Dec 07 2007
Values i5
Value, in any form, requires an agent: a being able to connect a desire, importance or need to something. It’s easy to extend the concept of value to life forms whom don’t posses brains through anthropomorphism. A plant definitely needs light and water for survival and natural selection rewarded those whom “sought” out these things with continued existence. However, the plant does not have the capacity to value anything. Light and water are a requirements for it’s life, but just as a time piece requires winding to be, they can not place a value on the requirements without a self.
In today’s hurricane of political rhetoric, Family Values (Christian Values), surfaces more and more as the most decisive character requirement of our representatives. Naively many people believe Christian values is synonymous with goodness. Jesus’ message of unconditional love to all, on the surface, sounds like a great way to answer all of the worlds problems in one great swoosh. But Mi casa Su casa requires everyone on the planet to willingly disown all of ones property, including the self: thus the “I live for Jesus” line. Conspicuously most Christians don’t actually value losing their self or their property. Christ was a communist minus the guns plus one god. Christian values is paradoxally one of oppression: Submission to an invisible ruler, Selflessness, Complete passiveness, Unconditional love, and Unconditional forgiveness. Baaaaa…
Family values are the Christian zeitgeist system of censorship and control. The group is comfortable with certain behaviors and the flock places a great importance on not permitting anything that causes them to feel uncomfortable anywhere . If this rampant xenophobia stayed in the walls of the church it wouldn’t be a problem for us Montagues who think the bible is as important to life as cheese wiz. Most Christians are comfortable with a husband and wife having 2.2 children, a white picket fence, per pressured public school prayer and a day dedicated to a god. The Sabbath day is dedicated to reinforcing dilutions and the children forged are into the carriers of the faiths torch.
I haven’t frequently used the word value with a modifier because to do so would seem to diminish the value I and/or others place on other things. It would be inhuman for a person to claim that an individual was worthless to humanity because they didn’t have a family nor valued the prospect of one. Unconditional dedication to a family that tortures oneself is a form of masochism, not a demonstration of righteousness. I’m sure the Human family argument could be used to combat the segregate nature of Family values but including all humans into a value structure shatters any semblance of order, especially when masochists and hedonists are essentially included in the whole of humanity. Christian values ultimately revolve around Christianity and it’s current popular version. Even the Christians themselves don’t mutually agree what Christian values are. Catholic values, Protestant values, Buddhist values, Jewish values, Muslim values etc. might as well be used in discourse. Whatever religious values a naturalist finds themselves immersed in, the common thread is a devotion to irrational beliefs and “right” behavior based on “divine” text.
“Social” is the humane modifier to use in conjunction with non property based values. All healthy individuals within a family or church value society but not all of society value the church or nuclear family. Society, as a continuing whole, values everything it produces that isn’t destructive of itself: from grand gold sculptures of deities to poop porn. The majority valuing one thing does not diminish the value of an individual valuing an other. The Social values that have relevance in the context of Family values is public behavior and policy. Every healthy human being values the lack of aggression against oneself and therefore values public peace and the system that maintains it with the least amount of effort. There is a range of public behavior, thus a gradient of values, that consenting individuals are peacefully capable of executing. On the conservative side is full dress attire, such as the burka or Sunday dress; on the wild side is group sex on the beach while popping whippets. Very few communities would like to be at ether extreme of the social value system, thus the only fair way to set the bar is by direct democracy. Obviously the notion of Nation State prohibits the ability of having a community (town or city) set the bar. It’s not surprising to find American voters are concerned primarily that the president be Christian. I presume that most naturalists value State leaders that aren’t influenced by invisible dictators or ambiguous “holy” text but more so on rational principles. Social values revolve around equal treatment, personal rights and private freedoms, peace and fair social freedom.
What trumps even social values is life values. Every rational human on the planet realizes that we are symbiotic beings on this life covered planet. We value our existence, the billions of ancestors we had and the invisible hand of selection that enabled us to be. Knowing this implies a responsibility to our future descendants and the society that hopefully will exist. If we were to loss the wild space and the animals and plants that surrounds us, we would lose a majority of our identity. It’s no secret that this grand tragedy of extinction and dwindling resources and landfill space is happening this very moment. A future society, without the buffer of the wilderness and it’s unmatchable ability to balance the forces of life on the planet, would end up depressed in a bio dome destined for sterility of living and life. The Human family is far to big and the primary reason is that group identity, nation state or religious sect know that population is directly related to group power. If we as a species value intelligent life on planet earth we need to give the wilderness back to nature and not fear a sub billion world population. Society values culture and culture is found in towns and cities. Life values that animals have the freedom to roam and uncultivated plants get majority of the water and light.
The irony is that a couple that values an enormous family must place the highest value on the singles who want free love and a life without kids. That’s the only way to be a species that doesn’t kill it’s self by making to much of it’s self by achieving a balance. The intrinsic problem is that couples who value the big family usually do so not for the family but more for societal impact reasons. Our society truly depends on our children and their courage not let any group identity persuade them to not own themselves.
Good post. It’s all about control. And they hate it when they don’t have it. At least those who are so set on making everyone obey the rules.
Notice that those who say you should read the Bible, also say that you shouldn’t read The Golden Compass?
Will have the trilogy completed by end of January, time permitting. But Pullman is most upset with organized religion. And goes after it heartily. Good for him. It’s too bad that people make mistakes and everyone gets the blame. Deservedly or not.
My post is a pile of turds resting on the hump of an imaginary apes ass. The bible, The golden compass: time on the toilet without cause to flush.
I see you still seem to carry those ape-chips on your shoulders.
“The bible, The golden compass: time on the toilet without cause to flush.”
Do you read them for long periods while on the toilet yourself?
Do you read them using the toilet as a table?
Do you set them on the toilet, but don’t flush them?
I’ll admit, I am confused by the statement. Little help here.
I attack thee not, thy book minest havith thou trama.
The basic principle of freedom is self ownership. According to self ownership certain laws are logically revealed and we must obey the fair rules if we expect justice. Searching for these rules in an unreliable far fetched book declared divine is a waste of time. (Like being on a toilette with producing anything to flush) People who tell me that I shouldn’t read a book of declared fiction because it’s evil or it will poison my mind, I give no consideration to. That is, except, when they start burning the books I should be free to chose to read: Best not to pluck out my eye.
If one is to pick through the bible as a tool to solve life’s current dilemmas from the lessons found therein, one could easily do the same thing with a few years transcript from a soap opera. Other than that all the bible has to offer is telling that I was born bad and need Jesus to be good. And I aint afraid of yins’ eternal inferno! O_o
Ah. Can’t argue with you.
Some people do seem to say that we are born bad. I would disagree. They just take the parts they want to put others down and lift themselves up. Sad.
Gen 1:31 “God looked over everything he had made;
it was so good, so very good!”
I guess I view it differently than the “christians” you have the misfortune of having met.
Roland you can argue with me. One passage said that all god made is good. Many others have said we made it bad; the later books said we need Jesus to be forgiven. You view the bible just like everyone else who believes the bible: You see what you want to see.
What is it I want to see?
For that matter, what is it you want to see?
I’m sure what you’re looking for in the bible varies from time to time. If I were having some drama in my life, I could easily find some wisdom in “Star Trek: The next generation.” But that doesn’t mean soap opera’s are written by the hand of god. The days of our lives and the bible were written by the same “divine” being: The Human imagination.
I want to see the truth. That requires the ability to distinguish between reality and fiction. I want to see a world that cares more about life than after death.
I’m positive that you, and all the other religious people, are looking for a reason to convince yourselves that death is not real. What a waste of time and brain power. Death is real and the dead can’t even care about being dead. The second thing I think theists want to see is that there is some super-great being that cares about you. Why isn’t caring about yourself, and perhaps friends and family, enough?
Of course if religion didn’t exist what would bring people together? Maybe Food? Music? Festivals? Friends? Weddings? Sport? Speakers? Art? Conversation? Wow, that sounds a lot like church, minus the bullshit.
So you believe that after death there is nothing more. A hypothesis.
I believe that there is something more. A hypothesis.
See you on the other side. Or not…
“Of course if religion didn’t exist what would bring people together? Maybe Food? Music? Festivals? Friends? Weddings? Sport? Speakers? Art? Conversation? Wow, that sounds a lot like church, minus the bullshit.”
That sounds a lot like a marriage without love.
It sounds a lot like a personal ad.
“My” “hypothesis” has reason; yours has faith.
The political use of religion has historically represented a powerful destructive force. Imo, the current administration and the neocon Christian far right movement that seemed to start flourishing under Reagan, provides a contemporary example.
The political use of religion has historically represented a powerful destructive force.
Religion is a powerful force for organization of intention and action, so it would stand to reason… Likewise science, and drug addiction.
Consider that politics and power as the corrupting influence.
If there is a God, with an active hand, would it make sense that there would be no church to spread the word? Maybe if God did not want to meet us, but suppose He did want to meet us?
Or suppose anything you like. But dismissing religious beliefs on the basis that religion has been perverted by the state is barely a knee jerk reaction.
Not everyone who is religiously inclined is Hernando Cortez, any more than every atheist is Stalin.
If there is a god, with an active hand, it makes no sense that the world would be in the state it is in. If god wanted to meet us, why does he stay so well hidden. Why is it that peoples unchecked over active imagination and the “works of god” are indistinguishable. Why would a god demand to believe him when there is just as much reason to believe in anything else that is undetectable by even modest standards of detection? If an all powerful guy wanted to meet us he would materialize in front of every human being at the same time, no one would doubt, everyone would come together and there would be peace on earth. But instead of dealing with the huge problem of states dealing with one another, the people that constitute the states bicker on which ghost is the true ghost and what laws should be founded on which “holy inspired” text instead of sound principle like equality.
It’s like arguing with a brick wall. I’ve tried for two years strait to talk sense into one fucking Christian. Not one has been able to see the hypocrisy, the illogic, the lack of reason, the senseless segregation, the abuse of children’s rights, the physiological terrorism, the waste of resources, the bullshit. It’s like trying to convince a 20 year old offspring that santa is not real. Showing him the presents you have hidden in the attic, eating the cookies in front of his face, and the kid still not accepting the truth. What the fuck is wrong with you people? “Suppose he did want to meet us?” By the very definition of god, he can not want anything, nor not be anywhere.
There is only one possible version of god: A cruel, game playing, genetic grunge holding, egotistical, completely insane, poor sport. And if that’s who god is, damn him to his hell for making me. The “it’s our fault reality is difficult” is bullshit. If god could create anything, however he wanted he could have made it impossible to ever have suffering or death. The very concept of suffering and death could be extinguished, or more accurately always null, by an all powerful universe daddy. And of course, I have to clearly define what I mean by death because you idiots are so hung up in fiction land that you don’t even believe that death is death: Death, the end of oneself. Oh shit I have to define oneself don’t I:? Body/Mind. Pull your fucking heads out of your fucking asses before you drag everyone else down in a whirlpool of irrational chaos. We’ve got one life to live, make the best out of it and respect the future citizens of earth, period.
Thimscool, you show your tainted religious bias with the standard Stalin-atheist comparison. Stalin, and the lack of any of his beliefs, is not relevant. Atheists don’t have anything in common, the religious do. If it wasn’t for the existence of the theists, atheist would be an illogical term. The religious have more in common with the communists and the fascists because they subscribe to group identity, power to the flock, oppress the outliers. I admit for a brief time I did explore the Humanists because I thought their aim was to help the religious “see the fucking light”. Apparently they’ve been shouting at the brick wall for a long time because they’re nothing more than a support group. Sane people who don’t talk to the ghosts, the non-believers, find themselves surrounded by you brainwashed believe anythingers. You have no excuse, the knowledge is here, the evidence is here. Christians, Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Hindu’s, UU’s, Scientologists, etc… are a disgrace to individualism, intelligence and if I may take the liberty, The Human Spirit. Your willed ignorance is enough for me to hate history and fear the future. Jesus fucking christ, it is not about opinion, this is reality.
Marry Christmas!
That’s quite a rant, sparky.
Rather than going point for point, I’ll just note that I indicated that it would be wrong to judge every atheist because of Stalin, just as it would be wrong to judge every Christian because of Cortez.
Read it again, fruit loop. Then, before you go calling other people “willfully ignorant” on some self-pitying rant, consider that it is likely you just don’t understand what other people are saying.
Honestly, I’m not sure if you understand what you are saying.
Or instead of thimscool’s very good response, I could just act like a kid and say:
“My” “hypothesis” has reason; yours has faith. ;p
A brick fucking wall.
Thimscool, I know what you said and why you said it.
It’s not wrong to judge everyone that doesn’t believe in the Invisible Pink Unicorn because of You, just as it would be wrong to judge every artist because of me. It’s wrong because ‘not A’ does not equal ‘A’. Therefor, the ‘just as’ is flawed.
GET IT? aA-Hole.
Happy three day sun not move in sky, day become longer! Son is born!!!
Last word.
Just kidding.
I don’t measure you the way to measure me. Why? Because I think you are an intelligent guy who reasons well. We both have drawn different conclusions. I have reasons to back up my beliefs, and so do you Konig (I really wonder what name you would prefer me to use).
I have no problem with you being able to believe what you want.
You have a problem with me being able to believe what I want.
Do you go out and murder people? Neither do I. Are you trying to destroy innocent civilians lives at every opportunity? Huh. Me neither.
I know you have run into some really severe nutcases. Don’t blame you for being angry. Matter of fact, I support it. People like that need to wake up. I’m not one of them. Neither is thimscool.
Calm down. Why do you let this stuff get to you so bad? I love to hear others opinions. Sometimes they help me to change my own.
GET IT? aA-Hole.
Well, I get that you think that every atheist is special, and that every Christian is willfully ignorant and potentially a savage aggressor.
What I don’t get is how you can’t see that makes you the aA-Hole…
My position was non aggressive; yours is judgemental, and assumes that you are right, an that the majority of humans are dangerously wrong.
Plus.. you’re ranting most copiously…
I don’t think that every atheist is anymore special than any Christian. In fact I stated in this very thread that “Atheists don’t have anything in common, the religious do.” I’m an A-mouth because I hope that if I scream at the wall enough perhaps one grain will fall. You read what I write; you’re smart. Why don’t you comprehend?
My position is assertive and backed with evidence and reason. I’m frustrated with people who assume the martyr sheep position and then complain about it; those who attack my “aggression” because I don’t take “feelings of truth” seriously. I do however take real truth seriously and promote it. I feel frustrated having to say real truth. I’m judgmental because I respect logic.
The majority of humans are dangerously wrong: Fact! And that’s true even if I go to fictionland and assume that the 2 billion Christians are right! Don’t you think 4.5 billion “souls” going to hell because they don’t got the Jesus is dangerous? If you don’t believe that you need Jesus to go to Jesus paradise, then you don’t even believe what you say you believe. Why do I have to respect that?
I rant copiously because people capable of intelligence have no right being idiots! I can’t sit by while you willed morons fuck up the future of the species. Value your children, value your neighborhood, value the continent, value the ocean but for gods sake don’t value believing something because it feels good.
Why do something for God’s sake? Wouldn’t that be against atheism?
Okay, here goes. You have reasoned out that evolution is fact. I have reasoned out that God is fact. I can show you God no more than you can show me evolution.
You base your belief on evidence and hypotheses of others.
You haven’t personally witnessed it. Never will. Yet you believe.
I base my belief on evidence and hypotheses of others as well.
God hasn’t personally shaken my hand. At least not physically. Yet I believe.
And in it all, you throw your rage at people, and I try to share love. Whose right? I don’t know. But in the end, the only person on your side will be you. And that is a very lonely place. Personally, I hate being alone. And you can do it at “Food. Music. Festivals. Friends. Weddings. Sport. Speakers. Art. Conversation.”
Why do you insist on being alone and blaming others for making you want to be that way. Life is filled with pain and anguish. It is also filled with hope, joy, and love.
All you really have to do is live.
Focusing on the crap isn’t living.
Wake up, Robert!
I don’t say this as a command, but a plea. You are such a smart guy. Truly gifted in your artwork and you can’t even defend you points without getting nasty. Is it possible that they could be wrong?
I can admit mine could be. I will still hold my beliefs though. Not force them down anothers throat, but discuss and test and see if they hold up.
When someone shouts, yells, and rages at another who asks a question, the conclusion is obvious. There ‘facts’ don’t hold up.
Defend your facts with calm reason. Or else just say, “I’m an asshole! Fuck you!” And at least then you have been considerate enough not to blindside someone who thought you were smart enough to back up your opinions.
“Christians don’t actually value losing their self or their property.”
-robert, could you be more ignorant with any statement than you were with this one?….I’ll concede the ’self’ fraction, but will not give up the ‘property.’
“Christ was a communist minus the guns plus one god. ”
-sounds like a great bumper sticker….it would fit perfectly on the rear end of a prius.
“Most Christians are comfortable with a husband and wife having 2.2 children, a white picket fence, per pressured public school prayer”
-even the most fanatic christians do not have 2.2 children…..Are you spreading the divine wisdom of beuracratic statistics?…… call it 2 or 3 but dont add the ‘white picket fences’ after you have already declared that christians do not value property…….additionally…..there is a difference between one having a right to pray in school….without religious persecution, and not being able to pray at all….because one is in a govt building……
The irony is that a couple that values an enormous family must place the highest value on the singles who want free love and a life without kids.
-I agree with the ‘life without kids’ part. The best decision that any of us could make….is to not have kids…….children are the greatest threat to this planet. I would love to hear ‘population control’ come up into political debates……but it hasn’t……..instead……rockers host concerts celebrating a ‘green lifestyle’ where thousands flock…..leaving carbon clouds to and fro…….and they all feel so good about themselves………They are FRAUDS……..