1.The reactive emotive response might be capable of inspiring, or creating to some extent the explanation for it, by manipulating our conceptual capacity, which may then only affirm post hoc, and only then, possibly doubt it.
2.Enhanced linguistic/analytic capability, in addition to possibly being solely influenced by increased blood flow to brain, or manipulation of the thalamus, it may also be a sole response to the relaxation caused by THC working outside the CNS.
3.The dreamlike visual experience while high is similar to dream and must involve the same sort of accessing/limiting of the visual experience that is involved in reproducing visual stimuli while dreaming.
4.The moon tonight looks like an expressionist, or Munch painting. It could also be a comic book in the lighting and coloring. The blue of the moon was of a certain softness that seemed to be generally reserved for the appearance of paint or ink.
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Sunday, December 27, 2009
NON-FICTION: Further notes on the Force of Faith
The dominant religions of our world cannot exist apart from continuously reinforced ingorance, fear of the outsiders, condemnation of the world available to us through free enquiry, and pressure to believe, starting at youth.
The majority of people in the world who adhere to Zoroastrianism, Sikhism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity, Islam, and Judaism have been introduced to their faith primarily by the awesome power of their parents.
The parents bring the child it's first role model, hierarchical system, and instructions on how to think. The parents are the witnesses to the validity of faith. They immerse the child in presumptions that need not be independently verified by the child. The child's belief in any nonsense that the parent spouts, such as the tooth fairy or Santa Claus is easily taken for granted by the child. And when the child doubts these presumptions, he or she is inclined to obey the parents admonitions against doubting. And when this doubt is portrayed to the child as fundamentally dangerous, fundamentally bad, and straight up evil, the child will invest great amounts of energy into suppressing this doubt and reworking his or her thinking in order to conform with these doubtful presumptions.
More than just parents are needed, however, to reinforce the suspicious presumptions. The child of a lone nut or cult member must be kept away from other kids in the neighborhood as much as possible, lest the child be corrupted by other views, and led astray by the desire to fit in to his or her peer group. And the child of a Christian living in a Christian neighborhood, or living in a country where Christianity is prevalent, still must be guarded, against the non-Christian elements of society, which tempt the child all it's life. This defense of the child's inculcation into an indefensible world view is not something the parent can do alone. It takes the whole neighborhood. It takes a group effort.
In addition, then to the force of the parents in inculcating faith, we further need the constant reinforcement of the wider group. Uncles, aunts, neighbors, grandparents, teachers and principals need to scare the child away from doubting doubtful assertions of miracles and magic. When the child of strong faith enters into a world where that faith is not taken for granted, it hardly survives. In an environment where assertions of god, battles between gods, resurrection, original sin, the illusory character of the self, contracts between a god and certain ethnic groups, or the communication between god and certain historical figures are generally tolerated, but often looked down upon for their irrationality or dismissal of the need for evidence, there is little hope for the full retention of the faith of one's childhood.
In such situations, the hope of faith lies in fear and incoherence. The parent and other authorities attach a strict fear of punishment, rejection, and hopelessness to the questionable doctrines they force onto children.
When the time comes that the child's reasoning contradicts the myths of his parents and community, the threats against non-believers come into play. You're life will be meaningless, if you sustain thought processes that invalidate your faith. You will be lost, afloat in the universe in a sea of chaos. You will go to hell, where everything you fear will be inflicted upon you ceaselessly. You will be a savage, a non-human, at the mercy of your base desires.
And, for children who reject this intimidation, a personal use may be fashioned out of the anti-definition, anti-verification doctrines of god that have been forced on them.
For these children, the entry into adolescence and adulthood may bring the realization that a positive internal experience of the other can be a source of comfort and power.
When we are alone in ourselves, there is that sense of otherness, perhaps it really is some independent entity, or perhaps it is just the corresponding brain mechanism that allows us to latch onto our parents at birth, or maybe it is some creation inspired by our sociality, or tendency to reach out to others in times of distress, to beg for help from the people available to us. But it is there in me, and I assume that it is there in many people. I have other presences in me too, some I call myself and some I reject. Some are paranoid, petty and violent, and some allow me to conform to a standard of behavior that I believe in.
When we are alone in ourselves, we are never alone. Our selves are a jumble of tendencies and drives and noise and processes. The anomalous nature of the god that we are forbidden from categorizing, defining, analysing, editing, correcting, or facing with cold logic becomes something ever more capable of survival for it's vagueness. And it is in this form that it survives within a great deal of adults, especially those in communities where no particular relgious dogma is enforced by the state, peer-pressure, or the clergy.
If you arm a child with tools of reasoning, evidence, testing, verification, and indepedendence of thought, you need not fear too much that the child will be turned toward Catholicism, Mormonism, or the Moonie cult.
But to go the other way, to arm the child with fear of disbelief in your own particular dogma, to constantly reinforce this fear with the participation of the greater community, and to erase from the child's mind any possibility of other beliefs is the true calling and goal of the fellowship of belief, be it in Saudi Arabia, 14th century Europe, Hindu Nationalist areas in India, the former theocracy of Tibet, the former theocracy of China, the former theocracy of Japan, or the desired theocracy of fundamentalist Christians in the U.S.A.
In the secular forums they speak for equal time, such as in the attempt to combat evolution by theists in my own country. In societies generated by plurality and a belief in the goodness of equality among different peoples, they demand fairness and respect, such as in the case of moderate Muslims during the Danish cartoon incident.
But in their realms, at Jesus Camp, in the countries where Isalmic clergy holds power superior or comparable to the state, and in other contexts where religion dominates, they let go of the secular appeals to respect, fairness, and tolerance. In their own worlds, they are free to ban, to kill heretics, to burn books, smash cd's, intimidate their children, subjugate woman, subjugate the poor, punish the victim, and generally deny the tenets of toleration, reason, discussion, evidence, and doubt.
After hundreds of years in Western Civilization of certain factions and camps fighting for ever greater inclusiveness, fairness, and better living for an ever greater portion of society, these Faithful, once again, are reacting against freedom and tolerance.
They fight against the system by appealing to the rules they spit upon. Christians who deny evidence, deny even the possibility of testing their central beliefs, argue for open-minded science, and embracing a plurality of beliefs. Their open mindedness extends only to those of their theories that have been rejected by scientists, and their plurality extends to and ends with their singular view of the world and our place in it. They fight against free speech by utilizing their rights to protest and publish. Muslims in Britain protest against the system that refuses to condemn them for their beliefs, and they do so in the hopes that they can spread Islam throughout the world, silencing and eliminating secular government and the reviled embrace of pluralism.
All this they call faith. There is no major, peace loving, fellow-human loving, beuatiful paen to humanity type of Faith around today that was not spread by force, by the threat of death, or some other punishment.
And when idiots promote their religion by appealing to the prevalence of religion, they are also endorsing the continued coercing of children into belief that is the endeavor of many of their co-religionists and a vital issue in their theology.
It is only in the modern times of rejection of religion that they embrace toleration of other religions. It is only because we skeptics, we heretics, we godless killjoys have had so much influence that religious leaders tentatively accept a society where our rights are protected. But, for the most part, those leaders only accept this secular society insofar as it serves the end of spreading their own dogma. For the dominance of the dogma is the general aim of religious leaders. Not a simple recognition of rights and practices, regardless of personal belief, but obedience to their chosen dogmas. Just as they were coerced into belief, so must others be coerced into the true belief, either by attacking evolution, democracy, and rational thought, or by attacking the people that don't agree with them, such as non-Muslisms, non-Christians,communists, abortion doctors, apostates, and, of course, the gays.
There will always be plenty of people ready to accept their own beliefs as something that others need not accept. There will always be people who prefer good social ties and equitable relationships over adherence to unprovable dogma. But these people don't get to be religous leaders very often, and if they do happen to attain influence, like Marting Luther King, they are slandered and reviled as untrue to their faith.
The religous leaders that hold out, espeicially when simply keeping one's religion to oneself is so banal, are the ones who have a fight, who stand out against the general society in their nonsensical intepretations of their religion (usually they claim to need no interpretation, which is impossible.)
These are the people that threaten our freedom, the progress of our civilizations, and the enjoyment of our lives.
Faith, one of the most revered artifacts of humanity, is nothing more than repetition of dogma backed by the towering authority of the parent, the threat of exclusion from one's community, the threat of physical harm, the internal threat of betraying the only truth one feels validated in accepting, and the kings and armies of history.
The reverence for faith is a reverence misunderstood and obfuscated by those who profess it. It is a feeling of obedience and loyalty made into a faculty in it's own right, that no one can find and that no one ought even to look for.
The majority of people in the world who adhere to Zoroastrianism, Sikhism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity, Islam, and Judaism have been introduced to their faith primarily by the awesome power of their parents.
The parents bring the child it's first role model, hierarchical system, and instructions on how to think. The parents are the witnesses to the validity of faith. They immerse the child in presumptions that need not be independently verified by the child. The child's belief in any nonsense that the parent spouts, such as the tooth fairy or Santa Claus is easily taken for granted by the child. And when the child doubts these presumptions, he or she is inclined to obey the parents admonitions against doubting. And when this doubt is portrayed to the child as fundamentally dangerous, fundamentally bad, and straight up evil, the child will invest great amounts of energy into suppressing this doubt and reworking his or her thinking in order to conform with these doubtful presumptions.
More than just parents are needed, however, to reinforce the suspicious presumptions. The child of a lone nut or cult member must be kept away from other kids in the neighborhood as much as possible, lest the child be corrupted by other views, and led astray by the desire to fit in to his or her peer group. And the child of a Christian living in a Christian neighborhood, or living in a country where Christianity is prevalent, still must be guarded, against the non-Christian elements of society, which tempt the child all it's life. This defense of the child's inculcation into an indefensible world view is not something the parent can do alone. It takes the whole neighborhood. It takes a group effort.
In addition, then to the force of the parents in inculcating faith, we further need the constant reinforcement of the wider group. Uncles, aunts, neighbors, grandparents, teachers and principals need to scare the child away from doubting doubtful assertions of miracles and magic. When the child of strong faith enters into a world where that faith is not taken for granted, it hardly survives. In an environment where assertions of god, battles between gods, resurrection, original sin, the illusory character of the self, contracts between a god and certain ethnic groups, or the communication between god and certain historical figures are generally tolerated, but often looked down upon for their irrationality or dismissal of the need for evidence, there is little hope for the full retention of the faith of one's childhood.
In such situations, the hope of faith lies in fear and incoherence. The parent and other authorities attach a strict fear of punishment, rejection, and hopelessness to the questionable doctrines they force onto children.
When the time comes that the child's reasoning contradicts the myths of his parents and community, the threats against non-believers come into play. You're life will be meaningless, if you sustain thought processes that invalidate your faith. You will be lost, afloat in the universe in a sea of chaos. You will go to hell, where everything you fear will be inflicted upon you ceaselessly. You will be a savage, a non-human, at the mercy of your base desires.
And, for children who reject this intimidation, a personal use may be fashioned out of the anti-definition, anti-verification doctrines of god that have been forced on them.
For these children, the entry into adolescence and adulthood may bring the realization that a positive internal experience of the other can be a source of comfort and power.
When we are alone in ourselves, there is that sense of otherness, perhaps it really is some independent entity, or perhaps it is just the corresponding brain mechanism that allows us to latch onto our parents at birth, or maybe it is some creation inspired by our sociality, or tendency to reach out to others in times of distress, to beg for help from the people available to us. But it is there in me, and I assume that it is there in many people. I have other presences in me too, some I call myself and some I reject. Some are paranoid, petty and violent, and some allow me to conform to a standard of behavior that I believe in.
When we are alone in ourselves, we are never alone. Our selves are a jumble of tendencies and drives and noise and processes. The anomalous nature of the god that we are forbidden from categorizing, defining, analysing, editing, correcting, or facing with cold logic becomes something ever more capable of survival for it's vagueness. And it is in this form that it survives within a great deal of adults, especially those in communities where no particular relgious dogma is enforced by the state, peer-pressure, or the clergy.
If you arm a child with tools of reasoning, evidence, testing, verification, and indepedendence of thought, you need not fear too much that the child will be turned toward Catholicism, Mormonism, or the Moonie cult.
But to go the other way, to arm the child with fear of disbelief in your own particular dogma, to constantly reinforce this fear with the participation of the greater community, and to erase from the child's mind any possibility of other beliefs is the true calling and goal of the fellowship of belief, be it in Saudi Arabia, 14th century Europe, Hindu Nationalist areas in India, the former theocracy of Tibet, the former theocracy of China, the former theocracy of Japan, or the desired theocracy of fundamentalist Christians in the U.S.A.
In the secular forums they speak for equal time, such as in the attempt to combat evolution by theists in my own country. In societies generated by plurality and a belief in the goodness of equality among different peoples, they demand fairness and respect, such as in the case of moderate Muslims during the Danish cartoon incident.
But in their realms, at Jesus Camp, in the countries where Isalmic clergy holds power superior or comparable to the state, and in other contexts where religion dominates, they let go of the secular appeals to respect, fairness, and tolerance. In their own worlds, they are free to ban, to kill heretics, to burn books, smash cd's, intimidate their children, subjugate woman, subjugate the poor, punish the victim, and generally deny the tenets of toleration, reason, discussion, evidence, and doubt.
After hundreds of years in Western Civilization of certain factions and camps fighting for ever greater inclusiveness, fairness, and better living for an ever greater portion of society, these Faithful, once again, are reacting against freedom and tolerance.
They fight against the system by appealing to the rules they spit upon. Christians who deny evidence, deny even the possibility of testing their central beliefs, argue for open-minded science, and embracing a plurality of beliefs. Their open mindedness extends only to those of their theories that have been rejected by scientists, and their plurality extends to and ends with their singular view of the world and our place in it. They fight against free speech by utilizing their rights to protest and publish. Muslims in Britain protest against the system that refuses to condemn them for their beliefs, and they do so in the hopes that they can spread Islam throughout the world, silencing and eliminating secular government and the reviled embrace of pluralism.
All this they call faith. There is no major, peace loving, fellow-human loving, beuatiful paen to humanity type of Faith around today that was not spread by force, by the threat of death, or some other punishment.
And when idiots promote their religion by appealing to the prevalence of religion, they are also endorsing the continued coercing of children into belief that is the endeavor of many of their co-religionists and a vital issue in their theology.
It is only in the modern times of rejection of religion that they embrace toleration of other religions. It is only because we skeptics, we heretics, we godless killjoys have had so much influence that religious leaders tentatively accept a society where our rights are protected. But, for the most part, those leaders only accept this secular society insofar as it serves the end of spreading their own dogma. For the dominance of the dogma is the general aim of religious leaders. Not a simple recognition of rights and practices, regardless of personal belief, but obedience to their chosen dogmas. Just as they were coerced into belief, so must others be coerced into the true belief, either by attacking evolution, democracy, and rational thought, or by attacking the people that don't agree with them, such as non-Muslisms, non-Christians,communists, abortion doctors, apostates, and, of course, the gays.
There will always be plenty of people ready to accept their own beliefs as something that others need not accept. There will always be people who prefer good social ties and equitable relationships over adherence to unprovable dogma. But these people don't get to be religous leaders very often, and if they do happen to attain influence, like Marting Luther King, they are slandered and reviled as untrue to their faith.
The religous leaders that hold out, espeicially when simply keeping one's religion to oneself is so banal, are the ones who have a fight, who stand out against the general society in their nonsensical intepretations of their religion (usually they claim to need no interpretation, which is impossible.)
These are the people that threaten our freedom, the progress of our civilizations, and the enjoyment of our lives.
Faith, one of the most revered artifacts of humanity, is nothing more than repetition of dogma backed by the towering authority of the parent, the threat of exclusion from one's community, the threat of physical harm, the internal threat of betraying the only truth one feels validated in accepting, and the kings and armies of history.
The reverence for faith is a reverence misunderstood and obfuscated by those who profess it. It is a feeling of obedience and loyalty made into a faculty in it's own right, that no one can find and that no one ought even to look for.
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
NON-FICTION: View of my recent self
美术历史 Art History
I really excelled in this class, in just the way I really want to. In just the way that can validate my sense of myself and my aspirations in writing and learning.
Significant aspects of success were a responsive, enthusiastic teacher who believed in what she was teaching, the emphasis on attribution of theoretical category as the main subject of the class, and my pre-existing familiarity with the history of western painting, western aesthetics, aesthetic theory, and western history in general.
The fact that so much of the motivation was antagonistic and rebellious helped to give me a structure within which to fill out the descriptions.
If only ever class was like this. I didn’t have to worry about learning anything for the most part. I just listened, and read, and thought. Everything was easily absorbed.
人类体格学 Phys. Anthropology
Son of a bitch. Here my creativity and serious treatment of the subject was useless, and perhaps worked slightly against me, either by encouraging a reaction against my arrogance or expecting more based on my writing syle.
That bastard was perfectly reasonable within the confines of his narrow mechanistic approach.
I didn’t study much or really give the time necessary to fully understand every thing he wanted us to memorize.
It brings to mind again the issue of submission as the key to success. My struggle with my fierce independence and the demands of being a student. 恶性死我
My sincere contemplation of the material was insufficient in demonstrating a familiarity and comprehension of the subject matter.
Any son of a bitch that faults for not explaining nature nurture or any other petty distinctions deserves the contempt of the angel as well as the gate keepers of hell.
Any fool that would read my writing and presume ignorance of things I deem insufficient in terms of explanatory power, and ignore the superiority of the explanations offered, or ignore the debate which they imply, or ignore the attempt to replace the check list data which shows an implicit understanding of that same data, grants to that fool the prize of god’s contempt, and the contemptuous smirk of little baby jesus.
My rhetoric was insufficient in dissuading this evil dictatorial banal student!!! from leaving me with at least a C.
Once decided, the grade is worthy only of defense, with the smug indifference of authority, and a single minded devotion to righteousness, lest the typical, unavoidable ambiguity in student assessment be revealed.
This cruel, cruel man required me to jump into a straight jacket, into a check list.
This is check listing, reducing education to list of things to be checked off.
中文Chinese
This was the easiest and most tearing. I didn’t devote enough time, particularly early on. So I felt embarrassed and guilty about the teacher. I felt like I half assed it too much and didn’t give her the courtesy of trying enough.
The class was full of half assers. Bunch of high school kids who thought there limp tongued, broken Mandarin needed no adjustment. Their cultural identity, mostly separate now from China
Again, I feel indebted to the teacher, she was kind and engaging.
人类体格学。lab Phsy Anthropolgy -lab
I forgive you Padua
I learned everything, I got everything. But I still will wind up with a D. It hurts and hurts and hurts.
At least twice in that class I just wanted to put my head down and cry.
All the information would have been great if presented in a series of Sunday visits, free, ungraded lecture/activities, or lessons given for anything other than short term memory retention.
My time issues played a role. I came to class on the day the class project was due with no awareness that it was due, and no awareness that I should have gone to the zoo, at least, in the previous week. That’s when I really wanted to cry.
孩子发展 Child Development, Early Childhood Education
I think that in this class, I missed out on the largest amount of useful information. I’d like to purchase the book, which I might then never look at. The stuff on different types of preschools, elementary schools was the most useful. There was stuff on head start and first five, that I’m working in now.
With this class, I can’t tell how the teacher was grading. I got a’s on all the assignments. I didn’t do the last exam, because of time issues, the opinion that I couldn’t do it anyways without the book, the sense that I already had enough points to get an a or a b, and the sense that maybe since I had already contacted the teacher in a cordial manner about resetting the exam for me (since my browser had closed before I could finish/half ass it), that maybe she would think I made a mistake and take pity on me.
I did make a mistake. I accidentally closed the tab. That’s when I gave up, rather than emaling her again. That’s when I came up with the idea that maybe she would assume I didn’t know that I had done that and give me a second chance after the day it was due.
This class allowed to reflect a lot on my own teaching, and prepare for what it will be like when I go back to teaching.
It made me realize that I’ve been using a lot of modern, progressive methods in teaching, and that, perhaps, learning the terminology and categories of teaching that are used in modern pedagogy, I can categorize and organize my own teaching.
弟弟
I want to finish going over the script and rewrite a portion for him.
This is one of those things where my thinking is that this is a chance to make rogress in my career as a writer, but the perspective that has his thought is a spectator, watching from the future, condemning my hesitance to embrace this opportunity, it tells me that this is what I want, what will help me, which is a lifeline in the monsoon.
哥哥
该咋说? I just want to find a way to interact with him, show him I care, without risking the eruption of his resentment or my defense against that resentment. At this point, he won’t accept concessions, but there might be something short of a full admission that can satisfy him.
I want to bring him some gifts for Christmas and his birthday. Maybe something like a cd, dvd, external memory. gift card, clothing, cologne…
老婆
If I can just keep her from leaving, or keep from leaving her, until I get my writing career (reflexive shame) going, than things will be okay, or what? Things will be stable? No. Things will be sturdy. Or at least I feel she won’t leave me, or she won’t feel so much despair, or at least not so very much, or slightly less.
I just want to be good to her, but there’s some things I don’t want to do, some things I feel like I can’t do. I don’t think I could just go out and get a job at starbucks on the weekend. I don’t know why I can’t resists feeling bad about that, feeling wrong.
海哥
Just emailed me to make sure I could go, and offred to loan me money, said it he hoped was a money issue, and not an emma issue.
我们还有一些矛盾， 他的几句话让我不开心。 有机会我要跟他白白地谈.
读书俱乐部 Book Club
Need to make emma feel both okay that she’s not into it and encourage her in a way that acknowledges her minimal interest.
My next choice, would be nice if it could be my finished Drama of the Christian Science Teachers.
啊根体那 Argentina
Go to the bookstores, buy some Yum Yum booksYum Yum. See the city, have resentful fantasizes about ditching emma and not coming back.
出版书 publish books
Revise beast resigns, and finish Christian scienc teachers (good title) check price of ucla bookfair booth
多写 Write more
Take writing classes (I am) and see every opportunity to write as an opportunity to show your skill.
Try to gain more clarity and acceptance of your situation and feelings. See without thoughts, meditate, pray..
叔叔
Wait till the opportunity comes to email/call, or till he contacts. Think over his possible motivations/disposition, or just stop worrying about them and just pay attention to him when you see him.
下学期的伸河课程 Next semesters rio hondo classes
Buy the textbooks in advance, circle, highlight, study all the key words, categories, chapters, people.
什么书想读 What books do I want to read?
Simple and direct, the spiritual in art, zizek/Trotsky, wenyanduben, mala ondo, years of salt rice-chinese, sciabarras hayek/marx, Chinese history, linguistics, neuroscience text.
Psych-situation
心理情狂
Feel sad, and feel like emma won’t let me feel happy, like I can’t feel happy without her consent that things are okay, or acceptable, or tolerable. Don’t feel in control of my life, like a slightly removed spectator, because, probably, that’s the area of my brain summarizing the day to day to action to action part.
进大学 Getting into university
Guess it will be okay, not be able to go if accepted because of money, might not be able to go unless I get student loans.
大学课程Unversity classes
OBEY!!!!! SUBMIT!!!! Doesn’t sound like anything too hard. I think I can do it with minimal submission.
钱，多上班。。。Money, work more...
I can take more classes in the next few days, before I leave, I can work every day. I can also work continuously until/if I can start classes at whittier
思想／理论的话题 Thinking/Theoretical topics
Origins of the brain,
Revolution as a evolutionary-hominid structure, academia, the revolution-party as dominance hierarchy, the dominant trend in scientific interpretations/humanities: biological mechanism, reintrepting everything as impulse-control again, falling back to reactionary morals sometimes, and, of course, providing powerful new ways of knowing the world and our connectedness too it.
The contstructive political endeavor.
The fight against faith
Being a thinker like zizek (gets to say whatever interesting stuff he thinks about, doesn’t stick to topic.)
The way to see Trotsky.
The problem of inherent class resistance to transcending capitalism.
Monday, December 7, 2009
NON-FICTION: Get to the freaking point: Theism/Atheism, Factual Assertions=True/False
How many pathetic centuries of obfuscation have been wasted avoiding this simple truth. A claim has to be defended, proven, doubted, explained, to be judged either true or false or possible.
The millions of theists, particularly those of the intellectual class, who obfuscate the issue of trust and belief by using a Latinate term, faith, are both unwilling and disinterested in clarifying the issue.
Faith, they say is a higher faculty, or "That's why they call it faith." As if the assertion can avoid any process of logic by it's common acceptance, as if the atheist could be cowed by ad populum (an argument that is said to be true because a lot of people believe it).
And, in fact, that is where faith really comes from, not from the appeal to the authority of the people, but rather to the appeal of some people: Those in Charge.
It use to be the case that there was a group of True Christians who hunted out the many heresies. There was noone to stomp out heresy with a police force or armies, so there were many groups with different Christianities. They listed and condemned the men and woman who deviated from their views.
But, for them, this was a matter of arguments about the state of the world. There was no controversy between science, because they believed the gods were forces that intervened in their world. God was something real, and He kept the world going and punished the people who messed around with him.
But when did Christianity spread? When it became the main authority. The western Roman Empire became the Catholic Church and that's when it became mandatory to believe in god. That's when the repression, the torture, the exploitation, and the wiping out of various cultures took the name of salvation rather than mere conquering.
And it is that same authority that confronts us to today.
Christianity was spread by the impulse to empire, the impulse to conquer. Islam was spread in this way as well. King Ashoka spread buddhism througout the Indian subcontinent and the nearby regions. The Tang emperor adapted it for China, and enforced it on the masses, and the Tibetan rulers adopted it in Tibet.
That is where faith gets it's authority from.
When the Christians, theists, and atheists denounce the strident, arrogant new atheists, like Dawkins and Hitchens, what they really mean is that anyone who could so assuredly and bluntly reject theism, must be arrogant.
But what does that presuppose? That there is something to be humble about. A topic to be humble before.
And just as the ancient Jewish god was akin to the despots of early Egypt or near eastern civilizations, so too is the faith that they refuse to question, and use as a refusal to question anything but why you don't agree with them, so too is this faith a loyalty to belief, a belief that they must believe.
This faith is the faith of the totalitarian state. It says "We shall do whatever it takes to get you to submit, for everyone must submit. And we shall never give up our loyalty to these ideas and lords, for to do so would be do to commit evil."
When you are confronted by the imperative to believe, which has to be reinforced constantly, remember that this is now embedded in our cultures because at one time it was picked up by an army, and made into the state ideology.
The only thing you ever need to do with a factual assertion, like "Jesus was killed and came back to life.", or "David didn't burn in the flames." is discuss whether or not it is true, why it might be true, and what would have to confirm or deny it.
If you say it must be assessed by faith, then you are saying it must be assessed by the second thing that faith refers: inner states of feeling. Assessing a claim by using faith means seeing what you feel about it.
But, between people, feelings must be explained and justified when they contradict.
But Christians don't do that. They say they you've got to have faith, which means they intentionally trust a set of ideas, and commit themselves to changing the mind of everyone, everywhere, while believing that to change their own minds would be a sin, or unholy, and, therefore, unthinkable.
If you say Jesus did something, that is an assertion on your part. If you wan't me to believe, than let's talk about it with the awareness that it might be true, and it might be nonsense, and both of us are completely to change our mights without negative consequences.
If, instead you fall back on faith, and recommend it to me, that what this means, is you are falling back on trust of certain ideas, and you seek to convince me to trust these ideas by telling me to trust.
Look at the following example:
A.Every piece of evidence I have and you have doesn't make the possibility of god very likely.
B. Evidence. Huh huh huh. That's why they call it faith.
And, since faith means a feeling of trust, despite what the apologists and deep thinkers want to maintain, this statement is equal to: I don't have enough evidence to believie in god? That's why they call it belief! Cause you have to blieive it.
And what we end up is with something the person can't understand because they believe it is something that cannot be understood.
And to you the idiot stupid enough to expect things we believe to understandable and subject to confirmation or denial, there is nothing that can be done except to tell you that there is no understanding to be had, only acceptance.
Relgion has been eaten away and replaced to such a great extent in our world, that the modern exponents of religion have no idea that they have inherited a past set of technologies, claims about reality, explanations of weather and illness, and explanations of government.
The millions of theists, particularly those of the intellectual class, who obfuscate the issue of trust and belief by using a Latinate term, faith, are both unwilling and disinterested in clarifying the issue.
Faith, they say is a higher faculty, or "That's why they call it faith." As if the assertion can avoid any process of logic by it's common acceptance, as if the atheist could be cowed by ad populum (an argument that is said to be true because a lot of people believe it).
And, in fact, that is where faith really comes from, not from the appeal to the authority of the people, but rather to the appeal of some people: Those in Charge.
It use to be the case that there was a group of True Christians who hunted out the many heresies. There was noone to stomp out heresy with a police force or armies, so there were many groups with different Christianities. They listed and condemned the men and woman who deviated from their views.
But, for them, this was a matter of arguments about the state of the world. There was no controversy between science, because they believed the gods were forces that intervened in their world. God was something real, and He kept the world going and punished the people who messed around with him.
But when did Christianity spread? When it became the main authority. The western Roman Empire became the Catholic Church and that's when it became mandatory to believe in god. That's when the repression, the torture, the exploitation, and the wiping out of various cultures took the name of salvation rather than mere conquering.
And it is that same authority that confronts us to today.
Christianity was spread by the impulse to empire, the impulse to conquer. Islam was spread in this way as well. King Ashoka spread buddhism througout the Indian subcontinent and the nearby regions. The Tang emperor adapted it for China, and enforced it on the masses, and the Tibetan rulers adopted it in Tibet.
That is where faith gets it's authority from.
When the Christians, theists, and atheists denounce the strident, arrogant new atheists, like Dawkins and Hitchens, what they really mean is that anyone who could so assuredly and bluntly reject theism, must be arrogant.
But what does that presuppose? That there is something to be humble about. A topic to be humble before.
And just as the ancient Jewish god was akin to the despots of early Egypt or near eastern civilizations, so too is the faith that they refuse to question, and use as a refusal to question anything but why you don't agree with them, so too is this faith a loyalty to belief, a belief that they must believe.
This faith is the faith of the totalitarian state. It says "We shall do whatever it takes to get you to submit, for everyone must submit. And we shall never give up our loyalty to these ideas and lords, for to do so would be do to commit evil."
When you are confronted by the imperative to believe, which has to be reinforced constantly, remember that this is now embedded in our cultures because at one time it was picked up by an army, and made into the state ideology.
The only thing you ever need to do with a factual assertion, like "Jesus was killed and came back to life.", or "David didn't burn in the flames." is discuss whether or not it is true, why it might be true, and what would have to confirm or deny it.
If you say it must be assessed by faith, then you are saying it must be assessed by the second thing that faith refers: inner states of feeling. Assessing a claim by using faith means seeing what you feel about it.
But, between people, feelings must be explained and justified when they contradict.
But Christians don't do that. They say they you've got to have faith, which means they intentionally trust a set of ideas, and commit themselves to changing the mind of everyone, everywhere, while believing that to change their own minds would be a sin, or unholy, and, therefore, unthinkable.
If you say Jesus did something, that is an assertion on your part. If you wan't me to believe, than let's talk about it with the awareness that it might be true, and it might be nonsense, and both of us are completely to change our mights without negative consequences.
If, instead you fall back on faith, and recommend it to me, that what this means, is you are falling back on trust of certain ideas, and you seek to convince me to trust these ideas by telling me to trust.
Look at the following example:
A.Every piece of evidence I have and you have doesn't make the possibility of god very likely.
B. Evidence. Huh huh huh. That's why they call it faith.
And, since faith means a feeling of trust, despite what the apologists and deep thinkers want to maintain, this statement is equal to: I don't have enough evidence to believie in god? That's why they call it belief! Cause you have to blieive it.
And what we end up is with something the person can't understand because they believe it is something that cannot be understood.
And to you the idiot stupid enough to expect things we believe to understandable and subject to confirmation or denial, there is nothing that can be done except to tell you that there is no understanding to be had, only acceptance.
Relgion has been eaten away and replaced to such a great extent in our world, that the modern exponents of religion have no idea that they have inherited a past set of technologies, claims about reality, explanations of weather and illness, and explanations of government.
Friday, December 4, 2009
中国会不会安排一个避免资本的未来。
伟大的领导都告诉我们他们还没有抛弃社会主义。 这种说法， 在海外没有任何人相信。 各种社会主义者， 共产主义者， 和无政府主义者都认为国际资本已经侵略了中国。 这样的人都认为邓小平已经把中国的共产时代推翻了。
世界上其他马克思主义者和反对资本人也都这样人围。 另外，世界上反对社会主义和支持资本主义者都认为中国政府还是个红色的中国， 还是反对自由。
这么多人觉得中国政府是个邪恶的政府， 那怎么同事也有这么多觉得中国是世界下一个超级大国家， 像以前苏联，八十年代的日本， 或现在的美国。
为什么中国政府不能受到支持分子的赞美呢。 就是因为世界打多数只是分子都没有适合的方式能够说明现实政治体系。
特别是在美国。 对一办政治家和主流只是分子都只有三种经济：社会主义，资本主义， 与混合主义， 与两种政府：民主的政府和专政的政府。
但是最大的问题都是每一国家的政府与大部分的人民都没有想他们的国家会有什么样的未来。
除了发财，挑战和长大， 国家都没有实际的未来计划。
世界各国都往哪儿开？
世界上其他马克思主义者和反对资本人也都这样人围。 另外，世界上反对社会主义和支持资本主义者都认为中国政府还是个红色的中国， 还是反对自由。
这么多人觉得中国政府是个邪恶的政府， 那怎么同事也有这么多觉得中国是世界下一个超级大国家， 像以前苏联，八十年代的日本， 或现在的美国。
为什么中国政府不能受到支持分子的赞美呢。 就是因为世界打多数只是分子都没有适合的方式能够说明现实政治体系。
特别是在美国。 对一办政治家和主流只是分子都只有三种经济：社会主义，资本主义， 与混合主义， 与两种政府：民主的政府和专政的政府。
但是最大的问题都是每一国家的政府与大部分的人民都没有想他们的国家会有什么样的未来。
除了发财，挑战和长大， 国家都没有实际的未来计划。
世界各国都往哪儿开？
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