Matriarchality, a made up word, used to describe a present social direction. — Gregory A

Is equality unappealing?

Matriarchality? — Gregory A

No, it’s spelled matriarchy.

The contact of a needle and a pain receptor causes pain. — NOS4A2

No, that’s not true. Many many more things are needed to cause a person to feel pain. Try again?

Western propaganda is of the latter type. — StreetlightX

You prefer authoritarian propaganda?

Marriage is a foundation stone of conservative values consequently a target of the Left — Gregory A

Conservative values are based in marriage?

Why do Liberals want to destroy these values?

What would you say if I claimed that it's magical thinking for you to believe that pricking a person with a needle would cause them to feel pain?

What I do believe is that they often don’t like to hear it. — NOS4A2

And they recoil in horror, yes, we've been over this.

What would you say if I claimed that it's magical thinking for you believe that anything you could say to another person could cause them to recoil in horror?

It’s simple, you believe that telling someone that their words do not have the effect they believe they have can cause them to recoil in horror, and because you do not not believe this you do not recoil in horror.

Yes. — NOS4A2

That explains your apparent lack of horror.

Tell anyone that their words do not have the effect they believe they have and they often recoil in horror. — NOS4A2

You believe that recoiling in horror is the effect of you telling them that their words do not have the effect they believe they have?

in a materialist universe where there are no absolute standards or an absolute Lawgiver. — Dermot Griffin

If there were no structure to the “materialist universe,” whatever that’s supposed to mean, nothing would be possible and there could only be chaos (though chaos would have no meaning).

Other religions carry truth and goodness but beauty is absent and by this I do not mean religions are not aesthetically pleasing. Buddhist prayers are beautiful as well as the Islamic call to prayer and Jewish temple services. When I say they lack beauty I mean that they lack it as a property of reality, of being. — Dermot Griffin

This seems to only mean that you experience beauty exclusively in your own religion. Have you considered that the same might be true for others in their religious experience?

I'd chosen mermaids to avoid the 'out' that tooth fairies allow by being super-natural. Your atheism says nothing about mermaids, unicorns, etc, so we need to believe you accept these as real as you do not protest their unlikely existence (up until now that is)? — Gregory A

People can be bound together in shared values, goals, and norms with fictions (institutional facts) and societies are built on them. They're an indispensable part of human social life. Money, property, marriage, governments, etc etc, are observer-dependent and not brut facts. Is Biden the president of the United States? Some believe that Trump is the actual president, despite the lack of evidence to support that belief.

I point this out to show that we all accept fictions of some kind. Some fictions carry more power than others. Religious fictions carry a lot of power and that's why they are met with a lot of skepticism in modernity.

So the issue isn’t about believer/non-believer, it’s about which leaders we choose to follow and why we follow them.

Anyhow, why should we listen to those who reject a God (a relatively simple addon) but then continue to believe in mermaids, unicorns etc. — Gregory A

I give up. Why?

Reminds me of a passage from Marx about how the "liberal" party of UK, whatever it was called at the time, just represents the aristocrats and their fellow rich friends that benefit from economic liberalisation and getting rid of the rest of aristocratic privileges, and they'll never deliver on their "ideals" of freedom and equality and the rest of it; that it's all talk and you'll never see actions no matter their majority in parliament ... it will always be close but "shucks, can't do it". — boethius

Reminds me of a NYT opinion piece I saw the other day.

Responsibility is always the price of freedom.

Being freed from the Great Terrible Chain of Being modern folks are lost in a chaotic sea of nihilism and moral depravity. :scream:

Whatever you believe about the existence of God or the effects of religion on society, there is an important sense in which religious people understand the universe more clearly than those who reject the spiritual dimension you're talking about. — T Clark

Emptiness is the only spiritual concept that I think, or feel, gives me clearer understanding of the universe. True that it’s a religious concept, even though I’m anti-religious. It makes rational sense while at the same time relieves existential anxiety. I can’t imagine it not being true and yet I don’t know if it is true. Perhaps somehow things can have an essential and independent existence.

Agreed. :100:

In Le Petit Prince, a super piece of lit that I like, there’s a line that goes something like, “you’re forever responsible for what you tame.” Think about that for a minute and consider, do you really want to be a Superman? A Superman is forever responsible for the sheeple that they tame.

Over the last decade there’s been a steep rise of adolescence seeking treatment of this kind, mostly biological girls for some reason, and I assume that’s what Floridians are responding to. That and the rise of trans activism in general.

Putin has succeeded in establishing the Atlanticist system even more solidly than before. The gift is so welcome that some sober and well-informed analysts have speculated that it was Washington’s goal all along.

Isn’t it hard to believe that Putin and gang are such fumbling fools?

Floridians are terrified of gender identity theory because they believe it's part of a clandestine plot by the radical left to turn their kids into communist zombies.

Kidding aside, the decision to take hormone blockers is very serious and can have long-term consequences, and I think is therefore best made by a mature mind.

If public school administrators are a poor choice of potential villain they are at least concrete, unlike the amorphous and untouchable social-media.

I’ll be the first to admit that Mr. Mello is far better at writing fiction than I.

If your story actually happened, it would be empirical to you, not empirical to someone who wasn’t there. — Joe Mello

I forgot to mention that as I was exiting the church yesterday a nun suddenly appeared from behind one of the marble pillars to confront me as I walked down the aisle. Dressed in a habit, she was quite old and frail looking, though her gaze was intense. Those intense eyes that flanked a large hooked nose could stop a buffalo in its tracks, and indeed I paused as if not by my own volition.

She looked me up and down and with a sweet voice said, “We welcome you to commune with our Lord whenever you wish, however, we have a strict policy of no cell phones and no phone conversations in this sacred sanctuary.”

Still deeply flustered by what had occurred only moments ago, I quickly replied, “I don’t have a phone.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, I thought you were speaking to someone a moment ago.”

Curious, I asked, “Did you hear anyone else speaking?”

“Why no, I thought you were using one of those ear gadgets.”

“Did you happen to notice that I was looking at the Virgin Mary in the window?”

“Yes.”

“Did you noticed anything unusual?”

“No. Should I have?”

“Oh no, it was nothing. I’ll remember what you said about no phones. Thank you.” I said while heading back towards the door.

So what do you think I think of your writing? — Joe Mello

That my little story is empirically verifiable, of course.

Spare me the literary criticism, please. :pray: :lol:

So yeah, I took your advice this morning and drove around the neighborhood until I found a church that was open for business. The Church of The Lady From Guadaloupe was having a bake sale for South American refugees. Dia Del Pastel they called it, which means 'Day of the Cake'. My Spanish is not so bueno, but from what I could make out their motto was something like "Baking towards a better future, one cake at a time." I thought it was really sweet and selfless of them to work for the benefit of others in this way.

They were selling cupcakes under a big tent on the lawn in front of the church. It was very windy this morning and as I walked past the tent on the way to the church one of the tent support pegs popped out of the ground and the tent partially collapsed. The collapsed part of the tent caught the wind like a sail and knocked people, tables, and cakes tumbling to the grass. It was a mess. I watched a kid get up from the ground who had two chocolate cupcakes stuck to his head. They were positioned like horns and he looked kinda like Hellboy. I tried my best not to laugh at the whole spectical but it was impossible so I ran the rest of the way up to the church in order to not offend those covered in buttercream frosting and lemonade.

The church was magnificent with huge marble columns on the inside and countless giant stained glass windows. I took a seat and opened myself to whatever love and joy could find me. The sunlight, multi-colored beams of it cascading down from the colorful windows, danced around my head as I stared at a depiction of the Virgin Mary in one of the windows. I kept staring. After a while she seemed to move. At first I thought it was the light moving and reflecting through the glass, but it eventually became clear that she was moving. She turned slightly and looked directly at me. She then began to speak.

"Are you ready?"

More than a little freaked out I managed to meekly ask, "Ready for what?"

"Love."

"What kind of love?"

"There is only one kind of love you fool."

Not sure what to say, after an uncomfortable pause I finally said, "I guess I don't know."

"Come back when you know."

"Okay," I agreed.

I hesitantly got up, saying "Okay, see ya later," and walked out.

Isn't religious nihilism an oxymoron?

The problem with group identity is that it requires an other for the group identity to have meaning. In order to accept everyone you have to give up yourself, in other words, which is funny because we eventually give up our-selves anyway, in the end.

who taught you that becoming religious is merely an intellectual decision of fearful and dumb people. — Joe Mello

No one taught me that.

Read your last post again with an eye on what proof you have to support any of your regurgitations of other skeptics — Joe Mello

Do you know of any religion that relies on empirical validity and therefore doesn't require faith in any authority figures? I don't, but I'm no expert.

How do you know the stories you here about knowing and loving God, mine and so many others throughout human history, aren’t simply True? And if they are simply True, then I am an authority and you are not, but just someone who reads? — Joe Mello

You’re missing the point. The point is that the essential building blocks of religion are a unique metaphysics that require special access from someone like yourself, someone with hard won experience, and someone that can therefore be seen as an authority. The faith is in the authority, not in God. There are other signs of your religious inclinations, such as the way you stress the division between skeptics and believers, your rather extreme arrogance, and even the way you write with isolated sentences for dramatic effect. The curious thing is how openly blatant you are about all this, practically undressing yourself without any assistance from skeptics like myself. That makes it hard for me to believe that you’re for real, because you’re obviously not a complete idiot, and this is all just a simple game you’ve designed for amusement.

It has been amusing.

In your post above you say many things that are not motivated by your intelligence but by your desire to correct me. — Joe Mello

If you’re suggesting that the smart thing would be to ignore you that’s fair.

You make a distinction between “purely personal” and “personal whim” when there is none. — Joe Mello

It’s true that personal reasons may be whimsical, though you mentioned whimsy and “panties in a bunch”, did you not? It’s a challenge to be whimsical when one’s panties are in a bunch, I imagine. I think you know that, and that you deliberately misconstrued my distinction in order to avoid looking foolish. Well, the ship has sailed on that score and no amount of ever-so-tricky word games can steer it back to shore.

To ask me to explain what value is in a logical metaphysical principle, which scientists refuse to consider when it is a principle that gives to us an understanding for the unanswered question how the evolution on our planet happened, is to ask a stupid question, and a question I have answered numerous times already. — Joe Mello

Obviously, my ever-so-evasive friend, that was not the question that I presented for your consideration. I was clearly asking you to explain the value of the topic as a whole, assuming that you judge it to have any value at all, and that includes all posts and not just the so called metaphysical principal. Different discussions containing the same principle can vary in quality, I should not have to point out. Judging from your posts in this topic, you appear to consider the majority, if not the entirety, of posts in this topic to be low-quality. I assume that you assign high value to your own words and the esteemed metaphysical principle, but they comprise only a small portion of the topic.

But fear not, I withdraw the question.

the hearing of a Truth is worth the telling of it — Joe Mello

Capital T truth is based in faith (in authority), that’s why it requires capitalization, and that’s exactly why you appear so desperate to be regarded as some kind of authority.

This thread was getting a lot of traffic when it got moved to The Lounge. — Joe Mello

Irrelevant.

As I have already outlined, I get on a forum and start a very popular thread because I am a different poster than the groupthink regulars, and then a Moderator steps in to stop it for purely personal reasons. — Joe Mello

If identifying yourself as a non-group-thinker means that you're not afraid to say things that are not in sync with a group then I say good for you Joe! But honestly, rebelliousness for the sake of attention isn't all that impressive.

Regarding the move, as I've pointed out, it was done because of low quality. You've pointed out the low-quality posts in this topic more than anyone else. Were you lying about that and actually think that the responses to the OP were generally high-quality?

So, your judgment that this thread was at its end and I had a good run is bogus, ... — Joe Mello

I was trying to be nice and the niceness was genuine, well, somewhat genuine.

... and kinda self-serving if you have never been able to start a thread that lasted. — Joe Mello

I don't follow your reasoning here. No matter.

Some moderator arbitrarily moved this thread. There was no critical thinking involved, just panties in a bunch. — Joe Mello

A moment ago you said it was moved for personal reasons. Purely personal reasons are not arbitrary. They're reasons motivated by resentment or satisfaction rather than whimsy, but whatever the case, again I point out that you appear to judge the topic low-quality yourself, with the exception of your own posts, of course.

If you believe that this topic has value, can you explain its value?

I’ve read every moderator here. They are some weird dudes — Joe Mello

Oh yes. I knew that we could agree on something.

Less remorse makes a person darker?

Millennia of philosophy down the drain! — baker

Just the portion of it that maintains the status quo, and good riddance.

I was being euphemistic, sure, but don't take my word for it, or trust your ability to assess it objectively, I guess, just do a search for 'moved to the lounge' and you’ll soon see how the lounge is a small step from total topic annihilation. My hurt feelings do not change this fact, Joe. I'm no God and my feelings don't alter reality, nor do I require your love in order to be fulfilled. You might argue that my feelings about people and things do actually alter them to an extent and I would not disagree, in my perception of them. But the fact of the matter is that your good topic ended up in the lounge. Nothing can change that fact. Nothing can change the fact that the lounge is historically used as a dumping ground for topics that are low quality but not quite bad enough to delete entirely.

Try to look on the bright side, your topic was popular and attracted participation from a rather large swath of the membership. Your interests were taken seriously and closely examined. You've received both valuable criticism and lavish praise ("You’ve been brilliant" I've recently observed). Not too shabby for your first topic, no, not too shabby at all, so take some pride in what you've accomplished here, learn from your mistakes, if indeed any mistakes were made, and resolve to do better in the future. That's the best any of us can do, my friend.

The lounge is where stupid topics go to die. That’s no reflection on you, Joe. You’ve been brilliant. The topic has been trashed because of the lackluster responses to your spiritual insights.

EugeneW,

You make a lot of declarations about God when you admit that you don’t know anything about him and are confused.

The face you see in the mirror is your face not my face, or everyone’s face.

Go to school. — Joe Mello

You’re not even nice to your followers. If finding God turns you in to such a sourpuss I don’t see why anyone would want to find it.

I guess the Clowns in the Clown Car on this forum drove to my neighborhood and got out.

They threw a lot of pies at me but only hit themselves in the face.

What a mess … — Joe Mello

You are good at constructing feel-good narratives. I’ll give you that.

The role that science plays is useful, needless to say, and the roll that religion plays is also useful, however they are not useful in the same way, right? Do you agree?
— praxis

Yes. Science can't explain that the universe and all in it is there. It only says how stuff inside it behaves without knowing its nature or its origin. You can close all gaps, but that doesn't explain that of which you close the gap. — EugeneW

You say yes but then go on as though they play the same role, the role of explaining the universe. Do you believe that God’s only role and only power is explanatory?

Perhaps I should try to rephrase. Let’s say we have God’s role in one hand, and in the other hand we have the scientific method and its results (earth is a sphere that revolves around the sun, evolution, etc.). The role that science plays is useful, needless to say, and the roll that religion plays is also useful, however they are not useful in the same way, right? Do you agree?

Science replaced the role that God once played. — EugeneW

Now you’re back to claiming that science replaced God. Okay, whatever. Again, I’m rather surprised to hear from a believer that God plays such a minor role as to be replaced by some scientific discoveries.