Hi there Grre, I recommend the writings of Donna Williams (a.k.a Polly Samuels) and Wendy Lawson.

Further to my response of 8 days ago, Fooloso4's response of the same day, and the responses of many other contributors.

As the questioner's concern was mainly whether the god of the Hebrews and Christians had set a good enough example or not, I am trying to highlight what I think is, in God's mind, supposed to be the essence of the issue for present day Christian believers.

Fundamentalism doesn't do any religion favours.

Autonomous responsibility-takers have got to grow personally and use diligence in deducing issues.

If you attempt to join a church and they are anything like the following:

- dumbing down in their own terms
- no genuine channels (only pretend ones)
- don't pray
- don't keep each other company (but hold barbecues, and overload the table with chocolate brownies)
- brownie point hunting in a show of good deeds
- serious subjects of conversation can't be raised
- passivity
- excessive deference to authority - which latter makes great show of acting casual
- lack of individuality

then don't touch them, and incidentally their deceptiveness is the same as characters in the Bible anecdotes about deceptive people.

To abuse credulity and credence, is an offence in thoughtful people's eyes and that is why we should deduce it is an offence in any worthwhile god's eyes.

The Bible stories show up the character of the men and women in the stories.

We have got to critique the quality of the "tradition" (handed-down meaning) that goes attached to the stories - as we all know this is often trashy and that is why we have got to research something better.

The bulk of the first chapter of Genesis, as Stephen Oppenheimer points out, is an account of a sea encroachment (re-creation) as a peg or visual aid or "bullet point" upon which to hang the meaning, creation (the sentence preceding).

(In regard to the floods a few chapters on, their level was above "mountains" bearing in mind ziggurats served as metaphorical mountains. There was an element in the people that had lived in mountainous regions where they had previously "known" their gods to abide.)

In what follows I do not presume to comment on Islam as I believe muslims do not generally study the handed-down meanings (which have been laboriously and multifariously discerned) of the Old and New testaments. I think the Koran tends to substitute its own conclusions and that muslims consider that the last word.

Mytochondrial Eve lived circa 120,000 years ago. Scripture covers say the last 5,000 of those; the first page maybe 2,000 years before that.

The mores and mental muddles of mankind had got, meantime, to where they had got. As I see it what we read is a mixture of a "god" "speaking their language" i.e the way gods were expected to speak, and trying to penetrate the fog with fresh values.

I paraphrase Old and New Testaments in their entirety as: "The worship of God is to not stunt the growth of the fellow adopted widows and orphans in Father's firm".

At a metaphysical level a "power" behind an intelligible system such as we are within, must be at a very huge level in the spectrum of spectrums.

The details of a real god operating, are somewhere near our level.

Religions tend to be about certain levels of meaning in things and in life. Fundamentalism doesn't help any religion work well, in my observation. If there was a true god then scriptures would turn out to be true at some level probably in an unfashionable and neglected way.

Certain kinds of religion have become assumed to be loaded down with baggage by certain people, bringing risks of genetic fallacy when we think about them, if we're careless, or swayed emotively against or for, inappropriately.

Some kinds of scepticism also get loaded down with baggage.

While S J Gould mentions "non-overlapping magisteria" I prefer to speak of "non-conflicting magisteria" for reasons as above. In my case I insist this supports freedom to maintain the atheistic kind of agnosticism, just as much as a more religious outlook.

Given that both religion and science are infinitely huge, let alone life, the universe and everything, it wouldn't be logical to get doctrinaire about any supposed wholesale, absolute clashes. Conflicts are generated by faulty reasoning and faulty relating between individuals (including some who misuse authority).

In the case of a god or gods, there is a very complex bunch of issues to have infinite shades of opinion on, if one thinks one is allowed by the religious authorities concerned, or if one permits oneself to go over their heads.

Assent is either assent or dissent.

I like John Henry Newman's phrase, "assent to degrees of inference" for this reason.

While there might be an objective level to the "existence" (in some form) of a god, e.g the statue is actually standing in our building and there is a body of writings about it, nonetheless this does not in any way negate the essentially personal level including the freedom for any of us to treat it as impersonal, or deserving to be ignored by us, if we choose.

Hence the work of inference is the job of each of us individually, and the degrees of inference on many points is the job of each of us as individuals. Then the yes-no assent process is also the job of each of us as individuals, once we are clear what we want to or can assent to or not.

Hence I think "god must be atheist" is making a point about assent, and janus and noah are making a point about inference.

This is because our other senses e.g touch and hearing give parallel evidence, and because the testimony of others gives parallel evidence (strengthened by our allowing for their experience to be different), plus all previous scholarship.

Young says things are projective, namely out there and in our heads at the same time. From the Varela quote I get that we humans are built as part of what is to be perceived, in order to perceive what is to be perceived.

Just as I knew when I was a kid but then that was just me.

My screen name comes from some Enid Blyton characters, in the variation proposed by one of the other characters.

My interests: mainly philosophy of science, also a bit of philosophy of mind, philosophy of history and philosophy of religion.

Thomas Sebeok points out that it is through language that humans offer models.

Hence, the value in always attempting to use synonyms, paraphrases, periphrasis and the like. Language has infinite scope for offering a new lens to view the continually appearing facets of things. It offers scope for creativity within tradition.

I believe phenomenological epoche has various basic practical uses during our logical analyses, but Heidegger and his followers perverted this.

As to the time-honoured subjective-objective "conundrum" in Berkeley et al, Arthur Young reminds us that things have been "projective" i.e out there and in here in our heads, both at the same time, all along.

1. If you meditate on my (modest) suggestions, you will become even more than an idea machine! You will become an idea co-creator!
Among other posts I most like those of Bitter Crank, Terrapin Station, and alcontali.
2, 3, 4, 8, 10. Take little steps back, take in what is going on around you, cultivate gratefulness in your heart for all the bright ideas everyone else in the world has ever had, eat and drink wholesomely, rest well.
Rather than the “substances” some responders mentioned, I recommend cheese, pork and a decent pot of tea.
7. Library books, second hand books you can afford, the links given on this board. A laptop that works and some sticks.
Wish for the serendipity principle to manifest itself, which is a cert!
5. More than 10% is very refreshing already.
9. Connecting with other minds healthfully is by reading and discussing.
6, 8. Just see how much seems to “stick” visually. In addition three more things:
- To remember a long phone number one can divide it into a visually recalled portion, an auditorily recalled portion and a logically recalled portion (e.g “the code for that geographical location”)
- Use visual and spatial thinking, e.g map concept on paper or just mentally, as an overview.
- Turn this overview in turn into something recallable with a few auditory key words.
Happy sparkling!