Controversial Opinions on Life

[Einherjar86]

Of course, one of the other options is that the religions and stories in various early civilizations between creation and the appearance to Abraham were distortions of the events chronicled more accurately by Moses....

Of course, the more likely option is that all of the religions and stories are bullshit. But, you know, whatever.

I subscribe to the theory that Nietzsche subtly implies in On the Genealogy of Morals; basically, that latter generations believe themselves to be in debt to their ancestors, and eventually these legendary progenitors achieve the status of what we consider divine entities.

 

[The Ozzman]

Of course. It was pretty much IB4 what V_P wound up posting.

You didn't put 'lol' at the end of your post, so I didn't know.

 

[Dak]

You didn't put 'lol' at the end of your post, so I didn't know.

I'm sorry I substituted a wink smiley.

@ DG: I did say one of the options. I'm under no illusion of a dichotomy.

 

[Vacant_Planets]

Well, the whole idea behind AA is that if you have two equal candidates (equal in every aspect) and one is a minority and the other is a white dude, you should hire the minority. Theoretically, it's prejudicial and discriminatory. However, no two candidates are at all equal in any aspect so there's that argument too.

Unless you were joking..

No, that's only true if the party, person, etc doesn't already employ minorities, if it does the white person might just get hired.

 

[skeptik]

The discussions, however end up getting on my nerves when my father will scoff at relations between themes between Biblical stories and other Afro-Asiatic tales and will think of other religious beliefs as nothing but myths. I think it is pretty condescending, to be honest, when someone believes in something else as much as one believes in what another believes (on a matter that is not logically provable or disprovable), and one thinks "oh, that's just a myth. Their gods can't be real."

This is your problem you moron. When somebody places devout, earnest belief in something through blind faith, something that is said to be infallible, then they will naturally dismiss anything that attempts to contradict those beliefs because they obviously could not both be true. It is logical for a Christian to dismiss other religions as untrue insofar as it impairs the truth value of their own beliefs. It's not condescending; it's a defense mechanism. If somebody holds a belief that is complete and infallible, then there's no point in arguing unless there's some evidence that that belief could potentially be relinquished.

 

[Vimana]

Yes, that is true, but the things I mentioned do not conflict with the possibility of the Christian god and its nature. That's why I get annoyed when my dad rejects those things. I should probably be less uptight, though.

Edit: But yes, other gods are another story and I can see how that isn't condescending.

 

[skeptik]

I think it would be perceived as an affront to their beliefs to tell a Christian that the vision that some Biblical character had was due to natural hallucinogens and not due to whatever way it is accounted for Biblically.

 

[Vimana]

Yeah, that one I can see as condescending or an attempt to disprove one's beliefs. Things like relations in themes between Biblical and Sumerian stories I don't really see as conflicting with Christian belief systems.

 

[Draehl]

I don't see any problem with Vimana's posts... hell, the whole resurrection story arose from Egyptian mythology which seriously pre-dated Christianity.

 

[Vimana]

There indeed are quite a bit of parallels. The one between Jesus and Osiris is the kind I don't bring up with Christians, though. I mainly bring up stuff like the Nephilim and the Anunnaki, the story of Moses in the basket and Sargon, and the snake in Genesis and Aapep. I love finding parallels between different peoples, cultures, times, languages, etc.

 

[waif]

That stuff is obviously interesting from a historical perspective, and I agree that it's interesting, but it's also obviously not welcome for most Christians, since it implies that the stuff in the Bible is merely a pastiche of belief systems that came before. The point being, this is stuff to talk about with detached scholarly types, probably atheists, in a calm and rational way. Not with random Christians and please not in random threads on this forum, create your own damn thread if you need to discuss this stuff.

 

[Saparmurat_Niyazov]

This is the controversial opinions on life thread, so is it not the appropriate thread for Vimana to come off as a "condescending twat"?

 

[Vimana]

That stuff is obviously interesting from a historical perspective, and I agree that it's interesting, but it's also obviously not welcome for most Christians, since it implies that the stuff in the Bible is merely a pastiche of belief systems that came before. The point being, this is stuff to talk about with detached scholarly types, probably atheists, in a calm and rational way. Not with random Christians and please not in random threads on this forum, create your own damn thread if you need to discuss this stuff.

I see what you mean, though in my experience with Christians in my family and in the church I used to go to, they tended to find more of the things interesting and rather irrelevant to their faith.

 

[Chanakya]

I see what you mean, though in my experience with Christians in my family and in the church I used to go to, they tended to find more of the things interesting and rather irrelevant to their faith.

I dunno if you've read much about Indian mythology, but I suppose you do since you're interested in Sanskrit. The virgin birth story is exactly the same as the birth of Krishna, which includes the snakes, parting of the sea, baskets, evil king killing all the babies after hearing the prophecies.

 

[Vimana]

I have read about parallels between the Vedas and the Torah and New Testament, but I've never come across those. The only ones I've seen were the sons of one character in the Vedas compared to the sons of Abraham, as well as the names of other figures. It would make a lot of sense. The Hebrews were from Mesopotamia, and it was pretty close to the Indo side of Indo-Europe. Hell, the Persians who weren't too far from the Indians wrote in cuneiform, which was originally Sumerian, a Mesopotamian writing system.

Besides, one thing I've found that many people don't seem to account for with history is just how much word gets around. I remember learning in AP world history that there were Arab records of Muslims in Ghana made by the first Arab to actually go out and visit the place. Basically, without Arabs actually going there, their ideas still got there. The only evidence of this would have to be subtleties, and to really study to see if the parallels are more than just coincidence one would have to read the ancient texts in their native languages and see how one would translate the parallels from one language to the other, and see if the wording fits that brainstormed translation. This is one of the main things that has gotten me interested in learning ancient languages. It really helps to understand the way the modern world has evolved from the ancient one.

 

[mutantllama]

Bumping this 5 year old thread because fuck you.

2D Sonic>2D Mario

 

[CiG]

2D Sonic>2D Mario

Metal Slug >

 

[The Ozzman]

Metal Slug >

Are you getting so bored with the current threads that you bumped a 7 year old thread?

 

[CiG]

@mutantllama bumped it man.

 

[The Ozzman]

@mutantllama bumped it man.

Shit I can't read. Sorry.