Christianity

[promethean75]

I'm going with swami D, Nick. He said God doesn't expect or care anything about receiving devotion and actually digs atheists becuz they challenge people and stuff.

[Immanuel Can]

If I don't find Christ, it's not because He doesn't exist, it's because I really did not seek Him with all my heart.

Right. For two reasons: one, others do find Him, and two, that's what He promised.

You can choose to believe Him, or not. But if you've never put in the kind of serious search it takes, and never really given it much more than dismissive thought, then don't expect much. Nobody ever finds him that way.

Is this confirmation...

Talk about going in circles. Read again. If you can't believe the words you read, I can't help you.

Okay, note for me articles in Philosophy Now magazine that do speak of Christianity as you do...by relying almost exclusively on The Word.

Oh, I dont' know of any there. But then, that's not what you asked me for: check back, and see. You asked for "articles," not just "PN articles."

I know of tons of academic articles, and tons of apologetical articles, and tons of other kinds of books. But I'm not saying that's the way PN magazine usually does things. PN's more likely to use a mix: some quotation, but some other sources, and some personal analysis as well. That's what makes it a popular-level publication: it's not totally technical or high-academic, and stays accessible to the ordinary person. It's for the lay philosopher, if such there be; and that's its great strength, really. But it's not the only way of doing things, nor even the most intellectually rigorous.

PN is a great publication: but it's not the ultimate model for philosophy, and wisely doesn't try to be. If you mistook it for that, I suspect you've never actually read it.

[Immanuel Can]

If we don't know what "proportional" entails, we are left unable to say when anything is "proportional."

Here's all we need to know about proportionality: infinitude can never be proportionate with finitude - by definition.

Which property are you now calling "finite"? Let's see if they're "proportional," or what your "finite" quality might be "proportional" to.

P.S. -- I have to say, it's very funny to see a person try to close the question, pretend it's done, declare unilaterally and contrary to fact a "win," and "run away with his ball and go home," so to speak. It's not the kind of gesture I've seen in many, many years. But okay. I understand where that impulse is coming from. I know what it signals.

[Harry Baird]

The question is closed, Mr Can, despite your sophistical attempts to lever it open.

[Age]

NO one has the ABILITY to REFUTE what I SAY and CLAIM ALSO, and this is BECAUSE of WHERE this KNOWING comes from EXACTLY.

From whence arrives this KNOWING?

From within the deepest center of EVERY 'thing', or from what is also sometimes known as from 'the heart', which is where thee One and ONLY, (ALWAYS OPEN KNOWING) Mind exists.

KNOWING is ALWAYS HERE in thee (Truly OPEN) Mind.

[Nick_A]

I'm going with swami D, Nick. He said God doesn't expect or care anything about receiving devotion and actually digs atheists becuz they challenge people and stuff.

You must be referring to Christendom. Christianity doesn't have a personal God. The essence and value of Christianity lies in the Cross. But as we have seen, it isn't wanted by the world.

[Immanuel Can]

The question is closed, Mr Can, despite your sophistical attempts to lever it open.

That's not "the question." It might be "your mind," though. We'll see.

The problems remain. Let's summarize:

• Harry has provided no justification for "justice" on the basis of his own worldview.

• Harry seems oblivious to the realization that Harry Baird's definition isn't everybody else's.

• Harry shows no awareness at all of cultural differences in "justice," even within his own culture, let alone worldwide.

• We've still not been given any criteria for detecting "proportionality."

• Harry can't identify the two elements he wants us to agree are "proportional" to each other.

• Knowing what Harry would need to know, in order to warrant the conclusion he wants, would actually require Harry to be omniscient. We might have residual doubts about that.

So you can close the discussion, for sure. Nobody can make you talk. But "the question" itself? It's obviously still wide open, for all of the above reasons.

[Immanuel Can]

Christianity doesn't have a personal God.

Yep, it certainly does. In fact, if it doesn't, you can be quite sure it's not "Christ-ianity."

[Alexis Jacobi]

So you can close the discussion, for sure.

You were never in the discussion.

It is not that he closed it — you have never answered any of the crucial questions posed.

Sez Droopy:

“You know what? That makes me very angry!”

[Immanuel Can]

you have never answered any of the crucial questions posed.

LIke what?

[Walker]

NO one has the ABILITY to REFUTE what I SAY and CLAIM ALSO, and this is BECAUSE of WHERE this KNOWING comes from EXACTLY.

From whence arrives this KNOWING?

From within the deepest center of EVERY 'thing', or from what is also sometimes known as from 'the heart', which is where thee One and ONLY, (ALWAYS OPEN KNOWING) Mind exists.

KNOWING is ALWAYS HERE in thee (Truly OPEN) Mind.

Age, what exactly do you mean by heart?
Are you referring to the physical organ?

[Alexis Jacobi]

you have never answered any of the crucial questions posed.

LIke what?

Don’t fuck with me, Immanuel.

[Harry Baird]

you have never answered any of the crucial questions posed.

LIke what?

Don’t fuck with me, Immanuel.

Those are pretty much my sentiments too.

[Immanuel Can]

you have never answered any of the crucial questions posed.

LIke what?

Don’t fuck with me, Immanuel.

No, really. What "crucial questions posed" have I not answered? Be specific.

Look, I get it. Keeping things "helicopter height," flying over the landscape, leaving everything in fuzzy focus is attractive. It allows one to make gross generalizations that look plausible...at least to minds also flying at helicopter height. People who are thinking weakly support us, agree, pat us on the back, and we move on -- because that's what we wanted: affirmation. We were never really looking for truth, but rather for a position from which we could be reassured, and could continue to be as we are.

When somebody came along and said "be specific," he immediately looked like our enemy. How dare he call us down from helicopter height, where we have all we need, and make us work and move on the ground level, where generalizations are so much harder to see and sustain? Worse still, he will deprive us of our affirmation, our agreeable (if-superficial) public, and make us rethink things we've used the helicopter position to close. How could he be so rude?

And yet, if what we were on were a search for the truth, instead of a the search for affirmation, then we'd be pleased to go down to the ground level and look at the real-world details: that would offer us a chance to ground our theory, and make it really strong; or just as good, it would offer us the means to refine and improve our theory, so it actually was closer to the truth.

But if that was not what we wanted in the first place, then we can have nothing but ire.

So what do you think, AJ? Does it help or hurt your theory if you adopt a specific definition of "Christian"? So far, you seem to want to stay in the helicopter, speaking of a kind of broad "Christendom" that never really existed, but which looks plausible if you keep the whole matter at the mere self-identification level, where we believe that everything that anybody ever applied the word "Christian" to deserved to have it. But if going down to the ground and dealing with the specifics hurts your theory, then how much was your theory actually worth, in the first place? And if the only way it can survive is by keeping everything up in the helicopter, then how much is it worth to have the affirmation of people who operate at the same level, even were there a million of them?

Worth thinking about. All I've ever asked of you is to say what the chief noun and adjective you are using in your theory means, in real-world, down-to-earth terms. And so far....nothing.

I'm not your enemy, if you're pursuing the truth. But if you're staying in the helicopter, we can't keep company in a common theory. The distance between there and where reality lives is just too great.

[Harbal]

Don’t fuck with me, Immanuel.

Go on, IC, fuck with him.