I just saw a play today. Unfortunately no actor broke a leg.

I mean literally I wanted to see a complex displaced femur fracture. Unfortunately no orthopedic injuries befell the cast.

The literal text of the Bible, taken in isolation without other traditions, texts, and cultural norms has not been the way any major religion has treated the Bible, with the best exception to what I just said being very modern Christian fundamentalism, but even there, that can't fully be said.

You're just going on and on with a strawman that no one who takes biblical critical theory seriously would take seriously.

In Judaism, for example, the oral tradition, is just as prioritized as the Torah, offering explanations well beyond the limited text you cite.

This would be like you citing a Georgia statute and refusing to consider any other statute, federal authority, prior judicial interpretation, or any constitution, and your insisting your interpretation was correct because the literal text says what it says.

Again, of all people you accept that meaning is use. The community that uses those words doesn't slaughter their children and never would, so obviously it means something quite different to them than to how you read it.

But if you're sure the Bible dictates dashing children's heads against stones, then you're right to avoid it and those who embrace it that way.

didn't say it was. I said it suits our more liberal times. In other times it was no doubt understood as showing how a vassal must obey their lord. — Banno

Cite?

Why would I apply a more open interpretation when most likely, at the time, it was precisely the literal one in the text which was trying to be conveyed? — schopenhauer1

This is just incorrect. Fundamental literalism is a reactionary response to perceived threats of the scientific revolution. It's a modern phenomenon.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_literalism#:~:text=Biblical%20literalism%20first%20became%20an,mention%20it%20in%20his%20Encyclop%C3%A9die.

For God to be an ogre demanding obedience, you have to take a very literalist definition and you must assume he decrees without being subject to interpretation.

If, though, you apply a more open interpretation throughout all contexts, your demand for obedience isn't to some angry demanding man in the sky, but it's to a conceptual goodness.

God is fully incorporeal, so what exactly do you propose you're being obedience to?

Rather, the main point is being obedient to god, and being rewarded for doing so. — schopenhauer1

If God is interpreted as Good, then where is the secular/religious distinction you make here?

Biblical interpretation has to be contextualized. If the document is held out as a guide for life, offering a literalist interpretation to derive it's meaning isn't helpful.

By analogy, "No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws" had been taken to mean the state could not regulate abortion in the first trimester.

Where do you see that?

It's how you wish use such documents that comes into debate, and that informs how you'll interpret it, meaning how you use it determines its meaning.

It's a story about obeying one's master, like it or not. Abraham does what he is told, to the point of obscenity, and is rewarded. — Banno

Thank you Rabbi Banno for that comprehensive and contextualized analysis. Thousands of pages and hundreds of years of interpretation crystallized.

That's the pat reply, softening the story for more liberal times It's about fear, submission and obedience. — Banno

In folk pologising for their book? Not so much — Banno

The interpretation I offered that interpreted the story as offering opposition to child sacrifice isn't a new fangled liberal interpretation, which you might have to learned had you been interested in understanding what the story means to those who use it. It's a 5th century Talmudic interpretation.

Meaning is use.

So, if you wish to know what people mean when they speak, you'll have to endure their translations. They speak a different language than you.

No language is better than another.

Yep. It sits in the foundational story of Abraham, who would sacrifice his son because god wills it, glorifying doing what one is told to do over taking personal responsibility. — Banno

If that's what you learn from the parable, then it is.

Others suggest it stands for the proposition that human sacrifice is prohibited. Others as a foretelling of the coming of Jesus.

Google "the binding of Isaac" if you're interested.

What I consider correct is somewhat less imposing and absolute. And even subject to change. — Ciceronianus

Religious debate doesn't lead to absolute rules. Much is debated and remains debated. Rules are also subject to change.

But you know this, so I don't know why you say otherwise.

Which seems to make the what right wants good and what the left wants bad doesn't it? What could be bad about godful rule, and good about godless rule? — Ciceronianus

The prior posts indicated that reliance upon godful rule was bad. One such argument was that godful rule was intolerant, as opposed to godless rule, which apparently is embracing.

The most glaring difference is atheists do not believe they know God's truth. An atheist attempts to know truth through a process of reasoning and that process means we debate with each other until we have a consensus on the best reasoning, and even then that is not the final word. New information can change the reasoning. This is what is vitally important to a democracy versus a theocracy. — Athena

You've not described the decision process of either atheists or theists. There is not a univeral forum of atheists where they gather to debate and then to arrive at a published consensus opinion that holds until such time as better evidence is found. What happens is that people form beliefs through all different sorts of processes and countless conclusions are reached, oftentimes greatly constrasting from one another. You present this idea that atheists have arrived at a consensus that keeps getting derailed by the religious, where all harmony of thought is shaken into disarray by religious people.

What actually dictates conclusions about all issues, moral and otherwise, are a countless array of things, ranging from religiosity to personal disposition to intelligence to regional differences. You could probably explain much of my views from the spot on the globe I was born as much as you could from my religion.

You also present a picture of relgious thought as if there is simply a list of things that are good and bad and I can know if X is bad by looking at the list. From your description, it's as if the religious turn off their brains and have someone else tell them what's what.

Here's an article comparing the American common law to Jewish law related to what to do should you find lost property. It explains the reasoning from both systems, and the argument presented by adherents of both positions. That is, whatever you envision takes place in religious debate is far more complex than you state it is.

https://www.jlaw.com/Articles/avedah1.html

I suppose those sects, if the recognize Abraham as a prophet and believe in the Covenant, would be Abrahamic, but don't know enough about them to say whether they are or not. I suppose it's possible that they don't teach they are "the way, the truth and the life", but understand that traditional Judaism, Christianity and Islam do. — Ciceronianus

We all have our views on what is right and what is wrong regardless of whether we anchor them in religious reasons. Secular views can be as firmly held as religious ones, as I'm sure there's no persuading you to change your view on certain moral issues.

That is, of course most religions consider themselves correct, but so do you.

What you brought up wasn't about confidence in one's own beliefs but of tolerance of other's beliefs. I tolerate the secular, the Christian, the Muslim, and the shaman's beliefs. You're right I disagree with some of them, but so do you.

Christians do not agree with each other about God's truth but that doesn't stop them from believing they know it. — Athena

Do Atheists all not agree as to what is moral and yet still proclaim to know it too?

doubt it. The Abrahamic religions are essentially exclusive and intolerant. It's not possible to reason with those who believe they already know what there is to know because their God has told them so (a felicitous bit of rhyming, if I don't say so myself). — Ciceronianus

This is quite the broad statement, describing the essence of all Abrahamic religions, from Shia Muslims, to Mormons, to Church of Christ, to Reconstructionist Jews and so on.

White people are under threat. Liberals are a threat. The deep state is a threat. Woke is a threat. Law and order are falling apart. Children are disobedient. Story time with drag queens is a threat. — BC

But isn't this a question of who's ox is being gored? You dismiss the right's claims of threats coming from the left as irrational, but you declare the threats perceived by the left coming from the right as a clear and present danger.

The right fears godless rule while the left fears godful rule.

I would only eat the pill if I could still get scurvy. It's the only pleasure I have.

I genuinely am not 100% sure what the point of the education system is or how I would live without school, however I believe that I would further my pursuit of what I find to be real knowledge and life experience and spend my time intentionally with those I love and working towards a greater goal. — pursuitofknowlege

I suspect the vast number of doctors, lawyers, accountants, computer programmers, financial analysts, upper level managers, insurance underwriters, engineers, educators (including philosophy professors) rely upon what they learned in school in their day to day lives. Of course school is not all you need, but it is an important component.

There are also the trades, and maybe you grew up around and learned on your own, but there are plenty of plumbers, electricians, auto mechanics, HVAC repair people and the like that also learned their trade through formal education.

Of course there are values to education beyond the pragmatic, which is the argument for liberal arts education. There are those (like me, for example) who believe it enriches lives in less tangible ways, arguing that we do not require a metric to prove such education has value.

The proof though is in the pudding. Take a look around you at those who decided to forego a formal education and see where they have landed. The stats don't paint a pretty picture for the high school dropout.

There is a particularly foolish trend in rejecting higher education that says the cost of the degrees are not worth the payoff, computing the value of the education against the debt you will be left with, especially those degrees that do not provide directly translatable skills. That is not a good argument against higher education. That is a good argument for why we need to reconsider how education is paid for. Because higher education is a high demand item because it can directly impact your social class, people are willing to take out massive loans for it and the government is willing to provide the money for it. That has resulted in the universities raising their fees to see how much loan money they can extract, and the costs have spiraled out of control, leaving students with debt they cannot ever hope to repay.

My advice would be to find an affordable education. It's well worth it. Like it or not, those who subscribe to the theory that formal education is a waste of time will not be the ones making the important decisions where you live.

I like this thread. It presents a good death watch so we can be on the look out and not be surprised when someone drops off.

My fear though is that one day I'll log on and find my name crossed off from the living. I think I'll feel somewhat slighted, having been alive all this time and then only learning second hand by reading about it on a website. I just feel like something like that deserves an in person conversation, or at least a phone call.

I read Traction, which provides a formula for running a successful business. I read it for work. What motivated me was I wanted to win the race of who got through it first.

In your face Joe.

What's the date of the meeting?

They say that in movies, you can kill as many people as you'd like, but to murder an animal is unbearable for the viewer.

It seems easier to talk about massive slaughters of humans over the years, but 500 year old accounts of animal torture don't sit well.

If I posted a picture of a man on a rack having his limbs pulled from his torso I'd likely get fewer objections than if I posted a dog yelping in pain as he was dismembered.

Just an observation. My recommendation is that neither be tortured, just for the record.

we have already had the personal faults of Descartes and Heidegger (among others probably) dissected on the site. — Baden

Ww dissected the fact he dissected dogs alive.

I have literally like 20 clocks in my house, many of which are the wind up chiming type. I have no explanation for why that is.

When it is time to move the clocks back, it's especially difficult, particularly for those clocks that you have to move the time forward and not back and so you have to revolve an entire day's time to change the time.

There have been occassions where the process of changing the clocks took so long that it was already time to change them back by the time I finished. That resulted in the process beginning again and I stood in my home crying in a blubbering sort of way as I ran perpetually between clocks trying to get them changed so I could be done and finally have some peace and enjoy my sandwich.

Pastrami on rye awaited me. Imagine how difficult that was.

I don't think you should say you saw a ghost because what you saw is doubtfully a ghost.

You might say though that you are influenced by the ghosts of your ancestors. Those are the ghosts I believe in.

From a scientific epistimology, ghosts surely don't exist. I have little respect for those who try to suggest they exist in that way. Those people tend to be charlatans or they are just poorly educated.

If you want to create a pragamatic epistimology, where you have no scientific proof that they don't exist, but you find your life has increased meaning or wonder with the existence of ghosts, I can understand your acceptance of that existence.

That is, I'm not committed to the idea that belief must be premised upon scientific proof, but we shouldn't equivocate with the terms "know" or "exist" if we're buying into pragmatism and not a rigid scientific epistimology but we should use those terms to mean different things in different contexts.

IME, the manifest function of 'US corporate news media' primarily has been to inform the business class & its mandarins (i.e. shareholders) while simultaneously disinforming – infotaining/polarizing – the masses (i.e. stakeholders). This mirrors the K-12 conformative education of their respective children. — 180 Proof

But if you're distinguishing the US system, you'll have to give a counter non-American news outlet that transcends these problems. That is, is Swedish and French (for example) news more accurate, or is it just more predictably consistent with the promotion of those countries' political ideologies?

Do you turn to the Guardian for information because it's more accurate or just because it's your version of FoxNews, ready to tell you what you want to hear?

As outsiders, that European population would see the Trump issue as an American one, — Vera Mont

The world is watching Trump.

By the way - Is there any reason to assume that there are only two "sides" to the American perspective on the Trump problem? — Vera Mont

Yes, there would be a reason. Pro and con. But mabe you're dividing it another way.

That's why I think this is a cultural and/or philosophical problem. Is there really a great deal of demand for unbiased reporting in the U.S.? The "cost" that individuals are willing to "pay" for that kind of reporting seems extremely low. As an Aristotelian I see this as a virtue problem. Those who are not educated in a way that helps them to love the truth do not love the truth, and in America we don't place much value on love of truth. — Leontiskos

Is it an American thing or just a diversity of thought thing? Would a European nation provide both sides of a Trump related issue or would that just not be necessary due to the homogenous view they might have on the topic?

You don't need to use the press as a means to advocate if everyone pretty much already agrees on everything.

The problem is that once upon a time there were very few national news outlets, so entry into the market was difficult. You had to get your credentials and prove your worth if you wanted a microphone in front of you. Reputation was critical, so no outlet wanted to get their facts wrong or appear biased. Ethical reporting was a requirement for survival in the market.

Now all you need is a keyboard and you can publish to the world. What sells is what people want to hear. The ethics exist, but it's not critical to follow them. And so we're left with people just as likely to listen to me or you, regardless of what malice lurks in our minds, as they are to listen to those who have agreed to a code of ethics.

That can't be helped: public services tend to concentrate on serving the public, not special interests. It's biased toward educating the public, regardless of party politics. — Vera Mont

I was listening to public radio last night and the issue being discussed was how to dissuade the Biden protest voters who have said they won't vote for Biden as long as he is supportive of Israel. They acknowledged the genocide that was occurring at the hands of the Israelis, but they were concerned that a Trump administration would be far worse, so the solution is not to refuse to vote for Biden.

Maybe you agree with these sentiments. Maybe you don't. That conversation was not about educating the public regardless of party politics. That was a pro-Biden, anti-Israel, anti-Trump conversation.

The government, whether the prevailing administration is liberal or conservative, can control the financing of these organizations, but not their day-to-day functioning. — Vera Mont

This strikes me as naive.

Trump unilaterally got hydroxychloroquine approved as a Covid medication, over-ruling CDC protocol. That's just one example, but the idea that there's some invisible wall that blocks the influence of Congress, individual representatives and Senators, and the President from administrative decisions just isn't a real possibility.

The right wing doesn't need a publicly funded platform for its propaganda: it has plenty of very large commercial platforms. If a Trump, or any of his ilk gained sufficient power, all public information outlets - along with public schools, clinics and libraries - would cease to exist. — Vera Mont

Except they didn't cease to exist when he was in power.

In any event, I'm not trying to discuss whether Trump poses a threat to democracy. I'm asking what role the press should have in controlling it. I think it's clear that both sides of the political spectrum have their media advocates, from FoxNews to MSNBC. The question is whether that is what the media ought to do.

Public funding should be in place to support the unbiased news organization in cases of threats like that. — L'éléphant

The problem with that is that our best example of publicly funded news (PBS and NPR) is left leaning. Putting the government in charge of reporting the news is a nod toward allowing propoganda. I think the fears here are lessened by the fact that Biden is President, but what would a publicly funded media look like that was ultimately answerable to a Trump administration?

The news organization does not have to listen to that article if the news organization is truly independent. — L'éléphant

If the news organization believes in professionalism, they know what to do. Their judgment should prevail. — L'éléphant

What will prevail is that the supply will meet the demand, meaning that if there is no demand for unbiased or balanced reporting, it won't be in the market, at least not terribly long.

But then also consider the role of Fox Media in the American Political landscape. — Wayfarer

That is actually what I had in mind when I read the NYT story. Fox is transparently lopsided, which makes it an entertainment source, but not a news source. As long as the headline says "Opinion," I think it's fair game to say as you want.

My concern is when those who claim objectivity give up on the idea and instead join the fray, or worse yet, pretend to be fair and balanced but instead have an agenda. It's at that point the Fox News channels of the world get vindicated, proving what they've said all along, which is that the news isn't the news, but it's part of the political process.

Biden has serious age issues. It's not worth denying at this point. To the extent admitting that helps Trump, I'd argue that denying it helps him more, especially when the denying is by people who everyone knows knows better. It's better to admit a flaw than deny it and lose all credibility.

I think all news sources should be held to a minimum standard of accuracy in the reporting of events, statistics, demographic information and quotations. — Vera Mont

I do think there should be journalistic ethics, but this seems to go beyond that. The debate in the article referenced what was reported versus what should be covered up. The report was that a high percentage of the population thought Biden too old to be President, so NYT subscribers were angry that the true report were published because it offered support for the Republican position. They were mad the truth was published because the truth didn't help their cause.

Isn't faith certainty? — Tom Storm

I don't think this is right. People have their faith challenged all the time, and there are times when one has higher or lesser degrees of faith. Perhaps the ideal is that one would walk with absolute certainty in whatever their foundational beliefs are, but I don't think describes most people who think things through. What I'm saying need not be limited to a religious context either, but I'd assume that whatever secular beliefs you hold foundational are occassionally self-questioned. I would also suppose that the committed atheist might have times in the foxhole where they question their previously held beliefs.

I also think this discussion misses an important sort of faith related to deciding to believe not based upon empirical evidence, but upon the consequences the belief tends towards your conduct and success. This pragmatic basis for faith might not be what some mean by faith because it offers a justification for the belief, and some take faith to be just blind acceptance that nothing could shatter.

What I hear from the many accounts here is that a good number have stories of loss of faith, where they began in childhood with a rigid form of faith that amounted to subservience to parents and other adult religious authority, to finally be freed from it in adulthood, finding comfort in sites like this where reverence to such beliefs is not expected.

What might have held those folks closer to their faith was some evidence of its purpose, meaning, or at least utility. It is a type of faith to believe whole heartedly that faith will lead one in the right direction, but it's important too to realize you have to have faith in the correct thing. That means faith is a meta concept, not just a list of rules and regulations. It is the idea that belief in something bigger than one's self is what faith is, with the goal in looking for that, but in being able to abandon the particulars if they don't meet that objective.

Even if my view on faith is peculiar to just me, I still think it responsive to the OP, which was a question generally of what sorts of faith there are. I just reject the idea that faith is best described as what children in Sunday school believe as they just repeat back what they're told.

For formal affairs, I suggest bowtie pasta.

For breakfast: a layer of granola with chocolate chunks followed by a layer of vanilla flavored Greek yogurt, topped with sliced strawberries and blackberries.

For dinner, pork ribs slow cooked in the oven with a dry mesquite rub and then slathered with BBQ sauce and then broiled a short time, served with lime beans.

It was a 9-0 decision, so it's not like this divided on ideological grounds.

The striking down of Roe v. Wade had to do with the Court's rejection of the Constitutional right of a woman to have an abortion up to a certain point in her pregnancy. It was not based upon there being a federal statute that guaranteed the right to an abortion that the Court decided violated the individual states' rights to regulate it.

That is, the Supreme Court's striking down Roe v. Wade wasn't based upon a violation of Constitutional federalist principles. It was based upon their reversing their view that the Constitution itself protected a woman's right to an abortion. It wasn't a state's rights decision.

I didn't read the recent Trump elections case, but I fully expected the decision to be supportive of keeping him on the ballot. From a practical perspective, I think the Court did the left a favor. The quickest way to get a hesitant Trump voter to commit to Trump is to make him think the other side has their thumb on the scale. That's actually why Trump's numbers keep rising with every new lawsuit brought against him.

It also doesn't hurt him that the Democrats are running someone who is brain dead and they think if they deny it everyone will think he's sharp as a tack.

What are others views on such topic from experience!? Can this actually be fixed or improved within organizations in a way that is justifiable? How can it be done so that it is fair and corresponds with everyone? — Born2Insights

I have worked for corporate America, and I would refer to a business as ethical if it adheres to the ethical standards within the system. That is, does it offer protections against rascim, sexism and violence in the workplace? Are the benefits promised (like vacation time, daily work schedule) honored? Do you receive credit where due and are you now blamed for things you did not do? Are you treated with respect and given honest feedback? That it what an ethical environment is to me.

If you're asking whether capitalism is inherently unfair and whether only through a Marxist reorganization can we acheive an ethical work environment, then I don't understand the word "anymore" attached to the OP. That is, if you think capitalism is inherently ethically flawed, then it always has been. I do think capitlistic systems grow more ethical over time, making life in a 21st century factory a more ethical work environment than one built when the industrial revolution was first underway.