> On 4 Jun 2018, at 19:12, John Clark <[email protected]> wrote: > > On Mon, Jun 4, 2018 at 10:38 AM, Bruno Marchal <[email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: > > > From -500 to +500, theology has progressed a lot. > > I'd like to see some examples of that.
Pythagorus, Heraclitus, Parmenides, Plato, Moderatus of Gades, Plotinus, Proclus, Porphyry, … Damascius. That describes the main theologians responsible for the progress in Occident. But Damascus was the last platonic scholars, and after him, the Plato Academy is close, and theology is stolen by the pseudo-politics and becomes an instrument of power only preventing the research. The neoplatonicians will move to Middle-East, leading, notably to the Enlightenment of Islam, and the development of science, including the translation of the greeks, up to the 11th century, where, unfortunately, there too, theology is abandoned to the political power. Al Ghazali, notably sided with those who subdued reason to the texts, unlike the neoplatonician, like the muslim Bektashis or the Alevis who subdue the interpretation of text to reason, and forbid the literal readings of the “Book”. Still, all that Islamic and Jew enlighten period will go through to Europa, and bring science again at the academy, but not completely, as theology remains in the hand of the institutions. > Religion didn't progress logically it just got dumber. Moses didn't claim to > be God, Jesus did. And the entire crucifixion thing is comically stupid. God > can do anything but He can't forgive the human race because one of them ate > an apple when He told them not to, so he arranged to get his son (who was > really Him) to get tortured to death by those same humans, after that God > gained the ability to forgive mankind. If this is true then God is an > imbecile.... Hmm ... now that I think about it that could explain a lot. > And moral teaching declined as well. As cruel as the Old Testament God was at > least when you were dead you were obliterated and He stopped messing with > you, but if you place one toe out of line the New Testament God will use all > His infinite power to torture you in fiendish new ways for an infinite number > of years (the Bible does not make it clear if that infinity is denumerable or > not but considering His sadistic nature my guess would be it is not) > I am talking about theology, the science. It has no sacred texts, no legend, nor even myth (except for Plato, who relies of them for pedagogical purpose only, but has been misunderstood on this by some school of thought). > > >> >> Leibniz invented the silly catch phrase but, as is customary whenever >> scientists put on their philosopher's hat, he was rather vague (and Bruno >> even more vague) > > > Not at all. There is not one statement I make which is not a precise > > Then tell me, which unique person is Mr. YOU after Mr. You is no longer > unique? By the first person indeterminacy I cannot know, in Helsinki, which one I will feel to be. After, you must ask them the question personally, or read their diary. > > >> about what "primary matter” means; and that's why specialists in the > study of matter, physicists, have never found the idea useful. > > > Solving fundamental question is not necessary useful, or not directly > useful. > > By “useful” I don't just mean the ability to make a better can opener, I also > mean the ability to pry out more secrets about how the universe works, Assuming that there is a universe. But that is an hypothesis in theology/metaphysics which contradicts computationalism. > and Leibniz's idea has never been shown to be able to do that. That wouldn't > be so bad if it could do other things but "primary matter" can't seem to make > a better can opener either. Indeed. But most people confuse it with matter. > > > Free-will is often defined by an ability to do something randomly, > > Free-will is NOT often described that way, I have but I've never heard anyone > else do so; I like it because, although it is not useful to the slightest > degree it is one of the very few free will definitions that is not pure > gibberish. > > > but that is impossible > > Randomness is impossible? What law of logic demands that EVERY event have a > cause? Rationality. But it is not the idea that randomness does not exist, or that some event might have no cause. What is irrational is to call that principle in any explanation. It is like confusing an UFO with a design by an alien. An UFO is just a flying object that we have not been able to identity. We can’t use that to invoke God or Alien in the explanation. The same for “no cause”. It means only: we don’t see the cause yet. Postulating no cause is the way to proceed for the irrationalist and wishful thinkers. > > > that is just, imho, a very bad definition. [...] Free-will is the > ability to say no to God > > Speaking of bad definitions... there is no God... but if there were then > being omnipotent Omnipotence makes no sense all by itself. Ig God exist, it is not omnipotent, nor omniscient. Patrick Grim wrote a convincing book showing that omniscience is meaningless. Bruno > He would have the ability to cause us to want to say yes to Him... and if God > is not causing us to say stuff then there are only 2 possibilities: > > 1) Something other than God is causing us to say no and therefore saying no > was deterministic. > 2) Nothing caused us to say it and therefore saying no was random. > > John K Clark > > > > > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]>. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]>. > Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list > <https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list>. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout > <https://groups.google.com/d/optout>. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. 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