Tag: religion
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The eternal law of the animals
Tolstoy explains beautifully as ever, the hypocrisy of Christians at war. “There are in Europe twenty-eight millions of men under arms,” says Wilson, “to decide disputes, not by discussion, but by murdering one another. That is the accepted method for deciding disputes among Christian nations.…either Christianity is a failure, or those who have undertaken to…
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Satan’s delusion
The greatest trick the devil pulled is not to convince people he didn’t exist, it’s to convince himself he didn’t exist. There’s an excellent UK comedy sketch from Miller and Webb of a Nazi asking his commander if maybe they’re the bad guys. The film Conspiracy too shows it. Its just a business meeting to…
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Secular Islamic countries
Too often when people think about Islamic countries they think of those involved in war. Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan. In all these countries, they have religious rulers. Religion rules the state. Europe used to have this too. We burned witches and heretics. We burned, tortured, punished and cleansed. But through things like the French revolution…
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The Dry Salvages – T. S. Eliot
(PDF Download) (The Dry Salvages—presumably les trois sauvages—is a small group of rocks,with a beacon, off the N.E. coast of Cape Ann, Massachusetts.Salvages is pronounced to rhyme with assuages.Groaner: a whistling buoy.) I I do not know much about gods; but I think that the riverIs a strong brown god—sullen, untamed and intractable,Patient to some degree,…
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God the mother
I’m becoming more firmly of the belief that Mother Nature is the closest rational approximation of God. Mother Nature isn’t the Earth alone, the rules of mama nature apply throughout the universe. So if Mother Nature is God, God is a woman. Only that which has the power to create life could be anything close…
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I’ll be back
A possible explanation for re-incarnation, but not how it’s explained in current religions. Once you die time has no meaning. Like going to sleep. In the same way you had no concept of how much time passed until you ended up in the body you are now. How long did those last 13+ billion years…
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Paradise theory
Let’s assume that the earth is paradise (Heaven in other words). Its an oasis of life in the middle of billions of light years of death. So when we talk about global problems, we’re talking about paradise problems. Or indeed, trouble in paradise. Gaia theory says that paradise is alive. It maintains its temperature and…
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Spirit of the teacher
Carrying on from Scientific observers, shepherds and messiahs, here’s Maria Montessori’s take: But let us seek to implement in the soul the self-sacrificing spirit of the scientist with the reverent love of the disciple of Christ, and we shall have prepared the spirit of the teacher. – The Montessori Method, p13, Maria Montessori Teaching is where…
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Antidote
In Buddhism they have a concept of antidotes. Klaus Barbie, was truly a Satan walking amongst us. But he had an antidote. Marcel Marceau. The Butcher of Lyon and a butcher’s son from Strasbourg who went on to be a world famous mime artist. Marcel Marceau ended up in Lyon where Barbie carried out his…
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The sins of love
Most of the seven deadly sins are defined by Dante Alighieri (c. 1264–1321) as perverse or corrupt versions of love; lust, gluttony, and greed are all excessive or disordered love of good things; and wrath, envy, and pride are perverted love directed toward others’ harm. The sole exception is sloth, which is a deficiency of…
Ian's Philosophy 