Valid simply means well grounded or efficacious. How my philosopy differs from solipsism, primarily, is that I believe there is an objective reality, unknowable from within our closed reference frames. That reality is spiritual in nature. I hope my English meets your standard.
If objective reality is unknowable, how can you say anything about it? If you say it is spiritual, could I not just as easily say it is NOT spiritual, or, for that matter, that it is “yellow”, or that “it smells bad”?
And could you explain what you mean by “spiritual”?
Okay, i think isee whats goin gon now. i’ll just shut up and let you guys continue than.
just a brief point…
I can say that I am not Plato, due to the fact that Plato would be dead by now, I am female, I am not Greek, I do not share his DNA or fingerprints, etc. It is occasionally possible to prove a negative.
As a corrollary to that, however, any bastard can ignore or disregard my evidence to say that I am Plato. 
Please quote accurately. I said that it is unknowable from within our closed reference frames. It is knowable from within the absolute reference frame.
“Of, relating to, consisting of, or having the nature of spirit; not tangible or material”
Athene1765, :D. Welcome to Straight Dope Great Debates.
Lib, please define “the absolute reference frame” that has some meaning outside your personal world view.
Thanks.
I quoted you word-for-word, which was followed by my paraphrasing of it in order to make a point. Paraphrasing is usually distinguished by the lack of the word quote and/or lack of quotation marks. I believe my point was valid, and I will continue to paraphrase in this manner if I so desire.
You said “unknowable from within our closed reference frames” (emphasis mine). The word “our” includes the writer himself, which would make YOUR (Libertarian’s) reference frame CLOSED, and would therefore make objective reality unknowable to you (Libertarian). Are you saying that you have access to your so-called “absolute reference frame”? If so, why then do you believe in these so-called “closed reference frames”? And, if possible, could you explain this stuff without using self-invented jargon?
Then our discussion is finished.
That would be God’s own reference frame, the reference frame of the spirit. That is meaningful to many people; whether it is meaningful to you might depend on your own experience and bias.
Don’t be a baby - you were not wronged by me in any way. If this means you are going to stop nitpicking my posts, though - I’m all for it.
**Erislover wrote:
But Fryer, if I pick two religions and show how they could have been interpreted similarly, then you could just say, “Well, sure, for those two you can do it, but you can’t do it for all of them.” Dunno if you would do that or not, but you could. So I figured I’d cut to the chase and have you pick two religions. **
Alright, I’m back. How about this:
The concept of salvation redemption is central to Christianity yet totally lacking in other religions (say Wicca).
How would you explain that?
Well, I would probably say that redemption can only come out in religions that have damnation. AFAIK most religions don’t have damnation as a key component of their belief system. While something like Wicca might promote harmony with nature to guide behavior toward harmony with your social surroundings, too, something like Christianity might take a different form to accomplish the same effect; to wit, love thy neighbor, or else.
http://www.greenleafcoven.org/page38.html
Check that out and wonder if you couldn’t hear Jesus bullshitting with the Apostles about something very similar.
The idea of redemption isn’t as focal as it is an idea about how to live life, for note that to become redeemed one must “go through Jesus”, or to look at it in a common way, emulate Jesus in words, thoughts, and deeds.
Pick two people and give them the commandment: there must not be harm done to men. Wiccans come up with a Crowley-esque saying (or Crowley adopted a Wiccan saying, and I’m not sure the distinction is important at all) while Christians turn the other cheek, and live by “do unto others”. Jews, of course, take a series of commandments. But the core of the system is a guide to social behavior that, it is said and hoped, will allow for great prosperity and happiness.
However, if Wicca is not an organized religion with prophets or others that speak to some Deity/Dieties then it becomes difficult to compare and contrast, for how does one compare a system with a no-system? Well, it can be done, because there is something that unifies Wiccans or there could be no such thing as a label such as “Wiccan”, we simply must tread carefully. From my scant readings, Wiccans seem to be sort of feel-good gnostics, seeking direct experience of the supernatural forces at work as a guide to peaceful living. This isn’t very far from feeling God and/or Jesus at work in one’s life: a testament many seem to be willing to admit to.
But my bias is starting to shine through. I tend to look at all religions as a means of behavioral control, and so sort of skip the philosophy and head straight for the practical effects, or at least the stated intent of these effects. Judiasm, AFAIK, doesn’t really seem to preach about a personal God the way Christianity does, and Jehovas Witnesses remain convinced that Hell is not a place but a state.
Also, one might choose to note that most religions that have associated text from the distant past also seem to have dated commandments and metaphors, while we in the present are sort of forced to mumble through references and hope the historians can come up with something. Other things which seem contrary to modern beliefs (like passages about subjugating women or slaves) are easily encapsulated by assuming an interpretation of the “typical” bigoted person, “Well, he couldn’t have meant the slaves. I mean, come on.”
Well, an Umbandist or practitioner of Candomble (sorry dunno how to do accents), would say that Gods and Goddesses with similar functions are indeed different Deities, however they would also say that the have the same ‘Axe’ (pronounced a-sh-e short vowels them both and both pronounced).
Axe is like the vital essence or energy/power of a particular Spirit (amoung other things, it is very much akin the the concept of ‘kami’, a Shinto principle.). So you can have different Tricksters and they are all distinct entities however they all share the same “Trickster essence”. In this model such a statement is the natural conclusion rather than a contradiction.
Anyway, hope that helps.
Oh btw, since you are fond of tricksters if you go looking into either Umbanda or Candomble you will very quicky run across a nice guy named Exu (pronounced E-shoo -short e) an important figure in both those practices. He’s a nice guy if your not affraid of him. He is reported to be very good at living up to your expectations of him. And he is very good at being delightfully sneaky in his interactions with people. Hardly suprising though i thought I’d mention it.
Enjoy enjoy!
**Erislover wrote:
http://www.greenleafcoven.org/page38.html
Check that out and wonder if you couldn’t hear Jesus bullshitting with the Apostles about something very similar. **
Actually, no I can’t. Wiccan philosophy emphasizes the Immanance of Deities in Nature while J/C/I philosophy emphasizes the One God’s trancendence.
You could say that the whole “feel good, love your neighbor, do good” approach is common to all religions, but it that the basic message?
Back to the point of redemption/salvation, I’ve never seen or read in anything about Wicca that this was part of their basic philosophy or theology (or THEALOGY for that matter). Yet it IS basic to Christian philosophy/theology. I think the Nicene code states it explicitly. Humans are inherently sinful creatures and need to be saved or redeemed. Wicca recognizes no such condition.
If there is only one God, why such disparity between the two philosophies?
Libertarian said: “Mapache, Usama bin Laden’s vision is valid. That isn’t to say that it isn’t evil. Valid simply means well grounded or efficacious. How my philosopy differs from solipsism, primarily, is that I believe there is an objective reality, unknowable from within our closed reference frames. That reality is spiritual in nature. I hope my English meets your standard.”
I didn’t ask you to meet my standards, I asked you to reply in standard English. Which you didn’t do; the above looks a lot like Libspeak to me.
Well grounded? In what? Efficacious? Towards what end?
Anyway, the point I was tring to raise is more or less the same point that you have been avoiding answering on the thread. You , Poly, Tris and others have claimed several times that there is only one god, which reveals itself in various ways to different people.
I have suggested that some of the supposed revelations directly contradict others.
Do you not see a contradiction in a god that has revealed itself to you as “Jesus” delivering a message to bin Laden directing him to blow up Xians?
Freyr, remember the key point I’m trying to put across is that humans have interpreted what their gods tell them, that the reason it seems to be many gods is that one god encountered many interpretations. You keep coming at from, “But look at what their God told them!” I keep saying, “No, forget what they say their god told them, look at what the point of these sayings are.” That is the only way we can remove their inherent bias in an interpretation.
What was Jesus trying to get across? Love thy neighbor? Or, you’ll burn in hell if you don’t love thy neighbor? Why will you accept the “burn in hell” so quickly but assume that “neighbor” is a metaphor? Or when Jesus said “brothers” he meant all believers?
In short, when it seems obvious to you and your cultural bias (which is so integral to your worldview that it is probably impossible to shed), you easily accept the spoken word as a fact. But what is obvious about communication with a God?
Did God really speak to Moses? Or did Moses merely say they spoke when in fact he simply had a vision and tried to put it into words? And what words would he choose? Should he not frame it to match the times and the people he spoke to? And was his interpretation flawless to begin with?
As Mapache says, “Do you not see a contradiction in a god that has revealed itself to you as ‘Jesus’ delivering a message to bin Laden directing him to blow up Xians?” Do you (and s/he) not see that the expression of a revelation is taken in the context of one’s assumed existence?
When we examine an object, we do so by utilizing the visual range of electromagetic spectrum. When we try and spread the word about what a god just said to us, we do so in the language and societal context that already exists around us. How else do you propose they do it?
Transcendentalism?—Reincarnation?—Void/Nirvana? Is perhaps what different religions attempt to refer to nothing but a shoddy metaphor that made sense to the recipient of the vision at the time?
Fryer, I present you with an image. This image evokes in you a sense of Justice. Does the image represent the abstract ideal of Justice?
If I flash an image of a fly, then a goat, then a human, then open space (the heavens), what have I just said? Did I say that everything goes around? Did I say that everything is linked? Did I demonstrate the superiority of man?
It is not obvious to me.
So? “No man comes to the Father but through me.” Some have interpreted this as meaning, “Live as I live to get to God” (which has a distinctly similar reading to zen and achieving enlightenment). Others have felt this expressed that one must pray to Jesus, and ask him directly for a path to God.
Personal redemption? Or does a priest need to forgive your sins for you? I don’t think this “Christian philosophy” is as clear as you want to make it. You choose to focus on man’s interpretation of a bible that was inspired (warning!— inspired!) by God, when my whole point is that this interpretation is hopelessly riddled with cultural context.
Now, it would amuse Eris greatly to keep some in the frame of mind that there is only one god, and others that there are many, and have it be entirely obvious to each group that they are perfectly right. Of course they are right: their interpretation comes from the context in which they live: the “truth” they got from the vision was a tautology! It told them exactly what they wanted to hear. “The meek shall inheret the earth” didn’t stop Kings from claiming divine right to rule, now, did it?
If so many people interpret one religion so differently, is it not possible that everyone interprets one god differently? “Oh, but our god is all powerful!” “Oh, but there is no god but man!” “Oh, but…”
And what makes you assume that any god (or gods, as you choose) want to tell us every little thing?
~One god
~similar visions
~Many interpretations reached from cultural bias
~people ask questions visions don’t answer
~culturally biased interpretation implies its own tautologically deductive “proofs” of metaphysical truth
~biased metaphysical “truth” becomes dogma
~rinse
~repeat
Or is it a given that any god can communicate with man perfectly in human speech?
Well, I think that I’m the best looking person on earth.