141 replies to this topic

[Robert B]

All this talk about Dawkins gets me excited that you're talking about Daryl Dawkins for one second before disappointment sets in. He was a basketball player nicknamed "Chocolate Thunder" who used to be announced in introduction as being from "Planet Lovetron". He is one of my favorite learned man or thinker and one the many reasons why the NBA is better than whatever professional sports league you like best.

Edited by Robert B, 03 May 2012 - 05:28 PM.

[Jim Ohara]

Robert just reminded me of another favorite learned man:

(Charles barkley)

[Arjan Dirkse]

I think a good media trainer could do wonders for Dawkins. I think his speech patterns rub some people the wrong way, but that is probably something be was born with, in his genes so to speak. Or born into.

He often gets pushed into corners in interviews with Christians like Billl O'Reilly, who feel they have to score points by claiming that Dawkins is calling Christians in general stupid. But this interview, with one of the leading scientists working for the Vatican, in the lion's den so to speak, shows a gentler and truer side of Dawkins:

[Jim Ohara]

I hear that a lot but I don't see it. Can you explain what it is that makes him obnoxious?

Critizing the church without acknowledging all the good churches do in the world. And how religion is a wonderful thing for many people in their daily lives.

[Henry Blanco]

How do atheists do harm?

Is an atheist incapable of doing harm by virrtue of his or her being an atheist?

I guess I'm just tired of being blamed for the Spanish Inquisition and the Crusades.

Reminds me of this:

Beautiful.

[Russell H]

I guess I'm just tired of being blamed for the Spanish Inquisition and the Crusades.

Then you shouldn't have done them, you rotter.

[Arjan Dirkse]

Is an atheist incapable of doing harm by virrtue of his or her being an atheist?

I guess I'm just tired of being blamed for the Spanish Inquisition and the Crusades.



Beautiful.

Of course they are capable of doing harm, but let's not get into hypothetical scenarios...I was wondering about the harm these new atheists do. A real example of real harm, rather than "their disagreement offends my sensibilities." People who rally against them like O'Reilly or Church leaders sometimes depict them as some kind of spiritual vampires who want to take away any joy or sense of purpose religious people have in their lives, which is nonsense. Most of the stuff that is discussed on an atheist forum that I visit is just about the abuses and the role of the Church in politics and public life. It's not about one's individual choice of religion or lifestyle, which is sacred, to coin a phrase.

And you're not that old that I'd blame you for the crusades.

Edited by Arjan Dirkse, 03 May 2012 - 09:32 PM.

[Will Carper]

Fucking dickheads, all six of them.

...

Nah not really of course. Nagarjuna I haven't read myself, but it's on the metaphorical pile.

What I've read of Nagarjuna is his exegesis of Buddha's teachings, which it seems you're already quite familiar with.

Jung I like for his breakdown of the self, but I'm not as convinced of his belief in the immutable properties of archetypes and the "collective unconscious" as a whole. I think that stuff's collective because we create and then distribute it, not that it's already there, so to speak. But he's a fascinating man. I'm reading some of his essays now.

My favorite living thinkers are these guys:



"In the past you picture an event like a black tie, what's the last thing you expect to see? Black guys/What's the life expectancy for black guys? The system's working effectively, that's why" ("Murder to Excellence")



His whole bit on being white and time travel. Paraphrasing: "A white guy can go back to ANY time period, and it'll be awesome. A black guy can't go past 1980."




Respect to a woman not afraid to voice the sometimes violent thoughts of an oppressed class. Seriously, I was playing her at the store, and a guy asked me what I thought of her "support" of the Tamil Tigers? I don't know, man. Hard not to understand the anger, though. Easy to talk about peaceful social movements as an American.

[Chris D]

procrastinator!

I'm sure there's a really great way to respond to this but...I don't know, maybe I'll figure it out later.

Edited by Chris D, 03 May 2012 - 09:42 PM.

[Arjan Dirkse]

What I've read of Nagarjuna is his exegesis of Buddha's teachings, which it seems you're already quite familiar with.

Ha well it's a lot to take in...I've just read some stuff, the Buddha's teachings as a whole probably takes up a small library.

I've been gripped by Dogen, the founder of the Soto Zen school who lived 700 years or so ago. Moon in a Dewdrop is a nice collection of some of his most important writings. A nice modern introduction to Zen Buddhism is DT Suzuki's Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind. Another book of DT Suzuki, Introduction to Zen Buddhism, had a foreword by Carl Gustav Jung, by the way.

Another book I've returned to a few times is Thubten Yeshe's Introduction to Tantra, he was a wonderful writer who made the somewhat more nebulous Tibetan version(s) of Buddhism accesible to a Western audience when it became popualr in the sixties and seventies.

[Will Carper]

Yeah, Buddhism's sure complex (and that's not adding the religious/mythological aspects...!), and I only understand a fraction of it, mostly just an acceptance of impermanence and my existence as a collective of parts with a continuity rather than an individual in the traditional or Western sense (or Hindu sense, at least prior to Buddha).

Nagarjuna's exegesis was/is kind of like Buddhism 101, though--that's what I meant. He went on to found his own school (Madhyamaka) and I'm sure his own thinking went into far more depth. But for a relative newcomer like me, there was already more than enough depth working my way through Buddha's sermons in the exegesis.

Taking it back to atheism for a quick, decidedly juvenile second, one of my proudest moments is when, in 6th grade, my teacher asked the class for some of example of myths, prior to beginning a unit on Greek mythology, and I raised my hand and said the Bible. Oh, the sucking teeth and gasps...

Edited by Will Carper, 03 May 2012 - 10:12 PM.

[Sarah Horrocks]

Mostpublic figure athiests take entirely too much glee in trying to tear down a belief system on which others have set their life around. It is cruel. And essentially bullying. Its like if a Christian starts pestering me about whether I have been saved. It should all be a personal private matter. There's just a kindness lacking in most theological debates. We all bleed the same way. Its so silly. And a lot of the horrors religion is blamed for is actually the work of socio political exploitation. In the end its all about the money and the power

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[Will]

Respect to a woman not afraid to voice the sometimes violent thoughts of an oppressed class. Seriously, I was playing her at the store, and a guy asked me what I thought of her "support" of the Tamil Tigers? I don't know, man. Hard not to understand the anger, though. Easy to talk about peaceful social movements as an American.

It is just as easy to condemn violent terrorists, too.

[jamon g]

All this talk about Dawkins gets me excited that you're talking about Daryl Dawkins for one second before disappointment sets in. He was a basketball player nicknamed "Chocolate Thunder" who used to be announced in introduction as being from "Planet Lovetron". He is one of my favorite learned man or thinker and one the many reasons why the NBA is better than whatever professional sports league you like best.

<iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.c...ed/Dxg7cLp-JIM" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

chocolate thunder from planet lovetron? i thought dodgy racist superhero names only existed in pre-80's comics!

[Henry Blanco]

Then you shouldn't have done them, you rotter.

Great, another "no blood for pepper!" type.

[Russell H]

Of course not. That would make my blood all itchy.

[Will Carper]

It is just as easy to condemn violent terrorists, too.

I mean, what she does isn't "easy." She gets flak for it, whereas I don't think anyone would get flak, at least in America or Europe, for condemning the Tamil Tigers. And she doesn't support them either. Allusions to them appeared in her first album, Arular, about and named after her father, who had ties to the organization. But then she includes the line "put away your stupid gun, yo" on one of that album's songs--the song before the closer, so it's a sentiment the listener is left with. She's mostly just pointing out that these groups do have legitimate grievances. I mean, our country was founded on violent rebellion, and we kill civilians all the time--how can we not at least understand the motivations behind violent insurrection, if not the violence itself? She used the imagery of the Tigers to make a point, and occasionally alludes to violent sentiments, but I don't believe for a second that she condones violence.

Malcolm X (another favorite learned man of mine) wrote in his Autobiography (well, Alex Haley did) about a time when he was asked by a white couple at a dinner what he thought about a recent case in which blacks murdered whites in a robbery attempt. I don't remember the specifics of the case, but he basically asked the couple to imagine the circumstances that led to the perpetrators being willing to kill--diminished social mobility for blacks, the history of racial violence in America, etc. I don't remember if he alluded to those things specifically--I really wished I owned the book--but you can infer. Anyway, his point was that it's not so easy to condemn the violence of an underclass, especially not if you're part of the class that has benefitted from there being an underclass. So M.I.A. is bringing that idea to the fore of her music, making it uncomfortable for her Western listeners, used to a culture that condemns the violence of its enemies when it's largely the West's violence that fueled and fuels those same enemies! Of course, the Tamil Tigers are more specific to Sri Lanka, but M.I.A. doesn't only allude to them in her music--"World Town," "Bamboo Banga," "Lovalot," etc all make broader references to oppressed peoples and the reality that that only serves to fuel anger and violence. It's easy to condemn a violent act; not so easy to think about why another human being would commit it, and where your own place may be in that.

Edited by Will Carper, 04 May 2012 - 09:36 PM.

[Sarah Horrocks]

Pynchon, Dylan, Burroughs, Gertrude Stein, and Hunter S. Thompson

[Christian U]

I find athiests as obnoxious to be around as christians. Anyone for whom God(or not God) is a major talking point in their life, tends to have a touch of annoying in their eye.

For me sometimes I believe in God, sometimes I believe in Gods, sometimes I don't. It is so completely unimportant in my life that it almost bears no mention, except for the rampant lecturing from theists, and atheists.

I'm a filmist, comic bookist, musicist, telivision showist...

And yet some of the greatest films, comic books, music and TV shows are about God and gods and faith or lack thereof.

Mostpublic figure athiests take entirely too much glee in trying to tear down a belief system on which others have set their life around. It is cruel. And essentially bullying. Its like if a Christian starts pestering me about whether I have been saved. It should all be a personal private matter. There's just a kindness lacking in most theological debates. We all bleed the same way. Its so silly. And a lot of the horrors religion is blamed for is actually the work of socio political exploitation. In the end its all about the money and the power

I think all those are issues worth exploring. Yes, maybe kindness is lacking from the discussion (though I still don't see the supposed bile here, it seems like the discussion is less resentful in Germany). We live in extraordinary times; for the first time in human history, there is atheism in statistically relevant numbers. The old religions are finding it hard to keep their followers in the developed countries, and at the same time we have, with Scientology, a deliberately manufactured religion prospering.

It would be weird to me if people weren't discussing religion.

[Henry Blanco]

And yet some of the greatest films, comic books, music and TV shows are about God and gods and faith or lack thereof.

There's a lot of crap films that revolve around similar themes, too.