ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
redsquirrel said:
That's the fella. He had some micro-membership forum where he and his mates debated. He used to get extremely irate if any of us dared question his pontifications.
The Rational Proof of God's Existence
- Thread starter phildwyer
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That's the fella. He had some micro-membership forum where he and his mates debated. He used to get extremely irate if any of us dared question his pontifications.
MysteryGuest
beyond boring and interesting
I'm all for irrational proofs of god's existence. They certainly liven things up, as long as not too many people get killed. 
That did occur to me too:
http://www.urban75.net/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=3611132&postcount=1701
Don't reckon it's the case though, although politically there are definite similarities.
goldenecitrone
post tenebras lux
I wonder what songs Phil will treat us to at Prod? I just hope it's not fucking Cliff Richard. 
goldenecitrone said:I wonder what songs Phil will treat us to at Prod? I just hope it's not fucking Cliff Richard.
Sizzla, "Bus out a Dis" and Capleton, "Tour." Anyway, I'm a but unsure as to how to proceed with this thread now. I'm on the road, so will have very limited internet access for the next few days. I also fear that this thread has been so comprehensively sullied and polluted by the hypocrites and backbiters that few will venture to read it in its entireity. It also seems that, until I have destroyed the basic empiricist assumptions of our "scientific" friends, we will never be free of their carping, although this manoeuver will naturally take some time. But maybe this is a necessary preliminary to further progress towards God. Let us therefore ponder once again the ideological connections between empirical "science" and market capitalism, the two modes of thought that dominate our world.
Each of them ignores the mediating role of representation. The neoclassical economist denies that financial value is a representation of human labour-power, while the empirical scientist denies that the world of appearances is a representation of substantial forms. Both discourses take the given, the appearance, the world as it is represented to us, for ultimate reality. In fact, this identification of representation with reality is the distinguishing characteristic of postmodern consciousness. For most of history, however, this opinion was considered the apotheosis of idolatry and magic. It achieved respectabilty through the back door, emerging out of the self-justifying ratinalizations of more or less openly demonic magicians.
Yes, the roots of empirical science are indeed to be found in the dusty tomes of the necromancers. Those who are familiar with the works of Dee, Aggrippa, and above all the tradition known as "Faustian Magic" will know that the dubious doctrines of Baconian investigation emerge from attempts to manipulate evil spirits through signification, incantation and ritual. The very term "empirick," used as a noun, was originally co-terminus with "magician." There can be no doubt that today's soi-distant "scientists" are the inheritors of yesterday's black magicians. Their failure to distinguish between appearance and essence, which is the most elementary, the most child-like of philosophical errors, is what, more than anything, has obscured our view of God so comprehensively.
Once I have dealt with the inevitable protests of "science's" advocates, I shall move onto the defintition of "essence," as I was asked to do a few pages back. Or maybe I shall start another thread on How To Destroy Capital. I'm not sure yet. Anyway, I'll be here only for a limited time over the next week or so, so you'll have to wait.
ZWord said:
Excellent post, I agree with almost everything you say here. My argument is that financial value more closely approximates to a "spirit," as conventionally described, than to anything else--and above all that it cannot be called an "idea." I want to point out, however, that I'm not defining *all* spirits as malign, I'm saying that financial value is a malign spirit. As for your final two questions, value clearly does have autonomous agency, though it does not have consciousness: it works through the consciousness of human beings, but it also transcends human consciousness. This is no obstacle to its Satanic nature, however, for Satan must also work through human consciousnsess *insofar as human beings can know him.*
I suppose this is obvious, even tautological. Value is just as independent of the human mind as "Satan," and neither would exist *in a form that could be recognized by human beings* if no human beings existed. Those posters who have objected that value can't be Satan because it depends on the human mind for its existence have simply misunderstood the nature of Satan. Secondly, value is *not* "the cause of its own existence," but neither is Satan--as I have said before, Satan must be conceived as an aspect of God, a messenger angel equal in status to Gabriel or Michael. I don't see that your questions problematize my identification of financial value with the devil.
We're all ears phil, I can't wait for you to single-handedly reverse the last half-millenium of human development with one single succint, cohesive and coherent written argument. In fact with every post this thread gets closer to that masterpiece of similar logic and plot development, stunningly well written, the Da Vinci Code.
slaar said:
You over-estimate the longevity of atheism, a tellingly common error among atheists. You fail to understand just how anomalous atheism is in human history. The first atheist philosophers were d'Holbach and Condillac, who lived a mere two and a half centuries ago, and their ludicrous ideas didn't become common curency for a hundred years after their deaths. You simply equate "human development" with the last two centuries of Western bourgeois ideology. How arrogant is that? Especially when that ideology has *also* facilitated the genocide of three entire continents, the enslavement of the rest of the world, the development of nuclear weapons and the destruction of the environment. Mere coincidence? Or an indication of the triumph of metpahyiscial Evil? You tell me...
phildwyer said:
* cough *
Gautama Buddha
* cough *
So, it's a specifically Christian agenda Phil has here, with the attendant falsification of history... this is just the first counter-example that comes to mind, avoiding a debate about, say, the theology (or not) of the wonderfully-named Chinese school of philosophy Mo Ti and the Mostists...
RubberBuccaneer
Hedd Wyn
laptop said:
Eh? Buddha
Why would Phil be a Christian?
RubberBuccaneer said:
A very well-known atheist. Not a believer in any god.
RubberBuccaneer said:
His argumentation is increasingly showing the fraudulent style of Christian theodicy... attempting to argue how the existence of a good or benevolent God is reconciled with the existence of evil.
Yep, that's why I still suspect that he is on a recruitment mission for some loopy jesus cult.laptop said:
Everything that he argues seems to be premised on the belief that until the renaissance, there was nothing but christianity. In particular he ignores all eastern philosophies and ancient greece and rome.
One could add Epicurus to the list of ancient atheists as well as various others. Roman society, too, for the first few centuries of the empire became largely atheist, at least among the educated classes.
Phil, a question. Are you a member of any religious / spiritual / theist organisations?
Phil, I submit to you:phildwyer said:
- The Western Christian doctrine of Manifest Destiny, which was used to justify the genocide of the Native American nations
- The role of the Catholic church in helping to establish and prop up authoritarian, quasi-fascist regimes all over the world
- Ronald fucking Reagan
- The Isreal-Palestine conflict
- Genesis 1:28 and its usefulness in justifying enviromental destruction
I really don't think you can blame atheism for the worlds problems and to categorise the bourgoisie as exclusively atheist is not only hopelessly wrong, but painfully irrelevant.
I reckon the underlying problem that you've all identified is the sudden switch from facts to values that describes the (IMO non-existent) financial-value-that-is-neither-exchange-or-use-value as malign. Is it intrinsically malign, or is this just an empirical judgement? It seems to me that the argument is either flawed or weak, depending on which of these you choose.
RubberBuccaneer
Hedd Wyn
The Buddha emphasized that he was not a god, he was simply enlightened. He stated: there is no intermediary between mankind and the divine;
According to one of the stories in the Āyācana Sutta (Samyutta Nikaya VI.1), a scripture found in the Pāli and other canons, immediately after his Enlightenment, the Buddha was wondering whether or not he should teach the Dharma. He was concerned that, as human beings were overpowered by greed, hatred and delusion, they would not be able to see the true dharma which was subtle, deep and hard to understand. A spirit, Brahma Sahampati, however, interceded, and asked that he teach the dharma to the world, as "there will be those who will understand the Dharma". With his great compassion, the Buddha agreed to become a teacher.
These are quotes from your Wikipedia link, he may not have been a God but certainly believed in spirits and a divine being. AFAICS not an atheist.
According to one of the stories in the Āyācana Sutta (Samyutta Nikaya VI.1), a scripture found in the Pāli and other canons, immediately after his Enlightenment, the Buddha was wondering whether or not he should teach the Dharma. He was concerned that, as human beings were overpowered by greed, hatred and delusion, they would not be able to see the true dharma which was subtle, deep and hard to understand. A spirit, Brahma Sahampati, however, interceded, and asked that he teach the dharma to the world, as "there will be those who will understand the Dharma". With his great compassion, the Buddha agreed to become a teacher.
These are quotes from your Wikipedia link, he may not have been a God but certainly believed in spirits and a divine being. AFAICS not an atheist.
RubberBuccaneer said:
That's arguable.
As I said, he was merely the first example to come to mind of an atheist (or at least a-theist) philosopher. Epicurus is another, excellent example - but I couldn't remember his name offhand
The point is that Phil is falsifying history for theological ends, and is demonstrated.
IIRC, Epicurus wasn't an atheist as we'd define it, he did accept that deities were a possibility, he just regarded them as irrelevant to human existence. Hence in modern terminology, he was more of a humanist than an atheist.laptop said:Epicurus is another, excellent example - but I couldn't remember his name offhand
But since the age of an idea has absoutely nothing to do with its validity, its all a bit irrelevant
Right.phildwyer said:
So religious ideology had nothing whatsoever to do with the crusades, burning witches and the disenfranchisement of women, the Spanish conquest and pillage of Latin America, colonial endeavours with associated missionaries to Africa. I could go on, but do I really have to join the dots?
As for this. What a ridiculous false dichotomy. I'm coming round to laptop's view of your style of argument / debate / rhetoric.
stdPikachu
Plughole in bathtub curve
phildwyer said:
I also find it odd that your methodology here is entirely hypocritical.
Firstly, if an ideology is as valid as it is old (a ridiculously specious argument at best) then surely the best is barbaric feudalism? And the best religion is Pagan polyheism? Both have been around for a heck of alot longer than any of the stuff you're basing your "argument" on.
Secondly, as pretty much everyone with their head screwed on has already mentioned, religion has been responsible for some of the bloodiest conflicts in known history. The fact that religion, atheism, capitalism, socialism and pretty much every sociopolitical ideology I can think of have been responsible for bloody conflicts would seem to point out that people are the inherent problem.
It also seems to me that you're equating the "evils" of capitalism with the "evils" of atheism, since I seem to interpret your post to mean that western capitalism in wholly responsible for WW1 and 2, the Cold War, etc, in the context of atheist philosohers. Can you explain your reasoning please? Preferably in a way that doesn't involve you doing your token "you're too stupid to understand my perfect brain" riposte.
From my A-level Buddhist text book I have kicking around, one of the things you can be reincarnated is as one of the four great divine kings, "foremost of the planetary dieties" (if you do not long for pleasure for yourself and do not rejoice in possesions). so, he taught that the diety real was one of the realms one can be born into (like animal or human). There is a kinda creation myth, but the universe is not created like in the bible by one perfect being.Fruitloop said:
I don't see how reconciling God with evil will actually proove God to many people. There doesn't seem to be any other coherent kind of proof here. To convince me that spirit exists someone is gonna have to do more than find something which meets part of our definition of it...
Or all statments about an object confirms every other
stdPikachu
Plughole in bathtub curve
Jo/Joe said:
I'll offer better than that; stdPikachu proves that phildwyer's brain occupies a hitherto unknown continuum of space/time.
gurrier said:
No. As I've said many, many times, I regard all organized religion as the Antichrist. And this would be a pretty odd, and highly unsucessful, "recruitment mission," now wouldn't it? Gurrier is clearly incapable of imagining that anyone could believe in God on the basis of their own research and reasoning, and without any ulterior motive. This proves conclusively that he has never even thought about the matter. Anyway, there are lots of interesting points made in the last page. I'm sorry to keep saying I'll get back to them later, but that's the best I can do. I'm off to Amsterdam, where I will be preaching the Doctrines of Dwyerism from the backroom of the Bulldog. Geen problemje.
phildwyer said:
If he is incapable of imagining it, he could think about it all he likes and still hold his current view.
Unless thinking about it is an action which automatically imparts a new cognitive ability upon the thinker?
Is this 'proof' as 'conclusive' as the one the thread title refers to, Phil?
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