So, after all the posts pro and anti religion, can we ask the question, "Are religions, metaphoric representatations of universal potentials, beneficial or detrimental to humanity?"metaphoric representations of universal potentials are beneficial, religions are detrimental I agree. "In the Beginning was the Word, and the Word was Potential"... :-)
So, after all the posts pro and anti religion, can we ask the question, "Are religions, metaphoric representatations of universal potentials, beneficial or detrimental to humanity?"metaphoric representations of universal potentials are beneficial, religions are detrimental I agree. "In the Beginning was the Word, and the Word was Potential"... :-) I agree too. RE: the word. How did that work? No air, no sound? :)
Come on Lausten, you and I both know that the church can’t answer questions like the virginity of Mary. Or the Image of God. They run as fast as they can from these subjects. Both questions are kindergarten questions with very simple answers.
In post #36, I pointed out to you everyone on this thread had placed a view except you. Trying to get your view point on this very, very basic question. Yet you claim that I am not responding. Ask me. What is your question? I will be glad to respond.
Again when I ask about Seth, no answer.
The Image of God is the real question at issue here. As far as CuthberetJ questions. Simple enough. I will take it for granite that we are talking about the OT and NT.
Was God married? To whom?
The NT god had one wife. The OT god had two wives. But that can be argued. So one needs to break down which god and which branch of religion. In all the older branches of religion the gods had a wife and children.
- Since Jesus wasn’t married, should I divorce my wife?
Disagree, Jesus was married. - Since Jesus didn’t have children, should I put mine up for adoption? To Whom?
Disagree, Jesus had children. - If we’re all God’s children, does he love Muslims too?
If you believe in the mystical god, then he does in the NT and there were no Muslims in the OT. - If God loves some of his children more than others, like Christians more than Muslims or Commie Atheists, is it ok if I love one of my kids more than the other? And favor them accordingly?
OT god, yes of course. NT god, I don’t know for sure, but I would think not. - If we are made in God’s image, what about dolphins?
The “god’s image question". The answer would be that dolphin have never been domesticated so they would be considered a wild species. Being created, basically means being domesticated. So no, dolphins were not created by god in the logical thinking. In the faith based thinking, god created everything by the word.
So, after all the posts pro and anti religion, can we ask the question, "Are religions, metaphoric representatations of universal potentials, beneficial or detrimental to humanity?"metaphoric representations of universal potentials are beneficial, religions are detrimental I agree. "In the Beginning was the Word, and the Word was Potential"... :-) I agree too. RE: the word. How did that work? No air, no sound? :) Infinite potential is a property of the universe and hierarchically exist as the Implicate order before it is expressed (Explicated) in reality.
Implicate Order and Explicate Order. http://everythingforever.com/Bohm.htm The Implicate is a higher state of order than Reality, but Potential is an even higher hierarchical order, from which the Implicate order is formed. Bohm then proposes a final state of order, Insight Intelligence". I am certain he did not mean a scriptural God, but an abstract (metaphysical) order of timeless constants, i.e. Cause/Effect, the laws of Mathematics, Pi, and everything else we believe to be a timeless constant necessary for "creation" and "orderly" unfolding of Reality itself. Renate Loll, proposes that spacetime itself unfolds in a fractal manner. CDT (causal dynamical triangulation) a mirror function. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causal_dynamical_triangulation and a illustrative presentation, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rstu3nGdZLs&feature=related
So, after all the posts pro and anti religion, can we ask the question, "Are religions, metaphoric representatations of universal potentials, beneficial or detrimental to humanity?"metaphoric representations of universal potentials are beneficial, religions are detrimental I agree. "In the Beginning was the Word, and the Word was Potential"... :-) I agree too. RE: the word. How did that work? No air, no sound? :) No language, no word. LOis
"In the Beginning was the Word, and the Word was Potential"... :-)I agree too. RE: the word. How did that work? No air, no sound? :) Since when does a "word" need to be spoken to be a "word"? To limit it thus, is just a bit narrow minded.
MikeYohe - 14 June 2015 02:19 PMWrite4U - 14 June 2015 01:35 PM “In the Beginning was the Word, and the Word was Potential"... grinI agree too.
Lois, RE: the word. How did that work? No air, no sound? smile
BreakUp, Since when does a “word" need to be spoken to be a “word"? To limit it thus, is just a bit narrow mindedLOL, I'm sure Lois was beig sarcastic.
I would hope so. Lacking the usual signals of spoken communication, (gestures, tone of voice, and others), I can only go by what is on the screen, and smileys don't help a lot.MikeYohe - 14 June 2015 02:19 PMWrite4U - 14 June 2015 01:35 PM “In the Beginning was the Word, and the Word was Potential"... grinI agree too.Lois, RE: the word. How did that work? No air, no sound? smileBreakUp, Since when does a “word" need to be spoken to be a “word"? To limit it thus, is just a bit narrow mindedLOL, I'm sure Lois was being sarcastic.
Come on Lausten, you and I both know that the church can’t answer questions like the virginity of Mary. Or the Image of God. They run as fast as they can from these subjects. Both questions are kindergarten questions with very simple answers.Which is exactly why I don't discuss them here.
In post #36, I pointed out to you everyone on this thread had placed a view except you. Trying to get your view point on this very, very basic question. Yet you claim that I am not responding. Ask me. What is your question? I will be glad to respond.I don't have a question for you. I made a comment, you quoted it, then talked about something that had nothing to do with my comment. That's annoying.
Again when I ask about Seth, no answer.I don't read most of your posts anymore. I skim for anything interesting. Haven't noticed anything lately.
Write4U
Got me there with the “Potential". To me, I was just using the simple meaning and not reading anything into it.
It was John that made the “WORD" god himself. Before that it was a logos that meant “I say".
To me it is a piece of the puzzle that does not fit in any of the religion stuff. The first gods were animals and stars and none human. How does a star talk or a snake? Well, I guess in the Garden of Eden the snake talked.
The oldest religion using “the word" that we know of is Egypt. And the god Thoth used “the word" to create everything. What is interesting is that Thoth came along after the Egyptian age of the animal gods.
"In the Beginning was the Word, and the Word was Potential"... :-)I agree too. RE: the word. How did that work? No air, no sound? :) Since when does a "word" need to be spoken to be a "word"? To limit it thus, is just a bit narrow minded. When is a good question for the timeline? History starts with the written word. Only spoken words are part of pre-history. All the older Genesis stories are pre-history. Only the OT’s Genesis could be argued as done in history time.
The original Greek has ‘logos’ in John 1:1.
‘Logos’ has a very broad spectrum of meanings, from ‘word’, ‘concept’, to ‘law of nature’.
Wikipedia]:
Logos (UK /ˈloʊɡɒs/, /ˈlɒɡɒs/, or US /ˈloʊɡoʊs/; Greek: λόγος, from λέγω lego "I say") is an important term in philosophy, psychology, rhetoric, and religion. Originally a word meaning "a ground", "a plea", "an opinion", "an expectation", "word", "speech", "account", "to reason" it became a technical term in philosophy, beginning with Heraclitus (ca. 535–475 BC), who used the term for a principle of order and knowledge. Ancient philosophers used the term in different ways. The sophists used the term to mean discourse, and Aristotle applied the term to refer to "reasoned discourse" or "the argument" in the field of rhetoric. The Stoic philosophers identified the term with the divine animating principle pervading the Universe. Under Hellenistic Judaism, Philo (c. 20 BC – AD 50) adopted the term into Jewish philosophy. The Gospel of John identifies the Logos, through which all things are made, as divine (theos), and further identifies Jesus as the incarnate Logos. Although the term "Logos" is widely used in this Christian sense, in academic circles it often refers to the various ancient Greek uses, or to post-Christian uses within contemporary philosophy, Sufism, and the analytical psychology of Carl Jung. Despite the conventional translation as "word", it is not used for a word in the grammatical sense; instead, the term lexis (λέξις) was used. However, both logos and lexis derive from the same verb leg (λέγω), meaning "to count, tell, say, speak".See here ]for John's use, here ]for an even longer discussion about John 1:1.
Come on Lausten, you and I both know that the church can’t answer questions like the virginity of Mary. Or the Image of God. They run as fast as they can from these subjects. Both questions are kindergarten questions with very simple answers.Which is exactly why I don't discuss them here. But I will. The virginity of Mary. In the first four hundred years of the Christian Church there was several different roads of belief. One was that Mary was a virgin. She could still have sex and kids. That was because she was also a god. And gods at that time could have kids and sex and still be a virgin. And they were talking about Mary the Magdalene, the wife of Jesus. It was at the Council of Ephesus in 431 that the Church decided that Jesus was better off without a wife and they made Jesus’s mother the Virgin Mary. The image of god. The problem is as you probably have guessed. There were no human gods in the beginning of the Age of Deities.
Write4U Got me there with the “Potential". To me, I was just using the simple meaning and not reading anything into it. It was John that made the “WORD" god himself. Before that it was a logos that meant “I say". To me it is a piece of the puzzle that does not fit in any of the religion stuff. The first gods were animals and stars and none human. How does a star talk or a snake? Well, I guess in the Garden of Eden the snake talked. The oldest religion using “the word" that we know of is Egypt. And the god Thoth used “the word" to create everything. What is interesting is that Thoth came along after the Egyptian age of the animal gods.But you are still speaking of metaphor. "The Word" is nothing more than the condition (BY ANY NAME) which allowed for the creation of the universe. Bohm used the Word, "Insight Inbtelligence", but he was not referring to a sentience, but a pseudo intelligence formed by universal constants, such as Cause/Effect, Action/Reaction, Mathematical functions, etc. The term The Word means nothing in and of itself. This is why Lois asked the question "what language?". IMO, it is the language of the universe, which we can understand and teach with our own (universally understood) language of physics. @Lois, That's it, Lois, it was the "language of physics" and all physicist are able to speak it without misinterpretation or need for metaphors. The beauty of the language of physics lies in our ability to also present it metaphorically with any appropriate example. I attempt to do that all the time, because I am not a physicist. IMO, the word Potential accurately defines the metaphor of God. There is no difference between the concept of God the Creative Enabler, and Potential, the inherent latent abilities of everything physical and metaphysical. Philosophically, the definitions (varieties) of Potential is fundamental for the existence and evolution of the Universe. Let me attempt a metaphor. A fractal is one of the simplest geometric forms. Simple duplication (reiteration) is one of the simplest causal commands. But when a fractal is reiterated a sufficient number of times, we can build the fabric of spacetime. This is what I understood from the above links. CDT, causal dynamical triangulation has the Potential for infinite expression in reality. Most all early forms in the universe were fractal reiterations (RNA). Today we can see this in almost every feature of the old universe and still in several old organisms on earth such as the fern. Its DNA has a fractal reiteration command. The problem is that the universe and everything in it multiplied in an exponential form and the fractal commands were not sufficiently energy efficient for instant variety in every iteration of living organisms. Thus the fractal function was augmented by the introduction of DNA from TWO parent genes (different fractals), which afforded an instant variety in the process of duplication (iteration) from the dual DNA commands. It sped up the evolutionary diversity by factors which I cannot even imagine. How many different individual organisms have lived and died in the history of the earth alone? Unimaginable numbers, each individual iteration producing slightly (but uniquely) different varieties.. Thus one might say that the inherent Potential of a fractal makes it equal to a metaphorical creative god. The God of Fractals. I really like this word Potential. IMO, it is the WORD in all languages. It is the only god which is supportable by the god of science. How many other metaphors describe the properties of god better than the scientific language? NONE. Potential = That which may become expressed in reality. It is a non-moral statement of an implaccable condition and mechanism which is the common denominator of everything. Everything that ever existed was preceded by Potential. Philosophically the word Potential describes a profound universal quality, IMO
The original Greek has 'logos' in John 1:1. 'Logos' has a very broad spectrum of meanings, from 'word', 'concept', to 'law of nature'. Wikipedia]:Very interesting, I read this and it seems to fundamentally describe a method information sharing . I can identify with that, but IMO, Potential IS the information beig shared, the Implicate of that which may become reality. The language of expression in metaphorical reality is Logos, not Potential, the word which already existed prior to the implied information. But in metaphorical reality the deliverer of the message is Logos. In physical reality, Science is the messenger of Potential. Potential is the word the message is. Logos and Science, the messengers are.Logos (UK /ˈloʊɡɒs/, /ˈlɒɡɒs/, or US /ˈloʊɡoʊs/; Greek: λόγος, from λέγω lego "I say") is an important term in philosophy, psychology, rhetoric, and religion. Originally a word meaning "a ground", "a plea", "an opinion", "an expectation", "word", "speech", "account", "to reason" it became a technical term in philosophy, beginning with Heraclitus (ca. 535–475 BC), who used the term for a principle of order and knowledge. Ancient philosophers used the term in different ways. The sophists used the term to mean discourse, and Aristotle applied the term to refer to "reasoned discourse" or "the argument" in the field of rhetoric. The Stoic philosophers identified the term with the divine animating principle pervading the Universe. Under Hellenistic Judaism, Philo (c. 20 BC – AD 50) adopted the term into Jewish philosophy. The Gospel of John identifies the Logos, through which all things are made, as divine (theos), and further identifies Jesus as the incarnate Logos. Although the term "Logos" is widely used in this Christian sense, in academic circles it often refers to the various ancient Greek uses, or to post-Christian uses within contemporary philosophy, Sufism, and the analytical psychology of Carl Jung. Despite the conventional translation as "word", it is not used for a word in the grammatical sense; instead, the term lexis (λέξις) was used. However, both logos and lexis derive from the same verb leg (λέγω), meaning "to count, tell, say, speak".See here ]for John's use, here ]for an even longer discussion about John 1:1.
If a word is spoken in a forest and no one is around to hear it, is it a word?
Lois;)
If Mike and Write are speaking, does anyone care?
If Mike and Write are speaking, does anyone care?Well, excuse meeeeeeeeeee...... Enthrall us with your knowledge and acumen . If you think I am wrong, correct me if you can. I welcome a healthy debate on the issues. But don't undermine Mike's or my posts by insinuation. It's a veiled ad hominem and it doesn't become you. I used to care a lot what you were saying, but considerably less so now.
If Mike and Write are speaking, does anyone care?If no-one reads the posts, have they really posted anything?
I used to care a lot what you were saying, but considerably less so now.Interesting, I usually come at forum members from the opposite direction. I discount everything till I start finding something interesting posted, but too many times I don't.