posted
But since religious belief is a delusion, how can it ever accurately model reality? You're locked into your own view of this just like everyone else. The acceptable outcome of learning to think critically must include letting go of delusions like religion.
Posts: 5957 | Registered: Oct 2001
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posted
I heard a very good preacher tell a story...
Hell is a banquet table, covered in every variety of delicious, perfectly prepared food. Around that huge table sit all of humanity, and they are hungry, oh so hungry. But they can not eat, all the utensils are three feet long and no one can reach their own mouth. So they sit and hate the food, and each other and starve.
Heaven is a banquet table, covered in every variety of delicious, perfectly prepared food. Around that huge table sit all of humanity, and they are hungry, oh so hungry. And everyone takes their three foot utensils and feeds each other and no one goes hungry and everyone is filled with fellowship and happiness.
So, as you say, hell maybe people, but so is heaven.
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And if you don't mind...please make the comparison for "heroin user = believer"...I don't think the bits and pieces that got through were sufficient to understand your point.
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Boots...is the "I was eleven" part mean you've known this story for a long time, or that it is only impressive to children?
Posts: 6683 | Registered: Jun 2005
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These discussions are so weird because often the religious people objecting to being called deluded understand that (conveniently) members of any other religion are deluded. They just have the right one.
A lot of it comes down to how people can and do convince themselves and become irrationally assured that the observable plausibility of their religion is way way more than it actually is. Mormonism gives a good example, too ...
Posts: 805 | Registered: Jun 2009
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quote:Originally posted by Parkour: These discussions are so weird because often the religious people objecting to being called deluded understand that (conveniently) members of any other religion are deluded. They just have the right one.
Has anyone on this thread given you reason to think they believe this, or are you just projecting?
Posts: 9866 | Registered: Apr 2002
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quote:Originally posted by Parkour: These discussions are so weird because often the religious people objecting to being called deluded understand that (conveniently) members of any other religion are deluded. They just have the right one.
A lot of it comes down to how people can and do convince themselves and become irrationally assured that the observable plausibility of their religion is way way more than it actually is. Mormonism gives a good example, too ...
I'll go even further than that. There are lots of things I think are true that I imagine most of my co-religionists don't. In fact, I imagine I'm the only wholly non-deluded person in the world. Furthermore, I'd put pretty good odds down that your particular set of beliefs about what is true are unique as well. And given that everyone disagrees with you, I'd say you're pretty deluded (but then, so am I, objectively).
Which is why labeling people we disagree with as "deluded" strikes me as both silly and counter-productive.
Posts: 2926 | Registered: Sep 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: Boots...is the "I was eleven" part mean you've known this story for a long time, or that it is only impressive to children?
It means it is an old story that most people have already heard by the time they are adults. Old (with rare exceptions) eventually resembles trite. So, both, I guess.
Honestly, you may as well quote "Footprints".
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"The times when you saw only one set of footprints are the times we were both hopping on one foot."
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quote:Originally posted by Raymond Arnold: I had not heard it, and I thought it was clever.
Clearly you have led a sheltered life. Or un-sheltered without access to Readers' Digest. Thirty years from now, you will roll your eyes at it, too.
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The advantage that the long-handled spoons story will always have over the footprints poem is that the image/metaphor actually communicates its point, instead of needing God to show up as a character in the story and tell the reader the point.
That and the fact that it's not printed on a gazillion "inspirational" gift items.
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posted
Being incapable of feeding myself and relying on other people to do so (with utensils that are gigantic relative to me, no less) sounds more like infancy than heaven.
Posts: 1087 | Registered: Jul 1999
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I'm currently on a bit of a "trite humanist things are currently okay" kick.
quote:Being incapable of feeding myself and relying on other people to do so (with utensils that are gigantic relative to me, no less) sounds more like infancy than heaven.
The key difference is that when you're an infant, other people are not relying on you to feed them.
Posts: 4136 | Registered: Aug 2008
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The idea behind the old trite story is one that is valid to this conversation. It's how we treat the people around us that makes this place a heaven or hell.
Tolerance and understanding too may be old and trite. But no mater what your personal beliefs are, being respectful and kind in your approach to other's beliefs helps make this world a better place instead of a worse one.
I don't think that is eye roll worthy.
Posts: 6683 | Registered: Jun 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: And if you don't mind...please make the comparison for "heroin user = believer"...I don't think the bits and pieces that got through were sufficient to understand your point.
The core of the analogy is that one of religion's purposes is making people feel better (and feeling better could include happiness or less sorrowful or better able to cope with life or even some kind of ecstatic experience). Since many religions profess to help people feel better, this seems pretty easy to grasp. People use opiates (and other kinds of drugs) to feel better (which could include euphoric, less in pain, calmer, able to cope, amused, etc).
Your objections don't really address the core of the analogy. There is probably no way to draw an accurate analogy between each feature of each religion and a corresponding feature of drug use, so pointing out the worst features of heroin addiction kind of misses the point.
One could, however, pretty easily make the case that using drugs in order to feel better can lead to some undesirable side effects: you listed some. And then go on to say that embracing an irrational (for the sake of argument, here) epistemology in order to feel better also has some undesirable side effects, like having less time for NFL.
Don't get hung up on the details such as whether church members are likely to debase themselves for a fix. The analogy isn't comprehensive.
I am not really trying to defend the analogy so much as help you understand why you haven't really addressed it.
Is "feeling better" one of religion's purposes? If so, are there fundamental differences in how that works compared to recreational drug use? What about if you assume the point of view that exclusively religious beliefs are pretty much all incorrect? Are those differences still fundamental?
(I think they probably are quite different, even though I take the view that exclusively religious beliefs are pretty much all incorrect. But it's not just because religious people don't tend to resemble rock-bottom drug addicts in various details. Some additional reasons are: if religions make people feel better there can be emotional and social factors that operate differently from drugs; sometimes there is no "feel better" effect from religion but people do it anyway.)
Posts: 4287 | Registered: Mar 2005
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Yeah, there's a reason why that damned "opiate of the masses" quote has such staying power. Moreso once we started getting into the psychology and even the neurology of religion.
We're all quite predictable creatures, frequently in ways we take great pains not to admit to ourselves.
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quote:Originally posted by Raymond Arnold: I'm currently on a bit of a "trite humanist things are currently okay" kick.
quote:Being incapable of feeding myself and relying on other people to do so (with utensils that are gigantic relative to me, no less) sounds more like infancy than heaven.
The key difference is that when you're an infant, other people are not relying on you to feed them.
With my level of dexterity, I'm guessing that they'll end up wearing most of the food I'm supposed to be spooning into their mouths. I'm afraid this heaven business isn't going to work out at all.
Could we all just pinky swear that we'll feed each other instead of ourselves if we're allowed sandwiches?
Posts: 1087 | Registered: Jul 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Jake: Being incapable of feeding myself and relying on other people to do so (with utensils that are gigantic relative to me, no less) sounds more like infancy than heaven.
Why did no one think to grab the fork near the tines, instead of the far end?
Posts: 1080 | Registered: Apr 2006
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Or eat with their hands. Really, the illustration fails on many levels. (And I've never heard it before, and I read Reader's Digest. )
Posts: 7954 | Registered: Mar 2004
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Hey Sean, you want food? Lets make a deal. You feed me, and I feed you, but you see, I think you want this more than I want it, so you have got to feed me twice as much as I feed you, and you have to go first. That's the deal. Take it or starve cause I can find someone else hungry enough to take it.
Why do I sound like a member of the House of Representatives?
Posts: 1941 | Registered: Feb 2003
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quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: The idea behind the old trite story is one that is valid to this conversation. It's how we treat the people around us that makes this place a heaven or hell.
Tolerance and understanding too may be old and trite. But no mater what your personal beliefs are, being respectful and kind in your approach to other's beliefs helps make this world a better place instead of a worse one.
I don't think that is eye roll worthy.
It isn't the idea that is causing the ocular spinning, it is more a sense of (and I admit this is peculiar to me and me in my more cranky phase), "Thanks so much for explaining things to us, Stone_Wolf, because it isn't like you just got here and we have been here for a thousand years and done this already."
Which totally isn't your fault - every one is new when they are new - but it does kinda make me want to slap you a little.
Posts: 11187 | Registered: Sep 2005
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posted
I'm glad my message of tolerance, understanding, respect and kindness is getting through to you boots. Posts: 6683 | Registered: Jun 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Jake: Being incapable of feeding myself and relying on other people to do so (with utensils that are gigantic relative to me, no less) sounds more like infancy than heaven.
Why did no one think to grab the fork near the tines, instead of the far end?
In the story, they are permanently attached to your hands. So good luck using your hands for anything else.
Posts: 11187 | Registered: Sep 2005
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Clearly, I can't slap you. Nor would I if I could. However seriously you want to take the fact that I find you irritating enough to want to*, is up to you.
*Not all the time, just when you are in the "bestowing your valuable wisdom upon the poor people of Hatrack, whatever did they do without me" mode.
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quote:Originally posted by Aerin: I have no respect at all for any of your opinions and I think the majority of the time you're lying anyway.
Lol, wait a second. Why is he supposedly lying all the time?
He is lying about his opinions to keep his true opinions secret for fear that, were they to become known, his true identity would come out. Tom is actually the pope.
Posts: 644 | Registered: Sep 2008
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boots: I'll try and keep that in mind. Is there anything specific you might impart upon me to help alleviate your irritation factor to the point that you don't want to slap me?
Samp: I certainly do have my moments, don't I?
Posts: 6683 | Registered: Jun 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Jake: Being incapable of feeding myself and relying on other people to do so (with utensils that are gigantic relative to me, no less) sounds more like infancy than heaven.
Why did no one think to grab the fork near the tines, instead of the far end?
In the story, they are permanently attached to your hands. So good luck using your hands for anything else.
Could we bend the spoons? Sounds like they'd be plenty long enough to loop back around. Then we could just feed ourselves, which would be a lot less convoluted.
Also, I want the food to be brought to the table by hypoallergenic ponies. On roller skates (the old fashioned kind that use a key. Only the keys are all three feet long, and surgically attached to the ponies' gaskins).
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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Assuming the hands (more precisely, I probably mean fingers) are blocked, it could be difficult to bend them.
Could just smash your face into the food and eat that way though, as undignified as it looks, it would still be better than starving.
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quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: In the story, they are permanently attached to your hands. So good luck using your hands for anything else.
Oh, dear, that's going to make a lot of very important things very difficult.
We are still eating, mind. So ... hmmm. I suppose I would come to deal with that level of intimacy with my friends, but I would rather not come to that level of intimacy with their forks. With which they feed me.
This is not good.
Posts: 831 | Registered: Jul 2005
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"Lately I have come to believe that the principal difference between heaven and hell is the company you keep there." The quote has a 12 volume narrative to back it up, but that's harder to print on a coffee cup.
Posts: 9866 | Registered: Apr 2002
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quote:Originally posted by Aerin: I have no respect at all for any of your opinions and I think the majority of the time you're lying anyway.
Lol, wait a second. Why is he supposedly lying all the time?
He is lying about his opinions to keep his true opinions secret for fear that, were they to become known, his true identity would come out. Tom is actually the pope.
But it's a serious question, though! The notion isn't unique, and I want to know how it's anything other than a reactionary defensive mechanism to tom's methodology.
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SW, based on the anecdote you chose in response, I don't think you understand Sartre's meaning. The point of "Hell is other people" is NOT "people suck and are unpleasant."
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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quote:Originally posted by dkw: "Lately I have come to believe that the principal difference between heaven and hell is the company you keep there." The quote has a 12 volume narrative to back it up, but that's harder to print on a coffee cup.
The summary does it good justice.
All kidding aside, I think a morbid literalism makes metaphor hard for me, and by extension religious considerations more difficult, too. I don't know what to do about this, other than to continue to do the best I can with what is in front of me and -- this is important -- to keep the most splendid people I can find as my friends.
I don't know if I hope for osmosis, or a rough stone being smoothed out by its mates, or what have you. (They are metaphors! Augh! I wilt.) But it will just have to do for now.
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posted
The point of the saying is this: our worldview is perfectly secure until we meet another person.
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Granted it's been over 20 years since I was in the play, but I would have said it (edit: "it" meaning the context of the statement as it fits into Tom's summary, not the play) focused more on self-image than world-view. Although the characters were all self-absorbed enough that for them it probably amounted to the same thing.
Posts: 9866 | Registered: Apr 2002
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quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: What's a gaskin?
I hate to have to be the one to break this to you, Stone_Wolf, but you don't have a chance of getting into Rollerskate Pony Heaven if you're going to remain that ignorant of equine anatomy.
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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quote:Originally posted by Jake: Being incapable of feeding myself and relying on other people to do so (with utensils that are gigantic relative to me, no less) sounds more like infancy than heaven.
I happened to read/hear that one when I was ten or eleven and in charm school/etiquette boot camp. The only thing I felt was frustration that people didn't just eat with their danged hands. It seemed a counter-evolutionary form of profound stupidity.
And I was a most devout believer at the time.
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