Beware Monotheism

[undergroundpanther]

BEWARE OF MONOTHEISM
various corporate logos for popular monotheisms Monotheism is the primitive religion which centers human consciousness on Hive Authority. There is One God and His Name is (substitute Hive-Label). If there is only One God then there is no choice, no option, no selection of reality. There is only Submission or Heresy. The word Islam means "submission." The basic posture of Christianity is kneeling. Thy will be done. Monotheism therefore does no harm to hive-oriented terrestrials (Stages 10, 11 and 12) who eagerly seek to lay-off responsibility on some Big Boss. Monotheism does profound mischief to those who are evolving to post-hive stages of reality. Advanced mutants (Stages 13 to 18) do make the discovery that "All is One," as the realization dawns that "My Brain creates all the realities that I experience." The discovery of Self is frightening because the novitiate possessor of the Automobile Body and the Automobile Brain must accept all the power that the hive religions attributed to the jealous Jehovah. The First Commandment of all monotheisms is: I am the Lord, thy God: Thou shalt have no other Gods before me. All monotheisms are vengeful, aggressive, expansionist, intolerant.

http://deoxy.org/bom.htm

[jody]

1. What proof do you have that there are exactly "n" gods? n/t

[OldLeftieLawyer]

2. Well, I'm one, and I think

there are others.

[jody]

3. That's an opinion, no more valuable than any other opinion without proof.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

4. No, it's fact

My surname is that of a Greek god.

True.

So?

[jody]

7. I don't believe in magic, e.g. that words can overcome laws of nature,

therefore your name does not convey magical powers upon you.

Please answer my question.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

10. Well,

you lack a sense of humor, you lack coherency, and you lack a question.

Now, if you don't believe in my divinity - where did you get "magic," which is for amateurs and necromancers? - that's your right.

But, really, if you don't think words can overcome laws of nature, you haven't read the Clear Skies Initiative or seen the logging laws.

[jody]

12. I've read many religious documents and I always end up with the

same conclusions stated so eloquently by Volney in "The Ruins or Mediations on the Revolutions of Empires and the Law of Nature".

[OldLeftieLawyer]

13. Well, then,

it's time for you to watch "Dogma."

[jody]

16. Why should I watch "Dogma"? n/t

[frankly_fedup2]

61. I LOVED Dogma. I even have an autographed copy of the script

written by Kevin Smith.

Chris Rock as the 13th Apostle was hysterical. Also, Jay's mouth is unbelievably filthy while Silent Bob just looks at him like he is stupid . . . which what he says is . . . but hysterical at the same time.

God is a female (However, in the start of the movie, the two angels speak of God as "He." They do it throughout the whole movie).

I think they may get the female God from Nostic Christianity. The female God known as Sophia.

You may want to read about Nostic Christianity. It's similar to Catholic Dogma as well as Jewish Kabballah.

[undergroundpanther]

65. I want a pair of those

Cool mechanical wings from dogma.

[frankly_fedup2]

67. Ohhhh to dream. (nt)

[beam me up scottie]

5. Did UPanther make that claim?

I must have missed that.

[jody]

8. Yes, the statement Beware Monotheism implies a certain knowledge

that one god was not correct. That can only mean some other number of gods does exist and I asked for proof.

[beam me up scottie]

11. Uh, no, it doesn't.

First, the op was a quote from an article and not UP's words.

Second, if someone does believe in more than one god, why would you ask them for proof?

You are aware that no one can prove or disprove the existence of deities, right?

[jody]

15. That's your opinion and I hold mine. I asked for proof, a legitimate

question.

If the answer is "I believe", I'll accept that but then it's impossible to engage in discussion/debate because logic and facts will probably never change a persons "belief".

All one can expect is a simple statement of the form "I believe without proof" versus "I believe without proof". If such beliefs are firmly held, then it's highly improbable that a compromise position can be found. :shrug:

[beam me up scottie]

18. You asked the op to prove

something that they never claimed.

It doesn't even resemble a legitimate question.

Honestly, my opinion is that your posts make no sense.

[jody]

20. So we disagree! That's what makes DU such a great forum. n/t

[salvorhardin]

39. Your statement is wrong on three fronts

1) The phrase "beware monotheism" in no way implies the "correctness" or truth-value of a single god. It merely cautions the reader against monotheistic religions.

2) There are many monotheistic religions. Which one god is being denied?

3) Even assuming that the existence of only one god was called into question, that does not mean more than one god exists. It could also mean 0 gods exist,

[undergroundpanther]

14. Nope I made no claims

But isn't it true,thatif you don't agree with a monotheist that there is ONE god they do call you a heathen or pretend the archetypes you tend to observe are not reallly as real as thier one god is..I get it everytime I challenge a monotheist and they get quite insulted I don't buy all is ONE..A Christian does not think Sekhmet is legit if they did they would not be cristian but a POLYTHIEIST.A hindu might think Sekhmet is legit but they just absorb her into THIER ONE GOD to them Everyone is Hindu.. I myself don't think there are gods as in super powerful lordly beings that made us this way in this fucked up world. Gods are mythic things, archetypes that are unknown merntal mechanisms and symbolic ideas we invented to cope with a nasty reality and a brutal human culture that opresses and regiments us through time,work and other mindfucks people never get around to asking why are they there.
We are prisoners dreaming of freedom from this being.
Disagree and I don't care, you are you I am me..Diversity can lead to insights, cause I am no monotheist.

[jody]

19. "heathen" means " One who is regarded as irreligious, uncivilized, or

unenlightened".

In that sense, some Roman Catholics believe all others are heathen as do some United Methodists, Muslims, Hindus, Mormons, etc.

The term heathen has become a pejorative term among so-called Christians when in fact it could mean those who do not agree with a particular religious dogma.

[undergroundpanther]

21. I have more ethics than alot of so called

Christians" I would feel like an asshole doing some of the shit they do.

[jody]

22. But, the topic was how many gods. Why do you change the topic? n/t

[beam me up scottie]

24. Actually, the article

is about the perils of monotheism, not the benefits of polytheism.

Did you even read it?

[jody]

26. Let undergroundpanther answer the question I posed. n/t

[beam me up scottie]

27. Excuse me?

I repeat, do you have a problem with the op?

[jody]

29. See #28. n/t

[undergroundpanther]

37. Ok but its a an indult or degrading term because...

Monotheists BELIEVE they are superior to polythiests or athiests?
Heathen would mean an insult only if being one somehow meant less than being a non-heathen.

[jody]

38. See #23 n/t

[papau]

6. In General Discussion??? Belief in one God equates to "hive" behavior

I do love assertions.

Whatever....

:toast:

:-)

[undergroundpanther]

17. Why is that idea so offensive to you?

Look at the fundies.. Look at the top down authority of churches,and the obedience of followers.

I don't believe in one god or gods as in beings that create and rule over me or events or the world. If I was to try monotheism I find I hate god.
Tell a monotheuist you think that there is not ONE god,and see how DEFENSIVE they get. Why is that? I don't like lords or masters at all and I don't trust them,ever.

[jody]

23. You said in #14 "Nope I made no claims" but now you reject the "ONE god"

belief.

Either (a) you don't know how many gods there are and monotheism may be right or (b) you know the number of gods and can prove it.

What is your answer and please provide proof for (b).

[beam me up scottie]

25. Where did UP "reject the ONE god" ?

Do you have a problem with the op?

Your interrogational approach is arrogant and condescending.

[jody]

28. Sticking your nose in an exchange between two people is intrusive and

obnoxious.

[beam me up scottie]

30. Deal.

Did you think you're in an AOL chat room?

[jody]

32. I've been on DU long enough to know where I am, do you? n/t

[beam me up scottie]

33. How about you stop hijacking the thread?

And address the article instead of harassing the person who posted it?

It's not about polytheism. (in case you missed that part)

[jody]

35. Good bye. n/t

[beam me up scottie]

36. Was I supposed to go away?

Or are just you closing your eyes and pretending I'm not here?

:rofl:

[undergroundpanther]

40. Heh

I reject all gods as gods.

I'm not a theist.
Because if I actually there was a god or a singular maker of THIS world I'd have to DISPISE him and want to destroy him for what he made here. Likewise if I was to believe in many gods and they made this world together and none of these so called gods bother to get off thier freakin thrones and use that power to step in to do things like stop torturers,wars and rapists than they all SUCK.They are either POWERLESS and therefor useless or totally morally depraved.Take your pick.
My options if I was to be honesat with MYSELF are

Maltheism or gods are not really gods but inventions of traumatized people or poorly understood psychological mechanisms or a massive supersized foilet au deux..(sp)

Noone can prove god and intellegent design looks pretty fucking stupid since everything alive dies.,hence the cop out called faith.Faith does nothing to stop wars.Nor do any gods.
Yet science has to admit it does not know everything yet.
Scientists would do well to keep open minded and not fear exploring the unknown and strange phenomena and coincidences and whatnot because of the claims of religion believers.

I don't believe anything.

All I know is the human condition sucks and I never asked to be born into this MESS.And besides I don't even know what I am really or why I exisdt or even what existance is.

[beam me up scottie]

41. I can't say I disagree with any of that.

Your posts always make me think, UP. :toast:

[undergroundpanther]

44. Scary to think

some people are that scared to think.

[beam me up scottie]

48. No kidding.

I see it every day.

Cognitive dissonance.

[undergroundpanther]

47. sorry scotty

After I posted this..and it got moved,I had to split for dinner,sorry to leave that guy for you but it looks like you took care of it. Thanks.

[jody]

49. Why do you refuse to answer my question in #23? n/t

[undergroundpanther]

55. My answer

You said in #14 "Nope I made no claims" but now you reject the "ONE god" belief.

I make no claims about what OTHER PEOPLE can BELIEVE.Because I am not YOU and I don't care what other people think because I am not you! You don't live in my brain..

I will think what I want to think and I will change it when I feel like it too. Don't take it personal,I reject everyones gods..equally.

Either (a) you don't know how many gods there are and monotheism may be right or (b) you know the number of gods and can prove it.

I don't care I don;t care enough to find out and BOTHER to get off my ass to answer your question.... because all gods or god SUCKS the CONCEPT of diety itself just sucks..I HATE anyone or any being claming to be lords or masters and divine creators if this mess is what they create. And because they suck I don't give a shit if there is one god or a billion,the world is suffering and if they made it I want to destroy it..God or gods don't do squat help the world heal or find out what makes us suffer.And fixing the human condition to me is what is most important.

Jesus never stopped a war nor has any other gods people have pulled out of thier ass. Every one god has to have an evil god to blame everything crappy on if that one god wants to say it is all good and kind.Many gods are just a cosmic team of good cops and bad cops.They suck too.gods that are"watchmakers" are uncaring souless fuckheads no more nurturing than a lizard who lays it's eggs and leaves it's young to fend for themselves as predators devour them as they emerge from thier eggshells alone.Evolution is a slow disaster. Believing evolution is somehow making us evolve into something better is a leap of faith I will not do.Evolution is real and it inflicts change,but not nessarily for the better.And gods who use survival of the fittist to hone a living creation through death and suffering over generations is an asshole(S).

What is your answer and please provide proof for (b).

Ask me if I care. Because I don't.People have wasted alot of time arguing this crap.

[jody]

56. If you "don't care what other people think", why malign and condemn them

for their beliefs?

Why not just condemn them for acts without regard to religion, race, or ethnicity?

[undergroundpanther]

60. Because religion prompts people to

Hate ME(I am transgender)Yes it is PERSONAL. Religion prevents women from getting cancer vaccines,it's believers are narcissistic,they interfere with others lives because they don't do as the believers want it proseletyzes,it threatens it's full of hypocrites it's god is two faced like the fololwers.it takes up valuable land for empty churches where if they practiced what they preached thered be no rent shelters and religion FAILS to practice what it preaches too consistently to be taken as anything but a scourge upon mankind.

[jody]

62. If you ever treat someone badly because of their religion, that's a form

of hate crime and vice versa.

I believe we all should be allowed to live our short lives as we see fit as long as we don't harm others.

I'm very sorry that some or many have offended you. Still, we must all learn to live together even though as individuals we are very different.

I don't know the answer but I strongly believe tolerance is the first step.

:hi:

[undergroundpanther]

63. If a religionist

Is content to NOT harass me on the street after I say "no I am not interested",If they can refrain from painting me up as a monster or destroyer of civilization as a scapegoat, if they can be content to not threaten me or my loved ones and demean us, and not deny us the rights of other citizens,not be an asshole to me and try some manipulating crap to try to force me to believe their way, if they don't follow me around like a desperate salesman,or try to use their churches to influence law and government to cater to THEIR particular religious system,I don't care what anyone else believes really if they do not use their belief to justify control or tyranny.. You must be allowed to be you I must likewise be permitted to be me and if we disagree whoop de doo.You have no right to take away my rights because disagreeing and being different from you and not believing any particular religion or god(s)is not a danger to you or an interference with your pursuit of happiness.

But If a religionist believes he is on a mission where he MUST make me believe as he does or else..If he is compelled to make me live their sects lifestyle or in some way be as they are,whether I consent or not ,that is a control problem,a kind of narcissism that is really sick and hive-like and it leads to holy wars and Matthew Sheppard types of crimes by zealots.

The minute someone else's so called faith is used like a weapon to justify and excuse the eroding of my safety,my civil rights,my mental health,my space,my right to be who I am and think for myself and explore the unknown my way for myself .

The time for my tolerance of that "faith" is over.

Because That religion is a threat to my well being and the well being of others. And quite possibly if they get a bigger stranglehold on the culture or in government they could endanger my LIFE.

That kind of seeking of control of others lives in the name of"faith" and religious belief systems is intolerable and unethical in any society that as an ideal, respects peoples freedom,respects civil rights and honors respectful relationships in a diverse community.

You see if there was no compulsory puritanical one lord kinds of religions there would not be this kind of severe neurotic homophobia problem in cultures full of believers who cannot question"faith"..this mental aberration is perpetuated and agitated through the control based-bigoted hierarchies too often found in dogmatic faith over reason religions, bibles and churches.If there was a place in "faith" for doubt about the "absolutes" put forth by religious claims and"faith",than faith would transform from a mindless abeyance of dogma into exploring the unknown and central church authority figures would lose it's power,authority and dominance over the believers beliefs..

Religions that can somehow tolerate having a two faced god who tortures people it said it created , who don't do as it wants,even though it gave them free will,is a sadist. If these confused people bullied by their gods, wouldn't be trying to set up a theocracy here to save their own egotistical ass by bullying people like me it wouldn't be so bad to be around them..That hypocrisy in the "monotheists" god that is reflected in the believers to me is obscene and an ugliest form of moral relativism.

Too many religious people in the pursuit of certainty which does not exist in this reality have lost their sense of humane ethics when they excuse the notion thier'special' religion and chosen kind of "faith" justifies all sorts of unethical abuses of power just because their so called god of love gets offended so they gotta please it or else.
If they like having a tyrant god fine for THEM. But I don't have to accept it or like it when these people try to tell me how to be..

Christianity and other monotheist religions have a very strong narcissistic core that taints any altruism they offer.These religions will deny it but it is there.In the real world abuse of power by people of faith is still abuse of power and it is wrong when the victims are NOT HARMING YOU by existing no matter what the excuses the churches cook up.

And what do you do to a traitor to the sanctity of human rights who wants to force you to be their religion and be like them ? Agitating for theocracy in a country that has a tradition of freedom? I fight them and I denounce them.I denounce control based ,custodial religions because ultimately they are narcissistic ,they want me to be someone I am not and they want to take my freedoms away and make my life subjected to their religious authority system,and I don't want to live like them at all. I do not recognize their empty authority and these control freak puritans HATE that so they use force in warping secular laws or through zealot thugs.. So I will fight such religionists bullshit and call it what it is..when I see it even if it offends..


The bill of rights is a noble ideal.. it was written a spirit of SECULAR freedom ,a rare sanity and inspiring ethical wisdom, that rigid custodial type religions and their adherents find scary,because they cannot control it,they cannot cope with real freedom to the point they have a disciplining freedom crushing god in their heads. So if religions seek to interfere with me and try to control my life,like their god controls them ,just because I offend their god or don't believe ,I will deal with that problem in THEM accordingly.It will get as ugly as it has to be to stop them from harassing me or endangering others rights..

The bill of rights is a noble ideal... not a suicide pact.

For ethics to matter at all to anyone..the happiness and suffering of others must matter to all of us.We all find happiness in our own ways and pursue it as is our right as long as we harm no one else or violate their consent.. And sadly for some faith ridden followers securing their own game of control over how others find happiness and domination of others,and their thirst to violate others consent matters more than life itself.


I will not tolerate abusers of power even when religionists set about to abuse and redefine the very definition of freedom ,ethics or civil rights as a tool to excuse their own narcissistic desire to dominate me and coerce others submit to their system of beliefs. Understand.I will be free regardless of anyone's beliefs or opinions of me.I will care about the happiness of others up until the point until they actively seek to destroy the happiness in me or in others and deny us the right to be when we are not harming them.This is the essence of live and let live.Right now religion is stifling others rights and lives.It is tyranny and the liberal religionists are not standing up against and denouncing and taking actions to stop the narcissistic tyrannical puritan bullies running roughshod over the sublime spirituality in their own faiths are betraying me and millions of others and refusing to protect even their own freedoms and rights from the "hive mind" of monotheistic fundamentalism...


Think on this..The False Choice of Pacifism
Pacifism is generally considered to be a morally unassailable position to take with respect to human violence. The worst that is said of it, generally, is that it is a difficult position to maintain in practice. It is almost never branded as flagrantly immoral, which I believe it is. While it can seem noble enough when the stakes are low, pacifism is ultimately nothing more than a willingness to die, and to let others die, at the pleasure of the world's thugs. It should be enough to note that a single sociopath, armed with nothing more than a knife, could exterminate a city full of pacifists There is no doubt that such sociopaths exist, and they are generally better armed. Fearing that the above reflections on torture may offer a potent argument for pacifism, I would like to briefly state why I believe we must accept the fact that violence (or its threat) is often an ethical necessity.

Religion is nothing more than bad concepts held in place of good ones for all time. It is the denial-at once full of hope and full of fear-of the vastitude of human ignorance.
A kernel of truth lurks at the heart of religion, because spiritual experience, ethical behavior, and strong communities are essential for human happiness. And yet our religious traditions are intellectually defunct and politically ruinous. While spiritual experience is clearly a natural propensity of the human mind, we need not believe anything on insufficient evidence to actualize it. Clearly, it must be possible to bring reason, spirituality, and ethics together in our thinking about the world. This would be the beginning of a rational approach to our deepest personal concerns. It would also be the end of faith.
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Sam_Harris/West_Of_Eden_TEOF.html

[beam me up scottie]

66. Sam Harris.

What an appropriate choice.

Here are some other excerpts:

The War on Sin
p159
It is no accident that people of faith often want to curtail the private freedoms of others. This impulse has less to do with the history of religion and more to do with its logic, because the very idea of privacy is incompatible with the existence of God. If God sees and knows all things, and remains so provincial a creature as to be scandalized by certain sexual behaviors or states of the brain, then what people do in the privacy of their own homes, though it may not have the slightest implication for their behavior in public, will still be a matter of public concern for people of faith.

***

p162
Our prohibition of certain substances has led thousands of otherwise productive and law-abiding men and women to be locked away for decades at a stretch, sometimes for life. Their children have become wards of the state. As if such cascading horror were not disturbing enough, violent criminals-murders, rapists, and child molesters-are regularly paroled to make room for them. Here we appear to have overstepped the banality of evil and plunged to the absurdity at its depths.

***

p167
President Bush recent decided to cut off funding to any overseas family-planning group that provides information on abortion. According to the New York Times, this "has effectively stopped condom provision to 16 countries and reduced it in 13 others, including some with the world's highest rates of AIDS infection." Under the influence of Christian notions of the sinfulness of sex outside of marriage, the U.S. government has required that one-third of its AIDS prevention funds allocated to Africa be squandered on teaching abstinence rather than condom use. It is no exaggeration to say that millions could die as a direct result of this single efflorescence of religious dogmatism.

***

Epilogue
p223
While religious faith is the one species of human ignorance that will not admit of even the possibility of correction, it is still sheltered from criticism in every corner of our culture. Forsaking all valid sources of information about this world (both spiritual and mundane), our religions have seized upon ancient taboos and prescientific fancies as though they held ultimate metaphysical significance. Books that embrace the narrowest spectrum of political, moral, scientific, and spiritual understanding, books that, by their antiquity alone, offer us the most dilute wisdom with respect to the present-are still dogmatically thrust upon us as the final word on matters of the greatest significance. In the best case, faith leaves otherwise well-intentioned people incapable of thinking rationally about many of their deepest concerns; at worst, it is a continuous source of human violence. Even now, many of us are motivated not by what we know but by what we are content merely to imagine. Many are still eager to sacrifice happiness, compassion, and justice in this world, for a fantasy of a world to come. These and other degradations await us along the well-worn path o piety. Whatever our religious differences may mean for the next life, they have only one terminus in this one-a future of ignorance and slaughter.

[beam me up scottie]

51. No sweat.

If people would give each other time to explain where they're coming from, stuff like that wouldn't happen.

I've been guilty of jumping a post more that a few times but I usually try to apologize after removing my foot from my mouth.

[papau]

59. If Taking advice from Timothy Leary of LSD "research" - one must catch

him in his lucid moments.

He does lttle more than assert, albeit with a knowledge of many religions.

If his construct works for you, then hang on to it.

"Turn on, tune in, drop out." was the lesson in my day from Tim.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/8-Circuit_Model_of_Consciousness

He claimed that the human mind consisted of eight circuits of consciousness. He believed that most people only access four of these circuits in their lifetimes. The other four, Leary claimed, were evolutionary off-shoots of the first four and were equipped to encompass life in space, as well as expansion of consciousness that would be necessary to make further scientific and social progress. Leary suggested that some people may shift to the latter four gears by delving into meditation and other spiritual endeavors. An example of the information Leary cited as evidence for the purpose of the "higher" four circuits was the feeling of floating and uninhibited motion experienced by users of marijuana. In the eight-circuit model of consciousness, a primary theoretical function of the fifth circuit (the first of the four developed for life in outer space) is to allow humans to become accustomed to life in a zero or low gravity environment.

[johnaries]

9. We are blind men feeling the elephant

It was six men of Indostan
To learning much inclined,
Who went to see the Elephant
(Though all of them were blind),
That each by observation
Might satisfy his mind

The First approached the Elephant,
And happening to fall
Against his broad and sturdy side,
At once began to bawl:
“God bless me! but the Elephant
Is very like a wall!”

The Second, feeling of the tusk,
Cried, “Ho! what have we here
So very round and smooth and sharp?
To me ’tis mighty clear
This wonder of an Elephant
Is very like a spear!”

The Third approached the animal,
And happening to take
The squirming trunk within his hands,
Thus boldly up and spake:
“I see,” quoth he, “the Elephant
Is very like a snake!”

The Fourth reached out an eager hand,
And felt about the knee.
“What most this wondrous beast is like
Is mighty plain,” quoth he;
“ ‘Tis clear enough the Elephant
Is very like a tree!”

The Fifth, who chanced to touch the ear,
Said: “E’en the blindest man
Can tell what this resembles most;
Deny the fact who can
This marvel of an Elephant
Is very like a fan!”

The Sixth no sooner had begun
About the beast to grope,
Than, seizing on the swinging tail
That fell within his scope,
“I see,” quoth he, “the Elephant
Is very like a rope!”

And so these men of Indostan
Disputed loud and long,
Each in his own opinion
Exceeding stiff and strong,
Though each was partly in the right,
And all were in the wrong!

Moral:

So oft in theologic wars,
The disputants, I ween,
Rail on in utter ignorance
Of what each other mean,
And prate about an Elephant
Not one of them has seen!
- American poet John Godfrey Saxe (1816-1887); based on a fable which was told in India many years ago.

[beam me up scottie]

31. Interesting article, UP.

Not threatening at all to reasonable liberals.

At least to those that bother to read it.

[beam me up scottie]

34. Before anybody else freaks out

and has a snit, here is another snip from the article:

The major evolutionary step is taken when the individual says: "There is only one God who creates the universe. This God is my Brain. As the driver of this Brain I have created a universe in which there are innumerable other Gods of equal post-hive autonomy with whom I seek to interest. And my universe was, itself, created by a Higher Level of Divinity—DNA, whose mysteries and wonders I seek to understand and harmonize with."

From The Intelligence Agents by Dr. Timothy Leary, Ph.D.

edited to add source

[undergroundpanther]

42. Scotty my brain is not a god

If it was there would be no bullies.No wars,hunger, death or social domination.

My brain creates shit by default.Sometimes I can make it manifest,by messing with magic and I don't know why that works it makes no sense,Other times I can create by my actions or words, sometimes not too.

I am but a drop in a sea of what the fuck.

We are one as for as we are interconnected in some ways on a planet we share in a universe that balances and it creates and destroys.

If there was a creator He's better wise up because from my perspective I'd want to find it to destroy it.I never asked to be born into this fucked up world yet here I am.I'd demand of this god monster to be let out of this jail NOW.If my mind is my godhood,I've had enough of these fetters of existence and humanity because frankly it tears me apart inside to see the crazy brutal shit this reality inflicts on life it's just sick..It's crazy making.And I ain't gonna pretend otherwise because sunsets are pretty and some invisible guy(s) somewhere think it's ok for me to suffer to show me how much they love me,every human abuser plays that game with the people they victimize..

[beam me up scottie]

46. Nope, mine either.

It'd be a different world, though, if everybody started using theirs instead of relying on religious and political leaders to tell them what to think.

Even godless atheists like myself know we need to start with the Golden Rule.

[undergroundpanther]

50. The golen rule

Is not do unto others as you would have them do unto you..Because you'd just get exploited..abused and hurt.

I added a bit to it.

Do unto others as you would have them do unto you do this until they break the golden rule against you,
Than warn them,they broke a boundary..
If they keep violating the boundary do what you wilt to them to make them stop until they stop,than stop.

[beam me up scottie]

53. Heh.

That's why I said "start".

[salvorhardin]

54. Tit for tat, the Prisoner's Dilemma and Mutually Assured Destruction

Your modified golden rule is similar to 'tit for tat'.

This is what Mutually Assured Destruction was based on and it was modelled after the best strategy to pursue in an iterated Prisoner's Dilemma game. Interestingly enough, Tit For Tat was recently dethroned in the Iterated Prisoner's Dilemma Competition by a group of programs that "cheated" by working cooperatively in "secret".
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/10/14/134202

Southampton's programs executed a known series of 5 to 10 moves which allowed them to recognize each other. After recognition, the two Southampton programs became 'master and slave': one program would keep defecting and the other would keep cooperating. If a Southampton program determined that another program was non-Southampton, it would defect."

You might also enjoy reading this introduction to game theory: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/game-theory

Oh, and if you can find a copy of Metamagical Themas somewhere (it's a collection of Douglas Hofstadter's columns for Scientific American back in the 1980s), Hofstadter wrote some good essays on game theory and MAD.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0465045669

[Spinzonner]

43. I believe in Fractional-Theism

but then I've always been kind of half-wittened.

[undergroundpanther]

45. What's fractional Theism?

Is it something like reality is a shattered mess that is a shattered god kinda thing?

I like the Wittened comment.. was that a joke on Wittgenstien? if so pretty clever of you. :)

[Spinzonner]

52. Try Wittenberg

[More Than A Feeling]

57. Contradiction

"It is the duty of a monotheist to destroy any competitive heresy. Concepts such as devil, hell, guilt, eternal damnation, sin, evil are fabrications by the hive to insure loyalty to Hive Central. All these doctrines are precisely designed to intimidate and crush Individualism."

-and-

"Advanced mutants (Stages 13 to 18) do make the discovery that "All is One," as the realization dawns that "My Brain creates all the realities that I experience.""

Isn't "All is one" a denial of the individuality of everyone other than myself? If everyone else is just a reality manifested by my brain, aren't they all really me? Where is the individuality in that?

[manic expression]

58. All is one

does not deny individuality. It recognizes the ultimate equality of all things.

Just as a water molecule in a river is individual, it is also part of the river, and becomes the river itself. It is also very much the same as any other individual water molecule, no matter what river or lake it may be a part of.

[undergroundpanther]

64. Equal

And diverse.

Same AND different at the same time.

It's NOT an either or idea in absolutist sense I think.

[More Than A Feeling]

68. That's not what the article says, so I'm glad you cleared that up.