Christian apology by a non-Christian

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

There's a recurring theme in your writing of blaming others for your inability to present and defend your thesis. Another reader commented upon this distraction in their review of your book from the Amazon site.

Actually what that commentator wrote is different:

"My biggest beef is that the author descends into a nasty political diatribe that has nothing to do with his main theories or the title of his work. He also displays an off-putting radical bias against most mainstream authorities, whether scientific or religious. An alert reader might be clued into this (but only after buying the book) by noting that the copyright is in the name of a church - "The Church of Physical Theology. Ltd". and comprises what is basically a highly unusual and restrictive contract the reader supposedly must agree to."

1) Interjecting (according to the commentator) irrelevant political commentary. 2) Bias against other theorists, scientific or religious. 3) The supposition (?) that the writer has a church affiliation, is a church, and because this is so is forwarding a religious dogma (?) (The commentator is not clear as to what he means).

[My personal view is that our ideas about 'Reality', if they can be considered real or poignant, must necessarily speak directly to social and political issues: the way that people orient themselves inside themselves. And that the stronger definitions will naturally place stronger limits on people, their comportment, etc. 'Liberalism' can indeed be seen and considered a form of license which rarely has positive results.]

It might be a step forward to work to identify the disappointments, personal emotional themes, social competition agendas etc in your presentations and surgically remove these distractions as best you can. Perhaps open a blog which is focused on venting the personal stuff, so that it might be kept separate from your intellectual offerings.

Given the fact that with the link to a quite decent general description of the man's theory in his book, which was filled to the brim with discussable ideas, it could be considered odd that you'd chose to emphasize a group of 'defects' that you have precipitated at least potentially from your own being. Generally, this is called 'projection': to project one's own content or motives on another. What is interesting is to examine what you wrote but turn it around and wonder if it might be better applied to yourself. In any case, you make no effort at all to discuss ANY of the ideas but to zero-in on psychological underpinnings. In essence, in my view, at least 90% of your general thesis---and I certainly noted this in our exchanges---totally avoids an exchange based on ideas presented and always seems to return to your favorite pseudo-psychological, pseudo-spiritual dogmatics. A relatively small adjustment would transform you into a very different interlocutor.

It's possible people aren't getting your thesis because it's too complicated, and that level of complication reveals you haven't yet been able to boil your core ideas down to their bottom line. I have no idea if this is the case, but it is perhaps worth noting that there tends to be a significant bias in the intellectual realm for complexity in both language and concepts, perhaps due to a notion that complexity equals value, and that complexity elevates the author to an expert status etc. In any case, there is nothing you can do about "speed reading nits" but you may be able to simplify and clarify your thesis, and thus expand your audience.

Here, apparently, you bring out another common theme in your criticism: your issues with 'complexity'. Now, I read the summary of the content of the book and it didn't seem overly complex nor opaque by any means. Quite the opposite. It seems quite accessible. Nevertheless one wonders if you had even read it, and if you did what you thought of it? I too, just above in this thread, presented many different ideas (at your request) all of which you roundly avoided. Not one item was discussed. It is as if no posts had been offered. You called it 'a wall of text'. One wonders if 'good writing' for you is something like a nursery rhyme? Suitable for a 'child of 11'? On what basis have you determined that truth must be 'simple' in that way and of the sort that a child could understand it? In fact, if other realms of knowing are considered, there is no field at all that is non-complex and accessible to a child. Yet for you---and this is declared all the time but never explained or defended---to be truthful it must be intensely simple. There seem to be a group of unexamined presuppositions here. I have a feeling that this connects, in your philosophy, to many other areas.

To be able to say: "but it is perhaps worth noting that there tends to be a significant bias in the intellectual realm for complexity in both language and concepts" could be validated if you were to demonstrate how you might do this in respect to any particularly knotty group of concepts. Myself, I read a great deal and I find that the best writing, even if dense, is lucid and clear but that it more often than not takes a commitment on the part of the reader (work) to extract it. This is even more true with valuable and significant poetry: to get to know a poem really is a commitment and cannot be undertaken lightly. One has to make a decision to penetrate it and allow it to penetrate one. While there certainly are 'accessible poems'---and accessible prose, musical compositions, paintings and art, even scientific theory---there exist domains of knowing which take real effort. Or, one might be introduced with a simple overview to an area of knowing that then takes a significant commitment.

It would seem that you regard 'difficulty' as an indicator of 'lack of content' or of content not sufficiently worked over? But I suggest it is possible that the problem may lie in you. In any case that this is a mistaken conclusion. One that could be examined. Again, you recur to your preferred but unexamined predicates as being 'axioms'. It simply may not be the case. And in some way, perhaps, you may be evidence in some way comparable to those "speed-reading nits". Yet it is something else: you see a 'wall of text' and perhaps you don't even bother to read it? So, perhaps you are a 'non-reading nit'? Or an 'I-can't-read-nit'? I only suggest to you that one expends a certain amount of energy making the effort to communicate with you and you thoroughly and roundly avoid the CONTENT.

I focus on this for two reasons. One is obviously that our communication here has been little successful. But it is a larger issue and I think this needs to be mentioned: There are simply a great many 'unprepared people' who because of ease of access (Internet-wise) can suddenly pop-up and appear within conversations in which they are not qualified to appear. Our culture, perhaps, in over-valuing the child and our industries in pandering to the lower common denominators, which is another way of saying 'a child of 11', opts to deal in material (value) that only such a one can 'appreciate'. Once one has established that it is this group---the widest group---that one seeks to reach, and established that one can only reach them with a very limited message which is essentially sentimental and emotional, not intellectual, one has become, more or less, a 'pimp'. But one will then be moulded by one's audience. I think it is fair to say that, more and more, the 'content' that floats around 'out there' is of such a low, digestible order. Pablum really. Is it possible that the core of your ideas is similarly sentimental? (This is of course why I have referred to 'the feminine').

You wrote: "There's a recurring theme in your writing of blaming others for your inability to present and defend your thesis".

Yet, if 'Felasco' or 'Sri Bozo' were the subject one were trying to reach and communicate with, it seems reasonable to suggest that frustration is understandable. If 'out there' in the larger Internet world there are a sufficient number of people essentially unprepared for thought---as seems to be the case sometimes---a general frustration could be defended. And blaming of said 'nits' might be seen as understandable. Myself, I think that we need to reevaluate the difficult and the harder-of-access.

[Felasco]

In any case, you make no effort at all to discuss ANY of the ideas but to zero-in on psychological underpinnings.

The author of the book has made no effort at all to discuss his own thesis here on the forum, he only continually mentions that he has a thesis. I've asked him repeatedly to present his thesis, but as best I can tell, he is fearful of being debunked, and so declines.

In essence, in my view, at least 90% of your general thesis---and I certainly noted this in our exchanges---totally avoids an exchange based on ideas presented and always seems to return to your favorite pseudo-psychological, pseudo-spiritual dogmatics.

I have discussed ideas extensively with you in many pages of this thread, as the record clearly shows. Like the author mentioned above, you can't seem to handle a real challenge, and so are changing the topic to the challenger.

Here, apparently, you bring out another common theme in your criticism: your issues with 'complexity'. Now, I read the summary of the content of the book and it didn't seem overly complex nor opaque by any means.

The author himself says his thesis requires very careful reading, and he continually complains about people who won't do so, calling them names like "speed reading nits" and so on.

My issue with complexity is that it is often worshiped for itself, not for any value it may contain. That is, if an author likes complexity, he will tend to pile it on thickly, whether or not complexity is what the subject requires. This is a form of bias which is reasonable to remark on.

I too, just above in this thread, presented many different ideas (at your request) all of which you roundly avoided.

For the ninth time, you DID NOT fulfill my request, no matter how many times you claim you did. I asked for a concise summary, you provided yet another wall of text. This persuades me you don't yet know what your core thesis is, and are doing a lot of typing in the hopes of finding it. I asked for a concise summary in the hopes that doing so might help you find your core thesis, but you apparently felt that would be too much work. As you can see, being clear and concise actually requires more intellectual ability and seriousness about one's thesis than typing walls of text.

Not one item was discussed. It is as if no posts had been offered. You called it 'a wall of text'.

I called it a wall of text, because it was a wall of text.

On what basis have you determined that truth must be 'simple' in that way and of the sort that a child could understand it?

Religion (the topic of this thread) is not a parlor game for over educated nerds. It is instead an attempt to address fundamental human needs. Messages which can only be grasped by "elites" are of little use, however correct their content may be.

Yet for you---and this is declared all the time but never explained or defended---to be truthful it must be intensely simple.

I have explained it endlessly, but your ego has become a wall of bricks obscuring your hearing. For the 99th time, this thread was supposed to be about Christianity. The core assertion of Christianity is that a God exists in the real world. You insist on looking elsewhere. You are looking in the wrong place.

A very simple message.

Myself, I read a great deal and I find that the best writing, even if dense, is lucid and clear but that it more often than not takes a commitment on the part of the reader (work) to extract it.

The whole point of writing is to create an interface that will transfer understandings from one mind to another. It is the writer's job to make that interface as easy to navigate as possible. To the degree the reader has to struggle or gives up, the writer has failed. You think the more complex you make it the better a writer you are. The opposite is closer to the truth.

It would seem that you dismiss 'difficulty' as an indicator of 'lack of content' or of content not sufficiently worked over?

Doing nothing is harder than doing something, which you will discover for yourself should you try it. If it's difficulty you want, try spending one day of your life doing absolutely nothing but breathing and observing. Such an experience of nothing provides very useful content, as it will reveal how noisy our minds are, and how that internal noise obstructs our observation of the real world we so love to make claims about.

Spinning up yet another big pile of words and theories is the most ordinary business. The world is full of college sophomores who can do it all day long.

Yet it is something else: you see a 'wall of text' and perhaps you don't even bother to read it?

Yes, because a wall of text is exactly what I didn't request. You had no obligation to fulfill my request, but when a writer ignores his readers, he usually winds up with fewer readers, and that's what happened to you.

So, perhaps you are a 'non-reading nit'? Or an 'I can't read nit'. I only suggest to you that one expends a certain amount of energy making the effort to communicate with you and you thoroughly and roundly avoid the CONTENT.

I am indeed a nit to be investing so much time in this conversation. I have posted many long posts in this thread, which are all full of content. I do avoid some of your content, as one can see it's content just for the sake of content. I might add here that it appears just about nobody else has chosen to consume your content. I appear to be close to your own only reader. That might be a useful clue to the value of your writing?

There are simply a great many 'unprepared people' who because of ease of access (Internet-wise) can suddenly pop-up and appear within conversations in which they are not qualified to appear.

If I am one of these unqualified people, you can best demonstrate that by taking on my posts and defeating them, which you've been unable to do, which explains why we're now talking about me instead of my posts.

Is it possible that the core of your ideas is similarly sentimental?

You are clinging desperately to this self flattering notion that you are the big intellectual here, and I am just some girly man who can't keep up. Except that I've pulled the rug out from under your entire thesis, and you've been unable to mount an effective defense.

The core of my idea is that we won't ever really understand any of our ideas until we first understand that which all ideas are made of. Like most philosophers, you are stuck on the surface level periphery, the content of thoughts, and apparently aren't yet ready to journey towards the center of the action, the nature of thought.

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

"Son of man, set forth an allegory and tell the house of Israel a parable."

---Ezekiel 17:2
_______________________________________________

I can't really speak much about Mr Ell since only recently have I noticed him and his posts. I came across his book independently of your recent interchanges though and thought it interesting. But more: After the 'death-of-god' at the hands of 'science', the world that science sees and understands needs to be linked again with man and man's existence (a rather inelegant way of putting it). Anyone who makes the effort to put such ideas into intelligible form deserves respect, in my view. It is a very important area.

...you can't seem to handle a real challenge, and so are changing the topic to the challenger.

I have a couple or three things to say to that: One is that, differently than you desire, every point you have brought up I have responded to. Every single one. It is only fair to recognize that. Groups of posts have gone toward 'answering', both directly and indirectly but also 'counter to', specific things you have brought up. You asked for an outline about my 'theology' and I obliged you but got no response or interchange whatever. Are you completely sure that it is myself who can't 'handle a real challenge'?

My issue with complexity is that it is often worshiped for itself, not for any value it may contain.

Let us try to work with a concrete example. I submitted to you the following:

First order of theological understanding: that the 'miracle' is the miracle of conscious awareness. There can be no other place to begin since everything hinges on it. The Miracle therefor is that of conscious awareness within this 'world', this cosmos. Awareness then is the 'tool', the object, the reward, and also---very much so---what stands to be lost. Awareness then, as it is suggested (but not explained) must be understood as precious beyond all price. Everything begins here. Also: if a philosophy or a theology were to begin on any other premise (axiom) it should be obvious that it would have begun incompletely, even defectively.

Since you did not answer nor make any comment at all, I assume that this formulations would be characterized as 'complex'? Can you speak about that? Can you point out how, or at least talk generally about, how this shows an attitude of 'worship'? Can you show how my paragraph, despite my intention, hope or illusion, is devoid of 'value'?

Mr Felasco: I explained in various ways that your 'question' is not answerable, and I explained why. It is very true that I did not 'fulfill your request' and yet I made substantial efforts to explain why. It is not my duty or my obligation to make a 'concise summary' for you, nor is it anyone's duty, and it is possible that coming at conversations from this stance you will run up again and again with the same reactions. I think you have to allow that people, each in their way, approaches the exposition of their ideas in 'good faith'. I suggest to you that it may be you who comes at things in less-than-good faith.

I called it a wall of text, because it was a wall of text.

Talk about that. Show it to be that. Even in a 'wall of text' there has to be sentences that are coherent and 'valid' by your own definition. Wouldn't it be better to extract a portion and see if that portion can be talked about?

Religion (the topic of this thread) is not a parlor game for over educated nerds. It is instead an attempt to address fundamental human needs. Messages which can only be grasped by "elites" are of little use, however correct their content may be.

Felasco, this is a statement which would have to be defended and explained. You can't merely make such an assertion but make no effort to back it up. Again try to remember the notion of 'good faith'. In good faith I respond to you and say: It is unfair (bad faith) to state that you determine my focus (or anyone's focus) in thinking or writing about religion is akin to a 'parlor game'. While the phrase 'fundamental needs' is not incomprehensible to me, I have made an effort to explain why I do not think such a basis for understanding 'religion' is a good one. Substantial efforts were made to argue different possible views. No one of them was addressed. Making these statements you reveal your own hand: you have established certain predicates as 'absolutes' and approach conversation on the basis of those 'absolutes'. But your absolutes are questionable through discourse.

And again, I suggest that you are wrong when you declare that ideas organized by 'elites' are 'of little use'. In fact it is always 'elites' which organize in substantial and complete ways systems of ideas which then, always, filter down into the human world in complex ways. You may have no understanding of Kant or Marx or Nietzsche but I can state as something quite certain that these men, through their 'elite' ideas, have influenced and continue to influence the world and you too. You simply may not be aware of it.

If you are going to make a case for 'religion' that is simple, or intuitive, make a go of it! But you don't really develop any independent thesis.

I have explained it endlessly, but your ego has become a wall of bricks obscuring your hearing. For the 99th time, this thread was supposed to be about Christianity. The core assertion of Christianity is that a God exists in the real world. You insist on looking elsewhere. You are looking in the wrong place.

Again: 'good faith'. What you write is incomprehensible to me. I have no awareness of any assertion of Christianity as making statements about 'God in a real world'. It is not that the phrase is incomprehensible it is that the assertion and the predicate make no sense to me. Talk about and show, either by describing your own subjective understanding or by referring to the writings of Christianity how and why this phrasing of yours reflects Christianity. I honestly do not understand.

The whole point of writing is to create an interface that will transfer understandings from one mind to another. It is the writer's job to make that interface as easy to navigate as possible. To the degree the reader has to struggle or gives up, the writer has failed. You think the more complex you make it the better a writer you are. The opposite is closer to the truth.

Can you offer some examples? From literature, from religious texts? From philosophical texts? If you brought forward a comparison one would better understand what you are referring to.

Yet at face value, and again in good faith, what you write does not seem accurate to me. There are writings (expressions of understanding and knowledge) which cannot be accessed without significant preparation. So, this brings into question your first statement. Often, one has to 'build an interface' to approach certain expressions of ideas. This is another possible argument against your formulation. Sometimes---as in the Jesusonian parables---one deliberately speaks allegorically. There is writing which plays to some extent a 'game' of hide-and-seek. There are people who have access to ideas---'wisdom' perhaps---who deliberately cloak their messages in difficult metaphors and demand that the hearer do the work to get to the message.

What do you make of Mark 4:11-12? Here, it would seem, there is a deliberate attempt to not disclose a message. It would be, according to your view, far worse than mere opacity:

• And he said unto them, Unto you is given the mystery of the kingdom of God: but unto them that are without, all things are done in parables so that, "'they may be ever seeing but never perceiving, and ever hearing but never understanding; otherwise they might turn and be forgiven!'"

Some commentary by Stephan Moore:

• "Parabolai in Mark are a partition, screen, or membrane designed to keep insiders on one side, outsiders on the other. Outsiders are those for whom 'everything comes in parables,' parables that they find incomprehensible (4:11-12). At the same time, parabolai are what rupture that membrane, render it permeable, infect the opposition with contradiction: those who should be on the inside find themselves repeatedly put out by Jesus' parabolic words and deeds. Appointed to allow insiders in and to keep outsiders out, parables unexpectedly begin to threaten everyone with exclusion in Mark, even disciples seeking entry. Deranged doormen, parables threaten to make outsiders of us all"

Or, to take a more modern example: the 'parable' in An Imperial Message by Franz Kafka:

• The Emperor—so they say—has sent a message, directly from his death bed, to you alone, his pathetic subject, a tiny shadow which has taken refuge at the furthest distance from the imperial sun. He ordered the herald to kneel down beside his bed and whispered the message in his ear. He thought it was so important that he had the herald speak it back to him. He confirmed the accuracy of verbal message by nodding his head. And in front of the entire crowd of those witnessing his death—all the obstructing walls have been broken down, and all the great ones of his empire are standing in a circle on the broad and high soaring flights of stairs—in front of all of them he dispatched his herald. The messenger started off at once, a powerful, tireless man. Sticking one arm out and then another, he makes his way through the crowd. If he runs into resistance, he points to his breast where there is a sign of the sun. So he moves forwards easily, unlike anyone else. But the crowd is so huge; its dwelling places are infinite. If there were an open field, how he would fly along, and soon you would hear the marvellous pounding of his fist on your door. But instead of that, how futile are all his efforts. He is still forcing his way through the private rooms of the innermost palace. Never will he win his way through. And if he did manage that, nothing would have been achieved. He would have to fight his way down the steps, and, if he managed to do that, nothing would have been achieved. He would have to stride through the courtyards, and after the courtyards through the second palace encircling the first, and, then again, through stairs and courtyards, and then, once again, a palace, and so on for thousands of years. And if he finally burst through the outermost door—but that can never, never happen—the royal capital city, the centre of the world, is still there in front of him, piled high and full of sediment. No one pushes his way through here, certainly not someone with a message from a dead man. But you sit at your window and dream of that message when evening comes.

These are just two example among dozens and hundreds possibles that refute your simplistic and misinformed notion.

• "OH HERMES, friendliest of gods to men, bestower of windfalls and lucky chances, lord of those who do their business by night; O whiz-kid and wizard, patron of thieves, rogues and perjurers; O friend to travelers in obscure places, O guide and conductor of those who consort with the dead; O spirit of fluency and sly calculation, genius of ways and entries, ingenious deviser, nimble wit and agile explainer-away; O god of the main chance, O Hermes, preserve us from evil, for we are all engaged in hermeneutics, over which you preside. We are all interpreters, and the world is out text."
  
  ---George Stade

The core of my idea is that we won't ever really understand any of our ideas until we first understand that which all ideas are made of. Like most philosophers, you are stuck on the surface level periphery, the content of thoughts, and apparently aren't yet ready to journey towards the center of the action, the nature of thought.

Can you show and can you talk more about this? What are ideas made of? Can you write about or quote from philosophers who are not stuck on a surface or periphery? I may indeed not be ready (and I may also not be interested in) a 'journey towards the center of the action, the nature of thought'. But how would you go about building a case to represent your view? Can it be done with words? Can it be done discursively? Can you offer an example in this forum or in any forum where you have had successful interactions with people who have received your ideas? How have you done this? Do you consider it fair that you would be expected to offer answers to these questions? To clarify your views? Doesn't the burden of demonstration fall to you? If you can't demonstrate your point in writing on a forum of written ideas would you consider it valid if you were dismissed? (Dismissed in the sense of not regarding you as serious, as dismissing your ideas).

You are clinging desperately to this self flattering notion that you are the big intellectual here, and I am just some girly man who can't keep up.

By your own definitions you are definitely not an intellectual nor do you desire to be so that is a ground that you can---must!---give up. If I am correct and if I have read you right your 'model' is a child, a non-intellect, a 'natural mystic'. You take what I write as if it is part of an ego-battle but I am referring to far larger and more important things: the feminization of culture and the weakening of ideas by thralldom to sensation, sentimentalism and emotionalism. This is what I call 'female' and 'feminine'. And I oppose that to the 'masculine' and, yes, 'the manly'. It is not that you are a 'girly man' but rather that you have given up and sacrificed a certain masculine rigor within ideas specifically. You are unable, yet, to see it and resist the characterization tooth and nail. That is understandable. And it is not just you. It is part of a much larger tendency. And yet it is one that, in my view, needs to be pointed out in crystal-clear manner. It is easy to do this in regard to you because you are 'emblematic' of the issue.

[Felasco]

Anyone who makes the effort to put such ideas into intelligible form deserves respect, in my view. It is a very important area.

We share this interest, and I remain open minded to hearing the new fellow's thesis.

First order of theological understanding: that the 'miracle' is the miracle of conscious awareness. There can be no other place to begin since everything hinges on it.

Ok, let's begin here. As a place to start do you mean the conscious awareness of higher forms of life generally, or human consciousness specifically?

It is not my duty or my obligation to make a 'concise summary' for you, nor is it anyone's duty,

I agree completely as I have said above. Please note that I did not complain when you ignored my request, I just quietly ignored the thing I didn't request. I have complained only that you keep claiming you met my request. It's that false claim I was objecting to, not that you wrote what you wrote.

Religion (the topic of this thread) is not a parlor game for over educated nerds. It is instead an attempt to address fundamental human needs. Messages which can only be grasped by "elites" are of little use, however correct their content may be.

Felasco, this is a statement which would have to be defended and explained.

Ok, fair enough. What is the purpose of philosophy and religion? Clearly this can be debated, but to keep it simple I claim the purpose is to serve human beings.

For religion especially, it seems silly to propose that religion would be only for intellectuals.

Even for philosophy, what good is it really if some professor has an advanced complex idea which he can only share with a handful of other professors? Why is the creation of ideas which can be of only limited service to a few considered "advanced"? Do such ideas change the lives of even the professors in any meaningful way?

I propose that simple ideas like love have had far more constructive impact on far more people personally, and thus on the society as a whole.

I rest my case your honor unless you wish to pursue this further.

While the phrase 'fundamental needs' is not incomprehensible to me, I have made an effort to explain why I do not think such a basis for understanding 'religion' is a good one.

Yes, you think it will make everyone narcissists etc. Do you have this same concern about agriculture and medical science, or is it only serving human's psychic needs that you find objectionable and problematic?

Substantial efforts were made to argue different possible views. No one of them was addressed.

I appear to be the only person on the forum willing to chat with you, and I have engaged your posts at great length. Please stop making silly claims which can only serve to embarrass you.

And again, I suggest that you are wrong when you declare that ideas organized by 'elites' are 'of little use'. In fact it is always 'elites' which organize in substantial and complete ways systems of ideas which then, always, filter down into the human world in complex ways.

Yes, in the world of science this is true. There is no need for electrical engineers to use widely accessible language, because they can give us the light switch, a simple mechanical interface which even a child can make use of. The same can not be said of philosophers and theologians.

I'm sorry, but you adamantly refuse to observe and acknowledge a bias that you share with many intellectuals. You like complex things. You like to chew on them, analyze them, unravel them etc.

I'm not objecting to such enjoyment and preference, really I'm not. I am only objecting to the notion that complex things must be important in a universal sense because they are important to the intellectual personally. If you wish to assert that complexity is necessary, you must demonstrate that on a case by case basis.

You may have no understanding of Kant or Marx or Nietzsche but I can state as something quite certain that these men, through their 'elite' ideas, have influenced and continue to influence the world and you too. You simply may not be aware of it.

I agree, but would counter that none of these gentleman have influenced the world as much as, for example, Jesus's teachings on love. This is a religion thread with Christianity in the title, as you may recall. Point being, I have not claimed that simplicity must be the essence of everything, such as science, economics, politics etc.

If you are going to make a case for 'religion' that is simple, or intuitive, make a go of it!

So all my typing above in this thread was in vain then?

But you don't really develop any independent thesis.

It's not important to me that anything I write be original. I doubt there is much new to say on these topics. I see myself more as a writer, a translator. As example, much of what I've been discussing is available in New Age culture, but that culture is a road block for most here, myself included. So I attempt to strip out the culture part, and present the understandings themselves in a form that may be accessible to philosopher types. Whether I succeed at this is entirely debatable, and I make no big claims here, I'm only explaining my intent.

Again: 'good faith'. What you write is incomprehensible to me. I have no awareness of any assertion of Christianity as making statements about 'God in a real world'.

If you refuse to understand the difference between the word "apple" and an apple one can eat, honestly Gustav, I am going to wash my hands of you, admit defeat, and move along. I apologize for my impatience, which is my bad and my problem, but seriously, I am not a perfect human being and I can only explain the simplest of things so many times.

Can you offer some examples? From literature, from religious texts? From philosophical texts? If you brought forward a comparison one would better understand what you are referring to.

The teachings of Jesus, as compared to an intellectual theologian's 900 page doctoral thesis. Jesus has been famous and worshiped for 2,000 years, the theologian is unlikely to be remembered much past his demise.

There are writings (expressions of understanding and knowledge) which cannot be accessed without significant preparation.

Yes, intellectualism requires intellectual training, agreed. I don't agree intellectualism is an important part of religion. An important part of many other fields for sure, which is why I suggested science to you. If you wished to be very technical and intellectual in science, I would not be objecting.

There are people who have access to ideas---'wisdom' perhaps---who deliberately cloak their messages in difficult metaphors and demand that the hearer do the work to get to the message.

This is an interesting reflection on the art of writing and communicating, I agree.

Krishnamurti declined to spell everything out, and instead created an environment where the reader was invited to do their own homework. He wrote a great many books filled with a great many words, and I read most of them.

And then I discovered I could learn much more just by walking in the woods and surrendering all those so many words. The big pile of complexity I'd assembled turned out to be an obstacle, not an asset. It's still an obstacle, as you can clearly see, as I type at you at 3,000wpm.

Here's an analogy that might explain the difference between us. Western music is linear, with a beginning, middle and end that one travels towards. Eastern music is more the creation of environment one enters and experiences.

Your writing is more Eastern in nature, as you are happy once you've created a complex conceptual environment you can experience.

My writing is more Western (though it sounds more Eastern) in that I'm looking for the bottom line, the destination.

I keep trying to aim our conversation towards simple core fundamental bottom lines, and you keep trying to aim it back towards the experience of complexity.

In the end, there is likely no ultimate right or wrong, but just two people ardently negotiating for what they want out of a conversation.

Can you show and can you talk more about this? What are ideas made of?

Thought of course, a chemo/electrical process in human brains.

Given that every idea is made of thought, whatever the properties of thought may be, those properties will impact and influence every idea.

As example, if it is true that thought is inherently divisive in nature, that would explain why every ideology, whatever it's content, subdivides within itself. If this is true, then subdivisions could not be prevented at the level of the content of thought, because they arise from a deeper source, the nature of thought.

Can you write about or quote from philosophers who are not stuck on a surface or periphery?

Never mind about experts, just think it through for yourself.

But how would you go about building a case to represent your view? Can it be done with words?

Yes, see above, lots of words.

Can you offer an example in this forum or in any forum where you have had successful interactions with people who have received your ideas?

Define "successful". I am reasonably successful in the sense of engaging readers and fellow posters. I am somewhat successful in helping them understand my ideas. I'm not very successful in inspiring them to accept my ideas. But then, I go to philosophy forums to argue for "aphilosophy" so this is to be expected. It's kind of like going to a theism forum to argue for atheism, one shouldn't expect a flood of converts.

By your own definitions you are definitely not an intellectual nor do you desire to be so that is a ground that you can---must!---give up.

I willingly give up the title intellectual, no problem. I'm still kicking your butt though. You are being pummeled by a girlie man without a brain, how embarrassing!

If I am correct and if I have read you right your 'model' is a child, a non-intellect, a 'natural mystic'.

I've used reason to show the limits of reason, specifically in regards to the field of religion. My "model" argues for nothing more complicated than observation of the real world. And it's of course not "my" model, but a conversation that's been going on for thousands of years, long before Christianity even.

You take what I write as if it is part of an ego-battle but I am referring to far larger and more important things: the feminization of culture and the weakening of ideas by thralldom to sensation, sentimentalism and emotionalism. This is what I call 'female' and 'feminine'. And I oppose that to the 'masculine' and, yes, 'the manly'.

Yes, I understand. Perhaps you might expand on your "masculine" theory a bit? Whatever label we might assign it, what values are you promoting? I already have a sense, but perhaps a summary and review would help us.

It is not that you are a 'girly man' but rather that you have given up and sacrificed a certain masculine rigor within ideas specifically.

I understand, and again, take no offense. Girly man is my phrase, not yours.

How do you explain that with all your masculine intellectual rigor you've been unable to defeat my lack of masculine intellectual rigor?

You are unable, yet, to see it and resist the characterization tooth and nail. That is understandable.

I resist it this theory of yours, because the evidence of this thread does not support it. It appears to me that you are still searching for your theology, while I have a coherent world view you are unable to defeat.

I do agree I am likely less learned than you, and not as capable of citing other authors, making historical references and so on.

And it is not just you. It is part of a much larger tendency. And yet it is one that, in my view, needs to be pointed out in crystal-clear manner. It is easy to do this in regard to you because you are 'emblematic' of the issue.

Ok, no problem. Again, although I do get impatient sometimes, I take no offense at your attempt to position me as the personification of all that's gone wrong in modern culture. Just kidding.

Again, to prove your case, you are going to have to use your "superior masculine rigorous intellect" to defeat my "feminine sentimentalism and emotionalism"....

Which you have yet to do.

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

I'm not very successful in inspiring them to accept my ideas. But then, I go to philosophy forums to argue for "aphilosophy" so this is to be expected. It's kind of like going to a theism forum to argue for atheism, one shouldn't expect a flood of converts.

Unless I am mistaken this is very close to the definition of a troll. The problem is that you come into an environment with a sort of 'mission' already established: that your Teachings of Jesus can defeat any aspect of philosophy. It would seem it is exactly the difference between 'eating an apple' and 'describing an apple' and you are an 'apple eater'. So, again by definition, you simply cannot be 'defeated'. It became (more) clear in this last post, after I again put energy into a post to you, that conversation (as I would define it) is futile. There is no point of yours that can, by definition, be argued against. You are basically though, one senses, a decent person and in my book that means a good deal. So, good luck with your project. And I do thank you for responding in this thread. You did a great deal of … typing!

(Pitiful attempt at a joke…)

[Felasco]

Unless I am mistaken this is very close to the definition of a troll.

You are pathetically mistaken. What has happened instead is that I've made sincere well reasoned arguments, which you have not been able to defeat, so now you're calling me names.

The problem is that you come into an environment with a sort of 'mission' already established: that your Teachings of Jesus can defeat any aspect of philosophy.

I never made any such claim.

...after I again put energy into a post to you, that conversation (as I would define it) is futile.

So having now said this about 17 times, how about actually fucking doing it?

Here, I will assist. Please do not respond to any post I make on any forum ever again. See? Simple. Not complex, simple. Now all that's left is for you to do this one very simple thing.

There is no point of yours that can, by definition, be argued against.

Again, more complete nonsense. People have been arguing against my posts for years on this forum and many others.

(Pitiful attempt at a joke…)

Pitiful attempt at a post.

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

You are right of course. I have seen that 'futility' and then, for my own reasons, seemed to desire to bridge it. I agree that it is time to bring the exchange to a close. But I do want to thank you for the effort.

[Felasco]

Thanks to you as well Gustav. I know I'm not the easiest person to chat with, and you have endured the latest epic Felasco Fiasco with remarkable patience and good cheer. I hope that once I'm out of the way you'll be able to attract posters who more closely share your interests. Good luck!

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

Relational to 'all this'; to this thread with all its difficulties, to the insurmountable conflicts that arise in the long rehearsal we all go through trying to describe our views, and trying, for so many different and sometimes murky reasons, to convince others of our understanding; relational to this forum with its intentions, to the 'battle of viewpoints', and on this forum sub-section where evil, regressive religion is chopped to threads; is the fact that we are I think all of us in deep confusion. That sounds pessimistic but I think it is an honest statement of fact.

A religionist of the old(er) school, if he has succeeded in holding to his little dream and if it has held him together, feigns well-being in the face of modernity and its acids, but even his smile shows some cracking at the edges. Who can be referred to as a model of lucidity then? Those lucid voices, they do exist, are still local voices speaking from within a Narrative, speaking from a limited platform, while around them things implode inward. Certainty is a farce, isn't it? Certainty is a game we play against more chaotic senses that exist in us it seems to me. The only 'solidities' that we can define, the only 'certain things'---and even these are chimerical in substantial ways---are some rather 'dead' facts that science offers us.

Whole, vast areas that contain(ed) extraordinary deposits and coffers of 'human value' or 'trans-human' value have 'vanished into thin air' or, to put it pictorially and dramatically, been zapped out of the air by lasers. All the stuff that those containers held have fallen onto the ground and are ground into the ground. There is no structure to which any of us can refer and hold to as a 'solidity' on which to construct a Viewpoint that can be expressed and defended to any other. If we went to War with some tempting aspect, a partial viewpoint, it would be an insane, postmodern war.

The 'matter' that surrounds us doesn't even offer that solidity. To recover 'solidity' in this sense one is tempted to 'regress' … in dreams … in longings … in fantasies … to imagined times when everything still hung together. The present, our present, it seems to me, is essentially mechanical. It is ruled and dominated by 'mechanical' forces. Mechanics offers the only certainty we can tangibly see and agree on. And mechanics operate in so many different areas of modern life. It infects the transpersonal. Programming, technology, production: faced with pressure from these hugely powerful forces, whose influence is really quite insidious---ubiquitous---frail persons are rendered secondary or tertiary. The 'content' of persons, so linked as they are to collapsed metaphysics, now must allow themselves to be restructured against their will (they have little will), must be rebuilt really, reoriented, by mechanical design.

Uwot, bless his heart, opined that I was a 'conspiracy nutter' with some of these ideas, and yet as I see things a whole dimension of man is 'on the threshold of destruction'. It is as if there is more to admire in the machine than in the man! Man is endless trouble and besides he smells bad and excretes horrors. The iPhone is in a very real sense more important than the person. Ordered beauty, sleek modern design, dependable and constant as the northern star. (It reminds me of something Eduardo Galeano wrote about in his book Open Veins of Latin America: that not so long ago a pound bag of peppercorns was more valuable than a man's life). This 'mechanization' is complex and hard to put one's finger on, and yet it is real. Dangerously real. It establishes a new sense of 'value' and, especially in people who can't and who don't have the interest in 'understanding', logistically, how this has come about, no defense can be offered. Hence the importance of the ability to explain, the ability to define, the ability to defend. The process of defining---of thinking things carefully through---is far more valuable than one ever imagined.

So, with all that, it is simply quite likely that it is now and will always be so very difficult to arrive at conclusions and accords. One desires to, but one can't.

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

It is interesting to note that the first U.S. Republican, Abraham Lincoln, was the man who destroyed the original U.S. Republic. He is revered as a great man, savior of "the union" between northern and southern states, for murdering hundreds of thousands of people in an unnecessary civil war that he created and exploited. Lincoln transformed the Republic of United States into the screwed-up United States of America. IMO he was really the first Democrat, a sheep in wolf's garb, a cunning and evil man who set the stage for his follow-ons, Theodore Roosevelt and Barack Obama.

I established a rule for myself early on: that as long as I am on this Forum I can write only in one thread. That means that I have to import things from other threads if I want to comment on them, which is rude in a certain way, but it is the way it is.

It really does seem to be true: The origin of the US Federal Government---an entity of astounding dimension and which inserts itself everywhere, as a mandate of its natural right---comes onto the horizon as a result of that war. But it doesn't seem right, and it seems a mistake in perception, to attempt to locate 'an evil' in the person of one man, namely Lincoln, when huge sectors of interest precipitated that and all successive conflicts. Yet they all seem to have a similar 'stamp'.

Richard M. Weaver (author of Ideas Have Consequences) wrote a book previous to that called The Southern Tradition at Bay: A History of Postbellum Thought in which he describes 'the Southern mind and the Southern Tradition' as 'the last non-materialist civilization in the Western world'. He describes that civilization through its 'fourfold root':

• "The most obvious of these is the feudal theory of society which, although a transplantation from the Old World, appeared in the South so natural a principal of organization that the Southern people have not to this day been persuaded to abandon it. Another is the code of chivalry, a romantic idealism closely related to Christianity, which makes honor the guiding principal of conduct. Connected with this is the ancient concept of the gentleman. First presented by Aristotle, and passed down through Castiglione, Sir Thomas Elyot and others, it significantly presupposes a stable social order and a system of class education. Finally, there is a religiousness, difficult of explication because, having little relation to creeds, it stands close to the historic righteousness of humanity".

Here is an interesting critique of some part of his ideas. What I find interesting in 'all this' is the idea that many of us seem to hold to (you very definitely) that we have 'deviated' at some precise point, a point that can be located, and this deviation then leads us toward a chaotic future, that is to say a present, against which we attempt to construct defenses and apply 'remedies'. There is no way to separate out 'the political' as the political is a direct manifestation of an assortment of all other dimensions. To define any ethical/moral and existential position can only be to define a way of organizing the present.

You also wrote:

"Here I am suspicious of the quality of your mind. You refuse to set a standard for conversation, yet claim to have a reasoned argument. What are your standards for reasoning? Where exactly is the reasoning by which you conclude that all of us are ignorant about the ultimate nature of everything? Where are your evaluations of ignorance, which seems to me to be a relative term? Because you are ignorant of fundamental physics, does that mean that everyone else is equally ignorant?

"I've asked you for a conversational standard. You reject science and logic, and seem not to understand the relevance of mathematics. The only thing that you propose as a standard is ignorance. I'm not interested in ignorance. If I wanted to communicate by such a standard I would buy a gerbil and argue with it."

I think it is fair and reasonable to understand and to note that, perhaps especially in our modernity, there exist and operate forces which 'turn a man's mind to mush'. In order to reclaim the mind and our epistemological underpinning we have no choice but to take a stand against those forces which produce 'mush' and which also seem to desire it. It seems that some part of that is separating 'sentiment' from 'ratiocination' or at least being able to distinguish the two.

From an essay on the Jain tradition in Sources of Indian Tradition, Volume 1:

• Western thought, from the days of the Greeks onward, has been largely governed by the logical rule known as the law of the excluded middle---'either a or not-a'. Socrates must be a mortal or a not-mortal---there is no other possibility. In India, on the other hand, this law of thought has never been so strongly emphasized as in Europe, and the Jain allows not two possibilities of predication, but seven. These are known as 'the Seven-fold Division' (saptabhangi) or 'the Doctrine of Maybe' (syadvada).

I can't imagine a way that a seven-predicate system of logic could function in mathematics but it is interesting how this wider set of possible predicates allows for a 'Doctrine of Many-Sidedness' (as it is called) to emerge. Mathematics (as far as I understand) allows no imprecision and is (isn't it?) an either/or system. But when it comes to any decisions which are to be instituted in the world itself, even among people who are acutely 'rational' or 'mathematical' thinkers, the conclusions are never the same. Is it then that some succeed in getting to the 'true logic' and the 'true result of logic' and others don't? If there really existed a mathematical base to which people could recur for decisions in the social and political world, what would it be? Who lives it? Understands it? Describes it?

Is it 'true' that to operate in the World 'successfully' a man has to have recourse to a multi-predicate system of thinking and perceiving? While I do not think that mathematical systems of thought could ever become multi-predicate, I cannot see a way around a multi-predicate system for the 'living of life'. One unusual thing I notice: that those who 'take up residence' in rigid systems (I would say that yours is such a rigid system and I too, in my way, desire to have one though I have less certainty about what the base of one should be) is that they become like Ancient Towers on the landscape: old, solid, complaining, a little 'haunted', but always challenging to the wayward of the present.

"Philosophical shock is the beginning of wisdom…"

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

A note to Most Esteemed Felasco. Since it is obvious that I continue to elaborate on elements in the conversation we have attempted, you should feel free as a bird to respond. I request that instead of doing the typical 'cut-up' of a post---which is terribly irritating and frustrating---that you make the effort (if you wish) to write independent and complete 'essays' of response to any points you desire to, as I generally do and as I have above. I think it is a way out of the 'locked horn' impasse. You can of course do what you please. It is only a suggestion.

[Felasco]

My dear Most Highly Revered Professor Gustav,

If you wish for me to write an essay on a particular topic, please make that request, and I will try to comply if I have anything useful to say on that topic.

Until then, I shall retire gracefully in to my state of Most Esteemedness.

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

Most Highly and Acutely Reverenced Señorote Sri Sri Felasco: I desire nothing at all. I am suggesting a more independent essay-style of post-writing, and less of the 'cut-up'. I posted a note to you because I continue to speak on themes that were developed in our exchanges. While no 'Southern Gentleman' it was an attempt at being gentlemanly. If I work really hard I can sometimes do it…

[uwot]

A note to Most Esteemed Felasco. Since it is obvious that I continue to elaborate on elements in the conversation we have attempted, you should feel free as a bird to respond. I request that instead of doing the typical 'cut-up' of a post---which is terribly irritating and frustrating---that you make the effort (if you wish) to write independent and complete 'essays' of response to any points you desire to, as I generally do and as I have above. I think it is a way out of the 'locked horn' impasse. You can of course do what you please. It is only a suggestion.

A note to Gus. I see you have met Greylorn Ell. I don't really pay much attention to either of you, precisely because you will not defend the premises on which you build your arguments, but insist that somehow the whole edifice is coherent. I know your liking for second rate poetry, and I suppose I could concede that the whole is occasionally more than the parts. But that isn't true of philosophy and Greylorn, if yer reading, it is abso-fucking-lutely not true of science.

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

Did you ever ask me to defend, specifically, a 'premise'? I seem to remember just some grumpiness on your part, a couple of personal insults (I still am deeply cut by that of 'berk') (which my spellchecker comically desires to correct to 'jerk', a possible insult from 1) God or 2) The Devil himself as there is no possible other), and then silence. I have not so far seen you really develop any noteworthy ideas, in any full sense of the word, in the writing of yours I've read so far. You seem to function within some partialities. Always open to hearing more.

The problem, or a problem anyway, is that I cannot offer a completed system of thinking or of philosophy. That is just a fact. My life ('the living of life' as I say) has forced me to tentative opinions and a sense of possible 'conclusiveness' in regard to certain things, and what is required of me is to construct or assemble the ratiocination that supports it. Toward that, I am working as hard as I can. It is a slow, laborious process.

Second-rate poetry? What is first-rate poetry in your view?