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Rationality, Intellect, Emotion, Intimacy ... are the key mechanisms thru which you grow as a person (and by which, profitably for others, you change the world). & & & Lest I give either of us too big of headache, I will only address INTELLECT at this time. The SUBCONSCIOUS is an arena of...

Hi Thomas. Thanks for responding. Attempting to approach existence (and the meaning behind existence) in a manner that is systematic (that is rigorous without being rigid) is difficult for me. A big living puzzle with many interacting pieces. Not ... this is "always true" and that is "always...

Friend of mine made this movie: Girl and guy on their second date. Dance recital, theater on Floor 2 in a college hall. The exit door to the hall is on the landing, at the turn of the stairs between Floor 2 and Floor 1. After the recital, the pair walk down the stairs. The guy pretends to...

What you want most. Choices, yes, but meaningless ones. & & & In Developmental Psychology, a person grows from child to adult not just biophysically, but neurophysiologically as well. The two principle pathways of this process are COGNITIVE and AFFECTIVE development. (i.e. The evolution of...

Hi Rodg Unlike some of your detractors, I recognize that your ideas (or, really, your ONE idea) is well grounded. Take a look at Game Theory. It is based upon your argument. (Except in Game Theory, the person who "only chooses what they want most" will always LOSE the game to a sophisticated...

{Defining Divinity (William James)} 6a. Old aphorism: There is nothing sure in life. Except death and taxes. 6b. Painful as it is, humans have to pay for their existence. We each owe a debt. We have to pay nature for our individual life ... with our personal extinction. But we also, while...

{Defining Divinity (Sigmund Freud)} 3a. The birth-trauma (in humans) awakens cognitive consciousness and affective awareness. We are conscious and aware from Day-1. ( ... Even though infantile sights and sounds are fuzzy and largely meaningless, at first. ... Even though the point of social...

The simple version of Deism goes like this: God sets His creation in motion, then backs off and watches it, not interfering. Lets "human morality and reason" take over. God sets the rules, starts the game, then sits back and indifferently watches the game play out. Lets affective and cognitive...

Defining Divinity 1a. Looked at scientifically, belief (in anything) is a hypothesis. (God is a theory.) 1b. But belief (in anything) never exists in a vacuum. Belief is always socially organized. (Even within an individual. Belief has to come from somewhere. Family, friends, community...

Rereading the The Book of J and comparing it to Genesis, Exodus, and Numbers (with their later additions by other authors of the Scriptures) ... something struck me as interesting: Yahweh "shows favor" on this individual or "gives his blessing" to that individual. Yahweh is "pleased" ... But...

Pitt-Rivers: ... form of sexual hospitality ... amply testified from ethnographies of many nomadic people, who use their women as a means of establishing relations with the sedentary population. (This is from page 159 of The Fate of Shechem or the Politics of Sex. Sorry for omission of this...

Dinah and Shechem & Shechem and Baal Berith Bob Thanks for taking my interest, here, as being a debate of ideas. If I have time next week, I will read again the story of Dinah in Genesis 34 and I will locate the Baal Berith episode in Judges. Bob X: ... This is what is being "encoded" in...

Taijasi It may be arcane of me, in our "postmodern" world, to enunciated a belief in human progress. But I do. And if there is a clear 'cause' for that progress, I put some value upon - and (conditional) faith in - that cause. It has the ring of Truth to me. & & & Newborns of Homo...

Nativeastral: l was just looking at it from a wider dimension; as to why Jesus became so popular there... Thomas: Maybe because the doctrine was so much more appealing? The success of Christianity might be a lot simpler than either 'linked mythology' or 'unique doctrine.' The astrological...

Is purity merely a refinement process? Sitting under a tree or in a cave or on a high butte, for hours on end ... till this person (via sensory-deprivation) begins to auto-hallucinate ... And some Great Truth comes knocking on Brain's door? Does exercising one's muscles - getting up, going...

Bob You are a wealth of facts and I always enjoy reading your posts. I am not a linguist. Nor am I as well-read as you on the ancient Near-East. (Who, at this forum, is? Should we all just shut up? You'd get bored, fast, without anyone to correct.) & & & What, above, have I got wrong in my...

Penelope: But I found myself gritting my teeth at all the Irish folksongs and romantic ballads I witnessed over that hour-and-a-half of time. Other songs during this 90-minute program ... Shawn: You actually sat through the entire program????????? Without just choosing to do something else...

Amergin: I think the main conclusion is that Christianity is a Pagan Religion with some Jewish names, 1700 years ago. Naturally details can be lost and records fudged to protect the guilty. The structure of Christianity is fundamentally Indo-European with only a trace of Semitic religion...

Penelope: Sectarian distinctions of class, race, gender ... Innate hierarchy based upon dogmatic discrimination of perceived purity and impurity. Mark (Eudaimonist): Examples? & & & In most cultures of the past, and some still in the current world, a woman is seen as "impure" when she is...

Hey Brian Put your glasses back on, and reread what I've written. I make the equation: 'honor and shame' = evil. Yes. I DO NOT make the claim: Torah = 'honor and shame.' (Repeat: I DO NOT make that claim. As the liturgy of an ethical religious practice? no way! As a form of literary...