arndt@lymph.DEC (05/28/85)
I couldn't get a path back to the person who posted to me so here it
is on the net. Will that person try again and give me a new path
perhaps? Warm Regards person.
*************************************
Well . . . , I've finally got a few minutes to send a reply to your
private mail. Welcome aboard. I had no idea who you were or anything
about you when I used your piece as an example of what I think is very
fuzzy thinking. Nice to meet you and continue the discussion. Let's
give it a try.
[you said]
I realise from reading the net for a few months that it is
probably foolish, rash and futile to reply to one of your postings
(in this news group anyway) but I feel as though I should make a couple
of things clear.
** Am I really that bad? Hmmmm. Or are you reading
more into what I have said than is there. Anyway.
[you continue]
First, I'm a SHE. Everyone automatically assumes maleness and
no alternative on the part of net readers, and it obviously isn't so.
Enough for that.
** How am I to know your sex? Or care. It is purely
a convention to assume you are male if unstated. Sounds like YOUR
problem, rather than the rest of us. Are you one of those 'personhole'
people? I hope not. IT'S A CONVENTION, that's all. Nothing sexist,
personal or mean meant by it. Look, one chooses the hill upon which to
make a stand. Choose better.
[you]
Piddly-shit out of the way, I'll address the main issue. If you
are seriously a committed Christian, and do not admit of any other valid
religion than Christianity (in other words, all else is heresy), then I
am wasting my breath. I understand that you would not give any credence to
anything I would have to say. But if you aren't, and you are interested in
other ideas, then maybe this isn't a waste after all.
** Sigh. Please don't be a bigot . . .. I mean you've
got me all wrapped up and delievered in a nice neat little package already.
All I have to do is say I'm a 'committed' Christian and into the little
box I go. What does 'committed' mean? I really believe in something?
You use the word 'committed' like it was a disease. Aren't you committed
to something? Isn't everyone? YOU WANT TO OPEN A DEBATE/DISCUSSION WITH
ME AND START OUT BY MAKING ME GIVE UP MY POSITION OR BE LABELED SOME KIND
OF A NITWIT????? Where did you learn debating or human relations? Have I
now resorted to saying naughty things about you and lost you? Hope not.
Look what you're saying about me if I admit to being a 'committed' Christian:
o I believe everyone else is wrong
o you would waste your breath talking to me
o I wouldn't "give any credence to anything (you) have to say"
o I'm not interested in any other ideas
Of course I reject all of the above.
I figure you must have been mugged by 'committed' Christians somewhere along
the line and you still haven't gotten over it. I refuse to believe at this
early stage in our conversation that you are a 'committed' anti-Christian
bigot.
[you continue]
I was carefully raised a Catholic,
so I'm familiar with the material.
I could ask, for example, why the writings included in the New Testament
were included and others left out. Had some or all of the Gnostic gospels
been included, Christianity might be a quite different religion. How can it
be said that the ones that were retained over time were because they are
the word of God and not the others ? (when in fact it seems to be random
factionalism that seems to have had most to do with it).
** Aside from an observation that most Catholics
I know don't know Genesis from Revelation, but are taught the 'teachings'
of the Church rather than how to study the scripture (a major point of
the Reformation you may remember - Catholics were against it because it
would lead to each man reading the scripture for himself rather than merely
accepting what the RC Church teaches about scripture) I accept your claim to
have read widely on the topic. However, I fear you have not read well. You
demonstrate a marked ignorance of what a simple reading of an Ency article
on the topic would give you. May I suggest the Ency of Phil., Paul Edwards,
ed., 'Christianity'. I referenced it in a recent posting on the net on the
topic of how the Bible got to be the Bible, etc. John Hick who wrote the
article claims that Christianity is unique in that it is based upon events
in history and the interpretation of those events, whereas other religions
such as those you mention are based upon insight and speculation about the
nature of life. He also gives a clear statement of how the books of the
bible and the doctrines in them came to be stated by the Christians of a
later time. The view you express was popular 50 - 100 years ago but it has
fallen by the wayside with modern scholarship into the texts and the times.
THERE WAS FROM THE EARLIEST A CORPUS OF EYEWITNESS ACCOUNTS THAT WAS CIRCULATED
IN THE CHURCH IN THE FIRST CENTURY AND LATER COUNCILS DID NOT 'DECIDE' WHAT
WAS CANNON AND WHAT WAS NOT BUT 'AFFIRMED' WHAT WAS ALWAYS HELD TO BE
CANNONICAL AGAINST THE GNOSTICS AND OTHERS. Arguments against scripture have
moved on to other topics and modern anti-Christian debators would blush at
your statements. It sounds like you got stuck in a town library that has
some old commentaries they never updated or threw out.
[you continue]
I hold that this
religion Christianity is still a belief, and has the same validity as such
as Buddhism or Sufi mysticism or any other belief system. That's the point
I was trying to make.
** Ok. And there is where I disagree with you. You see
two ways of 'knowing' and I see only one applied to religion/science. I hold
that EVERY belief system must adhere to certain things to exist - be other than
noise. It must, since it claims to express itself in terms of logic, be
logical - recognizing the limits of logic!!! (THERE APPEARS TO BE NO INFINITE,
ABSOLUTE STARTING POINT WHICH CANNOT BE DOUBTED! ERGO ASSUMPTIONS MAKE THE
WORLD GO 'ROUND - IN THE PHYSICAL SCIENCES, MATH, AND IN RELIGION!!!)
We can 'test' assumptions (given the limits of time I mention below) by logic
and expericence and draw FOREVER TENTATIVE (in this life at least) conclusions.
WE ALL LIVE THE RELIGIOUS LIFE!!! WE ALL WALK BY FAITH!
WE ALL 'WORSHIP' SOMEWHERE. WE ALL NEED GOD/S TO COMPLETE THE LOOP AND TAKE
THE NEXT STEP - OR ELSE WE JUST MAKE NOISE(an interesting question is if we CAN
really make only noise - if we can avoid making a logical statement with real
'noise',either on canvas, in print, or on the stage or music without being
contradictory. Remember Theater of the Absurd died because it contradicted
itself (and was boring) by making a meaningful statement that there is no
meaning to anything).
So . . ., logical; also account for ME as I perceive myself,
my consciousness in other words, my desires, feelings, and the way the world
appears to me as I observe it. A religious/scientific description of 'me',
the world, etc. must 'fit'. I must be able to live by it. By now you have
perhaps read the example I have posted of what I mean by 'fits' and live by
it. The materialist who mourns the death of his child has a conflict between
his 'world view' and his life.
Your use of the word 'proof' in your previous posting
which I replied to on the net and below is fuzzy if not wrong. To the modern
mind 'proof' means degree of evidence - NOT CERTAINTY! You seem to think that
there are 'hard' facts which science deals with and 'faith' which religion
deals with. Bosh! Read any number of modern scientists and you will hear
them say that they build their science on faith! And I don't mean a particular
religious faith.
[you continue]
I have nothing against any particular religion, except
as I said, having some one else's religion rammed down my throat.
** Does that mean you hold all religions to be equal??
But how can that be when they make opposing claims? Or does it mean you
hold them equally stupid. What about YOUR 'religious' world view?
Your starting point that of course is not based on 'fact', is it? Why do
you choose the starting points that you do? Ever think about that?
Who's 'ramming'? Does 'ramming' equal making claims to truth? My saying
that what YOU believe is untrue? Aren't YOU 'ramming' your view in this
sense?
[you]
I do
belive some odd things that I can't prove, any more than I can prove that
Christ is the son of an omniscient deity called God or Yahweh or whatever.
But I'm not saying that your believing so is baloney (or that what I believe
is incontrovertible fact, conversely). What I am saying is that the grounds
for argument are completely based on belief, not on physical laws. I can't
prove the existence of God in a Michaelson-Morley type experiment, but
I still believe in one.
Religion and objectivity don't seem to mix.
** Double bosh. Physical 'laws' are based upon faith.
They are 'models' of the world. Ways of thinking that give certain results
and would give different results if different models were used. YOU ARE
TALKING 19C SCIENTIFIC EPISTOMOLOGY! Total 'objectivity' doesn't appear
to be possible for us. It's another model. A construct of the human mind.
RELIGION SHOULD BE JUDGED ON THE SAME BASIS AS SCIENTIFIC MODELS! Logical
and 'fits'. Reread my posting that spoke to your 'fact'/'faith' posting.
What color does sugar taste like? Physical 'laws' are about one set of
thoughts and religious questions another. But all seems part of one reality.
Remember Michaelson-Morley doesn't 'prove' anything. Look, all science is
saying is that some things can apparently be repeated by independent
observers. Does that 'prove' anything? Of course not. We live such short
lives, even collectively, that what happens so many times in our view of it
could be the exception in the totality of time. We believe by 'faith' that
there is something to what we observe. An assumption because it's the best
we can do with our instruments in the time scale we can observe.
PLEASE DON'T TAKE AN UNEXAMINED RELIGIOUS VIEW OF SCIENCE.
Leave that for Time-Life books and the anti-religious cranks. AND DON'T
CLAIM THAT THERE IS SUCH A THING AS A NON-RELIGIOUS VIEW OF SCIENCE.
Again, your statements confuse the notions of 'fact' and 'faith'.
Regards and give me a new path,
Ken Arndt
PS. I'll answer your other question in a forthcoming epistle.