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Politics : Should God be replaced? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Solon who wrote (12178)	4/24/2002 9:33:42 PM
From: Frederick Smart	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 28931

The Automoton Man Theory.... >>Kurtz: Do you take the Bible primarily as a human document or do you think it was divinely inspired? Asimov: The Bible is a human document. Much of it is great poetry, and much of it consists of the earliest reasonable history that survives. Samuel I and 2 antedate Herodotus by several centuries. A great deal of the Bible may contain successful ethical teachings, but the rest is at best allegory and at worst myth and legend. Frankly, I don't think that anything is divinely inspired. I think everything that human beings possess of intelligent origin is humanly inspired, with no exceptions.>> What do you expect from a "creator" of science fiction? Isaac is hammering conditional nails for fun. Each nail relegates us to silver screen of the movie theatre. When we unwittingly divorce ourselves from the ONE End then all the particulars lose any and all posibilities for manifesting our Father in Heaven's divine order and glory. We simply fall into the trap of assigning references to any intervening causes to claims we are making to be THE singular End/Cause/Effect that lights up and flashes on the silver screeen. So we learn to play, mimic, mirror and conditionalize our existence in to more relative nonsense and insanity. No wonder mankind's world is insane!! Connect the dots folks!! We are simply "effects" which manifest from ONE End which proceed forth through an infinitely vast number of spiritual causes in our universe. We chose which channel we want to make manifest in our natural-conditional reality as "an effect." To say that nothing mankind receives and shares comes from the divine is like saying we can live without breathing air!! Love is LIFE!! Period. 119192!!

To: Solon who wrote (12178)	4/24/2002 10:32:36 PM
From: briskit	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 28931

I take it the sections in bold type are those of interest to you, or are perhaps counter-points to the positions you understand Christians to hold? There is much to discuss there. I haven't been home long enough to read and digest all this, but much of what Asimov says I would agree with. That there are source documents in the Pentateuch is well-established higher critical results, for instance. But Asimov argues mostly against fundamentalists and literalist creationists, and similar groups, of which I am not a member.

To: Solon who wrote (12178)	4/25/2002 9:37:47 AM
From: briskit	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 28931

Asimov: Yes, and my belief is that no matter how far we go we will always find that the universe makes sense. We will never get to the point where it suddenly stops making sense. But that is just an assumption on my part. I have that same article of faith, and have for years. I don't know if it is true, but I expect it from ethics, religion, politics, social structure, and all of life--that it all fits together in a unified whole that makes sense. I am not saying I make sense of it all the time, but then that would be my problem. Faith must also be ultimately practical and applicable to every situation, because it seems logical that if there is a god, then everything would fit together. I think Polkinghorne believes that much more deeply and sophisticated than I. I definitely am on the outside looking in on the technical and theoretical discussions. I have an old pair of rusty pliers in my tool box of understanding, compared to lasers and high precision instruments others have at their disposal. Still plodding along though.

To: Solon who wrote (12178)	4/28/2002 12:35:41 PM
From: briskit	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 28931

French government forgiveness of traffic tickets causes problems. If you are ethical only because you believe in God, you are buying your ticket to heaven or trying to tear up your ticket to hell. In either case, you are just being a shrewd profiteer, nothing else. The idea of being ethical is to be ethical for no reason except that that is the way to be if you want the world to run smoothly. I think that people who say virtue is its own reward or honesty is the best policy have the right idea I heard something interesting that reminded me of this part of the discussion. Apparently in France since DeGaulle in the '60s the incoming prime minister forgives all traffic tickets. The citizens quickly realized the opportunities this implies, and as a result ignore traffic laws at an increasing rate, in direct relation to the closeness of the election. They park in handicapped places, speed, drive reckless, etc. I don't know that the story is true, but if so it is an interesting response from the descendents of such a distinguished philosophical legacy. You'd think better of them, huh?