Poll

Your prediction, not your vote.

Clinton
- 9 (69.2%)
Trump
- 4 (30.8%)
Hung college
- 0 (0%)

Total Members Voted: 13


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Author Topic: Election predictions  (Read 66943 times)

Rob C

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Re: Election predictions
« Reply #380 on: January 12, 2017, 09:19:18 am »

I've only just seen this thread and not read it all - but I find the above statement rather sad.  I appreciate it's a generalisation but so untrue in many cases.  What I see is that people are fearful that others will take what they have - either their money/possessions/land or their lives.  Too much suspicion.  Then there are the greedy power-hungry people who will sow the seeds of distrust among others and lead them to hatred and fear.  I do love my neighbours (mostly) and I'm an un-suspicious sort of character.  Much more relaxing to be that way.

Man wants to love his neighbour - if you don't, perhaps you should try.

This sounds a bit religious doesn't it - and to think I'm an atheist...... :D

Jim


Jim, what on Earth gave you that impression? On rare occasions I could imagine loving a neighbouring wife, but very rarely, and then the second clause would snap in: I might get exactly what you mentioned before, and find my head in my hands. Which, in fact, would not only be poetic justice, but carry just a smidgen of religious justification too.

Better to stay away from them all, wives, husbands, the entire bunch of 'em!

Rob

N80

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Re: Election predictions
« Reply #381 on: January 13, 2017, 08:30:04 am »

This sounds a bit religious doesn't it - and to think I'm an atheist...... :D

Jim

Not at all. The typical religious view is that man is broken beyond his own ability to repair himself. Secularists and atheists tend to see man as flawed but a work in progress than can be repaired with the right programs and institutions. While the religious view doesn't seem open objective verification, the a-religious view flies in the face of all objective evidence. Another bitter irony.
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George

"What is truth?" Pontius  Pilate

Rob C

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Re: Election predictions
« Reply #382 on: January 18, 2017, 09:01:21 am »

Not at all. The typical religious view is that man is broken beyond his own ability to repair himself. Secularists and atheists tend to see man as flawed but a work in progress than can be repaired with the right programs and institutions. While the religious view doesn't seem open objective verification, the a-religious view flies in the face of all objective evidence. Another bitter irony.

I find myself, as I age, becoming slightly more serene about the prospects post-mortal coil.

Whilst not subscribing to any delineated or prescribed belief, my faith in a 'something greater than' grows by the year. In fact, the more I learn or think about things, the more unlikely it seems to me that any of this (our available visions) was just a random accident of any kind when, even that, would have required an earlier starting point that produced the things that supposedly combined in the intial stages of creation. Of course, I hold no PhD, and so my opinion is worthless, but I'm happy enough with that...

;-)

Rob

RSL

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Re: Election predictions
« Reply #383 on: January 18, 2017, 09:19:04 am »

Exactly, Rob. Roughly 18 years ago I wrote this in an essay I titled: "The Meat of the Matter":

"Faith can come to you in various ways, but never by an exercise of the intellect. Faith isn’t intellectual. It comes to you when you recognize not only that you don’t control the world — not even your own world — but that something else does.

"I think some people are born with that understanding. Most of us aren’t. But you can be touched by something. You can call it God if you want to. What you call it doesn’t matter because neither words nor symbols of any kind can describe what it is that touches you. The touch, itself, occurs outside of time; occupies no time. It isn’t like a Shirley MacLaine “experience”: being taken outside your body, for instance, into another world. Suddenly it has happened, and you can only recognize in retrospect that it has happened. But it leaves you with absolutely no doubt that there is an infinity of creation beyond your ability to grasp with your senses, that that infinite creation is a summer of brightness, and that all of it is in good hands: that all of this world’s glories pale before the reality of what creation really is like. And since the touch is beyond the reach of your senses, you can’t describe it. It simply is!"

C.S. Lewis described this kind of experience in Surprised by Joy. That's a book worth reading.
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Rob C

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Re: Election predictions
« Reply #384 on: January 18, 2017, 11:09:05 am »

I'm delighted to see that I share this concept with you, Russ.

In youth, I see it (organized religion) as something that can be structured into one by family, schools, churches etc. but those things (inputs) are external, and though they may convince one to a degree or even completely, there can come a time when, either through age or just experience, it's simply not enough to hold any longer and one abandons all spiritual faith, or, one breaks away and forms different, possibly parallel convictions, but a little apart, at least, from the dogma with which one might have grown up.

I think sometimes of those priests - possibly Jesuits - whose minds and characters are filled and formed with much learning and teaching, but who suddenly become stricken with doubt. That must be one of the most difficult and painful spiritual situations for any human to encounter. I envy them not at all! Not only might they carry the angst of their own situation, but the possible guilt, real or misplaced, of where their flock may also find itself in years to come.

Whatever one eventually discovers or, clearly, never will discover if there is nothing beyond, I'd rather live my life with a belief I can accept than with none at all. But, as with so much, one can't fake it.

Rob

N80

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Re: Election predictions
« Reply #385 on: January 18, 2017, 03:03:41 pm »

I am a devout, protestant Christian. Faith, of course, is the hallmark of this particular religion. And while I do believe that faith goes beyond intellect I do not believe that faith precludes intellect. I think that Kierkegaard's "leap of faith" or, technically "leap to faith" is a glaring misappropriation of Biblical principles of faith. He based his ideas of faith on the Abraham-Isaac story but simply got it incredibly wrong. My view is that faith is primal but it is fortified by intellect including but not limited to empirical evidence. The scriptures confirm this time and again for those inclined to believe them. In essence the Bible is a case, an evidentiary argument for a creator God and his Christ. Paul, is known for his long and detailed arguments with the Greeks, in their philosophical form, for Christ.

Now, if one is not inclined toward Christianity or even if one is but dismisses scripture, then my beliefs do not hold as well.

But as a scientist, I am with Rob, the longer I live and the more I learn the less likely it seems that this is all the result of chance and time. Heisenberg famously said “The first gulp from the glass of natural sciences will turn you into an atheist, but at the bottom of the glass God is waiting for you.” I agree.

I also think that those who deny a creator God are often unwilling to accept the consequences of that idea. Neitsche (sp?) and Sartre were the exceptions. Sartre in particular understood the existential crisis of there being no moral basis for our actions and decisions. (Of course he was not true to his ideal later in life when he prescribed and supported certain political views as good and right.)
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George

"What is truth?" Pontius  Pilate

RSL

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Re: Election predictions
« Reply #386 on: January 19, 2017, 07:31:25 am »

Hi George. I agree with everything you said. But I didn't say that faith precludes intellect. Faith is separate from intellect.
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