EAC: We're doing a good job!

[Keith&Co.]

. So the drawing should be seven blind persons feeling up seven little idols.

well, since theism as an industry seems to be people making up appealing gods to sponsor personal goals, and promote self-justification, it would be better as seven blind men feeling themselves up.
"My god has a big dick!"
"My god IS a big dick!"
"Mine's the biggest!"
"Mine's the hairiest!"
"Mine bends. Does anyone else's bend? And make their pants droop?"
"That's your belt, Josh."

 

[abaddon]

Yes, that's much more specific. And not even just a joke, there's truth in that. Whether a God exists or not, theists should consider "how much of my egoistic self is there in my ideas about God?"

 

[hurtinbuckaroo]

. So the drawing should be seven blind persons feeling up seven little idols.

well, since theism as an industry seems to be people making up appealing gods to sponsor personal goals, and promote self-justification, it would be better as seven blind men feeling themselves up.
"My god has a big dick!"
"My god IS a big dick!"
"Mine's the biggest!"
"Mine's the hairiest!"
"Mine bends. Does anyone else's bend? And make their pants droop?"
"That's your belt, Josh."

But Lion's god's son was hung the best.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Yes, that's much more specific. And not even just a joke, there's truth in that. Whether a God exists or not, theists should consider "how much of my egoistic self is there in my ideas about God?"

God, the afterlife, the specialnessity of life on Earth....

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

Whether a God exists or not, theists should consider "how much of my egoistic self is there in my ideas about God?"

That's what their god are. Isn't it obvious?

 

[abaddon]

Whether a God exists or not, theists should consider "how much of my egoistic self is there in my ideas about God?"

That's what their god are. Isn't it obvious?

I don't know what the entirety of their god-conception is. I don't know that there isn't something in nature that they're pointing at but misdescribing in metaphysical terms. And I don't know how much of that is projection and how much is sloppy description.

"Obvious" is for dogmatists. I don't want any part of that.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

Whether a God exists or not, theists should consider "how much of my egoistic self is there in my ideas about God?"

That's what their god are. Isn't it obvious?

I don't know what the entirety of their god-conception is. I don't know that there isn't something in nature that they're pointing at but misdescribing in metaphysical terms. And I don't know how much of that is projection and how much is sloppy description.

"Obvious" is for dogmatists. I don't want any part of that.

Gods are like art, cinema, books, poetry, no dogma involved.

 

[bilby]

The parable of the elephant is just a massive failure of humility. "All these people with wrong ideas about God, and yet I am one of the few who can see the wider picture and recognise that their disputes are errors caused by differing perspectives".

How awe strikingly humble that position is.

Only Lion can see the whole elephant. He claims. But he has no basis for that claim. It's just egoistic bullshit.

The whole foundation of the parable is that nobody sees the whole elephant. But it depends upon its unevidenced existence. So it's a massive fail. The evidence is that nobody's got the evidence. Well, that's compelling.

 

[Learner]

It doesn't have to be an elephant. The analogy works to all types of scenario's. You could for that matter replace the elephant with the notion idea of pure "chaos" or not - a something or nothing what ever it is in form or not ( i.e. not expecting God or any Intelligent entity to be there). Whereby individual scientist from varying fields are holding a little piece of information.

 

[Keith&Co.]

It doesn't have to be an elephant. The analogy works to all types of scenario's. You could for that matter replace the elephant with the notion idea of pure "chaos" or not - a something or nothing what ever it is in form or not ( i.e. not expecting God or any Intelligent entity to be there). Whereby individual scientist from varying fields are holding a little piece.

Ah. But, no. The scientists all agree that they're trying to sort through the chaos and fit everything together like one big jigsaw. They're cooperating. They know they cannot see the whole, but they can find parts leading to the whole.

The point of the analogy is that the individual theists cannot see the entire elephant and are NOT cooperating to discover what the elephant is. Each one grabs his little piece and proclaims that the ENTIRETY of the object they're all trying to grok IS the tail, the knee, the trunk.

Catholic and Protestant and Buddhist and Shinto and those guys in San Francisco that worship a trolley conductor's hat, they are not seeking a unified field theory on God.

 

[Learner]

They ALL know (according to their respected beliefs) there IS a God to them. What HE actually looks like, so to speak, is where each man grasping on to different parts, individually gets a different image.

(oops I'm just repeating again the same context of original post)

 

[Keith&Co.]

They ALL know (according to their respected beliefs) there IS a God to them. What HE actually looks like, so to speak, is where each man grasping on to different parts, individually gets a different image.

Yeah, a difference they've been historically willing to kill for.
So, the analogy doesn't really work when you try to apply it to the difference in scientific disciplines, does it?

I mean, nice try to pretend that 'the other side is just as bad,' but science STILL isn't the opposite of religion.

 

[ideologyhunter]

It's striking how early church "fathers" took positions that would make them insane outcasts today: St. Augustine was cool with flogging or banishing heretics; Calvin readily pushed to have heretics burned alive; Martin Luther's anti-Semitism was mind-bogglingly malicious. (I know there's more and probably grislier examples.)

 

[bilby]

They ALL know (according to their respected beliefs) there IS a God to them.

But the whole foundation of the analogy is that they DON'T know. They think that there's something, but they know so little about it that their conclusions are completely wrong.

What HE actually looks like, so to speak, is where each man grasping on to different parts, individually gets a different image.

So they know fuck-all of what God actually is. And yet, magically, we may conclude that He is as you, or Lion, or our local pastor claims Him to be. Despite having started from the premise that loads of people are convinced that they know his nature and are utterly and completely mistaken.

Doesn't that strike you as not only a very dubious, even foolish position to take; but also as HUGELY arrogant?

Everyone is wrong about this God entity - except us!

All of this falls short of even indicating that there's anything to any of it. Maybe there's no elephant at all, and the blind men are stumbling around a junk shop. None of them could possibly know - and therefore nor can you.

 

[Keith&Co.]

But the whole foundation of the analogy is that they DON'T know. They think that there's something, but they know so little about it that their conclusions are completely wrong.

Plus, Lion is making a big deal about the 7 blind men touching one creature.
But we can get the exact same testimony if they're all touching seven different elephants.
Or if three are touching an elephant, two a rhino, and two are molesting a hippo.
Or if they're all in an opium den touching each other's asses and marveling at the textures...

There is no 8th position one person can stand in to tell if the team is identifying one god, multiple gods, or no gods. The only thing we actually have is conflicting testimony from the terribly opinionated.

 

[Lion IRC]

And i am very serious. I read, I consider. You and others keep assigning malign intent to my curiosity, which turns out to be bearing false witness again. Tsk tsk tsk. You should not say words about me that are not true. Your god does not like that.

And seriously, these questions are quite genuine. It’s like a book I read and actually care about the plot line and it’s problems and you condemn me for discussing it?


So bizarre. I don’t follow your line of thought there.

Listen. I'm gonna hit the re-set button on several people here whose posts I stopped engaging with because they;
- call you a troll one minute then proceed to act as though they want a sincere discussion with the troll.
- privately drop abusive negative reps on you describing you as a forum pariah and wonder why I don't reply to their posts.
- sucker punch you with feigned interest in discussing the text of scripture then trash the discussion.

There's nothing more pointless than explaining your take on scripture to someone who doesn't care.

 

[Rhea]

Have never called you a troll
Have never neg repped you
Have never feigned interest in a discussion.

You are bearing false witness against me, FTR.

 

[skepticalbip]

But the whole foundation of the analogy is that they DON'T know. They think that there's something, but they know so little about it that their conclusions are completely wrong.

Plus, Lion is making a big deal about the 7 blind men touching one creature.
But we can get the exact same testimony if they're all touching seven different elephants.
Or if three are touching an elephant, two a rhino, and two are molesting a hippo.
Or if they're all in an opium den touching each other's asses and marveling at the textures...

There is no 8th position one person can stand in to tell if the team is identifying one god, multiple gods, or no gods. The only thing we actually have is conflicting testimony from the terribly opinionated.

A better analogy would be seven blind men who had heard a name for some critter like a behemoth but have never seen or felt any evidence of one. They are imagining what the nature of such a critter, if one existed, would be from what little they have heard and a lot of what they have imagined about it.

ETA:
The blind men and the elephant starts with assuming the conclusion that there is an elephant (god) then proceeds to claim that people just don't understand it.

 

[Politesse]

A note: the Blind Men and the Elephant is a Buddhist parable that predates Christianity. I like the way one of the oldest versions, in the Udana, ends:

"O how they cling and wrangle, those who claim
For the preacher and the monk an honored name!
For, quarreling, each to his view they cling.
Such folk see only one side of a thing."

Time moves on, but people don't much change!

 

[atrib]

And i am very serious. I read, I consider. You and others keep assigning malign intent to my curiosity, which turns out to be bearing false witness again. Tsk tsk tsk. You should not say words about me that are not true. Your god does not like that.

And seriously, these questions are quite genuine. It’s like a book I read and actually care about the plot line and it’s problems and you condemn me for discussing it?


So bizarre. I don’t follow your line of thought there.

Listen. I'm gonna hit the re-set button on several people here whose posts I stopped engaging with because they;
- call you a troll one minute then proceed to act as though they want a sincere discussion with the troll.
- privately drop abusive negative reps on you describing you as a forum pariah and wonder why I don't reply to their posts.
- sucker punch you with feigned interest in discussing the text of scripture then trash the discussion.

There's nothing more pointless than explaining your take on scripture to someone who doesn't care.

What about people who constantly bear false witness, accuse atheists of being pedophiles, mentally ill, drug addicts, hedonistic, and suicidal, people who taunt atheists about going to hell, and people who act like smug, superior buttholes all the time? Are you going to hit the reset button on people like that as well?