Posts by TheUbermensch

1495

An Old Argument.... does it hold water?

by AK - Jeff in

estimates range from 4 million to 15 million children die from starvation each year on this planet.

that's between 500 and 1700 children a day, depending on what numbers you accept.

still, no matter which numbers you use, doesn't this make you arrive at one of the following conclusions?.

TheUbermensch

Well then this argument is totally pointless.

And I'm sorry, I haven't seen you agree with anyone besides your fellow "Peace to you"ers. Can you show me where you have agreed with one non believer on this thread?

44

Absolute knowledge vs. Relativism

by Vidqun in

believing in a god is a leap of faith.

being an atheist is also a leap of faith, and that goes for the evolutionists too.

i believe in absolute truth as found in the bible.

TheUbermensch

I pasted that quote again because I couldn't even believe it, ahahaha

44

Absolute knowledge vs. Relativism

by Vidqun in

believing in a god is a leap of faith.

being an atheist is also a leap of faith, and that goes for the evolutionists too.

i believe in absolute truth as found in the bible.

TheUbermensch

Conversely, [true] knowledge as absolute truth from God is indeed available in this day and age. I find these truths in the Bible. The Bible as a book has greatly influenced Western Civilization (see quote below). If you study the origins of Roman Law, where our modern system of Law comes from, the Bible has made its mark there. Then there is lots of principles in the Bible worth emulating, e.g., Love your neighbour as yourself, etc. I would concede that the Bible text has suffered under a multitude of editors, but enough has remained for us to use.

Yikes. What absolute truth is available? Where do you find these truths in the Bible? The Bible HAS greatly influenced Western Civilization, it's given us the Holy Wars, Crusades, genocides, killing of first born infants, deportation of all that don't believe in the Bible (practiced in Spain under Queen Isabella), the Spanish Inquisition, and the Salem Witch Trials, and many others. Roman Law has hardly, if at all influenced our modern system of Law. John Locke, Jean Jacques Rousseau, and the GREEKS, greatly influenced the Governments of today, as well as Karl Marx (although his ideas were greatly misinterpreted) in the socialist countries. Roman Law was practiced on the Carthaginians though. This is a great example of Roman Law. When they were finished destroying Carthage, they gathered all females (infants, teens, and adults alike), made sure they raped them, then burned the entire city down, killing more than 90% of the citizens, and after that they salted the Earth, a practice by the Romans where they literally poured salt covering every square foot of land in and around the city so that no city could ever prosper on that ground again. That is Roman Law, as well as crucifixions for minor shoplifting and for claiming you are the son of God. Is that the Roman Law you were talking about? Do I go around worshipping Aesop's Fables? Because those stories have much better morals than the actual Bible. For instance Leviticus 20:13, if a man lays with another man as he would with a woman they both should be put to death. Great morals.

Everything is nonsense

--Ludwig Wittgenstein

It's that simple. Absolute truth is never possible. For absolute truth to be possible, EVERYONE in the world must accept it. It can't be YOUR absolute truth, it must be everyone's. Some might say gravity is an absolute truth. Many people in the world don't even know gravity exists, and gravity is invisible, so the truth of gravity can never be known.

You might want to argue about absolute truth and relativism, and that's a perfectly normal philosophical subject to discuss, but don't bring God into it. God will never be known as absolute truth, because truth has yet to be offered concerning God.

Relativism in the dictionary is much different than relativism discussed by the likes of Kant, Hume, Hobbes, and Wittgenstein.

Real relativism is the understanding that morality, ethics, and other subjective ideals are culture, and geographically based, thus our judging of something like female circumcision, an act that most find strange and wrong, is invalid and incorrect, because if we had grown up in the areas where they practice it, we would most likely support it as well.

This you cannot dispute, relativism is the only absolute truth, that everything is relevant.

However this can be applied to God, and belief in God. For instance, the only reason you believe in the Bible is because you were born in America, or Western/parts of Eastern Europe, (and you were indoctrinated as a child). However if you were born in the Middle East, you would be kneeling towards Mecca in about 2 hours.

Conversely, [true] knowledge as absolute truth from God is indeed available in this day and age. I find these truths in the Bible. The Bible as a book has greatly influenced Western Civilization (see quote below). If you study the origins of Roman Law, where our modern system of Law comes from, the Bible has made its mark there. Then there is lots of principles in the Bible worth emulating, e.g., Love your neighbour as yourself, etc. I would concede that the Bible text has suffered under a multitude of editors, but enough has remained for us to use.

1495

An Old Argument.... does it hold water?

by AK - Jeff in

estimates range from 4 million to 15 million children die from starvation each year on this planet.

that's between 500 and 1700 children a day, depending on what numbers you accept.

still, no matter which numbers you use, doesn't this make you arrive at one of the following conclusions?.

TheUbermensch

Okay, since we obviously aren't going anywhere with this, I have one question.

What, if anything, would allow you to question your faith, or perhaps accept ideas proposed by a non believer?

This is aimed towards tec, AGuest, N.Drew, and any other believer.

14

The easy way out

by logical1 in

jw
friends

background on me: mid 20's, raised as jw, never baptised.. .

a month or so ago, some jw's were calling on my street, i missed them at my door, but they had parked in front of my house while they hit up the rest of my block.

while they were at my neighbors door, i thought to myself "what is the easiest non-threatening simple message i could write on a piece of paper that would essentially give them "apostate" information, without them realizing what it was and shutting down?".

TheUbermensch

Wow. I definitely would have said something. You must have some amazing self control.

1495

An Old Argument.... does it hold water?

by AK - Jeff in

estimates range from 4 million to 15 million children die from starvation each year on this planet.

that's between 500 and 1700 children a day, depending on what numbers you accept.

still, no matter which numbers you use, doesn't this make you arrive at one of the following conclusions?.

TheUbermensch

Asking a question about delusion is perfectly normal, is it not to you? Do we not inquire the criminally insane about their crimes? It's a little thing called psychology....

1495

An Old Argument.... does it hold water?

by AK - Jeff in

estimates range from 4 million to 15 million children die from starvation each year on this planet.

that's between 500 and 1700 children a day, depending on what numbers you accept.

still, no matter which numbers you use, doesn't this make you arrive at one of the following conclusions?.

TheUbermensch

Well, N.drew, I would expect a good Christian to be honest about their endeavor to recieve entrance into heaven. If someone gives an honest answer it's pretty obvious that it IS honest. But usually if someone is living in denial it is not likley that they would own up to certain things, it IS likely that they would just deny it so that they win the argument.

31

Just another Music thread . . . Songs about Freedom

by sizemik in

almost everytime i come here i go away with something valuable.. but just occasionally i feel like i've left something behind .

.. ahh well .

i've still got my mind.. that's the worst part really.

TheUbermensch

What about Richie Havens' "Freedom"? The Woodstock performance is absolutely EXCELLENT.

48

How many ex-JW's are musicians on here?

by NoRegrets in

just wondering how many of us on here are musicians, what we play, and if we had witness bands and/or performed.

i have had quite a few funny moments of being in bands that wanted to be cool, but always had to nerf the edginess of any songs we played and watch the noise!

i played with different elders who loved to rock out, but when they played at a congregation party didn't even want to use overdrive of any kind!

TheUbermensch

I play drums, guitar, and bass, and a teeny bit of piano. I started out on bass when I was around 10 after I had given up guitar after attempting to learn a G chord. ahahaha. Then I went back to guitar. Drums were relatively easy to learn how to play after the struggle with guitar and bass. I took piano lessons for about half a year but had to quit because my grandparents went back and forth between Arizona and California, so I couldn't get a ride to piano lessons. But I'm thinking about returning to piano and purchasing a console upright, maybe even a baby grand. I'm one of those people that lamely get inspired by things, so I recently watched The Pianist, and have always wanted to be able to play Chopin, or Debussy. I also really dig jazz drums so I was thinking about taking jazz drum lessons since I just play rock/grunge/punk (relatively easy types) drums. With guitar I enjoy playing stuff like Django Reinhardt, Charlie Byrd, Stray Cats, Nirvana, Beatles, basically jazz, rockabilly/psychobilly, oldies, grunge, punk, and noise rock (i.e. Sonic Youth).

I do think that music liberates the mind, especially in composition or writing lyrics, even poetry. I can imagine when starting to compose a piano concerto one has infinite options concerning the piano, and even more options with the strings/horns that would accompany it. Being that you have this blank canvas, this infinite choice, it instills an idea of absolute freedom.

1495

An Old Argument.... does it hold water?

by AK - Jeff in

estimates range from 4 million to 15 million children die from starvation each year on this planet.

that's between 500 and 1700 children a day, depending on what numbers you accept.

still, no matter which numbers you use, doesn't this make you arrive at one of the following conclusions?.

TheUbermensch

You are right. If only they would listen, then they could write a earth shaking book, not they, but he or she, and it would become one of the millions of books, and how would we, I mean I, know which one it is that would cause me to volunteer in the right place, close to home, because I don't have much money for something else. But, to be fair, Mr. Jeff sir, (can I call you that?), thank you, you need not answer, unless it is (not me is) an irritation, you were not the one who said that genius of a plan, so I shouldn't say, but might sift through all the post, but it being my Sabbath, I probably shouldn't, but I don't want to anyway.

What does this even mean?