With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.
The good life, as I conceive it, is a happy life. I do not mean that if you are good you will be happy - I mean that if you are happy you will be good.
Too much sanity may be madness and the maddest of all, to see life as it is and not as it should be.
The only way to find the limits of the possible is by going past them into the impossible.
August 27, 2009 - 12:53 p.m.
How unfair is this? It's been hot for weeks now. Today Alan invited me to his pool. It's 66°. I have a few hours till I'm supposed to go. Maybe it will warm up. Otherwise I'll do my back to school shopping today. Hey it's 72° now. Maybe there is hope.
The only reason I left my building yesterday was to move my car. I didn't even get dressed. I don't feel bad about that. I feel bad that I didn't get any reading done. I should be finished with The Natural. I plan on reading it poolside. After that I'm reading On The Road. It's about time I followed up on The Dharma Bums.
I realized that the line of thought that led to my last entry was depressing. It was about my feeling rejected by a number of friends. The thing is I didn't get depressed. There have been times that would have put me into a slow sliding funk. What's the difference? I don't know. It does show how much how we feel is determined as much by what's going on inside our minds as by what's happening to us.
Is that all I got today? It seems like it. That's sad. I've been writing for more than an hour. I know it doesn't look like it. I read the Times online and had other distractions too.
Oh hell. I can't leave it at this. I'll write about God. He won't mind, he doesn't exist.
People often discuss whether or not they believe in God or is that god? People rarely discuss what they mean by god. This leads to some problems. When it comes to god people are like Humpty Dumpty; "God" means exactly what I want it to mean, neither more nor less."
My ancient history professor said that the only definition of a god that works is any immortal being. He then went on to say that by this definition Christianity was not monotheistic. Forget the trinity, angels are immortals so are lesser gods.
I don't buy that. There is more to the way people use god. Immortality is part of it but not the essence. I think my political science professor was more on the right track when he defined a government as those that control the legitimate means of violence. To me a god is someone with the right to play god. A god defines morality it is not constrained by it. The Greek gods were a pretty sorry lot in terms of morality yet they were viewed as having the power and right to judge others. A god doesn't has the right to demand to be worshiped.
Let's say that in the far future humans, or our descendents get to the point where someone can create an entire universe complete with intelligent creatures in it. Would that make that person a god? No, and if he mistreated his creations he would probably be punished. He would certainly be criticized by others.
God is also a person. Not a human being, not an old man with a beard, but someone who thinks and has self awareness. In every religious text I've ever seen god is attributed with consciousness, thoughts, desires, and emotions.
Using it in other ways leads to confusion. Einstein specifically denied in the existence of that sort of god but often spoke of a metaphorical god, by which he meant the fact that the universe has order. This has led to much confusion as people will pull quotes of his out of context and say how it shows Einstein believed in god.
When I think of God, I think of YHVH, the Jewish god. He's also the Christian and Muslim god. He's what most people I talk to will think of. He has some qualities that go with the job title, omnipotence, omniscience, and omnipresence. If you don’t have the three Os you aren't God in my book. That doesn’t mean it's wrong to believe otherwise but you really should make it clear what you believe when talking about him, or her, or it.
Raise your hand if I've offended you.
People believe strange things. I believe Oliver Perez is going to be a great pitcher. People look at me like I have two heads. Wait a minute. I just checked in the mirror, only one head. It must be the Oliver Perez thing. I just wanted to make sure. People never tell you when you have spinach in your teeth or when you have two heads.
Now I have to run into the shower. Alan should be calling me about going to the pool in about 10 minutes. It's up to 73°. I think I'll go. I can use the exercise and the opportunity to get some reading done. I know I won't be speaking to Alan much. He swims for hours at a time. I am not in that kind of shape.
On the Natural Road to Auto Inspection - September 01, 2009
A Retro-Walk Into My Soul - August 31, 2009
Class Dismissed - August 30, 2009
I Can't Not Be On A Boat - August 29, 2009
Lockout! - August 28, 2009
Email me: GordonLew at gmail
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License. Horvendile August 27, 2009
