--- In [email protected], "John" <jr_...@...> wrote: > > --- In [email protected], TurquoiseB <no_reply@> wrote: > > > > --- In [email protected], "Hugo" <fintlewoodlewix@> wrote: > > > > > > --- In [email protected], "John" <jr_esq@> wrote: > > > > > > > > Because to borrow a phrase from Descartes, "I think. > > > > Therefore, I am." In MMY speak, we as well as the > > > > universe/nature operate in the following triune synergy: > > > > we are the knower; we are the process of knowing; and, > > > > we are the known. > > > > > > Is it just me or does this not even make sense on it's > > > own terms let alone in an argument about the possibility > > > of life on other planets. > > > > I honestly think that the issue is that what you > > are trying to make sense of doesn't make any sense. > > > > John is reciting catechism. He's repeating buzzphrases > > that he considers magical, not only as an replacement > > for thinking, but to *prevent* thinking. He's like > > those terrorists who shout out the names of Allah > > believing that the unbelievers hearing them will be > > paralyzed by their mighty Woo Woo. > > > > I'd like to think of JohnR as a rational human being, > > but in all the time I've been participating on FFL, I > > have seen no indication that he is one. He's FAR more > > of a TB than Nabby, and IMO is the "poster child" of > > TM True Believerism. *Not once* have I seen him able > > to think for himself or do anything other than repeat > > some kind of buzzphrases or catechism.
John, like Willytex and Judy, you are not worth a reply, but some of the content is, so I'll riff on it, for fun. Y'know...fun...that thing you don't seem to know the meaning of. :-) > Barry, you're too busy lusting for virgin girls that > you've lost reason and logic altogether. Cite evidence for this. I'll wait. It'll be a long wait. I've never had sex with a virgin in my life and never hope to. Anyone I have "lusted after" in my writings here left their virginity behind decades before I encountered them. You're just doing *exactly* what I said you do above, and repeating a buzzphrase invented by Edg out of *his* suppressed desire to take advantage of young girls. > For example, you claim to be some kind of a "Buddhist"... Au contraire. I have said many times that I am NOT any kind of Buddhist. I am a member of no sangha, and have never "taken refuge." I just like some of the Buddha's thoughts on things, and think they had a clue. > ...but you don't necessarily follow all of its precepts, Note the carefully-chosen words "some of his thoughts on things." I pick and choose. If you feel unable to do so with the people whose ideas you like, that's your problem, not mine. > ...nor even know the implication of the Buddha. Meaning, because this is you writing, "*my* interpret- ation of 'implication of the Buddha,' because that's the right one, the correct one, the Truth." Sure, dude...and you can predict the future using Jyotish, but choose not to do so because...uh...because...uh... because you won't. :-) > MMY as well as other gurus consider the Buddha to be an > incarnation of Vishnu or Krishna. I consider Maharishi an incarnation of Donald Duck. There are quite a few people who have agreed with me after I did my impression of him, doing a MMY speech in Donald Duck's voice. Does that make us a religion? Does it make our "considering" true? Learn some fuckin' history, dude. The Hindus and the Vedic ripoff artists were *jealous* of the Buddha, because so many people they were formerly ripping off and sucking dry financially to pay for yagyas and their intercession with the "gods" were converting to Buddhism right and left. To stop the mass exodus, they "co-opted" Buddha and declared him an incarnation of Vishnu. Didn't work then, doesn't work now. > So, there is a deep connection between Buddhism and > the other mainstream religions. And you say *I* have "lost reason and logic altogether?" Please explain for me how citing Hinduism's co-opting of the Buddha has any relationship to "the other main- stream religions." I'll wait. :-) You've been talking bullshit to people without the discrimination to know that it *is* bullshit so long that you think you can get away with it here. I'm just taking a few moments to point out that you can't. As *you* say below, put up or shut up. Make a case for Buddha and his thoughts having a "connection" with "the other mainstream religions." > So, why is it that you continually attack all people for > having faith in their religious systems? I don't actually. I merely point out that many times they don't *know* that faith is all that they have. They speak as if the faith was fact, when it isn't. I'm FINE with someone having faith, as long as they know that's what it is. I cry bullshit when they try to present that faith as fact, as you do and as others do here. > I've asked you before to state your criteria for your > beliefs. And, you have failed to do so. I could say: > put up or shut up. My bet is that you cannot "put up and shut up" on *this* claim, either, John. Find and repost *any* post on FFL in which you have asked me this. My bet is that you cannot produce such a post, because you made this claim up. But since you have asked now, I'll answer. The criterion for the things I believe is that I believe them. Period. I don't feel the need to "cite authority" to believe in them, and I don't feel the need to convince other people to believe them. But the most important thing is that I *understand* that many of the things I believe are silly or ludicrous, seen from the point of view of science or other belief systems. And that's just FINE with me. You really don't seem to understand that *your* beliefs can be viewed as just as silly or ludicrous, and that *that* is FINE. No one on earth is required to take you and your beliefs seriously just because you hold them. Same for me. Poke as much fun at mine as you want; chances are I'll laugh at them with you. You seemingly cannot. I am suggesting that this is a failing on your part, and that you'd be a lot happier if you just Lightened The Fuck Up. > But on the other hand, we all know that you're just > whistling Dixie. I *sm* just whistling Dixie, in that I treat the things I believe as what they are -- mere ideas. They're toys, and I play with them in my writing. I don't take them terribly seriously, and do not ask anyone else to. You do. You *demand* to be taken seriously. In another post you said something like "it is necessary to see things both from the point of view of science and religion to get the full picture." And you said it as if that were some Truth you were benevolently passing along to Hugo. It is NOT necessary. What you are trying to say is that it is necessary *for you*. And you're projecting your unease at being able to view your religion critically onto others, as a failing. I see the ability to view one's beliefs critically as just as important as the ability to hold them in the first place. With regard to what you said in that post, that science and religion are not mutually exclusive, I agree most heartily. The only question in such a symbiotic rela- tionship is which component is "driving." I don't think that there is a single person on this forum who does not feel as I do that in your case religion is driving. You consistently paint bulls-eyes around arrows; you start with an assumption from the world of religion, and then try to make science "fit" it, using any means you can think of to do so. That is NOT the graceful co-existence of religion and science; that is the attempt to impose the tenets of religion *onto* science. I'm poking fun at you to see if you have the capacity to Lighten The Fuck Up, John. I don't CARE what you believe; I'd just like to see you having a little more fun believing it. And that's never going to happen IMO as long as you demand to be taken as seriously by others as you take yourself. And if you claim I'm wrong about this, here's a "put up or shut up" task for you. We all know how seriously you take your interpretation of the "Vedic literature," so seriously that you feel there is no other possible interpretation of it but what you see in it. Well, I presented a different interpretation of the Ramayana in: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/message/249800 You didn't even comment. Do so now, Mr. Put Up Or Shut Up. My little comedy riff is the plot of the early chapters of the Ramayana, verbatim. Just seen from a different point of view, that's all. I chose to focus on the fact that the actual plot *is* soap opera. All you have to do in this put up or shut up task is to present reasons why this point of view is not *just* as valid as your own interpretation of the Ramayana. You won't be able to do so. Above you claimed that I would not respond to your feeble, name-calling challenge. But I did, just because it presented the opportunity to have some fun writing about stuff. I think I can predict that you, in contrast, will be unable to take up the gauntlet of my put up or shut up task, and react to someone poking a little fun at a book with a soap opera plot that you consider "holy" or "scripture, and come up with any rational reason why my soap opera view of it is inappropriate or "bad." The ball's in your court, Chucko. Let's see what you do with it... Hint: Allowing your designated pinch-hater to respond for you isn't the same as responding yourself. :-)
