Good will to all men? Not from the grumpy atheists! (Thank God not all atheists are grumpy but there sure seems to be a lot of them)
Why is it that so many in the atheist community cannot bring themselves to get past their anger whenever they engage in discussions? The language of many of their contributions in public debate is laced with invective and dripping with sarcasm and bile. There are exceptions of course, but they tend to fall more into the category of being the 'exception that proves the rule' when compared to the hostility of many of today's atheist posters. Comment offered by the theists in the public square is often depicted as being 'malicious' or 'venomous' and intended to enslave the 'feeble minded and weak' by those who post. Nothing could be further from the truth. Venom is something that is oriented to death. Christians are oriented in a 180 degree different direction. We speak not to the culture of death that grips our world but rather for the culture of life and light which ends with the gift of eternal life. For example, the Catholic Church in its hum...
Science of any kind, belief in it or developing the kind of mind that fosters the practice of the scientific method does not make belief in God more difficult. It does however make it more difficult for predator priests to lead us placidly down the chute to the killing floor. Priests don't like that.
ReplyDeleteCheap shot. Discuss the article.
DeleteCheap shots are when Father Tim viciously maligns a person's parentage, religious tradition, intelligence, social class and educational level, when he can't refute your rhetoric, which he has often done to me.
DeleteTim is a man who acknowledges little control over his appetites and compulsions, having been for all his adult life a glutton, sloth and malingerer, morbidly obese, a chain smoker, reclusive and nefarious in his social behavior, a virtual stranger to most of his parishioners though most, in truth, are glad of this, yet claims to be a fit representative of religious life and sexually chaste. He freely mixes his own hippo-critical brand of religion, already offensive to ernest Christians by itself, with reactionary politics, as if the two were part of a whole.
Under the circumstances, I think I take it pretty easy on him. Someone must speak truth to blubber.
There's a saying. On the internet no one knows you're a dog. The internet is for ideas, personal attacks I classify as cheap shots. For instance I get very upset when people get on my case for looking too much like Brad Pitt.
DeleteTalk about the physics if you want, much more interesting than ad-hominem attacks.
"They think that physics has shown the material world to be a closed system of cause and effect, sealed off from the influence of any non-physical realities --- if any there be."
ReplyDeletePhysics certainly hasn't proved that, and arguably can't, but it's had no reason to evoke the supernatural. Indeed in the last few hundred years the need for the supernatural has steadily decreased to now almost all scientists dismissing that hypothesis baring future evidence.
As to the mind, it's the last human conceit. We've lost our special place in the universe, thanks to modern astronomy, we've lost our special place in creation, thanks to evolution, and now we're losing our special place because of our mind, thanks to neurobiology.
It's becoming increasing clear that just like pumping blood is what the heart does, gas exchange is what the lungs do, the mind is what the brain does.
We may not like this latest revelation, but there's no evidence to the contrary.
As someone who spent many hours in graduate school struggling over the Wigner D-Matrix ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wigner_D-matrix ) and his introduction of Group theory into quantum mechanics, Wigner's later embracing of a universal mind, including his embracing of Hinduism, leads me to think he was not up to his youthful exactitude. That said, if one wishes to embrace that theory and remain Christian, then I would suggest some of the New Thought movements, particularly Christian Science, with it's universal Mind teaching.
ReplyDelete"the mind is what the brain does" I agree. LOL. My cat's have souls if I do. I think they are Unitarians.
ReplyDeleteDogs think their owner is God, cats think they are God. As for gerbils, they're too busy running on that wheel to care.
DeleteClearly you've never cohabited with a large aggressive dog. They are just as likely to consider you a subordinate member of the pack, sorely in need of discipline.
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