Tom Storm

Is there anything much to unpack here? Look at the trajectory of most political and historical decisions. This demonstrates that what dominates is not...

Alcohol and tobacco are legal drugs and are two of the most harmful substances available to people. It's clear that policies of interdiction and prohi...

Ok. Does it actually say that in the Bible or is this your interpretation? Any reason why we should take these myths more seriously than any other tra...

Sorry, I have no idea what you mean and how you arrived at that. Citations?

Don't know, I think repetitive activity and movement appeals to some people. English travel writer Bruce Chatwin described this phenomenon too - the n...

To me all apolitical means is someone who is not interested in politics. The fact that they hold values and beliefs is a separate matter. An apolitica...

I wasn't aware I had given an actual argument. I simply made the observation that a bad person may produce good things, which can be bundled with a nu...

Ok. Well then I don't know what this debate is about. I thought the central focus was about whether H's work is contaminated or undermined by his Nazi...

Really? It seems implied in relation to Mr H.

I don't hold to a view that because someone may be problematic that this bleeds into all their activities. But this is for a different thread.

We're free to speculate and fantasize, why not? For me, atheism doesn't seek to explain anything. While it might posit that there are better explanati...

All we ever get to in these sorts of threads are, 'Heidegger was a philosopher of genius with significant flaws.' Not such a remarkable observation. A...

But god doesn't explain anything. When we say god created the world, it's equivalent to saying, 'the magic man did it.' God as a (pseudo) explanation ...

Yes, but I think the point being made in response is that aesthetic appreciation is subjective. We don't all appreciate or like the same things and no...

I generally hold the view that if there is a god they are either somewhat powerless or a cunt. But who are we to use puny human logic on such complex ...

Most atheists I have known would not say there is no god. They are more likely to say that they are unconvinced that there is. As an atheist, I am unc...

I think there is a bigger problem than this. If creation is the product of good god, then why did this god conceive of and build a system wherein bloo...

I imagine I could believe in something I knew to be true. But I don't think I would be worshipping anything.

Good question. I should have said 'I don't know if there are no gods.'

Agree. I never really know what people mean when they refer to god/s - the idea seems incoherent and convoluted. And you're right, a significant probl...

Hitchens tells us that pork cooking smells the closest to human flesh cooking. Probably tastes similar. I eat meat but I’m not a big fan. Rather sausa...

:fire: :wink:

Father RIchard Rohr is interesting. Of course much of the church finds him boarding on the heretical.

I don't know. I'd like to think so, but I imagine it's a combination of (not always available) protective factors that impacts upon a person's recover...

Thanks for both responses. Will check out the podcast. The Black Notebooks were probably a game changer.

I guess there's a scientific counterpart to alternative facts going on.

Maybe a diversion, but do you have a strong sense why Nazism appealed to H? What do you think was in H's process that allowed Nazism to fit comfortabl...

What percentage is faithful then? 60%, 40%, 2%? And the percentage that is not faithful - how does this reinterpret or efface the percentage which is?...

I think part of the problem is that people sometimes write putative soul-searching OP's along these lines without us having the benefit of knowing whe...

Interesting. In my experience people with depression are just as likely to get things wrong but the tendency is towards catastrophic underestimation a...

Sounds right. I was involved with various groups affiliated with the Theosophical Society for about ten years. Pretty much what I saw. Interesting too...

What do you make of the syllogistic proof above?

I don't see how these premises stack up and besides I would need more than an eccentric syllogism to establish non-dualism as a fact. I suspect we're ...

Interesting 180. I've never fully appreciated Spinoza's natura naturans but I am assuming (and forgive the crude summary) this monist view is an accou...

Easy mistake to make. The Nazis in Mary Poppins are played by the Disney family.

Hmm, is it the Blessed Virgin, or a shepherdess playing the panpipes?

That's beautifully expressed. Probably belongs in the Certainty thread too.

Lots of people make claims with 100% certainty - like many ordinary Christians or Muslims - they may also be 100% wrong. How would we know? There are ...

If you are referring to unfalsifiable propositions then we can include all manner of claims: ghosts, alien abduction stories, and most variations of c...

Perhaps they are golems and someone has removed their 'shem'. :wink:

Nice. Agree about this being a fixed thread or sticky.

Did you feel the same about Star Wars: The Phantom Menace and the appearance of Jar Jar Binks?

Yes, it was popular here. I was a big fan... 'Hey Rocky, watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat...' I think the voice over narrator was William Conrad w...

My favourite show back in 1970. Marine Boy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5v8OJY2CPEU

I loved Japanese cartoons - Gigantor, Marine Boy, Kimba the White Lion, The Amazing Three... As for US cartoons, I was addicted to Scooby Doo when I w...

Yeah. We ran the same TV shows continually (we only had 3 networks) from the 1960's until the 1980's. A type of eternal recurrence with a laugh track.

Sounds like the same American TV we all watched in Australia in the 1970's - Have Gun Will Travel, Mr Ed, The Cisco Kid, My Favorite Martian, Bewitche...

So let's say that for many god is experience and metaphysical speculation, what of it? Is it this? This seems to come direct from Peterson country. I'...

I think this formulation works for me reasonably well. Over the years, in jail and outside, I have met a lot of people conveniently called 'bad'. This...

Sounds about right. I can make little substantive sense out of anything much Peterson says - he frequently seems incoherent. But perhaps it's because ...