tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post548361806510981900..comments2024-03-29T12:03:37.344+00:00Comments on Bruce Charlton's Notions: Who are the most deluded - the Religious or Atheists?Bruce Charltonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09615189090601688535noreply@blogger.comBlogger12125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post-79045534898833245662014-02-25T13:39:43.184+00:002014-02-25T13:39:43.184+00:00@W - I have no intention of defending as right eve...@W - I have no intention of defending as right everything Christians have ever done - that would be silly!<br /><br />You can probably work out for yourself the kind of thing that would have to happen for the population of the earth as a whole to decline, but for birthrates of those in a position to expect to raise more than two children to remain above replacement level. Bruce Charltonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09615189090601688535noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post-57917138068709289662014-02-25T02:36:53.685+00:002014-02-25T02:36:53.685+00:00Tattoos are certainly vulgar... but more than just...Tattoos are certainly vulgar... but more than just that, they are (these days, in general) an advertisement of degeneracy. Either prideful or cooperative. <br /><br />Also curious is their example of a present phenomenon: a great diversity of symbol and show, pattern, variety that is all <i>totally and intrinsically</i> empty. I don't mean just fashion, but everything - the architecture, the art, the public discourse. Dead symbolism.Georgenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post-7170265943460858672014-02-24T21:19:43.178+00:002014-02-24T21:19:43.178+00:00@WmJas
"Small-scale" mutilations may no...@WmJas<br /><br />"Small-scale" mutilations may not be maladaptive in themselves, but one can readily observe that they go hand-in-hand with other maladaptive behaviors.<br /><br />The two people who have most vehemently insisted to me that "a few tattoos are no big deal" are my two childless, atheistic female relatives. I don't want to make too much of that, but it seemed to me they were as deluded about the tattoos as about everything else.JPnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post-86997488025196635982014-02-24T18:00:52.105+00:002014-02-24T18:00:52.105+00:00I wholeheartedly endorse this post, although I als...I wholeheartedly endorse this post, although I also agree with Wm. Jas. first comment.Adam G.http://www.jrganymede.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post-68488034317553899432014-02-24T17:31:43.985+00:002014-02-24T17:31:43.985+00:00You often have a situation where the older congreg...You often have a situation where the older congregation is used as a source of funds to subvert its own influence. They are complicit with this as they would rather pay than engage in the embarrassing matter of explaining what they have never thought deeply about.So we fund trips to Rwanda for retired doctors and engineers but have absolutely no plan to engage with unchurched children in our own town. For pointing this out one is labelled " unhelpful".David Stanleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13027972518979483844noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post-64990691514403807982014-02-24T17:11:47.407+00:002014-02-24T17:11:47.407+00:00@G - Yes, that is how it seems to work. Leftists o...@G - Yes, that is how it seems to work. Leftists on both sides. I have experienced this myself, when working as a part-time bureaucrat in the National Health Service. The NHS funds pressure groups (and 'independent' research) - which then 'pressure' the bureaucrats and give them an excuse to do what they want to do anyway. Bruce Charltonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09615189090601688535noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post-85900049859019666932014-02-24T16:15:08.013+00:002014-02-24T16:15:08.013+00:00We have an interesting situation where the liberal...We have an interesting situation where the liberals have taken important roles in the church. The liberals outside the church then point at how the liberals in the church are deluding themselves with false beliefs. The liberals in the church then use this as an excuse to push the church more to the left, so that nothing in the church has any meaning.<br /><br />Those who hold on to the central meaning as the most important element are attacked from within and without by those who think all that matters are the seemingly progressive elements as evaluated by modern liberalism (e.g. money for the poor), and that all the rest should be discarded or considered pointless - as nothing more than entertaining delusions for simple people.Georgenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post-74575103064993598692014-02-24T11:07:26.498+00:002014-02-24T11:07:26.498+00:00@DB - Just because someone says they are a Christi...@DB - Just because someone says they are a Christian or attends church...<br /><br />The majority of people (especially leaders) in the majority of self-identified Christian churches/ denominations are anti-Christian, apostate, Christian-subversive fifth columnists. <br /><br />You need to be clear about this, and use your discernment about these matters. <br /><br />Real Christians are rare in the West: very rare.Bruce Charltonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09615189090601688535noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post-36609198846961236792014-02-24T10:55:57.480+00:002014-02-24T10:55:57.480+00:00Several adults at my anglican church have tatooed ...Several adults at my anglican church have tatooed chi-rho symbols on arms or even back of the neck. Can't say I find it appealing on a woman but then I am an old fart.David Stanleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13027972518979483844noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post-3573294804129480132014-02-24T10:48:22.561+00:002014-02-24T10:48:22.561+00:00@WmJas - What! Me exaggerate?
"Small-scale m...@WmJas - What! Me exaggerate?<br /><br />"Small-scale mutilations such as ear piercing "<br /><br />Yes, but they aren't necessarily significantly mutilating - although some are. <br /><br />There is a question of degree - obviously barely-significant degrees of self-mutilation are... barely-significant. (Easily swamped in effect by other things.)<br /><br />" associated with religiosity and high fertility rates" No. You should notice that I always talk about CHOSEN fertility. <br /><br />High birth rates purely as a by-product of sexual activity in societies with no knowledge or means of controlling fertility is neither here nor there. <br /><br />When I read the accounts of scarification among Australian Aborigines it strikes me as a profoundly unhealthy (and indeed maladaptive) feature of those societies - it seems like pretty much a kind of ritualized torture<br /><br />This source<br /><br />http://charltonteaching.blogspot.co.uk/2011/12/life-for-women-among-australian.html<br /><br />Described elsewhere how the women got their scarified back 'decorations' - which amounted to be held down, screaming with pain etc. <br /><br /><br />Bruce Charltonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09615189090601688535noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post-62516355042479137692014-02-24T09:43:17.773+00:002014-02-24T09:43:17.773+00:00As someone who admits to being deluded very often ...As someone who admits to being deluded very often I can rarely find the confidence to even attempt to explain to atheist friends that they are also deluded. To my (probably autistic) eyes many Christians hold onto all sorts of comforting delusions about themselves and the world. And as someone of at best average IQ I have always held the delusion of being more well informed etc than most. Recently I have realised this to be untrue. Funnily enough this hasn't increased my happiness! Just as elements of the DE are so proud of their "seeing through" the delusion of liberalism they then invest themselves in multiple other compensating beliefs.David Stanleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13027972518979483844noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post-72587540587981544172014-02-24T09:27:49.855+00:002014-02-24T09:27:49.855+00:00Excellent points overall, but I think you're e...Excellent points overall, but I think you're exaggerating the maladaptive nature of most forms of self-mutilation. Small-scale mutilations such as ear piercing pose virtually no threat to survival; and it is a fact that some forms of self-mutilation (facial piercings among Indian women; circumcision in the Middle East; and, to a lesser extent, tattooing in Austronesian cultures) are associated with religiosity and high fertility rates. Circumcision in particular was a hallmark of the single most stable and long-lived civilization in all of history: that of ancient Egypt.<br /><br />I agree that the explosion of interest in self-mutilation in the modern West is a symptom that something has gone terribly wrong -- but it is only in its cultural context that it can be seen as such. The problem is not self-mutilation in se, but self-mutilation divorced from any cultural or religious meaning. A modern Westerner's tattoos and piercings are not a sign of religious commitment, the transition to manhood, group membership, or anything like that. (When they do signify group membership, it is membership in a criminal gang.) They are, for the most part, inflicted arbitrarily, in the spirit of why-the-hell-not, or in an attempt to "express one's individuality" (i.e., the <i>opposite</i> of commitment or group membership).Wm Jashttp://wmjas.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.com